Recent content from Jennifer Brooks
Department of Corrections to open tattoo parlor at Stillwater prison
Minnesota prisons are getting into the tattoo businesses
Brooks: Walter Mondale's urn rich in family and history
Made by Stillwater potter Warren MacKenzie, the urn once held the ashes of Mondale's wife, Joan
Brooks: A young author checks herself into the library
Delighted librarians have turned Forest Lake fourth-grader's debut novel into de facto e-book.
Jennifer Brooks: Oh say can you see a better flag for Minnesota
Legislature gets serious about finding a state flag with less nudity and racism.
Brooks: The art of protesting the Russian Embassy
A Minnesota-born artist put his support for Ukraine into his art, then put his art where Russia's diplomats can't miss it
Brooks: A scaled-back Minnesota fishing opener tries to preserve the traditions that matter
Has Minnesota become the sort of place where political divisions mean we can't even fish together?
Brooks: Minneapolis, St. Paul volunteers give the gift of comfort food
United Way drive collects culturally-specific pantry staples
Brooks: Spring cleaning in the Camden neighborhood of Minneapolis
A north Minneapolis entrepreneur working toward the future takes out the trash.
Brooks: Closing time at Deb's Place means the end to a longtime gathering spot
In the last days of the Maplewood Perkins, regulars returned to share a few meals and memories.
Brooks: For these Minnesotans, some jobs are worth striking for
While some quit in search of better jobs, others stay to try to improve conditions at the jobs they have.
Brooks: Cheatham Avenue leads Minneapolis into its future
A street once named after the founder of the Minnesota Eugenics Society now honors Minneapolis' first Black fire captain
Brooks: Minnesota teacher who fled Kyiv bears witness for Ukraine
Class continues for Ruth Karnowski of Little Falls, who is working now from Slovakia for the sake of some of the war's littlest refugees.
Brooks: Sen. David Tomassoni won't battle ALS alone
Lawmakers, scientists and celebrities unite to fight a disease that has taken some of Minnesota's favorite Minnesotans
Brooks: Park Board takes another swing at Hiawatha golf course
Preservationists and pro golfers rally around the Hiawatha golf course
Brooks: Solar garden powering and empowering north Minneapolis
For neighbors in north Minneapolis, a solar garden represents more than just a chance for cheaper electric bills
Brooks: The COVID pandemic and Edina's broken hearts
At a time when many are eager to move on from COVID, Edina remembers.
Brooks: For lawmaker, a shooting by police hits home
Rep. Esther Agbaje was home when SWAT team opened fire in her apartment building
Brooks: Downtown boosters work on 'Reanimating Minneapolis'
Downtown Minneapolis shifts from trying to get through COVID to learning to live with it
Brooks: Minnesota's irreplaceable replacement teachers
Substitute teachers hold Minnesota schools together as the pandemic tears everything apart.
Brooks: Once upon an Ojibwe story time in Duluth
The St. Louis County Historical Society and Ojibwe authors open a new storytelling chapter.
Brooks: North Minneapolis community finds a way to get COVID tests, residents living again
When there weren't enough COVID tests to go around in north Minneapolis, a community rallied.
Brooks: A fitting final resting place among pioneers and soldiers in Minneapolis
Longtime volunteer Jack Ferman's last wish was to be buried at Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery.
Brooks: One year after Jan. 6 and deeper in denial
A violent attempt to overturn an American election should have changed everything. It didn't.
Brooks: Mpls. will change infamous street name to honor trailblazing firefighter
Capt. John Cheatham spent his life protecting the lives and property of his neighbors.
Brooks: By spit or by swab, testing is powerful pandemic weapon
If you're looking for a test, Minnesota makes it easier and cheaper than most states.
Brooks: New book celebrates Minnesota kids who didn't win at the county fair
"The Unchosen Ones" offers lessons on resilience.
Brooks: In Northfield, a student's place is in the boardroom
Youth on Boards program in Northfield shows just how much high school students can bring to the table
Brooks: On Minnesota's Give to the Max Day, a chance to help the helpers
There are so many amazing groups and causes. This is your reminder that it's possible for one act of kindness to change someone's life.
