Most people know Ann Patchett for her fourth book, Bel Canto, an award-winning novel about a hostage situation at a presidential palace in Latin America. What no one knows about Ann Patchett, aside from me, is that she’s my literary crush. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and the Iowa …
As anyone who’s ever spent time in a grandmother’s kitchen knows, the best recipes aren’t written down. A pinch of this, a splash of that, butter the size of a walnut — these are the mysteries of holiday must-haves, the secrets to family recipes passed down to the daughters and …
Leave it to a woman to help people see clearly. Inspiration struck Alabama native Mary Anderson on a visit to New York City in 1902. Traveling through the wet, snowy city by streetcar, she noticed how often the driver stopped, got out, and cleared the windshield so he could see …
Lynda Barry is a cartoonist, author, graphic novelist, educator and recent MacArthur Foundation Fellow (known as the “genius” grants). And to my 11 and 13-year-old boys she was an inspiration. More about that later. Growing up in a racially mixed, working-class Seattle neighborhood, Barry began drawing comics at an early …
It’s not just the people who give the Chicago Pedway its neighborhood feel. Like any stretch of the city, the Pedway has its own rhythms — when it’s busiest; the good places to eat; where to get a shoe repaired; even the best place for a quick hair cut and …
The first day of school can be scary. New people, new rules, a new environment. Now, add a violent mob, federal marshals, and death threats. This is what six-year-old Ruby Bridges faced on her first day of her new, all-white elementary school. Ruby Bridges was born in 1954, the same …
Ruth Wakefield was a dietician who invented the chocolate chip cookie, which makes them healthy and just fine to eat in bunches, right? Born in 1903, Ruth graduated from Framington State Normal School Department of Household Arts in 1924. She taught home economics, gave lectures on food and cooking, and …
It’s a lyrical image: two young children wandering the English countryside with sketchbooks, plopping down suddenly in the tall grass to open their water color cases and start to paint. This was childhood for Helen Beatrix Potter, whose love of art and animals led to the most successful children’s literature …
Happy National Sisters Day! Anyone growing up with a sister knows – it’s complicated. Today, if I said to my sister “I need someone to . . .” she’d already be ringing my doorbell. Our teen years? Between the fighting and hair pulling and the rest of the family sick of …
Hers was a life of firsts: The first African-American woman elected to the Texas Senate after Reconstruction. The first woman from Texas, and the first African-American woman since 1898, to be elected to the United States House of Representatives. The first African-American woman to serve on the House Judiciary Committee. …