Buying at the 'Black Market'

Now you can buy a candy bar or a lottery ticket while simultaneously stepping back in time. \nDowntown Bloomington has a new late-night convenience store that provides a glimpse of its history. Inside the Black Mercantile, on the corner of Seventh and Walnut streets, the colors of shiny candy wrappers pop out against red brick walls that have existed for nearly 200 years. Neon signs glow inside windows that look as though they could've been taken out of a black and white movie; outside, you might half expect to see horse-drawn carriages rather than cars.\nMike Black noticed downtown Bloomington lacked a convenience store and he opened the Black Mercantile, or "Black Market." Black also owns the Video Saloon, a bar known to many as "The Vid," located directly above his new store. \n"It gave us a chance to do something besides sell alcohol," Black said.\nThe store opened Aug. 26 after about 11 months of construction and restoration work. It's convenient for students and Bloomington residents alike, open from 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. weekdays and until 2 a.m. on weekends. Black's still testing store hours, waiting to observe customer flows before fixing a permanent schedule. \n"You can't tell the public what they want," he said. "They tell you." \nHe's considering making the store a 24-hour operation, although he suspects business would be bleak from 4 to 6 a.m.\n"Between those hours you could go lay down in the middle of the street and not get hit by a car," Black said.\nOnce he started renovating, Black realized the building below his bar had a lot of history, giving customers a peek of what businesses looked like in the early 20th century. He used maps and photographs of businesses in the area to aid in the design of the restoration project.\nBuilt as a brick house in 1828, the original brick walls are still visible inside the store today. The new storefront was partially designed after a market that stood on the same corner in the 1940s. \nTo recapture the architecture of the early 1900s, the building was literally given a facelift. The entire front of the building was removed, even the doors. Only the support structures remained until the market got an entirely new façade.\nPrevious businesses were built onto the building's original insides, and layers of carpeting and flooring were stacked on top of each other. Tools, which Black compared to ice scrapers, were used to peel away these layers, revealing the wooden floorboards customers walk on today. Black knelt down and moved his hand along the boards to demonstrate they are smooth and splinter-free. \nThe Bloomington Historic Preservation Commission aided in the restoration of the building. It took great pains to preserve the historic feel of the building's design. The most prominent feature of the store's façade is its tall, oblong display windows. It would have been much easier to build the windows with aluminum frames, but the Commission urged the use of wooden frames for authenticity. Black agreed, and the window frames were specially fitted with wood because as he mentioned, the Commission "said please and everything."\nNancy Hiestand, program manager of the Bloomington Historic Preservation Commission, worked with Black to make sure the restoration process accurately echoed downtown Bloomington's architectural history.\n"He was very receptive to our ideas," Hiestand said.\nAs a result of Black's convenience store project, the Bloomington Urban Enterprises Association now offers a $10,000 grant to downtown business owners who want to restore their buildings. Hiestand said the grant was created to give incentive to restore and preserve the history of downtown's architecture. There are very few original storefronts left.\nThe Seventh Street side of the Black Mercantile is still under construction. Upon completion, it will include bay windows, an architectural feature common of downtown Bloomington's historic buildings. \n"They add to (the) uniqueness of Bloomington," Hiestand said.\nBut she lamented that many of these historic windows are covered with siding.\nStudents from Ball State University helped with the restoration process. Ball State has a Center for Historic Preservation as part of its College of Architecture and Planning. The students from the center developed guidelines for restoring the brick, options for painting and ways for the new design to complement the overall style of the building. \nTalisha Coppock, executive director of Downtown Bloomington Commission, said the Black Mercantile is a very important business to add to downtown. The Downtown Bloomington Commission is a non-profit organization that has been working to revitalize the downtown area for the past 20 years.\nCoppock accredited the push for the restoration of downtown to its importance in attracting tourists and improving the local economy. Bringing historic architecture to the surface helps preserve an area which makes Bloomington unique.\nThe Downtown Bloomington Commission's work to improve downtown is part of a statewide effort to preserve history, known as the Indiana Mainstreet Program. The program encourages Indiana towns to improve their downtown business districts. \n"Finding a vibrant downtown is important for the livelihood of the community," Coppock said. "Not every community has a vibrant downtown"

'Why did you do this to us?' Tragedy, triumph in Katrina's aftermath

NEW ORLEANS - Set down on dry land for the first time in three days, 83-year-old Camille Fletcher stumbled a few feet to a brick wall and collapsed. She and two of her children had made it through Hurricane Katrina alive, but her Glendalyn with the long, beautiful black hair was gone.\n"My precious daughter," she sobbed Wednesday. "I prayed to God to keep us safe in his loving care."\nThen, looking into an incongruously blue sky, she whimpered: "You're supposed to be a loving God. You're supposed to love us. And what have you done to us? Why did you do this to us?"\nBut for the rescuers rushing to pluck Fletcher and untold others from roofs, balconies and highways flooded by Hurricane Katrina, such questions were a luxury they simply could not afford.\nEmergency officials say 72 hours is about the longest they can expect most people to last in the sweltering Louisiana heat. So they called in volunteers from across this "fisherman's paradise" to help improve the survivors' odds.\nRonnie Lovett and about 30 of his crew from R&R Construction drove four hours from Sulphur, La., to join the rescue effort. They arose with the sun Wednesday after spending the night in sleeping bags on the pavement outside Harrah's casino on the Mississippi River, because they couldn't find rooms.\nLovett is paying the men's wages and furnishing gas for their personal boats.\n"They're all Bubbas, swamp men," said Lovett, who brought his own 21-foot fishing boat. "We're here for the duration, until they turn us loose."\nAt dawn, a motley armada of air boats, aluminum skiffs and even a two-seater Jet Ski moved out from the central business district. Heading east in the westbound lanes of Interstate 10, the boats passed the Superdome, where hundreds of ragged people stood on the hot pavement and helicopters buzzed around.\nMany of the displaced had clearly spent the night on the highway rather than suffer the stable-like conditions of the sports stadium. The caravan passed people dragging suitcases and pushing shopping carts. One man waved an empty water jug like a railroad lantern, pleading for someone to stop and fill it.\nAfter nearly an hour of zigzagging around downed lampposts and plowing through water up to past their wheel wells, the volunteer navy arrived at a staging point in New Orleans East, just south of Lake Pontchatrain.\nNew Orleans police Officer Martin Jules warned the men not to overload their boats. Some volunteers have had their rigs taken from them at gunpoint, so Jules also warned them not to be heroes.\n"These people have been out here two or three days," he said, standing on the bow of a flatboat. "They're scared, they're tired, they're thirsty, they're hungry. If it gets hostile, we roll, OK? We're here to help 'em. We got to be here to help them for the next couple of months, however long it takes. Our safety is No. 1."\nWithin minutes of launching, the men were returning with sunken-eyed, sallow-skinned survivors.\nKevin Montgomery, 40, had spent the past three days shuttling between the attic of a one-story home and a makeshift canopy he built on the roof. He and two other men rationed a gallon of water between them.\n"It was terrible," the carpenter said as he trundled through the gasoline-laced water.\nEvery once in a while, Mongtomery would see a body float by. But he cannot swim and had to fight the urge to wade in and tie them down.\n"All I could do was pass them by and hope that God takes care of the rest of that," he said. "You have to think of self, too."\nThe boats circled a Day's Inn, where people had hung sheets on the balconies reading, "SOS." and "We need food and water." At Forest Tower, a high-rise senior citizens apartment complex, one man waved his empty oxygen tank out a window.\nA boat floated through the building's shattered entrance and pulled right up to the stairs. Elderly residents stepped gingerly onto tables and into the boats.\nSimon Queen, 68, said he slept through Hurricane Betsy. But Katrina was like "King Kong pounding at the windows."\n"I need to get me to some high ground," he said. "I wasn't born with fins."\nAt the nearby United Medical Rehab Hospital, 14 patients, 11 staff members and their families awaited their saviors.\nNurse Bernadette Shine said the facility was nearly out of oxygen, and several diabetic patients had been without dialysis for nearly a week. After the fruit cocktail and peanut butter ran out, the staff broke into the candy and drink machines for sugary items to keep patients from going into shock.\n"There are people that are not going to make it," Shine said, her voice cracking. "One I've known since I was 10 years old. But we did what we could for them. We did everything we could for them."\nAfter several hours, a small fleet of rented moving trucks showed up to take the people to the downtown convention center so they could be taken out of the city. Police herded people up metal ramps like cattle into the unrefrigerated boxes.\nCamille Fletcher sat forlorn, not really caring when it would be her turn. Suddenly, a woman emerged from the waters and began walking toward her. She had long, disheveled black hair.\n"Mamma?" she shouted.\n"Oh my god, oh my God," the old woman screamed, kissing Glendalyn's hand and pressing it against her forehead. "My daughter's alive!"\nThe 60-year-old Glendalyn Fletcher told her family a harrowing story of how she had floated through a wall when her house started to collapse around her; how she had swum, stripped naked by the raging waters, to a neighbor's house and cowered in an attic; how someone had picked them up Tuesday and left them stranded on a water-locked section of I-10.\n"It was horrible, but there were millions of stars," the dehydrated woman said.\nA few moments later, it was time for Camille Fletcher to go to a shelter. Before being helped into the back of the moving truck, she looked back at her daughter and smiled.\n"God is good"

