Larry Garland

Carl Roosevelt Garland: A Common Life, Uncommon Fortitude

Carl Roosevelt Garland was born June 24, 1926, in Lawrence County, Tennessee, and died February 24, 2013, six weeks after a debilitating stroke. His official education was limited to eight years of schooling. A few years later, in July of 1950, he decided he needed to go where the jobs were, Detroit, finding work with [...]

A Perfect Pairing: Redeye Grill & Chaplin

One of the great things about Chefs to Dine For dinners is that each event is so different. I’ve attended a number of these feasts and all have been relaxed evenings—until this one. The September 2012 occasion was an action-packed, delicious feast for the eyes and ears as well the nose and palate, but [...]

Negatively Affected, Almost Impacted

I give up. Give in. Surrender. Capitulate. Take your pick and whatever synonym you choose will be okay by me—as long as it truly is a synonym. To my woe, there is a certain pairing that people think are synonyms, yet they are not. As an English major and an editor for a global financial [...]

Whose Beefsteak Is It Anyway?

Where's the Beef? (Photo by Larry Garland)

The New York Times, on Jan. 30, 2008, called “All You Can Hold for Five Bucks” “something of a Rosetta stone among fans of old New York and carnivorous foodies.” That classic piece is a 1939 New Yorker article by Joseph Mitchell. It begins, “The New [...]

In the Custody of the CIA

I just spent an intensive weekend with the CIA. That’s the Culinary Institute of America, not the Central Intelligence Agency. So, to clarify further, I was in Hyde Park, NY, rather than Langley, VA, and I was happy to be present at the CIA where the food may be grilled but the “guests” are not. [...]

Where Does Good Writing Come From?

“Write what you know” has been the mantra of good writing almost forever. But does it stand up to scrutiny? It does not, argues Bret Anthony Johnston within the pages of the current issue of Atlantic Magazine—the Fiction Issue. Writing what you know, he says, is “writing to explain, not to discover,” and it negates [...]

Mother

Famed writer Grace Paley wrote a wonderful short story called “Mother.” And I do mean short—420 words. Words made exquisite by their eloquence. The thing about eloquence is that it’s so elegant. And elegance means distilled into perfect beauty.

The story starts out this way:

“One day I was listening to the AM radio. I [...]

Truman Capote, Harper Lee, Frank Capra, and Annie Sue Dinsmore as Inspiration for Post-911 America

Annie Sue Dinsmore was one of my all-time favorite people. She was a New Accounts Opener at the main office of First Federal Savings and Loan Association. At the start of my tenure there, I was placed under her tutelage. Annie Sue was a doyen of the bank and the community, while I was only [...]

Last Night I Dreamed

Last night I dreamed I was at my aunt Dell’s house and she was washing clothes. Such a common thing, this doing the laundry. But when did I start calling it “doing the laundry?” Doing is without depth or emotion and has no life or reverence in it. No, we washed clothes and that rings [...]

Kings, Jobs, Jeers, and Jubilation in Brooklyn

Loew’s Kings Theatre opened in 1929 to a Brooklyn screening of “Evangeline” and closed in 1977 with the showing of George C. Scotts’ “Islands in the Stream.” Between those bookend performances, it gave joy and jobs to many locals. Perhaps you’ve heard of some of the ushers—Sylvester Stallone, Henry Winkler, Barbra Streisand? Ben Vereen danced [...]