Articles by Birney Imes
Birney Imes: Looking for Ted Kooser
When my brother Frank was paralyzed and laid up in a hospital in California, we took turns sitting with him. While Beth was there, she read to him from a book by Ted Kooser. She had gone in a bookstore in Santa Monica looking for something to read and, as she remembers, the book jumped off the shelf into her hand. She’d never heard of the guy.
Birney Imes: In other news …
Not all the news last week was bad.
Sometime Columbus resident (We share him with Brooklyn, NY.) Robert Ivy was named a master architect by the architecture fraternity Alpha Rho Chi. Robert, who is editor in chief of Architectural Record, is only the seventh architect to be accorded this honor.
Birney Imes: Abolitionists in Caledonia
Mike Murphy attributes his love of history to television and playing with toy soldiers as a kid.
Birney Imes: Surviving with grace
After her Friday morning workout at the Fitness Factor, Pat Wayman came home, put on her work clothes and spent the next five hours clearing underbrush in the woods bordering her backyard. Around 4:30 a friend came over and the two of them went through her beehives.
Birney Imes: Church of dreams
When Darren Leach was 9 years old his grandmother told him he was going to be a preacher. It took more than three decades — not until 2007 — for Macy Jones’ prophecy to come true.
Birney Imes: Random notes
Friday afternoon on the way to meet a friend at the Riverwalk, a poster on a downtown store window caught my eye.
Birney Imes: Art Johnson’s art
On a recent Thursday afternoon Daylan Hairston stood outside a metal building scrubbing the inside of a car hood balanced on two sawhorses. Hairston, 19, is a senior at Victory Christian Academy, and has the good fortune of already knowing what he wants to do with his life. Daylan plans to work in the auto body shop of Art Johnson, a man who claims Hairston as his “adopted” grandson.
Birney Imes: Stars of a different sort
On Wednesday in Parkinson Hall on the Mississippi University for Women campus, Jim Hill presented a program called “The Secret Life of Stars”. The next evening in the same building the hip-hop artist Chuck D. offered a rambling discourse on music, politics and popular culture.
Birney Imes: The philosopher coach
John Cohen is equal parts baseball coach and philosopher. At least that’s the impression I got listening to him speak to the Starkville Rotary Club Monday.
Birney Imes: Surviving the next three months
When it comes to Mississippi University for Women and this legislative session, no news is good news. And according to two local legislators, that might well be the case.
Birney Imes: Friday night on the town
Friday night was not one for counting flowers on the wall, smoking cigarettes or watching Captain Kangaroo.
Birney Imes: Starry night
Forty years ago in Duluth, Minn., a 4-year-old boy and his family watched as Americans first landed on the moon. After that July afternoon in 1969, the boy, David Teske, would never quite be the same.
Birney Imes: A New Year’s Eve blue moon
Google “Blue Moon” and the first things that show up are a beer company (must be 21 years or older to access this Web site), a Wikipedia entry and a drive-in theater in Guin, Ala. (now showing double features on two screens).
Birney Imes: Winter solstice
Had I remembered Monday was the winter solstice, I might have done something different than take a mid-afternoon stroll on the Riverwalk. Though, I’m not sure what that would have been. As far as I know, we have few practicing Pagans, Druids or anyone else in these parts who might be celebrating an event that has been observed through the millennia.
Birney Imes: The season of lights
“Walk slowly, I’ll catch up with you.”
I had asked daughter Tanner if she wanted to walk and look at Christmas lights on Southside. First she had said no, then had a last minute change of heart and yelled to me as I walked out the door.
Birney Imes: Whad’Ya Know, a Christmas parade
The evening may have been wet and the crowds sparse, but there was little evidence of dampened spirits at Monday night’s Christmas parade. Float riders (who may have outnumbered onlookers) waved and shouted, and the crowd waved back. Good cheer all around.
Birney Imes: Whad’ya know, Michael Feldman?
One of the funniest guys you’re ever likely to meet is coming to Columbus Saturday.
Birney Imes: The day after Thanksgiving
Friday afternoon as I was making my way down Military Road, a white El Camino passed me headed toward town. In the truck bed was a large piece of exercise equipment, price tags flapping in the wind.
Birney Imes: Georgia school offers example for MUW
In 1889 the state of Georgia established in Milledgeville the Georgia Normal and Industrial College to prepare young women for secretarial and teaching jobs. (Five years earlier the Industrial Institute and College, the first state supported school for women in the country, was established in Columbus, Miss.)
