News & Views of Phillips Since 1976
Friday December 26th 2025
The First Flames of the Phoenix
Burned brightly at MGM as literary creativity was unveiled
BY PATRICK CABELLO HANSEL
Thursday, January 29, 2015, at the Midtown Global Market saw the first literary magazine launch of the year in Minneapolis””The Phoenix of Phillips. What makes it most noteworthy was that it featured the writing of youth and adults from our neighborhood. Children as young as eight, seniors who”'ve lived a long time, amateurs and professional writers shared their vision and their talent.
The debut of The Phoenix was also the opening of the annual youth photography show of St. Paul”'s Lutheran Church. “We Are Midtown Phillips” is the work of talented youth ages seven to eighteen, who photographed their neighborhood during the summer and fall of 2014. At festivals, at block parties and on the street, in school and the market, and in a dark room lit by a candle, the young people saw the beauty of the community, and captured its diversity.
Related Images:
Telling your story is resistance and hope ”˜Rising Up”'
Overlooked creativity prompts collection of ”˜Keepers”'
BY PATRICK CABELLO HANSEL
“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes.
Art is knowing which ones to keep.” Scott Adams
The greatest mistakes often lead to the greatest accomplishments. For too long, those outside the Phillips community have overlooked the incredible creativity of our vibrant and diverse community. The schools, the businesses, the arts organizations, and above all, the people. This is compounded by much of the media”'s attention on what is wrong with Phillips: the ashes, rather than what arises from them. The literary magazine in this issue, “The Phoenix of Phillips” makes the case for the rising.
Though the depiction of the Phoenix varies from place to place, there are some commonalities across time and language. The Phoenix is a brightly colored bird that lives for a long time””often a thousand years””then, in a high tree makes a nest lined with incense where she does not lay eggs, but lays herself down. To be immolated, only to rise again from the ashes. As the 19th century Irish poet George Darley put it:
Half buried to her flaming breast
In this bright tree, she makes her nest,
Hundred sunn”'d Phoenix! When she must
Crumble at length to hoary dust!… Read the rest “Telling your story is resistance and hope ”˜Rising Up”'”
Stone wears slowly. Adapting regulations shouldn”'t be as slow!
This photo of John Carpenter was likely taken some time in the 1860s so he has that characteristic stare that comes of having to keep your eyes open forever for long exposures.
“The fall of dropping water wears away the Stone.”
”“ Lucretius c. 99 BC ”“ c. 55 BC)*
By Sue Hunter Weir
120th in a Series
Finally. Veterans Affairs has proposed amending their regulations governing who may order markers for military veterans. Since 2011 Friends of the Cemetery has managed to replace or get new markers for eight veterans. Two of them were for veterans of the War of 1812, five were for Civil War veterans and one was for a veteran of the Spanish-American War. That doesn”'t sound like many but given how restrictive the rules are it”'s nothing short of miraculous.
Military veterans are entitled to have their graves marked by a government-issue marker. The markers are provided at no cost although the government is not responsible for setting the markers on graves. The markers are available in a variety of styles but we have chosen upright, marble markers, the style that was introduced during the Civil War.
Current regulations require that the request for a new or replacement marker come from the veteran”'s next of kin or a representative of a next of kin.… Read the rest “Stone wears slowly. Adapting regulations shouldn”'t be as slow!”
Keep citizen journalism alive!
