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I-55 Bridge to Close for Two Weeks on Sunday

Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on Unsplash

The I-55 Bridge across the Mississippi River will close for two weeks or more starting Sunday. 

The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) said during that time contract crews “will hydro-demolition the bridge deck and provide a new polymer concrete overlay.” The overlay has strict temperature restrictions. So, all work is weather-dependent. 

The closure is the first of two allowed in the bridge contract. 

Here are details for local travelers: 

• Sunday, June 9, 8:00 pm through Sunday, June 23, 8:00 pm

• I-55 southbound will be closed at Bridgeport Road in Arkansas

• I-55 northbound will be closed at South Parkway. 

• Local traffic will be allowed to continue to the McLemore exit

• I-55 southbound ramp will be closed

• Crump Boulevard westbound will be closed

• A detour will be posted

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Grants Boost Community Organizations in Housing and Justice Reform

Photo: Tingey Injury Law Firm on Unsplash

Grants totaling $475,000 will allow three community-focused organizations to expand their work in justice reform, landlord accountability, and structural barriers in housing, while also dispelling myths about who these issues affect.

The funding is a result of an initiative of Community Foundation of Greater Memphis (CFGM) to tackle housing reform and inequities, and marks a “radical reimagining” of its grant making process.

The grantees are The Greater Memphis Housing Justice Project ($165,000), Just City ($100,000), and Memphis Interfaith Coalition For Action and Hope (MICAH) ($210,000).

Aerial Ozuzu, director of community impact for CFGM, said the organization went through a rigorous consulting and strategic planning process from January to April of 2023. As a result, the organization’s consultants touched on themes of funding equity, exploring collective impact, and property usage of community data to name a few, Ozuzu said.

“The committee decided early on that they didn’t want to take a Band-Aid approach and offer short-term relief,” Ozuzu said. “While meeting the immediate needs of our community will always be essential, it tends to be a safe and conventional method that only leads to incremental change at best.” 

CFGM decided to tackle these issues, which resulted in its Reforming the Housing and Justice Systems grant initiative. The committee reviewed applications in late 2023, and considered solutions that would lead to “a more fair, thriving, and resilient region for all.” Out of 66 applicants, the grantees were narrowed down to the three organizations.

“These are organizations that are uniquely addressing root cause issues of housing injustice,” Ozuzu said. “They are taking an unconventional approach to making change in our community. They are also organizations that hold community trust.”

Ozuzu said since this is a new approach for CFGM, they are on a learning journey with their grantees. However, she added that they are investing in these organizations to do the work they’ve been doing for a majority of their existence.

Gisela Guerrero, lead organizer of MICAH; Josh Spickler, executive director of Just City; Jamie Johnson, Memphis Public Interest Law Center; and Shirley Bondon of the Black Clergy Collaborative of Memphis met to discuss their work and how they plan to tackle their respective issues during the Community Foundation Annual Meeting and Grant Panel in May.

Ozuzu mentioned that while certain systems are important, they can sometimes pose “inequities and problems” due to the way they have operated for years. Part of the work that these agencies are doing to tackle these inequities are by specializing in specific sectors such as court and policy.

Bondon added that the government systems are failing both the city and county and Spickler emphasized the failures of the justice system. Guerrero emphasized MICAH’s focus on tackling justice and equity regarding education, economics, and race and class. 

“It feels like there are so many things that are happening,” Guerrero said. “There are so many systems that could be better, that could be improved and are creating so much harm, but we believe is if we can narrow it down, or focus on a few, we can make some better progress that way.

The participants also discussed certain misconceptions about their approach to their work such as the idea that Just City “refuses to acknowledge that some people should be taken out of society,” and that MICAH and The Greater Memphis Housing Project “are against property owners and anti-development … they all just aim to agitate without providing solutions.”

“I have a lot of confidence that years from now, we’re going to find out these were the right decisions,” Spickler said regarding Just City’s work. “We’ve got to be very careful in these days ahead that we don’t undercut some really important rights, and that’s what we’ll be working on over the next few years.”

