A Maddening Quest For Calm And Spring Wildflowers
I became obsessed with wildflowers last spring. One April morning I had been slumped on my couch with my laptop, and suddenly panicked as if I was on a plane falling out of the sky.
The Blob Isn’t Toxic, but the Politics Are: The Story Behind Lake Erie’s Mass of Sediment
If you believe the sensational headlines, Cleveland has a “toxic blob,” a silent menace that sits just nine miles off the coast of Lake Erie, and is said to be migrating towards one of the city’s water supply pipes.
Weekly Links Roundup
News of the Rust Belt from around the world, brought to you weekly by the staff of Belt Magazine. News from the week of May 2-8, 2016
On Not Winning A House In Detroit
This month, a nonprofit called Write A House announced the third and fourth winners of its unusually generous Detroit revitalization scheme: whole houses in Detroit, for writers, forever, for free.
Happy Anyway: A Flint Anthology
I had just started writing about Flint when I found myself sitting next to Michael Moore, listening to him talk about what Flint had to offer the world.
Building An Art House In Pittsburgh
A few years ago, Vanessa German sat on her front porch working on the sculptures for which she’s become well known -- complex black Madonnas made of found objects.
Weekly Links Roundup
News of the Rust Belt from around the world, brought to you weekly by the staff of Belt Magazine. News from the week of April 25-May 1, 2016
From Steel to Slots: Bethlehem, PA’s Casino Capitalism
In August 2005, just off Bethlehem’s historic Main Street, two costumed gondoliers “with authentic Italian accents” set up a tent at the annual, vaguely German-themed, Musikfest outdoor concert festival.
Announcing Belt’s RNC Fellows
When we cooked up the idea of inviting journalists to come to Cleveland this summer for the Republican National Convention, we thought it would be a fun experiment ...
After The World Ends, What Next?
If you, like I did, woke up on summer mornings with a mini boom box and a blank tape to listen for hours on end waiting for The Foo Fighters or Everclear or Rage Against the Machine or ...
Weekly Links Roundup
News of the Rust Belt from around the world, brought to you weekly by the staff of Belt Magazine. News from the week of April 18-24, 2016
Where The River Burned
On April 22, 1970, schoolchildren from around metropolitan Cleveland sat in their classrooms and wrote to Mayor Carl Stokes. Over the next few days, hundreds of letters poured into City Hall ...