View allAll Photos Tagged optimistic
that's the best I can say about events in today's world; if I felt otherwise, my pessimism might get the best of me
There is nothing more optimistic than sunrise.
The day is just starting and full of possibilities.
Taken by me, no edit whatsoever.
Location: Egypt - Luxor
Boy, it was this kind of day when you look back at it, you think...oh yeah Inferno.
Despite the detailed manual (in german), we were pretty optimistic on our chances to complete the process.
Fools that we were ! I don't know why we decided to lunch at Interlaken with a couple of french pals, but from that point the race for the park was on...In Oberhofen (T1 road bike park, checking in), everything was going smoothly in this heavenly haven. we were kind of just amazed by the "swissness" of the place, clinical neatness, yeah... anything has a place and a place for anything. We are French don't forget, land of revolution and some endemic allergies to rules (especially littering).
While we were heading to the next park (T2 - Mountain bike, Grindelwald), I saw a women running, some frantic discussion with the staff that I did not hear however it was definitely not a small talk, her body gesture was suggesting a sort of emergency. We continue our recon of the water exit path when clearly people in front of us next to the shore were literally freezing, (hum...not moving). Something weird was happening, this kind of moment that your unconscious mind know before it hits the frontal lobes. I through a glance above the parapet and there was this French guy with his swim goggles on in the water asking loudly (in french) where ? And then he dived...F...k drowning situation here, I called my buddies, swimmer gear now !
Don't panic, everybody was calling the rescue services (kudo for mobile phone era), check.
everyone out of the water (except the french rescuers) check.
the first guy pulled out a man (80 kg minimum) from the blue, not an easy task especially if the drown man was down under 5 meters. It feels that he knew how to proceed, my friends Jean Francois, Cyril and Raphael helped him out to put
the poor guy next to the wall. Unfortunately, it was not on waterfree environment, a shallow water was enough to perform CPR.
The guy started to vomit, that is good, no water in the lungs, some pulses were even there. The crowd (ok only 10 people max, it was sort of strange to know that 50 meters away triathlete were unaware of this situation) was encouraging the guy, come on, hang in there, fight dammit, as if he was racing against ...death ?
Unfortunately they lost the pulse, and then we went silenced, just like if we were praying in our head. Cyril shouted at me, Where is that bloody oxygen ?
Ok, it should have been here (the mandatory equipment in Switzerland should include an oxygen tank, did the women explain properly the situation to the person in charge of the swimming pool ?) time to move, I ran to the swimming pool and gosh...where did my proficient English go ? Finally, the women in charge at the swimming pool was looking into it at...snail pace. Frustration, that was my state of mind.
I came back to the scene, and they were still performing CPR, then a person from the swimming pool came with a defibrillator...ok, no oxy, and you know what ? can't perform a defib in shallow water. So they have to drag the body 50 meters to a dry location. In the meantime, some people succeeded to have crucial info on the timing. 5 minutes that was the time his girlfriend realized he was missing, 2 more minutes the diver needed to find him. 7 minutes accrued, it was still worth a try but it was a lot of minutes for the brain without O2.
The defib said ...continue to CPR (thank you dude !), time is an elastic concept and this kind of situation proved it, where are the goddamn rescue ? They came by boat and road, and installed a security perimeter, started to CPR with a stronger stance, but still no recovery. We were sort of depressed I have to confess, nothing we can do at this point, the slight pre race pressure we could have was gone for sure. We were meditating on the fragile line of life of our existence. Of course we need to prove our mortality through all kind of stuff (Inferno triathlon is one of them) but just a simple lack of air reminds us our condition.
Inferno or paradisio ? We have to move on, leave the drama, persuading ourselves that we did our best.
Kalihru is a Toa of flux and the leader of the team. He acts calm, yet quite optimistic and tends to prefer peace and symbiosis over hate and loneliness. His toa tools are virtual palms so he can manipulate the elemental connections he makes with his teamates.
I asked my best buddy if he liked to assist me as a model for my first photo shooting ever and surprisingly he agreed. That`s the result. I hope you like it.
Psychological resilience is defined as an individual's ability to successfully adapt to life tasks in the face of social disadvantage or other highly adverse conditions.Adversity and stress can come in the shape of family or relationship problems, health problems, or workplace and financial worries, among others. Resilience is the ability to bounce back from a negative experience with "competent functioning". Resilience is not a rare ability; in reality, it is found in the average individual and it can be learned and developed by virtually anyone. Resilience is a process, rather than a trait to be had. It is a process of individuation through a structured system with gradual discovery of personal and unique abilities. A common misconception is that resilient people are free from negative emotions or thoughts, and remain optimistic in most or all situations. To the contrary, resilient individuals have, through time, developed proper coping techniques that allow them to effectively and relatively easily navigate around or through crises. In other words, people who demonstrate resilience are people with optimistic attitudes and positive emotionality; they are, in practice, able to effectively counter negative emotions with positive emotions. Compare the pressures you face in a typical week with a few years ago: have they increased? Now think about the years ahead: are the pressures likely to keep growing? If you’re answering 'yes', this could be a good time to review and renew your strategies for resilience. Alan Heeks has many years’ experience of exploring how people can raise their wellbeing and resilience through contact with nature.Resilience is generally thought of as a "positive adaptation" after a stressful or adverse situation. When a person is "bombarded by daily stress, it disrupts their internal and external sense of balance, presenting challenges as well as opportunities." Resilience is the integrated adaptation of physical, mental and spiritual aspects in a set of "good or bad" circumstances, a coherent sense of self that is able to maintain normative developmental tasks that occur at various stages of life. The Children's Institute of the University of Rochester explains that "resilience research is focused on studying those who engage in life with hope and humor despite devastating losses". It is important to note that resilience is not only about overcoming a deeply stressful situation, but also coming out of the said situation with "competent functioning". Resiliency allows a person to rebound from adversity as a strengthened and more resourceful person. “One of the themes that emerges from these groups is that people feel increasingly depleted by everyday life and work, and it’s getting worse.
"There are many reasons for this, including the many hours spent with smartphones and screens, which mean that they are constantly overloaded with too much information, and alarming news from across the globe. Medical School quotes many research studies showing how long hours in front of screens put people in a continual state of alert, which makes it hard for them both to concentrate, and also to relax. An example of what we can learn from nature is composting: in woods, as in organic farms and gardens, the major source of future growth is waste, dead matter which can be transformed into nutrition for future growth.Resilience is generally thought of as a "positive adaptation" after a stressful or adverse situation.[8] When a person is "bombarded by daily stress, it disrupts their internal and external sense of balance, presenting challenges as well as opportunities." Resilience is the integrated adaptation of physical, mental and spiritual aspects in a set of "good or bad" circumstances, a coherent sense of self that is able to maintain normative developmental tasks that occur at various stages of life. The Children's Institute of the University of Rochester explains that "resilience research is focused on studying those who engage in life with hope and humor despite devastating losses". It is important to note that resilience is not only about overcoming a deeply stressful situation, but also coming out of the said situation with "competent functioning". Resiliency allows a person to rebound from adversity as a strengthened and more resourceful person. You could do the same: imagine recycling negative feelings and anxious thoughts, and using their energy to give you insights and growth. Another theme which emerges for some people at the wood is their concerns for the state of the world, climate change, and damage to the environment. Many people feel helpless about such problems, and simply stuff their worries down. Alan said: “I find that these deep, denied worries affect a lot of people, and sap their energy and resilience. We offer a range of processes, such as composting and deep ecology, to help people face these anxieties, and find a more positive outlook.” The way to positive change for the state of our world begins with dreams. He points out that dreams, in the sense of inspiring visions, and myths, in the sense of prevailing beliefs, have a huge influence in our world. It believes that the wisdom of Gaia, planet earth, can team up with the inventiveness of humans, to find solutions even to the current threats. The mega-crisis represents a mega-opportunity. You could look at it as a chance for humans to grow dramatically in resilience, and in their connection with Nature. We have to dare to dream: if we can at least carry a vision of the future we hope for, it starts to gather momentum.” He provides organic growth approaches for people and their work that help to build resilience. Jane has many years’ experience of working with mindfulness, deep ecology and other approaches to wellbeing, and is part of the Wisdom Tree team.Resilience is generally thought of as a "positive adaptation" after a stressful or adverse situation.[8] When a person is "bombarded by daily stress, it disrupts their internal and external sense of balance, presenting challenges as well as opportunities." Resilience is the integrated adaptation of physical, mental and spiritual aspects in a set of "good or bad" circumstances, a coherent sense of self that is able to maintain normative developmental tasks that occur at various stages of life.The Children's Institute of the University of Rochester explains that "resilience research is focused on studying those who engage in life with hope and humor despite devastating losses". It is important to note that resilience is not only about overcoming a deeply stressful situation, but also coming out of the said situation with "competent functioning". Resiliency allows a person to rebound from adversity as a strengthened and more resourceful person.Three notable bases for resilience, self-confidence, self-esteem and self-concept, all have roots in three different nervous systems—respectively, the somatic nervous system, the autonomic nervous system and the central nervous system. An emerging field in the study of resilience is the neurobiological basis of resilience to stress. For example, neuropeptide Y (NPY) and 5-Dehydroepiandrosterone (5-DHEA) are thought to limit the stress response by reducing sympathetic nervous system activation and protecting the brain from the potentially harmful effects of chronically elevated cortisol levels respectively. In addition, the relationship between social support and stress resilience is thought to be mediated by the oxytocin system's impact on the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis. "Resilience, conceptualized as a positive bio-psychological adaptation, has proven to be a useful theoretical context for understanding variables for predicting long-term health and well-being".There is some limited research that, like trauma, resilience is epigenetic—that is, it may be inherited—but the science behind this finding is preliminary.Studies show that there are several factors which develop and sustain a person's resilience: The ability to make realistic plans and being capable of taking the steps necessary to follow through with them
Confidence in one’s strengths and abilities
Communication and problem-solving skills
The ability to manage strong impulses and feelings
Resilience is negatively correlated with personality traits of neuroticism and negative emotionality, which represents tendencies to see and react to the world as threatening, problematic, and distressing, and to view oneself as vulnerable. Positive correlations stands with personality traits of openness and positive emotionality, that represents tendencies to engage and confront the world with confidence in success and a fair value to self-directedness.There is significant research found in scientific literature on the relationship between positive emotions and resilience. Studies show that maintaining positive emotions whilst facing adversity promote flexibility in thinking and problem solving. Positive emotions serve an important function in their ability to help an individual recover from stressful experiences and encounters. That being said, maintaining a positive emotionality aids in counteracting the physiological effects of negative emotions. It also facilitates adaptive coping, builds enduring social resources, and increases personal well-being. Formation of conscious perception and monitoring one's own socioemotional factors is considered as a stablity aspect of positive emotions.[citation needed] This is not to say that positive emotions are merely a by-product of resilience, but rather that feeling positive emotions during stressful experiences may have adaptive benefits in the coping process of the individual. Empirical evidence for this prediction arises from research on resilient individuals who have a propensity for coping strategies that concretely elicit positive emotions, such as benefit-finding and cognitive reappraisal, humor, optimism, and goal-directed problem-focused coping. Individuals who tend to approach problems with these methods of coping may strengthen their resistance to stress by allocating more access to these positive emotional resources.Social support from caring adults encouraged resilience among participants by providing them with access to conventional activities.Positive emotions not only have physical outcomes but also physiological ones. Some physiological outcomes caused by humor include improvements in immune system functioning and increases in levels of salivary immunoglobulin A, a vital system antibody, which serves as the body’s first line of defense in respiratory illnesses. Moreover, other health outcomes include faster injury recovery rate and lower readmission rates to hospitals for the elderly, and reductions in a patient’s stay in the hospital, among many other benefits. A study was done on positive emotions in trait-resilient individuals and the cardiovascular recovery rate following negative emotions felt by those individuals. The results of the study showed that trait-resilient individuals experiencing positive emotions had an acceleration in the speed in rebounding from cardiovascular activation initially generated by negative emotional arousal, i.e. heart rate and the like.A study was conducted among high achieving professionals who seek challenging situations that require resilience. Research has examined 13 high achievers from various professions, all of whom had experienced challenges in the workplace and negative life events over the course of their careers but who had also been recognized for their great achievements in their respective fields. Participants were interviewed about everyday life in the workplace as well as their experiences with resilience and thriving. The study found six main predictors of resilience: positive and proactive personality, experience and learning, sense of control, flexibility and adaptability, balance and perspective, and perceived social support. High achievers were also found to engage in many activities unrelated to their work such as engaging in hobbies, exercising, and organizing meetups with friends and loved ones. Several factors are found to modify the negative effects of adverse life situations. Many studies show that the primary factor is to have relationships that provide care and support, create love and trust, and offer encouragement, both within and outside the family. Additional factors are also associated with resilience, like the capacity to make realistic plans, having self-confidence and a positive self image,developing communications skills, and the capacity to manage strong feelings and impulses. Temperamental and constitutional disposition is considered as a major factor in resilience. It is one of the necessary precursors of resilience along with warmth in family cohesion and accessibility of prosocial support systems. There are three kinds of temperamental systems that play part in resilience, they are the appetitive system, defensive system and attentional system. Another protective factor is related to moderating the negative effects of environmental hazards or a stressful situation in order to direct vulnerable individuals to optimistic paths, such as external social support. More specifically a 1995 study distinguished three contexts for protective factors:personal attributes, including outgoing, bright, and positive self-concepts; the family, such as having close bonds with at least one family member or an emotionally stable parent; and the community, such as receiving support or counsel from peers. Furthermore, a study of the elderly in Zurich, Switzerland, illuminated the role humor plays as a coping mechanism to maintain a state of happiness in the face of age-related adversity. Besides the above distinction on resilience, research has also been devoted to discovering the individual differences in resilience. Self-esteem, ego-control, and ego-resiliency are related to behavioral adaptation. For example, maltreated children who feel good about themselves may process risk situations differently by attributing different reasons to the environments they experience and, thereby, avoid producing negative internalized self-perceptions. Ego-control is "the threshold or operating characteristics of an individual with regard to the expression or containment"[49] of their impulses, feelings, and desires. Ego-resilience refers to "dynamic capacity, to modify his or her model level of ego-control, in either direction, as a function of the demand characteristics of the environmental context"Maltreated children who experienced some risk factors (e.g., single parenting, limited maternal education, or family unemployment), showed lower ego-resilience and intelligence than nonmaltreated children. Furthermore, maltreated children are more likely than nonmaltreated children to demonstrate disruptive-aggressive, withdraw, and internalized behavior problems. Finally, ego-resiliency, and positive self-esteem were predictors of competent adaptation in the maltreated children. Demographic information (e.g., gender) and resources (e.g., social support) are also used to predict resilience. Examining people's adaptation after disaster showed women were associated with less likelihood of resilience than men. Also, individuals who were less involved in affinity groups and organisations showed less resilience.
