Chamblee54

PG found Archival Atlanta: Electric Street Dummies, the Great Stonehenge Explosion, Nerve Tonics, and Bovine Laws : Forgotten Facts and Well-Kept Secrets from Our City’s Past at the Chamblee library. There are always more stories to be heard. Pictures today are from ” The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”.
In the 1840s, the Western and Atlantic railroad wanted to hook up with the Central of Georgia railroad. The spot for the meeting was called Terminus. One idea was to name the town for William Lumpkin, a former Georgia Governor and a railroad executive. Lumpkinville sounded bad in the mouth, and the new town was named “Marthasville”, after the daughter of the Governor. (Martha is buried in Oakland Cemetery.) Few people liked this name, and someone decided that the feminine form of Atlantic was Atlanta. Unlike the state flag, this is unlikely to change.
The new town prospered, and recovered from the unpleasantness of 1864. In 1875, there was a problem with stray cows. The answer was the “1875 Cow Ordinance”. The law required that cows be kept in a pen at night. A fine of two dollars was assessed for every stray cow that was caught.
About this time, there were a few very busy railroad tracks going through downtown. People were getting tired of waiting for the trains to go through. One by one, viaducts were built over the tracks, creating a forgotten ground floor. This was built up into Underground Atlanta in the sixties, which was red hot for a while, then cooled off, and is now so so.
In 1897, J.W. Alexander was the first person in town to own a “horseless carriage”. One day, he decided to take a ride to East Point. A mule objected to the device, and kicked man and machine into a ditch.
It is a rule that all history books about Atlanta have to discuss Coca Cola and Gone With The Wind. There are only so many stories to go around. This book tells of an Alpharetta farmer who bought the Tara set from MGM. He stored in a barn, the location of which was a secret. Betty Talmadge wanted to buy it, and the price went from $375k to $5k. After a while, the sale was finalized. There was only one problem…the farmer died, and never told anyone where the barn was. Mrs. Talmadge got the money from her husband’s overcoat, went to Alpharetta, and found the barn. The set was moved into another secret location, where it was in 1996, when this book was published.
Sam and William Venable owned Stone Mountain, and had a quarry there. (The Ku Klux Klan held meetings on the mountain.) Sam built a large granite house at 1410 Ponce de Leon Avenue, and stocked it with ammunition. He thought a race war was on the way, and wanted to be prepared. One night, a chimney overheated, and set the roof on fire. The explosives in the attic exploded, and took the roof off. The house was repaired, Mr. Venable died, and the house became part of a Lutheran church.
One of the few ante bellum houses in Atlanta is near Grant Park. It was once owned by Lemuel Grant, who donated the land for the park. He stays in a large marble house in Oakland Cemetery now. The Grant Park house was purchased by Mr. and Mrs. John Marsh, in partnership with Boyd Eugene Taylor. After the death of Mrs. Marsh (also known as Margaret Mitchell), she was known to visit the house. “Margaret just wanders through the house, looking things over. She never talks, and she always carries jonquils. The first night she came I was very shocked. I went out to her grave at Oakland Cemetery the next day. I’d never been to the house before. But I was almost certain of what I’d find. The plot is covered by a bed of jonquils.”

These guidelines are very general and cannot cover every possible situation. Please don’t assume that ##### management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment. We reserve the right to filter or delete comments or to deny posting privileges entirely at our discretion. Please note that comments are reviewed by the editorial staff and may not be posted immediately. If you feel your comment was filtered inappropriately, please email us …. I don’t make the rules Madam. I just think them up and write them down.” – Eric Cartman … there is a limit in balance. actually two of them, one on each side. where the tear cliffs exist. I miss edging so closely on the brinks of the ocean’s waves … Everything belongs and everything comes along when I’m ready and not before. Thank God I am not in control… “Ah, that is a perfume in which I delight; when they roast coffee near my house, I hasten to open the door to take in all the aroma.”… THIS IS A SCAM – DO NOT OPEN IT! AND I BET BRUCE DIDN’T SEND IT EITHER! … not some preset essence that determines what a human becomes…. what means death in this rude assault?… during this four-year period there were still past issues that barb and i had to deal with individually as well as issues in our relationship. we had our disagreements and our differences but we wo as no relief from the terror as day after day i felt i was going to die; i felt i was in hell. i also felt anger, rage, terror, and the heartbreak of the utter hopelessness of it ever changing … To paraphrase Schopenauer: Man always does what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills… It’s frightening how the advance of freedom, human rights and equality draws such vermin out of Tea Party and Fundamentalist cesspools. … Live so that you wouldn’t be ashmed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip…Will Rogers ,,, Friends are like underpants.. Some crawl up your butt. Some snap under pressure.. Some don’t have the strength to hold you up… Some get a little twisted… Some support you…Some are your favorite… Some are cheap and just get bent out of shape… And some actually DO cover your ass when you need them to .. Re-post for all the friends you hold dear… You know who you are … contents are for informational purposes only. Readers are encouraged to think for themselves and act at their own risk …”Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted.” — Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr … Ad Hominem attacks are always the last tool of an exhausted argument and a desperate person … “A book should serve as the axe for the frozen sea within us.” ~ Franz Kafka. … It’s weird getting invited to a funeral on Facebook, especially when you’re invited by the person who died … Timothy Geithner Unfriends Standard & Poor on Facebook … “I am a Bear of Very Little Brain, and long words bother me.” ~ Winnie the Pooh … “We are terrified by the idea of being terrified.” — Nietzsche … “Present fears are less than horrible imaginings.” — Shakespeare …As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments. … “Fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself.” — Defoe … “You are absolute scum, the only factor which stops me feeling angry is pity, you are NOTHING, and you always will be. I hope you rot in hell motherfucker.” – Libby Jagger … “Groucho Marx had many stories about Berle. “You’re not funny,” he once told Berle. Berle’s reply, “Everything I know, I stole from you, Grouch.” Groucho, unplacated, shot back, “Then you didn’t listen.” … “It is nobler to declare oneself wrong than to insist on being right – especially when one is right.” -Friedrich Nietzsche … “Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.” -Aristotle … “Every passing minute is a chance to turn it all around.” -Vanilla Sky … “I Dont like Quotes” ~Doguls Franklin … Integrity has no need for rules. ~ A. Camus … i have an eating disorder, i have ocd, i need things to be fucking perfect. JUDGE ME. … living at my friends cause my moms a bitch :/ but i lost a couple more pounds so alls good in my world .. “Imagination is more important than knowledge”-Albert Einstein …Remember that you are our guests. We will, at our discretion, delete comments that we find off-topic, derailing, un-civil, slanderous, trollish or troll-feeding, petulant, pestiferous, and/or otherwise obnoxious and non-constructive. If we warn you, stop it. After no more than three warnings, you will find yourself banned, and all your future comments will be immediately deleted… “One half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it.” Sidney Howard …,Don’t interfere with something that ain’t botherin’ you none – A Cowboy’s Guide to Life …”My mind is like a bad neighborhood – I shouldn’t spend too much time there alone.” — Michael Musgrove .. More people have been brought into the church by the kindness of real Christian love than by all the theological arguments in the world, and more people have been driven from the church by the hardness and ugliness of so-called Christianity than by all the doubts in the world. …“There is all the difference in the world between treating people equally and attempting to make them equal.” …“Writers end up writing stories–or rather, stories’ shadows–and they’re grateful if they can, but it is not enough….Nothing the writer can do is ever enough” — Joy Williams …Jesus wears a WWRPD bracelet. … “It’s not a coma, she’s the opposite of numb. Some people soak pain up, and your sister is a sponge.” …It’s not that I don’t like subtlety so much, it is indirect communication that drives me bonkers.I don’t understand it and it makes me feel manipulated. …”Wisdom is much better than weapons of war”(Ecc 9:18), and, I would add, resorting to weapons of war reflects a lack of wisdom …. pictures today are from ” The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library” … selah

