A Knack for Knoing Things Stories from St. Paul Neighborhoods and Beyond [Paperback]

For thrity-six years, Don Boxmeyer wrote about St. Paul and Minnesota, first as a reporter for theSt. Paul DispatchandSt. Paul Pioneer Press, and for two decades as a columnist for thePioneer Press. During that time, he traversed the city and state and gained an intimate knowledge of its people, places, and traditions.A Knack for Knowing Thingsbrings together in book form the best of his writing and demonstrates his talents as a master storyteller with plain-spoken, intimate prose.

After more than fifteen years of covering hard news, writing a newspaper column gave Boxmeyer the freedom to tell stories of more than just the politicians and the famous. "I realized that the interesting people and places nobody ever wrote about held more fascination for me, and for my readers, than all the governors, mayors, and city council members who never seemed to be much persuaded by my opinions anyhow. I began to collect hermits and hobos, bare-knuckled bar brawlers and bread-baking nuns, short order cooks and hockey coaches, drake mallards named Jake, and bridge tenders, band directors, bear hunters, and quiet old men who wept softly when we talked about the friends they'd left on the battlefield."

Many of the places Boxmeyer writes about are gone now, except in the memories and hearts of the people who grew up there—Swede Hollow, the West Side Flats, Rondo Avenue, and the Upper Levee. These lost neighborhoods of St. Paul, ethnic enclaves on the West Side, the East Side, along the Mississippi River bank, and in the heart of the city, were razed over fifty years ago. Fortunately for us, Boxmeyer preserves their memory for posterity.

The final chapter in the book is about a special place in the heart of the author: Ashby—a real place, a town of less than 500 out in the rolling, open prairie land of west-central Minnesota. It is where Boxmeyer can be found each spring and each autumn, witlõ