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Jennifer Alexander, longtime Contributor vendor, artist, poet and writer, died Sept. 19 after suffering from a terminal illness. She was 74 years old.
The Salas Family Builds Businesses, Dreams and Community in Nashville
When you walk into LB Auto Repair in South Nashville, there’s a good chance you’ll be greeted not only by the smell of motor oil and the sight of cars in various stages of repair, but also by a four-year-old with big dreams. Her name is Lucy, and though she’s not even in Kindergarten yet, she’s already claiming her spot in the family business world. “She says she sells houses,” laughs her uncle, Jesus Salas Balcazar. “She’s our little CEO.”
That entrepreneurial spark runs through the entire family. Between Jesus, his sisters Perla and Ingrid, and their father, the family operates multiple small businesses in Nashville: LB Auto Repair, Perla’s beauty salon, and Ingrid’s real estate work and her husband’s business J. Any Fix, LLC. Together, they represent not only their own dedication and hustle but also the growing strength of Hispanic-owned, family-run businesses in Middle Tennessee.
Cooking Up Community: How Cynthia and Marcio Florez of Limo Restaurant are Building their Dream in Nashville
Steven Soderbergh is famous for also doing the camerawork in the movies he directs, and Presence might be the biggest-ever flex from Soderbergh the cinematographer.
The Contributor launches tour led by street paper vendors to help folks see the city through a different lens
Bachelder’s background is in public health and community organizing.
Retired Contributor vendor Calvin Brooks, born Nov. 24, 1957, in Columbus, Ohio, entered into eternal rest on Sept. 1, 2025, at the age of 67.
Glancing at the top films currently streaming on Amazon Prime, there’s the sense that we’re already in deep autumn at the height of scary movie season.
When you see a blind person with a seeing-eye dog, remember that this practice started with a young man from Nashville. In 1927, Morris Frank was a 20-year-old student at Vanderbilt University and unhappy about his dependency on others to get around. Frank’s father read him an article in the Saturday Evening Post by Dorothy Eustis, an American woman living in Switzerland. In the article, Eustis talked about how shepherds there were training dogs to help blind people. She speculated that this practice could be perfected to help blind people on a full-time basis.