Brooks: New series turns spotlight on Twin Cities Black businesses
The new season of the show begins streaming Tuesday on Hulu and Amazon Prime.
Brooks: David Hrdlicka has been MIA for 56 years and he's still missed
His former St. John's Prep classmates spent more than a decade seeking answers. They keep going, in honor of their friend.
Brooks: Once a felon, Jason Sole is now a Minnesota criminal justice professor
This is a chance to learn about policing from someone who has been policed.
Brooks: Minneapolis voter hit with the only thing worse than an unsolicited campaign text message
If you're a woman with an opinion in public, someone will try to weaponize male anatomy against you. The number that had been texting her has been disconnected.
Brooks: A family's desperate search for COVID care for their disabled son
Malik Lewis is battling pneumonia and COVID — and the tubes and wires keeping him alive.Malik, 21, has a sweet smile, a loving family,…
Brooks: Columbus fell and state is picking up pieces
A year and a half after a dented Columbus was carted off to a state warehouse, there is still no paperwork, no procedure, no plan for where it should end up.
Brooks: In the red spaces on the election map, the DFL makes its pitch
The 11 offices outside the Twin Cities are places to organize volunteers, hold meetings and distribute yard signs ahead of next year's midterm elections.
Brooks: At the bison auction: Sold to the buffalo-est bidder
Once home to huge herds, Minnesota now has about 5,000, maybe 10,000 bison, depending on who's counting.
Brooks: Minnesota schools begin to part ways with outdated mascots
Minnesota, thousands of whose citizens fought and died to preserve the Union, is home to at least half a dozen high schools with Confederate mascots.
Brooks: Photographer seeks to show young women what real beauty is
The hope is to start chipping away at years of Instagram messaging about which of their selfies are good or bad; which of their features are flattering or flaws.
Setting the record straight on long-ago offenses
Sometimes, a misdemeanor can feel like a life sentence.It wasn't much marijuana. Enough to roll a few joints.Enough to slap a college student with a…
Brooks: Spirits in the steel at Minnesota's memorials to the World Trade Center
That broken beam in Marshall, Minn., is as close as most of us will ever get to ground zero.
Brooks: Fort Snelling archaeologists offer the public a chance to dig into history this weekend
Nothing connects you with history like holding a piece of it in your hand.
Brooks: Fort Snelling archaeologists offer a chance to dig into history this weekend
Nothing connects you with history like holding a piece of it in your hand.
Brooks: Minnesota school boards are at the breaking point
It was always a thankless job. Then came the pandemic, and a thankless job turned joyless.
Up, up and away to your (adjective) Day at the Minnesota State Fair!
After a no-fair year, the Minnesota State Fair is back. Whether you're planning to get vaccinated, mask up, and attend — or if you're sitting this one out — here's your chance to fill in some blanks and remember what makes Great Minnesota Get-Togethers so great.
Brooks: Back in the Day Festival prepares for day of joy near George Floyd Square
The 11th annual gathering promises good food, great music, local vendors, drum lines, double-dutch jump rope exhibitions and joyous reunions.
Brooks: Minnesotans aren't sure they want to get together at the Great Minnesota Get-Together this year
The delta variant is surging just as the fair is drawing thousands of people with very different comfort levels on the issues of masks, vaccines and eating horse paste.
Brooks: Small Minnesota cities hit or miss a crucial census benchmark of 5,000 strong
Census Man always knew he could count on Circle Pines.For one last time last week, City Council Member Dean Goldberg donned his cape, his mask…
Brooks: Jennifer Carnahan wants you to remember the real victim here: Jennifer Carnahan
Jennifer Carnahan wants you to remember the real victim here.The FBI had swooped in to arrest top GOP donor Anton "Tony" Lazzaro on child…
Brooks: In Minneapolis's arsenic triangle, East Phillips residents ask council for a greener future
What Minneapolis wants is not what East Phillips needs.
Brooks: Vaxxed but not relaxed? Minnesotans debate whether they'd feel comfortable at State Fair
For 3 million fully vaccinated Minnesotans who did everything right, Jennifer Brooks asks: Is it still OK to get that Pronto Pup?
