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Each week I offer
a
Weekly
tip,
a
Weekly error, a
Weekly word,
and a
John Caddy nature photo (downloadable for use
as wallpaper),
and each month I post a
Column of the month.
Here are some other items
I’ve posted recently:
April 13, 2008:
In memory of three beloved Minnesota authors (click
and scroll down)
April 3, 2008:
Nature's Gallery, photos from
poet John Caddy, downloadable for use as wallpaper, updated weekly
April 1, 2008:
Compound words: Spelling with or without hyphens updated
March 9, 2008:
Column on
"went missing" and other annoying phrases
January 8, 2008:
An invitation posted on my
Boundary Waters Chronology
to support the Oberholtzer Foundation
January 7, 2008:
Column on
the misuse and overuse of "got"
December 29, 2007:
Columns on
apology and customer relations letters
November 14, 2007:
Boundary Waters Chronology updated with
information on the 2006 Cavity Lake, Famine Lake, and Redeye Lake fires; on
the 2007 Ham Lake fire; and on the August rampage by the "Ely Six"
November 11, 2007:
Column on
eliminating wordiness
October 27, 2007:
Column on
knowing your dashes from your hyphens
October 20, 2007:
Column on
the do's and don'ts for using e-mail effectively
September 18, 2007:
Teachers: A tribute
August 9, 2007:
Minneapolis Bridge Collapse: Reflections
May 1, 2007:
New column posted below
vocabulary-building exercises
March 17, 2007:
Notice of paperback release of my book,
Keys to Great Writing
January 21, 2007:
Columns on how to write
thank-you letters
October 12, 2006:
David Mura
on libraries, including two poems, presented at the September 18 celebration
held at the Minneapolis Central Library
September 2, 2006:
Poem for Dale Schatzlein in memory of my friend of 25 years who died unexpectedly on August
31, 2006
August 6, 2006:
More advice about how to write a
complaint letter,
as well as another column on
legal writing
August 2, 2006:
Ernest
Oberholtzer's classic 1934
complaint letter
July 23, 2006:
New
numbers usage
exercise
March 12, 2006:
Boundary Waters History
updated with information
regarding the August 2005 Alpine Lake fire, the largest fire in the Boundary
Waters in the past 10 years, and with statistics representing a dramatic
increase in the number of emergency incidents in 2005.
January 26, 2006:
Writing assessment: 15-point quiz (PowerPoint)
December 28:
Monthly tips now being collected into a book,
30 Tips for Writing with Style, to be published in 2007
November 20:
Salutations: FAQ updated with guidelines for
addressing married couples when one person has a professional title and the
other does not, as in Dear Dr. and Mr. Smith
November 15:
PowerPoint exercises from my writing
workshops on word choice, common errors, dangling modifiers, hyphens in
unit modifiers, and numbers usage
November 9:
January 10 and
February 14 dates now open for registration for my monthly
open-enrollment workshop,
Tuesdays with Wilbers.
October 23:
New column on
deadlines
September 7:
My
weekly column distributed by e-mail now
available on a six-month subscription basis
August 14:
PowerPoint presentation on when to use
nonrestrictive commas
July 1:
Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness
history updated with information about outdoor
adventurer Lloyd Skelton's disappearance
May 3:
Link to Mary Alice Hansen's newly published Boundary Waters book,
Sawbill History and Tales
New gray wolf population figures added to
Boundary Waters Chronology
April 30:
Weekly poem, Ted
Kooser’s
“American Life in Poetry” column
April 23:
Link to the
Ernest Oberholtzer webpage
April 12:
Links to amazon.com added to
Recommend Reading & Resources
April 10:
Web Style Guide
link
March 29:
Word choice errors,
as identified by the
“pickiest
wordsmiths”
of the Minneapolis Star Tribune (an exercise)
March 8:
This Northern Nonsense:
The Life of Ernest Oberholtzer in Verse
(book in progress)
February 3:
The Grammar of our Desire: A Romance with
Language (book in
progress)
February 1:
Link to
Parallel
structure
January 27:
Style:
Monthly tips by e-mail
link added
January 20:
Dictionaries added to
Contents
page
December 17:
PowerPoint presentation on
Oral Presentation Skills