Hurricane Katrina plows into Gulf Coast but spares New Orleans its full fury

NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Hurricane Katrina plowed into the Gulf Coast at daybreak Monday with shrieking, 145-mph winds and blinding rain, submerging entire neighborhoods up to the rooflines in New Orleans, hurling boats onto land and sending water pouring into Mississippi's strip of beachfront casinos.\nAt least two highways deaths in Alabama were blamed on the storm, and an untold number of others were feared dead in flooded neighborhoods.\n"Some of them, it was their last night on earth," Terry Ebbert, chief of homeland security for New Orleans, said of people who ignored evacuation orders. "That's a hard way to learn a lesson."\nKatrina weakened overnight to a Category 4 storm and made a slight turn to the right before coming ashore at 6:10 a.m. CDT near the Louisiana bayou town of Buras. The storm passed just to the east of New Orleans as it moved inland, sparing this vulnerable below-sea-level city its full fury and the apocalyptic damage that forecasters had feared.\nBut there was plenty of destruction in New Orleans, and a clearer picture of the damage emerged after the storm had passed: Mangled street signs, crumbled brick walls in the French Quarter, fallen trees on streetcar tracks, highrises with almost all of their windows blown out. White curtains that were sucked out of the shattered windows of a hotel became tangled in treetops.\nAn estimated 40,000 homes flooded in St. Bernard Parish just east of New Orleans.\nKatrina recorded a storm surge of more than 20 feet in Mississippi, where windows of a major hospital were blown out and billboards were ripped to shreds. In some areas, authorities pulled stranded homeowners from roofs or rescued them from attics. In Alabama, exploding transformers lit up the early morning sky and muddy, 6-foot waves engulfed stately, million-dollar homes along Mobile Bay's normally tranquil waterfront.\n"Let me tell you something folks: I've been out there. It's complete devastation," said Gulfport, Miss., Fire Chief Pat Sullivan.\nEmergency officials had not been able to reach some of the hardest-hit areas to determine the number of injuries or deaths. Officials across the region sent water rescue teams out and stood ready to dispense ice, water and meals to hurricane-stricken residents.\n"We know some people got trapped and we pray they are OK," Gov. Haley Barbour said.\nAt 3 p.m. EDT, a rapidly weakening Katrina was centered about 20 miles southwest of Hattiesburg, Miss., moving northward at about 19 mph. Its winds had dropped to about 95 mph, making it a Category 1 storm.\nEd Rappaport, deputy director of the hurricane center, estimated that the highest winds in New Orleans were about 100 mph. Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco said her office had reports of as many 20 building collapses in New Orleans, and scores of residents stranded in attics or on rooftops.\n"I'm not doing too good right now," Chris Robinson said via cellphone from his home east of the city's downtown. "The water's rising pretty fast. I got a hammer and an ax and a crowbar, but I'm holding off on breaking through the roof until the last minute. Tell someone to come get me please. I want to live."\nOn the south shore of Lake Ponchartrain, entire neighborhoods of one-story homes were flooded up to the rooflines. The Interstate 10 off-ramps nearby looked like boat ramps amid the whitecapped waves. Garbage cans and tires bobbed in the water.\nTwo people were stranded on the roof as murky water lapped at the gutters.\n"Get us a boat!" a man in a black slicker shouted over the howling winds.\nAcross the street, a woman leaned from the second-story window of a brick home and shouted for assistance.\n"There are three kids in here," the woman said. "Can you help us?"\nAt least a half-million people were without power from Louisiana to Florida's Panhandle, including 370,000 in southeastern Louisiana and well over 100,000 each in Alabama and Mississippi.\nAt New Orleans' Superdome, home to 9,000 storm refugees, the wind ripped pieces of metal from the roof, leaving two holes that let water drip in. People inside were moved out of the way. Others stayed and watched as sheets of metal flapped and rumbled loudly 19 stories above the floor. Outside, one of the 10-foot, concrete clock pylons set up around the Superdome blew over.\nAt the Windsor Court Hotel in New Orleans, guests were told to go into the interior hallways with blankets and pillows and to keep the doors to the rooms closed to avoid flying glass.\nIn Alabama's Mobile Bay, Fred Wright's whole yard was flooded and muddy waves were hitting the back of his home. Wright, shirtless and wearing shorts, spoke of the high-dollar real estate on the waterfront: "There are lots of homes through here worth a million dollars. At least they were yesterday."\nBy midday, the brunt of the storm had moved beyond New Orleans to Mississippi's coast, home to the state's floating casinos, where Katrina washed sailboats onto a coastal four-lane highway. The Beau Rivage Hotel and Casino, one of the premier gambling spots in Biloxi, had water on the first floor, and the governor said other casinos were flooded as well.\nKatrina was the most powerful storm to affect Mississippi since Hurricane Camille came in as a Category 5 in 1969, killing 256 people in Louisiana and Mississippi.\n"This is a devastating hit -- we've got boats that have gone into buildings," said Sullivan, the Gulfport fire chief. "What you're looking at is Camille II."\nIn New Orleans' historic French Quarter of Napoleonic-era buildings with wrought-iron balconies, water pooled in the streets from the driving rain, but the area appeared to have escaped the catastrophic flooding that forecasters had predicted.\nOn Jackson Square, two massive oak trees outside the 278-year-old St. Louis Cathedral came out by the roots, ripping out a 30-foot section of ornamental iron fence and straddling a marble statue of Jesus Christ, snapping off only the thumb and forefinger of his outstretched hand.\nAt the hotel Le Richelieu, the winds blew open sets of balcony French doors shortly after dawn. Seventy-three-year-old Josephine Elow of New Orleans pressed her weight against the broken doors as a hotel employee tried to secure them.\n"It's not life-threatening," Mrs. Elow said as rain water dripped from her face. "God's got our back."\nFor years, forecasters have warned of the nightmare scenario a big storm could bring to New Orleans, a bowl of a city that is up to 10 feet below sea level in spots and relies on a network of levees, canals and pumps to keep dry from the Mississippi River on one side, Lake Pontchartrain on the other.\nThe fear was that flooding could overrun the levees and turn New Orleans into a toxic lake filled with chemicals and petroleum from refineries, as well as waste from ruined septic systems.\nOfficials said a levee broke on one canal, but did not appear to cause major problems.\nBlanco took little comfort in the fact that the hurricane may have spared New Orleans much worse flooding, given the still uncertain toll in surrounding parishes.\n"I can't say that I feel that sense that we've escaped the worst," she said. "I think we don't know what the worst is right now."\nCrude oil futures spiked to more than $70 a barrel in Singapore for the first time Monday as Katrina targeted an area crucial to the country's energy infrastructure, but the price had slipped back to $68.95 by midday in Europe. The approaching storm forced the shutdown of an estimated 1 million barrels of refining capacity.\nAuthorities closed a major bridge over the Mobile River in Alabama after it was struck by a runaway oil drilling platform.\nCalling it a once-in-a-lifetime storm, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin had ordered a mandatory evacuation over the weekend for the 480,000 residents of the vulnerable city, and he estimated about 80 percent heeded the call.\nThe evacuation itself claimed lives. Three New Orleans nursing home residents died Sunday after being taken by bus to a Baton Rouge church. Officials said the cause was probably dehydration.\nNational Hurricane Center Director Max Mayfield said the forecast track issued Friday night was only 15 miles off from where the storm actually hit.\n"If that is not a superb forecast, I don't know what is," he said.\nNew Orleans has not taken a direct hit from a hurricane since Betsy in 1965, when an 8- to 10-foot storm surge submerged parts of the city in seven feet of water. Betsy, a Category 3 storm, was blamed for 74 deaths in Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida.\nKatrina hit the southern tip of Florida as a much weaker storm Thursday and was blamed for 11 deaths. It left miles of streets and homes flooded and knocked out power to 1.45 million customers. It was the sixth hurricane to hit Florida in just over a year.