In Paths Untrodden

In paths untrodden,
In the growth by margins of pond-waters,
Escaped from the life that exhibits itself,
From all the standards hitherto publish’d, from the pleasures,
profits, conformities,
Which too long I was offering to feed my soul,
Clear to me now standards not yet publish’d, clear to me that my soul,
That the soul of the man I speak for rejoices in comrades,
Here by myself away from the clank of the world,
Tallying and talk’d to here by tongues aromatic,
No longer abash’d, (for in this secluded spot I can respond
as I would not dare elsewhere,)
Strong upon me the life that does not exhibit itself, yet contains all the rest,
Resolv’d to sing no songs to-day but those of manly attachment,
Projecting them along that substantial life,
Bequeathing hence types of athletic love,
Afternoon this delicious Ninth-month in my forty-first year,
I proceed for all who are or have been young men,
To tell the secret my nights and days,
To celebrate the need of comrades.

Scented Herbage of My Breast

Scented herbage of my breast,
Leaves from you I glean, I write, to be perused best afterwards,
Tomb-leaves, body-leaves growing up above me above death,
Perennial roots, tall leaves, O the winter shall not freeze you delicate leaves,
Every year shall you bloom again, out from where you retired
you shall emerge again;
O I do not know whether many passing by will discover you
or inhale your faint odor, but I believe a few will;
O slender leaves! O blossoms of my blood! I permit you to tell
in your own way of the heart that is under you,
O I do not know what you mean there underneath yourselves,
you are not happiness,
You are often more bitter than I can bear, you burn and sting me,
Yet you are beautiful to me you faint tinged roots, you make me think of death,
Death is beautiful from you, (what indeed is finally beautiful
except death and love?)
O I think it is not for life I am chanting here my chant of lovers,
I think it must be for death,
For how calm, how solemn it grows to ascend to the atmosphere of lovers,
Death or life I am then indifferent, my soul declines to prefer,
(I am not sure but the high soul of lovers welcomes death most,)
Indeed O death, I think now these leaves mean precisely the same as you mean,
Grow up taller sweet leaves that I may see! grow up out of my breast!
Spring away from the conceal’d heart there!
Do not fold yourself so in your pink-tinged roots timid leaves!
Do not remain down there so ashamed, herbage of my breast!
Come I am determin’d to unbare this broad breast of mine,
I have long enough stifled and choked;
Emblematic and capricious blades I leave you, now you serve me not,
I will say what I have to say by itself,
I will sound myself and comrades only,
I will never again utter a call only their call,
I will raise with it immortal reverberations through the States,
I will give an example to lovers to take permanent shape
and will through the States,
Through me shall the words be said to make death exhilarating,
Give me your tone therefore O death, that I may accord with it,
Give me yourself, for I see that you belong to me now above all,
and are folded inseparably together, you love and death are,
Nor will I allow you to balk me any more with what I was calling life,
For now it is convey’d to me that you are the purports essential,
That you hide in these shifting forms of life, for reasons,
and that they are mainly for you,
That you beyond them come forth to remain, the real reality,
That behind the mask of materials you patiently wait, no matter how long,
That you will one day perhaps take control of all,
That you will perhaps dissipate this entire show of appearance,
That may-be you are what it is all for, but it does not last so very long,
But you will last very long.

Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in Hand

Whoever you are holding me now in hand,
Without one thing all will be useless,
I give you fair warning before you attempt me further,
I am not what you supposed, but far different.

Who is he that would become my follower?
Who would sign himself a candidate for my affections?

The way is suspicious, the result uncertain, perhaps destructive,
You would have to give up all else, I alone would expect to be
your sole and exclusive standard,
Your novitiate would even then be long and exhausting,
The whole past theory of your life and all conformity to the lives around you
would have to be abandon’d,
Therefore release me now before troubling yourself any further,
let go your hand from my shoulders,
Put me down and depart on your way.

Or else by stealth in some wood for trial,
Or back of a rock in the open air,
(For in any roof’d room of a house I emerge not, nor in company,
And in libraries I lie as one dumb, a gawk, or unborn, or dead,)
But just possibly with you on a high hill, first watching lest any person
for miles around approach unawares,
Or possibly with you sailing at sea, or on the beach of the sea
or some quiet island,
Here to put your lips upon mine I permit you,
With the comrade’s long-dwelling kiss or the new husband’s kiss,
For I am the new husband and I am the comrade.

Or if you will, thrusting me beneath your clothing,
Where I may feel the throbs of your heart or rest upon your hip,
Carry me when you go forth over land or sea;
For thus merely touching you is enough, is best,
And thus touching you would I silently sleep and be carried eternally.

But these leaves conning you con at peril,
For these leaves and me you will not understand,
They will elude you at first and still more afterward, I will certainly elude you.
Even while you should think you had unquestionably caught me, behold!
Already you see I have escaped from you.

