Monthly Archives: January 2014

Tales from the South on Tuesday: “Not Such a Good Idea”

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talesfromthesouthThe Tuesday, January 14 edition of  ”Tales from the South” is Not Such a Good Idea. Attending it WILL CERTAINLY be a good idea.  It will feature stories by Deb Cantrell, Kandace Parker, and Melanie Baden. Music is by The Eulogy Brothers and blues guitarist Mark Simpson

“Tales From the South” is a radio show created and produced by 2013 Governor’s Arts Award recipient Paula Martin Morell, who is also the show’s host. The show is taped live on Tuesday. The night is a cross between a house concert and a reading/show, with incredible food and great company. Tickets must be purchased before the show, as shows are usually standing-room only.

“Tales from the South” is a showcase of writers reading their own true stories. While the show itself is unrehearsed, the literary memoirs have been worked on for weeks leading up to the readings. Stories range from funny to touching, from everyday occurrences to life-altering tragedies.

The program takes place at Starving Artist Café.  Dinner is served from 5pm to 6:30pm, the show starts at 7pm.  Admission is $7.50, not including dinner.

You MUST purchase your ticket before the show

Previous episodes of “Tales from the South” air on KUAR Public Radio on Thursdays at 7pm.  This episode will air on January 23.

New Year equals New Reads at CALS

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The Central Arkansas Library System wants you to read your way into the new year with New Year New Reads 2014. All you have to do is read or listen to the book of your choice, then submit a 14 word review. The most creative 14 word book review submitted via e-mail or tweet between Monday, January 6 and Sunday, February 16, will be eligible to win a Kindle Fire! Entries submitted in person to your local branch may be eligible for alternate prizes (check with your favorite branch). Submit your review online in one of two ways:

  1. email to NewYearNewReads@cals.org
  2. tweet @calibrarysystem using the hashtag #NYNR14.

Example Entries

Catcher in the Rye: teenage angst and rebellion as toldy by whiny rich kid #NYNR14

Eats, Shoots, & Leaves: funny look at serious topic of punctuation. #NYNR14

Persepolis: Iranian revolution in a comic strip. #NYNR14

Little Rock Look Back: Basketball Comes to Robinson Auditorium

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Entrance to Robinson off Garland Street. Used to attend basketball games.

Entrance to Robinson off Garland Street. Used to attend basketball games.

While Joseph Taylor Robinson Memorial Auditorium is known today as a performance and meeting venue, in its early days it was also the home to sports. Seventy-four years ago tonight the first basketball game was played at Robinson.

One of the first regular activities which took place in the lower level exhibition hall was a series of boxing and wrestling matches.  Building on the success of this, basketball came to the convention hall in January 1940.

A series of games featuring Little Rock High School and North Little Rock High School were announced by Coach Earl Quigley to take place from January 11 through February 16, the official opening day for the facility.

At that time, neither high school had a gymnasium; therefore both schools played their basketball games on their school auditorium stages with fans seated in the audience. The convention hall offered a regulation size floor (made of pecan block parquet) with seating for over 1,300 people along the sidelines and in the balcony.  The first men’s basketball game in Robinson Auditorium took place between the Little Rock High School Tigers and the North Little Rock High School Wildcats on January 11, 1940.

The Tigers lost the game before a crowd estimated to be 1,300.  Earlier in the evening there had been an exhibition between two women’s basketball teams.  The cost for admission to the games was 35 cents for the reserved seating and 25 cents for general admission.

First 2nd Friday Art Night of 2014

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2nd Friday Art NightThe first 2nd Friday Art Night of 2014 takes place tonight.  Among the participating locations are Historic Arkansas Museum, the Central Arkansas Library System and Old State House Museum.

Historic Arkansas Museum will feature live music by Phil G. and Lori Marie from 5pm to 8pm.  It will also host the opening reception for Chasing the Light: Photography by Brian Chilson, in the Second Floor Gallery through March 10.  Arkansas Times photographer Brian Chilson has had a front row seat to some of the most exciting, entertaining, eventful and sometimes poignant events in Arkansas, as well as those smaller moments of everyday life. This collection of photographs taken over the past decade, from 2003 to 2013, serves as a sort of retrospective of life in Arkansas in the arenas of fashion, sports, politics and human interest.

At the Central Arkansas Library’s Butler Center a new exhibit will open.  Unusual Portraits: New Works by Michael Warrick and David O’Brien features explorations in portraiture by two accomplished Little Rock artists. Featured musician for the evening is Das Loop, a Little Rock duo that creates instrumental compositions using live loops and “layers of poly-rhythmic bliss.” The featured artist is Jacquelyn Kaucher, a painter who works with watercolor and acrylics, and she is a long-time teacher of watercolor and experimental watercolor painting in Little Rock.

The Old State House will host Second Friday Cinema: “Broncho Billy Anderson: Arkansas’s First Movie Star” at 6:00 pm. Born Max Aronson in Little Rock, Ark., Gilbert M. Anderson was a motion picture pioneer, who appeared in the groundbreaking film The Great Train Robbery in 1903. Anderson partnered with George Spoor to form the Essanay (S and A) Studios, where he wrote, directed, and starred in hundreds of one-reel westerns and comedies, the most popular featuring a character Anderson created for himself, Broncho Billy. “Broncho Billy” Anderson became Hollywood’s first western star, and Essanay one of the most successful studios of the early motion picture era.