Remembering 9-11 in visual exhibits

NEW YORK -- Days before the fourth anniversary of the 2001 attacks, a photographer is offering intimate images of death and love inside Ground Zero at a new museum that brings you nose-to-nose with the smoldering pit.\n"If people want to come past the security gates and see what our world was like down in the hole, this is as close as they can come to it," said Gary Marlon Suson, the official Ground Zero photographer for the Uniformed Firefighters Association, the city firefighters' main union.\nSuson spent eight months at the site with recovery workers searching for the remains of the 2,749 people who died on a sunny September morning, including 343 firefighters. His time in "The Pit" comes alive at the Ground Zero Museum Workshop of photographs, videos and artifacts, opening Sept. 8.\nLast year, Suson went to Amsterdam, Netherlands, and visited the home of Anne Frank, the Jewish teenager who wrote a diary of her life before the Nazis sent her to the Bergen-Belsen death camp.\n"Within two hours of being in there, I felt like I'd come to know this little girl. It put a face on the Holocaust," said the 33-year-old Suson. "I went back to the hotel and cried."\nThe experience inspired him to create the 1,000-square-foot museum, whose rooftop he stood upon in 2001 to take images of the Trade Center collapse.\n"I felt if I could create something that would have an effect on people similar to the one the Anne Frank museum had on me, it could help people connect more to 9-11. If you can't connect, you can't heal," he said.\nAt the second-floor museum in Manhattan's Meatpacking District, visitors are met by 3-D displays of photographs that pull the viewer close to the terror, dirt, sweat -- and death.\nSuson took one of the first photos of the firefighter honor guard that carried remains as they were found. He shot the scene in close-up, as he did other moments, such as a firefighter helping carry out the remains of his own son.\nThe museum has tangible vestiges of the Twin Towers, including pieces of window glass, lobby marble and jagged beam steel. One display case holds a beer can from 1971, when construction workers building the new towers shoved it between two steel beams before sealing them. The can was pried from the metal at Ground Zero, twisted and rusty.\nOne jarring item is a frozen clock, its simple black hands stopped at 10:02, and the small one at 14. The south tower collapsed first that day, at 10:02:14 a.m. The clock came from a room with a weightlifting bench used by Port Authority Trans-Hudson train workers.\nSuson, an actor and playwright, contributed thousands of dollars toward the $60,000 museum; the rest came from private donations. Proceeds from the $15 entrance fee ($12 for seniors and children) will go to six charities linked to Sept. 11, some benefiting families.

Police arrest suspected July 21 bomber

BIRMINGHAM, England -- Police pursuing suspects in the failed July 21 terror bombings in London raided four homes across Britain on Wednesday and detained four people, including a Somali man believed to be one of the fugitive bombers, media reports and a witness said.\nThe man was subdued with a stun gun when officers stormed a home in Birmingham before dawn. Members of the bomb squad, some dressed in armored suits, were seen entering the home after police evacuated 100 nearby residences in a quiet, ethnically mixed neighborhood of Britain's second-largest city.\nPrime Minister Tony Blair, without commenting on the man's identity, described the arrest as "an important development."\nThree more men were arrested in a pre-dawn raid at another home about two miles away in this city 120 miles northwest of London. The raids were carried out by 50 officers from London's Metropolitan Police Anti-Terrorist Branch and West Midlands Police. No shots were fired.\nIn London, police said they raided two homes at 6 a.m. in the northern neighborhoods of Finchley and Enfield. No arrests were made, but forensic examinations were under way at the residences, a spokeswoman said, speaking on customary condition of anonymity. She declined further comment.\nAuthorities said the four raids involved the investigation into the July 21 attack, during which bombs planted on three London subway trains and a bus failed to detonate fully. The attack came two weeks after four suicide bombers staged a similar assault that killed 52 other people.\nMeanwhile, police arrested a man at Luton airport near London under anti-terrorism laws as he prepared to leave on a flight for France, authorities said. Police did not say why he was detained or if the arrest was connected with the London attacks.\nTwo men also were arrested late Tuesday on suspicion of terrorism while traveling on a train in the Midlands region. Police said the train, which was on its way to London's King's Cross station from Newcastle, was stopped at Grantham and the men were taken off. It was not immediately clear if the arrests were linked to the investigation into the London bombings.\nAuthorities would not confirm BBC and Sky News reports that the Tasered man was Yasin Hassan Omar, a 24-year-old Somali suspected of trying to blow up a subway train near Warren Street station.\nAt least one witness said the man resembled Omar.\n"I looked out of the window and the road was full of armed police and they had got the road closed off," said electrician Andy Wilkinson, who lives nearby.\nHe said the suspect looked like Omar but could not confirm it was him.\n"After 10 or 15 minutes, they brought a guy out. He looked like the darkest-skinned one in the photos of the four suspects released by the police -- the one with the curly hair," Wilkinson said. "They had him dressed in one of those white suits. He had plastic cuffs on the front."\nSuch suits are used by police to preserve any physical evidence that may be on a suspect.\n"I think it is an important development," Blair, in London, said of the arrest. "Obviously we are greatly heartened by the operations today. The police have been working extraordinarily hard on this and have shown a tremendous amount of commitment and dedication to the task in hand."\nPolice launched a manhunt after releasing images of four men thought responsible for planting the July 21 bombs. The pictures have been plastered over much of London's transit and railway system while police have for more than a week released various details about the attackers.\nOn Monday, they released the names of two of the suspects, Omar and Muktar Said Ibrahim, 27, also known as Muktar Mohammed Said. Both came to Britain as the children of refugees, the government said.\nOmar arrived from Somalia in 1992 at age 11 and has British residency, the Home Office said. Said came in 1990 from Eritrea, his family said, and officials said he was granted residency in 1992 and British citizenship in September 2004\nPolice have been trying to determine whether the failed July 21 bombings were connected to the deadly July 7 attacks.\nThe Birmingham arrests would bring the number of people that police have said are being held in connection with the July 21 bombings to nine.

Mosque investigation a high priority for FBI

The FBI is continuing to investigate the firebombing, classified as hate crime, of the Bloomington Islamic Center, an FBI spokeswoman said \nWednesday.\nThe FBI has been investigating the incident in collaboration with the Bloomington Police Department. Bloomington Mayor Mark Kruzan receives regular briefings about this incident. \nMaria Heslin, communications director for the City of Bloomington, said police increased patrols in the area immediately after the incident and it is of the highest priority, especially in light of the type of incident, location and time it took place.\n"Investigators are doing interviews with individuals who may have information, collecting evidence and sending things off to the lab," she said. \nEarly Saturday morning an unknown number of suspects threw a rock through a lower level of Bloomington's only mosque, located on Atwater Ave, authorities said. The perpetrators then threw a Mountain Dew bottle full of an unknown accelerant through the window and proceeded to light it on fire. \nMembers of the Bloomington community, including those from other religious organizations, were outraged by the attack and gathered at a "Vigil for Peace" around the Monroe County Courthouse in the early evening Wednesday. \nThe vigil was organized by the Bloomington Peace Action Coalition. In a statement the about the vigil the BPAC said they were "saddened and troubled" by the incident and "condemn and abhor all acts of hate and violence, including the terrorist attacks in London last Thursday, the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the fire at the Bloomington Islamic Center"