For it is not for what I have put into it that I have written this book,
Nor is it by reading it you will acquire it,
Nor do those know me best who admire me and vauntingly praise me,
Nor will the candidates for my love (unless at most a very few) prove victorious,
Nor will my poems do good only, they will do just as much evil, perhaps more,
For all is useless without that which you may guess at many times and not hit,
that which I hinted at;
Therefore release me and depart on your way.

For You, O Democracy

Come, I will make the continent indissoluble,
I will make the most splendid race the sun ever shone upon,
I will make divine magnetic lands,
With the love of comrades,
With the life-long love of comrades.

I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America,
and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies,
I will make inseparable cities with their arms about each other’s necks,
By the love of comrades,
By the manly love of comrades.

For you these from me, O Democracy, to serve you ma femme!
For you, for you I am trilling these songs.

These I Singing in Spring

These I singing in spring collect for lovers,
(For who but I should understand lovers and all their sorrow and joy?
And who but I should be the poet of comrades?)
Collecting I traverse the garden the world, but soon I pass the gates,
Now along the pond-side, now wading in a little, fearing not the wet,
Now by the post-and-rail fences where the old stones thrown there,
pick’d from the fields, have accumulated,
(Wild-flowers and vines and weeds come up through the stones and partly cover them,beyond these I pass,)
Far, far in the forest, or sauntering later in summer,
before I think where I go,
Solitary, smelling the earthy smell, stopping now and then in the silence,
Alone I had thought, yet soon a troop gathers around me,
Some walk by my side and some behind, and some embrace my arms or neck,
They the spirits of dear friends dead or alive, thicker they come,
a great crowd, and I in the middle,
Collecting, dispensing, singing, there I wander with them,
Plucking something for tokens, tossing toward whoever is near me,
Here, lilac, with a branch of pine,
Here, out of my pocket, some moss which I pull’d off a live-oak
in Florida as it hung trailing down,
Here, some pinks and laurel leaves, and a handful of sage,
And here what I now draw from the water, wading in the pondside,
(O here I last saw him that tenderly loves me,
and returns again never to separate from me,
And this, O this shall henceforth be the token of comrades, this
calamus-root shall,
Interchange it youths with each other! let none render it back!)
And twigs of maple and a bunch of wild orange and chestnut,
And stems of currants and plum-blows, and the aromatic cedar,
These I compass’d around by a thick cloud of spirits,
Wandering, point to or touch as I pass, or throw them loosely from me,
Indicating to each one what he shall have, giving something to each;
But what I drew from the water by the pond-side, that I reserve,
I will give of it, but only to them that love as I myself am capable of loving.

Not Heaving from My Ribb’d Breast Only

Not heaving from my ribb’d breast only,
Not in sighs at night in rage dissatisfied with myself,
Not in those long-drawn, ill-supprest sighs,
Not in many an oath and promise broken,
Not in my wilful and savage soul’s volition,
Not in the subtle nourishment of the air,
Not in this beating and pounding at my temples and wrists,
Not in the curious systole and diastole within which will one day cease,
Not in many a hungry wish told to the skies only,
Not in cries, laughter, defiancies,
thrown from me when alone far in the wilds,
Not in husky pantings through clinch’d teeth,
Not in sounded and resounded words, chattering words, echoes, dead words,
Not in the murmurs of my dreams while I sleep,
Nor the other murmurs of these incredible dreams of every day,
Nor in the limbs and senses of my body that take you
and dismiss you continually—not there,
Not in any or all of them O adhesiveness! O pulse of my life!
Need I that you exist and show yourself any more than in these songs.

Of the Terrible Doubt of Appearances

Of the terrible doubt of appearances,
Of the uncertainty after all, that we may be deluded,
That may-be reliance and hope are but speculations after all,
That may-be identity beyond the grave is a beautiful fable only,
May-be the things I perceive, the animals, plants, men, hills,
shining and flowing waters,
The skies of day and night, colors, densities, forms,
may-be these are (as doubtless they are) only apparitions,
and the real something has yet to be known,
(How often they dart out of themselves as if to confound me and mock me!
How often I think neither I know, nor any man knows, aught of them,)
May-be seeming to me what they are (as doubtless they indeed but seem)
as from my present point of view, and might prove (as of course they would)
nought of what they appear, or nought anyhow,
from entirely changed points of view;
To me these and the like of these are curiously answer’d by my lovers,
my dear friends,
When he whom I love travels with me or sits a long while holding me by the hand,
When the subtle air, the impalpable, the sense that words and reason hold not,
surround us and pervade us,
Then I am charged with untold and untellable wisdom, I am silent,
I require nothing further,
I cannot answer the question of appearances
or that of identity beyond the grave,
But I walk or sit indifferent, I am satisfied,
He ahold of my hand has completely satisfied me.

Poems are from Leaves of Grass, Book V: Calamus by Walt Whitman.
Text is courtesy of Project Gutenberg.
Formatting of text, and pictures, by Chamblee 54.

