Deep Into the Delta

March 31, 2023April 1, 2023 steveboilard2 Comments

A surprising number of you were interested in learning more about Anthony Turner (my Delta barber). I’ll share two anecdotes that have been running through my head since yesterday. First, there is a method to the madness of the Menagerie Museum. Sure, it’s a tangled and confused congeries of seemingly unrelated trinkets and kitch. But it’s all connected (quite literally, with fishing line and rubber bands) in a way that Anthony seems to have dedicated much thought and deliberation. What’s more, schoolchildren visit his museum as part of their curriculum, and Anthony teaches them an inspirational lesson about what’s probable versus what’s possible. The teachers seem to think it’s a worthy message, delivered with earnestness, kindness, and the most overwhelming number of props imaginable. There’s a method to all this madness. I’m fully convinced that Anthony knows every piece of his collection, and sees a purpose for each one.

*Even the markings on the floor have meaning and purpose.*

Second, Anthony told me a story about how there had been an empty spot in front of his shop that “needed something.” Then one day he spotted that something: A giant metal rooster that was for sale elsewhere in town. Alas, at $800, the rooster was beyond his means. He mentioned this in passing to a customer in his barber chair, and by the end of the day that customer had taken up a collection around town and presented Anthony with $800. The rooster now stands in the spot where it belongs.

We now return to today:

This morning I woke up in Clarksdale, Mississippi. As proof, the downstairs buffet had biscuits and gravy, and the map on my cellphone revealed there to be two blues clubs, three churches, and a blues museum in the immediate area.

Clarksdale (pop: 14,000) is the birthplace of Sam Cooke, John Lee Hooker, Ike Turner, and many other blues musicians. Muddy Waters moved here as a child. Just east of the mighty Mississippi River (or, as the locals call it, the Mississip), Clarksdale sits at the crossroads of US Route 61 (the Blues Highway) and US Route 49 (which runs south to the Gulf Coast).

That crossroads is sometimes called the Devil’s Crossroads. Legend has it that a struggling, less-than-skilled blues player named Robert Johnson went to the Crossroads one night about a century ago, where a strange man tuned his guitar for him and showed him some techniques. Johnson disappeared for a few months. He eventually reappeared as a blues guitar virtuoso, achieving fame on the blues circuit and earning the respect of the established bluesmen.

As you might imagine, things didn’t end well for Johnson, who died under mysterious circumstances at age 27. The legend holds that Johnson had sold his soul to the Devil that night at the crossroads. And the fact that Johnson recorded a song entitled “Me and the Devil Blues” seems to support that hypothesis.

I got breakfast at a place called Yazoo Pass in the historic downtown, where I met a literal fellow-traveler. Jim has been making his own Blues pilgrimage that began in (what I assume to be his home of) Pensacola. He’s now traveling north on 61, while I’m traveling south. We exchanged a few stories and tips. He put me to shame with his extensive knowledge of blues history, his obvious emotional attachment to the art form, and his extensive photo collection from this trip.

I continue to be struck by how much people are deeply affected by music, and in particular by the blues. I’m a mere novice when it comes to this music, but I’m quickly learning of its power to affect moods and impart lessons. I’m especially struck by how dedicated the musicians are to this music which they seem to treat as a religion.

After breakfast I went to the famous Delta Blues Museum, which is housed in a hundred-year-old building that once was the freight depot of the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad.

It’s a modern and slick affair, but it does a great job of illustrating the importance of the blues to the delta, and vice versa. I’m beginning to learn about some of the key names in blues history. (A number of them I dimly recognize from when friends Chris and Jerry and I all went to the San Francisco (!) Blues Festival some forty (!) years ago. I knew nothing about Albert King and various other headliners, but I sure liked their music.)

I also noticed that as I get deeper into the delta, the music changes. What started as twangy country music in Nashville became gospel-infused bluegrass in Jackson and slick, horn-centered R&B in Memphis. Down here in rural Clarksdale the music is a bit more stripped-down and raw.

After I left the museum I took a brief break from the blues and visited the J W Cutrer House. Built in 1916 by a wealthy local attorney, the house and the Cutrer family served as inspirations for Tennessee Williams when he wrote A Streetcar Named Desire and Orpheus Descending. I don’t know about all that, but it sure is an impressive mansion.

It was now time to say goodbye to Clarksdale and get back on Route 61. Truth be told, Route 61 is not the most beautiful highway I’ve been on. The countryside is relatively flat with large, treeless expanses of grasses, low scrub, and sickly-looking farms. I didn’t see much cotton, with the exception of this designer plot.

One of the sparse settlements along The Blues Highway is the town of Alligator (pop: 116).

Soon I came to Leland, Mississippi, where things shifted from the Blues to the Greens. For, incredibly, it seems that this is Kermit the Frog country.

