Stories of Hope and Renewal from America's Heartland with Art Cullen

Story in the Public Square

The rise of instant updates from today’s online news sources have left many to regard the local newspaper as a thing of the past. But Atr Cullen describes how he and his family have kept Iowa’s Storm Lake Times newspaper alive and prosperous in the digital age.

Cullen is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and editor of The Storm Lake Times, a family-run weekly newspaper in Storm Lake, Iowa. He has made it his life’s work to ask the big questions, speak truth to power, and share the struggles and successes of his community. Part cultural history, part memoir, his book, “Storm Lake: A Chronicle of Change, Resilience, and Hope from a Heartland Newspaper” explores the themes of family, community, immigration, and the Heartland’s turbulent history and promising progressive future. It is both a story of cultural upheaval and loss and a story of successes and surprising sources of optimism for those who still believe in the promise of America. The small town of Storm Lake is vividly described as a diverse, growing community enhanced by immigration from Mexico, Laos and other countries. It is a story of how immigration revitalizes America culturally and spiritually, and how a small newspaper plays its role in investigating, explaining and sharing the life of the community around it. “Storm Lake” was published in 2018.

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