This post has been in the works for a long time. It is about life after death. This is a big deal to Jesus worshipers. It is fair to say that the entire religion has devolved into a scheme for life after death. Either you agree, and go to heaven, or disagree, and go to hell. PG has thought long and hard about this, and has a few thoughts.
One problem with this concept is human nature. When you have a religion based on broadcasting a message, some of the believers go overboard. Some will let their pride get in the way. They enjoy the power that seems to come with spreading this message. When a person hears this “good news,” shouted by people who are bad news, then it is natural to doubt the message.
A facebook friend supplied this quote “More people have been brought into the church by the kindness of real Christian love than by all the theological arguments in the world, and more people have been driven from the church by the hardness and ugliness of so-called Christianity than by all the doubts in the world. ” . The $64 question becomes: Do people who have been repelled from Jesus go to hell?
There is also the matter of people who simply do not agree with the scheme for life after death. Of all the standards to use, why would G-d use the doctrine of one branch, of one religion? Does G-d even exist? Are the billions of people who never even heard of Jesus destined for hell? Many good people ask a lot of good questions. They are not happy with the answers, no matter how much others may believe.
PG was raised in the Southern Baptist tradition. For various reasons, he resisted the pressure put on children to “make a profession of faith”, and be baptised. When he was 17, he quit going to church. In 1979, there was a week in a Moonie camp in California. There have been many books read, a bit of thinking and talking, and a few odd meetings attended. There were 7 years working closely with an abusive professional Jesus worshiper. After a while, PG got tired of worrying about it all, and just wanted to enjoy the time he has on this planet.
Which brings us to today’s post. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. These men were Union soldiers in the War Between the States. In no particular order, here is the product.
1- G-d does not write books. The Bible was compiled by the Council of Nicea from a variety of texts. These texts were written in a multitude of languages, and copied by hand. It is possible that the scribes copying them made mistakes. It is possible that errors in translation were made. It is probable that texts were not included in the Bible, for various reasons. The Bible is the product of man’s labor, with possible inspiration by G-d.
The first commandment says Thou shalt have no other gods before me. When you call the Bible the word of G-d, you are, in effect, making a G-d out of a book. When you violate this common sense commandment, you are going to have problems.
2- The first commandment… Thou shalt have no other gods before me. .. does not make an exception for the so called son of G-d.
3- Jesus was killed because he was a trouble maker. His death, and reputed resurrection, have nothing to do with what happens when you die.
4- What happens to people after they die is none of your business. Living people should be concerned with life, and not worry about what will happen when you die.
5- You should have faith in G-d to take care of you when you die. Period. Don’t scream about Jesus. Don’t kill the infidel. Don’t worry about your soul. G-d took care of you before you were born, and she will take care of you after you die.
6- What you say does not become more true the louder you say it. The way you say something is more important than the words you say. It is more important to show kindness to your neighbor, than to scream the so called truth.
7- The decision to end a life is G-d’s job. You are better off when you let her make this call. This applies to war, abortion, captal punishment, and euthanasia, and other forms of humans ending life.
8- G-d should be enjoyed. G-d should bring nourishment to life. G-d should NOT be fought or argued over. The third commandment…Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. … is another common sense rule that is shamelessly violated by those who claim to be “saved”. When you forget this rule, you cause trouble.
9- When copying some commandments for use in this post, PG found this. 23 Ye shall not make with me gods of silver, neither shall ye make unto you gods of gold. PG has heard about the ten commandments all his life, and yet has never heard this line. It is just 6 verses after the tenth commandment, which is about coveting.  The tenth commandment  is obsolete in this era of wealthy churches.

Democracy Now has a man telling a lie today. This is a whopper for the record books.
One of the things that President Obama has been consistent on is that we’re exceptionally precise and surgical in terms of addressing the terrorist threat. And by that, I mean, if there are terrorists who are within an area where there are women and children or others, you know, we do not take such action that might put those innocent men, women and children in danger. In fact, I can say that the types of operations that the U.S. has been involved in, and within the counterterrorism realm, that nearly, for the past year, there hasn’t been a single collateral death, because of the exceptional proficiency, precision of the capabilities we’ve been able to develop.
In this film, at 50:16, the image shifts to a shot from a camera on the side. We can only see the side of a man speaking. We cannot see if his lips are moving. In the embedded vdeo, the lips are clearly moving. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress.

PG read The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle. It is a good story, which is all PG asks of a book. When he was commuting on Marta, a good story could make the time between Chamblee and Peachtree Center go by in a flash. Maybe that is the role of reading in life, something to pass the time on life’s journey.
The Tortilla Curtain ( Which is the same initials as Tom Coraghessan.) is a story of Los Angeles in the early nineties. The riots of 1992 have come and gone. The landscape is beautiful, but fragile. Some people flourish, and live a life of glittering excess. These people are scared to death by the Spanish speaking masses pouring over the border. The Tortilla Curtain is a story about what happens when worlds collide.
This is the first novel by Mr. Boyle that PG has read, after reading two collections of short stories. The man knows how to tell a story. While there are a lot of coincidences in this tale, your suspension of disbelief does not get in the way of a good time. (Unless you are a fuddy duddy English major, in which case what are you doing reading this blog?) The tale of two families rolls along, like a mudslide going down a canyon, to it’s sticky conclusion.
There is only one issue here. PG got his copy of The Tortilla Curtain at a yard sale. The printer made a mistake when assembling the book. At page 294, the wrong section was inserted. Page 231 to 294 are repeated, instead of the conclusion of the story. At the point of this mistake, PG was reading this story every chance he got. The momentum was intense. At this point, the only choice was to order the book from the library, and wait a few days to finish it.
By the time the complete book arrived at the library, the magic was gone. The plot twists seemed a bit more unlikely. By the time the story came to the  conclusion, PG was shaking his head in disbelief.
The story of the yardsale where PG got this book is almost as good. The house was a few doors down from where PG used to live, and was a 1948 Cape Cod house spared the plague of McMansionization. The cd’s were negotiable, and the book was a quarter. For two dollars, PG got the book, Alladin Sane by David Bowie, Zenyatta Mondatta by The Police, Chronicle by Creedence Clearwater Revival, and a cd by Emmy Lou Harris.
PG knows to check the cd case. The one by Emmy Lou Harris was empty. The yard salesman gave PG a dollar back. PG found a four cd box set by the Moody Blues, and bought it for one dollar. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. The spell check suggestions for McMansionization : Acclimatization, Colonizations, Stigmatization.

The Living Walls conference hit Atlanta again. A collection of artists hit town and created images for the public. PG got a map of the specific locations, and went south to see the results. Uzi rode shotgun.
The first image was in downtown Decatur, across from the old courthouse. It was on the side of a business called Squash Blossom. A tree was in front of the mural,blocking the view.
A dance studio, on the other side of a courtyard, was the site for the second image. It was in a narrow alley, with a locked gate at one end. It was a nice enough image, but you could not back up and get a good overall view. Visibility was also an issue at Twain’s, where a vehicle was parked in front.
After viewing the three images on Howard Avenue, the fun started. PG memorized the address of a location on W. Trinity Place, and drove by that location without seeing anything. After seeing several mistakes in the google map, PG figured they had just missed it. He turned around in a parking lot, with the intention of going to town on College Avenue. While in the parking lot, he looked at his list again, and saw the correct address on W. Trinity.
PG started to pull into a parking lot, but quickly noted that it was full of police cars, and marked “authorized vehicles only”. Not being in the mood to discuss authorization with a uniformed officer, PG turned his vehicle around, and drove in front of the police station. He noted the street number, 420, on the front door of the police station. This called for a picture. ( This was image -042 in the folder.)
The Beacon Hill Recreation Center, an old school house, was at 430 W. Trinity, and was the correct location. PG drove in back, and looked for a place to park. He turned a corner, and found a fence at the back of the police station parking lot. A fence is more effective than a sign for blocking access. PG tried to turn around in a rather narrow space, and wound up with a curb in between his front and back tire. Several delicate front and back moves, and the vehicle was free to leave. It drove by a group of people doing exercises in a back yard. The murals were in a space on the building formerly occupied by a window. One of them was PG’s favorite image, to this point. It was not technically special, but had a happy vibe, and used the space efficiently.
College Avenue runs by the railroad/Marta tracks, past Agnes Scott towards the city. A business had a mural on the side, with the painter still working on it. The journey went down East Lake Drive, past the home of the late Hosea Williams, and into Kirkwood. A very, very subtle display was on the side of a business. PG drove around the block three times, and was going to give up, when Uzi saw something. It was a collection of pasted up images of a man in a fantasy costume.
The next stop was the beltline. A building near Cabbagetown had a vibrant mural on the side. In East Atlanta, a Bicycle Co-op had a face drawing, to go with the security equipment of his neighbor. A run up Moreland took the explorers to Arizona Avenue, where some traditional graffiti graced a wall.
Uzi was getting tired by this point. A decision was made to visit the rest of the murals later. After a tasty dinner at the S&S cafeteria, the weekend was over.

