Jay Prince
For being all of 30, Jay Prince knows a lot about retiring and growing older. As the CEO of the area’s oldest continuing-care retirement community, Prince oversees 450 employees and the care of 420...
View ArticleJanis Clark
Janis Clark is a connector. The former lawyer, QVC host and game show contestant who landed in Kalamazoo 26 years ago, is a go-to person for putting people together with other people, resources and...
View ArticleMickey Ciokajlo
The son of a newspaper reporter and a printer, Mickey Ciokajlo has ink in his blood. The Jackson native, who graduated from Western Michigan University and has a master’s degree from the Columbia...
View ArticleSharon Ferraro
When Sharon Ferraro was a young girl, she fell in love. Hard. The object of her affection was the Delos Chappell-Stewart House at 213 Elm St., where her best friend lived. “I thought it was the coolest...
View ArticleJames Sanford
If he hadn’t been so critical of his high school’s newspaper when he was 16, there’s no telling what James Sanford would be doing now. In a true “money-where-your-mouth-is” moment, the newspaper’s...
View ArticleLinda Kekic
Linda Kekic is an anomaly. She is a gifted artist whose glass and jewelry creations are featured in local galleries and retail shops. At the same time she is an organizational whiz who has successfully...
View ArticleMeet Larry LaBond
When Larry LaBond wants something, he makes it happen. In 1991, LaBond arrived in Kalamazoo as a Western Michigan University student hankering to play disc golf, but he found folks here were playing...
View ArticleMeet Mary Balkema
Mary Balkema takes her job personally. She knows every nickel and dime coming into the county’s coffers and oversees big things such as the county’s budget and smaller things like dog licenses.
View ArticleTroy Thrash CEO & President, Air Zoo
Troy Thrash has long wanted to see bigger things. It started with the universe: He got his first telescope at age 7, and his first job out of college was working with the Hubble Space Science Institute...
View ArticleYolonda Lavender
Kalamazoo native Yolonda Lavender is pulling double duty these days.The neo-soul singer and songwriter with two albums to her credit — 2009’s Soul Artistry and 2013’s The Genre of Me— became the...
View ArticleRob Underwood
Rob Underwood says he has the coolest job in his whole company. That’s because he is responsible for all the events and shows at Wings Event Center. He’s the one booking bands, setting up expos and...
View ArticleTiana Gee
Tiana Gee has been on the job at the American Red Cross for just two years and has seen a lot — a lot of fires, a lot of work and a lot of people. Seven weeks into her new job, the area had three major...
View ArticleJon Hoadley
Jon Hoadley, who was born and raised in Vermillion, South Dakota, says he was drawn to politics when he realized “its power to fight against discrimination.” Elected in 2014 as state representative for...
View ArticleLucy Dilley
The Can-Do Kitchen, a food incubator that has helped local entrepreneurs launch new products, from bean dip and Brazilian bread to granola and coffee concentrate, was created because Lucy Dilley was...
View ArticleJohn Korycki
As a chef, John Korycki naturally gravitated toward teaching. Whether it was training cooks in his kitchen or teaching guests to create delicious dishes at Zazios’ chef’s table, the Chicago native has...
View ArticleMaria Schneider
For 19 days, audiences at the Irving S. Gilmore International Keyboard Festival will be enthralled by the artists they see in the 70 performances at 20 venues across the region. But will they think...
View ArticleJohn Liberty
John Liberty began his professional career as a journalist, but now he’s “a craft beer ambassador” and says the two vocations aren’t really so far apart.Liberty, a former Kalamazoo Gazette...
View ArticleCarrie Vanderbush
Carrie Vanderbush knows a little something about volunteering, and not because she oversees an organization that matched more than 22,000 volunteers with local nonprofits last year. When Vanderbush was...
View ArticleAaron Lane-Davies
Aaron Lane-Davies is hiking for his hospital.To be more specific, Lane-Davies has embarked on a multi-year, 1,100-mile hike through Michigan to develop and maintain the Pediatric Specialists Endowment...
View ArticleSue Ellen Christian
In a world of immediate news — it happens and it’s on the Internet in the blink of an eye — the craft of the journalist is more important than ever, says WMU professor Sue Ellen Christian. And despite...
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