Gay activist and provocateur (and alt-weekly editor) Dan Savage speaks at Rhodes College tonight. Details in Memphis Gaydar.
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Tag: Rhodes College
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Dan Savage Speaks
Dan Savage, LGBT advocate and editor of Seattle’s alt-weekly The Stranger, launched the “It Gets Better” YouTube video project last September after a rash of suicides by gay teens who’d been bullied by their peers.
In his “It Gets Better” video, Savage talked about growing up gay in a Catholic school and assured viewers that life for LGBT people improves as one gets older. Thousands of other “It Gets Better” video testimonials followed, featuring everyone from Glee’s Chris Colfer and Ke$ha to Kim Kardashian and President Obama.
Savage will be at Rhodes tonight (Tuesday, Feb. 15th) as part of his “It Gets Better” lecture series. The free, open-to-the-public event begins at 7 p.m. in the McCallum Ballroom at the Bryan Campus Life Center. For more information, check out the Rhodes campus calendar.
Years ago, I wrote about the Welcome Wagon company, which had been founded in Memphis by a fellow named Thomas Briggs (below). He built a stunning, four-story building (also below) overlooking Court Square, and several newspaper articles mentioned that Briggs planned to mount a giant neon globe on top of his headquarters. I expressed some doubts that this globe was ever installed, because I’ve seen lots of pictures of downtown, and had never seen such a thing.
Well, I was looking in the wrong places. Because in the front of a 1966 Kingsbury High School yearbook is a nice color shot of downtown (shown here and below), and right in front is the globe! Wow. What a fantastic thing to put on a building here — it reminds me of the globe they had on the “Daily Planet” building in all the Superman comics.
The question now, of course, is: WHAT HAPPENED TO IT? Does anybody know?
The story of Thomas Briggs and Welcome Wagon is a pretty interesting one, and since I’ve got some time here before I take my usual two-hour lunch, followed by my two-hour nap, I’ll sum it up for you.
Years ago, you see, when you moved to a new city, a Welcome Wagon hostess would appear on your doorstep, bestowing nice gifts and free samples from the merchants of your city. It may seem a strange concept today, especially as people barricade themselves behind security doors, call blocking, caller ID, and other devices that would stump the most aggressive Welcome Wagon employee, but it was a huge success at the time, and it made Thomas Briggs into one of the wealthiest men in Memphis.
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Remembering Ted Rust 1910-2010
Edwin C. “Ted” Rust died last week at the age of 99. As the longtime director of the Memphis College of Art, and the Memphis Academy of Arts before that, he was an icon in the art world of our region. He can take credit, more than anyone else if you ask me, for turning the college into an institution with national credibility. He was also a talented sculptor, a brilliant administrator who had a knack for finding and nurturing the best artists and teachers, and a true gentleman in every sense of the word.
It was an honor to know him, and though he is gone, his memory lives on in all the public art he created throughout our city, from the sweeping sculpture of Rhodes College President Charles Diehl on that school’s campus to the wonderful plaques (below) that adorn the Memphis Dermatology Clinic in Midtown.
Ten years ago, one of my colleagues at Memphis magazine profiled Rust in a cover story. You can read about it here, and you should. Rust definitely made Memphis a better place.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the interesting water fountain at Rhodes College, which was dedicated to the beloved German shepherd, Cujo, who had once belonged to a Rhodes alumnus named David Granoff.
Well, somehow Granoff found out about the story, and took the time to contact me and tell me more about the fountains — yep, there is more than one at the school — and about his life after leaving Rhodes. And he said it was okay to share some of this with you, so I will:
“I actually offered to donate these fountains 10 years earlier then when they were finally built,” Granoff says. “The original person in charge of fund-raising and gifts did not think that this was an appropriate gesture for the campus, no matter what the amount was. Finally, with a changing of the guard, a new person contacted me and thought it was a great idea, as there were no water fountains out by the playing fields or the intramural fields. Ironically, when they had a major improvement of the athletic facility with a donor providing a couple of million for the tennis courts, the local newspaper featured the water fountains as the key item in a news article.”
Both fountains, as you probably surmised, are by the athletic fields on the eastern edge of the college campus: “As far as the water fountain locations are concerned, I believe you found the one that was out in the area we use to refer to as the intramural fields. The other one is between the tennis courts and the Stauffer baseball field (maybe near the physical plant between the two).”
I then asked Granoff what he had been up to over the years, and he told me this:
Not many people — and it seems not even many Rhodes College students — are aware that a rather remarkable tribute to man’s best friend can be found on that campus.