Certain aspects of religions and spirituality may, hypothetically, promote or hinder certain psychological virtues that increase resilience. Research has not established connection between spirituality and resilience. According to the 4th edition of Psychology of Religion by Hood, et al., the "study of positive psychology is a relatively new development...there has not yet been much direct empirical research looking specifically at the association of religion and ordinary strengths and virtues".In a review of the literature on the relationship between religiosity/spirituality and PTSD, amongst the significant findings, about half of the studies showed a positive relationship and half showed a negative relationship between measures of religiosity/spirituality and resilience. The United States Army has received criticism for promoting spirituality in its new [Comprehensive Soldier Fitness] program as a way to prevent PTSD, due to the lack of conclusive supporting data. In military studies it has been found that resilience is also dependent on group support: unit cohesion and morale is the best predictor of combat resiliency within a unit or organization. Resilience is highly correlated to peer support and group cohesion. Units with high cohesion tend to experience a lower rate of psychological breakdowns than units with low cohesion and morale. High cohesion and morale enhance adaptive stress reactions.
BACKGROUND
In the postwar years of last century, Australia was mad keen on immigrants. Under the White Australia policy of the time, that meant white immigrants. British subjects only need apply.
Ten Pound Poms is a colloquial term used in Australia to describe British subjects (including residents of British colonies such as Malta and Cyprus and citizens of the Republic of Ireland born before 1949) who migrated to Australia after the Second World War under an assisted passage scheme established and operated by the Australian Government. The program attracted over one million British migrants between 1945 and 1972, after a publicity blitz profiling Australia as a blissful haven of jobs, good health, appealing housing and ceaseless beachside activities.
Created as part of the "Populate or Perish" policy, the scheme was designed to substantially increase the population of Australia and to supply workers for the country's booming industries. In return for subsidising the cost of travelling to Australia (adult migrants were only charged £10 for the fare and children were free) the Government promised employment prospects, housing and a generally more optimistic lifestyle. However, on arrival, migrants were placed in basic hostels and the expected job opportunities were not always readily available.
The publicity was nothing like the reality, with Australia appearing backward, harsh, flyblown and unwelcoming.
THE PICTURE
My father left by ship for the 6 week sail to Australia in early 1955, and arrived with no job, no money and nowhere to live.
A timber machinist by trade, and with life in post war England looking very tough, it was agreed that a better life was to be had in Australia. After arriving, he managed to pick up a job as a salesman with a Queensland timber company at a sawmill located in the bush with only a group of a dozen houses (for employees) and a sawmill.
Following this, my mother then had to tidy up all the affairs in Lancashire, and sail on another boat with 3 children arriving in Sydney, then by train to Brisbane.
As fortune would have it, a newspaper photographer happened to be on the station that morning, and took a picture of the reunited family on the railway station, and this is a scanned copy of the only aging photo of the event.
I am the cute one. No not him, I'm the one in the middle of Mum and Dad.
I think my parents had an amazing resolve, when you consider they were separated for about 6 months, travelled to live across the world, never saw their parents again, had no shops or theatres or transport, no electricity and no relatives around the corner any more, and lived in the bush, with heat, flies and snakes.
They aren't here any more, but the memories are strong.
I was too optimistic in planning M64 shot to that night. Strictly speaking the white nights have already arrived washing faint stuff away and this nonsence will last till the beginning of August. Hello Sun, Moon, planets and double stars!
This one is definitely not the best among the bunch of my recent shots of M globular clusters but here is a feature that I want to boast: Baader Planetarium MPCC MkIII coma corrector works!!
And it's fun to try coma corrector on the object in constellation Coma Berenices :D
Acquisition time (start of a session): JD2556802.389086 (25.05.2014, around 01:20:18 MSK)
Equipment:
Canon EOS 60D (unmodded) running Magic Lantern firmware override fitted with Baader Planetarium MPCC MkIII coma corrector on Celestron OMNI XLT 150 mm Newtonian riding on Skywatcher NEQ-6 Pro mount with counterweight shaft extention.
Aperture 150 mm
Focal length 750 mm
Tv = 30 seconds
Av = f/5
ISO 1600
Exposures: 66% of 60 (plus 50 dark frames plus respective master offset and master flatfield images from the library (old flatfield made without corrector works better than the "proper" one :)).
Processing: Images were converted into .DNG and fed to DSS. "Superpixel" color generation mode was used, so the final image is two times smaller than the original subs. Final touches were "creatively" done in Photoshop. I have tried to protocol the processing in order to adhere to it next time, so in gereral it looks like:
1) setting gamma to 2,75;
2) setting black level rougly 8-10 8-bit units below actual minimum;
3) applying higly assimmetric sigma-like curve (that's "creative" :);
4) fine-tuning the background to 1-2 8-bit units;
5) setting gamma to 1,2.
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Very fun positive modern feelgood music for happy, optimistic people. Friendly, sunny, catchy track, features drive guitar, hammond organ and claps.
Optimistic sign on an outbuilding beside the Spruill Gallery in Atlanta. (I agree with the optimism.)
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
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1983 (part 2 of 3)
May 2, 1983
A new van, valued at $17,000, was donated to the City of Kanata by Kanata Realty Limited. The vehicle would be used by small non-profit groups within the City. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:23.
May 2, 1983
The Dunrobin Community Association held a well attended Annual Meeting. Officers for 1983 were Dale Murphy, John McDonald, Lou Armitage, Wayne Kilrea, Jean Azulay, Ruth Kennedy, and Dorothy Stanton. A motion was passed directing the DCA to take the necessary steps to become incorporated as a non-profit organization. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:14.
May 3, 1983
It was announced that the Parks and Recreation Department received a federal grant to support their Children’s Summer Workshops. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:7.
May 5, 1983
Trustee Hal Hansen stated that he was optimistic that the addition to Katimavik School would proceed, despite the lack of decisive action by the Carleton Board of Education the previous week. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:1.
May 5, 1983
John Harkness, the new City of Kanata engineer, announced that he intended to make Kanata his permanent home. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:1.
May 5, 1983
The largest inter-city competition ever held in Canada was well under way. The Great Canadian Participaction Challenge was a highlight of National Physical Activity Week. Kanata had already accepted a participation challenge from the City of Saskatoon. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:1.
May 5, 1983
In his weekly column, Alderman Des Adam explained recent fraud allegations and an investigation by the City auditor and solicitor. He later defended the role of Kanata City Council in a letter to the Editor, and particularly questioned a previous Kanata Standard editorial criticizing Council’s reaction to the issue. Kanata Standard, April 28, 1983:3; Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:2.
May 5, 1983
The Kanata Theatre announced its 1983-4 season, which included Hayfever by Noel Coward, Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare, Dangerous Corner by J.B Priestly, and The White Liars and Black Comedy by Peter Shaffer. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:8.
May 5, 1983
The Kanata Library proclaimed May 16-21 as Amnesty Week. This provided for the return of overdue library books, “no questions asked” and at no cost. Books worth $3,309.75 were outstanding at the time. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:8; Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:6.
May 5, 1983
The Royal Canadian Legion Branch 593, Bells Corners, sponsored a campaign to raise over $8,000 for physiotherapy equipment for the Geriatric Day Hospital at the Queensway-Carleton Hospital. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:9.
May 5, 1983
The new executive for the Glen Cairn Co-op Nursery School was announced. Serving on the executive were Jan Caldwall, Suzanne Mercier, Jan Lockhart, Dawn Carrick, Lynda Healy, June Corie, Debbie Shuto, Marlene Boersma, Janice Merryweather, Marie Brownell, Paul Brownell, Sandra May, and Kathryn Jeffries. Kanata Standard, May 5, 1983:12.
May 5, 1983
In response the Earl of March’s seminars during their Nuclear Awareness week, Toronto Mayor John Hasek flew to Kanata and spoke to the students at the Earl of March. T. James Stark, president of Operation Dismantle, also attended. Hasek felt obliged to convey his concern over anti-cruise missile positions, and pointed out in his speech that unilateral disarmament would “destabilize” the world. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:6,14.
May 8, 1983
City representatives, including the Mayor, marked the installation of signs giving Old Highway 17 the new name of “March Road.” Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:5.
May 9, 1983
Stan Katz was announced as the new Superintendent of Personnel for the Carleton Board of Education. He had been Acting Director of Education since 1980. Kanata Standard, May 12:31.
May 10, 1983
Kanata City Council rejected a request from the Carleton Roman Catholic School Board to share the cost of construction of a bus bay at Georges Vanier School. The estimated cost was $10,000. Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:1.
May 11, 1983
Three Carleton Board of Education officials spoke to parents regarding post-nursery school French options. Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:1,40.
May 11, 1983
A Kanata Esso station worker was robbed by three or four people after he was forced off Regional Road 12 near Fallowfield Road. The men, who were armed and fired shots, made off with the day’s receipts. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:1.
May 11, 1983
Regional Council adopted a Planning Committee report on the conservation lands, indicating that the South March Highlands and the Constance Creek area would be designated as a marginal resource category. Des Adam explained in his column that this would allow for development following an environmental impact study. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:3.
May 11, 1983
The staff and students of W. Erskine Johnston opened their production of Oliver to a full house. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:10.
May 12, 1983
Several Kanata residents were honoured at a patents award dinner for Bell-Northern Research scientists. Kanata winners were Len Charlebois, Sorin Cohn-Sfetcu, Jack Dyment, Ernst Munter, Brian Osborne and Bill Trumble. Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:1.
May 12, 1983
Tridel Corporation withdrew its application for rezoning of the area west of Young Road near Highway 7 to permit an apartment complex on the site. Paul Niebergall stated that it was “understood that Tridel is now developing new plans for the site which will hopefully be more acceptable to the locals.” Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:3.
May 12, 1983
Seven-year-old Kanata Beaver Dave Brooks won a provincial poster contest. Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:20.
May 12, 1983
The Kanata Sailing Club announced that it would sponsor a recreational sailing program for 9-16 year olds. Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:29.
May 12, 1983
Laurie McDonald Savoie wrote on the building boom in Kanata, and explained that a combination of low interest rates and an improving economy were important factors contributing to a large increase in housing starts expected for Kanata in 1983. Kanata Standard, May 12, 1983:36-7.
May 13, 1983
The Kanata Theatre Group ended its season with A Romantic Comedy. Wendy Doyle wrote that this production “was a fitting end to another season of excellent entertainment by the Kanata Theatre Group.” Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:9.
May 13, 1983
The Kanata Teen Centre held its first Parents’ Night in the Glen Cairn Community Centre. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:11.
May 16, 1983
Earl of March High School students began an archaeological search of BhFx-1, The Nathaniel Scharfe site north of the overpass in Kanata. The site was originally the home of Nathaniel Scharfe, and included a home, barn and dump. Kanata Standard, May 26, 1983:4.
May 17, 1983
Kanata City Council revealed that taxes in 1983 for most residents of Kanata would rise 11.57 percent. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:1.
May 17, 1983
City staff presented an initial report on video arcades to Kanata City Council, which concluded that a video recreation centre was not a permitted use in the General Commercial Zone of Glen Cairn Community Zoning By-law. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:1.
May 18, 1983
Eleven thousand Kanata residents, about 57 percent of the population, took part in the Participation Challenge. Kanata placed fourth in the Challenge against cities of similar size. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:1; Kanata Standard, May
26, 1983:1.
May 19, 1983
The Beaverbrook Branch of the Kanata Library displayed March heritage items loaned from Audrey Richardson, Wilfred and Lena Ives, and members of the March Historical Society. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:7.
May 19, 1983
Lumonics Inc. announced a net profit for the three months ended March 31, 1983 of $505,000, a 28 percent increase from the previous year. Kanata Standard, May 19, 1983:19.
May 19, 1983
Kanata students fared well at the Ottawa Valley Track Meet at Mooney’s Bay. Competitors included Earl of March and A.Y. Jackson students Joey Barnabe, Brett Hodel, Cathy Murphy, Phil Hughes, Scott Henna, Marc Olesen, and Kevin Waller.
May 20, 1983
The Hazeldean Lions Club was given an official City flag by Mayor Marianne Wilkinson. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:21.
May 24, 1983
Deciding on the configuration of pathways near the Town Centre was a contentious issue in a Kanata City Council meeting. The issue was deferred to staff for further study. Kanata Standard, May
26, 1983:1.
May 26, 1983
The scheduled events for the upcoming annual Mayfair celebration were announced. Mayfair began in 1966. Kanata Standard, May 26, 1983:9.
May 26, 1986
Hazeldean/Bridlewood District Commissioner Phyllis More was honored at a dinner for the work she had done for the local Guides. Guide Leader Beryl Morris took over the position. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:23.
May 27, 1983
Four scouts from A Troop achieved the highest level in Boy Scouts, the Chief Scout Award. They were Christopher Hickman, Peter Tomashewski, Murray Westmore, and Patrick van Abbema. Kanata Standard, June 23, 1983:6.
May 28, 1983
The 17th annual Mayfair parade ran through the streets of Kanata. Ivan Percy stated that the 20-float parade was bigger than the previous year. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:1.
May 31, 1983
The Kanata Indoor Pool Committee gave a slide presentation to Kanata City Council and the public, where it was related that there was growth in leisure pool development in other areas. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:1.
June 1, 1983
The Kanata Beaverbrook Community Association awarded Ron Maslin and Chris Lowrie with Man and Women of the year. A new Executive was also elected, which included Barbara Farmer, Hillel Kaslove, Larry Demchuk, and Tom Rimmer. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:1,9; Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:5.
June 1, 1983
The Kinsmen Club of Kanata elected a new executive for 1983. This included Lloyd Bowler, Ken Sharland, Gerry Umbach, John Whalen, Greg Moloney, and Jim Coulas. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:21.
June 1, 1983
Representing the City of Kanata, Sheila McKee unveiled a plaque to mark the official opening of Phase II of the Kanata Software Centre. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:1.