LONDON -- Four explosions rocked the London subway and tore open a packed double-decker bus during the morning rush hour Thursday, sending bloodied victims fleeing in the worst attack on London since World War II. At least 40 people were killed, U.S. officials said, and more than 700 were wounded.\nA clearly shaken Prime Minister Tony Blair called the coordinated attacks "barbaric" and said they were designed to coincide with the G-8 summit opening in Gleneagles, Scotland. They also came a day after London won the bid to host the 2012 Olympics. A group calling itself the Secret Organization of al-Qaida in Europe claimed responsibility.\nThe four blasts went off within an hour, beginning at 8:51 a.m. (3:51 a.m. EDT), and hit three subway stations and the double-decker bus. Authorities immediately shut down the subway and bus lines that log 8.4 million passenger trips every weekday.\nThe bus explosion seemed to go off at the back of the vehicle, said bystander Raj Mattoo, 35. "The roof flew off and went up about 10 meters (30 feet). It then floated back down," he said. "There were obviously people badly injured. A parking attendant said he thought a piece of human flesh had landed on his arm."\nDoctors from the nearby British Medical Association rushed into the street to treat the wounded from the bus. "The front of BMA house was completely splattered with blood and not much of the bus was left," said Dr. Laurence Buckman.\n"It was chaos," said Gary Lewis, 32, evacuated from a subway train at King's Cross station. "The one haunting image was someone whose face was totally black and pouring with blood."\nAs the city's transportation system ground to a near-halt, buses were used as ambulances and an emergency medical station was set up at a hotel. Rescue workers, police and ordinary citizens streamed into the streets to help.\nSome central London streets emptied of traffic. Groups of commuters who had been on their way to work gathered around corner shops with televisions, watching in silence. The mood was somber and subdued.\nAt the request of Queen Elizabeth II, the Union Jack flag flying over Buckingham Palace was lowered to half staff.\nBlair, flanked by fellow G-8 leaders, including President Bush, read a statement from the leaders. "We shall prevail and they shall not," he said.\n"Whatever they do, it is our determination that they will never succeed in destroying what we hold dear in this country and in other civilized nations throughout the world," he said earlier.\nReturning to London, he promised an intense police hunt for those responsible. He said he knew most Muslims worldwide "deplore this act of terrorism."\n"They are trying to use the slaughter of innocent people to cow us," he said. "They should know they will not succeed."\nIn Scotland, police evacuated a section of Edinburgh's main shopping street after a suspect package was found on a bus.\nIn Scotland, Bush warned Americans to be "extra vigilant," and his administration raised the terror alert for mass transit a notch to code orange. Security also was stepped up in the U.S. Capitol and in train and bus stations around the country.\nMuch of Europe also went on alert. Italy's airports raised alert levels to a maximum. The Czech Republic, Hungary, Russia, the Netherlands, France and Spain also announced beefed-up security at shopping centers, airports, railways and subways.\nThe U.N. Security Council was expected to pass a resolution condemning the blasts later Thursday, an official said.\nA group calling itself "The Secret Organization of al-Qaida in Europe" posted a claim of responsibility, saying the blasts were in retaliation for Britain's involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.\nThe statement also threatened attacks in Italy and Denmark, both of which have troops in Iraq. It was published on a Web site popular with Islamic militants, and the text was republished on Elaph, a secular Arabic-language news Web site, and Berlin's Der Spiegel magazine.\nThe statement's authenticity could not be immediately confirmed, but terrorism experts said the blasts had the trademarks of the al-Qaida network.\n"This is clearly an al-Qaida style attack. It was well-coordinated, it was timed for a political event and it was a multiple attack on a transportation system at rush hour," said Lawrence Freedman, professor of war studies at King's College in London.\nDeputy Assistant Commissioner Brian Paddick said there had been no arrests, and it was unclear whether suicide bombers were involved.\nAsked about the claim of responsibility, Paddick said: "We will be looking at that ... at the moment we don't know if that's a legitimate claim or not." He added British officials had received no prior warning or advance intelligence that the attacks would occur.\nEuropean stocks dropped sharply after the blasts, with exchanges in London, Paris and Germany all down about 2 percent. Insurance and travel-related stocks were hit hard, and the British pound also fell. Gold, traditionally seen as a safe haven, rose.\nThe explosions also unnerved traders on Wall Street, sending stocks down sharply.\nThree U.S. law enforcement officials said at least 40 people were killed. They spoke on condition of anonymity and said they learned of the number from their British counterparts.\nIn London, police said they could confirm at least 37 people had been killed, including two in the bus attack.\nBuckman, the London doctor, said ambulance staff told him about 10 people died in the bus blast. BMA doctors treated about nine seriously wounded people in the building's courtyard, two of whom later died, he said.\nLondon police said at least 700 were wounded. Among them, at least 45 were in serious or critical condition, including amputations, fractures and burns, hospital officials told The Associated Press.\nLondon Mayor Ken Livingstone said the blasts were "mass murder" carried out by terrorists bent on "indiscriminate ... slaughter."\n"This was not a terrorist attack against the mighty or the powerful ... it was aimed at ordinary working-class Londoners," said Livingstone, in Singapore where he supported London's Olympic bid. Giselle Davies, an International Olympic Committee spokeswoman, said the committee still had "full confidence" in London.\nJay Kumar, a business owner near the site of the bus blast, said he ran out of his shop when he heard a loud explosion. The bus's top deck collapsed, sending people tumbling to the floor, he said. Bloodied people ran from the scene.\n"A big blast, a big bomb," he told The Associated Press. "People were running this way panicked. They knew it was a bomb. Debris flying all over, mostly glass."\n"I was on the bus in front and heard an incredible bang, I turned round and half the double decker bus was in the air," Belinda Seabrook told Press Association, the British news agency.\nTraces of explosives were found at two explosion sites, a senior police official said.\nExplosions were reported at the Aldgate station near the Liverpool Street railway terminal, Edgware Road and King's Cross in north London, Old Street in the financial district and Russell Square, near the British Museum.\n"I saw lots of people coming out covered in blood and soot. Black smoke was coming from the station. I saw several people laid out on sheets," office worker Kibir Chibber, 24, said at the Aldgate subway station.\nSimon Corvett, 26, on an eastbound train from Edgware Road station, described "this massive huge bang ... It was absolutely deafening and all the windows shattered."\n"You could see the carriage opposite was completely gutted," he said. "There were some people in real trouble."\nOn March 11, 2004, terrorist bombs on four commuter trains in Madrid killed 191 people.