Brooks: Twin Cities shops take a shot at protecting customers from COVID
More than a dozen Black-owned barber shops and salons across Minnesota have thrown open their doors to the federal Shots at the Shop initiative.
Brooks: A love letter from Jim Ramstad's hometown(s)
If you want a measure how beloved a public figure is, look to see how many different places stake a claim to them.
Brooks: Heat waves, smoke clouds and the battle to breathe easy in Minnesota
The climate is changing, and not for the better: Our bodies are choking on Canadian wildfire smoke, roasting through heat waves, then choking on wildfire smoke again.
Brooks: In Crystal, a monument to a little boy lost
If a playground seems a strange place to remember a murdered child, imagine how much worse it would be to forget.
Researchers follow trail of sex trafficking to Minnesota massage program
Something seemed very wrong at the American Academy of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine.There was a locked closet with student files the registrar could not access.There…
Brooks: A change of law, a change of heart, on the anniversary of Philando Castile's killing
The Minnesota Legislature changed the law to ban lunch shaming for good five years to the day after he died.
Brooks: Minnesota Historical Society looks to the future
In the worst days of 2020, MNHS was urging Minnesotans to be mindful of the history we're living through.
Brooks: The Women of West St. Paul give to the maxi
It was a protest that started with a creep who crept through the night in 2018 to dump a box of maxi pads on the doorstep of West St. Paul's first female mayor.
Brooks: Let Derek Chauvin's sentence be the start of the conversation
Sometimes there's no neutral ground. You stand with your neighbors or you stand against them.
Brooks: In Minneapolis, all roads lead away from Dight Avenue
Charles Fremont Dight lived in a tree and wrote fan letters to Adolf Hitler and founded the Minnesota Eugenics Society.Minneapolis named a street after him.It…
Brooks: Twin Cities Pride festival set to return after a long pandemic year
An event that usually requires six months of meticulous planning came together in a matter of weeks.
Brooks: Deona Knajdek fought so Minneapolis wouldn't look away from its pain
Deona Marie Knajdek took to the streets.Winston Smith Jr. was dead, gunned down by law enforcement on the same day city work crews plowed through…
Brooks: Metro Transit trains a new generation of bus drivers as commuters return to the commute
Experience has taught transit officials that their next bus driver could come from anywhere.
Bids roll in for a piece of the Roller Garden in St. Louis Park
Fans are eager take home a piece of the past.
Brooks: A Minneapolis neighborhood gives public thanks to Public Works
For 11 years, Mark Clark greeted neighbors and visitors to the Loring Park Greenway. Off to a new assignment, he was invited back for a party by the neighborhood.
Brooks: Orange farm in Minnesota landed PPP loan with little scrutiny
Pro Publica's review of federal Paycheck Protection Program loans turned up "fake farms in absurd places"
Brooks: A year in the life of the city that killed George Floyd
It is hard to move on when it feels like it is not over.
Brooks: Fishing opener offers the first big get-together, after year apart
Minnesotans were back together on Saturday — vaxed, relaxed and newly unmasked.
Brooks: Historic vote at Minnesota Legislature shifts the debate on marijuana
People have gotten more comfortable with cannabis in recent years. Institutions have not.
Brooks: How the census heroes saved Minnesota a seat in Congress
The state that never takes the last bite of anything snagged the last available seat in the U.S. House.
Brooks: Masked up and vaxed up, Minnesotans are ready to have fun again
A Minnesotan walks into a bar.Orders a beer and takes a seat at a table crowded with friends and happy dogs and covered with bingo…
Brooks: After attack on mosque, Moorhead refused to let hate have the last word
Volunteers drive in from miles away to help the cleanup.
A second chance for veterans gets a second chance at the Legislature
Not every county has the resources to set up a veterans courts of its own. The Minnesota Legislature could change that.
Brooks: Art thief makes off with a piece of Grand Marais history
"Woman Hauling Sticks" was a crowd pleaser at the Johnson Heritage Post Art Gallery.
