Philadelphia’s quiet heroes include block captains, volunteers who, under the sponsorship of the Philadelphia More Beautiful Committee (PMBC)—a division of the Streets Department—rally their neighbors to keep their blocks attractive. Now, in addition to beauty, some block captains help ensure food and a sense of security for their neighbors in the face of the COVID-19
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One could call the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society’s (PHS) Tree Tenders quixotic in their drive to increase Philadelphia’s tree canopy, a goal whose attainment would mean a healthier city. “Our canopy, which currently sits at 20 percent, represents a 6 percent loss over the past 10 years,” says Tree Tender Marcus Ferreira, 47, of South Philadelphia,
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Photography By Rachael Warriner Graveyard Shift By Constance Garcia-Barrio If tombs are the clothes of the dead, as one poet said, permanent residents of cradle graves at The Woodlands Cemetery wear vivid garments indeed. Marble headstones, footstones and low sides form these graves while pansies, bleeding hearts, and other flowers bloom atop them and brim
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Given the unruliness of time machines, apt to choose their own destinations, you’ll need a bike, car or SEPTA to see the scattered sites where enslaved Black women helped to get colonial Philadelphia going.Take Black Alice, aka Alice of Dunks Ferry, who reached age 116, c.1686 to 1802, historians say. Her parents, from Barbados, arrived
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