Downtown art gallery opens new summer show

Strolling around the Prima Gallery's new summer show, it's easy to forget every art piece and its respective price tag has a unique history, similar to the gallery itself. Tiny pots stock the shelves, mimicking the artists' hands who crafted them. Oil paintings snake up the stairs, offering narratives of the painter's life. Even a broom takes on meaning after hearing its torrid past from the broom's sculptor, David Eppinghouse, who retrofitted the cleaning tool with neon lights. \nAs the summer show opened at the Prima Gallery Friday night, art lovers had a chance to mingle with well-known and emerging artists to hear these stories behind their work. The summer show, "Paints, Pots, and Prints" opened to the tunes of a live accordion player and the excited chatter of exhibited artists, avid collectors and curious onlookers. Various artists made an appearance to reflect on their individual pieces, view other artists' works or grab a piece of pizza from the reception table.\n"We have old and new and rich and poor (artists) if you can use those generalities," said Eileen Rice, who has worked for the Prima Gallery the last seven years. \nThe Prima Gallery has maintained this hodgepodge of artists since the gallery first opened 37 years ago, in 1968. According to Rice, the first gallery owner, Rosemary Frasier started the Prima Gallery with other "faculty wives" because no Bloomington art gallery existed at that time. This original start-up team created the first gallery behind where Pygmalion's stands on Grant Street.\nMoving to Sixth Street 10 years ago, the current Prima Gallery took over space once owned and used by the Princess Theatre. The large glass windows and doors in the front of the gallery once housed the theatre's screen. \n"The (Prima) Gallery was the first gallery and it's lasted forever," said art exhibit installer and gallery artist David Eppinghouse. "This is like a flagship for the local art scene."\nIn the past year, the Prima Gallery has undergone more changes. The current owner, Linda Fratianni, bought the gallery last July. For the past year, she has been establishing her vision for the gallery with several month long shows and now the summer show. \n"I think we're different in how we present our shows, in our objectives," she said. "This show's objective is to present emerging and established artists." \nIU Fine Arts professor Rudy Pozzatti, recently named a "living treasure of Bloomington" by the Bloomington Area Arts Council, is one of the most established artists at the summer show. Pozzatti said the summer show gives his fans a chance to see what he's been working on, instead of waiting three more years for his next one-man show. For his pieces, "Prismatic V" and "Prismatic II," Pozzatti manipulated European candy wrappers to design the realistic looking stained glass windows in his pieces. \n"The wrappers in Europe are much nicer color-wise, design-wise, and the chocolate is damn good," said Pozzatti. \nFormer IU student and Evansville artist Shirley Kern mixed art materials for her summer show pieces. Kern created her oil paintings on wood slates and then added metal bolts to make the paintings appear like houses. Her four-squared wood image also plays on her notion that "everything's connected." \n"I sort of like to go back and forth between flat plane and sculpture so now I'm somewhere in between," said Kern, who used Asian influences to create impressionistic paintings.\nDavid Turner Hannon's oil paintings tell stories more than they conjure impressionistic images. Each of his four exhibited oil paintings not only includes the artist himself, but tells some facet of his life story. Not surprisingly, Hannon began as an illustrator and then moved to oil painting. \n"(I like) the narrative appeal where you're telling something beyond just one image, even though you're only giving one image," said Hannon. \nUnlike some of the more well-known artists, Hannon, a 2000 IU grad with an MFA in Fine Arts, got involved in the summer show completely by accident. When attending an opening at the Waldron Arts Center, he wandered into the Prima Gallery and introduced himself as an artist. Rice asked if he would be interested in displaying there. \nFor some of Prima Gallery's artists, it's just that simple. Jenni Cure, a local artist, walked into the gallery with her original wood cuts for the gallery exhibitors to examine. Those two original works, "Tree Shadow Two" and "Tree Shadow One," now hang in the summer show. \nIn addition to the summer gallery hours, artists and art lovers alike can view the show during the Downtown Gallery Walk July 8. As the eighth stop on the Gallery Walk, the Prima's Gallery Summer Show will provide Bloomington patrons an impressive collage of artistic talent.\n"It's the best commercial gallery in Bloomington -- the most established with the highest caliber of work," said artist Patricia Cole, whose ballpoint pen on paper drawings also hung in the summer show.\nPrima Gallery is located at 109 E. Sixth St. and is open Monday to Saturday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Pubs and dubs in London

After doing extensive research on British culture before leaving Indiana (I watched "Bridget Jones's Diary" and "Closer"), I arrived in London at the beginning of January expecting great things. I stood in immigration, waiting excitedly with passport in hand, and stepped up to the officer. I smiled, said hello, and waited for a response. Unfortunately, in the 10-minute quiz session that followed, the only thing I understood from his mouth was "'ello." The charming British accent I saw in the movies quickly turned annoying. Were they speaking a different language? What the heck was a queue? My class starts at 14:00? I was lost but not disenchanted. It was relatively easy to adapt to the British culture, and I quickly learned that the solution to any problem was to go to the pubs. Feeling alone? Go to the pubs. Tired of school? Go to the pubs.\nSo one night, my friends and I decided to go down to Picadilly Circus for some "problem solving." We started early, and after a few pints of beer, boarded the red double-decker bus #19 to begin our journey. Joking and laughing loudly on the bus (which is not "appropriate" in England), a very drunk British lady appeared from the top level of the bus and asked us what coast we were from in America. My friends replied one by one. "New York." "Boston." "Dallas." "Indiana." The lady replied, "Well I don't know where that last one is, but man, do I hate George Bush." She continued to drunkenly yell at us as if we were Dubya ourselves and then suddenly looked out the window, yelled, "Whoops, there goes my stop!" and jumped off the bus as it was rapidly rounding a corner. Unbelievably, she landed on her feet -- in heels -- and hurriedly made her way to Sloane Square. When we got to our destination, we stepped off the bus and went into a nearby pub. We sat down, ordered a drink and suddenly realized another person had joined our group: a British guy named Glenn. He had just gotten out of the "drunk tank" and decided to celebrate with a drink. We decided to take Glenn in as one of our own and had a much better experience than on the bus. He was fascinated to hear all about America and bought us all a round of drinks as we told our stories of home. \nWhen it was closing time, he decided to take his drink with him, hidden in the pocket of his jacket. Closing time in London is starting time at IU, though, considering the pubs shut their doors at 11 p.m. This works well for the Brits because they can still get up in the morning for work after a night out on the town. Not a bad idea, I have to admit. Now that my time in London is coming to an end, the annoyances I had when I first arrived have vanished. I'll miss the accent, the strange words, the double-decker buses and the crazy stories that can be told over a cold pint of beer at the local pub.

Business in Brief

Lender's to close bagel production line; 35 lose jobs\nMATTOON, Ill. -- The Lender's Bagels bakery is closing down a production line because of declining sales, a company executive said.\nThe move, effective May 9, will put 28 full-time and seven part-time workers out of a job. About 300 people work at the Lender's plant.\n"Over the last couple of years, the bagel business has continued to decline," Harold Tessman, senior vice president of operations for Pinnacle Foods Group Inc., Lender's owner, said Monday. "As a result, we are eliminating one of our bagel production lines and will be preparing the plant for the future production of different products."\nPinnacle Foods spokesman Kelley Maggs declined to comment about which products might be added to the plant's production lines. The Cherry Hill, N.J.-based company produces such products as Swanson frozen dinners, Mrs. Butterworth's and Log Cabin syrups and pancake mixes and Mrs. Paul's frozen seafood.

Jordan River Forum

Bursar billing agreement not acceptable\nI learned this afternoon that the IU Bookstore will no longer be allowing anyone but a select few on financial aid and student athletes to bill their semester books to their bursar. This has resulted because of the disagreement between T.I.S. and the IU bookstore about competition. This is really inconvenient for me, and personally I think a bit unfair. I was hoping that you, as the voice for the students, would write about this and speak out against it. It's important that the school not think this is an acceptable solution.\nKylie Stanley\nSophomore

Miami University students somber after 3 deaths in house fire

OXFORD, Ohio -- Students stunned by the deaths of three Miami University classmates in a house fire left bouquets of flowers at the site and paused for moments of silence in classes Monday, leaving the normally buzzing campus unusually still.\n"It's really quiet today everywhere," said Jennifer Hanson, 19. "Even when people are talking, this is what they're talking about."\nFire investigators were still trying to determine what sparked the blaze in the 19th-century brick home early Sunday, sending flames shooting out the windows. Investigators believe the fire started accidentally in the living room or recreation room on the first floor, fire chief Len Endress said.\nThe house, rented by nine students, complied with fire safety codes.\nAuthorities said one of the residents, Sebastian Barsh, used his cell phone to report the fire just after escaping through his first-floor bedroom window. He told a 911 dispatcher that a smoke detector woke him, and he saw a red glow under his bedroom door.\n"There's still somebody inside, I think," Barsh said on the tape.\nFire officials interviewed the eight survivors Monday, one of whom jumped to safety from a second-story window. Investigators believe 11 people -- seven residents and four guests -- were in the house when the fire started.\nJulia Turnbull, 21, of Milford, Ohio, and Kathryn Welling, 21, of Bronxville, N.Y., died of carbon monoxide inhalation in second-floor bedrooms, Endress said.\nA cause of death had not been determined for Stephen Smith, 22, of Bethesda, Md. Smith apparently had been shaken awake by a housemate and made it down a flight of stairs before becoming disoriented in the smoke, Endress said. His body was found near the front door.\nSmith, a rugby player, single-handedly stopped two scoring drives in a rugby game the day before the fire, friends said. The marketing major, who was expected to graduate next month, was known for his ability to make people laugh.\n"He had a lot of fun, and he knew people all over campus," said Sara Waterfield, 22, who met Smith in a study abroad program.\nTurnbull was a senior mass communications major, and Welling was a junior in the business school.\nMourners stopped by the house throughout the day Monday, some crying and hugging each other. Flowers were piled outside.\nThe house was in a neighborhood of older homes surrounded by large trees a few blocks from the campus, about 30 miles northwest of Cincinnati. Its roof had partly collapsed, and its windows had been blown out.\nUniversity President Jim Garland sent a note to faculty asking that they be sensitive to students' needs in Monday's classes.\nRhetta Bowers, 20, said one teacher let her class leave early.\n"I don't think I'll go to any of my other classes," she said. "It's just somber"

