Growing a nonprofit for kids
Just before the pandemic in 2020, Columbia resident Steven Porter was reading a book that mentioned a Baltimore organization called Threads — a nonprofit that connects at-risk high school students with adult mentors. It sounded to Porter like a success story of community involvement in an increasingly isolated society. Recently retired, he and his wife, Susan, had been... READ MORE
Local twins are soup-meisters
Keith and Kevin Mullaney started a soup business 25 years ago and are still stirring, selling and serving fresh, hot soup together. The identical twin brothers, 60, grew up in Mayfield in Northeast Baltimore. They started their company in California but came home in 2007 to be closer to their mother. In 2008, they opened a shop in Mount Vernon, and ever since, Soup’s On has... READ MORE
Descendants carry the torch
The theme for this year’s Black History Month is “African Americans and Labor,” highlighting how African Americans helped build the United States — voluntarily and involuntarily. Both free and enslaved African Americans constructed the U.S. Capitol, the White House and the Smithsonian Institution’s first building, the “Castle.” They laid out the first streets of the... READ MORE
Producer’s second chance at life
One Friday morning 12 years ago, Robert Neal Marshall paced back and forth in his living room in Columbia, Maryland, feeling that something was wrong with his body. Phone in hand, he wondered if he should call 911. Despite that hesitation, he made the call. “That Friday for me, on August 3 of 2013, was like any other day. I had no idea that that could have been my last day on this... READ MORE
A life of music and adventure
When Betty Scott retired after nearly 40 years of teaching music to Prince George’s County elementary school students, she didn’t stop molding young musicians. Instead, she began a new career launching and directing the Artists in Residence (AIR) program at Strathmore Music Center in North Bethesda, Maryland. Even now, 20 years later at age 81, she welcomes a new cohort of young... READ MORE
Professor seeks climate solutions
After more than a decade as a volunteer with Citizens’ Climate Lobby, Sabrina Fu has some advice for would-be environmental activists: Keep an open mind. “We should advocate for solutions, but we need to use the logical part of our ourselves,” she said in an interview with the Beacon. “Being curious and open-minded is so important. Go out and talk to people and meet on common... READ MORE
Decades of restaurant success
Wilbur Reich and his wife, Jill Reich, are local celebrities in the northwest Baltimore neighborhoods of Pikesville, Park Heights and Pimlico. The couple, now in their 80s, is widely known for their longtime ownership of two popular Pikesville restaurants: The Pike’s Diner and Crab House and Jilly’s Ale House, which is now owned by their son and his wife. The Reichs are... READ MORE
Life after working in Congress
The U.S. Congress is a high-stress, pressure-cooker environment. For staffers, working there means multiple deadlines a day, a demanding public, an unpredictable schedule and, frequently, long days. Both the House of Representatives and the Senate can seem like a roiling cauldron of egos, with super-ambitious people eager to make headlines and nab television interviews. In addition,... READ MORE
Our own Golden Bachelorette
Of all the talented contestants who viewers faithfully followed on season one of ABC’s “The Golden Bachelor,” producers chose Rockville, Maryland’s own Joan Vassos to be the lead in the first season of “The Golden Bachelorette.” The show is another spinoff of “The Bachelor,” a reality TV program that premiered in 2002. The franchise produces romance and relationship shows ... READ MORE
In style, thrifty and over 50
Donna Jenkins, 68, owner of The Zone, a popular used clothing store in Mount Vernon, remembers how she discovered her love of vintage. “It was ’77, and I hated the clothing of that time period,” she said, “so I started hunting around for other clothing.” Jenkins, then a senior at the University of Maryland, found a warehouse in D.C. full of industrial bales of old clothes... READ MORE
