Day and night, SEPTA operators witness the soul of the city. There are the regulars, Mr. and Miss So-and-so. There are hotel workers, casino workers, and fast-food workers, uniforms rumpled, coming home from the suburbs. There are suited professionals headed to Center City. There are honor students and delinquents. There are girlfriends cradling their babies […]
The 40-year-old mother, bundled in a worn jacket, walks into the basement of the People’s Emergency Center, hopeful that the past will finally fade away. Tables are staffed by eager law students with laptops supervised by two lawyers. A fledgling volunteer group, the Philadelphia Criminal Record Expungement Project, C-REP for short, holds monthly clinics at […]
There is no name on the faded mural, a blurred image of a man in a fedora, with piercing eyes. There is just a poem, about a warrior who persevered through trials and tribulations, who faced defeat too soon. It hovers above a playground of concrete, scattered trash, and two lonely swings. It is passed […]
Along the shopping strip of Woodland Avenue, between the pizza shop and an abandoned building, a wind chime carved with the Chinese symbol for luck dangles in the doorway, next to a well-used fly strip. In walks a young woman chatting in Spanish on her cellphone. A regular, she passes through a second glass door […]
Below the Church Street stop, under the roar of the El, an appliance dealer pushes a washing machine to the sidewalk, readying for the start of business. Nearby, a woman waits at a bus stop. And in front of a blue door marked by graffiti, a handful of men in ragged clothes and with life-weary […]
David Hardy believes every young man at Boys’ Latin is “the architect of his own fortune.” But to build that future, students must first pass inspection. “Hat off, sir!” a gatekeeper barks at an entering student, who quickly tucks the contraband away. “More walking, less talking,” stragglers are cautioned. On this bright, cold Friday, boys […]
On a gray morning, Deion Barnes rolls out of his narrow bed with an hour commute and four hours of lifting, running, blocking, and passing on the horizon. His season opener is in two weeks, launching the last year the championship-hungry captain will run onto a field wearing the red and black of Northeast High […]
