Maybe it's my son's love of water towers or maybe it's because I enjoy a little small-scale spectacle every now and then, but if you're free this morning, I suggest you head over to The North End demolition site at the intersection of North Water and East Pleasant Streets at 9:30.
A crew will begin the first phase of moving the historic 44,000-pound Pfister & Vogel water tower to its permanent site in the mixed-use residential project, developed by the Mandel Group. In this step, the tower will be raised and secured to beams that will allow it to be transported.
In step two, slated to start around 11 a.m., the tower will actually be moved across the site and through the intersection to its new home on the northwest corner of Water and Pleasant, where it will anchor what will be one of the public squares in The North End project.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
