The Good News Monday

Nursing the coral reef back to health

Underwater speakers have been playing the sound of a vibrant living reef so that young fish would be attracted to the area and rebuilt dead coral reefs.  The research paper from Nature Communications highlights the impact of playing sound around dead or dying corals. The research concluded that broadcasting healthy reef sounds doubled the total number of fish and increased the number of fish species by 50% compared to equivalent unmodified dead coral. The reintroduction of fish in the ecosystem is not enough to fully recover the coral reef, it gives a start to the recovering of it.

The recent times helped the Great Barrier Reef by pausing tour boats and having family owned tour company, Passions of Paradise, collaborate with scientists set up “nurseries” where young corals are being grown and harvested to be fused with the old one. 1000 pieces of coral have been re-planted.

Ella Fitzgerald & Marilyn Monroe’s connection

When once asked about her favorite singers, Marilyn Monroe answered, “Well, my very favorite person, and I love her as a person as well as a singer, I think she’s the greatest, and that’s Ella Fitzgerald.”

If you haven’t seen the viral image of Marilyn Monroe and Ella Fitzgerald together at the Macambo club stating that Monroe helped raise Fitzgerald’s career with a wholesome gesture, let us put you up to speed.

In 1950s, Fitzgerald’s enthralling singing voice had won her many fans, however the venues that hired her were often smaller clubs; some places weren’t interested in having an overweight black woman perform for them. Dorothy Dandridge and Eartha Kitt had already performed at the Mocambo, so Fitzgerald wouldn’t have been the first African-American to sing there. But the club’s owner felt the heavyset Fitzgerald lacked the glamour to draw crowds.

Movie star Monroe had spent hours listening to Fitzgerald’s recordings, a recommendation from a music coach to help improve the star’s own singing). In November 1954, she saw Fitzgerald perform in Los Angeles and the two were soon friends, in a time of racial prejudice.

When Monroe learned of Fitzgerald’s inability to get a gig at the Mocambo, a famous L.A club, she approached the owner to book Fitzgerald. She promised to sit at the front of the house every night and to bring along other celebrities. Monroe made clear the amount of publicity this would garner, so the club owner agreed to hire Fitzgerald for a couple of weeks in March 1955.

Teamwork in communities

Recent protests and riots have left the U.S. a bit out of shape, with some cities being more affected than other. We showed you last week’s The Good News Monday that the media is not portraying fairly how the protests are actually like on the streets. It’s not just vandalism and chaos, but that people are being united, from random citizens to police captains and that most of them agree that a change in mentality is needed.

This week we have to highlight other heroes of the protests, the communities that came together to clean up the mess left behind by furious crowds.

NFL player, Marquette King, sent out a tweet on the 6^th of June that as a resident of Arizona, he will be in downtown Phoenix to clean the city and invited others to join. Over a doze people showed up to scrub graffiti off the walls and windows.

Sunday morning, 7^th of June, in downtown Seattle saw community members coming out to clean up the destruction and secure storefronts. That’s the spirit we have to be about going forward, is people coming together and find a way to really acknowledge the challenges that we have, make them better, but still love our city,” said the Mayor of Seattle.

When Antonio Gwynn saw the damage done in his hometown of Buffalo, New York, he immediately took action. The 18-year-old grabbed a broom and trash bags and took to the streets to begin cleanup at 2 a.m. Monday after a newscast showed glass and trash throughout one of his neighborhood’s main streets. He continued cleaning for 10 hours.

When word spread about Gwynn’s service to his community, Matt Block took notice. Block found Gwynn on Facebook and took a look at his profile page where he saw Gwynn had recently written a post asking for car-buying advice. Block thought about his prized, red 2004 Mustang, which he only drove occasionally. What the generous man didn’t know was how important the car would be to Gwynn. The teenager’s mother died in 2018. She had had her own red Mustang. How about that Karma?

5 star hotel houses homeless people during pandemic

Fownes Hotel in Worcester, England, and the staff there have been hailed as unsung heroes after they refused to close during the novel coronavirus lock downs so they could offer up their rooms to homeless people for free.

More than 45 people going through a rough time have been staying for free at the 60-room hotel, which normally charges guests up to £155 per night. The guests have praised the staff for their excellent treatment and amazing food.

“I have never slept in a double bed before. I’m happy here—this is a five-star hotel putting up homeless people. The food is also excellent, I feel a lot healthier than when I came in.” said a 55-year-old guest who decided to repay the hotel by building a patio and a wall. Other guests have helped as well with gardening, cleaning and various odd jobs.

The hotel even joined forces with a homeless charity to host workshops on how their guests can manage addiction, seek benefits and secure future accommodations.

Youtube’s dad

Rob Kenney knows what it’s like to grow up without a father so he made it his mission that no one else feels the same, at least for part of it.  The man from Washington wants to fill in the void whenever a kid needs someone to guide him through different jobs: change a car’s oil, put up a piece of furniture, use a stud-finder or even shave your face.

His YouTube channel, called ‘Dad, How Do I?’, aims to teach youth the valuable lessons a father is meant to teach. Launched only two months ago, his DIY channel already has more than two million subscribers. Fans can now count on Mr. Kenney whenever they get into a jam, using his step-by-step instructions for jump starting a car or unclogging a sink.