Leland was the boyhood home of Jim Henson, who lived here until he was 12. Leland claims Henson as a native son, and the chamber of commerce has set up a small Jim Henson museum just off the road.

*It’s not easy being green in the land of the blues.*

Docent Heather explained to me the history, and directed me to the nearby “Rainbow Connection Bridge.”

*Shockingly, this bridge, which is directly behind the museum, is NOT the Rainbow Connection Bridge. But it should be!*

While I was in Leland I was hoping to visit the Highway 61 Blues Museum, which is touted as one of the most earnest (albeit small) of the museums along the Blues Highway. Alas, Heather reported that the museum closed at the beginning of the Covid pandemic and never reopened. As an alternative she recommended something called the “wildlife heritage museum.” I thanked her but I chose instead to head down to the next town: Indianola. It’s the birthplace (and final resting place) of B.B King, and it boasts the impressive B.B. King Museum. As you probably already know, B.B. King was one of the most successful blues artists of all time, and was known around the world.

Believe it or not, BB King’s “The Thrill is Gone” was the first record I ever bought. I was 8 years old, and my parents took my brother and me to a record store and allowed us each to pick a record. “The Thrill is Gone” was a crossover hit and playing on top 40 radio. Mom tried to steer me towards Blood, Sweat, and Tears’ “Spinning Wheel,” but I would not be moved. Interestingly, both songs seem to have a very similar groove and have stood the test of time.

Anyway, this is not the place to recount B.B. King’s life, which is well told in many, many other places. But I did want to share this small scrap I learned at the museum: When B.B. King’s mother lay on her deathbed, she held her son’s hand and said “Be kind. It will always bring you good things.” He was and it did. (It also sounds very much like something barber Anthony Turner might say!)

I’m spending the night in Greenville, which is just west of Indianola and right on the east bank of the Mississip. Tomorrow it’s onward to Vicksburg… as Ulysses S. Grant might have said…

Bonus Material!

I did come across an old theater in Clarksdale. The Marion Theater opened in 1918–one of the first theaters constructed to show (silent) movies. It was renamed the Paramount in 1931. It closed in 1976, and has only been partially and fitfully restored by a local performing arts group. Heaven only knows what all those upstairs rooms are for. There is evidence of a fire in those upper rooms. But on the ground floor, I did see some evidence of recent renovation. Let’s hope they’re able to save this impressive structure!

*Look carefully at the uppermost part of the sign over the entrance, and you can see “Theater Marion” cast into the cement*.

I Got The Blues

March 30, 2023 steveboilard6 Comments

If I had it to do all over again (and my wife reminds me that, if I’m not careful, I just might receive that opportunity), I would seriously consider living in a small town in middle America. But I’d put a lot of conditions on it: It would have to be out of the snow belt and out of the humidity belt. It would have to have an interesting history linked, ideally, to railroads or mining or the Marathon Motor Car. And it would have to have successfully preserved a large number of historic structures in its downtown. And it would have to exude vitality. Oh, and there’d be no dogs and the gas prices would be low.

To a large extent I’ve found that city in Jackson, Tenn. It’s a little larger than my ideal, with a soulless sprawl of undistinguished national chain stores and fast food restaurants around the periphery. And there’s always something a little sinister in the air in these former Confederate strongholds. But the historic downtown is wonderful. It’s here that one finds the restored Greyhound depot I described yesterday. There’s a performing arts center in another restored, historic building, which appears to be well-utilized by the residents. As Jackson is the county seat of Madison County, there’s a historic courthouse. And today the temperature was 72 degrees.

This morning I got my coffee and a galette (I’d never heard of it either) at a place called Turntable Coffee Counter. It’s almost directly across the street from the Greyhound station, in a historic building that had once been a department store. It had been vacant for years when in 2018 Anthony Kirk renovated part of the space and created this coffee place. It’s decorated in mid-century modern, with (probably faux) Eames chairs and a very hipster vibe. Racks of vinyl albums are for sale along one wall, and abstract art hangs on the walls. As I enjoyed my coffee I watched a churn of customers coming through: lawyers from the courthouse, writers with their laptops, a young couple who were getting lattes after their pilates class. This is an active community gathering place. (See related article from the local paper here.)

Turntable Coffee neatly illustrates what I appreciate about towns like this: They’ve created a modern (retro) space while respecting the history and flavor of the town. It works, and it draws people in. There’s a vibrancy and positivity about the place. And it’s unique–not just another Starbucks. The barista told me that Turntable began in a shared “incubator” space down the street, and after a bit was able to move to its current space. A couple of other businesses from the incubator (a book store and a record store) soon followed to the same location. So they’re doing something right.

