Author: Halley Johnson

This Friday marks the beginning of Launch Memphis’ fourth annual 48Hour Launch, a weekend-long event where Memphians pitch ideas for company start-ups. But this time around, there’s an added bonus for one 48Hour Launch participant.

The Seed Hatchery, a new early-stage investment firm, will choose one group to enter its start-up “boot camp,” where it will receive funding and mentorship for 90 days.

In addition, the Seed Hatchery is accepting applications from start-ups not involved with the 48Hour Launch.

With a group of successful business leaders and entrepreneurs on hand, the Seed Hatchery matches start-ups with mentors. Each start-up will have access to roughly $15,000 in capital for 90 days. In return for these investments, the Seed Hatchery and the mentorship teams will collectively own 10 percent of each start-up’s common stock.

While the Seed Hatchery accepts all manner of ideas, the group acknowledges that its level of funding lends itself to technology-based start-ups, such as companies that design web-based or smart phone applications. Seed Hatchery co-founder Eric Mathews said the firm is looking to invest in promising groups of Memphians who have powerful ideas and few resources.

“The most important selection criterion is the team itself,” Mathews said. “A lot of the questions are designed to get the team thinking and help us evaluate where they’ll go together.”

A team doesn’t need to have a detailed business plan to apply for Seed Hatchery funding, said Mathews. In some cases, a very simple concept can be a great match, as long as it has the potential to expand into something sustainable.

“The idea changes and morphs over time anyway,” Mathews said. “This way, they can start with a simple idea, and we’ll help them refine that and get it into what we think is a much better position for moving forward.”

The deadline for applying to the Seed Hatchery’s first 90-day program is February 11th. In June, participants will present their business models in a public launch, where they’ll be able to pitch to potential investors for more funding.

“We’re going to fund around 10 start-ups this year,” Mathews said. “In my opinion, that’s fantastic, because that’s 10 start-ups that probably wouldn’t have gotten started otherwise.”

Visit seedhatchery.com to submit an application.

When a New York college professor needed an example for a newly created course in protest and public opinion, he looked to Memphis.

Dale Hartnett of the College at Brockport created the class after visiting Memphis last year. Last week, a group of his students, calling themselves “Team Memphis,” traveled to the Bluff City to learn more about Memphis’ civil rights history and to help restore one of its oldest cemeteries.

“Focusing on the civil rights movement made a lot of sense for the course,” Hartnett said. “What we deal with is the rhetoric of protest: What kinds of persuasive means do people use to express themselves?”

The students toured the National Civil Rights Museum, visited the Mason Temple, and had a question-and-answer session with the Rev. James Netters of Mount Vernon Baptist Church.

Hartnett said the class was intent on having a dynamic schedule, and they were pleased when opportunities arose that they couldn’t have planned for in advance.

“It’s exactly what you hope for and seldom find,” Hartnett said. “As we go along, more and more, [the students are] finding things that we should deal with in the classroom.”

Much inspiration was drawn from the group’s experiences at the Zion Cemetery, a South Memphis cemetery created by former slaves in 1876. Located on South Parkway, Zion is the oldest African-American cemetery in Memphis.

The cemetery’s 17 acres, where more than 22,000 people are buried, have fallen into disrepair. In 1990, the Zion Cemetery Project was formed to restore the cemetery, and it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Team Memphis spent part of their time last week volunteering with the Zion Cemetery Project to clean up the site.

While working, the students stumbled upon a few overturned gravestones. After some research, they determined that one of those graves belonged to the Rev. Morris Henderson, one of the founders of the cemetery and historic Beale Street Baptist Church.

The students are responding to their experiences through oral reports, papers, and even a mini-documentary. Hartnett said he was delighted at the welcome they received from Memphians. Mount Vernon Baptist Church provided transportation for the group, and Russ Wigginton, an historian and vice-president for college relations at Rhodes College, spoke to the group and helped coordinate their service efforts.

“Service projects have beginnings, middles, and ends,” Hartnett said. “We wanted to demonstrate to our students people who are spending their lives in service, and it’s been very successful.”

Students’ experiences are posted at

brockport.edu/serve/memphis.

It might seem strange to label the Cooper-Young neighborhood as conservative, but the strides its residents have taken in saving energy over the past 12 months make them worthy of the title.

The Cooper-Young Historic District and the Evergreen Historic District began competing last January to see which Midtown neighborhood could reduce energy consumption more. The competition ended in December.

“The Smallest User” contest was a collaboration between Memphis Light, Gas, & Water (MLGW) and the University of Memphis’ journalism department, which assisted the two neighborhood associations throughout the yearlong competition.

“Everyone in this area has a vested interest in seeing how much we can reduce our energy consumption,” said MLGW spokesperson Glen Thomas. “In an economy like this one, people begin to focus on those expenses that they can control, and I think energy consumption is one of those expenses.”

A grant from the Strengthening Communities Initiative gave each community foundation the tools to reach out to their neighborhoods. Kickoff events, mailings, and an art contest helped raise awareness among residents about the urgency of energy conservation and how to get started.

The Cooper-Young neighborhood saved an average of 12.7 percent more energy in 2010 compared to 2008, while Evergreen’s usage actually increased by 4.1 percent. MLGW used 2008 data as a comparison, because the utility company implemented certain energy-savings programs in 2009 that could skew the results.

