What is your Top 25? Earl Austin Jr. has been covering high school sports 25 years – and he wants to know your top 25 athletes, teams, moments.
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Vol. 83 No. 14
CAC Audited JULY 7 – 13, 2011
COMPLIMENTARY
stlamerican.com
Bailing out North City MSD budgets for Dryden Court, says not at fault at Essex Place By Rebecca S. Rivas Of The St. Louis American Helen Ivy, a North City resident, was reading Bible stories to her four-year-old grandson on the evening of June 25. Just when he was getting sleepy, she heard a funny noise, as if something was bumping against the house, she said. “I thought it was my dog on the back
See story video at www.stlamerican.com porch,” Ivy said. “And my grandbaby said, ‘Grandma, Coco want in.’ About that time, the thunder came.” Ivy, 76, went to the front door to see
whether a storm was coming in. “And I’m not lying, that water was all the way up to the top of my porch,” she said. “The police lights were everywhere. They were saying, ‘Hold tight, hold tight.’” The flooding terrified her grandson, she said. “He said, ‘Grandma, we need Noah’s Ark,’” she said, chuckling. In Ivy’s neighborhood near Interstate 70 and West Florissant Avenue, the sewer back-ups flooded the basements of several dozen homes, including Ivy’s, and rendered about 13 homes unlivable in Dryden Court See MSD, A7
Photo by Maurice Meredith
Margret White, a North City resident whose home was damaged in recent flooding, talks with Alderman Antonio D. French at a meeting between residents and MSD officials that he organized on Friday.
Son of ‘Precious’
Hello from a King Ealgie Edwards, Gabby Edwards and Shaniya Holloway enjoyed a big greeting from The King in the “Wizard of Id” during last weekend’s Fair St. Louis parade.
In new follow-up novel, Sapphire tells the tragedy of Abdul By Kenya Vaughn Of The St. Louis American
Ronnell Wright, an eighth grader at Ferguson Middle School, is a KIND Club member. He’s a Kid In Nature’s Defense. As part of the afterschool club, he handles the school’s recycling and learns how to care for the environment. This summer, he took his role a step further and studied organic farming at the nonprofit EarthDance’s summer camp. The problem, for Wright, was it only lasted a week. “Not to be greedy or anything, but I wish it could have been longer,” Wright said. The camp, which hosted 10 teens, took place at the
“The cycle was broken with Precious,” Sapphire said about the character who made her a household name. Fifteen years ago, Sapphire introduced Precious Jones and her son Abdul in her debut novel Push, creating a sensation on the urban literature scene. Gritty and graphic, Push tackled the topics of incest, abuse, a failed education system, teen pregnancy and AIDS. Precious is a living statistic, but fights her way through for the sake of her son. As Sapphire returns to the story in her new novel The Kid (to be released on Tuesday), she knows that Precious must ultimately lose her battle. “The reality is that – even with the strong will African Americans have – if the structure for society “When you dehu- is oppressive, your will is not enough,” Sapphire told The manize American. people, Sapphire will return to St. Louis next week to discuss the they will follow-up to her wildly successful act less book that received a second wind than in 2009 when director Lee human – Daniels turned the novel into the Academy Award-winning film they will Precious. act “It was something about the according- movie and reconnecting with the ly.” audience and the people who had loved Precious and loved Push,” – Sapphire Sapphire said. “I heard people talk about the progress that they made as far as combating violence against women and children, and I thought, ‘It had made a difference.’ I thought, ‘It’s time.’” The new book picks up several years from where she left off in Push. “It shows the generational effects of AIDS and poverty and the interfamilial cycle of abuse and Abdul’s generational connection to the past,” Sapphire said.
See FARMING, A6
See SAPPHIRE, A7
Photo by Wiley Price
LINKS, INC. LINKS UP IN STL
See story video at www.stlamerican.com
Farming in Ferguson School district partners with nonprofit to teach kids organic farming
750 women from Midwest chapters meet to network, service By Lydia McGhee For The St. Louis American More than 750 African-American women, from the age of 25 to octogenarians, converged upon downtown St. Louis last week to connect as members of The Links, Incorporated. The Archway, Gateway and St. Louis Chapters of the national civic and service organization hosted the 2011 Central Area Conference with the mission “Powering the Promise” from June 29 to July 2 at the St. Louis Hyatt at the Arch. The Links, Incorporated was foundSee LINKS, A6
By Rebecca S. Rivas Of The St. Louis American
Photo by Corey Woodruff
Ronnell Wright, an eighth grader at Ferguson Middle School and a member of its Kids In Nature’s Defense Club, spent a week learning organic farming at the nonprofit EarthDance’s summer camp.