July 31, 2015
File Art/for PhillyVoice
Don't miss these must-read PhillyVoice stories from July.
July is a time when most people slow down, put their feet up and take it easy. But not here at PhillyVoice.com.
Here, we examined the birth of Scientology right in our own backyard. We met small business people making a difference. We said goodbye to a Phillies legend. And Jimmy Kempski took a virtual blowtorch to the NFC East as only he can. And that was just the tip of the iceberg.
Here are some must-read stories from the just-completed month on PhillyVoice:
Created in Camden: the USS Indianapolis, the Navy ship sunk soon after delivering the uranium for Little Boy, the first deployed atomic bomb; Campbell’s condensed soup; the Victrola phonograph; and later, RCA.
Oh, and one more: Scientology.
On Dec. 18, 1953, science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard and others gathered in a downtown building. Three sets of incorporation papers were signed and filed with the Camden County clerk, all identical, except for the names.
One read: Church of American Science.
Another: Church of Spiritual Engineering.
And the third, the name that stuck: Church of Scientology.
Taking whatever the Phillies can get for Cole Hamels is patently absurd.
But that’s what a veteran Philadelphia sports columnist opined last week. Yes, it’s much more difficult churning out Phillies copy than it was four years ago, but the notion that the Ruben Amaro and Co. should settle for anything less than a top prospect for Hamels is insane.
Dealing Hamels for whatever the beleaguered club can score is quintessential Philadelphia sports talk radio fodder. But the Phillies brain trust can’t give away the best homegrown pitcher since Robin Roberts. Hamels is still a certifiable ace, who can help a contender win any game.
Maybe your parents are from Philly or maybe you used to live in the City of Brotherly Love. If you relate to this list, chances are you grew up in South Jersey but have a special attachment to Philadelphia.
Over a week and a half span, we published our NFC East dumpster fire series, in which we pointed out the flaws of all the teams in the NFC East. Now, you might ask, "So every team in the NFC East going to be a dumpster fire, Jimmy?" No, of course not, but it's July and nothing is happening right now, so point out your plot holes elsewhere, jerks.
Eight years ago, when Vik Dewan stepped into the top job at the Philadelphia Zoo, it was a risky choice. Virtually everyone in the industry still thought that only an experienced zookeeper could run such a complex organization.
Today, Dewan has not only put the Zoo on a financial path that many other non-profit cultural institutions can only envy, he’s unleashed a string of innovations that have redefined best practices for zoos all over the country. And the way he’s done it has established him as one of the region’s most effective and innovative leaders.
On May 16, an otherwise uncontroversial pop-up garden surfaced at 1622 Point Breeze Ave. To anyone familiar with the neighborhood, you could be fooled into thinking it was a mirage -- an unlikely birthing ground for an entertainment concept you'd expect to find occupying lots in major commercial corridors like South Street or Columbus Boulevard. The initial reaction, to put it mildly, was a mix of confusion and chaos.
The Philadelphia sports world just can't get enough of Chip Kelly. Just look at how the region reacted to a recent story by Kent Babb of The Washington Post that revealed Kelly was married for seven years in the 90s.
Even my 87-year-old grandmother was grilling me about the story.
And that's because Kelly is a mystery. An enigma. Quite possibly the most interesting man in the world. Only we wouldn't know because Kelly wishes it to be this way.
Since arriving in the Philadelphia area in the late 1970s, Hiroshi Iizuka has outfitted hundreds of musicians with his handcrafted violas and violins. In an industry obsessed by expensive Italian relics, he has managed to carve a niche for himself — without advertising or a website — through immense skill and word of mouth.
“I tried numerous violas all across Europe for two-and-a-half years…[but] a lot of the really expensive old instruments that I’ve tried out paled in comparison with this one,” says Vincent Peters, a violist in the world-renowned Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam. “After I played on this viola for about 10 seconds I asked if I could buy it.”
Simple math proves 1,400-1,500 (not to mention 1,200) calories a day is not enough to sustain a young, active woman, no matter how short she may be. If a young, aspiring figure skater, or even a moderately active adult female, were to follow Lipinski’s 1,200-calorie diet, she would not remain active for very long. For her, a 1,200-calorie diet is a starvation diet.
It’s pretty crazy how much a player’s value can change over the course of one calendar year. Just a tad more than 12 months later, Nik Stauskas is now a Sixer for a price far less than the 10th pick and a couple of second rounders. Amazingly enough, the 21-year-old “sniper” (in quotes because he shot 32 percent from deep as a rook) isn’t even the most interesting aspect of the trade that sent him to Philly.
On a wild and wacky first day of free agency around the association, two rebuilding teams provided quite the nightcap. Let’s focus in and examine what exactly Vivek and Hinkie have done here.
The revelation of Atticus Finch as a white supremacist in Harper Lee's "Go Set A Watchman" quickly transformed perceptions of the "To Kill A Mockingbird" hero, long viewed as a standard-bearer of justice and integrity.
But the new book also could reshape the way the classic novel is taught to future generations.
“Watchman” prompts questions that must be confronted when teaching “Mockingbird,” according to education professionals and literature experts interviewed by PhillyVoice. But they doubted “Mockingbird” will be knocked from the canon of high school literature.
You might recognize these guys from their work with the comedy group Bird Text that has put together several parodies of Philadelphia stereotypes. One of their more notable videos is their reality television spoof the "Real Househusbands of Philadelphia."
Before it became a darling of social media, Rosa's Fresh Pizza on 11th and Market "used to be really dead in here. It sucked, it was boring,” said manager Keith Powell.
Then came the idea of giving customers the option to donate a dollar to feed a homeless person pizza for free. Ellen DeGeneres noticed, then Upworthy, who featured Rosa's pay-it-forward strategy in a March video that has gotten more than 35 million views and 800,000 shares on Facebook.
Since then, Powell said, business has been "booming." As of June, the store has given away more than 23,000 slices of pizza.
There's never a worse time to be hungry in Philadelphia than at 2 a.m.
There were twenty minutes left to play the Mexicans are up on the Jamaicans 3-0 and I had just found a seat 10 rows from the field. The U.S. was supposed to be here at this 2015 Gold Cup final but the Americans lost Wednesday night.
From this close the action in front of you was very real and I am reminded these are simply men playing a game, the same one you play in a backyard. I was as close right now as I would be at any high school game.
But I was in a swarm of fans like a coin in a bottle — 68,390 of them, Sunday’s game at the Linc was a sellout — an announcer said, in a stadium dominated by those rooting for the Mexican men's national soccer team. All afternoon among dozens of tailgates and since the game's start shortly after 8 o'clock there had been a vital pulse.
Anywhere you turned you were bound to see the red, white, and green tri-colors of Mexico painted across a face. This might have well been a home game for the Mexicans