Bondon said the misconceptions they hear the most is that “renters are all bad” and “landlords are all bad.” While she said this isn’t true, she acknowledged that there is an imbalance of power. 

“There is this perception that ‘good enough’ is fine for the poor,” Bondon said. “It’s not … You have to understand the imbalance, and we hope to balance those scales. We want renters and landlords to balance — want equity.”

Ozuzu said the organizations have received their first year’s funding. She added that while this is a new way of doing things, it provides a different way of looking at how to implement change in Memphis.

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Former Airport CEO Passes Away

Credit: Memphis Shelby County Airport Authority

Larry Cox, the former president and CEO of the Memphis Shelby County Airport Authority (MSCAA), passed away, according to airport officials. 

Cox served in several leadership roles in his 41 years with the airport before taking the top job in 1985. He also served on numerous industry and community boards, including the Greater Memphis Chamber, Memphis Tourism, and the Mid-South Minority Business Council.

 “Larry Cox had a profound impact on the success and growth of Memphis International Airport and was a respected leader in the aviation industry,” said current MSCAA president and chairman Terry Blue. “More importantly, he was deeply committed to the Memphis community. We mourn his loss, and our thoughts are with his family.”

Cox received the Federal Aviation Administration’s 1996 Kitty Hawk Award and American Association of Airport Executives 2001 Distinguished Service Award. He was awarded the FedEx Bravo Zulu Award in 2004 and was inducted into the Tennessee Aviation Hall of Fame in 2005.

In remembrance, the family has asked that any charitable donations be made to the University of Memphis Larry Cox Scholarship Fund. Donations can be made here.

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Special Sections Sponsored Content

Twin Oaks Celebrates 40 Years

Almost 40 years ago, in August of 1984, entrepreneurs Carl and Brenda Carter recognized the need for a cemetery in DeSoto County where local families could bury and memorialize their loved ones. They embraced the challenge to establish a burial ground that was not affiliated with a church or a family cemetery. The result was Twin Oaks Memorial Gardens on Goodman Road in Southaven. At that time, the cemetery was across the street from a golf course and surrounded by nothing but vast, undeveloped land.
Fast forward to the early 1990s, when the Carters realized that a funeral home was needed, to better serve their clientele and the citizens of DeSoto County. Twin Oaks Memorial Gardens and Funeral Home opened as Southaven’s first and longest-established funeral home.
Carl Carter died in September of 2007 and his wife, Brenda, continued their legacy of operating the funeral home. In September of 2023, she decided it was time to pass the torch to new members of the funeral profession.
Dillon Dickey and Seanna Hamm purchased the cemetery and the funeral home from Mrs. Carter to continue the legacy that the Carters had begun. The facilities have undergone a complete overhaul with total upgrades to the lighting, flooring, painting, and furniture.
Dillon and Seanna plan to operate the funeral home and cemetery for many years, offering the same high level of service and dignity, with special attention to personalized services, that the people of DeSoto and Shelby County have come to expect from the Twin Oaks name. Striving to inform, educate, and assist their community, they partner with the local schools, colleges, chambers and other groups.
Today, Twin Oaks is proud to be a full-service funeral home offering any deathcare-related services such as pre-need planning, burials, cremations, cemetery, markers, and more.

Call us or visit us online for more information: 662-349-9720,
www.twinoaksfuneralhome.com.

PIctured, Owners: Seanna Hamm and Dillon Dickey

This article is sponsored by the Twin Oaks Memorial Gardens.

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Film Features Film/TV

Music Video Monday: “Hysteria” by A Weirdo From Memphis ft. RXK Nephew

Unapologetic artist A Weirdo From Memphis is hitting the road this summer with label mates PreauXX, Kid Maestro, and CMajor. They’ll be appearing at Offbeat in Jackson, Mississippi on June 15, at the California Clipper in Chicago on June 22, at Seasick Records in Birmingham, Alabama on June 28, at the Platypus in St. Louis on July 13, and then two nights in NYC at Heaven Can Wait on July 27 and the Bed-Stuy Art House on the 28th.

