We write a year in review each year.. We have done this since we began a website in the year 2000, with 2001 officially being the first named year in review with logo and full wrap..
2020 is the first in these two decades where it feels like than stellar.. less than a twelve month period of 52 that seems worthy of remembering. Because we sadly will NOT forget..
Just about every news headline we saw this year finished its fact with “amid the coronavirus pandemic.”
People voting “amid the coronavirus pandemic.”..
Snowstorm “amid the coronavirus pandemic.”
Graduation ceremonies “amid the coronavirus pandemic.”..
Someone stubbed their toe “amid the coronavirus pandemic.”
x x x
THE BIGGEST NEWS EVENT OF 2020.
The election was set to be the big story of the year. All of that tension build up the reality show showdown of Donald Trump vs Joe Biden. Rallies and huge conventions were set to dominate our short attention spans.
Those predictions were dead wrong.
A virus that started in 2019 would obviously become the story of 2020.
U.S. health officials said they diagnosed a second patient with the China coronavirus in January of 2020 after a Chicago woman returned from Wuhan with the infection.. at that time they were monitoring 63 others. The virus obviously had begun to take hold long before lockdowns and government intervention.
The Super Bowl, Mardi Gras, and the funeral for Kobi Bryant were among those super spreader moments.. fleeting moments from an old world that now seems so far gone.
As the pandemic began, we wrote this in early January 2020:
And if you remember that global hysteria, you will recall how much of the world was brought to a halt in the year 2003 .. The virus was discovered in 2002.. it spread around quickly..and there has been no recent known transmission from human to human since 2004..
This new disease has unfortunate potential to be SARS II.. hopefully not worse..
It was certainly much, much worse.
Later in the same month, as the Chinese New Year “metal rat” was celebrated, we wrote,
A view from within Wuhan seems desperate.. sources that Coal Speaker have talked to from inside tell of empty streets.. People fearfully staying in their homes and staying away from people.. There is a massive construction project underway to build a hospital from the ground up in just days–enough for 1,000 patients.
Fears began to emerge that COVID-19 was the “disease X” that the world was worried about.
Finally, major national and statewide lockdowns began on March 13 .. Friday the 13th, of course..
We wrote then,
One day a few months from now (we hope) we can look back on this time and breathe a collective sigh of relief.. we can applaud the ingenuity of human and thank our lucky stars that the pandemic coronavirus, Covid-19, was a moment in time that we all muddled through together..
We did hope.
And the hope is just … still hope.
As the year ends, there is a strong chance that this may be the story of 2021… for all the wrong reasons.
THE not BIGGEST STORY OF THE YEAR: The rejection of Donald Trump
Trump still had big rallies, where he could.
But he didn’t get a convention, a serenade..
He didn’t get a strong economy. He got a virus, a pandemic and a national nightmare that never seemed to end.
What caused the defeat of Donald Trump in 2020? It would be interesting to see how the election would have ended up in 2019, prior to COVID-19, if Trump battled Biden. Or Sanders.. or someone else.
The economy was strong, the chances of a Democratic defeat looks equally likely.
Fate was beholden to another prospect. Instead, the national mood turned against Trump and he became the first president to get denied a second term since 1992..
But that’s showbiz…
THE DREAMS OF 2020
One of the biggest stories of the pandemic was the nightmares on main street that it brought..
All around the world, something strange was occurring across the planet in March and April.. reports varied, but it seemed some form of night terrors had taken hold.
People of different background and national origin had reported strange dreams. Strange visions at night. I even had one, vivid in my mind to this day..
We wrote about COVID-19 nightmares in March of this year, where I shared my personal experience,
My father and I were looking out of the window in his kitchen .. my 9-year-old son was busy with a Pokemon toy, shaped like a cross, digging in the dirt.. I wanted to yell out, commanding him to stop. But my dad told me not to.. when I looked out next I saw my grandfather–my dad’s dad–helping my son dig holes… Before I knew it, people who were residents of the nursing home where my mom is living right now were walking towards the square-shaped holes in the dirt.. And they were younger, they were happier.
This was all a dream–a reoccurring dream I have been having over the previous two weeks..
At that time, Professor Mark Blagrove, an expert in sleep and dreaming at Swansea University’s department of psychology has explained that cabin fever, financial pressures and lack of stimulation from being indoors so much is wreaking havoc on sleep patterns around quarantined nations..
It seems that the pandemic dreams have faded since that time.. but wow were they were. And wow were they visceral.. They happened. They happened so much that they began to seem real.
Tons of people from sea to shining sea are thankful for Vicks Pure ZZZs because of this pandemic.
THE MOST IMPORTANT WEBSITE OF THE YEAR
Yet another year where it was not mine. This time, the championship award goes to a site that many fans left: The Drudge Report.
Early in 2019, it appeared that the libertarian influencer began to change his brand from slightly pro-Trump to mightily against.
The links on the site changed style so much that many conservative outlets who relied on Drudge for years suddenly abandoned the site. Some said his web traffic collapsed…
But through it all he didn’t change, with each day of the 2020 election cycle seemingly turning more and more against the President.
And finally, in the end, a link and photo expressed it all when Trump lost, with the headline saying “You’re fired.”
