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Third time a charm?
Black-owned business hopes to find success at NFL training camp
Herman Baskerville is optimistic about the start next Thursday of the 2016 summer training camp in Richmond for Washington’s professional football team.
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Faith facts about GOP VP candidate Mike Pence
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence will be Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s running mate. Mr. Trump made it official July 15 — fittingly in a tweet.
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Brady does it again
New England comeback beats Atlanta in first OT Super Bowl
Lady Gaga plunged from the lofty roof of Houston’s NRG Stadium at halftime to a platform far, far below. Later that night, you had the feeling Tom Brady of the New England Patriots could have performed the same act — only with no bungee cord.
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What’s at stake
Our spirits are heavy with the Trump victories this week that put Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Betsy DeVos in the critical roles of U.S. attorney general and U.S. secretary of education, respectively. The fight for civil rights, voting rights, gay rights, immigration and equity in education just got tougher, but we knew what was coming and are ready for the battles ahead.
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Like father, like sons
Clyde Austin’s sons shine in college hoops
The name Clyde Austin is back in the basketball news. Only it’s not the Clyde Austin readers might remember.
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Icon Angela Y. Davis unleashes her thoughts on Trump, Clinton and future
The election of Donald Trump as the nation’s 45th president “was the future we really dreaded,” said scholar and activist Angela Y. Davis.
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Henrico senior wins state title in 2 events
The term “country comes to the city” could be the title of Craig McElroy’s athletic fortunes. McElroy spent his freshman and sophomore seasons at rural Charles City High School, enrollment 285. As a junior, he transferred to suburban Henrico High School, enrollment 1,780.
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Prince autopsy report hints at puzzling painkiller mystery
The report from the medical examiner who conducted Prince’s autopsy is tantalizing for what it doesn’t say. The single-page document released last week lists a fentanyl overdose as the cause of death, but it offers few clues to indicate whether the musician was a chronic pain patient desperately seeking relief, a longtime opioid user whose habit became an addiction or a combination of both.
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Richmond School Board adopts budget; cuts funds for academic improvement plan
The Richmond School Board adopted a $280 million operating budget that eliminates $4 million in numerous programs and services, but includes money for a plan to increase salaries to attract and retain teachers.
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Future of food
VSU Harding Street Urban Agriculture Center uses cutting-edge technology to grow fish, vegetables
A former recreation building in historic downtown Petersburg has been transformed by Virginia State University into an innovative center for urban food production.
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Armstrong tennis players honing their game
At Richmond’s Armstrong High School, the only girls sport involving a net has been basketball. After Armstrong High School merged with and moved into the former John F. Kennedy High School building on Cool Lane in 2004, girls tennis practically vanished. The sport had little traction previously at either school.
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60 years back, 60 years ahead
Education is the great equalizer, so it has been said. Take for example Irving L. Peddrew III. He was a teenage honors student at his all-black high school in Hampton whose future seemed limitless. He received offers to attend numerous schools across the nation. Yet he chose Virginia Tech in Blacksburg.
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Sen. Lucas flip-flops in Va. Supreme Court battle
Judge Rossie D. Alston Jr. is still one Senate vote short of winning a General Assembly election that would move him from the Virginia Court of Appeals to the state Supreme Court.
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Chemistry clicking among George Wythe players
There appear to be three basic categories of George Wythe High School basketball Bulldogs. There’s the obvious leading man, senior do-it-all guard Maliek White, the Providence College-bound 2015 State 3A Player of the Year.
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African-American cemetery in Charlottesville to be restored
The Daughters of Zion Cemetery was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2010, but there are no markers telling of the Charlottesville cemetery’s cultural and historical significance. Instead, there’s trash and sinking and broken gravestones.
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VUU’s ‘hitting machine’ is winding up for final season
Whether it’s a battle of the brains or a battle of brawn, Virginia Union University’s Taylor Hamilton is a home run hitter.
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Trump gets trumped in Iowa
Ever since Donald Trump entered the Republican presidential race, I have been waiting to see him lose. I wanted to see how he would handle it. Humility, after all, is not an emotion with which The Donald appears to be intimately familiar. Remember when his rival Ben Carson, the retired brain surgeon, was running neck and neck with him in polls back in November, occasionally beating him? “How stupid are the people of Iowa?” Mr. Trump raged about Dr. Carson in a Fort Dodge rant. “How stupid are the people of the country to believe this crap?”
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Planned school cuts causing pain
North Side resident Sherri Davis said she is concerned about planned budget cuts that may close schools, crowd classrooms and have parents scrambling to arrange transportation for their children. “It becomes a safety issue when you propose to put more kids in classes,” the mother of two Richmond Public Schools students told the Free Press on Wednesday. “It’s already hard enough for teachers to teach the large numbers of students they have in their classrooms.”
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Pounce
VUU Panthers drub the VSU Trojans 83-62 in Freedom Classic
If the Virginia Union University Panthers were homesick, it didn’t show. In the midst of an epic road trip, the Panthers looked comfortable and confident in routing host Virginia State University 82-62 in the 25th Annual Freedom Classic last Saturday at the VSU Multi-Purpose Center.
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City Council approves Salvation Army headquarters move; honors former park superintendent
The Salvation Army will be able to move its headquarters and shelter from Downtown to 1900 Chamberlayne Ave., next to a Wells Fargo bank branch.