December 15:
New columns
delivered weekly to your inbox
December 14:
Monthly
tips for writers: free one-minute
exercises
November 29:
Article
about my teaching in the Center for the Development of Technological
Leadership
November 24:
New feature, how to write
application letters
November 15, 19, & 22, 2004:
Boundary Waters Chronology updated
with information regarding the black bear population and the four recorded
incidents of bears attacking humans in Minnesota
November 1, 2004:
Index to syndicated columns updated to include most recent columns
October 24, 2004:
The story of winning academic
acceptance for
American Sign Language (ASL)
October 6, 2004:
Take the Proofreading Challenge:
A fun proofreading exercise
September 22, 2004:
Weekly columns delivered to your inbox
Take the Grammar Challenge: An
assessment linked to an
Error Checklist
September 9, 2004:
Error Checklist
Take the Punctuation Challenge: An
assessment linked to an
Error Checklist
August 31, 2004:
Writers
Free Reference added to
Links to online writing resources
August 24, 2004:
PowerPoint: How to use,
a column identifying the do's and don'ts of effective PowerPoint
presentations
August 7, 2004:
Workshop Review: PowerPoint Presentation for
participants in my writing workshops and seminars
"In Search
of a Whole, Live Moose,"
a story, originally
published in 1988, about my son's first canoe trip in the Boundary Waters
Canoe Area Wilderness
April 25, 2004:
Boundary Waters Chronology for nature writers
April 20, 2004:
Link to
Resources and recommended reading
December 20, 2003:
Advice on how to write an
effective
résumé
November 20, 2003:
New winner of the
Golden Pen Award
October 19, 2003:
New link to
The Loft
Literary Center (Minneapolis): Programs and services for writers.
See other
links
to online resources for writers
May 12, 2003:
Sixth
Golden
Pen Award
March 30, 2003
A second copyediting exercise, based on an
M.O.T. Final Exam
March 9, 2003:
College Board Review article, the article that got me started as a writing consultant
February 10, 2003:
Third column, "The do's
and dont's of saying thank you,"
posted under
Thank-you letters
January 24, 2003:
Second column posted under
Thank-you letters
January 23, 2003:
Columns on
"E-mail:
Do's and Don'ts"
New review of my book
Keys to
Great Writing
January 10, 2003:
Link added to William Sabin's
The Gregg Reference Manual, a guide
widely used by on-the-job writers. Also, see
Links to online writing resources.
January 4, 2003:
Additional columns on these topics:
Grant
proposal writing
Legal
writing
Sales letters
& proposals
January 2, 2003:
A copyediting exercise, based on an
M.B.A. Final Exam
October 12:
Although our campaign has officially ended, we've added five new chairs --
for
Anne Gillespie Lewis, Ewa
Rydaker, Sharon Darby Hendry, Mary Logue,
and
Al Sicherman -- thanks to some
enthusiastic supporters who couldn't allow their authors to be omitted.
July 15:
I'm delighted to announce that in the final phrase of our campaign 47
additional Minnesota authors will be honored with chairs in our new
library. (A few more names will be added as we finish recording our many
pledges.) These additions bring our total to
215 chairs, which represents more than $100,000 raised in support of
our beautiful new library. Wow!
Congratulations to our Minnesota authors. And
my heartfelt appreciation to everyone who participated in our campaign.
Here are the 47 authors:
Annette Atkins, Marge Rogers Barrett,
John Berryman, Lee
Blessing,
Thomas L. Friedman,
Robert Bly,
Betsy Bowen,
Carol Ryrie Brink,
Emilie Buchwald,
Gabrielle F. Civil,
Philip Dacey,
Michael Dorris,
Kat
Duff,
Bob
Dylan, Heid E. Erdrich,
Barbara Flanagan,
Wanda Gag,
Diane Glancy,
Cheryl Green, Erin
Hart,
Pete
Hautman,
Michael J. Henley,
William S. Howell,
Ed Bok Lee,
Kathy Lewis,
Judith Mattison,
Patricia Condon McDonald, Dale
Mulfinger,
Joseph E. Murphy, Tim
Nolan,
Isabel Monk O’Connor,
Oliver K. Olson,
Sally J. Power,
Gordon Parks,
Beverly Rollwagen,
Ole
E. Rolvaag, John
Sanford,
Charles Schulz,
Roxanne Sadovsky, John
L. Shannon, Jr. ,
Margot Siegel,
Wallace K. Swan, Brad
L. Thompson, Anne
Ursu,
Laura Waterman Wittstock,
Susan Welch, and
Jon
Zurn.