There was a table set out under a tree in front of the house, and the March Hare and the Hatter were having tea at it: a Dormouse was sitting between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using it as a cushion, resting their elbows on it, and talking over its head. ‘Very uncomfortable for the Dormouse,’ thought Alice; ‘only, as it’s asleep, I suppose it doesn’t mind.’
The table was a large one, but the three were all crowded together at one corner of it: ‘No room! No room!’ they cried out when they saw Alice coming. ‘There’s PLENTY of room!’ said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in a large arm-chair at one end of the table.
‘Have some wine,’ the March Hare said in an encouraging tone.
Alice looked all round the table, but there was nothing on it but tea. ‘I don’t see any wine,’ she remarked.
‘There isn’t any,’ said the March Hare.
‘Then it wasn’t very civil of you to offer it,’ said Alice angrily.
‘It wasn’t very civil of you to sit down without being invited,’ said the March Hare.
‘I didn’t know it was YOUR table,’ said Alice; ‘it’s laid for a great many more than three.’
‘Your hair wants cutting,’ said the Hatter. He had been looking at Alice for some time with great curiosity, and this was his first speech.
‘You should learn not to make personal remarks,’ Alice said with some severity; ‘it’s very rude.’
The Hatter opened his eyes very wide on hearing this; but all he SAID was,
‘Why is a raven like a writing-desk?’
‘Come, we shall have some fun now!’ thought Alice. ‘I’m glad they’ve begun asking riddles.—I believe I can guess that,’ she added aloud.
‘Do you mean that you think you can find out the answer to it?’ said the March Hare.
‘Exactly so,’ said Alice.
‘Then you should say what you mean,’ the March Hare went on.
‘I do,’ Alice hastily replied; ‘at least—at least I mean what I say—that’s the same thing, you know.’
‘Not the same thing a bit!’ said the Hatter. ‘You might just as well say that “I see what I eat” is the same thing as “I eat what I see”!’
‘You might just as well say,’ added the March Hare, ‘that “I like what I get” is the same thing as “I get what I like”!’
‘You might just as well say,’ added the Dormouse, who seemed to be talking in his sleep, ‘that “I breathe when I sleep” is the same thing as “I sleep when I breathe”!’
‘It IS the same thing with you,’ said the Hatter, and here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent for a minute, while Alice thought over all she could remember about ravens and writing-desks, which wasn’t much.
The Hatter was the first to break the silence. ‘What day of the month is it?’ he said, turning to Alice: he had taken his watch out of his pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to his ear.
Alice considered a little, and then said ‘The fourth.’
‘Two days wrong!’ sighed the Hatter. ‘I told you butter wouldn’t suit the works!’ he added looking angrily at the March Hare.
‘It was the BEST butter,’ the March Hare meekly replied.
‘Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well,’ the Hatter grumbled:
‘you shouldn’t have put it in with the bread-knife.’
The March Hare took the watch and looked at it gloomily: then he dipped it into his cup of tea, and looked at it again: but he could think of nothing better to say than his first remark, ‘It was the BEST butter, you know.’
Alice had been looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. ‘What a funny watch!’ she remarked. ‘It tells the day of the month, and doesn’t tell what o’clock it is!’
‘Why should it?’ muttered the Hatter. ‘Does YOUR watch tell you what year it is?’
‘Of course not,’ Alice replied very readily:
‘but that’s because it stays the same year for such a long time together.’
‘Which is just the case with MINE,’ said the Hatter.
Alice felt dreadfully puzzled. The Hatter’s remark seemed to have no sort of meaning in it, and yet it was certainly English. ‘I don’t quite understand you,’ she said, as politely as she could.
‘The Dormouse is asleep again,’ said the Hatter, and he poured a little hot tea upon its nose.
The Dormouse shook its head impatiently, and said, without opening its eyes, ‘Of course, of course; just what I was going to remark myself.’
‘Have you guessed the riddle yet?’ the Hatter said, turning to Alice again.
‘No, I give it up,’ Alice replied: ‘what’s the answer?’
‘I haven’t the slightest idea,’ said the Hatter.
‘Nor I,’ said the March Hare.
Alice sighed wearily. ‘I think you might do something better with the time,’ she said, ‘than waste it in asking riddles that have no answers.’
‘If you knew Time as well as I do,’ said the Hatter, ‘you wouldn’t talk about wasting IT. It’s HIM.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Alice.
‘Of course you don’t!’ the Hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously.
‘I dare say you never even spoke to Time!’
‘Perhaps not,’ Alice cautiously replied: ‘but I know I have to beat time when I learn music.’
‘Ah! that accounts for it,’ said the Hatter. ‘He won’t stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he’d do almost anything you liked with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o’clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons: you’d only have to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling! Half-past one, time for dinner!’
(‘I only wish it was,’ the March Hare said to itself in a whisper.)
‘That would be grand, certainly,’ said Alice thoughtfully:
‘but then—I shouldn’t be hungry for it, you know.’
‘Not at first, perhaps,’ said the Hatter: ‘but you could keep it to half-past one as long as you liked.’
‘Is that the way YOU manage?’ Alice asked.
The Hatter shook his head mournfully. ‘Not I!’ he replied. ‘We quarrelled last March—just before HE went mad, you know—’ (pointing with his tea spoon at the March Hare,) ‘—it was at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts, and I had to sing
“Twinkle, twinkle, little bat! How I wonder what you’re at!”
You know the song, perhaps?’
‘I’ve heard something like it,’ said Alice.
‘It goes on, you know,’ the Hatter continued, ‘in this way:—
“Up above the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky.Twinkle, twinkle—”‘
Here the Dormouse shook itself, and began singing in its sleep ‘Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle—’ and went on so long that they had to pinch it to make it stop.
‘Well, I’d hardly finished the first verse,’ said the Hatter, ‘when the Queen jumped up and bawled out, “He’s murdering the time! Off with his head!”‘
‘How dreadfully savage!’ exclaimed Alice.
‘And ever since that,’ the Hatter went on in a mournful tone, ‘he won’t do a thing I ask!
It’s always six o’clock now.’
A bright idea came into Alice’s head. ‘Is that the reason so many tea-things are put out here?’ she asked.
‘Yes, that’s it,’ said the Hatter with a sigh: ‘it’s always tea-time, and we’ve no time to wash the things between whiles.’
‘Then you keep moving round, I suppose?’ said Alice.
‘Exactly so,’ said the Hatter: ‘as the things get used up.’






