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Memorial Day weekend 1973: Saturday night in Tulsa
For fun, I decided to look up the local newspaper from 50 years ago this weekend. I was particularly curious to see what kind of live entertainment was on offer, and what people were watching on TV. (News clips below are from newspapers.com. Click the image to see the original...
GT Bynum's transgender executive order
I will be on with Pat Campbell on AM 1170 KFAQ tomorrow morning, August 29, 2019, just after the 8 a.m. news, to discuss Tulsa Mayor G. T. Bynum IV's executive order adding gender identity and gender expression to the city's non-discrimination policy. (UPDATE: Here's the podcast of my August...
Santa Fe, Taos, Aspen and back
Late last night we returned from a quick five-day, nearly 2,000-mile trip to Aspen, Colorado, by way of Amarillo, Santa Fe, Taos, Buena Vista, the Great Sand Dunes, Capulin Volcano, and Black Mesa. We packed a lot into a short trip. Some notes: Downtown El Reno has a very nice...
Roundup for π Day 2013
Happy Pi Day! This evening at 6:28 Eastern time, applicants to MIT will learn whether or not they've been admitted. For those hopefuls and anyone else in need of worthwhiling away a little time, some links of interest: Tyson Wynn, who runs local news site WelchOK.com, has been bombarded with...
<em>UHF</em> tonight at Guthrie Green
Weird Al Yankovic lived in the Bob Wills District before it was cool. His character in a movie did, at any rate. A two-story building at 114 S. Archer provided the interior and exterior shots of the apartment and adjoining karate studio shown near the beginning of the movie. Tonight...
Let's call it Wills Park
The Wills boys, from left to right, youngest to oldest: Brothers Billy Jack Wills, Luther J. "Luke" Wills, Johnnie Lee Wills, and Bob Wills, and their father John Tompkins "Uncle John" Wills. From BobWills.com The George Kaiser Family Foundation is looking for public input on the name of the...
MEND marks 25 years
Earlier this evening, I attended the annual fundraising banquet for MEND Medical Clinic and Pregnancy Resource Center. MEND was founded in 1987 to provide pregnant women in crisis pregnancies in the Tulsa area with the resources they need to say "yes" to the new life growing within. In 2011, MEND...
Getting to know a new city
Natasha Ball (Tasha Does Tulsa) has posted the notes from her presentation last week at Ignite Tulsa 3 -- 19 Ways to Get to Know Your Town (Even If It's Not Tulsa). All the suggestions are good (except maybe 17 -- if I ever do Foursquare it'll be under a...
Tulsa Boy Singers special fundraising and singer recruitment concert Friday
The Tulsa Boy Singers, a choral group of boys from ages 8 to 18, is holding a special concert Friday night, August 28, 2009, at 7 p.m. The concert has a dual purpose -- to recruit new members and to raise money. Brief auditions for boys interested in singing...
Rockefeller Center on Frisco Ave.?
For the first time in many years, Tulsa will have a downtown ice rink, for a month anyway. It's a nice idea, but the implementation doesn't seem to have been well thought out. Rather than put it somewhere with nearby activity, they've put the rink on the backside of the...
"Who Owns Tulsa?" benefit concert today, 1 - 5
Who Owns Tulsa? is holding its "first annual jam" today (Sunday) to raise funds for their ongoing efforts regarding the Admiral and Yale "apartments." The benefit runs from 1 to 5 p.m. at the Sunset Grill, 5800 S. Lewis Ave., and it features the Wanda Watson Band, Stanky Brown, Salty...
A Tale of Two Texas River Cities
An edited version of this column appeared in the April 2, 2008, issue of Urban Tulsa Weekly. The published version is available on the Internet Archive. Posted on August 4, 2018. A Tale of Two Texas River Cities By Michael D. Bates On a recent business trip to San Antonio,...
Robinwood B&B
Three summers ago, our family enjoyed a few peaceful days with some of my wife's relatives, staying in their beautifully restored and decorated home, built in 1913, in Little Rock's Quapaw Quarter. It looked like it ought to be a bed and breakfast, and now it is. (Here are some...
Will Drillers follow Sixers south?
My column in this issue of Urban Tulsa Weekly is about the news that the Tulsa 66ers will be moving to Bixby and what that means for the prospects of luring the Tulsa Drillers to downtown Tulsa. The same factors that make Bixby, Regal Plaza, and the SpiritBank event center...
Happy birthday, Bob!
This week's column in Urban Tulsa Weekly is a salute to the late great western swing band leader Bob Wills. This weekend is the annual Bob Wills birthday celebration at Cain's Ballroom, so it seemed like an opportune time to explain, to Tulsans unfamiliar with his legacy, his importance...
Happy Birthday, Bob Wills
An edited version of this column was published in the March 1 - 7, 2007, issue of Urban Tulsa Weekly. The published version is available on the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine. Posted April 11, 2024. Happy Birthday, Bob By Michael D. Bates It looked like a typical scene in an...
A history of holiday tunes
Each month I receive Rich Appel's electronic 'zine Hz So Good, which is devoted to Top 40 music over the years. This month's edition features a chronological review of the songs that are a part of pop music's annual observance of Christmas. Rich begins by remembering the outdoor mall, where...
Council committee agenda: EDC, appointments, noise nuisance, 15th & Utica zoning
Tuesday's Tulsa City Council committee agenda is full of interesting topics: Economic development oversight, appointments to authorities, boards, and commissions; a change to the noise nuisance law; a change to the zoning code regarding modular housing; and a rezoning at 15th & Utica. If you have time, this would be...
River development meetings this week
The process of developing an Arkansas River Corridor Master Plan continues this week with three "workshops" -- tonight, Wednesday, and Thursday. Here are the details from the e-mail notice: The next series of public workshops has been set for Tuesday through Thursday, May 4 - 6th. The location of these...
On the arena: Fisking the Whirled
A few weeks ago, a friend asked me to make a point-by-point reply to Julie DelCour's opinion piece about the downtown sports arena and convention center in the Sunday Whirled. He thought it seemed a bit one-sided. [I started it back then, but to be honest, it wore me out,...
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