Month: November 2001

Chateau On Central

Post author By Marsha Oates
Post date November 30, 2001

This whimsical and picturesque house is especially distinctive — even in the architecturally eclectic Central Gardens. Its facade, carefully balanced yet asymmetrical, has a bold, rough-faced ashlar-stone tower with beaded mortar joints and a conical roof that incorporates elements of chateauesque French architecture and the Romanesque style popularized by Henry Hobson Richardson. The extremely steep front gable roof terminates in curved rafters above the porch. The two bays of the deep porch are flanked by robust, square stone piers not unlike the piers found on many Craftsman bungalows in the surrounding neighborhoods. The pair of rectangular openings to the porch form a horizontal block which balances the strong vertical tower element.

The curving roof, the wood-shingle siding on the second floor and the front-facing gable, the leaded-glass windows, and the tower are all elements of the Queen Anne style, popular throughout the United States from the 1880s to the early years of the 20th century. The applied tracery on the facade is derived from the work of Robert Adam, an 18th-century English architect. On this house, the tracery is used to emphasize the front gable, the spandrel between the tower windows, and the tower cornice.

The entrance foyer has the feel of a baronial hall, with a stone fireplace and a pair of arched alcoves: One is used as a small music room, the other is formed by the bottom run of the staircase and its large landing with a bay window. The stair’s solid balustrade of quarter-sawn oak panels extends into the adjoining alcove, where it becomes a screen wall in the music room.

Two pairs of pocket doors lead from the hall to the living and dining rooms. The first-floor tower room is now used as the dining room, adjoining the parlor behind it through a third pair of pocket doors. A big breakfast room and a nicely remodeled kitchen extend across the back of the house. The kitchen has a good, workable layout and is embellished by a painted frieze above the cabinets.

Some time ago a large den, a kitchenette/wet bar, and a full bath with a claw-foot tub were added to the rear of the house. The den opens to a huge covered porch, which is both a visual and functional expansion of the den.

The second floor has two distinct areas: two bedrooms and a bath, which open off the hall, and a master suite consisting of a bedroom, sitting room, walk-in closet, and a full bath with a shower. The third floor has one long room with a sloping ceiling and narrow stained-glass windows in each of the gable-end walls.

The house sits near the front of a large lot (almost an acre) with a side parking area, between the street and the vast, fenced backyard, which is entered through an automatic gate. In the back garden, a waterfall cascades down a stone wall into a pond. Extensive beds of perennials and a border of mature trees contribute to the park-like setting. The placement of the main house and a one-bedroom guest house on the east side of the lot leaves a large area available for development as pool, tennis court, or more gardens. Now close to 100 years old, this little castle has been beautifully preserved and sensitively augmented to provide amenities not often found in Midtown, and it is nicely outfitted to provide the setting for another century of pleasant living.

1475 Central Avenue

3,950 square feet, 4 or 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths (Guest house: 420 square feet; 1 bedroom, 1 bath)

$416,900

Realtor: JPM Properties, Inc., Agent: J. Patrick McDowell

278-6300, 537-4952 (pager)

Cover Feature News

Where There’s Smoke …

Post author By Lesha Hurliman
Post date November 30, 2001

It’s an uncommonly beautiful November Saturday. No one seems in a hurry. Even the leaves are taking their time as they drift to the ground. As I pull into a driveway on Central Avenue in Midtown Ken Robinson waves at me. He is wearing some sort of mountain-climbing get-up, suspended in mid-air from a chimney.

“Scaring squirrels out,” he shouts.

“There’s about four squirrels in that elm there,” he says once he’s on the ground again. “I’ve had to wave my arms around like a scarecrow to keep them from coming back while we’re patching up the hole.” As Robinson tells me this, his face lights up like a kid at Christmas and his arms flap. Even on this gorgeous Saturday he’s obviously happy to be working, hanging out with a family of angry squirrels on a roof with the pitch of a black-diamond ski run.

At first glance you probably wouldn’t peg Robinson as a chimney sweep. There’s no hint of Dick Van Dyke’s Mary Poppins character. With his long, braided hair he looks more like an artist or maybe a professor of some sort. Actually, if you didn’t know that he owns a macaque named Ernie, routinely sits under houses in the dark on all-night raccoon stakeouts, and has rescued an 8-foot, 70-pound ball python from a storage facility, you might write him off as an average Midtowner.

But Robinson makes his living in the smoke chambers of 100-year-old chimneys, wearing a respirator. He is a chimney sweep’s chimney sweep, having been a certification instructor for the Chimney Safety Institute of America, a director of Region Four’s National Chimney Sweep Guild for six years, and secretary and vice president of its board. He claims his business, Coopertown’s Mastersweep, Inc., is the oldest sweeping business in Shelby County and does everything from removing unwanted rodents to cleaning out dryer vents. He’s also an expert on the smoky history of his profession.

THE FIRST CHIMNEYS WERE PROBABLY BUILT around the 13th century. Soon — no doubt after a few houses had burned — it was determined that creosote, a thick tar-like substance, would build up inside chimneys and eventually catch fire. Once it became obvious that chimneys had to be regularly cleaned, numerous methods were tried: tying brush to long sticks, stuffing small trees inside, and dropping ducks down the chimney (or geese or turkeys, depending on the chimney’s size). None of these were ideal, and as houses became larger and taller the task became much more complicated. “Chimneys would go up and then turn at a 45-degree angle and then maybe turn again and maybe again,” says Robinson.

Such complex chimneys couldn’t be cleaned by a guy with a stick — or even an overactive duck — so chimney sweeps began using children. Literally.

