5.17.2011 … Kudos and happy 125th The Charlotte Observer!

Happy 125th birthday to The Charlotte Observer, a newspaper that first began telling Charlotte’s story when it was yet a dream.

Along the way, the Observer has put forward some dreams of its own, helping to shape our region in significant ways. Some will say for the better, others for the worse, depending on a particular issue or outcome. But there is no denying that the place where we live today is a blended legacy of an aspiring city and its newspaper.

That legacy continues now as Charlotte shakes off a devastating collapse of the banking industry and the Observer rewires itself for the digital age. Neither job will be easy, which makes it an especially good time to remember how far both have come.

via A part of your world, every day for 125 years | CharlotteObserver.com & The Charlotte Observer Newspaper.

Here is a great summary of posts from around the country about Charlotte’s hosting the 2012 Democratic Convention, and the one I excerpted answered my first question.

… Democrats have not lost the convention host state since 1988, when Michael Dukakis was nominated in Atlanta.

via Democratic National Convention comments from across the U.S. | Charlotte Business Journal.

How often do official records and oral history differ? Everyone I know will remember Christmas 2010 as a white Christmas. Sounds very Grinchy to me!

oral history, media, official records, Charlotte,  headlines:

John Tomko, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Greer, S.C., says the official snow depth reading is taken at 7 a.m. Charlotte had no snow at 7 a.m., so according to weather service in Greer, S.C., Charlotte had no snow on Christmas. And the official records in Greer, S.C., will state that Charlotte’s last White Christmas was in 1947.

via Musta been a Grinch who stole our White Christmas – CharlotteObserver.com.