Though the numbers aren’t staggering, residents of both neighborhoods worked to improve energy conservation in their homes.

A project blog (SmallestUser.wordpress.com), maintained by a University of Memphis graduate student, catalogued stories from residents, who tried everything from line-drying their clothes to self-insulating their attics.

“Cooper-Young is fairly green in general,” said Debbie Sowell, who serves on the Cooper-Young Community Association’s board. “I think we have recycling in our bones. All we needed was a little grassroots effort.”

A reward system encouraged residents to make pledges and complete energy-saving projects in their homes, and the winning neighborhood received a $500 cash prize. An award ceremony will take place in February.

Conserving energy is still a priority despite the competition’s end. Sowell said that what began as a friendly contest equipped residents with lasting tools for greening their neighborhoods.

“We’ve got these old homes that everybody wants to make more energy efficient,” Sowell said. “What’s been great is the neighborhood getting together and doing what they can — simple and inexpensive things that can make a big difference.”

In light of Memphis’ high ranking on so many negative lists, Leigh Johnson began to wonder why she’d chosen to stay here. The native Memphian and Rhodes philosophy professor posted a few thoughts about why she’s still here on her blog, “Read More Write More Think More Be More.”

After receiving a wealth of positive responses, Johnson began a series of blog posts called “Why I Chose Memphis,” where she publishes stories from residents on why they moved to the city.

Recently, Johnson’s blog featured guest posts by WMC news anchor Anna Marie Hartman Birkedahl, Rhodes economics professor Art Carden, and Memphis Flyer wine columnist Michael Hughes among others. — Halley Johnson

Flyer: What prompted you to ask people why they

chose Memphis?

Johnson: What motivated [the project] is all the bad press that Memphis has gotten in the last year. We’ve been called miserable and ugly. Of course, we’re always up there on the crime rankings.

How have you chosen the people whose stories you’ve featured?

I put up my own story and said if you want to share, send me something. Within six hours my inbox was full. It wasn’t a matter of twisting people’s arms to say why [they] chose Memphis. I have been trying to shape it a little bit more now by finding people who I know have stories, but aren’t on the Internet all the time.

It seems that most of the responses are from academics. Are you planning to branch out?

I’d like to have a more representative cross-section of Memphians. I’ve been soliciting stories, and I’ve got several in the works from musicians, artists, newscasters, business people, and medical researchers. I’m trying to hit the highlights of Memphis culture.

What’s the source of the bad attitudes you’re trying

to combat?

I’ve lived here most of my life, and I’m not naive or delusional about the problems that Memphis has. There’s poverty, and then there are all the things that come along with poverty, with crime being just one of them.

But I don’t walk around the city afraid. It would be a lie to say that I’ve not been the victim of crime in my life; I have. But there’s a sense that Memphis is this dangerous, scary place, and people conduct themselves as if they are afraid. I don’t feel like this is a place where you have to live in fear. It’s a false stereotype, and it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.

How does your project help counter that

negative image?

“Why I Chose Memphis” is largely about disabusing people of that notion. One thing I like about creating an archive of these stories is that it’s not just me. There are a lot of people who are different from each other but have this kind of communal bond that’s difficult to explain except in first-person narrative.

Memphis is one of those cities where the reasons that people love it are these quirky and odd “you really have to be here” stories. That’s what I wanted, those first-hand accounts of “you have to be here to know X.”

Read Leigh Johnson’s blog at readmorewritemorethinkmorebemore.blogspot.com

Months after clear-cutting trees for the construction of a pedestrian bridge over the Wolf River, the Shelby Farms Park Conservancy has put its (sustainably sourced) wood where its mouth is.

In March, a 50-foot-wide area of trees near the park’s BMX track was clear-cut to make way for construction vehicles working on the bridge. The construction zone crossed through the Wolf River trail system, and some trail users complained about the disturbance to the natural area.

At the time, then-Shelby Farms Park Conservancy deputy director Laura Adams promised trail users that new trees would be planted after the bridge was constructed.

The conservancy kept its word, and as of last week, all but a small strip of the trees have been planted.

“The only piece that’s left is the access road from Humphreys Boulevard to the bridge,” said Adams, who has since been named executive director of the conservancy. “The bridge is open, but there are still some things to be done.”

Sustainably sourced pine temporarily decks the walkway of the 200-foot pedestrian bridge, which connects the new Wolf River Greenway to Shelby Farms. The bridge, along with a 1.5-mile stretch of the greenway, opened to the public in early December.

The pine walkway soon will be replaced with Brazilian hardwood, which already lines the sides of the bridge.

The Brazilan wood is certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). The FSC guarantees worker-friendly, environmentally-conscious practices from the wood’s origin to its delivery. A sign posted on the bridge explains the conservancy’s dedication to completing construction with wood obtained in this way.

“We decided that it was really important to us to only use FSC-certified wood,” Adams said. “The supplier wasn’t able to get all of the wood to us in time to open the bridge when the Wolf River Greenway opened.”

Adams said the pine that temporarily decks the bridge will be reused once the permanent hardwood is in place.

“[The pine] will be used for foot bridges that we need in other parts of the Wolf River trails, for benches in the park, and on the Shelby Farms Greenline,” Adams said.

Adams expects the bridge to be dedicated in the spring and underlined that environmental concerns have been a priority throughout construction. “One hundred percent of the wood will be reused,” Adams said. “None of it will go to waste.”