Torched Holocaust museum reopens

TERRE HAUTE -- A Holocaust museum gutted by a November 2003 arson fire reopened Sunday in an expanded space that includes displays of books and photos charred by the still-unsolved arson.\nAbout 500 people attended Sunday afternoon's reopening of the new museum. The 3,700-square-foot building's entrance is flanked by six slender windows that resemble candles and represent the estimated 6 million Jews who perished in the Holocaust.\nHolocaust survivor Eva Kor in 1995 opened the original CANDLES museum, which stands for Children of Auschwitz Nazi Deadly Experiments Survivors.\n"I'm asking you a special favor, to remember today as a shining example of triumph over evil," Kor said to the crowd.\nAs a child, Kor, 71, and her identical twin sister, Miriam, were prisoners in Poland's Auschwitz concentration camp and were subjected to Josef Mengele's experiments on twins.\nThe museum, which Kor opened in hopes of teaching Midwesterners about the horrors of the Holocaust, saw thousands of schoolchildren visit in the following years.\nOn Nov. 18, 2003, the museum was gutted by an arsonist who apparently spray-painted "Remember Timmy McVeigh" on the outside wall next to the window that was smashed.\n"It happened because of hatred and prejudice," Kor said.\nMcVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber who shared sympathies with white supremacists, was executed at a federal prison outside Terre Haute in 2001.\nThe fire is still under investigation by Terre Haute police and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, said city police chief George Ralston.\nDonations of nearly $300,000 allowed Kor to rebuild.\nThe original museum occupied part of the same building and was a "modest museum," where posters were pinned to the wall, Kor said.\nPush pins were no longer tacked to the walls of the new building, which includes a dramatic entryway with a vaulted ceiling, a library room, offices and a display room, she said.\nThe new museum features 11 elongated windows, expanding the memorial to embrace not only Mengele's lab experiment victims but also the other groups persecuted and murdered by Nazis in concentration camps during their 12-year reign in Germany. It includes Jews and other religious groups, gypsies, the physically and mentally handicapped, homosexuals and political opponents, Kor said.\nThe new museum holds displays, memorials and local students' artwork commemorating the Nazis' 11 million victims.\nSurvivors of Nazi crimes, liberated from the camps 60 years ago, must forgive to free themselves from the tragedy, Kor said.\n"Physically, they were set free. Emotionally, they're still imprisoned," she said. "It's for the victim to reclaim their life"

Pope rumored to have received last rites

VATICAN CITY -- Pope John Paul II developed a high fever Thursday because of a urinary tract infection and was being treated with antibiotics at the Vatican, his spokesman said. The latest health setback for the 84-year-old pontiff came one day after he began receiving nutrition through a feeding tube.\nThere were reports that the pope received the sacrament of the anointing of the sick -- what used to be called the last rites.\nBut the Italian news agency Apcom, without citing any sources, reported that John Paul's condition was "stable" early Friday, several hours after he started receiving antibiotics. Another Italian news agency, ANSA, said the pope "seems to showing a first positive reaction" to antibiotic therapy.\nAt the Gemelli Polyclinic, the hospital where the pope has been treated before, an emergency room chief said there were no plans to admit John Paul "at the moment," ANSA reported.\nHis assessment could mean that the Vatican medical staff feels confident it can handle the latest medical crisis with the sophisticated medical equipment installed at the Vatican. But it could also mean that the pope's condition was considered so precarious it would be better not to move him immediately.\nAt the edge of St. Peter's Square, hundreds of people gathered early Friday in a sign of concern over the pope's fragile condition. A few kneeled down on the cobblestones to pray, others wrapped blankets around themselves as they prepared to keep vigil throughout the night.\n"There's nothing we can do but pray. We're all upset," said Agriculture Minister Giovanni Alemanno, who was in the crowd.\n"I was in the car and I heard on the radio about the grave condition of the pope. I immediately thought I would come to St. Peter's," said Antonio Ceresa, a Roman.\nPolice barriers kept the faithful and curious out of the square itself.\nVatican officials could not be reached for comment on a report by CNN quoting an unidentified Vatican source as saying that John Paul received the sacrament of the anointing of the sick. The sacrament is often misunderstood as signaling imminent death. But it is performed not only for patients at the point of death, but also for those who are very sick -- and it may be repeated.\nThe pope's spokesman, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, told The Associated Press by telephone that "the Holy Father today was struck by a high fever caused by a confirmed infection of the urinary tract."\nThe pontiff was started on "an appropriate" course of antibiotics, Navarro-Valls said. "The medical situation is being strictly controlled by the Vatican medical team that is taking care of him."\nIn medical terms, "appropriate" often refers to a choice of antibiotics based on laboratory analysis of the kind of bacteria causing the infection.\nLights in the papal apartment above St. Peter's Square were on until about 11 p.m., generally well past the papal bedtime. The light remained on in the Apostolic Palace's nursing station on the same floor as the pope's apartment.\nPolice cars and other vehicles were seen going in and out of the Vatican gates as the evening wore on, and a small crowd of Italians who were following news on television began gathering at the edge of the square.\nEarlier, ANSA and Apcom said the pope had suffered an alarming drop in blood pressure Thursday evening.\nA urinary infection can produce fever and a drop in blood pressure as reported in the pope, said Dr. Marc Siegel, a specialist in internal medicine at the New York University Medical Center.\nThe pope's risk of such an infection is heightened because he is elderly -- which suggests his prostate is probably enlarged -- debilitated and run down from the illness that recently sent him to the hospital, Siegel said.\nUrinary infections tend to respond well to antibiotics, given either as pills or intravenously, and "I would suspect there's a very good chance he's going to recover well," Siegel said.\nHospitalized twice last month following two breathing crises and with a tube placed in his throat to help him breathe, John Paul has become a picture of suffering. When he appeared at his apartment window Wednesday to bless pilgrims in St. Peter's Square, he managed to utter only a rasp.\nLater that day, the Vatican announced he had been fitted with a feeding tube in his nose to help boost his nutritional intake.\nThe use of the feeding tube illustrates a key point of Roman Catholic policy John Paul has proclaimed: It is morally necessary to give patients food and water, no matter their condition.\nAs Parkinson's disease and other ailments have left him increasingly frail, the pope has been emphasizing that the chronically ill, "prisoners of their condition ... retain their human dignity in all its fullness."\nThe Vatican's attitude to the chronically ill has been apparent in its bitter condemnation of a judge's order two weeks ago to remove a feeding tube from Terri Schiavo, the severely brain-damaged American woman who died Thursday.\nVatican Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, reacting to Schiavo's death, denounced the removal of her feeding tube as "an attack against God."\nAlthough different, some see parallels in the two cases.\nUnder John Paul, Vatican teaching on the final stages of life includes a firm rejection of euthanasia, insistence on treatments that help people bear ailments with dignity and encouragement of research to enhance and prolong life.\nA 1980 Vatican document makes the distinction between "proportionate" and "disproportionate" means of prolonging life. While it gives room for refusal of some forms of aggressive medical intervention for terminally ill patients, it insists that "normal care" must not be interrupted.\nJohn Paul set down exactly what that meant in a speech last year to an international conference on treatments for patients in a so-called persistent vegetative state.\n"I should like particularly to underline how the administration of water and food, even when provided by artificial means, always represents a natural means of preserving life, not a medical act. Its use, furthermore, should be considered, in principle, ordinary and proportionate, and as such morally obligatory."\nJohn Paul's 26-year papacy has been marked by its call to value the aged and to respect the sick, subjects the pope has turned to as he battles Parkinson's disease and crippling knee and hip ailments.\nIt is not clear who would be empowered to make medical decisions for an unconscious pope. The pope has no close relatives, but the Vatican has officially declined to comment whether John Paul has left written instructions.\nThe Rev. Thomas Reese, editor of America, the Jesuit weekly magazine, published in New York City, said Thursday, "We don't know whether or not the pope has a living will. But if he does not, the statement issued a year ago would be a clear indication of his desire that he would not want to be disconnected from a feeding tube unless he was clearly dying"

