New Monument Circle Penney’s packed ’em in
By CONNIE ZEIGLER Contributing editor It really did happen one certain day. Seventy thousand people came to Downtown Indianapolis to be part of an event that wasn’t sports-related. No movie …
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Going to the dogs: When the city went all out
By CONNIE ZEIGLER Contributing editor In July 1922, Indianapolis reached a new high-water mark in its display of residents’ refinement and breeding. The event that demonstrated this watershed moment was …
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History 301: The tumultuous life and career of Frances Farmer
By CONNIE ZEIGLER Contributing editor Indianapolis movie and theater actress, television host, interior decorator and shopkeeper, Frances Farmer, is known today – if she is remembered at all – for …
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History 301: Bruce Rogers was a preeminent book designer
By Connie Zeigler Contributing editor Did you know that Bruce Rogers, considered the modern world’s most important book designer – whose most-admired work, the Oxford Lectern Bible, is protected behind …
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Indy architect unknown here, but not around world
By CONNIE ZEIGLER Contributing editor In 1969 one of the once-most-respected architects of European modernism moved to Indianapolis to take a job at a local development/architecture firm. The architect was …
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History 301: An ‘it’ couple who left a very big impression
By CONNIE ZEIGLER Contributing editor Helen McKay Steele and her husband, Rembrandt “Brandt” Steele, were the artsy “It” couple of Indianapolis in the early years of the 20th century. They …
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Before Purdue Polytechnic, before P.R. Mallory, there was Wonderland Amusement Park
this is an updated version of a feature which appeared in the May 2010 edition of Urban Times. By Connie Zeigler Contributing editor In July 2020, Purdue Polytechnic High School …
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The rest of the story: Wirt’s famed son-in-law
August’s installment of History 301 about the city’s first Black pharmacist, Wirt Smith, ended with the surprising news that his daughter, Alpha, married the famous jazz trumpeter, Louis Armstrong. This …
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History 301: Wirt Smith (who?) was an Indianapolis trailblazer
For historical accuracy, this report contains terminology which newspapers of the time period used to describe African Americans. By CONNIE ZEIGLER, Contributing editor This is the story of Wirt Smith. …
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History 301 – Madelyn Pugh: Writing the funny words for ‘I Love Lucy’
By CONNIE ZEIGLER Contributing editor For six years in the 1950s the name of former Shortridge High School student Madelyn Pugh was in 11 million homes every week, thanks to …
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