‘But what happens when you come to the beginning again?’ Alice ventured to ask.
‘Suppose we change the subject,’ the March Hare interrupted, yawning. ‘I’m getting tired of this. I vote the young lady tells us a story.’
‘I’m afraid I don’t know one,’ said Alice, rather alarmed at the proposal.
‘Then the Dormouse shall!’ they both cried.
‘Wake up, Dormouse!’ And they pinched it on both sides at once.
The Dormouse slowly opened his eyes. ‘I wasn’t asleep,’ he said in a hoarse, feeble voice:
‘I heard every word you fellows were saying.’
‘Tell us a story!’ said the March Hare.
‘Yes, please do!’ pleaded Alice.
‘And be quick about it,’ added the Hatter, ‘or you’ll be asleep again before it’s done.’
‘Once upon a time there were three little sisters,’ the Dormouse began in a great hurry; ‘and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie; and they lived at the bottom of a well—’
‘What did they live on?’ said Alice, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking.
‘They lived on treacle,’ said the Dormouse, after thinking a minute or two.
‘They couldn’t have done that, you know,’ Alice gently remarked; ‘they’d have been ill.’
‘So they were,’ said the Dormouse; ‘VERY ill.’
Alice tried to fancy to herself what such an extraordinary ways of living would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so she went on: ‘But why did they live at the bottom of a well?’
‘Take some more tea,’ the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.
‘I’ve had nothing yet,’ Alice replied in an offended tone, ‘so I can’t take more.’
‘You mean you can’t take LESS,’ said the Hatter: ‘it’s very easy to take MORE than nothing.’
‘Nobody asked YOUR opinion,’ said Alice.
‘Who’s making personal remarks now?’ the Hatter asked triumphantly.
Alice did not quite know what to say to this: so she helped herself to some tea and bread-and-butter, and then turned to the Dormouse, and repeated her question. ‘Why did they live at the bottom of a well?’
The Dormouse again took a minute or two to think about it, and then said, ‘It was a treacle-well.’
‘There’s no such thing!’ Alice was beginning very angrily, but the Hatter and the March Hare went ‘Sh! sh!’ and the Dormouse sulkily remarked, ‘If you can’t be civil, you’d better finish the story for yourself.’
‘No, please go on!’ Alice said very humbly; ‘I won’t interrupt again. I dare say there may be ONE.’
‘One, indeed!’ said the Dormouse indignantly. However, he consented to go on. ‘And so these three little sisters—they were learning to draw, you know—’
‘What did they draw?’ said Alice, quite forgetting her promise.
‘Treacle,’ said the Dormouse, without considering at all this time.
‘I want a clean cup,’ interrupted the Hatter: ‘let’s all move one place on.’
He moved on as he spoke, and the Dormouse followed him: the March Hare moved into the Dormouse’s place, and Alice rather unwillingly took the place of the March Hare. The Hatter was the only one who got any advantage from the change: and Alice was a good deal worse off than before, as the March Hare had just upset the milk-jug into his plate.
Alice did not wish to offend the Dormouse again, so she began very cautiously: ‘But I don’t understand. Where did they draw the treacle from?’
‘You can draw water out of a water-well,’ said the Hatter; ‘so I should think you could draw treacle out of a treacle-well—eh, stupid?’
‘But they were IN the well,’ Alice said to the Dormouse, not choosing to notice this last remark.
‘Of course they were’, said the Dormouse; ‘—well in.’ This answer so confused poor Alice, that she let the Dormouse go on for some time without interrupting it.
‘They were learning to draw,’ the Dormouse went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, for it was getting very sleepy; ‘and they drew all manner of things—everything that begins with an M—’
‘Why with an M?’ said Alice.
‘Why not?’ said the March Hare.
Alice was silent.
The Dormouse had closed its eyes by this time, and was going off into a doze; but, on being pinched by the Hatter, it woke up again with a little shriek, and went on: ‘—that begins with an M, such as mouse-traps, and the moon, and memory, and muchness—you know you say things are “much of a muchness”—did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness?’
‘Really, now you ask me,’ said Alice, very much confused, ‘I don’t think—’
‘Then you shouldn’t talk,’ said the Hatter.
This piece of rudeness was more than Alice could bear: she got up in great disgust, and walked off; the Dormouse fell asleep instantly, and neither of the others took the least notice of her going, though she looked back once or twice, half hoping that they would call after her: the last time she saw them, they were trying to put the Dormouse into the teapot.
‘At any rate I’ll never go THERE again!’ said Alice as she picked her way through the wood. ‘It’s the stupidest tea-party I ever was at in all my life!’ Just as she said this, she noticed that one of the trees had a door leading right into it. ‘That’s very curious!’ she thought. ‘But everything’s curious today. I think I may as well go in at once.’ And in she went.
Once more she found herself in the long hall, and close to the little glass table. ‘Now, I’ll manage better this time,’ she said to herself, and began by taking the little golden key, and unlocking the door that led into the garden. Then she went to work nibbling at the mushroom (she had kept a piece of it in her pocket) till she was about a foot high: then she walked down the little passage: and THEN—she found herself at last in the beautiful garden, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains.
Today’s entertainment is Chapter VII of ALICE’S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND By Lewis Carroll .
The text is courtesy of Project Gutenberg. Living Walls by Zipcode happens today.