AWFM’s got a new single and music video to wow the crowds. “Hysteria” is a horrorcore-style grinder which features a guest verse from prolific New Yorker RXK Nephew. “Its an unexpected blending of universes between two unhinged artist that both value being themselves over more traditional approaches,” says AWFM.

For the video, AWFM and crew traveled to Los Angeles to work with filmmaker filo5ofi, with whom the rapper had collaborated early in his career. Instead of some some California sun-and-fun street footage for the video, AWFM says “it was filmed in an L.A. hotel in the middle of one of the most unprecedented rain storms in 20 years.”

Stay dry, stay fly, and take a look:

If you would like to see your music video featured on Music Video Monday, email cmccoy@memphisflyer.com.

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Music Music Blog

Samara Joy at the Cannon Center

Samara Joy (Photo: Ambe J. Williams)

For lovers of classic jazz, witnessing the ascendance of Samara Joy has been a great … well, joy. Having been born in the last few weeks of the 20th Century, one might expect her to be mining the same vein as Adele or other pop stars, and yet she is that rare 24-year-old who’s devoted mostly to jazz, and not only that, but jazz standards written nearly a century ago like “Someone to Watch Over Me.” And, as her three Grammy Awards suggest, she brings a natural talent and interpretive verve to the material: a breath of fresh air indeed.

That’s why this Monday, June 3rd is a great day for jazz aficionados in Memphis, as Joy will be appearing at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts then, thanks to Cultural Arts for Everyone. (Click here for tickets.)

Anticipating her appearance, the Memphis Flyer reached out to Joy via email to explore her thoughts on her musical upbringing, her love of jazz, and what Memphis means to her. Read on for a most enlightening interview.

Memphis Flyer: Your life in music echoes something often seen in Memphis: the musical family, strongly rooted in the church. Your grandparents co-founded the Philadelphia gospel group The Savettes, and your father is a professional gospel vocalist and bass player. What did you learn from your family that still informs your artistry today?

Samara Joy: I learned that performance, for me, is about connecting people to something greater than one can put into words. I can try to do a million cool things with my voice but, when I’m presenting music, the goal is to encourage people to feel and understand that, at the end of the day, there are life experiences and emotions that we all experience. Therefore, we’re all connected in more ways than we might think. Music is a great aid in realizing this connection, which is why I love singing for people.

Assuming you sang a lot of gospel music in your youth, did that prepare you well for jazz singing or was there a learning curve ? How did you came to embrace classic jazz to such a degree?

There was definitely a learning curve and it took a while for my voice to catch up to what I was hearing. But I think gospel prepared me to listen with intent. I didn’t have any knowledge of what jazz sounded like and in order to feel confident enough to sing it, I had to put it in my ears. Listening to gospel music growing up and trying to imitate other singers helped me to develop my ear for detail and I’m grateful for that musical influence.

I came to embrace jazz simply by listening to it. Because the genre was so new to me, I listened with open ears and allowed myself to be immersed in the sound of the artists who created it. As a result, my love for it grew stronger and I was able to use my voice in an entirely new way.

Should we look for more music from you in the vein of your latest single from the Netflix film Shirley, “Why I’m Here,” a song which is “pop” but also seems closer to contemporary gospel?

That was a special song for an incredibly important story and movie about Shirley Chisholm. My focus for my own music, as of now, is still jazz. What I love about jazz is the fact that even though I feel at home within the genre, I am also constantly being challenged to grow.

What specific thoughts or associations do you have about Memphis, whether it’s the jazz players from here, the gospel tradition here, or any soul/R&B artists from here?

One of the first documentaries I ever encountered was Wattstax (1973), which was a concert sponsored by Stax Records at the Watts Summer Festival. I was blown away by this footage of a completely different time in music and culture. Seeing the crowd’s response to Memphis artists like Rufus Thomas and Isaac Hayes was inspiring to watch and I’ve seen the film multiple times. That being said, I can’t wait to perform in Memphis!

