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1.29.2021, No. 39
“It was a big moment. I was tearing up” — my wife Bri, an elementary-school teacher, after getting the vaccine
FIVE.
1. I know I’ve been saying this since like ’84, but the new Louisville.com will be live next week.
2. A slow clap for a friend: Louisville Public Media president Stephen George announced an expansion of the WFPL newsroom, which will be adding four reporters to cover city politics, race, health and breaking news, plus a business reporter and a VP of content upon the completion of a $1.5-million fundraising campaign. He wrote, “Lies run sprints while truth limps along in an ecosystem designed to reward the incendiary. At Louisville Public Media, we have a role in stopping that. That’s why we are investing in a bigger and stronger newsroom.
“We have to fight the misconception that local news isn’t sustainable.”
👏…👏 …👏👏…👏👏👏…👏 👏👏👏👏👏👏
3. Another pal, Chris Kenning, who works at the C-J and also contributes to Louisville Magazine, had a front-page story Monday titled “What We’ve Prayed For,” about immigrants hoping to reunite with their families under the Biden Administration. Edgardo Mansilla, director of the Americana Community Center in the South End, told Kenning, “We’ve had a target on our backs for four years, and now at least we can stand up and look to the future with hope.”
4. The Kentucky Derby Festival announced that the Pegasus Parade and Thunder will not have crowds this year, and track attendance will be at a TBD reduced capacity. (Tomorrow is 13 weeks out from May 1, the first Saturday.)
On this frigid afternoon, feeling late-January blah and in need of a laugh and some better-days reminiscence, I pulled out our 2016 Derby Issue, with this cover:
That was our version of Derby’s id, and we threw this backyard bash to celebrate. (I can’t remember if we ever shared who’s under the horse-head mask, so I don’t want to reveal the mystery, although I will say she’s one of the most talented writers I’ve known.) Readers were, um…
“Disgusting and beneath the class and legacy of the Kentucky Derby.”
“Your ‘Party Animal’ feature was atrocious.”
“This is NOT what Louisville should be celebrated for.”
“Not the message young people need to see.”
“Inappropriate, degrading, classless.”
“I am ashamed.”
And from a woman in Anchorage, Alaska: “This month’s cover provides a splendid example of precisely how one shotguns a beer while wearing a horse-head mask. And it makes me homesick. Thanks!”
5. Man, I don’t know what’s wrong with me but I watched Call Me Kat AGAIN. Set (but not filmed) at a Louisville cat cafe, the FOX sitcom portrayed our town like this last night: “Expired bourbon is the best bourbon.” (How dare you, even as a joke.) And: “Bourbon gives me weird dreams.” (OK, that’s true.)
I emailed an ACTUAL Louisville cat cafe owner, “purrprietor” Chuck Patton of Purrfect Day Cafe on Bardstown Road, for his thoughts: “The cafe is cute and colorful but needs more cats,” he wrote. “I think Call Me Kat is the purrfect title. Maybe Welcome to Meowyville — home of over 4,000 adoptions. Shameless plug, but our city has put cat rescuing on the map.”
I was flipping through our most recent issue, which came out in late December, and I wanted to say thank you, thank you, thank you to every single supporter who appeared in those pages: Norton Healthcare, Kentucky Fertility Institute, Kentucky Select Properties, Rural 1st, Derby Dinner Playhouse, Taunt, Republic Bank, Beam Suntory, Indiana Wesleyan University, DDW: The Color House, the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute at the University of Louisville, 502 Hemp, Summit CPA, Trees Louisville, Gilda’s Club Kentuckiana, Catholic Education Foundation, Waterfront Park, the YMCA, Audi Louisville, Integrity HR, Design Builders Inc., Ken Combs Running Store, Nanz & Kraft, Transworld Business Advisors, Louisville Public Media, Gaylord Opryland.
OH!
A little something from the LouMag archive.
Louisville Magazine debuted in March 1950, with this “full-color air view of the city looking north toward the Ohio River and showing, left to right, Seventh, Sixth, Fifth and Fourth streets — the heart of Louisville’s shopping and business center.” In the upper-left-hand-corner, an artist’s drawing of then-Mayor Charles Farnsley’s new city flag “whips in the breeze.” The flag, which became official on Oct. 5, 1949, features 13 stars to represent the nation’s original 13 states. The “golden fleurs-de-lis denote Louis XVI, our city’s French namesake.”
Inside, a story about Farnsley, who died in 1990, included this photo, with the caption: “Somebody once said, ‘Charley will try anything once.’ Here he shows off his bowling form. His score? Let’s forget it.”
TOO…
Bri took our four-year-old, Miles, to snowy and hilly Joe Creason Park Thursday afternoon during her lunch break, and he said, “The virus can’t catch us on this sled.”
Josh Moss
editor, Louisville Magazine
jmoss@loumag.com
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