CHICAGO — Happy Wednesday, Chicago. The sun is shining, the temps are below freezing and we're prematurely ready for the weekend.
Here are some stories we're reading:
To Tweet or Not to Tweet, That is the Question: All journalists struggle to find the right mix on Twitter, but it can be especially difficult for women brought up to downplay their accomplishments. Heather Cherone is reading this New York magazine story that got 12 women in journalism and entertainment to talk about how they use Twitter. Writer Lauren Bans gets a gold star for quoting Cherone’s favorite line from Jane Austen’s “Sense and Sensibility” that perfectly captures the worst of social media: "I wouldn't say it myself, but many of my friends say I have the most exquisite taste.”
Tales from the Terminal: If you’re of a certain age, when your mother warned you of the dangers of Downtown Chicago, she was probably thinking about the old Greyhound Bus Terminal at Randolph and Clark. A travelling exhibit currently at Union Station (and online) focused on Chicago’s past and present transportation hubs recalls the five-story Greyhound center. Opened in 1953, it was “the largest independently owned bus station in the world.” When it was torn down in 1989, a Tribune account described it as Chicago’s “Ellis Island.” But senior editor Andrew Herrmann recommends a memorable Reader piece which chronicles the bus barn’s horrors: sketchy guys paying teenage boys for sex in the bathrooms, junkies snoozing in the waiting area, and abductions, and sometimes murders, of naive travellers. John Wayne Gacy picked up his first victim there. One 1975 news account of the station was headlined: “The Bus for Rapists, Pickpockets and Vagrants is Now Loading.” Good ol days? Uh, no.
The House That Thibs Built: David Matthews is reading a column on embattled Chicago Bulls Head Coach Tom Thibodeau that “New Girl” star Jake Johnson wrote for Grantland. Despite consistently coaching up his often injury-riddled roster to the top of the NBA’s Eastern Conference, Thibodeau has drawn ire from Bulls fans (and perhaps the team’s front office) for his stubborn demeanor and propensity to work his players “to the bone.” “Under Thibs, we seemed like we were on the verge of competing for years to come,” Johnson writes. “But times change. The NBA changes. Thibodeau doesn’t.” Local and national media don’t expect Thibodeau to return to the Bulls next season.
Negative Cash Flow: It’s not surprising that the mayor’s office isn’t answering phone calls from the International Business Times. Columnist David Sirota has hammered Mayor Rahm Emanuel on how his administration has spent taxpayer money and on Wednesday he detailed how money from the Chicago teacher’s pension money is flowing to the investment bankers that donated to the mayor’s campaign. Hyde Park Reporter Sam Cholke is reading about how the pension boards are slipping through loopholes in the laws banning pay-to-play to direct money to Gov. Bruce Rauner’s investment firm GTCR and Grosvenor Capital Management, whose executives have donated $1.8 million to Emanuel’s campaigns since 2011.
This is Modern Controversy: The Steppenwolf for Young Adults production “This is Modern Art (Based on True Events)” has caused some controversy and heated debate between critics and the show’s authors, and among other Chicagoans. Hallie Gordon, the artistic and education director of Steppenwolf for Young Adults, has weighed in on HowlRound, and this is one of Kyla Gardner’s favorite lines: “Young audiences are smart, discerning, and thoughtful—they consistently exhibit a greater capacity than their adult counterparts to engage with material they find vexing or baffling, troubling or flat-out wrong.”
Reinventing the Book Mobile: Patty Wetli started reading a New Yorker piece on the world’s weirdest library and was quickly reminded why she stopped subscribing to the magazine. Not enough time in the day for billion-word articles. This piece on Argentine artist Raul Lemesoff and his Little Free Library-on-steroids went down a lot easier and … pictures! Lemesoff has converted a military tank into a mobile library — he calls it a “weapon of mass instruction” — that holds nearly 1,000 books, which he gives away for free. How’d you like to see one of these babies rolling down Western Avenue?
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