July 6:
And here's another one for Catherine Watson!
June 26:
We have three more chairs -- for Lois McMaster Bujold,
Patricia Wrede,
and Pauline Schatzlein!
June 17:
Here are our 153rd and 154th chairs! These are for Sherry Quan Lee
and Morgan Grayce Willow.
June 9:
We have three more chairs -- for Carol Dines,
Bryan Thao Worra, and Dale Mulfinger!
That makes 11 new chairs in one week!
June 7:
Here's another one -- for Larry Sutin!
June 6:
We now have our 145th, 146th, 147th, and 148th chairs. These are for
Jonis Agee,
Louis Alemayehu, Michael Dennis Browne, and Carolyn Holbrook.
June 4:
And here are three more chairs -- for Abigail Garner, Edith Mucke,
and Alex Soth!
May 24:
Here are our 140th and 141st chairs -- for Connie Wanek and
Louis Jenkins!
May 23:
Wow! Another grand slam -- we have four new chairs for
Joyce Sutphen,
Sharon Chmielarz, Sigurd Olson,
and
Taiyon Coleman!
May 19:
And one more chair just before the grand opening of our beautiful new
library -- our 135th -- for Alexs Pate!
May 17:
Here's our first grand slam, plus one -- five new chairs in one day -- for
Katherine Lanpher,
David Mura,
Jane St. Anthony, Lisa Ann Berg,
and
Jack El-Hai!
May 16:
Another double -- our 128th and 129th chairs-- for Ka Vang and
Mai Neng Moua!
May 15:
We now have a chair for Jane Pejsa -- our 127th!
May 12:
And here's our 126th
chair, this one for Margaret Hasse!
May 11:
We have two more chairs --
our 124th and 125th -- for Anna George Meek and August Wilson!
The good news is I'm inundated with pledges
-- with more than 60 coming in just in the past few days. The bad news is it takes me more
than a few
minutes to record and post each pledge and send a confirmation to each donor,
so please be patient if you don't see your pledge for a day or two. Thanks.
May 9:
We're on a roll -- we have another three chairs today, our 121st, 122nd
and 123rd, for
Juliana Pegues,
Pamela R. Fletcher, and
Susan Deborah King!
May 8:
Wow! Three new chairs in one day -- for Cheri Register, Sara Evans,
and Peg Kerr!
May 2:
Here's our 117th chair -- this one for
Thien-bao Phi!
April 28:
Two new chairs in one day! Our 115th and 116th chairs are for Natalie
Goldberg and Jim Lenfestey.
April 21:
Here's one that will make a lot of people happy. Jim Moore -- poet,
founding member, and loyal supporter of the Loft Literary Center -- has been
awarded our 114th chair!
April 20:
Well, that didn't take long -- we now have our 113th chair (and we're past
the halfway mark), and it's for Laura Ingalls Wilder!
This chair gives me special pleasure. I read
every one of Wilder's books to my children when they were growing up, then my
daughter read through the series again on her own.
April 19:
And our 112th chair is for our very own Garrison Keillor!
One more chair and we'll be more than halfway
to our goal of 225 chairs named for Minnesota authors. I think we'll be well
beyond the halfway mark by the May 20 grand opening of our beautiful new
downtown library.
April 18:
Here's another chair -- our 111th -- for Roy McBride!
April 6:
Julie Schumacher is our 110th Minnesota author to be honored with a chair
in the new library!
April 1:
This is no April Fools' Day joke --
we have our 109th chair, this one for William Hezlep!
March 27:
Two in one day --
our 107th and 108th chairs -- for Gus Hall and
Nolan Zavoral!
That's more than $54,000 we've raised for the new library.
March 24:
We have another chair! This one, our 106th, is for
Neala Schleuning.
March 21:
Here are two more chairs -- our 104th and 105th -- for Susan
Hunter McLean and
Marsha Wilson Chall!
March 19:
This is the best day yet for our campaign -- four chairs have been secured
for Kathryn Kysar, Florence Chard Dacey,
Susan Allen Toth, and
R. D. Zimmerman.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!
March 15:
Our 99th chair has been designated for
John Minczeski!
