Documentary-5

I want justice for George Floyd.  I don't agree with destroying the community he lived in.  Click here if you would like to help those in need.

I'm still trying to wrap my brain around the massive destruction and complete anarchy in our city last week.  You can see all the blogs in this series by going here.   

These first two images show our local Wendy's – torn asunder, just like their sign.

This was our local Walgreens.  

A shot of the interior of Walgreens.  Most of the buildings we saw were still smoldering, 2 days after they went up in flames.  The air was thick with the pungent smokey odor.  What I didn't notice until I was looking at the images, is that there were still some partially burned jugs on the bottom shelf in front and one still has the Walgreen's "Nice" brand sticker visible on it.  How bizarre!  

A grocery cart in the Walgreens with molten glass or something in the bottom of it.

The heat from the fire in Walgreens was so hot that it melted the tires, seats and fairing on a row of Nice Ride bikes parked outside.  It must have been hottest in the middle because those bikes had everything that wasn't metal burned completely off.

Documentary-4

I want justice for George Floyd.  I don't agree with destroying the community he lived in.  Click here if you would like to help those in need.

I'm still trying to wrap my brain around the massive destruction and complete anarchy in our city last week.  You can see all the blogs in this series by going here.   

This house is behind the 7-Sigma building that burned.  The heat from the fire was so hot, the vinyl siding melted off the house.  If you can't read the sign, it says: "the common enemy is violence not each other."

A small area at the rear of the 7-Sigma building.  You can see the house with the melted siding in the upper right.

I didn't even realize that this used to be a semi until I got home and looked at the pictures.  I thought it was a pile of rubbish from the clean-up efforts.

Here's a wide-angle of the remains of 7-Sigma. According to their website, they design, manufacture, and supply components and assemblies to medical, printing, aerospace and industrial markets.  They just came out with a COVID-19 modular airway training dummy for the medical field.  

Back on Lake Street is another retail building that burned with, what appears to be, a residence in the rear.  This fire happened right next door to a large apartment complex.  

Documentary-3

I want justice for George Floyd.  I don't agree with destroying the community he lived in.  Click here if you would like to help those in need.

Since I use photography to document my world, I want to give a little context to the destruction that has happened in our city.  

For several years, there has been an event called Open Streets Minneapolis, so I have a few before/after images for this series.  You can see all the blogs in this series by going here.  

The top image was taken at Open Streets in 2015.  You can see the third precinct police station on the left and the sign for Target and Minnehaha Mall on the right.

The bottom images were taken on Saturday. 

The Hook and Ladder Theater (originally fire station 21, built in 1894) survived.

Target is already vowing to fix and re-open the store.  

Documentary-2

I want justice for George Floyd.  I don't agree with destroying the community he lived in.  Click here if you would like to help those in need.

Since I use photography to document my world, I want to give a little context to the destruction that has been happening in our city.  

For several years, there has been an event called Open Streets Minneapolis, so I have a few before/after images for this series.  You can see all the blogs in this series by going here.  

The top image was taken at Open Streets in 2015.  You can see Minnehaha Liquors in the top right of the image.  

The bottom images were taken on Saturday. 

I want to mention again that volunteers have been out every day helping to clean up the destruction and gathering food and supplies for families in the community.  This makes my heart happy.

You may think, what's the big deal?  It was just a liquor store.  Well, like many of the businesses on Lake St., it was family-owned and operated.  

According to the owner's page on Yelp:  

"Minnehaha Liquor was one of the original liquor licenses granted by the city of Minneapolis after prohibition, making it one of the oldest liquor stores in the area. We are locally owned and operated; serving the Longfellow neighborhood with quality products, great prices and friendly service for over 75 years."  (According to Hennepin County property taxes, the building was built in 1922, so it is historic in its own right.)

Documentary-1

I want justice for George Floyd.  I don't agree with destroying the community he lived in.  Click here if you would like to help those in need.

Since I use photography to document my world, I want to give a little context to the destruction that has been happening in our city.  

   

For several years, there has been an event called Open Streets Minneapolis, so I have a few before/after images.  The top image was taken at Open Streets in 2015.  The bottom image was taken yesterday. 

I'm also including a couple videos.  One is showing volunteers picking up the broken Town Talk Diner sign that you see in the before image above.  The second video shows the end of the building that's still standing in the after image above.