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Film Features Film/TV

The Blues Society: When Musical Worlds Collide

Bukka White and Jimmy Crosthwait onstage at the the Overton Park Shell in The Blues Society. (Photo: Randall Lyon | courtesy of The Hogan Jazz Archive at Tulane)

For director Augusta Palmer, The Blues Society is a personal project.

Her father, music writer Robert Palmer, was a member of the group of hippies and weirdos who first brought Black blues artists from Memphis and Mississippi to the Overton Park Shell. They were among the first to acknowledge the deep debt that popular music owed to these artists. Robert Palmer went on to write the bestselling music tome Deep Blues in 1981.

Augusta Palmer’s film debuted at Indie Memphis 2023, when Memphis Flyer Music Editor Alex Greene interviewed her about the film and what it meant to her, the city, and the world. It went on to win awards at the Oxford Film Festival, and is now playing in limited engagements all over the country.

On Friday, May 31, The Blues Society opens in Memphis at Studio on the Square.. The opening weekend will feature a series of Q&A’s with the director and some Memphians involved in the project. On Friday, Grammy-winning author and filmmaker Robert Gordon will moderate a discussion with the director and musicians Jimmy Crosthwait and Chris Wimmer. On Friday, June 1, Indie Memphis executive director Kimel Fryer will moderate a discussion with director Palmer and editor Laura Jean Hocking. On Wednesday, June 5, Robert Gordon will return with Memphis radio legend Henry Nelson.

Here’s the trailer for The Blues Society.

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On the Fly We Recommend We Recommend

On the Fly: Week of 5/31/24

What’s For Breakfast? Records hosts a two-day, fourteen-band showcase at Lamplighter Lounge this Friday and Saturday. (Photo: Victoria Marie Photography)

Memphis Italian Festival
Marquette Park
Thursday, May 30, 3-11 p.m. | Friday-Saturday, May 31-June 1, 11 a.m.-11 p.m.
When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s amore. When the world seems to shine like you’ve had too much wine, that’s just the Memphis Italian Festival, “where everyone’s Italian.” There are several events going on throughout the day including bocce, grape stomping, wine races, live music, face painting, and cooking demonstrations from local chefs. This is a family-friendly festival with games and rides your kids will love. Tickets are $15 for Thursday and Friday, and $20 for Saturday. Purchase ahead here or at the gate. Kids 10 and under get in free, and so do active military with ID.

Trolley Night
South Main
Friday, May 31, 6-10 p.m.
Visitors will be able to stroll South Main and explore the many galleries, shops, restaurants, and bars in the neighborhood. Doors will be open and featuring an assortment of live music, performances, complimentary drinks/appetizers, and more.⁠⁠

Brek Fest Memphis Showcase
Lamplighter Lounge
Friday-Saturday, May 31-June 1, 7 p.m.
They say breakfast is the most important meal of the day, but sometimes it’s just too early to be making decisions on what to eat. What’s for breakfast? I don’t know. Now, if you were to ask who’s What’s For Breakfast?, I’d tell you it’s Dan Staggs’s Chicago/Memphis-based record label and it’s hosting a two-day, 14-band showcase this weekend, with six Memphis-based artists and eight traveling bands from around the Rust Belt and Mid-South. Friday night features Pity Invite, Big Whoop, Grimey, Snørkler, Mr. Clit and the Pink Cigarettes, and Lollygagger. Saturday night features Opossums, Bluff City Vice, Pet Mosquito, NightFreak, Deady, Wesley & the Boys, and Little Baby Tendencies. Admission is $20 at the door each night. Limited presales are available online at wfbr.bandcamp.com/merch. Doors open at 7 p.m. and music will run from approximately 8 p.m. to approximately 1 a.m. 

Shelarious
Rumba Room
Friday, June 31, 7 p.m.
Hehehe … or shesheshe? ’Cause this night of comedy is led by comedians who just so happen to be women. Tickets are $13.73 and can be purchased here.