Just east of the Bryant Campus Life Center, close to the soccer fields, is a nice stone drinking fountain, with a bronze plaque on it, dedicated to a dog.
The main inscription reads:
Given in Memory of Cujo 1983-1993
“Man’s Best Friend”
by
Dr. David P. Granoff ’80.
A smaller inscription gives a touching account of the dog’s last moments:
I held you gently in my arms, and you left knowing with the last breath you drew, your fate was ever safest in my hands.
The voices in the wind will take you home again. The journey on has just begun my friend.
And when I leave this earth, you will be out there waiting … My True Companion.
I don’t know Dr. Granoff, or where he may be these days, but I think it’s a wonderful tribute to a beloved pet. Cujo lived only 10 years, it seems, but I’d say he was a mighty lucky dog to have a man like Granoff as an owner.
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Reading: At Risk
According to a report entitled Reading at Risk: A Survey of Literary Reading in America, issued by the National Endowment for the Arts, reading in America — literary reading, in the form of novels, short stories, poetry, and plays — is declining dramatically. That goes for every age group, and in the past 20 years, it’s meant a loss of 20 million potential readers. What’s more, the overall rate of decline is increasing, tripling since 1992. The steepest drop: readers 18 to 24 years of age.
“This report documents a national crisis,” Dana Gioia, chairman of the NEA, said when the survey was released three years ago.
“America can no longer take active and engaged literacy for granted,” Gioia went on to say. “As more Americans lose this capability, our nation becomes less informed, active, and independent minded. These are not qualities that a free, innovative, or productive society can afford to lose. No single factor caused this problem. No single solution can solve it. But it cannot be ignored and must be addressed.”
The NEA, in partnership with the Institute of Museum and Library Services and in cooperation with the organization Arts Midwest, is doing its part to address the problem. The NEA is calling it “The Big Read,” and in this the program’s inaugural year, Rhodes College is doing its part too. Rhodes is among the more than 100 recipients nationwide of a grant from the NEA to conduct a Big Read locally. The idea is to get everybody — students and adults, school groups and book clubs — to read one book and talk about it.
From the list of 12 titles recommended by a “Readers Circle” of writers, scholars, librarians, critics, and publishing professionals assembled by the NEA, a committee at Rhodes has selected Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. That book, according to Cathy Palmer, of Rhodes’ Office of College Relations and coordinator of the Big Read, will not only enhance student learning and provide for discussion. It will fit nicely into the college’s developing digital archive of the civil rights movement in Memphis, “Crossroads to Freedom.”
The big kick-off for Memphis’ Big Read is Tuesday, October 2nd, on the Rhodes College campus. Shelby County mayor A C Wharton will be there. Free copies of To Kill a Mockingbird, plus free bookmarks, reading guides, teacher guides, and audio CDs (all provided by the NEA) will be available. Participants can also sign up for community book groups. But that’s not all. On October 9th, panelists will discuss race relations in the context of To Kill a Mockingbird at Cypress Middle School. A “Family Night,” with a focus on kids’ activities and parenting tips, will take place on October 25th at the Hollywood Community Center. And on November 8th, Theatre Memphis will stage an event inspired by Harper Lee’s enduring look at childhood and racial tensions in the segregated South.
But first, the Big Read needs readers.
According to Palmer, “We need people to participate. We’re tying to reach out to the whole community — yes, absolutely everybody! Schools. Book clubs. Bookstores. Other colleges. We want people to start reading again, get their own book groups started, get conversations going. We’ll keep track of the numbers that show up at these events and the materials given away, and then we’ll report back to the NEA. We’ll hand out evaluation cards with questions such as how often you read, what kind of reading you do, in addition to general demographic questions.”
Is Rhodes hoping to make the Big Read an annual event?
“Every year, we hope,” Palmer says. “It’s our goal. And so far, so good.”
“The Big Read Kick-off” will be at the Crain Reception Hall of the Bryan Campus Life Center at Rhodes College on Tuesday, October 2nd, from 5 to 6:30 p.m. For more information on that event and other Big Read programs in Memphis over the next several weeks, contact Cathy Palmer at 843-3958 or at palmerc@rhodes.edu. For background information on the Big Read, go to the National Endowment for the Arts’ Web site at www.neabigread.org.
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In the Paint
More than a decade ago, Elliot Perry — then a point guard for the Phoenix Suns — was sharing a flight to Japan with fellow NBA’ers Charles Barkley and Darrel Walker when the conversation turned to art.
“I had no interest in it at the time,” Perry, a University of Memphis alum who earned a record-breaking 2,200-plus points for the Tigers before graduating in 1991, quickly confesses, “but Darrel showed me books and catalogs and some things from his collection.”
