About Jim Walsh

Jim Walsh Articles written 65

Jim Walsh is an award-winning author, journalist, writer, and songwriter from Minneapolis. A columnist for the Southwest Journal and regular contributor to MinnPost.com, his work has appeared in Rolling Stone, the Village Voice, St. Paul Pioneer Press, City Pages, and many other publications. He is the author of Fear & Loving in South Minneapolis; Bar Yarns and Manic-Depressive Mixtapes: Jim Walsh on Music from Minneapolis to the Outer Limits; Gold Experience: Following Prince in the ’90s; and The Replacements: All Over But The Shouting. A father of two (Henry and Helen!) and sometime teacher at the Loft Literary Center, Walsh is the ringleader behind the longtime singer/songwriter showcase The Mad Ripple Hootenanny. His new band, Jim Walsh and the Dog Day Cicadas, has recorded two releases, “Songs For The Band To Learn” (2017) and “Shout It Out To You” (2022). He lives in Minneapolis with his partner Mary Beth Hanson and their two cats, Rumi and Rilke.

Articles written by Jim Walsh

Lennon Law

How Leon Wildes helped John Lennon stay in the city he loved

“I didn’t expect I’d be talking about the Bible this morning,” says Leon Wildes, but it hardly slows him down. “I was going to be a rabbi,” he continues, “and in college I studied the Bible. And in the Bible, in some 34 instances, probably the most repeated mandate is ‘Love the stranger.’ I have found that as a kind of byword in my professional life.” Wildes wound up founding, not a temple, but Wildes & Weinberg, an immigration firm that takes to heart not only that …

The Republican from Harvard

Don't try to pigeonhole Chris Ward; you're sure to get him wrong

Anyone attempting to track the meandering trajectory of Chris Ward's legal career would be well-advised to use a telescope with a wide lens. Ward, who focuses on complex appeals and Supreme Court litigation for Yetter, Warden & Coleman, in Austin, has followed an impressive—if unorthodox—path to legal success. Consider: He is the biracial child of an unwed mother, adopted as an infant in 1969 by a white United Church of Christ minister and his wife who had been active in the civil …

Three Kings and a $25,000 Pot

Rick Daly found a novel way to finalize the deal—poker

What would you get if Sergio Leone met Denny Crane? Meet Rick Daly. Daly, a young hot-shot attorney with Houston's Caddell & Chapman, was negotiating a mid-six-figure settlement with one of several defendants in a lawsuit he filed on behalf of a couple who had lost their son in a grain elevator accident. After much negotiation, both sides were $25,000 apart. The defendant instructed the lawyer to offer the last $25,000 up for chance. "Flip you for it," said the lawyer. "Why?" asked Daly. …

Into Africa

Angela Spivey finds meaning half a world away

Five years ago, Angela Spivey wasn't feeling it. "It was a lack of fulfillment," she says. "You set certain goals in your career: ‘I want to make partner, I want to make equity, I want to do this.' And you conquer them all and then you find yourself still feeling a little unfulfilled. You want something more meaningful." That impulse led the 36-year-old products liability litigator for McGuireWoods in Atlanta to embark on missionary work in Africa. For the past five years, Spivey has taken a …

I Remember Mamaliga

For Andrei Iancu, the good ol' days are now

Read this intellectual property lawyer's list of successes, and you'd swear you were summarizing the long career of a silver-haired veteran of the bar. Large-scale, big-money victories representing TiVo and Immersion Corp. and defense of St. Jude Medical and eBay in various patent infringement cases have made Andrei Iancu, a partner in the Los Angeles office of Irell & Manella, one of the leading IP lawyers in California. He also just turned 40. A native of Bucharest, Romania, Iancu came to …

America’s Two Favorite Pastimes

Where sports and business intersect, you'll find Adam Klein

Adam R. Klein seems to have the dream job of every sports junkie and Monday morning quarterback in this game-happy nation. The guy serves as outside counsel to the Chicago White Sox and Chicago Bulls, and as close adviser to their owner, Jerry Reinsdorf. He also represents the Oakland Athletics, the Chicago Fire and the San Jose Earthquakes. But Klein, 37, a partner at Katten Muchin Rosenman in Chicago, whose main practice area is securities law, isn't overly impressed with himself. "Quite …

The Collector

Robert T. Franklin is a maniac for Baltimore sports memorabilia and die-cast model trucks

He knows how it looks, Bob Franklin does. He knows only a few other souls who truly appreciate his passion, and he knows what you're thinking about the photograph that accompanies this story: Nutjob. "My wife once said I can't do anything like a normal person," says Franklin. "I don't have a dial with notches; I just have a switch: ‘Off' and ‘Maniac.'" Robert T. Franklin has been general counsel to the Maryland Motor Truck Association since the mid-'80s. He was drawn to working with the …

Rainy Day Man

Stephen P. Hurley fights ‘the 21st-century version of lynching'

Stephen P. Hurley's office, tucked into the far reaches of the stylish fourth-floor law firm of Hurley, Burish and Stanton in downtown Madison, is perhaps best defined by what sits outside it: two chairs on a patio. They offer an oasis for the many lost souls who sat there and put their future in Hurley's hands.   Inside, hanging on the wall over his computer, you'll find the requisite undergrad and law school diplomas—Knox College and the University of Illinois College of Law at …

From Court to Court

Karie Cattanach is still sinking threes as Dane County assistant D.A.

“Shooting the three is an art form. It’s an elation. It brings a smile to my face. If it’s going in, I can feel myself going, ‘Yep, that one’s good.’ And when you’re in the zone, you could take it from half-court and you know it’s going in.” That’s Karie Davenport Cattanach, 33, assistant district attorney for Dane County, talking about the passion that has been at the center of her life since she was a girl: basketball. “My dad was a basketball coach,” she says, “so …

In the Aftermath of Katrina

Two attorneys describe their post-hurricane legal work

It’s been a little more than a year since Hurricane Katrina ripped through New Orleans and the Gulf Coast; a little more than a year since thousands were killed or displaced; a little more than a year since lives were shattered and hopes ravaged.   And so much still needs to be done.   Many remain without permanent shelter, or without work, or without the means rebuild their lives. For twoMid-South attorneys, the stories of these people are more than newspaper clippings or stories on the …

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