December 31, 1999 - While many of us are giddy about crossing over from the 1900's to 2000, a fair number of Minnesotans are entering their THIRD century. That means they were born in the 1800's. Last year there were about nine-hundred Minnesotans a hundred years old or older living in nursing homes. The state doesn't know how many centenarians are still living at home. Marie Brodwolf, an honorary council member for the Minnesota Historical Society, is a spry 106. She was born in Bloomington, Illinois, but moved to Minneapolis as a young woman after she got married. She still lives in Minneapolis where she frequently entertains school children with stories about her life.
December 30, 1999 - One person who will definately be working this New Year's Eve is Jill Waterman. She's a New York photographer who's spent the past 16 years capturing New Year's Eve celebrations throughout the world on film. Some of her photographs are on display this month at the pARTS gallery in Minneapolis . Waterman says her New Year project started accidentally, when she found herself on the Champs-Elysees in Paris on New Year's Eve 1983.
December 28, 1999 - A few years ago, researchers in Africa had a perplexing problem. Lions were dying in record numbers on the Serengetti Plain. University of Minnesota evolutionary biologist, Craig Packer, was among the researchers who linked the problem to canine distemper. Since then, Packer and others launched "Project Life-Lion", a massive campaign to vaccinate dogs who had never been innoculated for common canine diseases. Packer just returned from the Serengetti, where he checked in on colleagues who have vaccinated about 30,000 dogs so far.
December 28, 1999 - Republican Party leaders are considering urging their candidates to skip the Star Tribune newspaper's endorsement process. GOP leaders accuse the state's largest newspaper of liberal bias and say it's a waste of time for their candidates to seek the paper's endorsement. We invited the party's deputy executive director Randy Skoglund and the Star-Tribune's editorial page editor Susan Albright to talk about relations between the party and the paper. Skoglund says Republicans aren't getting a fair shake.
December 28, 1999 - Governor Ventura stopped by the Minnesota Public Radio studios today to offer his reflections on his first year in office and his hopes for 2000. Ventura said he had governed to the best of his abilities, but did have some regrets, such as the controversial playboy magazine interview in which he criticized organized religion. If he gets his way with the legislature next session, the governor says taxpayers can expect another sales tax rebate this summer, and a reduction in auto license tab fees. MPR listeners had a chance to call in and praise or challenge the governor. One listener took the governor to task for not doing more to help the homeless.
December 27, 1999 - To close out the millennium, Minnesota Public Radio's All Things Considered presents a look back at Minnesota life in 1900 via a 12-part series, entitled “A Minnesota Century.” This segment, a look back at what was the news at the turn of the last century.
December 21, 1999 - If someone has registered your trademarked name on the internet, you can now avoid court by taking the so-called "cybersquatter" to arbitration. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers--called ICANN-- has named two firms to arbitrate cases of cybersquatting. One of them is the Minneapolis -based National Arbitration Forum. Curtis Brown is the General Counsel.
December 21, 1999 - It's being billed as the final full moon of the 1900's--bigger and brighter than anything we've seen in 133 years. Tonight and tomorrow's full moon coincides with the winter solstice and happens when the moon is at its closest point to earth, but astronomers aren't hyping this celestial event. John Dickey is a professor of astronomy at the University of Minnesota. He says he's not sure what all the fuss is about.
December 10, 1999 - The St. Cloud explosion led to a change in the law governing the handling of pipeline ruptures. Charles Kenow, the administrator for the Minnesota office of pipeline safety says the St. Cloud accident demonstrated the need to clarify the first response to any pipeline accident.
November 30, 1999 - The state won't receive its first payment from the tobacco settlement endowment until January, but the health department is making plans to launch a massive anti-smoking campaign aimed at teens, more and more of whom are picking up the habit. Katie Tilley is a senior at Eagan High School and one of two teens who serves on the Tobacco Endowment Advisory Group. Katie recently traveled to Florida to see how that state has cut teen smoking by about twenty percent in ONE year.