Mark Twain is said to have described the obelisk honoring George Washington in the nation’s capital as a “memorial chimney.” Some leading Parisian critics judged the Eiffel Tower as “useless and monstrous” in 1887. We’re going to guess that quite a few Baltimoreans were less than enchanted when the Bromo Seltzer Tower became the city’s tallest building in 1911 — especially when a 51-foot illuminated bottle of the headache and indigestion remedy was added to the top a quarter-century later.

The city of Frederick is getting ready to further develop Westside Regional Park, and the money behind the planning is coming from a familiar angel: the Ausherman Family Foundation. The Board of Aldermen voted unanimously last week to allow the foundation to develop the park plan. While they are at it, the city should give thanks to the foundation for all of the money, time and effort it has provided to improve the Frederick community since it was founded in 2001 by Marvin E. Ausherman, a home builder and developer.

I’ve spent years working in communities, and I’ve seen the ebbs and flows of support for charitable services. But it’s the mission that keeps public servants like me going. In the heart of the central Maryland region, a dedicated group of individuals is quietly making a significant impact on the lives of military members, veterans and their families. They work behind the scenes, often on top of their regular careers and without a desire for recognition.

Real estate developer David Bramble was in a challenging but enviable position when he took on the task of conceiving a new vision for Harborplace. It was a tough assignment, but Baltimore officials and business leaders were so eager to do something about the neglected, depressing 40-year-old waterfront mall that Bramble could pretty much expect official support for whatever he came up with. And he got it: near complete buy-in from the city’s mayor and state’s governor.

Howard Libit is the Executive Director of the Baltimore Jewish Council. In this episode of The Lobby, Howard talks about the 25th anniversary of the Hon. Elijah Cummings Youth Program in Israel, along with the powerful success of Maryland / Israel relations and cooperative business development. In addition, Damian and Howard discuss the terrorist atrocities committed against Israeli families and the war with the terrorist organization Hamas. Howard Libit is a former spokesperson and strategist for Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake. He was previously a top editor at The Baltimore Sun, co-founded the news site Center Maryland, and was a principal at KO Public Affairs leading high intensity campaigns and delivering media strategy.

The trait that separates major league baseball from every other game on earth is the sheer length of its regular season. At 162 games, the baseball season is twice as long as basketball and hockey, and 10 times that of NFL football. For half the year, baseball teams play almost every day.

The frequency and unpredictability of extreme weather are increasing; we’ve seen this throughout the country and locally. Just recently, a severe storm snapped more than 20 transmission poles in Westminster, Maryland, causing thousands of BGE customers to be without electricity for days.

Last week’s horrific shooting in Maine that left 18 dead and 13 others wounded has already raised the questions that have become familiar after mass casualty events. What motivated the suspect, 40-year-old Robert Card, to go on his rampage in a Lewiston bowling alley and bar?

Last Sunday in Israel, Richie Pearlstone and fellow travelers heard horror stories of 10/7 from terrorized people who had lived until that day in the kibbutzim near the Gaza Strip. In a phone call from Tel Aviv on Monday, he described what he had heard the day before: “A woman said, ‘My husband went out to defend the kibbutz with a gun. He got killed. We managed to survive.’

As if new state schools superintendent Carey Wright doesn’t have more than enough Halloween hobgoblins to contend with, the scariest one has been overlooked in public understanding and political debate about the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future: How many students are actually expected to succeed by the time the Blueprint sunsets in 2032?