June 2, 1983
Des Adam warned against overspending by Kanata City Council. He stated in his regular column that the city “should not be spending money on the expectation of future growth.” Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:2.
June 2, 1983
It was announced that Kanata City Council had renewed a contract with the Youth Services Bureau for another year. This municipally funded program worked with children between the ages of eight and fifteen. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:3.
June 2, 1983
Stan Rogers, 33, nephew of Alderman Charlie Rogers died in an Air Canada DC 9 fire. Rogers was a well-known folk singer. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:20.
June 5, 1983
The Kanata Golf and Country Club hosted the first Pro/Am tournament of the 1983 Ottawa Valley Professional Golf Association. Host Professional Gerry McKee had a clean sweep of the event, shooting a 68 to win top Professional honours. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:15.
June 5, 1983
Bonnie Joe Loewen, 13, of Glen Cairn fell out of the back of a van and suffered a fractured skull. She was taken off of the serious injury list the next day. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:1.
June 5, 1983
At a regional track meet in Oshawa on May 10, 10 of 13 Earl of March students qualified for the OFSSA in Kitchener. The Earl of March track team was quite successful at the OFSAA meet. Among the competitors were Kanata’s Cathy Murphy, Joey Barnabe, Phil Hughes, Scott Hanna, Kelly Armitage, Elyse Chan, and Brett Hodel. Kanata Standard, June 2, 1983:1; Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:1.
June 6, 1983
Two Kanata residents, Dave Conway for Mitel Corporation and Martha Webber, were presented with Environmental Awareness Awards at the York Street Theatre. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:4.
June 7, 1983
Aldermen Eva James and Paul Niebergall attempted to link problems on Rothesay Drive and Dorey Court with a new development by Iber Homes in Glen Cairn. James moved that lights on Rothesay Drive be repaired before the site plan agreement for condominiums on Castlefrank could be signed. Niebergall tried to link problems in Dorey Court to the proposed condominium project, based on the complaints of some of those homeowners and unfinished work by Iber. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:1.
June 7, 1983
Kanata City Council proposed modifications for its Official Plan for Conservation Lands in Rural Kanata to fit with a new Amendment 12 to the Regional Official Plan. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:1.
June 8, 1983
At a March Rural Association meeting, it was announced that some renovations to the Old Town Hall may have to wait until 1984. However, as June Gibbs pointed out, the South March Women’s Institute hoped to hold meetings in the hall by September. Kanata Standard, June 16, 1983:1.Kanata Standard, June 16, 1983:
June 9, 1983
The Carleton Board of Education announced that it may have to give up another parcel of land in Kanata due to lack of funding from the Ministry of Education. Trustee Hal Hansen stated that the CBE staff were going to do a feasibility study on the growth problems in Kanata. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:1.
June 9, 1983
Alderman Des Adam suggested in his column that Kanata City Council, the City Treasurer, and other department heads begin work on the 1984 capital budgets. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:3.
June 9, 1983
Mayor Marianne Wilkinson announced that it was the 10th anniversary of Kanata’s Mitel Corporation. She stated that Mitel was the largest single employer in the City of Kanata, and had “played a major role in making this area Canada’s ‘Silicon Valley.’” Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:3.
June 9, 1983
It was reported that Earl of March mathematics teams for Grades 12 and 13 did very well in math contests sponsored by the University of Waterloo. Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:4.
June 9, 1983
Laurie McDonald Savoie wrote about the rapid development in the Kanata area. She emphasized that the City of Kanata was always committed to good planning and developed along the residential community theme. She added: “While it is apparent that growth is not only inevitable but planned and desired, and that the municipality will never be like Topsy who just grew, the best laid plans, as they say, have a way of seldom being foolproof.” Kanata Standard, June 9, 1983:21.
June 14, 1983
A public hearing was held regarding a proposed golf course by Metcalfe Realty along the Old Carp Road and the Huntley Townline. There seemed to be general approval of the project. Kanata Standard, June 16, 1983:1.
June 14, 1983
Kanata residents attended a Kanata City Council meeting to support the staff recommendation for Natural Environment Areas. Kanata Standard, June 16, 1983:1.
June 16, 1983
The Kanata Standard announced that Dennis Finlay and Janice Forbes would join the newspaper as editors of the paper. Kanata Standard, June 16, 1983:3.
June 16, 1983
Twenty-two Guides from the 2nd Hazeldean Guide Company were presented with their Citizen badge on the Floor of the House of Commons. They were the second Guide Company to receive this honour. Kanata Standard, June 16, 1983:11.
June 16, 1983
A new board of Directors was elected at the Kanata Standard Annual General Meeting, including Ron Andoff, Fred Boyd, Maureen Locherer, Gordon Marwood, Ivan Percy, Sandra Racine and John Tweedie. The company Officers for 1983-4 were Ivan Percy, Gordon Marwood, Paul Whitlock, Sandra Racine, Judy Findlay, and Alan Sewards.
June 21, 1983
Approximately 50 Bridlewood residents attended a Kanata City Council meeting to express their concerns regarding accidents at Eagleson Road and Cadence Gate. Kanata Standard, June 23, 1983:1.
June 21, 1983
A main issue at a Kanata City Council meeting was the proposal for the development of Huntsman Park. The plan was that the park would contain a scrub ball diamond and children’s play area. Kanata Standard, June 23, 1983:1.
June 22, 1983
In the middle of the afternoon, a fire struck a Dunrobin stable, owned by James and Susan Davies of Cotswold Stables. Firemen arrived in time to rescue a horse from a burning building. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:1.
June 23, 1983
Mayor Marianne Wilkinson announced that Campeau Corporation had “indicated that they would like to expedite development of industry in the Kanata area following the general theme presently found in California [Silicon Valley].” Wilkinson stated that she and Alderman Lund would visit California to gain first-hand knowledge of the region. Kanata Standard, June 23, 1983:3.
June 23, 1983
It was announced that Kanata student Scott Simser won $300 in the 1983 Alexander Graham Bell Scholarship Awards. Kanata Standard, June 23, 1983:9.
June 23, 1983
Mario and Mike Borsato and Peter and Tom Bouzanis opened the March House Restaurant, located at the corner of Klondike and March Roads. Kanata Standard, June 23, 1983:19.
June 23 1983
A public meeting was held in an attempt to deal with a rezoning issue in Katimavik and discuss Campeau’s proposed zoning changes in Blocks Q, R, and S of the Katimavik-Hazeldean Community. Residents attending the meeting were concerned with the possible increase in density and increased probability of rental units being built. No consensus was reached at this gathering. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:1.
June 23, 1983
Kanata City Council received and accepted the resignation of Jim O’Leary, Treasurer of the City of Kanata. O’Leary left to take a position in Ottawa. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:1.
June 23, 1983
Reverend Frank Stiles was awarded the Royal Windsor Cross, given for his 20 continuous years of outstanding and meritorious service, far beyond the call of duty, to Canadian veterans and their families. Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:13.
June 24, 1983
Kanata resident Keith Woleston was awarded a Bravery Decoration by the Governor General, on the recommendation of the Canadian Decorations Advisory Committee. Woleston was involved in a violent struggle in his taxi with a man holding him at gunpoint. He received the Star of Courage at an Investiture at Rideau Hall, Ottawa. Kanata Standard, February 3, 1983:9; Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:2.
June 25, 1983
The Kanata March Horticultural Society held its first flower show of the year. Lenore Fentiman won the B.J. Roberts Cup for the second time. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:7.
June 26, 1983
Kanata youth, 13-year old Kevin Chiswell, was named Most Promising Student at the Canadian Annual Music Pageant Festival. Kevin played the Spanish guitar. Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:9.
June 28, 1983
Kanata City Council approved a $78,000 upgrading project for Pumphouse Park in Glen Cairn, which would include receiving grading, topsoil, new grass seed and a variety of trees. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:9.
June 28, 1983
Kanata City Council denied J. Perez Construction an excavation foundation permit for the corner of McCurdy and Castlefrank for 144 apartment units. Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:1.
June 30, 1983
Alan Sewards wrote in an article in the Standard about Kanata creating its own police force due to its increase in population. Sewards stated that Kanata was currently well above the size of community normally policed for free by the Ontario Provincial Police. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:1.
June 30, 1983
Des Adam, in his weekly column, expressed his opinion on the need for a Chief Administrative Officer in Kanata and wrote: “I had hoped that Kanata could have done without the need of a Chief Administrative Officer. What I have observed lately at council reinforces the need for such a position.” Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:3.
June 30, 1983
Paul Niebergall, in his weekly column, stated that he had received a number of calls from people in the Hazeldean Ridge area concerned about the manner in which Del Corporation was commencing work in the subdivision around the connecting link of McCurdy Drive. This bordered a pond that was a local landmark and environmental site. Wendy Doyle reported that Kanata residents lobbying had ensured that Young Pond on Young Road would be maintained and not “swallowed up by a subdivision planned by Del Corporation.” City Planner David Krajaefski said that Del decided to include the pond as a feature in their plans. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:3.
June 30, 1983
It was announced that a Bridlewood park would be “Pony Park,” a name suggested by three different contestants in a Name the Park Contest. The three winners were Erin Brown, Lorraine Gardner and Jennifer Hunter. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:4.
June 30, 1983
The Kanata Public Library received six new Polaroid Cameras for loan to library cardholders. Kanata Standard, June 30, 1983:8.
July 3, 1983
Harold Craig, former Reeve of March Township, died at the age of 68. Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:7.
July 4, 1983
The Kanata Hydro Electric Commission appointed Guy Cluff as General Manager of Kanata Hydro. Kanata Standard, September 15, 1983:1.
July 5, 1983
In a Kanata City Council meeting, Des Adam chastised Mayor Wilkinson for taking on too much. He also questioned information provided to Council by the Mayor, claiming that she sometimes used “misleading and manipulative” information. Des Adam later stated, in March Notebook, that in his opinion Kanata could not afford to be without a Chief Administrative Officer. Part of his concern was in the Mayor taking control of too many areas and spreading herself thin. He also stated: “There is a frequent complaint that the mayor is interfering in the day-to-day operation of the administration of the city. Before the CAO left, he requested that Council ask the mayor not to attend department head meetings because of her constant interference. Since the CAO has left, the department heads have requested that the mayor not head the meetings. The mayor insists on attending. Is everyone wrong but Madam Mayor?” Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:1,23; Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:2.
July 7, 1983
Leslie Jones reported that Kanata’s three-year-old pedestrian overpass would need $70,000 worth of repairs. Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:1.
July 7, 1983
On behalf of the March Historical Society, a letter to the Editor was written emphasizing the need to foster the name of “March” in the community. He wrote: “We propose that for historic reasons the geographical area of what was March Township, excluding the city proper, should be referred to simply as March.” Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:2.
July 7, 1983
John Allen reported that the Canada Day celebrations were an “unqualified success,” and that particular thanks should be given to Sheila Silver for her efforts as coordinator. Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:7.
July 7, 1983
It was reported that Kanata resident John Bennett, 17, won a silver and bronze medal in the 1982 Shell Cup Canadian Cross Country Ski Championships. Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:15.
July 7, 1983
The Ontario Minister of Labour appointed a conciliation officer to help with negotiations between the City of Kanata and inside workers. The main stumbling block was the membership of the newly formed local. Kanata Standard, July 7, 1983:15.
July 7, 1983
Lismer Crescent residents gave their consent for the City to begin park upgrades behind their homes; $10,000 was allocated for the work. Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:1.
July 8, 1983
Crain Real Estate opened in Kanata. It was the 7th real estate firm in the area. Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:6.
July 14, 1983
Wendy Doyle reported that the Ontario Municipal Board was close to issuing its decision regarding Amendment 12 to the Regional Official Plan. Doyle stated: A decision by the OMB will end a four-year saga of public information meetings and bickering between landowners, City Council and Regional Council.” The difficulty arose when landowners voiced concerns of the designation of conservation lands. Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:1.
July 14, 1983
Kanata resident Jack Donohue coached the Canadian Men’s Basketball Team that won a gold medal in the World University Games in Edmonton. Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:1.
July 14, 1983
Paul Niebergall, in the Katimavik-Hazeldean Report, first reported that the promise by Del Corporation to protect Young Pond during development was not kept. He commented: “I was down to look at the pond last Monday night and I can assure you that all that remains is a very small mud puddle and a complete loss of whatever wildlife might have been in the area.” Wendy Doyle later reported that Set Corporation, hired by Del, had prematurely “pulled the plug” on Young Pond. It was previously determined, due to lobbying by residents, that the Pond was to be a feature of the subdivision. Kanata Standard, July 14, 1983:3; Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:1.
July 14, 1983
The Atomic Energy Control Board announced that it granted a license to Atomic Energy of Canada Limited for the operation of its new radioisotope processing facility in Kanata. Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:1.
July 19, 1983
Caroline McIntyre presented Kanata City Council with a petition to end the use of 2,4-D, a herbicide used in the control of weeds. Council accepted the petition without comment, and later referred it to staff for further study. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:1.
July 19, 1983
Kanata City Council approved money for a Leisure Centre Study. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:1.
July 19, 1983
Kanata City Council gave J. Perez Construction approval for a 144-apartment complex at Castlefrank and McCurdy. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:1.
July 19, 1983
Several residents attended a Kanata City Council meeting to confront representatives of Del Corporation over the issue of Young Pond. The pond was prematurely drained after assurances that it would remain a feature of the new subdivision. Many were concerned with the effect of wildlife in the pond. A public meeting to further deal with the issue was set for August 10. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:1-2.
July 21, 1983
Mayor Marianne Wilkinson, in her Commentary, discussed her trip to California’s Silicon Valley. She stated that she hoped that new developments by Campeau Corporation in the Kanata North Business Park could integrate some of the ideas they saw in California to “ensure that the businesses in Kanata benefit from the type of beautiful surroundings that we saw in California.” Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:2.
July 21, 1983
Digital Corporation landed two major contracts, valued at $20 million. Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:3.
July 21, 1983
Mitel Corporation announced that sales for the 13 weeks ending May 27 showed a loss of $4,496,000, or 12 cents per share. Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:3.
July 26, 1983
A rather enthusiastic meeting was held to discuss the possibility of creating a Kanata Arts Council. Kanata Standard, August 4, 1983:1.
July 28, 1983
Wendy Doyle reported that construction for a new Co-op housing project began, which entailed building 64 two, three and four bedroom garden homes on Castlefrank Road. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:1.
