Richmonders restore city’s tree canopy
Richmond is getting greener, thanks to Richmonders who are getting involved in a number of tree-planting projects around town. One of them, led by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, involves a coalition of 12 organizations in the Greening Southside Richmond Project, who are working to convert asphalt into green spaces. Participants are planting 250 trees on municipal properties and giving ... READ MORE
Speak out to make a difference
In the 1990s, Sarah Harris was raising three children in Fairfax County when her husband was diagnosed (at age 53) with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. In the five years he lived with Alzheimer’s, he lost the ability to hold conversations or complete small tasks, like turning off the television. Harris’ experience inspired her to take action. Today, she is an Alzheimer’s... READ MORE
Appreciating Maryland’s heritage
How has nature nurtured you during the pandemic? That’s the question Patapsco Heritage Greenway Inc. — the conservation group that oversees the Patapsco Valley Heritage Area — is asking Marylanders to respond to this month in the form of poems, essays, drawings or even songs. Based in Ellicott City, the nonprofit Patapsco Heritage Greenway (PHG) works to preserve and protect the ... READ MORE
Weekly calls create surprise friendships
Once a week, rain or shine, a call reaches Joan Kerby’s apartment at the Lakewood Retirement Community in Richmond. That’s the signal for the 70-year-old retiree to shoo away her husband and launch into a wide-ranging video chat with 27-year-old VCU medical student Miranda Savioli — a conversation that might last an hour or more. Kerby, a retired IT business analyst, and the med ... READ MORE
Tina Panetta, Mother on the Hill
Years ago, though it’s hard to imagine today, Republican and Democratic senators used to sit at the same table to share a meal in the Senate Dining Room. They would cross the aisle just to talk to beloved waitress Tina Panetta, an ebullient Italian mother and grandmother. “We talked like family, like brother and sister,” Panetta, now 95, recalls of her 23-year career serving... READ MORE
Richmond area artist memorializes civil rights icon
When the Virginia Museum of History and Culture completes its renovations next year, it will display a significant new work in the collection: a portrait of Oliver Hill — a Richmonder who was a trailblazer in the civil rights movement. “The portrait of Hill fills a major gap in the VMHC collection,” William Rasmussen, senior museum collections curator and Lora M. Robins Curator of... READ MORE
Unearthing Sugarland’s story
One day 26 years ago, Gaithersburg resident Gwen Hebron Reese visited the Maryland town where she was born in 1941 — at least what was left of it. Reese walked around the grounds of the shuttered church that had been the heart of Sugarland, established in 1871 by formerly enslaved people. “The church had been closed, and it was just sitting there. The door was nailed shut, and the ... READ MORE
Conversations on race, culture
The new director of Maryland’s museum of African American history and culture has bigger things in mind than cataloguing or explaining events and artworks of the past. Terri Lee Freeman takes over as executive director of the Reginald F. Lewis Museum in Baltimore on Feb. 15, at a time when the country is focused anew on the issue of racism. She hopes to involve the museum and its... READ MORE
Local author draws on her own childhood
In Richmond author Meg Medina’s latest children’s book, Evelyn del Rey Is Moving Away, two best friends face the sadness of separation but vow an enduring friendship. Daniela is a light-skinned Cuban American; Evelyn is a darker Cuban African. Their story, their ethnicity and their skin color are at the core of Medina’s mission: to bring to life the experiences of under-represented ... READ MORE
A spy reveals her life in disguise
“Don’t look back” — someone is definitely following you. “Use your gut” to choose your next move. Are you being bugged with microphones and cameras in the walls of your office or apartment? “Assume that you are.” As you drive to a crucial meeting with an asset, if you realize you’ll be boxed-in by other vehicles, scoot away. Then, before you duck out of the car,... READ MORE