After coffee I took a walk around the downtown and saw more examples of well-maintained historic structures that added to Jackson’s very successful formula.

*Jackson’s Nashville, Chatanooga & St. Louis Railway depot.*

Of particular interest to me was the restored NC&St.L Railway depot. It was originally constructed in 1907, and after passenger trains stopped coming to town it was converted to a museum. Alas, when I arrived today the friendly woman inside told me the museum had moved and that the building was now a photography studio (among other uses). While I would have liked to have been able to spend some time in Jackson’s railroad museum, this is a good illustration of that same principle I was just describing: Jackson has wisely preserved its historic buildings, but rather than making them all into museums that the locals probably wouldn’t visit very often, they have repurposed them into vibrant, viable and useful public enterprises for which there is local demand.

At the same time, I did visit two wonderful museums in Jackson this morning. The first is Rusty’s TV and Movie Car Museum. Rusty Robinson has been collecting cars for over a quarter of a century and he has them on display here in Jackson. Rusty was the only other person at the museum this morning, and I appreciated the opportunity to wander among his collection. It’s worth nothing that the collection is a mix of vehicles that actually appeared on the screen, as well as some reproductions that Randy himself has manufactured

*Jake and Elwood’s “Blues Mobile.” (One of many cars used in that movie.)*

*Garth’s “Mirthmobile,” from Wayne’s World. (Original from the movie.)*

Delorean time machine from Back To the Future. (Not from the movie. But it’s a real Delorean, which is rare in its own right. Rusty and I had a long talk about the new John Delorean documentary on Netflix.)

*Herbie from the 2005 relaunch of the Love Bug franchise with Lindsay Lohan. (Actual car from the movie.)*

*Rusty himself, in front of The Green Hornet’s “Black Beauty.” (Not original from the movie; Rusty built it himself!)*

The other museum in Jackson I visited was the Southern Legends of Music at the Carnegie. It’s a very small museum inside an old library built in 1901. (Hence the “Carnegie” part. As you may know, Andrew Carnegie funded the construction of almost 1700 libraries around the country between the 1880s and the 1920s….like this one, below, that I saw on my Route 2 trip last year)

*Unrestored Carnegie library from 1917, in Malta, MT. I passed it on my Route 2 trip.*

Here is the Carnegie library in Jackson–fully restored and open to the public as a music museum:

It’s a wonderful museum, focused on western Tennessee’s music history. (By “western Tennessee” they mean mainly Jackson and Memphis). While small, the museum is stuffed to the gills with guitars, recording equipment, framed photos, harmonicas, stage outfits, awards, guitar picks, sheet music, handwritten lyrics, and tons of other stuff.

In the center of the main room is a large, octagonal skylight. It must have been an awesome place to spend an afternoon reading.

Speaking of which, the docent who helped me (Roger) told me he was drawn to work at this museum because as a kid he spent many, many hours in this library. Over the years, though, he’s learned much about western Tennessee’s music history, and he was able to convey an enthusiasm about the music that’s infectious. I’m starting to get why music is such a big deal to this area. It’s partly a shared language, partly a relieve valve for emotions, and partly storytelling. Notably, each region out here seems to put its own stamp on the music. In Nashville it’s country; here in Jackson it’s moving more to bluegrass. By the time you get to Memphis it’s blues. But there are intersections and overlap among these styles, and they all fall under an American Roots umbrella. It’s heartfelt and earnest and moving. In just a short time at this museum I got a better feel for why this music matters. And I was able to connect the through lines linking Elvis and Johnny Cash and Ray Charles and Roy Orbison and Jerry Lee Lewis and on and on….

*Docent Roger sharing stories about the music of western Tennessee.*

I was thoroughly enjoying my music history lesson but unfortunately I had to get back on the road to get to a haircut appointment at noon. I’m not making this up.

Before I’d left California I had learned about a quirky museum in Brownsville Tenn. that also served as a functioning barber shop. It’s only open by appointment during the week, so I called the owner (Anthony Turner) and asked if I could make a visit on Thursday. “For a haircut or for the museum?” he asked. I figured the right answer was “both.” I arrived at Anthony’s “Master Barber Shop Menagerie Museum” at the appointed time.

Anthony greeted me with a thousand-watt smile and took me to the building, which looked like a circus had exploded.

