OLD NEWS: Rebecca, Raccoon of the White House, clawed her way into Calvin and Grace Coolidge’s hearts
If Americans know anything at all about Calvin Coolidge, U.S. president No. 30, they know he had a pet raccoon.
If Americans know anything at all about Calvin Coolidge, U.S. president No. 30, they know he had a pet raccoon.
When you've got a date that's living in infamy, every so often you just have to take it out and weep all over again.
Let's play Obfuscation.
Americans showered Grace and President Calvin Coolidge with a veritable zoo of White House pets, from birds and a bear to a hippo, a wallaby, two lions and ple…
On Sept. 8, 2007, the Bella Vista Animal Shelter staged a dachshund race at the Loch Lomond softball field in Bella Vista. From this little event the Wiener Ta…
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.
One hundred years ago this week, the nation's new first family was adjusting to life in the spotlight. It liked them, but they didn't like it.
As I write this, the thermometer outside my window reads 104 degrees. 104 degrees is ... not the hottest daytime temperature ever recorded in Little Rock. The …
Vice President Calvin and Grace Coolidge were visiting his father in Vermont when President Warren G. Harding died suddenly in San Francisco. That was Aug. 2, …
The 5-month Fox singing contest "American Idol" was riding high in Nielsen ratings when a slim, 23-year-old church worship leader from Conway charmed his way i…
Office seekers in Arkansas dodge and weave through a gantlet of potentially embarrassing Kodak moments. No cagey candidates want to be caught on camera extract…
Oh, the press, the press. What terrible people they all are.
Let's play Obfuscation, a game in which I give you some of the definitions of one common word, and then you recognize that word. Or not.
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.
One hundred years ago, high-profile citizens of Little Rock were irritated by a rash of anonymous letters.
Vertigo was a slide at Wild River Country, a water park in North Little Rock that refreshed Arkansans from Mother's Day 1985 to some vague day in fall 2019.
Let's play Obfuscation.
Maybe history likes repeating itself, did you ever think of that?
In July 2004, thousands lined up in Arkansas for a chance to get former President Bill Clinton's autograph on one or more copies of "My Life," his memoir. Crow…
Who here knew about the Texas tradition in which high school girls wear an elaborate "mum" — our July 17 word? Texas: It has ginormous folk objects.
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.
A century ago, the Arkansas Gazette added a fun new category to its classified ads section: swap ads. It was kinda like today's Buy Nothing Project, except not…
The game is named Obfuscation, and I made its rules:
Deployed at the Alamo, used to kill Count Dracula and bandied about by action hero Crocodile Dundee, the Bowie knife was first forged in the Hempstead County t…
The job of the "blow-by-blow" account, as a format, is to deliver details of a happening in the order they happen. It's a storytelling method that can maximize…
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.
Long before Fleet Feet Sports took over the Firecracker Fast 5K and even longer before the point-to-point, 3.1-mile footrace flowed downhill from Little Rock's…
Just being able to make a noise is not a good enough reason to try.
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.
It looked like tossing Barbie off a ledge, but it was math.
Maybe history just likes repeating itself, did you ever think of that? Or maybe there's a scratch on the historic record. It repeats itself a lot, and not just…
Who knew that the June 12 word, "nit," meant a measure of screen brightness equal to one candela per square meter?
On June 22, 2002, under a big tent at the Villa Marre, an eager public purchased the contents of the 1881 Little Rock landmark featured on the sitcom "Designin…
What's more wholesome than life on a farm? What's more beautiful than parents, in love, on a farm?
Let's play Obfuscation. I'll give you some definitions of one very common word. You'll recognize the word. Or not.
Balloon racing is nothing new in Arkansas, but it's always something memorable.
Today Old News wraps up a four months' effort to paraphrase a novella written by Bernie Babcock and published in 1922 by the Arkansas Democrat.
Let's play Obfuscation, a game in which I give you some of the definitions of one common word, and then you recognize that word. Or not.
In June 1998, the Jewish Federation of Arkansas conducted its official first Jewish Food Festival. This was a hit.
Part 16 in a series: Old News is paraphrasing "Billy of Arkansas," a novel by Bernie Babcock that was serialized by the Arkansas Democrat in 1922.
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.
John Bierce has just carried Billy Camelton upstairs against her will, kissed her full on the mouth and plopped her into a sitting room chair in a most un-gran…
Let's play Obfuscation.
In a metal outbuilding on the family farm of Kenneth and Carrie Anderson near Murfreesboro, 130 dark snouts slanted out of murky water — with about 9,620 teeth…
Continuing our trek here through Bernie Babcock's 1922 ... oh, let's call "Billy of Arkansas" a novella. Today we come to a moment of romantic peril.
Let's play Obfuscation, a little game in which I give you some of the definitions of one very common word, and then you recognize that word. Or not.
A photo of a Master Gardener working in the garden outside the Pulaski County Courthouse appeared in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on May 10. By spreading mulc…
The impetuous heroine of Bernie Babcock's "Billy of Arkansas" has discovered to her sincere dismay that the women's workhouse in New York is as dangerous as th…
Let's play a game of Obfuscation.