WYXR DJ Night
Bar DKDC
Friday, May 31, 8 p.m.
WYXR stacks the deck for a hip-shakin’ sensation with DJ Bizzle Bluebland and DJ DY3. $10 cover.

Dragon Boat Festival
Hyde Lake at Shelby Farms Park
Saturday, June 1, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.
Enjoy a fantastic and memorable time with family and friends at the 2024 Memphis Dragon Boat Festival. In addition to electric boat racing, the festival will also have stage performances, art crafts, Asian street food, and other vendors. Admission is free.

Memphis Pride Festival and Parade 
Robert Church Park and Beale Street
Saturday, June 1, 11 a.m.-5 p.m.
June, if you can imagine, is already here, and that means it’s time for Pride. This year’s Memphis Pride Fest, which bills itself as the largest gathering of LGBTQ people in the Mid-South, promises to be bigger and better than ever before, with a theme of “Embrace Your Story,” a celebration of diversity, strength, and unity. Headlining the event organized by Mid-South Pride is Kornbread “The Snack” Jeté, a fan-favorite from season 14 of RuPaul’s Drag Race, and 37 local drag entertainers and four local bands will join the lineup across two stages. The festival will also host over 175 booths, providing a wide array of activities. Admission to the festival starts at $1. Kicking off the day, of course, is the annual parade which starts at Fourth and Beale before making its way through the historic Beale Street Entertainment District. The procession features over 100 units with 2,500+ participants from myriad organizations. The weekend also includes a Drag N Drive on Thursday, Big Gay Dance Party on Friday, and Grand Marshal Drag Brunch on Sunday. For more information on all that’s happening this weekend and to purchase tickets to any of these events, visit midsouthpride.org.

Headspace IPA & Sour Festival
Grind City Brewing Company
Saturday, June 1, noon-10 p.m.
Grind City is grinding out four one-day-only IPAs and four one-day-only sours. (Flavors are influenced by the summer season and will include some local farm ingredients. This is where you oooh and ahhh.) There will be food trucks (Albee’s at noon to 6 p.m. and Champ’s BBQ at 2 to 8 p.m.) and live music (Joe Downing at 1 to 4 p.m. and Flirting with Sincerity at 4 p.m.)

“Threaded Legacies” Opening Reception
Cossitt Library
Saturday, June 1, 3 p.m.
Celebrate the artistry of Black women quilters at the opening reception for “Threaded Legacies.” Join the library for an evening of culture and creativity honoring the remarkable contributions of the Orange Mound Community Service Center quilters. Hear their inspiring stories firsthand during an engaging artist talk, and immerse yourself in the beauty of their craft. 

Beginner Sushi Class
Memphis Made Brewing Co.
Sunday, June 2, 5-7 p.m.
Learn how to roll a big fat one — by that we mean the perfect roll of sushi. In this beginner class, learn how to make perfect sushi rice and all of the sauces you love (from eel sauce to BangBang), where to shop/what to buy, and how to safely serve raw fish at home and save a lot of money. Tickets are $50 and can be purchased here. 

Showboats 
Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium
Sunday, May 2, 6 p.m.
The Showboats are playing the Houston Roughnecks. I don’t know anything about football, nor do I really care. But here’s the link for tickets if that’s the lifestyle you choose. They start at $14, which isn’t that bad even if you don’t like football.

Samara Joy
Cannon Center for the Performing Arts
Monday, June 3, 7:30-9:30 p.m.
Cultural Arts For Everyone is bringing the incredible Samara Joy to Memphis to kickoff Black Music Month. To hear acclaimed vocalist Samara Joy perform live is to feel the emotional resonance of every lyric. With her Grammy award-winning Verve Records debut, Linger Awhile, the 23-year-old Bronx native has already earned her millions of likes on TikTok, cementing her status as perhaps the first Gen Z jazz singing star. Tickets ($35-$119) can be purchased here.

There’s always something happening in Memphis. See a full calendar of events here.

Submit events here or by emailing calendar@memphisflyer.com.

