Star Tribune
Beverly Cottman, Minneapolis teacher and storyteller, has died
If you’re looking for an epitaph for Beverly Cottman — a longtime Minneapolis high school biology teacher and prolific Black storyteller who died this month at 80 — just use her own words.
“I aspire to be a teller of universal truths,” the woman known as Auntie Beverly once said, “to provide emotional depth by the way I tell, and to bring wisdom of the ages to these troubled times.”
Or, “An imaginative mind can overcome many obstacles. Storytelling is the key to developing an imaginative mind.”
Or, “A story that makes you feel as if you can do anything, that you have the ability to reach and surpass your goals, or that you have the wisdom of the ancestors pushing you forward with love, is perhaps the most powerful tool of storytelling.”
The story of Beverly Cottman began in California, and added an education in Washington, D.C. There, as a student at Howard University, she met her husband, Bill Cottman. The two became a force in the Twin Cities’ arts and literary scene, Bill as a photographer, writer and radio host, Beverly as a teacher — first at the old Marshall-University High School, then at North High School, and also at arts organizations like COMPAS, where she was a teaching artist.
Beverly Cottman became the very definition of a renaissance woman: a teacher and dancer and fabric artist, a storyteller who interpreted and performed African fables and African-American folk tales, an energetic docent at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, a gracious host who whipped up soul food meals for big groups of fellow artists, a mentor to students and an elder in her community.
“She had such an impact because she was a storyteller, an artist and a scientist — a true teacher,” said Vusumuzi Zulu, co-founder of the Black Storytellers Alliance, of which Cottman was a member. “She had a very nice, soft, smooth style of storytelling with a smile that was infectious.”
As a teacher to thousands of students over the decades, her style was not one of rote memorization or standardized testing. Instead, students became excited about biology when Cottman invited them to tell stories about science.
“There was always this concept of making and sharing and telling,” said George Roberts, the Cottmans’ longtime next-door neighbor in north Minneapolis and colleague at North High School. “A storyteller is more than an entertainer. A storyteller is a teacher who shows us the important moments in history.”
Said Dawne Brown White, the executive director of COMPAS: “She really believed in the power of the arts. She saw something in every person.”
Cottman died in her sleep March 11 while on a trip to Egypt with friends. Cottman was preceded in death by her husband, who passed away in 2021, and is survived by their daughter, Kenna, and two grandchildren. Memorial services will be held Friday, March 31, with a program beginning at 1 p.m. at Liberty Community Church’s Northside Healing Space, 2100 Emerson Ave. N. in Minneapolis. Details and livestream will be posted at www.voiceofculture.org.
“Kids loved her — when you spend 30 years in a classroom, you know how to work an audience,” said Danielle Daniel, a teaching artist at COMPAS and a friend. “She was like the Energizer Bunny, even at 80. I’d tease her: ‘How you get so much energy?'”
The Lynx are in the hot seat.
The team lost Game 3 of the WNBA Finals series against the New York Liberty on Wednesday night 77-80, setting the stage for a decisive match at Target Center on Friday night. Fans in the arena reacted with resounding disappointment after Sabrina Ionescu sunk a three-pointer to break away from the tie game and dashed the Lynx’s chance at forcing overtime.
Before we get to the reactions, first things first: The Lynx set an attendance record, filling Target Center with 19,521 spectators for the first time in franchise history. That’s nearly 500 more than when Caitlin Clark was in town with the Indiana Fever earlier this year.
Despite leading by double digits for much of the game, the Lynx began the fourth quarter with a one-point lead over the Liberty and struggled to stay more than two or three points ahead throughout.
The Liberty took the lead with minutes to go in the fourth quarter and folks were practically despondent.
Of course, there were people who were in it solely for the spectacle. Nothing more.
The Lynx took a commanding lead early in the first quarter and ended the first half in winning position, setting a particularly jovial mood among the fanbase to start the game.
Inside Target Center, arena announcers spent a few minutes before the game harassing Lynx fans — and Liberty fans — who had not yet donned the complementary T-shirts draped over every seat.
DULUTH – The Minnesota and Wisconsin transportation departments will make upgrades to the Richard I. Bong Memorial Bridge in the summer of 2025, in preparation for the structure to become the premiere route between this city and Superior during reconstruction of the Blatnik Bridge.
Built in 1961, the Blatnik Bridge carries 33,000 vehicles per day along Interstate 535 and Hwy. 53. It will be entirely rebuilt, starting in 2027, with the help of $1 billion in federal funding announced earlier this year. MnDOT and WisDOT are splitting the remaining costs of the project, about $4 million each.
According to MnDOT, projects on the Bong Bridge will include spot painting, concrete surface repairs to the bridge abutments, concrete sealer on the deck, replacing rubber strip seal membranes on the main span’s joints and replacing light poles on the bridge and its points of entry. It’s expected to take two months, transportation officials said during a recent meeting at the Superior Public Library.
During this time there will be occasional lane closures, detours at the off-ramps, and for about three weeks the sidewalk path alongside the bridge will be closed.
The Bong Bridge, which crosses the St. Louis River, opened to traffic in 1985 and is the lesser-used of the two bridges. Officials said they want to keep maintenance to a minimum on the span during the Blatnik project, which is expected to take four years.
Red Wing will celebrate the grand opening of its first permanent set of pickleball courts next week with an “inaugural play” on the six courts at Colvill Park on the banks of the Mississippi, between a couple of marinas and next to the aquatic center.
Among the first to get to play on the new courts will be David Anderson, who brought pickleball to the local YMCA in 2008, before the nationwide pickleball craze took hold, and Denny Yecke, at 92 the oldest pickleball player in Red Wing.
The inaugural play begins at 11 a.m. Tuesday, with a rain date of the next day. Afterward will be food and celebration at the Colvill Park Courtyard building.
Tim Sletten, the city’s former police chief, discovered America’s fastest-growing sport a decade ago after he retired. With fellow members of the Red Wing Pickleball Group, he’d play indoors at the local YMCA or outdoors at a local school, on courts made for other sports. But they didn’t have a permanent place, so they approached the city about building one.
When a city feasibility study came up with a high cost, about $350,000, Sletten’s group got together to raise money.
The courts are even opening ahead of schedule, originally set for 2025.
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