In the 18th and early 19th centuries it was not uncommon for children to be kidnapped or taken from orphanages as early as age 3 and indentured to chimney sweeps. “[Children] were like a cork in a bottle; their body was a brush,” says Robinson. Chimney holes were called nines and eights — as in 9-by-9 inches or 8-by-8 inches — so the children had to be very small and very young. Robinson continues: “It was all they could physically do to squirm through, and that action cleaned the chimney.” Most of these children had a life expectancy of about three years, due to heavy exposure to carcinogens, suffocation, and burns.

One story Robinson recalls tells of a master sweep leaving a boy he thought was dead in a chimney. The lad was discovered by the owners of the house later, when they lit a fire. He survived and they adopted the lad. But others weren’t so fortunate. “Often they just left dead children [in the chimney] if they were in a place that didn’t block the path of smoke. It would just burn them up, dehydrate them, and all the odor would go up,” says Robinson.

Robinson recalls a story he read about an Allied spy in Germany during WWII who disguised himself as a chimney sweep and spent long periods of time hiding inside chimneys, eavesdropping. One day, while leaving a chimney, he was noticed by a guard. The spy stabbed him to death and stuffed him up the chimney onto the smoke shelf.

Though Robinson was once practically buried in an avalanche of tiny mouse skeletons, he assures me that he hasn’t ever run across anything that macabre in a chimney. He has, however, discovered secret rooms. And once, while mapping the chimneys and flues of a house in Midtown, he found a torture chamber. “I was thinking it was a joke,” he says. “A very elaborate joke.” When the owners came home they confirmed his find, but Robinson was sworn to secrecy. He continues cautiously: “I will say it was one of our well-known old political leaders. One of his chief enforcers had built the [room]. It had manacles on the walls, hooks, a drain in the center of the floor. The hidden flue I had been confused about went to an incinerator. It’s still there, I guess.”

Robinson says chimney sweeping as Americans know it really only started about 25 years ago. “They were all a bunch of hippies who weren’t afraid to get dirty and I was right in the middle of them,” he says.

Since then one of the things most chimney sweeps, including Robinson, have given up is the traditional attire — a top hat and coat with tails. The outfit is attributed to George Smart, who is credited with inventing a flexible rod-and-brush chimney-sweeping tool in 1803. (It was a welcome and humane alternative to using children.)

Smart’s closest friend was an undertaker, a profession which at that time included paying people and dressing them up to pad the crowd at funerals when the deceased lacked sufficient family and friends to fill the church. The undertaker gave his worn-out mourning clothes to Smart, who wore them to sweep chimeys. Old ragged top hats and formal coats with tails quickly became associated with the new breed of sweeps.

Now sweeps are moving away from their historical roots in favor of a more technology-centered, baseball-cap-and-khakis approach. “But we can still take our digital video cameras and other modern technologies up the chimneys with us without forgetting the historical and traditional aspects [of our profession],” says Robinson.

Like anyone who cares about his trade, Robinson has pet peeves. For instance, he hates prefabricated chimneys. While the price difference between a good masonry chimney and a prefabricated chimney can be more than $10,000, Robinson says it can also be the difference between life and death for a homeowner.

Prefab chimneys consist of a metal pipe inside another metal pipe. The air-space between the two provides the only insulation from the chimney’s heat. “The metal used in the pipes is thin enough that you can take a pocket knife and stick a hole through it,” says Robinson. The fire box is built the same way — a box within a box — only with a veneer of faux brick, so that when you and your sweetie are all cozied up in front of the fireplace it looks … real. Needless to say, Robinson prefers masonry.

There are two kinds of masonry chimneys, he says — lined and unlined. Chances are if your house and/or chimney was built within the last 55 years you have a liner. If your house is older, then you may not. A good chimney liner stands up to the high temperatures of chimney fires and will resist creosote acids, which can break down masonry. If you don’t have a liner, Robinson says, then you absolutely must clean your chimney annually. Otherwise a lot of damage could be done to your chimney and ultimately to your house.

“I love Midtown because there are real chimneys,” Robinson says. “If you go anywhere else in Memphis … if you drive up to a brand-new $1 million home there will be a $2,000 prefabricated chimney in there. The yard lights and mailbox cost more.”

And more often than not, Robinson says, the owners aren’t even aware of it. “You’ll talk to the owner and he’ll say, ‘Yeah, they tried to talk me into one of those prefab fireplaces but I wouldn’t have it.’ You hate to tell him, but …”

Robinson says using a prefabricated chimney comes with other costs, too. In 15 to 20 years (the life expectancy of current prefabs) you should be prepared to install a new one. And if anything goes wrong in the meantime, Robinson says it’s often hard to find parts. “Maybe you only need one part, but a lot of the time we can’t find it because they are constantly coming out with newer models.”

Robinson estimates that only one of every 35 to 40 prefabricated chimneys are properly installed. He tells of being at a local prefabricated fireplace dealership when the manager handed the new forklift driver a manual and sent him out to install a chimney.

Robinson concedes that if a prefab is properly installed and is kept up, it can work out fine. Just be careful, he warns, that you know who is installing it. According to Robinson, most sweeps will install one correctly for $300 to $400.

Another thing that gets him worked up is vent-free logs. According to Robinson, closing the damper is a bad idea. “Vent-free logs sound great,” he says, “but a chimney was designed for air to be sucked up as the temperature rises. The room air helps to cool everything down.” If you close the damper, Robinson says, the coolest part of your fireplace is now the hottest, and this can and has led to fires. Robinson warns: “Even the mantel can catch on fire.”