March 8:
The final pledge for Thomas McGrath was mailed to me from Alice McGrath,
along with this photograph and a note:
"We were
married in the '50s."
March 1:
Two new chairs in two days! Our 97th chair is for Patricia Weaver
Francisco.
February 28:
And here's our 96th chair! This one is for
Patti Frazee.
February 18:
Here's another chair -- our 95th -- for Irene Paull!
February 16:
We're on a roll! Thank you, thank you, thank you! Our 94th chair is for
Roseann Lloyd.
February 13:
And here are three more chairs: these for the incomparable F. Scott
Fitzgerald, Jim Berg, and
Biloine (Billie) Young!
February 10:
Hamline University's GLS Alumni Association has pledged the remaining
funds needed for not one, but two, chairs! Our 91st and 92nd chairs will be in
honor of Deborah Keenan and Mary Rockcastle.
February 9:
Here's another one, our 90th! This chair is for Pamela Hill Nettleton.
February 6:
It is with special pleasure I announce our 89th chair -- designated for
Meridel LeSueur!
February 1:
Wow -- our second chair this week! Our 88th chair has been designated for
Betty Bridgman!
January 30:
Here's one, our 87th, for one of my favorite Minnesota authors: Bart
Sutter! Go, Bart!
January 22:
And here's our 86th chair, for Vincent Wyckoff!
January 19:
And now we have our 85th chair, with 140 to go, in the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
This chair is for Jim Heynen -- and I'm not
telling who the anonymous donor was, but you'll recognize Professor Eileen
Thomas's name because she's already done so much to support his campaign.
January 15:
Our 83rd and 84th chairs, in Duke Klassen's and Marsha Qualey's names, have been designated
as part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
December 29:
Marge Rogers Barrett's
92-year-old mother thought
her daughter should have a chair in the new Minneapolis Public Library as part
of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign.
Way to go, Mom! That's our 82nd chair, with 143 to go.
December 21:
It's fun watching your pledges coming in -- thank you, thank you, thank
you! And now we have a new chair for Vicky Lettmann, our 81st (144 to go), as part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign.
It all goes to support the new
Minneapolis Public Library.
December 19:
And here's number 80: a new chair for Larry Gavin, as part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
December 17:
A new chair for Leo Dangel, our 79th, in
support of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
That's $10,000 contributed to honor those authors
and to support the new Minneapolis Public Library.
December 15:
Wow, two new chairs in one day, one for Kathleen Coskran and one
for Judith Katz, our 77th and 78th, in support of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
December 10:
And now our 76th
Minnesota Author,
Susan McLean, will be honored with a chair in the
new Minneapolis Public Library!
December 9:
With a chair for Mary L. Junge, we now have our 75th
chair designated as part of the
Minnesota Authors
Campaign!
December 6:
With two new chairs, one for Future Authors
(sponsored by Loft instructors and their families) and one for Iris C.
Freeman, we now have honored 74
Minnesota Authors
with chairs in the new Minneapolis Public Library.
November 30:
We now have our 72nd,
this one for
David Pichaske, designated as part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign.
The funds were donated by Michelle Pichaske as a surprise for him, so if you know David, don't tell him.
November 16:
We now have chairs for Edna
A. Anderson, Bill Holm, Howard Mohr, and Beth Weatherby, designated via this
website as part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign.
That's $6,000 and counting for the
new Minneapolis Public Library. Keep those pledges coming!
November 14:
Two more chairs, for Jane Resh
Thomas and Warren Woessner, have been designated via this
website as part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign.
Wow! That's $4,000 and counting for the
new Minneapolis Public Library. Keep those pledges coming!
November 7:
We now have a chair for Barrie Jean Borich, who has been
honored in the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
November 4:
Another chair in the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
Judge and Mrs. Ray G. Miller have pledged $500
to honor their daughter, Leslie Adrienne Miller
October 27:
As part of the
Minnesota Authors Campaign,
a chair has been designated for
Sandra Benitez!
October 23:
Another new chair designated for Joseph Amato as part of
the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
October 19:
Two new chairs designated for authors Joe Paddock and Don Olsen
as part of
the
Minnesota Authors Campaign!
September 8:
Launch of a grassroots
Minnesota Authors Campaign
in support of the new Minneapolis Public Library
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