Tag: New York Times

New York Times Describes Decatur as “The Brooklyn of Atlanta”

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While a recent feature in the New York Times travel section went with the old, go-to “Mayberry Meets Berkeley” descriptor of Decatur, this recent blurb at the end of the New York Times’ “Atlanta For Kids” feature gets a bit more creative in describing our city.

Feel free to ignore or express your exasperation at the slightly exaggerated city population figure. 🙂

Where to Take a Field Trip

The City of Decatur, population 75,000, shares a boundary with the city. It’s essentially the Brooklyn of Atlanta, but with fewer hipsters and more strollers. The center of town is called “The Square.” It serves as a base camp for eating, play and shopping, which should include a visit to the Little Shop of Stories, a great bookstore that is a regular stop on the book tour circuit for some of the best children’s authors in the nation.

Families looking for a really local experience should head to the Decatur Toy Park at the corner of East Ponce de Leon Avenue and Nelson Ferry Road. It’s owned by a church and is the repository for seemingly every plastic wheeled vehicle and playhouse outgrown by the city’s toddlers.

New York Times Gives Decatur Some Love

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The Old Grey Lady has given a nod to ol’ Decatur and some of its local businesses in the “Surfacing” column of its Travel section.   Here’s the summary…

Equal parts molasses-drawled Southern and au courant, Decatur, Ga., has in the last 20 years recast itself from the sleepy DeKalb County seat catering to commuting government nine-to-fivers to one of the South’s trendsetters. Residents say the township, six miles from Atlanta proper, is where “Mayberry meets Berkeley.” Bordered by Emory University and Agnes Scott College, Decatur is anchored by a late 19th-century courthouse (now the DeKalb History Center) and a leafy square dense with some of the state’s best restaurants, pubs and shops. The walkable downtown hosts more than three dozen festivals a year.

Do we really have more than three dozen festivals a year?

Lucky local spots, Decatur CD, Eddie’s Attic, Kimball House, Brick Store and Sq/Ft all get shout outs. Check it out!

Photo courtesy of Kate

How Do You Talk To Your Kids About Money?

The New York Times had an interesting article in its Sunday paper about talking to your kids about money entitled “Why You Should Tell Your Kids How Much Money You Make“, which argued the benefits of teaching kids about money from a young age.

One dad in the story brings home thousands of dollars in $1 bills, which represents his monthly salary, and then separates the pile of cash out in front of his kids to demonstrate where all the household’s income goes each month.

The recommendations in the article aren’t quite that extreme – talk to your kids about the grocery bill, talk to them about the cost of their activities, etc – but it got me wondering about how much folks out there are talking with their kids about money regularly, what they’re discussing, and and how important they believe it is.

Photo courtesy of 401k 2013 via Flickr

Decatur High Mentioned in New York Times For Later Start Time

Robin points out this article on the “front page” of the New York Times website about high schools adopting later start times to accommodate “the adolescent body clock”, which includes this blurb…

The sputtering, nearly 20-year movement to start high schools later has recently gained momentum in communities like this one, as hundreds of schools in dozens of districts across the country have bowed to the accumulating research on the adolescent body clock.

In just the last two years, high schools in Long Beach, Calif.; Stillwater, Okla.; Decatur, Ga.;, and Glens Falls, N.Y., have pushed back their first bells, joining early adopters in Connecticut, North Carolina, Kentucky and Minnesota. The Seattle school board will vote this month on whether to pursue the issue. The superintendent of Montgomery County, Md., supports the shift, and the school board for Fairfax County, Va., is working with consultants to develop options for starts after 8 a.m.

Before the school system increased the school day by 30 minutes to make up for recent snow/ice days, DHS was starting at 8:30a.  Until May, DHS starts at 8:15a.

NYTimes: Braves Move Raises Questions of How to Define “Atlanta”

From the front page of the Sunday Times’ National Section and website…

…as the team makes plans to head a dozen miles northwest to a new $672 million baseball stadium in Cobb County, a regional civic conversation has begun: Is the move a blow to a city beginning to enjoy a post-recession urban renaissance, or is it a signal of a new era in which traditional assumptions about the divide between city and suburb no long apply?

…“We’ve got to make a decision — either we’re going to be a region or we’re not,” [Mayor Kasim Reed] said at a packed news briefing the day after the Braves’ announcement. “It bothers me that we have not come far enough as a community that people feel that a team moving 12 miles is a loss to the city of Atlanta.”

Kirk Road Home Restoration Featured in the New York Times

Been getting lots of folks pointing to this recent Winnona Park rehab featured over the last few days on the New York Times website.

Take a look!

Photo courtesy of the New York Times

Natasha Trethewey To Be Appointed Second Term as Poet Laureate

FM Fats points out that the New York Times and other news outlets are reporting this morning that Natasha Thethewey will be appointed to a second one-year term as the United States’ Poet Laureate.  According to the Times’ blurb…

In her second year Ms. Trethewey will travel the country for a series of reports exploring societal issues through poetry that are to appear on “The PBS NewsHour.”