According to Robinson, the best time to get your chimney swept is in the spring or summer. During the winter months sweeps may be cleaning up to 40 chimneys a day (including Saturdays). However, no matter what the season, it’s always better to be safe than sorry.

Fire Safety Tips From the Chimney Safety Institute Of America (CSIA)

— Starting a fire in a fireplace: Open damper and wait 10 minutes to let cold air in chimney fall into room and warmer air to rise into chimney.

— Light gas-log lighter or burn balled-up paper for about 3 minutes to establish draft.

— Add more paper balls and small dry pieces of wood and wait 10 minutes.

— Add more small wood and a couple of fire logs (be sure all wood is seasoned).

— Keep all combustibles 36 inches from fireplace openings.

— Do not hang stockings, garland, Christmas cards, or other combustibles on mantel.

— Do not burn gift wrapping, boxes, paper, or other highly combustible items in fireplace (can cause chimney fire).

— Keep tops of flames 6 inches to 8 inches below lintel (top of firebox).

— Have fireplace inspected for creosote and structural defects by a CSIA-certified chimney sweep.

— Have fireplace and chimney swept if necessary.

— Be sure damper is open.

— Keep ABC-rated fire extinguisher in home.

— Keep combustible decorations on roof away from the top of the chimney.

— Keep spark screen in front of fireplace during burning cycle.

— Keep Christmas tree far away from fireplace.

Fire Numbers

United States Consumer Products Safety Commission’s Most Recent Chimney Fire Statistics (1998)

— 18,300 residential fires in the U.S. originated in chimneys, fireplaces, and solid-fuel appliances. These fires resulted in 160 personal injuries, 40 deaths, and $158.2 million in property damage.

— The Chimney Safety Institute of America (CSIA) recommends that people have inspections performed by CSIA-certified chimney sweeps. These chimney sweeps have earned the industry’s most respected credential by passing an intensive examination based on fire codes, clearances, and standards for construction. The CSIA recommends all chimneys be inspected annually.

— To receive free information about wood-burning safety and for a list of CSIA-certified chimney sweeps, call (800) 536-0118 or visit the CSIA Web site at www.csia.org.

Tips on firewood

— Wood is purchased by volume not weight. One cord equals 128 cubic feet. A contemporary cord is four feet high, four feet wide, and eight feet long.

— To judge if wood is seasoned, look for radiating splits on the cut end of the log.

News The Fly-By

City Reporter

Post author By Flyer Staff
Post date November 30, 2001

Novelty Act?

An adult novelty shop has some Cordova residents loaded for bare.

By Rebekah Gleaves

It’s just a matter of days until Cordova shoppers will be able to buy a gun, a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, and a “Wind-up Whackin’ Willy” in a single stop. Christal’s, an adult novelty store, is moving into a small strip-mall on Germantown Parkway just in time for Christmas, much to residents’ chagrin. Other businesses nearby include Natalie’s Liquor Warehouse, a sporting-goods store, and an auto radio shop.

“It’s right next to Dowdle Sporting Goods where young families shop with their young children,” notes city councilman Brent Taylor, who represents the Cordova area. “The types of things this store will sell are not in keeping with the values of the Cordova community.”

Store owner Wayne Dowdle worries that teenagers shopping for baseball bats and fishing and hunting gear in his store may be tempted to sneak into the novelty store.

“Some parents have already said that they don’t want their kids coming to my store anymore because they’re afraid they’ll walk in next door,” says Dowdle. “Kids will be kids, they’re going to be curious. I was curious at that age.”

The issue seems to hinge on whether Christal’s — which sells lingerie and gag gifts as well as more explicit sexual toys — has more than 5 percent of its retail space devoted to adult items. If it has less than 5 percent, it is considered a regular retail establishment. If it has more than 5 percent of its space devoted to adult novelty items, a city zoning ordinance prevents it from operating in the strip mall.

The Cordova Christal’s will be the fourth Memphis-area store operated by the Colorado-based chain. Christal’s officials would not comment to the Flyer for this story.

“There are designated areas in this city for adult entertainment. This is not one of them,” says Taylor.

On Friday, November 16th, Christal’s was issued a retail permit “based on the information they gave us,” says Allen Medlock, deputy administrator for the city’s construction codes enforcement agency. “We still have to do a final inspection and sign a use and occupancy statement. Prior to the final inspection we have to ascertain if they meet the definition of retail sales.”

But Dowdle, whose store has been in its location for seven years, doesn’t see why Christal’s should be allowed to open. “What positive can come from all of this?” he asks. “The liquor store I didn’t have any problem with. That’s a legit business. If Christal’s sold what they say they’re going to sell — gag gifts and negligees — that’d be fine; I wouldn’t have any problems with that. But what they’ve got is pretty rough. It’s pretty hardcore.”

According to Taylor, even some of the lingerie sold in other Christal’s stores should be considered adult novelty items.

“Lingerie in and of itself is not an adult novelty item, but crotchless panties are and edible panties are,” says Taylor. “The inventory list they submitted had things on it like jumbo pecker pacifier, pussy comb, virginity restoration kit, hoochie shave cream, sticky dick, anal ease cream, tit tacs, dick tacs, and a ‘Wind-up Whackin’ Willy.’ This store is definitely an adult novelty store.”

This is a point Dowdle notes as well. He says that people will be able to see the lingerie in the windows from outside the store.

“It’s negligees, but when it opens people are going to see what that means. It’s not classy like Victoria’s Secret. I even like the stuff at Victoria’s Secret,” says Dowdle.