This is a repost from a year ago. In the past twelve months, we have gotten in one more war, that we know of. The economic turmoil in America is caused, in large part, because of these conflicts.
There was a feature the other day on the innertube called War is a racket . It was about a man with the unlikely name of Smedley Butler . Pictures for today’s adventure are from The Library of Congress. The video features an actor named Graham Frye in the role of General Butler. The video is courtesy of Smedley D. Butler Brigade Chapter 9 Veterans For Peace.
Major General Smedley Darlington Butler was a star of the U.S. Marine Corps. He lied about his age to enlist during the Spanish American War. Mr. Butler served in Philippines, China , Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America and World War I. With the exception of World War I, most of these conflicts are forgotten today.
Smedley Butler received the Medal of Honor twice. “His first Medal of Honor was presented following action at Vera Cruz, Mexico, 21-22 April 1914, where he commanded the Marines who landed and occupied the city. Maj Butler “was eminent and conspicuous in command of his Battalion. He exhibited courage and skill in leading his men through the action of the 22nd and in the final occupation of the city…The following year, he was awarded the second Medal of Honor for bravery and forceful leadership as Commanding Officer of detachments of Marines and seamen of the USS Connecticut in repulsing Caco resistance on Fort Riviere, Haiti, 17 November 1915.”
After his retirement in 1931, Mr. Butler had a change of heart, and decided that killing for Uncle Sam was not such a great idea. He wrote a book, “War is a Racket”, and became a popular speaker. Here is a “money quote”… “I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class thug for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”
Smedley Butler died June 21, 1940. Eighteen months later, America was at War again. How he would have reacted to that conflict is a mystery.

World Class Stupid is a great corner of the internet. It has chamblee54 on an automated blogroll called “my blog list”, which displays the latest post here to the digital universe. Thank you. The neighbors on MBL include WTF Japan Seriously and  Alex Balk. The videos embedded today come from WTF Japan Seriously. (Youtube is embarrassed by this video.) Mr. Balk records bits of digital merriment. A recent post involved a tweet from @Hooters. “Happy Women’s Day! Celebrate @Hooters, where every day is women’s day!” A response was “Get a load of the powerful sisterhoods on her”. Today’s WCS post involves the period abusing Joe.my.G-d. The current lineup at JMG involves a cnn poll on the Republican Presidential hopefuls. Of the top five in the polls, three are currently not in the race. The poll was taken by ORC international. Company spokesman Mork did not make a comment. In any event, the post today at WCS was a work of art. It is borrowed below for your reading pleasure. Pictures today are by chamblee54. I love love love Joe.My.God, but sometimes I wonder about the usefulness of political posts. I mean, after we’ve established that somebody is a brain-dead idiot, do we really need daily updates? Say your neighbor tells you that in the middle of the night a little yellow space alien walloped his butt with uncooked spaghetti. The next time you see him, are you going to ask for news? Will you email asking for any continuing developments? No. You’re going to write the dude off.  As the spokesperson for certified hate group Liberty Counsel, Matt Barber has been walloped with spaghetti more times than anyone can count. Yet today Joe quotes him attacking Ann Coulter for her ties to the right-wing gay group GOProud: “There is nothing conservative about the radical homosexual activist agenda which seeks to impose, under penalty of law, sexual anarchy.” Got that? We’re going to impose — under penalty of law — sexual anarchy. It’s crazy. Certifiably crazy. But, you know, I like it. I’m glad I read about it. It cheers me up to think idiots actually believe gay people have that kind of clout. That kind of vision. In fact, I want to hang on to this mental picture of our agenda. No longer will the police patrol our streets: no, they’ll be stationed in our bedrooms. “Let me see,” Officer Rachel Tension will bark as she ticks off items on her check list. “Rubber sheets, Slim Jims, vanilla pudding. Looks like you’re good to go!” “I’m sorry,” Sgt. Wilma Fingerdo will say to Mr. and Mrs. Demarest across the street as he gently maneuvers her into the missionary position, “but if you don’t have a black dude or a chicken, I’m going to have to write you up.”

The top yahoo search item was “most hated person in America”. PG, once the most hated person at RedoBlue, saw something to write about. Why is the corporate media fanning the flames of opprobrium?  The answer might say more about America, than about the winner of the contest.
The impeccable NY Daily News reports :”Casey Anthony is officially America’s Public Enemy No. 1. The 25-year-old brunette acquitted of killing her daughter tops a list of the nation’s most hated people, beating out loathsome lowlifes like reality-show creep Spencer Pratt, Nadya “Octomom” Suleman – and even O.J. Simpson, a new poll shows. The survey was released Wednesday by California-based E Poll Market Research. Of the 1,100 responders, 53% said they were aware of Anthony, and 94% said they disliked her, the poll showed. Additionally, 60% of poll-takers called Anthony “cold,” while 57% said she was “creepy.” The rankings come from the firm’s E-Score Celebrity rankings, which rates more than 6,000 celebrities and public figures based on their public awareness, appeal and other attributes.”
The story is a publicity coup for E Poll Market Research. The Celebrity rankings are sold to companies who subscribe to the service. The idea is to find the ideal famous person to endorse your products. One wonders what would be a good product for Casey Anthony to endorse. Duct tape comes to mind.
Psychology Today has an article about Anthony mania. It is boring. The article has a header ad for a book, Kabbalah on SEX: Make Love, Make Light.
When you google the phrase “the most hated…”, the suggestion is for “The most hated family in America”. There seems to be a consensus for some Jesus worshipers in Kansas. They probably take pride in the designation. The fact that many Jesus worshipers share their overall values is conveniently forgotten. While one medium is more flashy, the message is the same.
Sheknowsentertainment adds little to the story. They have one comment: “Rick Patel • August 11, 2011 • 2:23 AM There is no way shapely, seductive super-hottie Casey Anthony is “most hated”. That dubious distinction belongs to nasty Nancy Grace.”
Jezebel reports that “Jesse James Is The Most Hated Man In America”. For those, like PG, who have memory/apathy issues, it is noted that Mr. James is not the bank robber, but someone who was married to Sandra Bullock. He done her wrong. “And sure, Bullock will recover, at least professionally. But James is a woman’s worst nightmare: the lying, the cheating, the hairline.”
Many of the people who should win this award are not known to the public. The functionary in the bowels of government that allowed banks to only keep a tiny percentage of cash in reserve, while they made riskier and riskier loans. The wonk who decided to let the 911 plot go on unimpeded. The person who outsources an American jobs to India. The government which allowed housing to be built, not knowing where the water was going to come from. The list goes on and on.
Maybe Buffalo Beast has the answer. They published a story, “The BEAST 50 Most Loathsome People in America, 2005”. Number one was Pat Robertson, followed by Dick Chaney and George W. Bush. ( BHO was a little known Senator at the time.) Number four was YOU. “Charges: Silently enabling and contributing to the irreversible destruction of your planet. Absolving yourself of your responsibility to do anything about it that your immediate neighbors don’t. Assuming that it’s normal behavior to spend several hours each day totally inert and staring into a cathode ray tube. Substituting antidepressants for physical motion. Caring more about the personal relationships of people you will never meet than your own. Shrugging your shoulders at the knowledge that your government is populated by criminal liars intent on fooling you into impoverished, helpless submission. Cheering this process on.”
Pictures today are from The Library of Congress.

