August 3, 1999 - The national conversation on urban sprawl has reached rural Minnesota. Specifically the Brainerd lakes area, where the city of Baxter has seen such commercial growth it's now trying to expand its boundaries, and its tax base.
July 29, 1999 - Tomorrow night, the Oak Street Cinema in Minneapolis begins a three week retrospective of the work of French director Francois Truffaut. The Oak Street is the only threater outside New York showing all of the new prints of Truffaut's 23 feature films. Truffaut was among a group of brash young film-makers who challenged the accepted cinematic norms of the 1950's and launched what became known as the French New Wave. But unlike other New Wave directors Truffaut, went on to enjoy wide success. He is perhaps best known in America for his role in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". The Oak Street's Bob Cowgill told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr that role was chosen very deliberately.
July 26, 1999 - Soccer is the fastest growing sport in Minnesota, spurred especially by its popularity among immigrants and baby boomers. In St Paul alone an estimated 12 thousand young people are playing organized soccer this season. There are thousands more who are just playing, scrounging for any available patch of ground to kick a ball around. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Stucky reports this demand for soccer space in St Paul is intensifying --creating alliances between diverse communitities.
July 13, 1999 - One of the nation's most expensive -and dramatic - storage facilities for rare books is now under construction at the University of Minnesota. One collection making the move to the new facilitiy is the Kerlan Collection of children's literature, which must leave the beautiful room it's occupied for years.
July 7, 1999 - MPR’s Euan Kerr interviews campers Jennifer Sly and Mary Marrow of Minneapolis about their experience during the blow down in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The two recall lightning while paddling across Lake Saganaga with two other friends, and heading for shore to set up a temporary campsite.
July 5, 1999 - In Winona writer Marjorie Dorner's new novel "Seasons of Sun and Rain", a group of women-friends annual vacation together on Lake Superior's North Shore is overshadowed by shattering news. One of their number is suffering from "Early on-set Alzheimers." The women have been friends since college, sharing each others joys and sorrows as they have had families, and watched their children become adults. Dorner told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr the story is based on experiences she's had with her own friends. The central shocking secret in the novel...is fiction. Dorner says one of the women is about to get a huge test... she's been asked to promise she'll help her sick friend commit suicide at some time in the future.
June 17, 1999 - For the last seven decades watercolor artist. John Cody has been obsessed with the nocturnal insects few people see. Cody is known as the "Audubon of Moths"... creatures he says are misunderstood. More than sixty of Cody's moth paintings are on display at the University of Minnesota's Bell Museum of Natural History. Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr took a tour with the artist.
June 10, 1999 - For the last 40 years Ed Rusha has been taking the ordinary things of American life and making them extraordinary. Considered one of the most influential of American Graphic artists ... he makes pictures of buildings, signs, and sayings, giving each a whole new meaning. This weekend the Walker Art Center opens a major retrospective of Rusha's work including his famous books of pictures of gas stations and parking lots. Rusha is in Minneapolis for the opening, and walked round the show with Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr.
May 24, 1999 - One day after the "made-for-tv" movie "The Jesse Ventura Story" air from coast to coast on NBC, the reviews have been uniformly bad. And Governor Ventura added his own thumbs down today at the annual meeting of the Minnesota Film Board saying he only watched the first few minutes.
May 21, 1999 - On Sunday evening, NBC will broadcast "The Jesse Ventura Story" a made for TV movie commissioned shortly after Ventura was elected Governor of Minnesota. Critics have panned the movie, calling it shallow and inaccurate. Still it presents a generally favorable --- if simplistic --- view of Ventura and his anti establishment message.