Taylor and Dowdle both say that stores like Christal’s don’t belong in Cordova and that this particular location — in the shadow of Bellevue Baptist Church’s giant crosses — is particularly inappropriate. With that in mind Christal’s opponents have already developed an alternate plan if the store is allowed to open.

“Everybody is real upset,” says Dowdle. “We’ll have to make it tough for them to do business.”

According to Taylor, some opponents have said that if the store opens they will visit it to make sure that the inventory is under the five-percent limit. Others have said that they would stand outside the store to take photographs of customers entering and leaving Christal’s and of their vehicles and license plates.

“Communities should be able to dictate what the values of their community will be,” says Taylor.

Asked about the nearby presence of a liquor store and a store that sells guns, Taylor said, “Cordova and East Memphis have made it clear that adult novelties are not in keeping with the community, but guns and liquor are. People kill people, guns don’t. Viewing adult novelties and using adult novelties is inappropriate for the Cordova community. A store where children can see products shaped like penises and vaginas undermines the morals taught in this community.”

Fire Delays Jail Move

Direct supervision postponed.

By Mary Cashiola

Last Saturday morning’s Shelby County jail fire was no big deal, say jail officials. The inmates weren’t even evacuated and only a few were treated for smoke inhalation.

But the fire, probably caused by an overheated clothes dryer, was big enough to delay plans to switch another segment of the jail over to direct supervision this week.

Due to a federal court order to quell inmate violence, the jail is in the process of changing how inmates are supervised. The fifth and sixth floors of the jail were switched in October. Half of the fourth floor was scheduled to change to direct supervision by December 6th.

In direct supervision, officers are inside the pods with the inmates, not separated from them by bars or doors. In an effort to ease the transition for the fourth floor, which houses more violent, unsentenced offenders, jail officials had decided to switch two pods November 27th and gradually change the rest of the floor.

But the laundry room fire slowed things down. Much of the damage was to telephone lines that run to the pods.

“We were trying to get ahead of the curve, but we had to put it off for a week,” says Bill Powell, Shelby County criminal justice coordinator. He said the overall plan for the fourth floor is still on track to switch in early December. “As of right now, we expect to be able to do that, but it will be contingent on how much cable damage there was with the fire. We can’t put officers into pods without telephones.”

Officials are still investigating the extent of the damage. Powell says they hope to have the repair work done by Friday so that the systems can be tested Monday.

Web Insight?

Popular online site for city schools is up and running again.

By Mary Cashiola

Former Memphis school teacher David Page says he wants the public to know what’s wrong with the city system. That’s why, he says, his Web site’s popular “complaints, comments, and suggestions” section is back up.

“I already know first-hand what’s going on,” says Page, a former teacher at East High. “I know why the kids aren’t learning. I know where the problem is coming from.”

Page’s Web site, www.memphiscityschools.com, which he bought in 1999 for $15, featured a section where faculty and staff could anonymously air their gripes until Page took it down last spring.

At one time, Page says, the site was receiving 10,000 hits a day. “I had opened it up and I didn’t realize what they were posting,” he says. “They were posting some really outrageous stuff.” Its return, he says, comes at the request of numerous teachers, parents, and students. And now he’s figured out how to organize and filter the postings.

Page, whose children go to city schools, says in the past he has gotten information about everything from grade-fixing and administration corruption to whom the board commissioners are sleeping with. He admits that some of the postings might not be true.

“Some of it could be personal,” he says. “You know, if you have a problem with a principal, but some of it is actually going on, like grade-fixing.”

Page has had his own problems with the school system. He had a number of run-ins with the administration at East, and was suspended for 10 days for allegedly charging $417 to the school. Page denies the accusation and says when he came back he was continually harassed.

“I just want to provide some exposure,” he says. “Nobody has anywhere to go when they have a complaint with the system.”

Art Art Feature

Art Farm Heals

Post author By David Hall
Post date November 30, 2001

Larry Giacoletti’s Stovetop at Art Farm.

The graffiti reads “Art Farm Kills Art.” Regardless of the circumstances that led to the tag on the street in front of Art Farm, one victim of this dust-up is the exhibit now showing at the artist-run gallery. The simple fact is that alternative spaces like Art Farm and other non-commercial venues fill the void that established museums and commercial galleries will not. Furthermore, short of endowments and capital, such enterprises have long depended on the pockets of independent artists and curators. One would think that there are more deserving targets for young revolutionaries.

“Inside Out: Images of Suburbia” is the most ambitious project to grace the Art Farm gallery in a long time. Curated by Allana Clarke, the exhibit examines the patent homogeneity of suburban life and the ultimate vacuity of the American dream. Clarke laments, “A suburban neighborhood in Seattle is indistinguishable from a street on the outskirts of Atlanta,” adding that “these communities have grids of streets with matching split-levels or perhaps cul-de-sacs emanating from every street like split ends. Suburbs are responsible for obliterating regional charm and creating instead a depressing redundancy that has swept the nation.”

The four artists of “Inside Out” regard the subject of suburban life with the same sense of dread expressed in Clarke’s essay. Kim Beck’s Mall Parking Lot conveys the dull ubiquitousness of urban sprawl, depicting the expanse of uniform parking spaces as ultimately dehumanizing. The awesome power of Beck’s drawing is due both to her deft handling of atmospheric effects and to the work’s colossal scale, which mocks the inhospitable ambience of acres of hot blacktop. Several relief prints by Beck — of a tennis court, swimming pool, and dwellings — emphasize the blandness of suburban life.

