Author: George Johnson

The New York Times has published a “a celebration of the sandwich’s diversity in the United States” broken down into 5 basic classifications: sandwiches made on hard rolls, soft buns, sub rolls, sliced bread and “singulars”. Featured to represent the hard roll category is Charlie the Butcher’s Beef on Weck—”Buffalo’s second-most-famous foodstuff”. Warning: not an article to read on an empty stomach. photo by Nick Gray

Business First reports that construction, service, transportation, and leisure and hospitality jobs have helped increase private-sector job growth by 2 percent—”the largest growth rate in Upstate New York, according to the state Department of Labor.” That’s an increase of 9,100 jobs year-over year compared to Rochester, whose private-sector added 3,400 new jobs—an increase of 0.8 percent. photo by David McSpadden

Maybe it’s an attempt to get more money out of TV networks. Maybe it’s an effort to see just how much cash internet players are willing to spend for live sports. But NFL executives announced at the league’s owners meetings on Monday, that the league will stream its first regular season game next fall. The NFL will sell the rights for the Jacksonville Jaguars-Buffalo Bills game in Week 7 to a digital distribution company. The game will be played in London and fans in Jacksonville and Buffalo will have to stream it because no broadcaster or cable network will be carrying the game. Brian Rolapp,…

Artists, artisans, and creative people with ‘Green’ hearts… I was over at the Buffalo ReUse warehouse last week and picked up an item that will be the basis for my entry in the Buffalo ReUse, October 18th ReArt exhibit opening and 1st anniversary party. In order to promote awareness of artistic ways to use salvaged building material, Buffalo ReUse is organizing a gallery exhibit and sale at Gallery 141B in Allentown. Artists, artisans, and all creative people are invited to produce a piece for the event. I’ve got a pole that I’m seeing as a potential floor lamp. I’ll have…

You may have seen the new Saturn “Rethink American” campaign. The latest spot just started to air and focuses on modest price and lower environmental footprint as the new vogue. Eric Hirshberg, the Chief Creative Officer at Deutsch/LA said the campaign attempts to “recast a cultural moment in America through the lens of the American car”. That “cultural moment” Hirshberg references is fascinating, specifically that large ad agencies and their very large auto manufacturing clients are banking on an increasing awareness of issues like leaving smaller environmental footprints and more moderate consumption changing people’s buying patterns, specifically what they want…

After helping save the city $186.6M in it’s first three years, improving Buffalo’s credit rating, creating and increasing surpluses, the control board is seeing some significant personnel changes. The News’ Brian Meyer has the story. Brian Lipke, the board chairman whose day job is chairman and CEO of Gibraltar Industries and Robert Wilmers, chairman of M&T Bank, have both resigned from the control board. Dorothy Johnson, the board’s executive director is leaving as well. In addition to the vacancies created, three other positions which expired June 30 must be filled (2 re/appointments by Governor Spitzer and one by State Comptroller…

PUSH Buffalo and the Righteous Babe Foundation invite you to join them this Saturday, July 14 for an event to raise awareness of the continuing fight for democracy and human rights in Burma. In 1992, Aung San Suu Kyi was elected President of Burma and has lived under house arrest and oppressive conditions imposed by the Burmese dictatorship ever since. PUSH Buffalo, which fights to keep democracy alive in our own neighborhoods, will take pause Saturday to hear testimonials from Zaw Win @ Min Naing, Kyaw Wunna and Aung Moe Win, all former political prisoners currently living on Buffalo’s West…

It would be an impossible task to find someone in Buffalo who wasn’t affected by the October storm, which swept in like a freak accident, replacing crunchy autumn foliage with a flurry of snowflakes and raging wind, and leaving Buffalonians to confront a devastating blow to one of our many fond pseudonyms, the “City of Trees.” Even as a college student who could only marvel at the “Surprise Storm” from afar, I’ve found my eyes wistful on the thousands of scrubby treetops struggling to be the lush green beauties they once were, longing for the Bidwell Parkway of yestersummer. However,…

The Hasenpfeffer Club will be visiting Rochester’s famed beer bar, The Old Toad, and then going out to the ball game. Why see another town’s ball team when you can go to the Bisons? Besides the general camaraderie of the Hasenpfeffer Club, Frontier Field has one of the best beer selections in baseball! That’s right, you can sip on one of a number of Rohrbach’s beers while watching the Red Wings get destroyed by the Bisons under the lights! This trip promises to be lots of fun. Past Hasenpfeffer events have been great fun as well- last month’s trip to…

Today, a friend sent an audio file of the speech Robert Kennedy gave in Indianapolis, Indiana the night of Martin Luther King’s assassination. I’d heard of it and even read excerpts, but had never actually listened . To say it’s an amazing piece of American political rhetoric is just to repeat what so many have written before. What moved me was the transformative quality of a speech that lasted barely six minutes. This was a speech given before CNN and cell phones. King was dead but the crowd of African-American supporters Kennedy was about to address didn’t know. There had…