Josh Shaffer
Reporter and Columnist at The News & Observer
GA reporter and columnist for The News & Observer who has crisscrossed NC for 20 years in the same pickup truck. Eager to profile eccentric and quixotic heroes.
Articles
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1 week ago |
newsobserver.com | Josh Shaffer
A statue of George Washington has stood on the grounds of the North Carolina State Capitol in Raleigh since 1857. It's been four decades since it was last refurbished The News & Observer From his perch on Capitol Square, George Washington projects a jaunty self-confidence, his gaze steady, his chin lifted, his wig tied in a respectable bow - keeping a patriot's post with sword at the ready.
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2 weeks ago |
newsobserver.com | Josh Shaffer
Pete Proimos and his wife, Annie, on their wedding day. Proimos has improved beyond expectations with his cystic fibrosis and started a Raleigh foundation to help other patients financially. Filtotimo Foundation When he was about 14, Pete Proimos learned a soul-crushing statistic about the cystic fibrosis he'd endured since birth: Patients back then didn't live much past high school. "Should I go to college?" he asked his parents.
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2 weeks ago |
newsobserver.com | Josh Shaffer
Days out of prison, Brandon Lowery borrowed a lawn mower, borrowed a weed eater, borrowed a truck and started cutting grass for cash - the first dollars in his ex-offender's business plan. He would cut a lawn for free then knock on the neighbor's door to show off his good work. As customers piled up, he learned to branch out and build patios by watching YouTube videos, one step at a time.
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2 weeks ago |
newsobserver.com | Josh Shaffer
For the last 60 years, Sylvester White has flicked on the lights in his family's barber shop, just a few blocks from the house his grandfather built in 1925, back when the streets were made of dirt. At 84, White has cut some of the same heads of hair for a half-century, along with their children, their grandchildren and their great-grandchildren - such a mainstay on Hill Street that his customers would line up before dawn.
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3 weeks ago |
newsobserver.com | Josh Shaffer
In his newest PBS series, Ken Burns trains his slow-zooming gaze on the American Revolution and finds a bloody mess led by a deeply flawed commander, fought in guerrilla style by soldiers as young as 14, leading to an unlikely victory that toppled a monarch. "It's the most important event in the history of the world since the birth of Christ," he said Thursday in Raleigh, promoting his upcoming project. "People were subjects and then they were citizens. It's big news.
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