If the depiction of such environments laments the encroaching homogeneity of American culture, Alison Oulette-Kerby’s ensemble of objects reveals the attendant alienation and the futility of living in such a world. Self Portrait (I Think About You All the Time) is a three-legged pedestal on wheels that, when pushed, activates a set of gears and cogs that spins a bust of the artist that Clarke says “introduces feelings of anomie, feeling alone in the crowd, just as the sculpture is trapped in a repetitious cycle of the same movement over and over.”

I didn’t think much of Delta Axis’ new exhibit, “Exit 23B: Young Artists from Jonesboro,” but I’m still damn glad they are willing to get out on a limb. The pitfall of this show is the same one that revisits many Delta Axis offerings: the proliferation of half-baked conceptual art.

For instance, Brian Wasson shoots for profundity with his suite of used aluminum painting pans (the kind used to charge latex to a roller) transformed into works of art by being boldly displayed on the wall like paintings. I always get the feeling that people who do this sort of thing think they are being transgressive or that I should be wowed by their Richard Tuttle-like slackness. The truth is, this kind of schtick is old, boring, and usually just slack.

Dusty Mitchell’s Suggestion Box appears to be quite ordinary in function and design, yet when the suggestion is placed into the slot, it is immediately shredded and falls to the floor below. Likewise, the joke is on the unwitting participant that peers into Mitchell’s See Yourself, a simple microscope that startlingly casts a reflection of one’s own eye. Such works challenge the passive role of the viewer by being confrontational. While such baiting might be initially potent, the novelty wanes quickly.

What do Sigmund Freud, Nathan Bedford Forrest, Mike Tyson, Satan, and Mark McGwire have in common? This I pondered while standing before Catherine Sullivan’s portraits of these men in her series titled “Vagina Envy,” in which every painting is cropped so as to include only the lower third of the face, particularly the mouth and chin of each subject. Perplexed and annoyed by the title, someone finally pointed out to me that every fellow represented sports a goatee, an obvious allusion to the pubis. Sullivan is a gifted painter technically, who obviously labored patiently over every solitary brushstroke but what a convoluted setup for a groaner of a punch line.

A block east of the burgeoning South Main Arts District is Second Street Studio, established by Charlie Agnew and Tom Delaney, who converted the ramshackle building into an exhibition space. The building’s owner has taken up where Agnew and Delaney left off and is now running the enterprise.

Currently at Second Street is an exciting new photography exhibit titled “Pieces of a Whole” by graduating students of the University of Memphis. Gray Clawson’s pictures capture the chaotic beauty of old-growth forests — the tangles of underbrush, the massive trunks of trees and of light passing through translucent foliage. Justin Fox Burks follows in the tradition of Cartier-Bresson, taking “quick, decisive” photos of people participating in myriad forms of worship at temples, mosques, synagogues, etc. Anastasia Laurenzi offers an installation in a darkened room, with film positives of self-portraits illuminated by light boxes that convey a sense of isolation and despair. The passing glimpses of people in Kelley J. White’s diminutive Polaroid transfers are charmingly mysterious the top of a head here, a pair of legs there.

My criticisms notwithstanding, the existence of alternative spaces and the artists and curators who operate them add much to the cultural life of Memphis. Support them.

“Inside Out: Images of Suburbia” through December 2nd.

“Exit 23B: Young Artists from Jonesboro” through December 15th.

“Pieces of a Whole” through December 17th.

News The Fly-By

LUNCH IN THE FAST LANE

Post author By Chris Davis
Post date November 30, 2001

Linda A. Moore reported in the CA that a recent Better Business Bureau survey shows that Memphians are generally dissatisfied with the quality of service they receive in fast food restaurants. Dr. Dan Sherrell, associate dean of faculty and research at the U of M’s Fogleman College of Business and Economics had some interesting explanations for the discontent. His

rationale excluded simple things like speed, accuracy, courtesy, and cleanliness. According to Moore Sherill noted, “the survey was taken right

after September 11th and perhaps people were feeling unsafe after the attacks.” By this statement it can only be assumed that one too many

customers had previously come into contact with exploding Whoppers.

News News Feature

F. 451, Episode I: The Red Menace

Post author By Chris Davis
Post date November 30, 2001

“It didn’t come from the Government down. There was no dictum, no declaration, no censorship, to start with, no! Technology, mass exploitation, and minority pressure carried the trick, thank God. Today, thanks to them, you can stay happy all the time.” — Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

number of concerned citizens and perturbed politicos have complained that the work of art outside the new main library’s entrance, a piece which supposedly represents the wisdom of the ages, contains the old (but still potentially harmful) communist battle cry, “Workers of the world, unite.” It’s etched in the stone walkway adjacent to a carving of that childhood fave cum druggie icon the Cat in the Hat.

It’s troubling enough, but that isn’t the half of it. There’s loads of potentially hazardous iconography hidden in the alleged artwork, including snippets of pagan lore and oblique references to the irresponsible theory that man (only a notch below the angels) once swung from long prehensile tails.

There is a large picture of a hand with its two center fingers and thumb drawn in toward the center of the palm, the universal sign representing both heavy metal music and its evil inventor, the Christian Devil. There is another equally disturbing representation of a hand adorned with the kind of arcane symbology that suggests the occult. As if all the red propaganda and witchcraft wasn’t disturbing enough, the art bears quotations by homosexuals (both suspected and known) and at least one very graphic depiction of a male sexual organ (fortunately not engorged).