July 28, 1983
Wendy Doyle reported that Louise Reynolds was leaving the community. Reynolds, one of Kanata’s “hardest working and most active community volunteers,” moved to Mississauga to be closer to family. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:5.
July 28, 1983
It was reported that Kanata residents Barb Saberton and Rob Weiler brought home a medal from the Canadian National Roller Skating Championships. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:10.
July 29, 1983
Two Earl of March students, Yvonne Scorupinski and Mary Lynn Nyenhuis, were aboard a train to Paris when it derailed. They were uninjured. However, four Ottawa girls were killed in the accident. Kanata Standard, August 4, 1983:1.
July 31, 1983
Reverend Douglas Heard gave his last sermon in Kanata before relocating to Cobourg, Ontario. Kanata Standard, July 28, 1983:13.
August 2, 1983
During a Kanata City Council meeting Mayor Marianne Wilkinson stated: “I’m fed up, and I’ll be actively seeking other employment.” Earlier in the meeting the Mayor and Alderman Adam had a series of battles that came to a head over the issue of purchasing a car for the Mayor’s use. Ron Boyd reported that the Mayor said that she was continually being stabbed in the back by Council and exclaimed “especially this guy,” as she pointed accusingly at Alderman Adam. Adam responded: “I’ve never stabbed you in the back; I’ve always stabbed you in the front and I will continue to do so.” The Mayor said it was the most difficult Council she had experienced in 14 years, that she would seek other levels of government for work, but that it would take time and they would just have to put up with her awhile longer. Kanata Standard, August 4, 1983:1,3.
August 2, 1983
A subdivision plan proposed by Cadillac-Fairview that would significantly increase the size of Bridlewood was submitted to Kanata City Council. Kanata Standard, August 11, 1983:1.
August 2, 1983
Some Kanata residents participated in the Canadian Pony Club National Tetrathlon Championships. Carol Stamper and Meredith Curren were on the St. Lawrence and Ottawa Valley Region team, which placed 4th overall. Rob Stamper placed 7th in the individual competition. Kanata Standard, September 15, 1983:23.
August 3, 1983
It was announced at a Carleton Board of Education meeting that construction would begin on a $1.9 million extension of Katimavik Elementary School. This followed seven months of negotiations with the Ministry of Education, which had earlier rejected the Board’s request due to lack of funds. Kanata Standard, August 11, 1983:1.
August 4, 1983
Gordon B. Thompson was awarded the first Fellow Emeritus by Bell-Northern Research Ltd. Thompson was internationally recognized as a communications philosopher, a provocative thinker on the nature and future of communications, and on its impact on economic and social structures. Kanata Standard, August 4, 1983:11.
August 5, 1983
Kanata residents Bill and Emily Harris celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. Kanata Standard, July 21, 1983:4.
August 10, 1983
Approximately 30 people attended a meeting to deal with the issue of Young Pond. Alderman Niebergall agreed that a misunderstanding led to the premature draining of the Pond, which was to be a feature of a new subdivision development. Biologist Bill Thoreau stated that wildlife would return to the Pond if it was lined and refilled, though the numbers would depend on the type of park development that followed. Kanata Standard, August 18, 1983:1.
August 11, 1983
An open letter to Kanata residents from Mayor Marianne Wilkinson was published in the Standard. The letter dealt with an earlier statement by the Mayor in a Kanata City Council meeting of her intent to resign and seek other employment. Wilkinson wrote: “It was with great sadness that last week I announced to Council that I would be resigning as Mayor of Kanata as soon as I could find alternative employment. The statement was made out of complete frustration and with deep regret, as I do not wish to resign.” Kanata Standard, August 11, 1983:1.
August 11, 1983
Bob Kingham, in his As I See It column, commented on recent problems in Kanata City Council and stated: “What we have been witnessing in recent months, however, is NOT HEALTHY - not for Council or the City of Kanata.” He further urged the Mayor to complete her term and not resign as she had indicated was her intent. Kanata Standard, August 11, 1983:3.
August 11, 1983
Paul Niebergall, in his Katimavik-Hazeldean Report, commented on the recent problems in Kanata City Council. He felt that the participants in this type of behavior succeeded in bringing Kanata’s public affairs “unfavorable attention of all the Ottawa - Carleton region and created a significant discomfort to city staff which could only view with dismay this public demonstration of colic by those who pretend to provide mature policy direction.” He added: “Personally I feel that Marianne Wilkinson has much to contribute to the progress of our City in the balance of her term, but to act effectively she will have to earn the trust of all members of Council.” Kanata Standard, August 11, 1983:3,16.
August 11, 1983
Eva James, in her Glen Cairn-Bridlewood Report, commented on recent problems of Kanata City Council and wrote: “it is rather unfortunate that personality clashes and struggles for power have gotten so out of hand” and that “I cannot believe that the resignation of the Mayor will solve the City’s problems and I hope she will reconsider.” Kanata Standard, August 11, 1983:3.
August 11, 1983
Nearly 100 local teenagers attended the Kanata Teen Centre’s Coffee House in the Glen Cairn Community Centre. As Leslie Jones stated, the result was “an entertaining melange of local talent.” Kanata Standard, August 25, 1983:23.
August 16, 1983
Mayor Marianne Wilkinson made a statement in a Kanata City Council meeting and informed Council that she would fulfill her obligations made to the residents of Kanata and reconsider a previous statement of resignation as Mayor. Kanata Standard, August 18, 1983:1,13.
August 16, 1983
Kanata City Council was presented with the terms of reference for a Management Study of the structure of the municipal bureaucracy, including the Chief Administrative Officer position. Alderman Lund was concerned that the study would delay dealing with the CAO issue. Aldermen commented that the CAO position should be removed from the study, as Council could decide on that issue without the aid of a study. Council passed amendments to speed up the timetable of the study. Kanata Standard, August 25, 1983:1.
August 16, 1983
Kanata City Council approved the naming of several parks in the Katimavik area. Many were based on recommendations of the Katimavik-Hazeldean Community Association. Kanata Standard, August 25, 1983:1,25.
August 16, 1983
The Heritage Club sponsored one-day trip to Kingston for Kanata Seniors. Kanata Standard, August 25, 1983:4.
August 18, 1983
Paul Niebergall, in the Katimavik-Hazeldean Report, stated: “In my mind, the Young’s Pond incident demonstrated another instance in which Council’s control of the developer proved to be illusory.” Niebergall expressed his concern that the Young Pond issue was indicative of the lack of policy and the granting of foundation permits before the final details of the builders’ plans were made available to the City’s planning department for review and revision. Kanata Standard, August 18, 1983:3.
August 19, 1983
The City of Kanata and its unionized public employees signed their first contract. The employees became unionized and gained membership in the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) in December, 1982. The new contract standardized working hours, gave employee flexibility, and replaced a sick leave program with an Income Protection Program. Kanata Standard, August 25, 1983:1.
August 21, 1983
Two Kanata men, Blair Medynski and Mike Azulay, were injured in a car accident at the intersection of March Road and Klondike Road. Both men suffered minor injuries. Kanata Standard, August 25, 1983:1.
August 22, 1983
The Ontario Municipal Board passed Amendment 12 to the Regional Official Plan after four years of controversy over land designation. The Amendment substantially reduced the amount of land designated as conservation in 1979, which was when the Regional Official Plan was passed. Kanata Standard, September 8, 1983:1.
August 27, 1983
The heritage of Kanata and surrounding areas was celebrated in the Central Canada Exhibition’s Heritage Village program. Kanata’s display was organized by Alderman Sheila McKee. Kanata Standard, September 1, 1983:1,23.
August 30, 1983
Tom Carroll of the March Rural Association appeared before Kanata City Council to protest a proposed upgrade to the 2nd Line Road, based on the fact that the 5th Line Road was in more urgent need of repair. Council agreed on further study. Kanata Standard, September 8, 1983:1.
August 30, 1983
Kanata City Council approved the Kanata Indoor Leisure Pool Feasibility Study terms of reference and decided to seek a consultant for the study. Kanata Standard, September 8, 1983:1.
August 30, 1983
Kanata City Council agreed to allow a Council meeting to be shown on television once a month on the Ottawa Cablevision station. Kanata Standard, September 8, 1983:3.
August 30, 1983
Mayor Wilkinson gave her report to Kanata City Council on a meeting with the minister regarding policing in Kanata. It was estimated that establishing a police force would cost $1.2 - 1.3 million along with a $300,000 provincial grant. Kanata Standard, September 15, 1983:1.
Toulouse Lautrec Impressionist Painting Young Girl & Eros - Adolphe c.1882
Attributed to Henri de Toulouse Lautrec (1864-1901) After William Bouguereau
Approx: Size 47" tall x 35.25" wide (without the frame) - 62.75" tall x 51" wide (with Frame)
History
William Bouguereau was France's most popular painter of the late 1800s. A leader of the Academic School,
Bouguereau specialized in carefully detailed mythological and genre scenes, and was particularly noted for his tender
portrayals of children. "The Abduction of Psyche" (1895) is probably his best-known work. Today many critics dismiss
his style as kitsch and do not look kindly on his harmful opposition to new creative trends; but his exquisite craftsmanship
is undeniable. Bouguereau completed over 800 paintings, many of them life-sized. Adolphe William Bouguereau (he
never used his first name) was born in La Rochelle, France. He studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and won the Prix de
Rome in 1850. In 1868 he built a lavish studio in Montparnasse and helped make that area the foremost artists' quarter
in Paris. Around this time he also began a liason with one of his students, American painter Elizabeth Gardner;
Bouguereau's mother opposed the relationship and the couple did not marry until her death in 1896. As comparatively
obscure as he is these days, it's difficult to imagine what a star Bouguereau was in the art world of his era. He worked
hard to fufil his many commissions and his paintings were so sought after, and fetched such high prices, that he once
boasted, "I lose five francs every time I pee". Engraved reproductions of his works sold in the millions. Along with wealth
and fame came many honors, including election to the Institute of France and being named a Grand Officer of the Legion
of Honor. Reactionary in visual tastes, Bouguereau believed art should idealize beauty and turned up his nose at
anything that even remotely deviated from this dictum. As President of the Society of French Artists from 1881, he
oversaw the selection of the thousands of paintings shown annually at the Paris Salon, the only real avenue to success
for aspiring Gallic painters and sculptors. For decades he used this position to hinder the press and public from
discovering the revolutionary changes that were taking place in French painting, including Impressionism, Realism,
Pointillism, and the singular efforts of Paul Gaugin, Henri Rousseau, and Toulouse-Lautrec. Paul Cezanne, who
submitted canvases to that venue every year only to have them rejected, finally gave up and declared, "I don't stand a
chance in Monsieur Bouguereau's Salon". Rival salons sprang up in Paris to combat Bouguereau's conservatism, but he
remained powerful and influential until his death at 79. (bio by: Bobb Edwards)
In 1882, Lautrec moved from Albi to Paris, where he studied art in the ateliers of two academic painters, Léon Bonnat
(1833–1922) and Fernand Cormon (1845–1924), who also taught Émile Bernard (1868–1941) and Vincent van Gogh
(1853–1890). Lautrec soon began painting en plein air in the manner of the Impressionists, and often posed sitters in the
Montmartre garden of his neighbor, Père Forest, a retired photographer. One of his favorite models was a prostitute
nicknamed La Casque d'Or (Golden Helmet), seen in the painting The Streetwalker (2003.20.13). Lautrec used peinture
à l'essence, or oil thinned with turpentine, on cardboard, rendering visible his loose, sketchy brushwork. The
transposition of this creature of the night to the bright light of day—her pallid complexion and artificial hair color clash with
the naturalistic setting—signals Lautrec's fascination with sordid and dissolute subjects. Later in his career, he would
devote an entire series of prints, called Elles, to life inside a brothel (1984.1203.166).
The most notable painting from the Harris collection was the early Toulouse-Lautrec painting "La blanchisseuse" (1886-
87), a young laundress with copper-colored hair and a pearly white blouse. Its optimistic presale estimate of $20 million
to $25 million turned out to be justified, as the painting sold for $22.4 million to a phone bidder. The price was a record
for a work by the artist sold at auction, $6 million more than the previous highest price.
Henri de Toulouse Lautrec (1864-1901) was a French artist of the late 19th Century, most closely associated with the
Symbolists, but with a unique, distinctive style of his own. His depictions of Parisian night life and society -- vivid, candid,
energetic and unflattering -- are instantly recognizable, and typify that place and period in the minds of many. The
painter's own life has become a legend that has inspired many romanticized interpretations.
Henri-Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Montfa was born on November 24, 1864, in the town of Albi, in the south of
France. He was the first child and heir of Alphonse Charlers Jean Marie (1838-1913), Count of Toulouse, and his wife
Marie Marquette Zoe Adele Tapie de Celeyran (1841-1930). Count Alphonse de Toulouse-Lautrec was an avid
sportsman and hunter, with a penchant for flamboyant outfits. Marie de Celeyran, by contrast, was very reserved and shy,
and doted on her first child. Young Henri was probably first introduced to painting through his uncles, several of whom
were amateur artists. He received his first tutelage in art from Rene Princeteau, a well-known sports-painter and a friend
of his father's.
Much of Henri's early childhood was spent in the Chateau de Celeyran, his mother's familial home, near the
Mediterranean town of Narbonne, where he spent much time drawing and painting the life and landscape of the estate. In
1868, his parents separated; Henri would live mostly with his mother. In 1872, he was enrolled in the prestigious Lycee
Fontanes in Paris, but he left the school only three short years later, in 1875, due to health reasons. Together with his
mother, he moved back to the south of France, and its gentler climate.
In 1878, Henri broke his left thigh as he was getting up out of a chair. Bed-ridden, he spent his time reading, drawing and
painting. A year later and just barely recovered from his first injury, he broke his other thigh whilst taking a walk with his
mother. The growth of his legs was stunted forever, and he never grew taller than 5 feet. There is much speculation about
the causes of the painter's medical condition. From the evidence we have today, it is probable that he suffered from
brittle bone disease (osteogenesis imperfecta), a genetic disorder that prevents bones and connective tissues from
developing properly. Osteogenesis imperfecta was not uncommon among the European aristocracy, and this would
explain Henri's physical frailty and other symptoms. Be that as it may, his illness was never identified during his lifetime,
and nothing his mother and his doctors undertook would help.
