A battered tombstone in Forest Hill Cemetery is the only visible reminder of one of Memphis’ most notorious robberies.
Eighty-seven years ago today, two Ford employees, chief accounting clerk Edgar McHenry and special agent Howard “Shorty” Gamble drove to a bank on Second Street to pick up that week’s payroll — a satchel containing $8,500, which was an enormous sum in those days.
To read more, visit Vance’s blog.
A battered tombstone in Forest Hill Cemetery is the only visible reminder of one of the most notorious robberies in our city’s past.
In the early part of the last century, the Ford Motor Company operated a manufacturing plant on Union, where The Commercial Appeal stands today. On the morning of August 10, 1921, two Ford employees, chief accounting clerk Edgar McHenry and special agent Howard “Shorty” Gamble drove to a bank on Second Street to pick up that week’s payroll — a satchel containing $8,500, which was an enormous sum in those days. They were accompanied by two Memphis police officers, Polk Carraway and W.S. Harris.
They returned to the Ford plant and parked in front of the building. Just at that moment, a blue Cadillac pulled alongside. Four masked men jumped out with revolvers and shotguns and shouted “Hands up!” Before anyone could move, the bandits opened fire, killing Carraway and Gamble and wounding Harris. “They were shot down by cold-blooded murderers, who never gave their victims a dog’s chance,” said The Commercial Appeal later.
Half a century ago, one of the most popular restaurants in Memphis had a rather humble name. Owners called it The Stable, and I recently turned up an old menu for this interesting establishment — one of the earliest “theme” restaurants in our city.
In 1942, an enterprising young man named Allen Gary teamed up with an equally enterprising fellow named George Early, and they purchased a brick stable — a real one, apparently, that had been built in the mid-1800s — at 60 South Bellevue, just around the corner from Union Avenue. They cleaned the place out, put in a full kitchen, installed a Wurlitzer jukebox, added tables and booths, and hung a neon sign out front advertising “The Stable.”
Vance Lauderdale has delved into the Lauderdale Library archives and pulled out a collection of 75-year-old photos of West Memphis that show long-lost businesses, horses and buggies on Broadway, and the town’s curious obsession with … bananas. Yes, we said bananas. See more here.
The Lauderdale Library recently made an interesting purchase — some pages torn from an old scrapbook that contained eight photographs showing Broadway Street in West Memphis, Arkansas, as it appeared in 1932. It’s really a fascinating glimpse at a bygone age. Broadway, as you might expect, has changed quite a lot in 75 years.
Look carefully (you may have to squint at the images below — I’ve posted them as large as I can), and you’ll see a service station with globe-topped pumps and a sign offering gasoline at 16 cents a gallon, a billboard for Fortune’s Ice Cream, lots of horse- and mule-drawn carts, and such long-gone establishments as the tiny Bell Cafe, West Memphis Cleaners, West Memphis Meat Market, and the Martin Drug Store.
When Roller Derby came to Memphis in 2006 — organized into teams with such catchy names as the Legion of Zoom and the PrissKilla Prezleys — lots of fans thought it was a reincarnation of the matches they watched on television back in the 1960s.
But it turns out the sport is actually much older than that, and the Lauderdale Library has recently acquired a souvenir program for a 1939 event with the long-winded title of Leo A. Seltzer’s Trans-Continental ROLLER DERBY or Coast-to-Coast Roller Skating Race.
Now I have no idea how this race could take place “coast-to-coast” since the participants, then as now, raced around in a circle. But that’s how they promoted it, anyway. And this entertainment spectacular took place here in Memphis every night from 7 to 11 p.m. for two entire months — January and February 1939 — at the Municipal — better known to Memphians as Ellis — Auditorium.
The program is interesting because it lists the members of the two competing teams. Forget names like “Legion of Zoom.” These teams were simply called the Reds and the Whites, and though most of the racers came from all across America, one of them was a Memphian: a woman named Honey Thomas. As you can see, she raced on the White team. What also distinguishes the 1939 version of roller derby from today’s matches is that the 10-member teams also included men, which must have made for some especially bruising matches. In fact, the program itself proclaims, “We use Norwich products exclusively — makers of Unguentine,” which (for those youngsters out there) was a popular rub-on pain reliever.
Then as now, nobody can make sense of roller derby rules. But here, I’ll let you decide for yourself. Here’s how the old program tries to explain the game:
To read more, visit Vance’s blog.
Or, if you’re interested in seeing the rules (and skaters) in action for yourself, Memphis Roller Derby’s Hustlin’ Rollers take on the River Valley Roller Girls this Saturday, July 26th, at the Mid-South Fairgrounds.
When Roller Derby came to Memphis in 2006 — organized into teams with such catchy names as the Legion of Zoom and the Priskilla Presleys — lots of fans thought it was a reincarnation of the matches they watched on television back in the 1960s. But it turns out the sport is actually much older than that, and the Lauderdale Library has recently acquired a souvenir program for a 1939 event with the long-winded title of Leo A. Seltzer’s Trans-Continental ROLLER DERBY or Coast-to-Coast Roller Skating Race.
This is a pretty amazing document, because Seltzer, it seems, is the fellow who pretty much invented roller dergy. I have no idea how this particular race could take place “coast-to-coast” since the participants, then as now, raced around in a circle. But that’s how they promoted it, anyway. And this entertainment spectacular took place here in Memphis every night from 7 to 11 p.m. for two entire months — January and February 1939 — at the Municipal — better known to Memphians as Ellis — Auditorium.
Hanging beneath the old Frisco Bridge is a sign that has baffled me for two years now — ever since I discovered it during one of my drunken “explorations” (I was looking for a shortcut to West Memphis). But as you can see from the scan, a bright red metal sign dangles from the underside of the old bridge. Neatly cut into the quarter-inch steel are the words “S.L. Lipe 1943-2004.”
Who was S.L. Lipe, and why is he memorialized in such a strange location?
This isn’t that easy to find. To see it, you have to get on Crump Blvd. heading west and take the Metal Museum Drive exit. Be careful, because if you miss this exit, the next stop is West Memphis. The drive loops beneath the old bridges, but just as it passes beneath the Frisco Bridge, there’s a dirt road on your right, which heads towards the river and deadends below the bridge. Look up — after you’ve parked your car, NOT while you are driving! — and you’ll see the lozenge-shaped sign.
For reasons that only my team of highly paid psychiatrists, psychologists, venipuncturists, and ventriloquists can explain, I’ve always found these dire warning signs amusing. Not because of what happens to the people (if you can really call these “people”), but by the sort of noncommittal, unemotional way these tragedies are depicted.
Most of them are found around industrial or construction equipment, and — without saying a word — they warn that your hands could get cut off, your feet could get smushed, you might get electrocuted (usually by lightning bolts!), you could get bonked on the head, and all sorts of other hazards. Why, it’s enough to make you just stay in the house all day. Which probably explains why I do just that.
But this sign is one of my favorites, because it shows the awful fate that awaits anyone who — get this — doesn’t get out of the way of the gate of a certain parking garage downtown. My, that is one deadly powerful gate! Seems to me they might adjust the spring tension on it, so it wouldn’t just crush the life out of you, as it has done with this nameless (and footless, handless, and neckless) fellow.
Poor dumb bastard. What a way to go.
Years ago, I think people took more pride in their work, even when their jobs involved routine labor. It’s also possible that they saw marketing opportunities that we just overlook today. Of course, nowadays when you want to find the name of a builder, or a contractor, or any sort of manufacturer, you search the Internet or flip through the phone book. But years ago, you could actually admire a fellow’s work, and often find their names right on it.