Friends, it’s no accident that these images grace the library’s main entrance. They are not mere decoration. They are clear indicators of the dangerous geophysical and neopolitical pornographies housed like welfare babies within the walls of this tax-supported institution. Our library system may try to position itself as a benevolent entity dedicated to the judicious accumulation of human knowledge, but further investigation reveals it to be a filthy Gomorrah packed with dangerous ideas and dirty pictures.

Outside the library is the quote from the Communist Manifesto. Inside there is an entire book by Adolph Hitler. And that’s just the beginning.

To see evidence of the ongoing plot to weaken our national morals one need look no further than the entrance to the new library’s children’s book section. A fake forest has been erected there. Trees with yellow, green, and red “candy-colored” trunks guard a golden path to the obviously satanic Harry Potter series.

The secret commie meaning of this art installation is two-fold. First, the brilliant, unnatural colors are obviously an effort on behalf of the designers to simulate the effects of a way-out “trip” on pot or perhaps on the drug known as LSD. The communists know that it will be easier to control our children’s thoughts once they are hooked on these addictive mind-altering drugs.

Don’t believe it? Peruse the shelves and you’ll find The Practitioner’s Guide to Psychoactive Drugs and a number of Terrence McKenna’s blasphemous texts which credit psylocybin mushrooms with miracles of creation that should be rightfully ascribed to God Almighty. And if dabbling with drugs leads to any scrapes with the law, F.D. Rosenthal’s Marijuana, the Law and You: A Guide To Minimizing Legal Consequences should prove to be a useful resource. It is, as one might suspect, also available.

And anyone who stayed awake through freshman English knows that in literature the “forest” always represents something else: a place of discovery, magic and sexual transformation. Long story short, it’s where kids go to fornicate against their parents’ wishes. The collected works of William Shakespeare (a possible warlock and homosexual) are filled to bursting with lurid arboreal references. Therefore the library’s colorful, deceptively innocent “forest” must be chopped down immediately, before our children get any deeper into Satan’s woods.

While on the topic of Satan it may be appropriate to point out that there are a number of texts on Satan worship and the occult in our library, including a selection of works by the demonic conjurer Aleister Crowley. Crowley practiced a type of black art which incorporated a number of perverse sex acts. Those who wish to learn more about sex before attempting any of Crowley’s studied suggestions may wish to peruse the library’s extensive collection of sex-related books and videos. Younger readers who may not be ready for the Kama Sutra can always turn to Carole Marsh’s practical text, Sex Stuff for Kids 7-17.

Before leaving the topic of sex, magik, and satanism it must be mentioned that the Dewey decimal number 666 denotes texts which are devoted to an insidiously innocuous art form widely associated with the strictly forbidden creation of “graven images.” Is it at all surprising that when searching through section 666 one of the first listings you come across is a book titled The Magic of Ceramics? No indeed. No indeed.

Topping the list of blasphemous texts is a pair of false Bibles. The Roof Framer’s Bible obviously insinuates that God is a tar-paper shingle while The Investor’s Bible clearly leads one to worship Allen Greenspan. It’s unconscionable. It’s wrong.

There are, just as one might expect in this communist stronghold, many books about communism in both theory and practice. Too many to list here. Former Soviet prime minister Nikita Kruschev claimed that the fundamental goals of Marx and Lenin would not be relinquished “till shrimp learn to whistle.” You won’t hear any shrimp whistling at the new library, not by a long shot.

Finally, while there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the Koran, Americans are now all too aware of how it can be interpreted by evil men with evil plans. Can we really afford to have this book sharing shelf space with Tadeusz Urbanski’s Chemistry and Technology of Explosives? Can we? I think not.

Bring on the torches. Let the burning begin.

Opinion

As Others See Us

Post author By John Branston
Post date November 30, 2001

If AOL’s 32 million subscribers clicked on “Sports” Tuesday, they got a picture of Jason Williams and a story about the Memphis Grizzlies’ win over Sacramento. That’s the kind of “Big Time” publicity boosters were talking about when they brought the team here.

So how’s it going elsewhere on the publicity front after the NBA’s first month in Memphis? All in all, not so bad, particularly if you are of the just-spell-the-name-right persuasion.

Locally, WMC-TV general manager Howard Meagle is pleased with early television ratings for the Grizzlies. The regular season opener on November 1st drew a 12.5 rating on what Meagle called a night of “incredible competition,” including the World Series. That was the only game televised so far on WMC-TV, although other games have been televised on affiliate Channel 50. Those games, Meagle said, have drawn a 5 in prime time and a 3 to 4 in afternoon slots.

The best is yet to come. In December WMC-TV will televise the Grizzlies’ games against Michael Jordan and the Washington Wizards and Shaquille O’Neal and the Los Angeles Lakers.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution had kind words for Memphis and Grizzlies part-owners Staley and Andy Cates last weekend under the headline “Memphis Develops Into A Major Player”:

“The Soulsville project is yet another high-profile enterprise in the continuing makeover of Memphis. A city with a rich cultural history, it long seemed reluctant or unable to play in the same go-go league as such aggressive Atlanta wannabe brethren as Charlotte, Nashville and Jacksonville. It’s playing now. The city’s first major-league sports franchise, the NBA Grizzlies, was lured from Vancouver this season, with a new $250 million downtown arena expected within the next few years.”

The Wall Street Journal‘s Stefan Fatsis is a doubter:

“With few rock-solid markets left, the risk of trading one weak one for another grows. The NBA’s Vancouver Grizzlies just moved to Memphis. Vancouver was a reasonable, if failed, Canadian experiment. Can the NBA succeed in Memphis, the nation’s No. 41 TV market? The Griz are supposed to get a new arena and a new nickname, but attendance, so far, isn’t encouraging: 19,000, 13,000, 11,000. Elvis is already leaving the building.”