Library to unveil new addition

Only silence and the clicking of keyboards will be heard in the new Information Commons 2 beginning today. The newest installment of the Information Commons at the Main Library will officially open for quiet individual study and work this afternoon with a reception and brief remarks by Dean of University Libraries Suzanne Thorin and Dean of Information Technology Brad Wheeler.\nAlthough the 9,600 square-foot study space has been open since late February, library officials have waited on the grand opening while final touches were being completed. But that hasn't stopped students from steadily pouring into the newest work area, located on the second floor of the west tower, directly above the current Information Commons.\n"I was surprised the second day construction was complete. I walked out of my office and (the IC2) was filled," Thorin said. "We hadn't even announced the opening and it was already filled."\nThe IC2 is described as a scaled-down version of the first floor IC with 68 individual work stations that feature a computer at each desk and an additional 100 desks with space for laptop users to plug in and access wireless Internet.\nThe IC2 is dedicated to individual work while its downstairs counterpart is for collaborative and group-based work, said Interim Head of Information Commons for Undergraduate Services Diane Dallis. The IC2 also boasts plush couches and glass windows that overlook the Arboretum.\nThe IC and IC2, a collaboration between IU-Bloomington Libraries and University Information Technology Services, combine information and technology, said Chip Rondot, senior communications specialist for UITS. Both offer research or computer tech support from librarians, reference assistants and technology consultants during their open hours.\n"Students are getting the best strengths of each," Rondot said. "With this joint project, students can get what they want 24/7; it's not 9-to-5 anymore. When students are getting ready to study at 11 o'clock they can have that luxury."\nWhile some professors argue that technology has begun to take over where books once ruled, Dallis said that the combined 36,600 square feet of the IC and IC2 haven't made books second-class citizens. \nThe new IC2 houses a current, high-use core collection, which offers more than 15,000 books. Along with the core collection are new materials and books available to check out, which Dallis said hasn't seen a decrease. She also said much of the library materials have been added online, so a computer addition isn't seen as a problem.\n"A lot of library materials are online, so we don't mind that it shares space with the books," Dallis said.\nThorin said with the new additions, the Main Library now has more to offer, giving students the option of collaborative learning in the IC or quiet study in the new IC2. \n"I think this gives students interested in a quiet study area a place to go to hit the books and have a computer in a safe and attractive environment."\nIUB Libraries and UITS will host the official opening of the IC2 today from 3:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. on the second floor of the west tower of the Main Library. The event is open to the public.\n-- Contact Senior Writer\nKatie Schoenbaechler at kmschoen@indiana.edu.

Cinema pubs drawing crowds with movies, food, drink

WESTERLY, R.I. -- When Emily Steffian and Daniel Kamil moved from California with thoughts of opening their own movie theater, they wanted to show films that were off the beaten path, but they didn't expect to land there themselves.\nThey envisioned setting up shop in Providence, near the colleges and the capital city's arts community. But the business climate seemed daunting, and a search for an appropriate and affordable property brought them to the seaside community of Westerly.\nSomewhat to their surprise, the combination of a small town and an independent film-screening art house has worked.\nThe Revival House, Westerly's 1 1/2-year-old cinema pub, is one of a growing number of movie theaters nationwide that serve food and alcohol, allowing patrons to combine their viewing and dining. They're a concept that industry experts say is particularly popular in areas like the Pacific Northwest and Dallas-Fort Worth, but they only recently have begun to take off in other places.\nJim Kozak, spokesman for the National Association of Theater Owners, said theaters that serve food and alcohol have been around for years. But they mostly have shown second-run films, movies that run weeks or months after their initial theatrical release.\nThese theaters are becoming more popular, however, and many are showing newer films. As of 1997, only 14 first-run theaters in the country served alcohol. Today that figure is up to 270, said Kozak, whose organization counts among its members the owners of more than 29,000 of the roughly 36,000 to 37,000 screens in the nation.\nHe traces the trend to a theater-owner in Dallas who ran a second-run cinema pub and convinced a studio to include him in the initial release of the 1998 movie "The Waterboy."\nThe experiment was a success, and the film, a national hit, did well at the alcohol and food-serving venue.\n"That opened the floodgate," Kozak said.\nThe earliest first-run cinema pubs tended to be outside of major cities, in part because distributors wouldn't include theaters that served alcohol in initial film releases if they had competition. That's been changing, Kozak said. But in New England, most cinema pubs are located outside of urban centers.\nIn California, where Kozak is based, few venues follow the theater pub model, and just one of those that do is a first-run theater. However, Kozak said, Arclight Cinemas, located in Hollywood, seems to do tremendous business. There, a movie and a dinner entree with a glass of wine or a beer runs about $31.\n"There's a lot of consumer interest in being able to enjoy a cocktail while watching a movie," Kozak said.\nThe Revival House features a cafe with a view of Westerly's downtown and a patio that overlooks the Pawcatuck River. The walls, painted in red and gold tones, as well as a large mural, help set the single-screen theater apart from the atmosphere of large multiplexes.\nThe movie part of the dinner-and-a-movie deal has included nontraditional film offerings in addition to food and beverage service in a cafe-style theater. Movie tickets sell for $6, whereas entrees run between $6.95 and $11.95, and a beer costs between $3.50 and $7. The food also differs from the fast-food style offerings of some other cinema pubs, with a meat, olive and cheese platter replacing the cheese fries. The theater also offers lunch, minus the movies.\n"What we're doing is sort of an urban thing in a small town," Kamil said.\nSteffian and Kamil now feel comfortably established, staging showings that often sell out even though they're not wider box office hits.\nPointing to a poster in the window for "Derrida," a documentary about the deconstructionist Jacques Derrida, Kamil said screening a film about a French philosopher is part of an approach that's "risky, but it's working."\nKamil and Steffian have cut a niche with classic and short films they solicit directly from independent filmmakers, films the couple screens before the main feature.\nBut the cinema pub concept takes a variety of forms.\nAt venues in Pelham, N.H., and Haverhill, Mass., Chunky's Cinema Pubs cater to families.\nThe Pelham location has operated as a first-run cinema pub for about eight years, whereas the Haverhill location, open for about nine years, has shown first-run films for the last four years, said Al Coburn, chief executive of Chunky's.\nMany patrons arrive with time before the movie and order their food, which is brought to their restaurant-style seats inside the theater. The theater also does a brisk business in children's birthday parties, he said.\n"It's a great family atmosphere, obviously for the right movies," Coburn said. "It can be a great date atmosphere."\nTheater owners try to keep the noise down by serving meals before the movie begins, but many say they don't get many complaints about noise.\nBut the model hasn't worked for all who have tried it.\nIn 2000, Larry and Anthony Gemma transformed Providence's Castle Cinema into a cinema cafe and bar, offering "dinner in the movies." In 2004, saddled with debts, the cinema closed its doors. The owners cited a deal that allowed the theater to run movies only after they had shown at a large multiplex nearby, as well as parking problems and other issues.\nFrancisco and Adriana Sandoval, of Providence, drove to North Attleboro one recent evening to catch Nicholas Cage in "National Treasure" at the Route One Cinema Pub in North Attleboro, Mass. The second-run theater, with a menu of appetizers, entrees, beer and wine, was the right spot for a weeknight out, they said.\n"You get a chance to go to a movie, have dinner and be home by nine o'clock," Francisco said.\n"The chairs are comfortable, there's food and you can have a beer," Sharon Sullivan, of Cumberland, said after an evening showing at Route One. "I'm surprised it's not more popular"