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Memphis Ranked Most Dangerous City for Pedestrians

Photo: Adrien Bruneau on Unsplash

Memphis has been ranked as the most dangerous metro city for pedestrians, with 343 pedestrian deaths from 2018 to 2022. Smart Growth America said this means more than half of pedestrian deaths (65 percent) over the last decade happened in the last five years.

The nonprofit organization, dedicated to helping people who “want to live and work in great neighborhoods,” released its “Dangerous by Design 2024” report in conjunction with the National Complete Streets Coalition. The report found that 7,522 people were killed by moving vehicles in 2022. They also found minority populations such as Black and Native Americans, older adults, and “people walking low-income communities” to be more susceptible to walking fatalities.

“Our nation’s streets are dangerous by design, designed primarily to move cars quickly at the expense of keeping everyone safe,” the report said. “Researchers found that Black people are killed at over twice the rate of white people (213 percent), and for Native people, it’s more than four times (428 percent). For Latino people, there is a 26 percent increased risk of death while walking. In addition, lower-income areas have far higher rates of pedestrian deaths.”

In order to understand why Memphis’ streets are dangerous, the organization interviewed local residents to not only put faces behind the numbers, but to hear their experiences first-hand.

Jared Myers, director of The Heights Community Development Corp, said in The Heights specifically, many residents depend on sidewalks to get from place to place. Many places such as grocery stores are often 20 minutes away by car. 

“Memphis drivers, they just drive fast and careless,” Vernice Foster, resident of The Heights, said.

Foster said several years ago she was walking on the corner of Homer Street and Macon Road and was involved in a hit-and-run.

“When I come to that intersection now and I’m walking there is such a fear,” Foster said. “Right now, if I gotta go, you know, I’ll go.”

The organization also interviewed Shannon Curtis, a Crosstown resident who primarily uses cycling and walking as their preferred method of transportation and prefers to take “neighborhood roads” when possible.

“I very rarely will not cross at a light,” Curtis said. “You’re supposed to yield to pedestrians, even if there’s not flashing lights, even if there aren’t yellow signs, you’re supposed to yield to pedestrians at a crosswalk, but no one ever does.”

Curtis also said they never take Poplar due to its design with seven lanes.

Mike Rutkowski, senior principal of complete streets leader at Stantec, explained that Summer Avenue had twice the state average crash rate “for a similar corridor.”

“You have crumbling sidewalks, gapped sidewalks. … There are segments on Summer Avenue that have gaps between high-visibility crosswalks. Certain areas [have] almost 3000 linear feet between a high or a protected or a safe crossing.”

As a result of this, many are forced to take an extra 12 to 15 minutes to cross the road. 

“Inherently, you know they’re not going to do that,” Curtis said. “They’re going to run across there, even though it’s seven lanes.”

The report suggests improvements in road designs will minimize fatalities and danger. Advocates stressed current road designs often prioritize vehicular speeds as opposed to safety.

“The only way to truly stop this epidemic is to make safety improvements in road design,” Smart Growth America said in a statement. “Crosswalks are regularly missing or too far apart, intersections are difficult to cross on foot, and many turn lanes encourage going around corners quickly, which can pose a hazard. Many places people regularly walk have zero sidewalks.”

Some of the recommendations included speed bumps in residential areas. Beth Osborne, vice president of transportation and thriving communities at Smart Growth America, said design interventions should be put in place to slow drivers down such as delineators and other improvements that will encourage drivers to “look for pedestrians.”

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News News Blog

Mr. Lincoln’s Costume Shoppe to Close After 34 Years in Overton Square

Barry Lincoln inside Mr. Lincoln's Costume Shoppe.

Mr. Lincoln’s Costume Shoppe, a Midtown landmark for more than three decades, will close on Friday, May 31, 2024.

Barry Lincoln, the longtime owner and shop’s namesake, is retiring after building his business into a must-visit spot for Memphians wanting to look sharp for Halloween.

I interviewed Mr. Lincoln himself about how he got into the costuming business, and why he’s leaving it all behind. But the good news is, he wants to sell the shop. So, maybe this is one Memphis tradition that can continue.