Fort Wayne Magazine

This month, I connected with Stephanie Scheele, executive director of the Vera Bradley Foundation. Passionate and compassionate, Stephanie leads a team and a network of partners working to further research to find a cure for breast cancer. She has a magnetic personality and her leadership has expanded the impact of this unique organization that’s part of the fabric of Fort Wayne. Tell me about your career? I’ve been at Vera Bradley and the Vera Bradley Foundation for twenty-five years.

Artist Tyler Toole spent part of his childhood in the foster care system and Toole’s mom spent part of his childhood in prison. His first serious girlfriend provided stability amid uncertainty, and making art helped him cope with the end of that courtship. Toole believes his relationship with art developed more organically than intentionally. “Art chose me,” he said. “I didn’t choose art.” Initially, Tyler went to culinary school thinking his creativity would be expressed through food.

Home > Restaurants > BITES It seems unfair to single out any of the equally great steak places in Fort Wayne. Which is why I do all my “steak singling out” in Roanoke. I keep hearing that the Roanoke Village Inn is the place to go for steak. I haven’t checked it out yet, but I plan to. What I have noticed from looking at the Roanoke Village Inn menu is that prices are lower for steaks than they generally are at fine-dining restaurants in Fort Wayne. Great taste? Low price?

LET’S GET LOST: A famous man once said, “They call me the wanderer. Yeah, the wanderer. I roam around, around, around, around.” Why he needed so many “arounds” is unclear. Perhaps he’d lost his bearings. I love losing my bearings. Which is why I wrote this month’s cover story, “Wandering Indiana.” It is about the things I found in my wanderings in 2026, although several of them may have found me. Let’s just say we found each other.

2026 Readers’ Choice Awards Celebration 2026 Readers’ Choice Awards Celebration Best of the City: A Skyline Celebration An elevated evening for the city’s favorites Thursday, September 24th, 2026 6:00-8:00pm  |  early access tickets at 5:30pm LaVetta  |  110 W. Berry St. Fort Wayne, IN  | Floor 25&26

Parkview Field | Suite Level Lounge 1301 Ewing St. | Fort Wayne, IN 46802 Fort Wayne magazine August 2026 GOOD READS Table Talk – Karen Petersen PEOPLE Fort Wayne magazine July 2026 GOOD READS Table Talk – Meghan Britton PEOPLE Fort Wayne magazine June 2026 GOOD READS

I don’t know artist and musician Amber Hehl very well, but she recently shared a story that struck me as quintessentially Amber Hehl. Some kids were trying to teach her a viral TikTok dance, and she went, in her words, “hog wild.” “And they’re laughing at me like, ‘Why are you doing it like that?’ But I was doing it like that on purpose,” Hehl said. “Because the point of dance is to move the body. It helps your lymphatic system. It’s a primal urge.

In the 21st century, waitpersons are trained to try to convince you to order dessert. Growing up on the east coast in the 1970s, I would often order a dessert and hear the waitress say, “Do you really need that, Tubby?” Don’t feel sorry for me. I won at life.

There is angst and heartache on the menu at The Stand. Not because of all the different hot dogs that are on it, but because you have to choose from among them. Kierkegaard wrote about this sort of conflict in his 1844 work “The Concept of Tubular Anxiety.” This predicament can grow even worse when you start hearing the hot dogs say things like “Pick me!” “No, pick me!” This is not a hallucination. It is simply what happens when hot dogs know they are loved.

Because the Hot Brandy Apple Pie dessert at the Black Dog Pub arrives at your table in a hot skillet, one can only assume that it was invented by an 18th century blacksmith. While he worked, the blacksmith threw apples, butter and brandy in a glowing cast-iron pan, cooked it for three seconds and tossed it all into his calloused mouth. OK, maybe not.