Young Buck, Something Corporate to perform during Little 500 week

Punk-pop band Something Corporate and G-Unit artist Young Buck will play concerts coinciding with Little 500 at two fraternity houses in April.\nSomething Corporate will perform at 7:30 p.m. on April 11 at the Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity, 1100 N. Jordan Ave. Tickets cost $20 and can be bought from fraternity brothers or from Ticketmaster.\nAlpha Tau Omega fraternity, 720 E. Third St., will bring Young Buck at 5 p.m. on April 14. Tickets cost $25 and are available at Tracks Records, 415 E. Kirkwood Ave., or from fraternity members.\nThe Young Buck concert has been billed as "Hip-Hip Palooza" and features an MC battle and two opening acts. The MC battle will be judged by three talent scouts from Interscope Records. First prize is two tickets to Las Vegas.\nHip-hop acts Da Gorgeous Gangsters from Astoria, Queens, and House of H.E.M.P. from Gary, Ind., will open for Young Buck. The G-Unit artist will perform for 45 minutes, said ATO Vice President and junior Adam Goldberg. \nThe fraternity is still accepting entrants to the MC battle. Proceeds will go to the Bloomington Boys and Girls Club.\nAnother G-Unit member, The Game, was also advertised to perform in Bloomington during Little 500 week, but the show was cancelled last week. More than 500 tickets had already been purchased.\nGoldberg insisted that the Young Buck show will take place. The fraternity is not working with the same promoter, and Young Buck has already publicly discussed the IU show on radio, he said.\nPhi Sigma Kappa sophomore Jason Boo said Something Corporate will be an alternative to the Little 500 hip-hop shows. Union Board is also bringing The Roots on April 14. \nHe said the five-member band from Orange County, Calif., has created their own identity with a style called "piano rock." \n"There's no other band really like them," Boo said. "It's a rock group but they incorporate the piano."\nPhi Sigma Kappa senior Michael Palm said Something Corporate has built a loyal fan base by touring and not selling-out to "MTV, TRL or the music machine."\n"They've not gone on your typical pop route," he said. "They put on an amazing show. It's really energetic."\nThe band has released three studio albums: "Audio Boxer" (2001), "Leaving Through the Window" (2002) and "North" (2003).\nDavid "Young Buck" Brown, from Nashville, Tenn., originally recorded with Cash Money Records in the late 1990s before joining 50 Cent and Lloyd Banks in G-Unit. His first album "Straight Outta Cashville" (2004) debuted at No. 3 on Billboard's Pop Charts.\nLate last year Young Buck was charged with assault with a deadly weapon after he allegedly stabbed a man at the Vibe Awards in Los Angeles. Reports have said that Young Buck was retaliating against a man who punched Dr. Dre. Young Buck is currently free on bail and faces an eight-year prison sentence if convicted.\n-- Contact General Assignments Editor Adam VanOsdol at avanosdo@indiana.edu.

Student fees fund special services

After a student attempted suicide on campus last year by jumping from Ballantine Hall, the University asked the Health Center to hire a second psychiatrist. \nBut costs for psychiatrists are rising industry-wide. Still the center plans to pay the added expenses by increasing students' mandatory health fee, even though less than 10 percent of students use the psychiatric services, according to Health Center reports. \nIt is not uncommon for student fees to fund services used by a small minority. Mandatory fees subsidize campus child care and student legal services, for example, even though a small minority of students use them each year.\nAssociate Dean of Students Damon Sims said it makes sense to spread the cost of some critical services across the entire student body to make them more affordable. \n"It's not just as simple as, 'We have to have 50 percent plus 1 students participating in this program for it to be meritorious of a mandatory fee,'" said Sims. "There are some very good things that need to be supported."\nAccording to a plan submitted by an appointed committee of students to the University before spring break, the Health Center, Student Legal Services and Campus Child Care all would receive fee increases next year.

Kokomo fire that killed four over the weekend was intentionally set, police say

KOKOMO, Ind. -- A weekend house fire that killed a woman and three children was intentionally set, police said Tuesday.\nNo arrests were immediately made and investigators were not releasing details on how the fire was started, police Lt. Don Whitehead said.\n"There are certainly people we are interested in talking to," he said.\nThe house was engulfed in heavy smoke and flames when firefighters arrived Sunday morning. Crews searched the home and found Amy Parrish, 25, along with her sons, Dacota Rasmussen, 4, and Caleb Parrish, 2, and stepson Casey Parrish, 11. They were all soon pronounced dead.\nParrish's husband was the only family member to survive the fire. His sister, Lori Teter, said in an interview that he fell from a second-story window as he tried to find an escape route for the family.\nMichael Parrish, 37, suffered 22 cuts when he fell through the window, Teter said. He was released Monday from Howard Regional Health System.\nParrish woke up about 8 a.m. to a bedroom filled with smoke and his wife telling him that the house was on fire, Teter said.\n"He couldn't see. He tried to open the window and ran into it," she told the Kokomo Tribune for a story Tuesday. "He tried to stop, to stay inside the house, but he couldn't. He landed on the ground."\nTeter said her brother tried to get back inside the house after he fell, but the fire was too intense.\n"He keeps saying, 'It should have been me. Why wasn't it me?'" she said.\nAmy Parrish and the three children all died of smoke inhalation, the Howard County coroner's office said. Caleb was the son of Michael and Amy Parrish; Dacota was her son from a previous relationship, and Casey was his son from a previous relationship.\nThe couple's 1-year-old daughter was unharmed because she was staying at a relative's home.

Overlooked IMU dining

Stepping into the Tudor Room restaurant on the third floor of the Indiana Memorial Union feels like stepping into a country club. The high ceilings, big open windows and delicate artwork make it easy to forget that the restaurant is located on IU's campus. But don't be fooled. The Tudor Room is rich in IU tradition. The high ceilings are adorned with flags that represent different schools of the University. The antique furniture that adds to the restaurant's atmosphere includes pieces from Herman B Wells' personal collection. \nThe Tudor Room was built in 1959 as a restaurant that would define the IMU. Originally serving a full menu at lunch, dinner and Sunday brunch, the Tudor Room offered a place for students, teachers and Bloomington community members to socialize and attend business meetings, all while enjoying home-cooked food. But competition never fails to arise. As grab-and-go style meals have become more popular, the Tudor Room has suffered. \n"We did not want to stop serving quality food," said Maureen Brown, general manager of IMU Dining Services. "But business was decreasing, so we had to do something."\nIn the early '90s the Tudor Room became a buffet-style restaurant that is only open for lunch 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Monday through Friday, while Sunday brunch remains. \nBut if the Tudor Room is the restaurant that defines the IMU, why have most students across campus never eaten at the restaurant? Judy Drew, Tudor Room manager, believes it is because students are misled about the restaurant.\n"First of all, we are located on the third floor of the Union," Drew said. "A lot of students don't even know there is a third floor. Secondly, I truly believe that students are intimidated by the appearance of the Tudor Room."\nSome students might see the ambience of the Tudor Room and immediately assume that the restaurant is pricey, but there are four options for meals during lunch at the Tudor Room that vary in price, all the way from the Grand Buffet for $8.95 to the soup buffet for $2.10. \nSunday brunch at the Tudor Room can be considered expensive. The buffet is $14.95, which is a lot more than what students pay for brunch at a place such as the Village Deli. And the price for brunch increases on such Sundays as parent's weekend or holidays.\nThe Tudor Room lunch buffet offers a variety of choices. The hot lunch buffet follows a daily theme from Italian food to Asian-infused meals. Homemade soups, salad bar and fresh desserts are also part of the offerings. \n"We like to give our customers options," Drew said. "It's important for people to know that we are a buffet, but there are still many options for a variety of different meals."\nFor some students, like junior Lauren Gospin, the idea of the Tudor Room is nice but unrealistic. \n"The hours that they are open are very restrictive," Gospin said. "I have class between 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., so I won't ever be able to eat at the Tudor Room for lunch." \nBut the hours won't stop junior Adam Solloway from venturing to the restaurant.\n"You will definitely see me at the Tudor Room in the future," Solloway said. "I might not always be eating the Grand Buffet, but who can pass up homemade soup for $2.10?"\nFor more information on the Tudor Room visit www.imu.indiana.edu. For reservations for Sunday brunch call 855-1620.\n-- Contact Staff Writer Monica Dix at mcdix@indiana.edu.