He was immediately hooked.
Talk to Perry for five minutes, and he’ll discuss the merits of Mississippi-born painter William Tolliver and dissect the life and work of the 20th-century African-American master Jacob Lawrence before making predictions about his beloved Tigers’ upcoming season.
Today, his zeal is reflected in his collection, which includes hundreds of pieces in mediums that range from photography and painting to drawing, sculpture, and video.
For the next month, 15 choice works are on display at Rhodes College’s Clough-Hanson Gallery. The selection includes pivotal pieces such as Glenn Ligon’s neon sculpture Untitled (Negro Sunshine), Renee Cox’ portrait American Beaute, and Wardell Milan’s Cibachrome collage of lush greenery, dinosaurs, and African figures.
“Most African-American people don’t grow up appreciating art,” Perry says. “They’ll like a cotton-picking scene or a portrait of a mother and child — something figural we can all relate to. For me, it’s been a growing process. In the beginning, I couldn’t appreciate abstraction or anything conceptual.
“Over the last four years, I’ve made a 360 on the work I collect and began moving toward young contemporary artists, artists of my time. I read about when [noted African-American art collector Dr. Walter Evans] started collecting in the ’70s and how he built friendships and working relationships with artists. I thought, Hey, I can do the same thing. So I started getting in touch with young contemporary artists.”
Clough-Hanson’s director, Hamlett Dobbins, says, “It’s one thing to buy something, and another thing to build that relationship. And in that way, Elliot is like a patron, someone who is aware of how important his support can be to a young artist.”
After crossing paths at a Brooks Museum exhibit that featured work on loan from Perry’s collection, Dobbins began laying the groundwork for “Taking Aim: Selections from the Elliot L. Perry Collection,” which will be on display at Clough-Hanson through October 11th.
Dobbins and Perry handpicked the pieces from 15 different artists, including hoop-dreams-themed works like photographer Hank Willis Thomas’ luminously deceiving Basketball and Chain, Michael Ray Charles’ Untitled (an arresting, nearly 5-foot tall painting which features a cartoonish figure stuffed into a fishbowl, while a carrot, a basketball, and words like “prosperity” and “influence” dangle above him), and Robert Pruitt’s ominous Sandinista, a drawing that depicts a figure dressed in half-bushman, half-NBA attire, a fatigue-styled cap on his head and a pistol at his feet.
The oldest pieces in the show, mixed-media work such as Kerry James Marshall’s The Face of Nat Turner Appeared in a Water Stain and Radcliff Bailey’s Untitled, date back to the ’90s; everything else is 21st century and as breathtakingly contemporary from a socio-political standpoint as they are on a purely artistic level.
“People paint what they know,” Perry says. “This collection tackles so many different issues. It shows the rich heritage of African-American people in so many diverse ways.
“Since I began collecting, I’ve always wanted to share art with other people,” he continues. “For me, it’s an inspiration. People think of it as a rich person’s game, but I know guys who have built significant collections by paying out a little bit at a time, doing their homework, and going out there and being a part of the scene.”
Now, Perry, a part owner in the Memphis Grizzlies, sees his collection as much more than a monetary investment.
“Being a collector has broadened my horizons,” he says. “I’ve gained an appreciation not just for visual art but for music, from opera to classical. Dance and performance art too — the whole nine yards. Wherever I go, whether it’s basketball season or not, I’m always talking to people and always collecting.”
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Photographic Memory
Museum curators receive plenty of calls from people willing to sell art. Most don’t result in deals, but a parcel of old photographs that came to the attention of the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art last year broke the trend.
“We told the owner to bring them in, and it turned out to be this group of photographs from the Memphis World,” says Marina Pacini, chief curator of the Brooks. “We decided we had to have them.”
The World — a member of the Scott Syndicate of African-American newspapers — published downtown from 1931 to 1973.
The Brooks bought 222 World photographs and plans to host an exhibit of the pictures and the stories behind them. First, however, they have some work to do.
The photographs were sold piecemeal at an estate sale without any identifying information. Pacini and David McCarthy, professor of art history at Rhodes College, seized the problem as an opportunity to create a community project combining the images with their sometimes obscure historical circumstances.
“These connect us with a moment in Memphis history that we all need to know about,” says McCarthy, whose students have joined the excavation for information about the photographs. “We’re hoping we can find people in the photographs and do oral histories with them.”
Most of the pictures in the Brooks collection depict events between 1949 and 1964, such as the 1953 Dairy Council Luncheon and the 1951 opening of the W.C. Handy Theatre — everyday activities excluded from the typical narrative of Memphis history.