Meanwhile, Henri continued to pursue art. By 1880, he had produced as many as two and a half thousand works, in a
variety of techniques. Encouraged by his uncle Charles and by Princeteau, he eventually managed to convince his
mother to allow him to return to Paris to study art. In 1881, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec set up residence in Princeteau's
Paris studio.
In 1882, the young artist was accepted into the studio of the famous painter and art teacher Leon Bonnat. However,
Bonnat took an immediate dislike to Toulouse-Lautrec, who, already then, had something of a caustic personality. The
two did not get along well, and after Bonnat became a professor at the Paris Academy of Art, Lautrec quit his studio and
began to study, instead, under Fernand Cormon. Cormon was a talented artist in his own right, and an enthusiastic
teacher, and his workshop attracted many young painters who would later be among the shapers of the art world.
Under Cormon, Toulouse-Lautrec explored many styles and techniques. He received a firm grounding in academic
painting, but Cormon also encouraged his students to explore Impressionism and contemporary directions in art. Two of
the painter's works from this period are the Artist's Mother (1883) and the Young Routy at Celeyran (1883).
In 1883, Lautrec had his first romantic liaison with Marie Charlet, a 17-year-old model. The painter would have many
affairs over the course of his rather brief life. All of them would be with women far below his station, and none of them
were very long-lasting. Although the artist immersed himself in the life of the lower classes -- the cabarets, the dance
halls and the brothels -- he always retained an aristocratic aloofness and a sense of his own superiority. He was not
attempting to become part of that life: he was rather an unprejudiced observer; a doctor or a scientist, trying to dissect it
and give it life, in his art.
Lautrec moved into the Montmartre district in 1884. Here, he met Edgar Degas, whom he came to admire. He soon
began to frequent the district's cabarets, including the Elysee-Montmartre, the Moulin de la Galette and the Mirliton, run
by Artistide Bruant, where he displayed his works. That year, he also had his first exhibition at the Pau.
In 1886, Lautrec met Vincent Van Gogh at Cormon's studio, where the Dutch painter had come to study. They quickly
became friends, though Lautrec left the studio only a few months later, his education there concluded. This was also the
year when he met Suzanne Valadon, who modelled for him, and they began a relationship. It didn't last long; two years
later, Valadon attempted suicide and the couple broke up. See The Laundress, which is one of the artist's depiction of
his mistress.
By this point, Lautrec's art was beginning to attract greater notice. In 1887, he participated in an exhibition in Toulouse,
where he assumed a false name, in order to distance himself from his father, the Count of Toulouse. In Paris, he
exhibited together with Van Gogh. He was invited to send some of his work to the les Vingt ("The Twenty") exhibition,
taking place early in 1888, in Brussels. At the same exhibition, two years later, Lautrec had a fierce argument with the
painter Henry de Groux over the inclusion of Van Gogh's work, and challenged the Belgian to a duel. The duel never took
place, but it shows the friendship Lautrec and Van Gogh shared. Van Gogh stayed with Lautrec in Paris, not long before
his suicide in 1890. See Toulouse-Lautrec's portrait of Vincent Van Gogh.
In 1889, Lautrec participated in the Salon des Independants for the first time. He would become a frequent contributor to
the Salon's exhibitions. He spent the summer on France's Atlantic coast, yachting. This year saw the opening of the
cabaret Moulin Rouge in the Montmartre; Lautrec immediately became a regular, and would often show his work at the
establishment. In modern popular culture, the name Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec is inseparably linked to the Moulin Rouge,
and it is true that some of his most iconic work was made there, including his notorious Moulin Rouge poster of 1891 (La
Goulue), Valentin "the Boneless" Training the New Girls (1890), and others.
Though Lautrec is most famous for his depictions of Parisian night-life, he was a man of constantly-evolving interests,
both artistically and otherwise. Around 1893, moved away from the cabarets and took an interest in literature and
theater. He made his first engraving in 1891, and his later works include many lithographs, such as Les Ambassadeurs:
Aristide Bruant (1892), May Milton (1895), The Jockey (1899), and others. In 1893, he took part in an exhibition devoted
to painters and engravers. That year was important as well, because he had his first solo exhibition at the gallery of
Maurice Joyant. In this, he was part of a modern trend for the celebration of individual artistic achievement. Prior to the
late 19th Century, exhibitions had always been collective, featuring numerous artists.
Lautrec spent a lot of the time between 1894 and 1897 travelling. He visited London, Madrid and Toledo in Spain,
Brussels, Haarlem and Amsterdam. In England, the painter became acquainted with Whistler and Oscar Wilde, both of
whom he saw as role models -- the former for his art, the latter for his lifestyle. In Spain, he took inspiration from the old
masters: Velasquez, Goya and El Greco. In Holland, he studied Rembrandt, Bruegel and Hals. In Brussels, in 1895 and
again in 1897, he took part in exhibitions organized by the group La Libre Esthetique (The Free Aesthetic), the
successors to les Vingt, where his work was exhibited side-by-side with that of Cezanne, Signac, Gauguin and Van
Gogh.
His lifestyle, ever erratic, was becoming increasingly so as a result of his drinking, which was rapidly spiralling out of
control. In 1894, on a whim, he moved into one of the brothels he frequented and lived there for some time. Some works
painted from his experience there include Rue de Moulins (1894), Prostitutes Around a Dinner Table (1894), Two
Friends (1894-95), In 1896, at a private exhibition in the gallery of Joyant, he got into altercation with no less a
personage than the former King of Serbia, Milan Obrenovic, whom he called an ignorant "pig farmer". By this time, he
was descending into outright alcoholism. In 1897, he had an attack of delirium tremens, while on summer vacation at
Villeneuve-sur-Yonne. His artistic output decreased sharply, as most of his days were spent in various states of
intoxication. His health deteriorated sharply. In 1899, he was confined to a mental hospital, attracting jabs from the press.
He died on September 9th, 1901, at the age of 36, at one of his beloved mother's homes in Malrome. His last two
paintings were "Admiral Viaud" and "An Examination at the Faculty of Medicine".
Biography by Yuri Mataev
Bibliography:
Court Painter to the Wicked. The Life and Work of Toulouse-Lautrec by Jean Bouret. Harry N. Abrams, Inc. NY 1968
Toulouse_Lautrec. A Life. by Julia Frey Viking. 1994
Nightlife of Paris. The Art of Toulouse-Lautrec by Patrick O'Connor. Universe, NY.1991
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec by Herhard Gruitrooy. 1996.
Toulouse-Lautrec by Philippe Huisman and M.G. Dortu. Chartwell Books, Inc.1971
Toulouse-Lautrec His Complete Lithographs and Drypoints by Jean Adhemar. Harry N.Abrams, Inc. NY
Toulouse-Lautrec: The Complete Graphic Works by Gotz Adriani. Thames & Hudson, 1988.
H. de Toulouse-Lautrec: One Hundred Ten Unpublished Drawings by Arthur William Heintzelman, Edouard Julien, M.
Roland O. Heintzelman. French & European Pubns, 1955.
The third story in the book I am writing -
PEPPERMINT LOUNGE
NEW YORK CITY
1965 was the year I graduated from high school.
It was also the first time I took a trip WITHOUT my parents! Our high school class trip was to the 1964/1965 New York World's Fair at Flushing Meadows Park in Queens, New York.
That’s me second from the left on the bottom left photo.
The 1964/1965 New York World's Fair held over 140 pavilions, 110 restaurants, for 80 nations (hosted by 37), 24 U.S. states and over 45 corporations and remains a touchstone for many Baby Boomers who visited the optimistic fair as children, before the turbulent years of the Vietnam War and many cultural changes such as increasing domestic violence associated with the Civil Rights Movement.
However, this story is about another trip I took to New York City later that year. When I graduated from high school dad told me to get a job or he was going to throw me out of the house. Don't know if mom would let him but I didn't want to take the chance.
So my high school friend John R and I traveled around by bus applying for employment at various places. Now let me tell you about John R, a.k.a. “Roz". He was my best friend in high school and we played on the Junior Varsity and Varsity soccer team together.
I was the goalie (with the circle) and Roz is fourth from the right in the back row.
We applied with the Philadelphia Electric Company, the Philadelphia Gas Company, Frank’s Beverages (founded by Jacob Frank in 1885 ) and Sears.
Sears called me and I started working in their warehouse as a catalog order picker in the automotive supply section on July 5, 1965. This was my first full time forty hour per week job and I was hired in at a minimum wage that was $1.25 per hour at that time.
Working for Sears in 1965.
Luckily for me, dad drove past Sears going to work every day so I rode with him in the morning and he would pick me up on his way home. That was fine until I started night school in September at Spring Garden Technical Institute, which was located near downtown Philadelphia, for a mechanical drawing diploma. It was at Spring Garden, which was established in 1851 , that I would see a microwave oven for the first time in 1965.
On school nights, two nights during the week, dad would drop me off at Sears and after work I would take public transportation, a combination of bus then subway, to school. Classes were from 6 pm to 10 pm. I would get home about 11 pm from school using the elevated rail called the “El" and riding a bus.
Here are two stories from riding public transportation in Philly. I would leave work at 5 pm, take a bus and then catch the Broad Street subway (which opened September 1928 ) to school. When I would come up the stairs to the street level from the same exit each night there was a man wearing dark sunglasses selling pencils from a tin cup. It appeared that he was blind. Maybe I threw some change into the cup some nights and maybe I didn't. I had seen him twice a week from September to December. But get this. One of the first “Life Lessons” I would learn – Things are not what they always appear to be! One night I walked up the steps from the subway exit and as I walked past this man I nodded my head at him to acknowledge his presence. Guess what? He nodded back! Well I thought everybody needs a “con" and he certainly had a good one going for him so why blow his cover. This of course was one of the first coming of age lessons on the streets and there would be many more in the next few years.
The second story is certainly not a “Life Lesson” but a good story nevertheless. Coming home late at night I really didn't want to eat a large meal before going to bed so I would have a beef pot pie and a glass of Hawaiian Punch. I really enjoyed this meal and this is what I ate each night after school for two years. BTW, this meal will appear in a future story because I had told this story so many times to people I met.
Traveling on public transportation took a long time as both the bus and rail cars would make stops every few minutes to allow passengers to get on and off.
I needed a car. So I started to save what money I could from my weekly paycheck that cleared about $40.00 after taxes. The agreement with mom was I would give her 25% of my net pay which left with nearly $30.00 each week to spend or save. My goal was to buy a car on my 18th birthday in November.
On my 18th birthday I had saved a total of $200 dollars and my friend Darryl C drove me to a used car dealer not far from where I lived. We found a 1956 Buick that cost $200. Not wanting to look like this was the first time I bought a car I asked the salesman what was my guarantee and without missing a beat he replied “Son, I guarantee it will drive off this lot!”
I had my guarantee so I gave him $200 in cash (at 18 I knew nothing about having a checking account since I didn’t have any bills to pay) and I now had my first car that I could drive to work and school.
With my first car – a 1956 Buick.
Don't ask me about auto insurance either because I do not remember but I did have it. But more importantly for me I now had the means to travel on my own, without my parents, and I certainly was not going to drive to Wilson, North Carolina or Shamokin, Pennsylvania!
For anyone who was 18 years old and living near New York City THAT was the place to be since legal drinking age at that time was 18 and guess who was now 18!
I asked my friend Darryl C and his friend Lexie G if they wanted to go to New York City with me one Saturday night and they both said yes.
Of course we didn't know anything about New York City except I did listened to Joey Dee & the Starliters sing Peppermint Twist which hit #1 on the Billboard U.S. Chart in 1961 so the Peppermint Lounge was our destination.
We left Philly early one evening and drove north on U.S. Route 1 which is a major north-south U.S. highway that serves the East Coast of the Unites States.
It runs 2,369 miles (3,813 km) from Fort Kent, Maine near the Canadian - US border south to Key West, Florida making it the longest north-south road in the United States. I have always wanted to drive the entire length of this road but have not done so to date. Maybe one day?
The 45 rpm of Peppermint Twist by Joey Dee & the Starlites
On the way to New York City we stopped at a gas station that night in Princeton, New Jersey and the three of us bought Coca-Cola in bottles from a vending machine that was outside the building. The gas station was closed and we didn't think anything about it at that time.
Not sure exactly which month we made this trip but it was a cold winter day and it did get colder during the night. Snowflakes started to fall. We arrived in Manhattan, parked and started to walk around. It was near freezing and all three of us had our heavy winter coats on. We seen a U.S. Marine walking without any jacket on and thought he was one tough dude. Asking directions to the Peppermint Lounge we found our way there, parked once again, and went inside.
Whenever I’m walking in freezing weather I always think about how tough United States Marines are.
The Peppermint Lounge was a popular discotheque located at 128 West 45th Street. When the Twist craze hit in 1960 to 1961 celebrities such as Audrey Hepburn, Truman Capote, Marilyn Monroe, Judy Garland, Liberace, Frank Sinatra, Norman Mailer, Annette Funicello and even the elusive Greta Garbo would be there to listen and dance to the house band – Joey Dee & the Starliters.
But when Darryl C, Lexie G and I arrived “in the Winter of‘65” (sorry Joan Baez) it was a dump. We drank a few beers and went back to the car to drive home. By then about four inches of snow was on the ground but I knew we would be safe since that 1956 Buick was built like a tank and just about as heavy as one!
Driving back home I experience a strange occurrence that I never experience before or since. When I pushed the brake pedal down the pedal didn't move back up when I removed my foot. I'm following the existing tire tracks in the now six inches of snow on the road and I realized the brakes have frozen. Thus I tried to time the traffic lights so I wouldn't have to stop. There was little traffic during this winter storm but when did have to stop I would put both feet under the brake pedal and pull it back up. We did make it home safe and sound.
A few days later my parents received a phone call from the New Jersey State Police and wanted to speak with me. Gulp! What had I done? Seems as if that gas station we stopped at in Princeton was robbed Saturday night and someone had written my license plate number and gave it to the police. I told the police what we did and why we stopped and nothing else ever became of this.
On the front line against malaria: Army medical researchers in Kenya mark World Malaria Day 2010
By Rick Scavetta, U.S. Army Africa
KISUMU, Kenya – Hundreds of local people gathered Sunday at Kit Mikayi primary school to mark World Malaria Day 2010 with educational skits, songs and dance.
Among them was Lt. Col. Maria Bovill, director of U.S. Army Medical Research Unit-Kenya’s Kombewa Clinical Research Center – where research into the world’s first phase three clinical trial of a malaria vaccine is underway.
