Roanoke’s O. Winston Link Museum

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Virginia Postrel writes about the new 0. Winston Link Museum in Roanoke, Virginia (Link recorded the waning years of steam locomotives)

The museum is in the former Norfolk and Western train station, which famed industrial designer Raymond Loewy redesigned in 1947. As Modernism’s Victoria Pedersen writes: “He completely transformed the 1905 neoclassical station, adding 22-foot ceilings, marble walls, terrazzo floors, a futuristic wall of horizontal windows and a dome. He also designed a concorse leading to the train platform that featured the first passenger escalators in the Roanoke Valley, cutting-edge technology for the period.” The new station was the epitome of streamlined modernism. But what that meant in the Virginia of a half century ago is spelled out in the letters above the door in these photos from the Library of Congress collection, the first of which Modernism reprinted

Madison Property Taxes: “Everybody’s Richer”

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According to city assessor Ray Fisher Friday when 2004 property assessments were released. “My house went up 10 percent this year. I look at it as money in my pocket.” – Beth Williams writes. Interesting perspective…. Can’t say that I agree with Ray on that one. Bill Novak writes:

“Last year, assessments went up 8.6 percent and the local real estate tax was up 7.1 percent, according to the Assessor’s Office. In 2002, assessments were up 8.1 percent and taxes went up 3.2 percent. In 1997 and 1999, assessments went up and taxes went down.” What about 1998, 2000 and 2001?

There has been talk in the state legislature of completely shifting school taxes from the property tax to other sources, such as the sales tax. Wayne Wood, a retiring representative from Janesville and Rep Mickey Lehman (R-Hartford) developed a proposal that would have used a sales tax increase to reduce property taxes for schools.

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Educators Flocking to Finland, Land of Literate Children

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Lizette Alvarez writes:

Imagine an educational system where children do not start school until they are 7, where spending is a paltry $5,000 a year per student, where there are no gifted programs and class sizes often approach 30. A prescription for failure, no doubt, in the eyes of many experts, but in this case a description of Finnish schools, which were recently ranked the world’s best.

Finland’s Schools: Yahoo | Google | Teoma | Alltheweb