In Minnesota, Judge Harry Seymour Crump indirectly gave comfort to Memphis NBA backers in an order banning the owner of the Minnesota Twins from moving the team (with a name like Crump, we shouldn’t be surprised):

“The welfare, recreation, prestige, prosperity, trade and commerce of the people of the community are at stake … Baseball crosses social barriers, creates community spirit, and is much more than a private enterprise. Baseball is a national pastime.”

Sounds like a blueprint, if not an actual citation, for the Memphis response to the Duncan Ragsdale lawsuit still on appeal.

The Jackson (Mississippi) Clarion-Ledger doesn’t have a Grizzlies beat reporter but does give Memphis top billing in its Associated Press roundup of NBA results. The Tennessean of Nashville covered the home opener with a feature by writer Joe Biddle:

“It was the second coming of Elvis, a full slab of Rendezvous ribs, and some sweet soul music rolled into one. It was ushers spit-polished in tuxedos, Memphis native Justin Timberlake of ‘NSync with a stirring national anthem, and Memphis blues man Isaac Hayes making women go limp as he got way down with ‘God Bless America.'”

Then Biddle gets down himself with a little analysis.

“Memphis long has been a hoops hotbed. Kids grow up learning a crossover dribble before their ABCs.”

Oh? Has he been looking at our young hoopsters — or our school report cards?

The Tennessean doesn’t have a Grizzlies beat reporter, but Middle Tennessee NBA fans are now getting the Grizzlies on TV instead of the Atlanta Hawks. Fox Sports Net has added a 20-game package this season as part of a three-year contract. The number of telecasts increases to 25 in each of the next two years.

In Louisville, Kentucky, they’re approximately where Memphis was one year ago in the NBA courtship. But the mayor and Board of Aldermen are sharply divided over the merits of a new arena, which, of course, is the price of admission.

“Mayor Dave Armstrong’s office has been working for three weeks with a private consultant on a financing plan for a pro basketball arena in Louisville,” says the Louisville Courier-Journal this week. “The consultant, The Goal Group of Washington, D.C., is the same firm that a committee of the Board of Aldermen voted against hiring last week. The committee’s recommendation is scheduled to go before the full board tonight [Tuesday]. But Steve Magre, the board’s president, said yesterday that he would table the discussion because he doesn’t believe there is enough support on the board to build an arena — let alone hire a consultant.”

The Goal Group was recommended by Memphis officials, who used the firm to help lure the Grizzlies.

As you might expect, there’s not much cheering in Vancouver.

“Hey, the Grizzlies open their NBA regular season schedule tonight,” wrote columnist Gary Kingston of The Vancouver Sun. “In the Pyramid in Memphis. Against Detroit. Of course, that’s if you still care. Don’t care anymore? Don’t worry. It’s a widely held view.”

The Sun didn’t send Kingston or anyone else to the opener, which may explain things. Bet a few complimentary beers and some barbecue would put his mind right.

Editorial Opinion

Editorial

Post author By Editorial
Post date November 30, 2001

h3>The Line Of Fire

At this writing eight journalists have been killed covering the hostilities in Afghanistan. You will not likely read any glowing tributes to their heroism, nor is it probable any funds will be raised to help their families. But those men and women died while doing their very essential jobs and they deserve our deepest respect.

The job of war correspondent is often seen as a glamorous one. And, indeed, the image of a flak-jacketed reporter standing against the night sky while bombs burst in air has an undeniable aura of showmanship. But someone is holding the camera. And hundreds of other journalists you’ll never see are writing newspaper stories and reporting for radio — and ducking bullets.

History is being made in Afghanistan and the press plays a vital role by providing a source of unofficial information. Governments, no matter how righteous their cause, give out only the information they deem necessary to dispense. A free press is essential — in war and peace — to make sure the whole story is told. This doesn’t mean giving away information that would put our troops in danger; it does mean letting the world know the truth. Our servicemen and -women deserve no less.

Eight journalists have died doing their job. So far. We owe them our gratitude.

A Life To Remember

It is unfortunate that on a day when most of us were still dealing with the sad news of James Ford’s death, the family name of the late Shelby County commissioner took a hit from the actions of Tamara Mitchell-Ford, estranged wife of the commissioner’s brother, state Senator John Ford, who chose this inauspicious time to drive her car into the residence of the senator’s paramour. (The incident made ambivalent, to say the least, the proper application of the term “home-wrecker.”)

However, that bizarre incident should not be allowed to distract us from honoring Commissioner Ford and his achievements.

Though Ford, a former member of the Memphis city council, was confined to a wheelchair for the last several years, he was still able to vigorously perform his duties as commissioner. This was most notable during the last year when he was chairman and oversaw the resolution of several tough issues, including prolonged and intense debates over school funding and the use of public money to construct a new arena for the Memphis Grizzlies.

Even when he was relatively healthy, Commissioner Ford was mild of manner and polite, even courtly, to an extreme. Conversely, his failing health did not impede his robust responses to opponents or, as was the case in one or two of the past year’s stormier meetings, audience members who heckled the commission. He did not suffer fools gladly.

“He had as much resolve as anyone I ever knew, even in his illness, and he had great academic achievements,” observed his nephew, U.S. Representative Harold Ford Jr., who pointed out that James Ford had attended, more or less concurrently, Columbia University Medical School, Union Theological Seminary, and New York University School of Law.