The daylong event offered a great opportunity for the people to share information about the advances of malaria research and reiterate prevention measures with the community, Bovill said.
“This is important for the community where we work, to recognize the advancements in malaria research and prevention,” Bovill said. “I’m proud to be a part of it.”
Crowds danced on the school’s soccer field to live music performed by local musicians who tailored their lyrics to the day’s message – wiping out malaria in Africa. People presented skits to dispel malaria myths and stress preventative measures. Screenings for malaria and HIV were available, as were immunizations and pharmacy prescriptions.
“We all hope that one day this disease will no longer be a reality of everyday life for so many people,” Bovill said, during her remarks at the event.
In the U.S., malaria campaigns over the weekend ranged from photo exhibits to baseball stadiums. In several cities, people slept outside under mosquito nets to raise awareness. Media events were held in Europe, Asia and Africa.
But the front line in the fight against malaria is arguably near Kisumu, along the shores of Lake Victoria in Kenya’s Nyanza province. Home to the Luo people, the area is where President Barack Obama’s father came from. Some of Obama’s paternal family still lives nearby. The World Malaria Day event took place a stone’s throw from Kit-Mikayi, a 70-foot tall rock formation sacred to the Luo people.
“We took time to come here today to show our local community that we are dedicated, to be here with them and recognize the fight against malaria,” said Agnes Onyango, who works alongside Bovill at the Kombewa Clinical Research Center. “We let people know that adding vaccine trials to other efforts can work, so malaria stops killing the innocent.”
In a statement released Sunday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton launched a new six-year strategy to combat malaria. The goal is to cut malaria illnesses and deaths by 50 percent in most affected countries of sub-Saharan Africa by 2014.
U.S. Army medical researchers have been combating disease in East Africa for more than four decades. In 1969, Kenya invited the U.S. Army to study trypanosomiasis, a parasitic disease transmitted by the tsetse fly. In 1973, the unit was permanently established in Nairobi, working through an agreement with the Kenya Medical Research Institute.
USAMRU-K has a staff of 12 U.S. Army Soldiers, two Army civilians and over 500 Kenyan contractors – a mix of doctors, nurses, scientists, laboratory technicians and administrative staff who work together to research, test and prevent disease. They collaborate with Kenyan health officials, U.S. civilian and military organizations, private companies and universities, plus nongovernmental organizations and non-profit foundations.
With the establishment of U.S. Army Africa, USAMRU-K is now coordinating its established missions with new Army initiatives on the continent. USAMRU-K, known locally as the Walter Reed Project, is named for U.S. Army Maj. Walter Reed, who in 1900 discovered mosquitoes transmit yellow fever. Now, USAMRU-K efforts are focused on malaria – another disease transmitted through infected mosquitoes.
With U.S. Army Africa Soldiers and U.S. Africa Command service members performing more missions on the continent, USAMRU-K’s role in Africa serves as a model for interaction in Kenya and elsewhere. Additionally, USAMRU-K studies infectious diseases those troops will face in order to determine what force health measures to implement and subsequently, protect the Soldier.
Currently, USAMRU-K is taking part in a vaccine trial that may produce the world’s first malaria vaccine for children. Research participants receive free healthcare for the duration of the three-year study, known to researchers as MAL-55. Later this year, USAMRU-K will undertake another study to gauge the vaccine’s effectiveness specifically in HIV-infected children.
Bovill, an Army dietitian with two-decades in uniform, hails from Raceland, La., a small town roughly 60 miles southwest of New Orleans. In Aug. 2009, she became the head of USAMRU-K’s Muriithi-Wellde Clinical Research Center in Kombewa, just as MAL-55 began.
Fueled by two decades of research, MAL-55 is the first malaria vaccine trial to reach this phase of study. Once proven safe and effective, the vaccine could be marketed to others, she said. The current study is the result of a partnership that includes the nonprofit Malaria Vaccine Initiative and the pharmaceutical company Glaxo Smith Kline.
At Kombewa, 1,000 children, from five to 17 months , already take part. The next step is to find 1,000 more participants as young as six weeks. That means building trust with new mothers in rural villages, who often give birth at home, Bovill said.
“Community relations is very important,” Bovill said. “The key ingredient is our staff of 70 field workers, whom we rely upon to explain the study to local people.”
During World Malaria Day, the study’s field workers – young Kenyans who interact with potential study volunteers from the community – performed a dramatic scene and recited a poem in Luo, before declaring loudly to the disease itself that they were there to “push you out of Kenya, Africa and the whole world.”
Like most people in the community, Calvin Odhiambo, 23, has firsthand experience with the disease. That motivates him as he explains the vaccine research to others.
“Today, we celebrate efforts made together to take initiative, measures to reduce or eradicate malaria – from mosquito nets and drug tests to further vaccine research,” Odhiambo said. “The community here is very optimistic.”
Sometimes people are hard to persuade, which is the reason why public events such as World Malaria Day are so important, said Maureen Ochieng, a 25-year-old field representative who is often going door-to-door to explain the study to mothers of young children.
“To one woman I said ‘go listen to the briefing, see where you end up. She went, understood what she heard and consented. She is now a very cooperative volunteer.”
In a few months, Tom Onyano Oludhe will be a father. The 25-year-old field representative for USAMRU-K's malaria vaccine research grew up hearing of people crippled with polio, a disease he saw eliminated in his lifetime. When he is out in the community discussing the malaria study with potential participants, he often thinks about how his own child may not have to endure the effects of malaria.
“It’s satisfying to know that malaria may one day be out of the question, like measles or polio,” Oludhe said. “Even more satisfying is to know that I was a part of it and how I can tell my children that. I’m privileged. “
To learn more about U.S. Army Africa visit our official website at www.usaraf.army.mil
Official Twitter Feed: www.twitter.com/usarmyafrica
Official YouTube video channel: www.youtube.com/usarmyafrica
...smiling when you have stuff on your face.
Or something like that.
January 3: Optimistic
Look. I am not the most optimistic person at all. That is just not how I am wired. I see the bad before the good. But sometimes it's refreshing to see the innocence in my little girl who seriously doesn't have a care in the world and know that it will be okay. Sure, she has her fits at times for the strangest reasons that I have yet to understand, but all in all she is happy. I need to be more like her. <3
{3/365}
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Shawn Wolfe: Nauseously Optimistic
Opening Reception
Friday, July 18 2008 (tomorrow)
7PM - 9PM
Wall of Sound
315 East Pine Street
Seattle, WA
Recent works by artist and designer Shawn Wolfe (that's me). Nauseously Optimistic features painted, photographic and sculptural works that sometimes evoke the artist's pre-millennial pre-catastrophe "Panic Now" campaign. Graphic creations take the form of rough-hewn signage drawing on the imagery and the daft/deft language of a mass-produced culture of crisis.
Show runs through August 30th.
Wall of Sound
tel. (206) 441-9880
wosound@questoffice.net
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
1619 Broadway, Theater District, Manhattan
Since its construction in 1930-31, the 11-story Brill Building has been synonymous with American music – from the last days of Tin Pan Alley to the emergence of rock and roll. Occupying the northwest corner of Broadway and West 49th Street, it was commissioned by real estate developer Abraham Lefcourt who briefly planned to erect the world’s tallest structure on the site, which was leased from the Brill Brothers, owners of a men’s clothing store. When Lefcourt failed to meet the terms of their agreement, the Brills foreclosed on the property and the name of the nearly-complete structure was changed from the Alan E. Lefcourt Building to the, arguably more melodious sounding, Brill Building. Designed in the Art Deco style by architect Victor A. Bark, Jr., the white brick elevations feature handsome terra-cotta reliefs, as well as two niches that prominently display stone and brass portrait busts that most likely portray the developer’s son, Alan, who died as the building was being planned. A remarkable number of tenants have been music publishers, but the building is also notable for attracting an evolving roster of songwriters, booking agents, vocal coaches, publicity agents, talent agents, and performers. As the popularity of big band music and jazz increased, many performers leased offices in the building, including Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, and Nat King Cole. By the early 1960s, more than 160 tenants were involved in the music industry. While not every artist associated with the so-called “Brill Building sound” actually worked at 1619 Broadway, these creative men and women produced some of early rock and roll’s most beautifully-crafted and memorable songs. Also contributing to the building’s reputation have been various commercial tenants, including such fashionable restaurants as Jack Dempsey’s and the Turf, and a succession of vast second floor nightclubs, including the Hurricane, Club Zanzibar and Bop City, where jazz briefly gained a prominent midtown venue and a wider audience in the 1940s.
DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS
Few office buildings in New York City are as closely associated with a single profession as the Brill Building. Built on speculation at the start of the Great Depression, during 1930-31, for the next half-century this 11-story Art Deco-style structure was synonymous with popular music and entertainment. A succession of tenants, including music publishers, talent agents, songwriters, and nightclubs, have contributed to the building’s legendary status. Not only were more than 160 music-related businesses based here by the early 1960s but music historian Ian Inglis has written that these talented artists brought “a new professionalism and maturity to rock and roll,” leading to the increased presence of women as performers and producers, as well as the development of the “singer-songwriter” – artists who compose and record their own material.
And Ken Emerson, author of Always Magic in the Air: The Bomp and Brilliance of the Brill Building Era, observed: “The music publishers and songwriters who worked there routinized the creation and production of rock ‘n’ roll. They smoothed the rough edges . . . Reigning in the unruliness of rock ‘n’ roll made it safe for teenage America and profitable in the mass marketplace.”3 During this period, the Brill Building became the unofficial center of pop music in the United States. While not all of the artists and companies associated with the so-called “Brill Building sound” actually leased space here, such myths demonstrate the structure’s longstanding importance, from its early ties to Tin Pan Alley and the Big Band era to the present day.
The Site
The Brill Building occupies the northwest corner of Broadway and West 49th Street. It was named for the Brill Brothers – Samuel, Max and Maurice – who operated a Manhattan chain of men’s clothing stores for more than five decades. Founded by Samuel and Maurice Brill in late 1886, their first store was located in lower Manhattan at 45 Cortlandt Street, near Church Street. The Brills began leasing the Broadway site in 1909 and a branch opened here in October 1910. The New York Times reported:
The steady growth of Times Square and the adjoining streets as the business centre of Manhattan is proved this morning by the opening of a new clothing store . . . it covers half the block on the Broadway side and 75 feet in Forty-ninth Street.
The site was originally owned by Archibald D. and Albertina Russell, who conveyed it to the financiers Moses Taylor and Percy R. Pyne (1857-1929) in 1919. The Ruspyn Corporation was established following Pyne’s death and the lease with the Brill Brothers was extended 85 years. This set the stage for a sublease to the 1619 Realty Corporation, which agreed to erect a building of at least six stories, valued at more than $400,000. In addition, the contract stipulated that any plans be approved by the Brills.
Plan and Construction
On October 3, 1929, three weeks before the stock market crash, Lefcourt announced plans to build the world’s tallest structure at the northwest corner of Broadway and 49th Street. Representing an investment of $30 million, the Chicago Tribune reported:
An arrangement already settled between the builder and his client, said to be one of
the largest business institutions in the country, is that the building shall not be less
than the height announced.
Not only would the 1,050-foot tower be much taller than the 538-foot Lefcourt-Colonial Building – the firm’s tallest project to date – but it would also have surpassed two of the city’s loftiest structures: the 1,046-foot Chrysler Building (completed May 1930, a designated New York City Landmark) and the 927-foot Manhattan Company Building (a designated New York City Landmark). In the weeks that followed, Lefcourt may have become uneasy about such ambitious plans. Though he remained publicly optimistic about the real estate market, a December 1929 article made no mention of the Brill Building’s height.16 This suggests that he had difficulty financing the tower or that the original height was being reconsidered, and subsequently, reduced.
Despite a tough economic climate, the project eased forward. Lefcourt and the 1619 Realty Company finalized the purchase of the lease from the Brill Brothers in January 1930 and in March 1930 plans (NB 46-1930) for a much lower structure were submitted to the Department of Buildings. The New York Times commented: “No definite statement could be obtained yesterday regarding the reason for changing the plans.”17 Bark was identified as the architect and the owner was the Ruspyn Corporation, with Percy P. Pyne as president. It was described as ten stories tall, with a penthouse, stores, bank and offices. The estimated cost was modest, $1 million. Initially called the Alan E. Lefcourt Building, construction began in May 1930 and the exterior work was completed in late November 1930.
Design
The Brill Building is a handsome example of the Art Deco style.
Especially popular with New York City real estate developers from the mid-1920s to the early 1930s, it grew out of Beaux Arts classicism and included decorative elements associated with structures erected at the Paris Exposition des Arts Decoratifs & Industriels of 1925, as well as other European styles. Prior to this period, American architects tended to find inspiration in historical forms, borrowing ideas not only from classical sources, but also from medieval and Byzantine models, as illustrated in such designated New York City Landmarks as: the New York Times Building (various architects, begun 1912) on West 43rd Street, the American Radiator Building (Raymond Hood, 1923-24) on West 41st Street, and the Bowery Savings Bank (York & Sawyer, begun 1921-23) on East 42nd Street. In contrast to subsequent architectural trends, particularly following the Second World War, Art Deco buildings are frequently distinguished by low decorative reliefs, vivid colors, and unusual materials.
Times Square has relatively few buildings of this style. This can be explained by the fact that most theaters were completed before 1925 when variants of neo-Classicism were at the height of popularity. With few sites open to development, only a small group of neighborhood structures would reflect the new fashion; surviving examples include: the Manufacturer’s Trust Bank (Dennison & Hirons, 1927-28, now a theater and stores) at the northwest corner of Eighth Avenue and 43rd Street; the Film Center Building (Ely Jacques Kahn, 1928-29, a designated Landmark Interior) at 630 Ninth Avenue; the Edison Hotel (Herbert J. Krapp, 1930-31) on West 47th Street; and the McGraw-Hill Building (Raymond Hood, 1930-31, a designated New York City Landmark), at 330 West 42nd Street.
In designing the Brill Building, Bark divided the Broadway and 49th Street facades into three distinct sections: a three-story base, a seven-story shaft, and penthouse. These elevations are faced with mainly white brick but the base, the central window bays, and the top story incorporate light-colored terra-cotta reliefs. This cast material was favored by early 20th-century architects as a less costly but attractive substitute for carved ornament. While some architects used it extensively, covering entire facades, as in the Woolworth Building (Cass Gilbert, 191013, a designated New York City Landmark), in most instances it was used selectively to enhance specific architectural features and to enrich setbacks on the upper floors. Though the source of this building’s terra cotta has yet to be identified, it may have been produced by the Atlantic Terra Cotta Company (active 1907-43), which supplied similar decorative reliefs to several contemporary buildings in Times Square.
