Featured in Calvin University January Series
James and Deborah Fallows will be featured in Calvin University’s annual January Series on Wednesday, January 15, 2020, 12:30 – 1:30pm EST. The 32-year-old lecture series seeks to cultivate “deep thought…
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Named to Best Books of 2019
Gracy Olmstead of The American Conservative named Our Towns to her list of Best Books of 2019, one of five in her category ‘Books About Place and Community.’ The column was also…
Reviewed by eJournal of Public Affairs
Keith Morton, PhD, a professor in the Department of Public and Community Service Studies at Providence College, recently reviewed Our Towns for the eJournal of Public Affairs. He describes the…
Referenced in The Hill’s ‘Changing America’
In his December 27, 2019 opinion column in The Hill’s ‘Changing America,’ George Washington University Professor Richard Tucker champions reversing economic decline by “starting local.” He references Our Towns and…
Looking at Libraries
Continuing the photo essay about public libraries, which showed many examples of children’s rooms and adult spaces, this collection shows some of the multitude of activities happening at public libraries. It also…
A Portrait of Public Libraries
Since Jim Fallows and I began traveling the country for American Futures and Our Towns nearly seven years ago, there has been one beat that began as a surprise to me and grew into…
Dayton, Ohio, Is ‘a Place That Knows What It Is’
Let’s take another look at Dayton, Ohio. For context, here is a report on how the city has dealt with the loss of major industries over the decades, and with the…
How Artists Build the Spirit of a Town
During our travels to towns around the U.S., Jim Fallows and I have come across several artist-in-residence programs, for example in Ajo, Arizona; Eastport, Maine; and Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The University of Dayton Is Reinventing Town-Gown Relations
It’s time for another report on Dayton, Ohio, subject of this introduction last month. A century ago, Dayton was known mainly for the things it created, from the Wright Brothers’ airplanes…
Ajo, Arizona, is the story of a better America
Take a walk through the oasis of green grass and palm trees in the central plaza of the tiny Sonoran Desert town of Ajo in southwest Arizona. You’re likely to run into…
New Jobs, New Residents, and New Possibilities
Here are news items and developments related to trends we’ve been covering in the recent “Our Towns” series, and elsewhere: The furniture business returns, and is looking for furniture-makers. In a…
An Artist-in-Residence Creates a Sense of Place
We’ve seen artist-in-residence programs in a number of the towns we’ve visited. The first was in Eastport, Maine, where we ran into Richelle Gribble, a young artist based in Los Angeles, whom I…
Report for America Goes Big
It has been another rough period for the financial models behind journalism in general, and local news outlets in particular. Last month Brookings released a sobering report about the spread of “news…
Photos Can Trigger Change in a Town
In 2008, National Geographic photographer Jodi Cobb and photographer and former Second Lady, Tipper Gore, talked about the role of photography at the then Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. The…
The Death and Afterlife of the Mall
The shopping mall has had a dramatic fall from grace. Once the veritable town square and a cornerstone of American consumerism, malls have aged into oblivion, replaced by cheaper and…
Democrats Should Talk About Place-Based Policy
Staying versus moving is one of the eternal tensions of American life. Americans have frequently moved: Consider how the geographic center of the population has shifted over the centuries, from…