Commissioner Ford was a decent man and a distinguished public servant whose contributions will be missed.

Book Features Books

Pulp Nonfiction

Post author By Leonard Gill
Post date November 30, 2001

The National Enquirer

Thirty Years of Unforgettable Images

Talk Miramax Books, 253 pp., $45

Never mind for the moment who. The question is what has gotten into America’s premier rag, The National Enquirer. Respectability, to judge from the new coffee-table book The National Enquirer and to judge from an essay, contained in that book, on the tabloid’s recent stabs at mainstream journalism and its past mastery of paid journalism. But your 45 bucks aren’t going for a self-congratulatory essay. They’re going for the pictures of celebs and politicos, hangers-on and 15-minute media darlings, somebodies and nobodies caught in the act of being themselves, and the more humiliating, the freakier the photos, the better. The book’s layout is good and clean. The book’s “unforgettable images” are something else, and let’s begin by working our way down (or is it up?):

Bottom line: the piece of patchwork known as Michael Jackson, in brutal, full-color close-up, laying hold of a petrified 7-year-old leukemia patient. Jocelyne Wildenstein, wife of a billionaire art dealer, full-face and demonstrating “the catastrophic results of a 10-year addiction to cosmetic surgery.” Wayne Newton alive but from the looks of it embalmed. Bikini-clad ex-“Happy Hooker” Xaviera Hollander hitting the beach at Cellulite City and hitting the scale at 200 pounds. Bryant Gumbel and Matt Lauer in extremis and party to a “man-sized lapdance” courtesy of some transsexual waitresses. A 1987 Brad Pitt looking like Kristy McNichol. A preadolescent Mariah Carey looking like Kristy McNichol. A preadolescent Ben Stiller looking like a butch-version Liz Taylor, circa Butterfield 8. Mug shots of Linda Tripp (1969; the charge: loitering; the look: guilty) and Al Pacino (date unknown; the charge: concealing a weapon; the look: pre-Raphaelite gas-station attendant). In the swim: the “free-wheeling” Brooke Astor, a century old and atop a dolphin, in a full-spread one-on-one with Tom Arnold atop the lovely Roseanne. Charles Manson in 1976, the year of the “dry look,” mop clearly in need of professional help, mind clearly beyond professional help. (His jail jumpsuit reads “S WING,” or is it “SWING”?) Fun couple of the year, 1994: giantess Anna Nicole Smith cradling 89-year-old hubby and meal ticket Howard Marshall II. Fun couple of the year, 1997: Woody and Soon-Yi lip-locking in the Tuileries. Boxed and ready to ship: a very dead River Phoenix, an equally dead Elvis Presley (a photo that helped sell 6.5 million copies of the Enquirer the week it ran). Dead but unboxed: John Lennon, Steven McQueen, Ted Bundy, and, hiding somewhere under a blanket, what used to be Rock Hudson.

Back to the living and on to the life-altering: historic photos, such as O.J. in his “ugly-ass” Bruno Maglis, Gary Hart and Donna Rice on board (and in the middle of some) Monkey Business. Family shots: the Ramseys positively glowing (the oversized cross hanging from Patsy’s neck, literally aglow); a couple of stiff upper lips (emphasis on the stiff): the Prince and Princess of Wales.

But there’s one knockout photo here that, truth be told, might just register as art. What’s it doing inside the Enquirer ? Giving it some photojournalistic cachet. What’s it of? An outfit of Australian bikers called the Findon Skid Kids captured exiting the most beautiful fireball you ever saw. Say you saw it in The National Enquirer. Enquiring minds will want to know. The less curious will wonder over this season’s asking price for a tabloid suddenly making out like People, as we know it, Life, as we knew it.

Ascending Peculiarity

Edward Gorey on Edward Gorey

Edited by Karen Wilkin

Harcourt, 273 pp., $35

Call him illustrator, writer, playwright, set-designer, cat-fancier, balletomane, voracious reader, TV junkie, man-about-town when he was in New York City, homebody when he was home on Cape Cod. Depending on the one interviewing him, you can also call him an artful dodger or a real charmer: one part coy closet case, one part pure showoff, for every two parts genuine smarty. Stephen Schiff in a 1992 New Yorker called him a “half bongo-drum beatnik, half fin-de-siècle dandy.” You could call him a knowing eccentric of the mink-coat-and-tennis-shoes variety but one who wisely knew when and when not to go on about himself. He is Edward Gorey or was before he died last year after authoring and illustrating such contemporary classics of the sinister as The Curious Sofa, The Hapless Child, The Loathsome Couple, and The Gashlycrumb Tinies. (Still don’t recognize him? Check out the opening credits for the Mystery series on PBS.)

Ascending Peculiarity is the appropriately titled collection of interviews with and profiles of Gorey written or broadcast over the past 30 years. There are within these pages serious overlaps, only so many ways for Gorey to trot out his boyhood, his first taking pencil to paper, his habit for years of attending every performance of the New York City Ballet, his admiration for the films of Louis Feuillade. Then there’s the matter of his instantly identifiable illustrations, which are only partially gone into here stylistically, psychologically. On a key to his character, though, think on this: a man who likes watching Golden Girls reruns as much as rereading (without ever understanding) Musil’s The Man Without Qualities. And in terms of memorable quotes, think on this, which makes Gorey no marginalist but a realist: “I think you should have no expectations and do everything for its own sake. That way you won’t be hit in the head quite so frequently.” Sound advice from a man of sound mind who had his audience believing he was anything but.