The Gang’s All Here Regarding Steve Jackson’s current series, “Dealing with the Devil”: Each time I read about Brandy DuVall, the savagery sickens me. If I could make a deal with the devil, it would be to purge that whole family, as well as eternal damnation and excruciating pain for…
Way back when, a cantankerous old guy named E.H. “Brownie” Brown climbed atop his taxidermy shop south of U.S. 85 near what would become Highlands Ranch and posted a sign painted in big red letters: “Hellsville, USA.” Brownie wanted the world to know exactly what he thought of the DuPont…
Sir Alec Guinness has won two Oscars, one for best actor and the other honorary, and has been nominated for four more. Queen Elizabeth knighted him in 1959. A remarkable career; a distinguished actor. And, now, for just $275, you can have a sixteen-inch ceramic cookie jar in the shape…
Theresa Swinton looks at the simple two-story house at 2727 California without much affection. An uncle she never knew purchased it for his parents, her grandparents, shortly before he died in action during World War II. It was the childhood home of her mother, aunts and uncles. The address is…
Fat chance: Hmmm…if rumors were running rampant that Scripps Howard had a March 15 deadline for purchasing your newspaper, would you call a March 12 staff meeting–without telling staffers why? Denver Post editor Dennis Britton would, and when he announced the mandatory meeting this past Monday, he threw Nervous Nellie…
Plans recently unveiled by Westminster and Arvada to build a major link in a new beltway along metro Denver’s west side have alarmed Golden officials, who fear thousands of cars will be funneled into their city on Highway 93. But the din of oncoming traffic is nothing compared to the…
Shea Davis and two friends, Katie Koshka and Allie Grenier, were headed home after shooting pool last August 24 when they stopped at the King Soopers store at 88th Avenue and Wadsworth Boulevard to return a page from Davis’s mother. That 35-cent phone call wound up costing the family over…
Is there such a thing as a pornography recycling center? I just got a new girlfriend and she wants me to get rid of my collection of porno videos (about thirty). I also have some hardcore het print magazines I want to get rid of (they remind me of a…
The Master Builder Regarding Stuart Steers’s “Building for the Future,” in the February 18 issue: David Tryba’s dream of a walkable city means the recovery of something wonderful and tangible. Americans are so inured to the convenience of driving that we’ve lost the very thing that makes life really wonderful:…
At 81, Ted Alexander has every right to be picky about what sort of piano student he accepts. He is down to five now, and most will stay with him for the foreseeable future. Over the years, though, nearly 800 musical hopefuls have taken instruction from him in the room…
It’s the workplace, stupid. I do not care if Bill Clinton wants to cavort with Hollywood cuties, light fires with torch singers or be a close personal buddy to Buddy. That’s between Hillary and Bill and whoever he might be lavishing his attentions on in what had better be a…
It’s swing night at a Denver dance club. Sweating couples are whirling around a crowded dance floor. Decked out in glorious fashions from days gone by, the revelers juke and jive through a dizzying array of footwork as a combo blazes through a set of vintage jazz. The frenetic gathering…
Three days after Christmas 1998, there are few reminders of the holidays in Theresa Swinton’s Denver apartment. Although her faith remains strong, she doesn’t feel like celebrating. Her son Danny is sitting in a Jefferson County jail cell, awaiting trial for the gang rape and murder of a fourteen-year-old girl…
Beat the press: When the Colorado Press Association announces its contest winners at the close of the annual CPA confab Saturday, the Denver Post’s name will be among the missing. That’s because the paper resigned from the group in a snit fit two years ago, leaving the Rocky Mountain News…
In the peculiar economics of farming, this year’s Colorado apple crop was the best of times–right up until it became the worst of times. Last fall, the size and quality of the state’s harvest was the healthiest in nearly a decade. Unfortunately, growers across the country enjoyed the same luck…
Stan Bracclon’s office, on the third floor of a well-worn brick-and-concrete building at 1245 East Colfax, smells only faintly of cigarette smoke and homelessness. Bracclon is executive director of the Emergency Assistance Grant & Referral Project Inc. , an agency that provides homeless gays and lesbians with general assistance–a hundred…
After building more than 120 houses for low-income area families, Habitat for Humanity of Metro Denver is suddenly facing a tough lot: No lots. The group is being out-run, out-bid and out-maneuvered by private developers whooping it up in one of the biggest residential booms ever seen on the Front…
They’re not very tall. They’re not whippet-fast. In the eighth game of the season, their starting center crashed to the floor, shattering both wrists and putting their dreams in jeopardy. In places like Knoxville, Tennessee, Storrs, Connecticut, and the slam-dunk-crazed Carolinas, not even hardwood junkies know who they are. Just…
Out of Left Field I decided to grab a copy of the February 18 Westword since I hadn’t read one in a couple of years. The first article I read was Harrison Fletcher’s “Arrested Development.” Next, it was Julie Jargon’s “King of the Dump.” That was enough for me! Let’s…
Jim Stone has waited for this day a long time. Thirteen years, if you start counting from back when the engineer was terminated by Rockwell International in March 1986. Close to ten years, if you start from July 1989, when Stone first filed suit against his former employer, charging that…
Sue LaBella lives in a two-level home in Westminster, with white siding, a wooden fence, and two Labradors playing in the yard out back. It’s the classic picture of the suburbs. Inside the house, however, you won’t find the typical nuclear family. Six-year-old Ray, a boy with thick black hair…
A map of downtown Denver covers the entire wall behind David Owen Tryba’s desk. Squiggly lines and arrows fill in blank spaces; historic churches and commercial buildings are highlighted in red. Jumping out of his chair, Tryba paces in front of the map, sweeping his hands over the triangle of…