The screening will include three short movies featuring Gilbert M. “Broncho Billy” Anderson:   The Great Train Robbery (1903) Broncho Billy’s Fatal Joke (1914) The Son-of-a-Gun (1919).  Ben Fry, General Manager of KLRE/KUAR and coordinator of the film minor at UALR, will introduce the films and lead a discussion.

“Scandal” Inspiration Judy Smith at “Bless the Mic” Tonight

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pscsmithThose needing to get their “Scandal” fix while awaiting the return of new episodes next month have the chance tonight.  Judy Smith, the Washington politico who is the real life inspiration of Olivia Pope will be featured tonight at Philander Smith College’s “Bless the Mic” series.

The founder and president of Smith & Company, a strategic and crisis communications firm with offices in Los Angeles and Washington, DC, Smith has honed her skills through experiences guiding her clients through some of the most sensational events of our time, including the Iran Contra investigation, the Los Angeles riots, President Clinton’s involvement with Monica Lewinsky and the congressional inquiry of Enron, to name a few. Celebrities she has consulted in times of crisis include actor Wesley Snipes, NFL quarterback Michael Vick, and more recently, celebrity chef Paula Deen. She has also worked with Fortune 500 companies such as BellSouth and Wal-Mart.

In 1991, Smith joined the White House with her appointment as special assistant and deputy press secretary to President George H. W. Bush. During her tenure she provided the president and his cabinet with communications advice on a wide range of foreign and domestic issues.  Smith earned her B.S. in public relations from Boston University and graduated from the American University Washington College of Law where she was the first African American woman to serve as executive editor of the Law Review. The author of Good Self, Bad Self: Transforming Your Worse Qualities into Your Biggest Assets, Smith’s writing her been featured in numerous publications and she frequently appears on major TV networks offering commentary on topical issues of the day.

Free and open to the public, all lectures are held in the M.L. Harris Auditorium. Tickets are not required; seating is first-come, first-serve. For more information, call 501-370-5354.

Legacies & Lunch Looks at Slavery in Arkansas

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legaciesSlave resistance in Arkansas is the topic of Legacies & Lunch in January. Kelly Houston Jones, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Arkansas, will present “A Rough, Saucy Set of Hands to Manage,” a discussion of her research on slavery in Arkansas.

This work was the lead essay in the Spring 2012 issue of Arkansas Historical Quarterly. Making extensive use of legal documents and carefully reading oral histories, Jones sought “to recover the slave point of view in examining explicit resistance.” She concludes that “slaves’ resistance in Arkansas seems to have had more to do with making their lives a little easier than with a continuing, self conscious effort to undermine the slave regime.”

Legacies & Lunch is free, open to the public, and supported in part by the Arkansas Humanities Council. The program is held from noon-1 p.m. on the first Wednesday of each month in the Main Library’s Darragh Center. Attendees are invited to bring a sack lunch; drinks and dessert will be provided.

The Butler Center for Arkansas Studies is a department of the Central Arkansas Library System (CALS). It was founded in 1997 to promote the study and appreciation of Arkansas history and culture. The Butler Center’s research collections, art galleries, and offices are located in the Arkansas Studies Institute building at 401 President Clinton Ave. on the campus of the CALS Main Library.

For more information, call 918-3086.

Tales from the South Tin Roof Project: Carole Katchen

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Carole KatchenThe first Tuesday of each month, Tales from the South features one person sharing their life story. They call it Tin Roof Project.  The January featuree is artist Carole Katchen.  The program will be Tuesday, January 7.

Music is by Brad Williams and blues guitarist Mark Simpson.

A native of Colorado, by the time Carole Katchen was 21, she was already an established freelance magazine writer.  The first children’s book she wrote and illustrated, I Was a Lonely Teen-Ager, was published in 1965.  It sold over 700,000 copies.  By 1969 she had decided that she wanted to become an artist.  She studied art at West Valley College in Northern California and received their Outstanding Achievement in Art Award.

As her career as an artist developed, she would often take hitchhiking trips across the continent to get inspiration for her artwork.  By the end of the 1970s, she was able to support herself full time as an artist.  In the mid 1980s, she moved to Los Angeles and started to focus more on pastel and less on oil painting.  She continued to receive national recognition and continued writing.  By the end of the 1980s, she had published six art instruction books which had been translated into several languages.

In 1995, she relocated to Hot Springs where she continued to paint, teach and encourage others.  In 2000, she began to produce bronze sculptures of the chefs and society figures from some of her most famous (and whimsical) paintings.  She has returned to television production creating the program “Symphony Sam.”  Katchen has also continued to travel extensively having spent several weeks in Asia recently teaching art and being honored for her contributions.

“Tales From the South” is a radio show created and produced by Paula Martin Morell, who is also the show’s host. The show is taped live on Tuesday. The night is a cross between a house concert and a reading/show, with incredible food and great company. Tickets must be purchased before the show, as shows are usually standing-room only.

“Tales from the South” is a showcase of writers reading their own true stories. While the show itself is unrehearsed, the literary memoirs have been worked on for weeks leading up to the readings. Stories range from funny to touching, from everyday occurrences to life-altering tragedies.

The program takes place at Starving Artist Café.  Dinner is served from 5pm to 6:30pm, the show starts at 7pm.  Admission is $7.50, not including dinner.

You MUST purchase your ticket before the show

Previous episodes of “Tales from the South” air on KUAR Public Radio on Thursdays at 7pm.