The Loneliest Liberal: Pop culture marks generations

Star Trekkers,
for example

By James Knudsen

When you get to a certain age, you’re not eager to provide a number. You hedge, fudge, lie, add a suffix — usually “-ish.” I like to provide a range. Telling someone who was President provides a range. If you were born during Franklin Roosevelt’s time in office, you can be in your mid-seventies to mid-eighties. I’m a Lyndon Johnson baby, which provides a smaller window. Any way you slice it, I’m in my fifties. The only upside is that it is rare to find a junior college student who knows that we had a President named Johnson and even rarer that they know when he was in office.

Boldt Words & Images: When the stars begin to fall

Art Institute of Chicago, original building

By Bob Boldt

In 1962, I was attending the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. For 13 days that October, the world was poised on the brink of universal destruction over the Cuban Missile Crisis. I remember crossing Michigan Avenue on my way to class and noticing a construction crew pouring curbing at the corner of Michigan and Monroe Streets immediately north of the Art Institute. I wondered whether, before the concrete had set, we might all be dead. The fear and apprehension was just that immediate, just that concrete in everyone’s minds.