People Who Make Our City Great Are Getting Kick Ass Awards Tonight

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There are a lot of things that make St. Louis an awesome place to live, and tonight some of the citizens that make our fair city a more interesting place to live in will be honored at the Fifth Annual Kick Ass Awards. The annual event honoring the people who are cultural gems to our city was dreamed up by and is hosted by the editors of 52nd City: Thomas Crone, Stefene Russell, and Andrea Avery, who also pick the honorees. The awards and the publication have gained a lot of popularity since their 2004 inception. Crone said, "As we've moved into year five, we've actually gotten a couple of good nominations from friends of the magazine. This year, we selected two people from those recommendations: Wiley Price and Floyd Wright."

Tonight's honorees are:

• The Angry Black Bitch - a local blogger with some might jaws, hence her aka Shark-Fu, she recently was featured in a book about blogging and started writing for a nationwide feminist blog.


• The Cupcake Project - We love Stef (you might remember she made the ToastedRav cupcake for us that was awe.some) and are so happy she will be honored for having "what might be the only experimental cupcake blog" in the US according to 52nd City


• The Fox Hole - A.M. sports talkers Maurice Drummond, Martin Kilcoyne, and Andy Strickland's show on 1380 will be honored as the 52nd City's pick as the most amusing sports show on the dial.


• Lucas Hudson -Editor extraordinaire of the local publication Vital Voice will be honored for his work with the publication and his work with the Old Farmer's Market North


• The International Institute - this South Side institution provides services for St. Louis's refugees and immigrants will be honored for their work in the community.


• Kosha Irby - SLU's Associated Athletic Director is being honored for the work he does around the city even with a hectic schedule.


• George Malich - a local improv actor who is being honored heavily involved with the arts in our community, and as 52nd City said for being "a room brightener, always."


• Phil Valko - a local rehaber who is deeply involved in, "a variety of progressive causes."


• Lori E. White - Another TRav favorite! Lori is a local blogger who loves this place as much as we do. She is the awesome chick who let us borrow her pictures of the Light Project (photography, dance, writing, acting - she is St. Louis's Renaissance woman for the modern day).


• Josh Wiese - a local musician and activist being honored for his work in local neighborhoods and for being the kind of guy that the folks at 52nd City said they wish, "St. Louis had a few thousand more of this personality type."


• Wiley Price - a local photojournalist who was nominated by a 52nd City reader for his work for the newspaper St. Louis American.


• Floyd Wright - also nominated by a 52nd City fan for his work in South City's Southwest Garden neighborhood with, "stabilizing, development, and beautification," in the neighborhood.

This will be the fifth year Crone and his crew will be spotlighting a diverse group of local mavens. Past honorees include developers, children's literacy programs, artists, and others who make our city a little more interesting. Back in 2004 the awards and the 52nd City publication were only something the city needed. Crone and Russell happened upon the Kick Ass Awards in Austin, TX which were hosted by Spike Gillespie and decided to bring them to our fair city. Crone said that after hosting the first awards ceremony in St. Louis he, Russell, and Avery, "wound up wanting to collaborate on something more substantial and the 52nd City idea was hatched." Since then, the awards and the publication have been doing a kick ass job highlighting what is great about our city.

The Kick Ass Awards will be bestowed upon their honorees tonight at Joe's Cafe, a music venue that doesn't serve booze located at 6014 Kingsbury, starting at 7pm.