McCarthy will lead a seminar this fall with students researching and writing entries on each of the images.
“The photographs go against what you think of as typical for Memphis in that time period,” says Amber James, a Rhodes student who has researched the photograph (shown above) of a Universal Life Insurance transaction as part of a larger project on black-owned businesses in Memphis.
McCarthy, Pacini, and students read through microfilm copies of the World at the Central Library. They have found about 160 of the photos in the Brooks collection in the paper and noted the photo captions and photographer credits as they originally ran.
Pacini and McCarthy also assembled an advisory committee to help identify the photographs and set up a computer kiosk in the Brooks’ lobby that displays each photograph in the collection. People are encouraged to view the kiosk and help identify subjects of the pictures. “We’re trying to find anyone and everyone who can help us with this,” McCarthy says.
They would likewise welcome the appearance of other World photographs. The estate sale where the Brooks collection was acquired sold other lots of World pictures separately. “We don’t know what happened to the rest,” McCarthy says.
The exhibit will be on display at the Brooks in the fall of 2008.
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Getting Around
Rhodes College junior Anthony Siracusa says that traveling by bicycle sometimes takes longer than expected. But not for the reason you might think.
“It’s a social activity,” he says. “You run into people on the street, and they want to talk.”
Even so, Siracusa hopes to get more bicycles on the roads.
Siracusa represented the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) at the Memphis City Council’s park committee meeting last week. Under a joint resolution, the council and the Shelby County Commission want to expand BPAC’s authority and designate it as a permanent standing committee of the area’s long-range transportation planning arm, the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO). The MPO is expected to vote on the change during an August 30th meeting.
“This raises the political profile of BPAC,” Siracusa says of the proposal. “This was a committee organized for a specific purpose.”
BPAC was formed in 2003 to advise on a 25-year comprehensive transportation plan. Now, Siracusa hopes the group will be able to work more closely with the city engineer’s office to add bicycle facilities to area roads.
“One thing BPAC was adamant about from the very beginning was writing into MPO policy that every time a street is repaved, a bike lane is added,” he says.
In 2000, the U.S. Department of Transportation said that states receiving federal dollars needed to incorporate bicycle and pedestrian amenities into transportation pro-jects unless “exceptional circumstances exist.” However, only half of all states have complied, according to the national Complete Streets Coalition.
“Here’s the problem,” says local bike and pedestrian advocate Steven Sondheim. “The federal regulations say when you improve a street or make a new street, they recommend putting in bike and pedestrian facilities, unless there is some compelling reason not to. It’s a recommendation. It’s not a law.”
Though Memphis has designated bicycle routes throughout the city, riding on those roads can still be dangerous. (Insert your own joke about Memphis drivers here.)
“In the three years [since the plan was created], nothing has happened,” Sondheim says. “There is not one bike lane in the city of Memphis. There are some in Germantown and Bartlett.”
Though the MPO plan includes recommendations for bicycle lanes, the group has no authority to implement its plans. Humphreys Boulevard is the only current road project that includes bike lanes.
Perhaps Memphis is behind the curve. Across the country, cities are adding bicycle lanes as part of “complete streets” programs. The idea, utilized in Chicago, Charlotte, and Iowa City, is that public streets should accommodate a variety of transportation, including areas for motor vehicles, bicycles, mass transit, and pedestrians.
Some planners have argued that adding extra vehicle lanes has not reduced traffic congestion; it has just invited more drivers onto the road. Supporters of complete streets initiatives say biking and walking reduce congestion and help fight obesity-related diseases.
The American Association of Retired People and various disability groups are also fans of the program. The environmental argument is a no-brainer, especially with higher gas prices and global warming.
“I see a direct link between creating bicycle facilities and reclaiming streets for a healthier way of life,” Siracusa says. “Bicycle facilities typically reflect people-friendly cities. It’s a mark of livable communities where people like being outside. … Not to mention, bikes are fun.”
The history major would like to see a pilot program add bike lanes to a target neighborhood, preferably in Cooper-Young.
“People are already riding bikes there,” he says. “The least we can do is make them safer.”
But if Memphians want bicycle lanes, they are going to have to lobby for them.
“I wish we lived in a place like Chicago where the mayor got on a bicycle and led the way,” Siracusa says. “At the same time, Memphians have to decide: Do we want to see increased bicycle and pedestrian access in our city?”
Sondheim says a group of cyclists will be starting to identify specific roads for bike lanes as early as this fall.
“What we want is [more lanes] in the next year or two,” he says. “We can’t wait until 2030. That’s part of the problem with long-range plans.”
Sometimes, they just leave you spinning your wheels.