PG wondered what happened to Lurch, the harpsichord playing butler on The Addams Family. A bit of web searching turned up a festive facility called Findadeath. It turns out Ted Cassidy passed away in 1979, Maybe that scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid hurt more than we thought.
Findadeath, or FAD, turned out to be a delightful dungeon of digital death. The directory page has an alphabetic list, from Don Adams to Robert Young. Both men had active lives, full of danger and disappointment. Mr. Adams was a Marine at Guadalcanal. Mr. Young was an alcoholic with alzheimers, and was not invited to James Brolin’s wedding to Barbra Streisand. (Mr. Brolin was his co star on Marcus Welby M.D.) Both men lived to an old age, and died of “natural causes”.
Some TV shows have a group page. Ted Cassidy is with The Addams Family. Carolyn Jones survived marriage to Aaron Spelling, to play Morticia. Colon cancer claimed her. One time child actor Jackie Coogan played Uncle Fester, and had heart issues. ( Charles Addams says that the Uncle Fester character was modeled on himself.) Ted Cassidy was Thing, in addition to Lurch. After his death from heart failure, his children buried the urn, with his ashes, in the back yard, and then moved. No one knows what became of the urn.
Another dysfunctional TV family was the Clampets. Nancy Kulp ( whose middle name was Jane) played Jane Hathaway, and was out of the closet years before Ellen. According to FAD, this was not acting. Jerry Springer put a Clampet reunion together once, and the merriment was intense. “He (Max Baer, Jethro) spoke of Nancy Kulp’s dykedom, and the fact that Donna Douglas slathers on makeup with a trowel. He did tell one story about how he and Reenie (Irene Ryan, Granny) were doing a scene together once, and for some reason unbeknownst to him, she kicked him with one of those army boots she wore. He asked her (not so politely) why? She pointed upwards, “You were in my key light.”
In one episode of The Hillbillies, Bea Benederet played Jethro’s mother. Ms. Benederat was given a role on Petticoat Junction . Bea Benederet was the original voice of Betty Rubble. She was also the first choice to play Ethel Mertz, but had already committed to play the neighbor of George and Gracie.
It is tough to imagine a room big enough for Milton Berle and Groucho Marx. Apparently, it did happen once. “Groucho Marx had many stories about Berle. “You’re not funny,” he once told Berle. Berle’s reply, “Everything I know, I stole from you, Grouch.” Groucho, unplacated, shot back, “Then you didn’t listen.”
Looking down the list, (sponsored by stardoll , the world’s largest online fashion and dress up games community for girls! ), PG noted the name of Margaret Mitchell. FAD thinks the Museum on Peachtree Street is the real residence of Peggy Marsh. PG sent the following email to FAD.
I am a native of Atlanta GA, and have written about Maragaret Mitchell . I hate to be nit picky, but there are a couple of mistakes in your story.
The Margaret Mitchell House has little in common with “the dump” except the location. The really tacky apartment where Mr. and Mrs. Marsh lived was on Cresent Avenue, behind where the present house is. (I have never been to the museum.) The apartment building burned to the ground, with little left. The house that is there now was built from scratch, and bears little external resemblance to the apartments.
After she left Cresent Avenue, Mrs. Marsh ( She was married to John Marsh, an executive for Georgia Power Company. Her friends called her Peggy.) moved to an apartment at 4 17th Street. They lived there until they moved to Piedmont Avenue and South Prado. It was across from the Piedmont Driving Club, which made it convenient for Mrs. Marsh to get a drink.
“Genius and Heroin” reports that Peggy enjoyed a long cocktail hour at the Women’s club, where her husband joined her. They went across Peachtree (it is a straightaway, which is rare in Atlanta) into eternity. The book that I based my blog post on said she had been feeling unwell, and spent the afternoon in her apartment. Her and the husband parked on the other side of Peachtree, and tried to cross the street to the theater. Who knows what really happened?
The Theater survived until a few years ago, when it was torn down to make way for a high rise. It had a yellow glow in the lobby, and permanently smelled of popcorn.
PG has been to Peachtree and Tenth Street before.
People of a certain age will remember this area as the strip. The tenth street district was a neighborhood shopping area, up until the mid sixties. At some point, the old businesses started to move out and the hippies moved in. For a while, it was a festive party. Soon enough reality returned, and the area went into a crime filled decline.
The 999 complex is the neighborhood story in a nutshell. Before 1985, it was a block of small businesses. There was a hardware store, with the peace symbol set in tiles in the sidewalk. On Juniper Street stood the Langdon Court Apartments. They were named for PG’s great uncle Langdon Quin. Ru Paul used to stay there. He would sit out on a balcony, and wave to the traffic going by.
Across the street was a chinese restaurant, the House of Eng. A staircase on the side led to the Suzy Wong Lounge. Behind the building was an apartment building. It was one of the residences of Margaret Mitchell, while she wrote “Gone With The Wind”. She called it “the dump”, which was fairly accurate.
PG went to the House of Eng for lunch, one day in 1985. He noticed that he was the only customer in the house, at 12:30 pm on a weekday. After finishing his lunch, PG knew why.
At some point, it was decided to build a high rise there. Heery was one of the equity partners, along with a law firm and an ad agency. The building was designed by Heery (duh).The ad agency folded before the building opened, followed within a couple of years by the law firm. Heery was sold to a British company. PG does not know who owns the building now.
Pictures are from ” The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”.