WGN, The Cubs: More Than A Baseball Story
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After 71 years of harmony and profitability, the longest marriage in televised baseball history is officially dead. The Chicago Cubs and their broadcast partner, WGN, have severed ties. To paraphrase sportswriter supreme, Jim Murray, we all just became ten years older. Our youth has fled. The Cubs were first seen on WGN on April 23, […]
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Lessons From Boone Pickens and Bill Gates
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From a distance, T. Boone Pickens didn’t appear to have much in common with Bill Gates. That is, except money and billions of it. Pickens, who died at the age of 91 on September 11, 2019, was an oil tycoon turned corporate takeover wizard. His nature was unpretentious and direct, no matter whether he was […]
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Art Too Real To Die
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Caravaggio, the outlaw Italian painter of the late 16th and early 17th century, only lived to be 38 years old. Given his ungovernable temper and depraved behavior, it’s a wonder that he made it that far. And it’s equally implausible that in his turbulent life, where he found himself in jail fourteen times, Caravaggio could […]
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Walking Dead in Russia
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For eight years, Vladimir Feltsman was the ultimate victim of identity theft. The talented Russian pianist was forced to live the life of a “non-person” in his own country. “It was a very bad time,” he later recalled. “It was a very painful experience.” Talk about an understatement. Feltsman, who was born in January, 1952, was […]
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In The Face of Clear and Present Danger
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At 12:15 am, Jack Phillips was ordered to begin sending calls for help. “CQD,” he transmitted, “CQD.” The CQ indicated a General Call, the D meant Disaster. For the next two hours and two minutes, the Marconi operator and his assistant, Harold Bride, furiously repeated their emergency dispatches. It was April 15, 1912: the Titanic […]
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