BIGGEST LOCAL STORY OF THE YEAR: THE DEATH OF GRAFFITI HIGHWAY
There were amazingly important local events (for those new to this site we broadcast from Eastern Pennsylvania) .. but the biggest local event had to yet again indirectly take place in “amid the coronavirus pandemic.”
In April 2020, as lockdowns in Pennsylvania took hold, countless people flocked to what many deemed a safe refuge. The former town of Centralia, and its Graffiti Highway.
In April, it was killed.
As the members of the Breakfast Club found out, when you mess with the bull you get the horns. This weekend the bull was put on the spot.. A choice had to be made. Continue to have thousands of people per month stream into this ‘hot spot,’ pun intended, or do something.
News broke early Monday morning: Land owner Pagnotti Enterprises hired Fox Coal Co. Mining to truck 400 loads — between 8,000 to 10,000 tons of dirt — to cover the unofficial popular tourist destination… Trees and grass is rumored to be getting planted next.
State police were actively forcing people away from the scene.. Some lucky news hounds on Facebook got photos, or even live video from the Coal Region site HO BOTT NEWS.
The highway died.
Long live Graffiti Highway.
THE BIGGEST ENTERTAINMENT OF 2020: THE DEATH OF THEATERS
It’s over!!
WONDER WOMAN 1984 has officially premiered on HBO Christmas day, instead of theaters.
According to reports back in January of this year, the biggest films of 2020 were all films that eventually did not get released or were released in places other than theaters.
It is hard to believe that movie houses will survive into 2022 after this is all (crossing fingers) over..
The way WONDER WOMAN was released may present a new challenge for theater chains.
Will they survive?
ENTERTAINMENT REBIRTH OF THE YEAR: Drive in theaters
As inside theaters died, there was a rebirth .. the famous drive in theater.
Bloomberg reported this in September 2020:
As of October 2019, only 305 drive-ins remain in the U.S., according to the United Drive-In Theatre Owner Association (UDITOA). But during the coronavirus pandemic, the promise of a shared entertainment experience from the comfort of a controlled, socially distant environment has fueled a drive-in resurgence — and movies are only part of the offering.
With most live events on pause, the drive-in movie theater became Covid Summer’s go-to venue. In April, Doc’s Drive-In Theatre in Buda, Texas, welcomed 85 cars for a socially distanced wedding live-streamed on the theater’s two screens. Churches resumed drive-in services, reviving a practice rooted in the 1950s. In cities around the world, idled shopping malls and empty parking lots hosted ad-hoc screens for pop-up community movies, while existing drive-ins expanded their offerings to include concerts, art shows and stand-up comedy performances. Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium turned its football field into a giant outdoor cinema. And in July, a boat-in movie theater even popped up in Key Biscayne, Florida, complete with a 60-foot floating screen.
Could it be? The rebirth of something long gone? A lost art and a long feeling…
The revenge of the past.
THE INSURRECTION OF 2020
There was so much this year it is hard to believe that during some trying months of 2020, we actually thought the White House would be attacked…
There are these moments when you realize you are living through fast moving history..
Only days ago the nation was greeted with news of lockdowns and curfews due to a virus.. now we are hit by arrests and curfews due to protests going violent in cities across the United States..
Tonight, as the President of the United States was set to address the nation from the Rose Garden, a decision was made to tear gas relatively peaceful protestors in Lafayette Park.. That is where the “church of the presidents,” St. Paul, had fire damage from protesters a day ago.
x x x
THE LOST NOSTALGIA OF 2020
This year was a tragic moment for those who loved weird nostalgia. Roadside America is no more, and the insides are being auctioned off after sellers failed to sell the famous attraction.
After all these years, all these train rides in a tiny village, and all those God Bless Americas.. it is over.
COVID was blamed. .. but the traffic just drove by for years and stopped stopping.
We visited so many times.. but in 2012 decided to document it..
THE WEIRDEST CODED MESSAGES OF 2020
In July of this year, strange mail not ordered was showing up on people’s doorsteps. We wrote,
Various local affiliates across different cities in multiple states are reporting that people are receiving packages in the mail. Unsolicited.. NO orders. No expectations.
According to reports, the packages are coming from China and they contain… Seeds.
The mystery is what the seeds are and why they are being mailed.
But the seeds were not mutant. They were just boring seeds after all as we reported in August..
For the record, at least we re-wrote it one time. But we refused to do it a second time.
HONORBALE MENTIONS
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle quit royal family
Australian bushfires
Impeachment of President Donald Trump
The disgraced Hollywood kingmaker was convicted Feb. 24 of raping an aspiring actress and sexually abusing a TV and film production assistant. The verdict was celebrated by his dozens of accusers and their supporters as a watershed moment for the #MeToo movement.
The coronavirus pandemic triggered a global recession as numerous countries went into lock down. The Dow Jones industrial average suffered its worst single-day point drop ever on March 9.Kim Jong Un death rumors
Ghislaine Maxwell arrested..
And murder hornets.
Finally…
THE YEAR OF VIRTUAL
For better or worse, most of us did not see each other much in 2020. It was all virtual. Zoom.. Teams. Pick your poison.
These were paradigm-shifting events after all.
Virtual has made business… better? Worse? Or just different.
Schooling has become.. better? Worse? Or just different.
So much is unknown…
So many juries remain out for ’21.
Welcome to the roaring 20s.
