ConnCAN Success Stories

Mary Hooker School, Hartford, CT, produced by Rabbit Ears Media

Hartford's Mary Hooker School in the Behind The Rocks Neighborhood was honored with the ranking "#1 in Middle School Performance Gains" and "#2 in Middle School Improvement" according to the research of ConnCAN. This video is one of 15 highlighting successful schools in Connecticut, as evaluated by the organization Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now (ConnCAN). I was fortunate enough to work with them to produce the videos, and was able to learn quite a bit regarding the various education systems in Connecticut and the huge achievement gap. For more schools and videos, visit their Success Stories page. These videos were written and produced by Tori Truscheit.

PHH: Who will haunt the abandoned amusement park now?

In this economy.... um... In this economy... Sorry. I got nothing off that. I'm contractually obligated to start every rant with that phrase, but I don't see where I can go with that. Frankly, I'm still recovering from my overdose of peeps made out of kosher matzoh from the weekend. But man, did anyone else catch that TV miniseries last week? I swear that was the worst "Pirates" movie that Disney has ever put out. You couldn't even see Johnny Depp this time. Wait...what? That was real? Pirates??! WTF? What century is this again? In THIS economy, now we have to deal with an international seafaring crisis? (yes!) But I don't even have all the usual pirate jokes ready! OK...blue beard, shiver me timbers, swashbuckling...uhh parrots, arrr. There. Now, you can make your own hackneyed jokes, mad-lib style.

OK, raise your hand if you ever thought we'd hear NPR dominated by "what do we do about the pirates!?" stories. But seriously, there was our president, Barack Obama, just stone cold killing nefarious pirates! Wow. And all it took was several US Navy warships carrying 3 sniper bullets to take down 4 guys in a rowboat. But we won! It was an effective and heroic end to a crisis that in the past would have dragged on for months. Why, it's a pretty fun game to figure out what Bush/Cheney would have done. Here's my answer: They would have bombed Denmark and paid Halliburton to set up military bases in Argentina. So Change has indeed come to America! I just wish Obama had worked in "I will kill muthaf#cking pirates" into his campaign platform, but that probably would have made everyone downloading the latest Jonas Brothers album soil themselves.

And so, fellow ninjas, now that our enemies, the pirates, are on the run, I invite you to first stealthily infiltrate Kino Kafé at 7:30pm at La Paloma tonight for the screening of "Heavy Metal in Baghdad." Following the documentary, mystically appear from the shadows at Red Rock Tavern (Kenny's in seafaring times) for pitchers of beer and curly fries. We will discuss how we can be everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

--Capt. Richard "Sully" Phillips

New Housing on Main St.

Where did these new buildings come from? Have I been on hiatus for that long that I missed hearing about this project let alone seeing work being done on it? These new apartments are a "gateway" to North Hartford, residing at the intersection of Main Street and Belden Street. This is the historic location of the original gateway to Route 44 (to Albany Avenue). It was actually quite a sight to drive east up Belden from Albany and have this place appear. Here's hoping it provides a healthy living for it's residents.

Visit to Vernon, CT

Vernon Burying Ground photo by MiraHartford

Pic of the Day: A selection of ancient tombstones from the Burying Ground in Vernon, CT, at the intersection of Talcotville Rd. and Dobson Rd. In traditional Helder fashion, while going out to meet with a client for a commercial, I misread directions and came across this site. I've actually driven past a few times over the years, but finally had some time and handy iPhone camera to snap some shots during the daytime. You can check out the full set on my flickr page.

Looking over the set, I was reminded of how graveyards and photography seem to go hand in hand. This seems especially true of say 'youth photography'. I recall my photography class in high school and how many of us in one way form or another, took photos of graves, graveyards, memorials. It's been a while since I've gone out of my way to do photos of graves (and they're not spectacular), but it just caught my attention and needed to be done, it seemed. In the end, isn't that what graveyards are about: catching our attention to remind us of the past?

My favorite image: this tombstone and flag seem to indicate that the deceased served in the Revolutionary War.

The Hartford Demolishing Mass Mutual

Photo by Mira Hartford

Pic of the Day: The Hartford Insurance Company purchased the old Mass Mutual Insurance Company's Hartford campus and is now demolishing a large portion of this old structure. While part of the building and the outdated parking garage were pretty hideous architecture, the majority of the building seems like an amazing structure. At least the original building and entrance will remain.

I've been observing the demolition of this structure for the last few months and saddened as I see it slowly disassembled. My friend, Ken Krayeske, at The 40 Year Plan recently wrote a piece about best kind of "Green Building" that would be perfect for this economic time. Considering all the amazing architecture that Hartford has lost since the mid 50's, we really need to be doing more to preserve our historic buildings and giving them a second life. Often times, due to the time being vacant, no, these structures aren't sound enough to rehab. But more often, it seems people feel it's just expedient and cost effective to demolish. One wonders what The Hartford, with it's lovely tower of Mordor overlooking the site, will build in it's place. They've already ripped out much of the green space around it under the pretext that there was arsenic in the fertilizer; one has to wonder if more surface parking is to come invade our already overburdened city.