We’ve got more planned in the future, including a print anthology of Rust Belt poetry and the production of an original podcast about environmental calamities in our region, but none of this will be possible without your generous support.
By Ed Simon
In most of the country, a ticket to the latest derivative, explosive Hollywood blockbuster will put you back around $12 a ticket, but by contrast $5 a month for a Belt membership pays for engaged, vital, and crucial local writing. From supporters like you, we’ve been able to publish investigative reporting, creative nonfiction, photo-essays, poetry, and important work such as Chelsea Lake Roberts’ important “A Love Supreme,” Ashley Stimpson’s fascinating “Saturday Afternoon at the Last Dog Track in America,” and Lauren Abunassar’s incredible character study “The Secrets of a ‘Homeless Influencer.'” These are the sorts of stories that you don’t see at the regular sites; the sorts of stories that are as complicated, multifaceted, diverse, strange, beautiful, and interesting as the region which Belt Magazine covers.
Thanks to your support over the past year, Belt has had a spectacular year. We’ve become a member of the Pittsburgh Media Partnership and have collaborated with sites like the Pittsburgh Institute for Nonprofit Journalism, we’ve become a media partner with Interlochen Public Radio’s show Points North, we’ve begun a series of publishing excerpts from books of regional interest, and we’ve become a community supporter of the Rust Belt Humanities Lab at Ursuline College, as well as the publisher of their new scholarly journal Rust Belt Studies. We’ve got more planned in the future, including a print anthology of Rust Belt poetry and the production of an original podcast about environmental calamities in our region, but none of this will be possible without your generous support.
Which is why we’re in the midst of our 2023 Summer Fund Drive! We’ve set a goal of fifty new members at any level, but we also need the continued support in the form of donations from those of you who are already members! As a thank you, we’re offering not just copies of 2022’s The Best of Belt, stickers, and Rust Belt postcards like we always do, but also the choice of poetry titles from our partner Autumn House Press, and for those willing to donate $150, a signed, first-edition hardcover of Idra Novey’s novel Take What You Need, which The New Yorker described as a “delicate meditation on art, family, and ugliness,” where the “characters dwell not only on the difficulties that arise in family life but also on the ways in which such difficulties can’t be separated from love.” Generously donated by the author as part of our fundraiser, Idra’s work exemplifies the best of the Rust Belt, and the sort of literature, journalism, and art which you support when you contribute.
Just click here to be a member, and if you’re already a member, remember that all donations to Belt are tax deductible! And in the meantime, please reach out to me at [email protected] to let me know what’s important to you at Belt, what sort of features you’re interested in reading, and what stories you think we should be covering.
Ed Simon is the editor of Belt Magazine.