This Brill Building has mostly conventional, one-over-one fenestration, but the three-story base is almost entirely glazed with a distinctive combination of gridded and fixed window panes.
The main entrance was positioned at the center of the Broadway facade, opening to a small foyer and a deep hallway that leads to an elevator lobby along the west side of the building. Though the width of the entrance is relatively narrow, Bark used eye-catching materials to highlight it. Three gleaming brass-finished doors are flanked by polished black granite piers, topped with brass cruciform details that extend up and slightly cover the base of the second-story windows. The elaborate door surround features a grid of windows that resembles a ziggurat. These windows illuminate the foyer and provide visual support for the niche that contains a bust. Set on a pedestal, flanked by elaborate scrollwork and ascending panels incorporating slim vertical reliefs, the brass sculpture sits in an elaborate faceted niche, crowned by a keystone. The John Hartell Company is likely to have been responsible for executing these dazzling features since it recently had collaborated with Bark on the Lefcourt-Colonial Building.
At the corner of each facade, above the storefronts, the outermost window bays are flanked by double-height pilasters. These flat, brown pilasters are crowned by square reliefs that suggest capitals, a device frequently used by contemporary architects. Between the second and third floors is a continuous band of polychrome (bluish gray and pink) terra-cotta reliefs. Aligned with each set of metal-framed windows, these panels are divided into three sections. The distinctive treatment of these floors suggests that the interior spaces were designed for a specific purpose. Not only would these decorative elements attract attention to the lower floors but the continuous fenestration permitted generous views south toward the heart of Times Square.
To gently lead the eye up both elevations, Bark used recessed terra-cotta panels above the three center window bays. These white panels contain foliate reliefs, crowned by a wave-like horizontal band that functions as a window sill. To cap the uppermost windows, a narrower panel was used. Less tall than the rest, it has clipped corners that when viewed together with the brick pilasters suggest curtains being pulled open. At this level, the architect also added six raised terra-cotta circles above the three side window bays. The 11th floor penthouse, recessed from 49th Street and disguised by a stepped gable, incorporates a large masonry or terra-cotta bust set into a niche, flanked by round arched windows. This massing is decorative – not only does it hide the penthouse but this feature recalls the developer’s original intent to construct a much taller structure since taller buildings were generally required to have setbacks.
Roof-top signs also contribute to the Brill Building’s character and its historic role in Times Square. Since as early as 1934, it has served as a platform for a steel framework that supports colorful illuminated signs. Long-term advertisers have included Camel cigarettes (1934) and Budweiser beer (c. 1958). Set atop the penthouse, at an angle to Broadway, these multi-story billboards face south and enjoy great visibility.
The Portrait Busts
Above the Broadway entrance, incorporated into the brass window surround, is a small niche displaying a bust. This sculpture, as well as the slightly larger masonry (possibly terra cotta) bust installed at the penthouse level, has frequently been interpreted as a portrait of Alan E. Lefcourt, for whom the building was originally named and who died two months before the architect filed plans with the Department of Buildings. In both busts, the subject is portrayed as dressed in a three-piece suit and tie. Whereas the head in the 11th-floor niche faces directly forward, the brass bust is turned slightly to the left.
Figurative sculptures, set into niches and roundels, were an important part of the ecclesiastical tradition in Europe, used on church facades to represent saints and occasionally religious patrons. In the late 19th century, terra-cotta sculptures of historical figures were sometimes used to decorate the exteriors of institutional structures, such as the six large portrait heads on the Brooklyn Historical Society (1878-81, part of the Brooklyn Heights Historic District) by Olin Levi Warner, and a series of portrait busts portraying figures from antiquity and physicians on the Deutsches (German) Dispensary (1883-84, a designated New York City Landmark), 137 Second Avenue, Manhattan.
In terms of commercial structures, the print dealer Frederick Keppel embellished the facade of 4 East 39th Street (George B. Post, 1904) with the “first permanent memorial” to the painter James McNeil Whistler,19 as well as a portrait of Rembrandt van Rijn, and above the entrance to the Gainsborough Studios (1907-8, a designated New York City Landmark), 222 Central Park South, is a bust of the 18th-century English portrait and landscape painter. In Times Square, at least two buildings display portraits connected to the performing arts: the elaborate north entrance to the Lyric Theater (Victor Hugo Koehler, 1903, now the Hilton Theater), 214 West 43rd Street, includes portraits of the light opera composer Reginald De Koven, for whom it was built, as well as Gilbert & Sullivan, and the south facade of the I. Miller Shoe Store (1926, a designated New York City Landmark) contains three full-length portraits, set into gilt niches.
Chosen by popular vote, these sculptures represent leading actresses in their most famous theatrical roles.
The busts on the Brill Building are especially unusual because of their personal nature. When former New York governor Samuel Tilden built his house on Gramercy Park (Vaux & Radford, 1881-84, a designated New York City Landmark), he decorated the lower facade with small brownstone portraits of his favorite authors. While caricatures of individuals are sometimes incorporated as building details, such as the architect, owner, and engineer flanking the elevators in the Woolworth Building, the central and conspicuous placement of the two busts on the Brill Building is notable. Born in 1912, Alan E. Lefcourt gained some notoriety at the age of twelve when his father, Abraham, gave him ownership of a $10 million office building, to be erected at the southwest corner of Madison Avenue and 34th Street. Abraham reportedly said that he wished to “inculcate in his son . . . a sense of thrift and responsibility.”
Alan, however, was unable to enjoy the financial returns anticipated by his father – a victim of anemia, he died in February 1930.
The only known contemporary account that mentions the brass bust appeared in November 1932, as part of Abraham Lefcourt’s New York Times obituary: “Alan died, he put up an eight-story building with his son’s bust over the entrance.”21 In 1990, David Dunlap speculated that the penthouse niche displays the “bust of the developer, Abraham E. Lefcourt.” More recently, in 1999, New York Times reporter Daniel B. Schneider wrote: “The subject of the two busts is uncertain . . . Evidence suggests that the one on the 11th floor is Abraham E. Lefcourt, the building’s developer, and that the other, is his son.”22 Such interpretations may be based on the fact that both died early, well before average age. While it seems likely that the brass portrait is, in fact, a memorial bust, the other bust was installed by September 1930 – more than two years before Abraham’s untimely death, suggesting that it, too, represents the son, or, perhaps, an idealized male tenant.
Music Tenants
A rental office opened in September 1930. With “new automatic-stop, high-speed elevators” and plans for a ground floor shopping lobby, early leases were reportedly signed with “public utility companies, law firms, certified public accountants and other professional interests.”23 Despite confident accounts in the press, a great many units remained vacant. Contemporary telephone directories list relatively few tenants and a 1934 photograph shows a two-story-high banner advertising “OFFICES” across windows along the east edge of the 49th Street facade. Furthermore, many windows were without shades or blinds, suggesting that considerable space remained available.24
The Brill Building was planned as “executive office space” with floors that could be subdivided.25 When this initial strategy failed, smaller spaces were created and leased – the kinds of offices that appeal to wide variety of businesses. It was under these circumstances that the popular music industry found a new base in New York City, from the last years of Tin Pan Alley to the dawn of rock and roll. Phone directories indicate there were approximately 100 entertainment-related tenants in 1940, and as many as 165 by 1962. These included an evolving roster of songwriters, music publishers, booking agents, vocal coaches, publicity agents, talent managers, and performers.
Early tenants tended to be music publishers, some with ties to Tin Pan Alley. They included the T. B. Harms Company,26 one of the earliest American firms to profit from the sale of sheet music to musical stage shows; Mills Music Inc.,27 headed by Jack and Irving Mills (aka Joe Primrose), a major independent publisher of sheet music and jazz recordings; Famous Music, established in 1928 by Famous-Lasky Pictures (later Paramount Pictures) to produce and publish songs from film musicals; Southern Music Company, founded by music scout and engineer Ralph S. Peer in 1928; Crawford Music Corporation (B. G. De Sylva, Lew Brown & Ray Henderson); and lyricist/composer Irving Caesar, one of the building’s longest tenants, who wrote more than 700 songs and continued to lease space until the 1970s.
According to the Times Square Alliance, of more than 1200 songs performed on the popular radio and television program Your Hit Parade (1935-58), 404 songs, about a third, originated with Brill Building tenants.29 Other 1930s tenants included numerous attorneys; Hyman Caplan, a boxing promoter; theater producer George Choos; as well as the management offices of the Ben Bernie, Earl J. Carpenter, and George Olsen orchestras.30
As the popularity of jazz and big bands grew in the late 1930s, many popular groups, some with ties to music publishers in the building, leased offices in the Brill Building, including Cab Calloway, Tommy Dorsey (aka the Embassy Music Corporation, 11th story penthouse), and Duke Ellington. Ben Barton, a former vaudevillian, founded the Barton Music Corporation in 1943. A close friend of Frank Sinatra, who performed with Dorsey’s orchestra in the early 1940s, Barton’s firm published and controlled much of the singer’s best-known compositions, as did a related tenant, Sinatra Songs, until the mid-1960s.31 Vocalists Nat King Cole and Louis Prima had offices here in the 1950s, as did the influential radio disk jockey Alan Freed, Roost (later Roulette) Records, the music publishing companies Charles K. Harris and Harry von Tilzer, and the celebrated songwriting team of (Johnny) Burke & (Jimmy) Van Heusen.
The heyday of the Brill Building was during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Not only were there more music-related tenants here than at any other time, but these tenants helped make rock and roll music part of the American mainstream. Music historian Ian Inglis wrote: “it is one of the few buildings whose name many readily evoke a particular period or circumstance – along with, for example, the Cavern, Graceland, Studio 54, and Harlem’s Apollo Theater” (1913-14, a designated New York City Landmark and Interior). Though not every artist, songwriter, and producer associated with the building, particularly Aldon Music, actually leased offices here, a remarkable number did. In his 2003 essay on the building’s legacy, Inglis summarized:
Stylistically, its innovations can be credited with much of the responsibility for the increased presence of women as performers and producers of popular music, and for the development of the singer-songwriter. Industrially, its working practices and policies informed many of the changing emphases – and responses to them – characterizing the organization and implementation of the commercial operations of popular music. Creatively, it has been seen as a major source of inspiration for performers and musicians within a variety of popular music genres.34
One of the most significant tenants during this period was Hill & Range Songs, founded by Jean and Julien Aberbach in 1948. Located in the 11th-story penthouse, this publishing company had numerous subsidiaries, including Big Top, Rumbalero and Gladys Music. Among the talented songwriters on their staff were (Jerry) Leiber & (Mike) Stoller, who wrote numerous hit songs for Elvis Presley and other artists, as well as the songwriting team of Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman – all members of the Rock and Roll and Songwriters Hall of Fame.35 Red Bird Records, specializing in “girl groups,” was founded by Leiber & Stoller and was based on the ninth floor during the mid-1960s. Other memorable songwriting tenants included the team of Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich, who were associated with Red Bird and other recording labels.
Composer Burt Bacharach and lyricist Hal David met at Famous Music in 1957 and together would write more than one hundred songs for films and Broadway productions, as well as the singers Dusty Springfield, Dionne Warwick, and Tom Jones. David recalled:
The preponderance of songwriters were in the Brill Building, the energy was in the Brill Building, the publishers were there, and if you had to be someplace else, you always wound up back at the Brill sometime during the day.
[he and Bacharach] started out in New York and met almost every day in the Brill building for about 17 years . . . It was still filled with music publishers when we were there. We wrote in the same little room with an upright piano. Eventually, we moved back and forth between New York and Los Angeles.39
Starting the late 1960s and 1970s, the number of tenants in the entertainment industry began to decline – many moved to Los Angeles – with only a fraction remaining today.40 They include: Charing Cross Music, Paul Simon Music; Sound One, an audio post-production facility; KMA Music, a recording studio; Saint Nicholas Music, founded by songwriter Johnny Marks in 1949 and specializing in popular holiday songs; and Broadway Video, an entertainment company and film distributor founded in 1979 by television/film producer Lorne Michaels.
Commercial Tenants
The base was planned for retail use, with street level shops and related tenants on the second and third floors. One of the first businesses to sign a lease was Joseph Hilton & Sons, a chain of men’s clothing stores. To be located at the corner of 49th Street, the New York Times reported: “This lease, one of the largest that has been closed for many months in the Times Square district” was valued at almost $1 million.41
Hilton & Sons, however, never moved into the building and this space became part of a much larger store operated by Brill Brothers, the property’s lessee. Their clothing store opened in August 1932, with ample display windows, shaded by retractable awnings, extending along both Broadway and 49th Street. On opening day, an advertisement boasted that it was:
Distinctively a “man’s store” . . . a shopping place all his own . . . in all New York there are few men’s stores so fine . . . so modern . . . so satisfying. Men who know you, and know what you want will make you feel “at home” as soon as you enter. May we have the pleasure of showing you around? 42
During the 1930s, the company had as many as four branches, with stores at 49 Cortlandt Street, Seventh Avenue and 35th Street, and 41st Street, near Madison Avenue. Max D. Brill (18661938) retired in 1930 and Samuel Brill (b. 1859) died in 1931, leaving Maurice Brill (18691951) as head of the business. Brill Brothers closed in spring 1940 and the corner space was leased to the Turf Restaurant.43
Because of the proximity to Times Square and the second location of Madison Square Garden (Eighth Avenue and 50th Street, demolished), many of the new tenants were involved in the entertainment industry. Though the ground floor was planned for stores, the earliest tenant to open was actually a pair of movie theaters operated by the Trans-Lux Movies Corporation. Located to the right of the Broadway entrance, the New York Times said it was:
Constructed in modern style, with a silver and black design, the two houses have
turnstiles instead of doormen, daylight projection, and other innovations.
