Slimantics: In higher ed, student loans are a symptom, not the illness
I took a 40-year break between my junior and senior year in college. At the time I dropped out of school I had no student loan debt. When I returned to complete my degree at Mississippi State I lived primarily on student loans, supplemented with a part-time job at the B-Quik convenience store.
Sid Salter: Mistrust, political division, and isolation threaten more than elections, economic policies
Pew Center Research reflects a widely shared belief in this nation that distrust of the federal government and distrust among fellow Americans is a fundamental obstacle to finding meaningful solutions to the problems that confront our country.
Possumhaw: Fun and the sun
It looks like summer has arrived except for strong breezes and the greening of the trees, grass and flowers. Last week I checked when and where the sun was at points throughout the day.
Partial to Home: A day on the river
“Was that an alligator?”
It was Thursday morning. An hour earlier Laird Bagnall and I had dropped our kayaks in the Tenn-Tom a mile downstream at Vienna Landing, an isolated launch 10 miles due south of Aliceville.
Sid Salter: Mississippi is center stage in nation’s abortion debate
As predicted months ago, Mississippi is now the epicenter of America’s divisive, bitter abortion rights debate.
Possumhaw: Prairie field trip
Spring brings with it so many changes in the Prairie, it’s hard to take it all in. Each season has a beauty of its own. What looked barren only a month ago is now lush and green. The fields with its blowing wheat-colored sedge have now been bush-hogged, replaced by pale green tender growing vegetation. We rarely cut the sedge field in the fall unless to make trails. Deer find safe bedding in the tall sedge.
Ask Rufus: Mrs. Munroe, Mrs. Monroe, what are you doing?
I first heard the story of Mrs. Munroe from my grandmother when I was a small child. It is the local must-tell ghost story for children, for it always happens just as the story says.
Gail Thompson: Happy Mother’s Day
It’s Military Appreciation month! April was the month of the military child, and on Mother’s Day I find myself reflecting upon those times I felt I utterly failed as a Mom, but there’s no way to know it now.
Thom Caraccio: The night we played Go Go Beach
From 1964 to1969, the music scene in the Columbus area exploded following the “British Invasion” and the flood of “soul music” from Memphis, Muscle Shoals and Motown.
Slimantics: Curfew is a well-intentioned, but misguided, response to crime
My dad was not an educated man, at least as far as formal education goes. But neither was he a dummy.
Slimantics: Reeves’ veto proves existence of systemic racism in our state
Almost since statehood, Mississippi has failed to scratch the surface of its potential.
Sid Salter: Title 42 and immigration politics: What the issue means to Mississippi and the South
The latest skirmish in the nation’s highly partisan, often logically erratic fight over the broad topic of immigration is being fought over the Biden Administration’s plan to rescind an obscure public health law written 78 years ago to stop the spread of communicable diseases like tuberculosis.
Possumhaw: On the move
As I write this it’s been another beautiful sunny day. The weather report said rain would pass through, but it never happened. Now that temperatures have been rising to the 80s, I thought it time to bring out the greenhouse plants.
Partial to Home: Transplanted
In 1961 when the U.S. cut diplomatic relations with Cuba, Archie Noy’s father phoned his son and told him to come home.
Ask Rufus: Barbecue sauce
As warm weather descends on the Black Prairie and the Columbus, Starkville, West Point area, it is hard not to think of barbecues.
Slimantics: Spare the rod, end the myth
Tomorrow, April 30, is International Day to End Corporal Punishment, known here in the U.S. as National Spank Out Day.
Sid Salter: A vital record: Journal article chronicles path to changing Mississippi’s state flag
In any given publication since 1939, The Journal of Mississippi History has been an invaluable record of the institutional memory of the state of Mississippi. But few editions of the scholarly journal have been more valuable to Mississippians than is the current Vol. 84, No. 1 and No. 2 for the Spring and Summer of 2022.
Possumhaw: The book people
Books are my life. Okay, maybe not all my life but I would be so lost without them. It all started when I was born into a family of booklovers. This was before Google and streaming and color television. My mother believed in libraries. Once a week we made a trip to the William Alexander Percy Memorial Library in the Delta. Mother deposited me in the children’s sections while she wandered over to the murder mysteries.
Namaste: Are we civilized?
In the ancient times, there were wars too, but it used to happen between soldiers against opposing soldiers, king or emperor against opposing king or emperor. The ordinary people were out of life and death situations during wars.
Rufus Ward: Luxapalila fossils
It’s springtime and my favorite time of the year. Last week I wrote about the flowers of spring, and this week I will look at something I enjoy seeing even more than flowers: fossils.