The Trans-Lux opened in May 1931, with one screen devoted to short features and the other to sound newsreels. To celebrate the opening, U.S. President Herbert Hoover wired Courtland Smith, the sponsor:
I extend congratulations on the opening of your New York theatres. The showing of new pictures throughout the country cannot but be educational and instructive. The bringing of world events into the lives of great numbers of our people will serve to promote better understanding and closer world relations.45
In late 1937 the theaters closed and the space was leased to Jack Dempsey.46 It was one of several businesses owned by the famed prize fighter, who held the world’s heavyweight title from 1919 to 1926. With a streamlined storefront and interior, napkins described the “Broadway Bar and Cocktail Lounge” as “The Meeting Place of the World.”47 Dempsey remained a prominent celebrity and the restaurant attracted both fans and musicians. It stayed at this location until 1974, when it closed following a dispute with the building’s new owner. At this time, the New York Times described it as “one of the last survivors of the Damon Runyon era of Broadway.”48
In 1940, the large corner space became the Turf Restaurant, operated by Jack Joseph Amiel and Arnold Ruben. One location in a small chain, it gained particular notoriety in 1951 when Amiel’s horse, Count Turf, won the Kentucky Derby. The restaurant specialized in lobster and steak (often called Surf and Turf), as well as cheesecake. Amiel, who later became a part owner of Jack Dempsey’s, sold his interest in 1957 and the Turf closed in 1963. Popular with songwriters and musicians, Duke Ellington was a frequent customer at the Turf and aspiring actor Sidney Poitier worked as a dishwasher – his first job in New York City – during 1943.
Since about 1974 the corner storefront has been leased to Colony Records, also known as the Colony Record Center. Founded by Harold S. (Nappy) Grossbardt and Sidney Turk by 1948, the store was formerly located at Broadway and 52nd Street, where it developed a reputation as a gathering place for musicians. In recent decades, Colony has specialized in vintage records, sheet music, karaoke software, and souvenirs devoted to the theater district.
Nightclubs
The vast second floor was initially leased to the Paradise, a popular cabaret. Reached by stairs, located directly left of the Broadway entrance, it covered approximately 15,000 square feet and held as many as a thousand people. Planned by the celebrated architect and interior designer Joseph Urban, the cost of construction was estimated at $500,000.49 Large signs, obscuring the second-floor windows and projecting at an angle over the corner, claimed it was “America’s foremost restaurant” with the “world’s most beautiful girls.” Floorshows, sometimes called “Paradise Parades,” were accompanied by such well-known performers as the Paul Whiteman Orchestra and Glenn Miller.50
During the 1940s, this space housed a succession of clubs associated with the growing popularity of jazz. Some Harlem nightspots opened midtown locations, offering big band music and later bebop. The Paradise closed in late 1939 or 1940 and became the Hurricane, with “palm trees, tropical flora and fauna” evoking the Pacific Ocean island of Tahiti.51 Operated briefly by lawyer David J. Wolper, who reportedly received ownership as part of a 1942 financial settlement with a gangster, it had a troubled existence, marred by suspicious fires and “stench bombs.”52 Duke Ellington headlined at the Hurricane during 1943 and 1944 and some of these performances were aired nationally on the Mutual and Columbia Broadcasting Systems.
Club (Café) Zanzibar occupied the second floor from approximately 1944 to 1948. Ellington frequently performed here, as well, as did the Nat King Cole Trio, Cab Calloway, Ella Fitzgerald, the Ink Spots, and Louis Jordan.53 In 1949 it became Bop City, managed by Ralph Watkins, formerly of the Royal Roost, a legendary jazz venue. He told the United Press that his staff would dress in “bop fashion,” wearing berets and polka-dot ties and that “some will sport goatees, which are popular among bop players.”54 It debuted with Artie Shaw and Ella Fitzgerald on April 14, 1949; subsequent headliners included Louis Armstrong, Nat King Cole, the Dizzy Gillespie Orchestra, and Sarah Vaughan. The club also maintained an enlightened policy of hiring “mixed waiters,” meaning waiters of different races.55 Despite presenting celebrated performers, Bop City struggled to find a consistent audience and closed in 1950 or 1951. In subsequent years, it functioned as the Avalon Ballroom, closing around 1966.
Later History
The Ruspyn Corporation sold the building to the Inch Corporation, later known as Breecom, in 1966.56 Allan Rose’s AVR Realty Company sold it to Murray Hill Properties and Westbrook Partners in 2007, who sold the property to Stonehenge Partners, Inc. (with INVESCO Real Estate of Dallas, Texas) in November 2007.
The Brill Building has been featured in a handful of feature films, including The House on 92nd Street (1945) and the Sweet Smell of Success (1957), in which the gilt lobby appears, as well as in several Woody Allen productions: Broadway Danny Rose (1984), Hollywood Ending (2002), and Anything Else (2003).57
Description
The 11-story Brill Building, 1619 Broadway, is located at the northwest corner of Broadway and West 49th Street. On Broadway, the facade is divided into three sections: a three-story base, a seven-story shaft, and a single-story penthouse. The main entrance is located at the center of the ground story. Flanked by polished black granite piers, capped with elaborate brass metal work, the entrance features three brass doors with glass panels and handles on the left, surmounted by a sign for the building in capital letters set against a black background, gridded glass windows configured like a ziggurat, and a richly-decorated niche for the bust of the developer’s son set on a pedestal. The stores, located on either side of the Broadway entrance, have non-historic display windows and non-historic illuminated signage. The south storefront has a corner entrance, opening onto both Broadway and 49th Street. Established by 1964, this angled configuration incorporates cast-concrete piers.
The second and third stories have large windows flanked by pairs of masonry piers at either end. Each pier, as well as the simple cornice that extends above the third-story windows is tinted brown, suggesting the use of a non-historic coating. The second floor windows are slightly taller than the third story. Between the floors are pink, yellow, and blue terra-cotta reliefs. Each window bay is divided into three sections. The wide center section contains a single fixed panel above a multi-pane sash. The vertical side windows are arranged in six-over-six or nine-overnine grids. The northernmost window on the second floor has been replaced by a non-historic, tripartite ventilation grille, with horizontal metal louvers. On the third floor, the third window bay from the corner of 49th Street has been altered by the replacement of the center fixed-panel and-sash with horizontal metal louvers.
The fourth through the eleventh floors are faced with white brick. There are nine pairs of one-over-one windows across each floor, flanked by continuous piers. The three pairs of windows at the center of the facade are crowned by white foliate terra-cotta reliefs that incorporate a sill on top. Above the tenth floor, these terra-cotta reliefs have no sill and feature concave corners. In contrast, the three pairs of side windows display no ornamentation other than small circular reliefs above the tenth story. The top of the stepped penthouse level is trimmed with thin bands of terra-cotta relief. At center is an elaborate faceted niche, trimmed with terra cotta, that displays a possibly limestone bust on a projecting pedestal. To either side are small arched windows, with stone or terra-cotta sills.
The West 49th Street facade faces south. The base and upper floors are similar to the Broadway facade, with identical white brick and terra-cotta embellishments. The west end of the ground story, which incorporates a secondary entrance and loading area, is non-historic. Above the tenth story are small circular reliefs, as well as a raised parapet at center. Near or at the west end of the 2nd, 5th, and 8th floors, the windows have been replaced with metal ventilation grilles.
The south end of the west (rear) facade is visible from 49th Street. Here, due to the curved east corner of the tan brick Ambassador Theater (1919-21), two rows of windows can be seen, as well as a blank brick wall that steps up toward the center of the building, and a single metal pipe on the roof. Two windows on the eighth floor contain ventilation grilles.
The north facade is simply treated and partly visible from Broadway and 50th Street, where the upper floors can be seen above the adjoining building, as well as part of the west (rear) facade, including an engaged structure with a single window, possibly containing stairs. To the south, at the rear of the 11th story penthouse, are two additional floors. The east and north-facing facades contain simple windows with industrial sash. The rest of the north facade (fifth to tenth floor) incorporates four sets of windows; the outer sets are grouped in pairs, the inner two sets, in groups of three. At the center of this facade is a projecting rectangular chimney shaft. Between the west pair of windows, a single metal pipe extends the full height of the façade. Most are three-over-three industrial sash, except where projecting metal ventilation ducts have been installed. On the lower floors, beside the roof of the adjoining building, the windows have vertical security bars.
Air conditioning units have been installed in a small number of windows, as well as some horizontal ventilation grilles. Two electric lights are attached to the center of the facade, below the seventh floor, directed down onto the adjoining roof. On the roof, set at a slight angle to Broadway, is a metal framework that displays two illuminated non-historic signs facing north and south.
- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
www.ibtimes.com/election-2016-bernie-sanders-nyc-fundrais...
Outside of the Town Hall theater on West 43rd Street in Manhattan, a crowd of smiling and optimistic people Friday overflowed into the one-way street. Delivery trucks and yellow taxi cabs creeped by, their engines engaged in a shouting match with Bennet Weiss, a man who bore a fleeting resemblance to the Democratic presidential candidate they were all there to support.
"We don't have billions of dollars! All we have are people wearing Bernie pins," Weiss yelled, a large black umbrella covered in Bernie Sanders campaign pins at his feet, catching drops of sweat from his brow. The Occupy Wall Street protester-turned-Sanders supporter urged the crowd to wear the pins at all times with no exception -- even in the shower -- and gave them away freely to anyone who said they didn't have enough cash to afford to pay the suggested donation.
That's the kind of populist support Sanders' campaign has steadily been attracting since the U.S. senator from Vermont formally announced his candidacy in late April. Friday was no exception, with passion-filled people who think Sanders has proved himself the worthy champion of causes they care about the most, such as income inequality, climate change, Wall Street reform and further healthcare reforms. But, perhaps most importantly, they also think he can win the White House.
"Absolutely" he can win, said Joe Trinolone, 30, a former finance industry worker from Long Island, New York, who is studying mathematics at St. Joseph's University. "I mean, he's winning right now."
Sanders, during a fundraising speech Friday, ticked through the policies he cares about and areas of change he wants to see in Washington should he become president. At each turn, his blend of outrage, optimism and sly sarcasm brought raucous cheers from the crowd of 1,100. He rejected recent Wall Street Journal criticism of the high price tag of his proposals, including making public colleges and universities free, lowering so-called real unemployment by pumping funding into infrastructure repairs for the nation’s roads and bridges and implementing a universal healthcare system.
Instead, he pointed to European nations that already have those programs. He implored the crowd to think about what many of them were already talking about: that taking on the big-money interests in the United States that impede those sorts of policy changes is a shared moral obligation.
“Welcome to the revolution,” Sanders said, describing what he believes must happen to American politics. “We can accomplish all of this and more.” And the crowd ate it up.
When asked why they support Sanders, many described his candidacy as a movement. They love his policies, and have a hard time thinking of much they don’t like about him. They especially like that he has been a consistent voice during his time in Washington. That’s a big perceived difference between Sanders and his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Those "feeling the Bern" were split on whether they would consider voting for her if she becomes the nominee. Many were newcomers to political action but felt compelled to join the fray when they heard Sanders and his message.
“I’ve never been excited about a politician my entire life,” said Meira Marom, 34, a Brooklyn third-grade teacher with a master's degree in creative writing. When Marom started seeing social media posts about Sanders and reading about him, she decided to stop focusing her personal time on writing for herself. She now writes and publishes something about Sanders every day -- Dr. Seuss themes every Sunday, poems and parodies. “I decided this is the most worthy cause to put my rhymes to use.”
Sanders has seen an unexpected rise in the polls since he joined the race for the Democratic nomination shortly after the current national front-runner Clinton announced her candidacy. While Sanders was trailing Clinton by 21.4 percent in national averages of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, a look at early nominating states like Iowa and New Hampshire paints a different picture of vulnerability for Clinton and strength for Sanders.
The two candidates are tied in Iowa, which constitutes a dramatic drop for Clinton and an impressive surge for Sanders, who has been distancing himself from Clinton in New Hampshire at the top of the Democratic pack since Aug. 25, when he jumped past her in the state for the first time. He currently leads there by 10.5 points.
The candidates are noticeably different in many ways, from policy prescription to fundraising strategy.
Clinton has moved leftward since announcing her candidacy, but she is still threatened by the populist appeal of Sanders, who has long championed the causes that seem to be coming into grace for the Democratic Party. While the candidates currently hold some very similar positions on issues such as immigration reform, gay rights, gun control and campaign finance reform, Sanders has been able to stake out positions to the left of Clinton on other issues that excite some vocal voters.
Among them are his strong anti-war and anti-government surveillance positions as well as his distaste for President Barack Obama's Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal. Sanders also has been a vocal critic of Wall Street and champion of financial reforms, and his stance on those issues has drawn attention to Clinton's cozy relationship with Wall Street executives and the huge paychecks she has received for speeches to large banks since leaving the U.S. State Department. For some Sanders supporters, though, the perception that Sanders has been a consistent proponent of these liberal policies, and cares about them more than winning, is key.
“It’s the message that supporting Bernie Sanders is not just voting on a horse in the race” that attracts Brian Dillon, a 28-year-old self-employed Web designer and developer for e-commerce, said Friday. Dillon has voted just one time in his life, but he has been organizing meetings to drum up support for Sanders.
Sanders's fundraising portfolio also is the reverse of Clinton's. While the former secretary of state is expected to spend somewhere north of $1 billion should she win the primary and head into the general election for 2016, the same has not been said of Sanders. Currently, Clinton has raised, through her campaign committee and super PACs associated with the campaign, $47.5 million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Sanders, on the other hand, has raised just shy of $16.5 million, according to CRP data.
Their most startling difference in fundraising, however, can be seen in the size of the donations they're receiving. The Clinton campaign received 82 percent of its donations from large contributors, and her top industry donors, not including retired people, so far have been lawyers, business services and the financial industry.
In contrast, Sanders relies much more on small donations, which are defined as donations totaling $200 or less. So far, 69 percent of his contributions have come from small donors, and the biggest industries that have given to his campaign have been from the education, legal and healthcare sectors.
Who are those small donors? The types of people who showed up Friday. Some said they donate $25 to $30 a month to Sanders. Some said they have donated several hundred dollars since he jumped into the presidential race. Nearly all of them mentioned they don't earn a ton of money personally. One in particular, Machumu Sakulira, said he donated $500 before attending Friday’s event.
There is “no way” he would support a Clinton ticket, said Sakulira, a 31-year-old senior political science student at the University at Buffalo. He got on a bus Thursday night at 11 p.m. and arrived in New York at 7 a.m. for the Sanders speech. He said he was going back Friday night. “Bernie represents my interest. My vote is a moral choice, I don’t give it to somebody who doesn’t deserve it.”
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