*A tiny fraction of the Menagerie Museum.*

I asked what it all meant, but Anthony directed me to a tiny room with a barber chair. For the next hour he cut my hair and told me his story. I can’t do justice to his whole spiel, but the basic outlines are as follows:

*I told Anthony just to do whatever he thought needed doing on my head. “All’s you need is a high fade.” And so it went.*

Anthony grew up here in Jackson, and after graduating he attended barber college. For reasons he doesn’t really understand, his fellow students and instructors kept bringing him various items (pieces of art, antiques, odds and ends). He opened his barber shop next to where his chum from public school, Billy Tripp, was building an enormous sculpture out of scrap metal. He felt there was a synergy between their two projects. In his shop Anthony displayed the various objects he’d received while at barber’s college. But he kept feeling he was supposed to have a bigger impact. He planned a grand opening, and for reasons not entirely clear, decided he’d invite Oprah Winfrey’s father (whom he’d never met) to MC the opening. He tracked down Mr. Winfrey, who accepted. The museum grew and grew, and more and more people brought him more stuff. Anthony was also always looking for specific additions that he would purchase, including this horse:

In a repeat of the Oprah’s dad trick, Anthony managed to get John Wayne’s grandson to show up for the unveiling of the horse, as he needed a “real cowboy” for that job.

Again I asked Anthony what the whole museum is all about; what unites everything? And he responded sincerely and convincingly that it was all united by positivity. Anthony is a man of faith, and believes that God has led him to do this project to make the world a more positive place. And if my hour with him is any indication, he’s doing a good job.

After my haircut Anthony had another customer to take care of, so I browsed his small museum and then checked out Billy Tripp’s sculpture in the back. Words cannot describe how enormous, complicated, and overwhelming the sculpture is. And pictures don’t do it justice, because it’s so large and contorted you just can’t get a full picture. But here are a few attempts:

Anthony tells me that Billy works on the sculpture almost every day, and that he plans to keep working on it until the day he dies. I suspect that Anthony takes the same approach with his museum.

Finally, freshly shorn, I was back on the road to Memphis. I had been in Memphis just last year on my Route 70 trip. While I was there I saw the outside of the building where Stax records made music history in the 1960s and 1970s. I have a fondness for Stax in part because my dad had Booker T. and the MG’s “Greatest Hits” album, and I thought it was the coolest thing in our household. (It actually was, considering that most of Mom and Dad’s other records were stuff like Motovani and Percy Faith.) I also saw Booker T give a talk in LA a few years ago, when he was promoting his autobiography. He’s a remarkable and articulate man. Booker T and Stax represent a magical time in music history, and they’re central to the so-called Memphis sound. Recall that earlier I mentioned how Jackson merged Nashville’s country into more of a bluegrass? Well, Stax merged bluegrass and blues with soul and R&B. In addition to the MGs, classic Stax acts included Issac Hayes, Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Albert King, and various other acts that you’ve heard on the radio.

You’ve heard this before, but you might not have known the title.

Anyway, when I’d visited the Stax building (which is now a museum) last year it was closed, so I made a point to see it today. And I’m glad I did. It further deepened my appreciation for Blues/R&B and all its variants.

*Full disclosure: The original Stax building was razed in 1989, This museum was built on the same site, faithfully recreating the facade and the interior recording studio.*

*The Hammond organ that Booker T Jones used to record “Green Onions.”*

Since I’d been to Memphis just last year, Stax was my only stop this time. So afterwards I got back into the trusty Trailblazer and got onto Route 61– the Blues Highway!

I stopped for the night in Clarksdale, Mississippi. I had dinner at the estimable Ground Zero Blues Club (owned in part by Morgan Freeman).

I had some good BBQ (as it’s called in these parts) and enjoyed listening to some live blues. It was a perfect end to this day. It’s one thing to learn about music in museums, but there’s no substitute for hearing it performed live.

BREW OF THE DAY

I’ve noticed that most of these music venues have a pretty crappy selection of beers. The Ground Zero Blues Club is no exception; their most interesting beer was an IPA. So I decided instead to order a cocktail. How about an Old Fashioned? That’s pretty basic, right? The waitress (Mandy, who was being very patient with me) came back and told me the bartender couldn’t make me one because they’re “out of bitters.”

Ok, fine. How about just a Scotch then, served neat? Again Mandy consults with the bartender, and comes back with the sad news that they’re “out of Scotch.” Borrowing a line from Monty Python’s cheese shop sketch, in which a neighborhood cheese shop was out of even the most common cheeses, I spluttered “How can a bar be out of Scotch?! It’s one of the most basic staples for making cocktails!”

I settled for the “featured cocktail,” which is a “moonshine margarita.”

The Moonshine Margarita is essentially lots of margarita mix and some “moonshine” (i.e., distilled whiskey that hasn’t been aged in a barrel). Let me give you the pros and cons:

On the pro side, it contains alcohol, which goes well with a BBQ dinner at a blues club. But it’s cloyingly sweet, like sno-cone juice. And it’s the same color, as well. Of course, when all you have is hammer everything presents as a nail. So I ordered a second one.

First drink: 1 star out of five.

Second drink: 3 stars.

Cars · Road trips · trains

Highway 61 Revisited

March 29, 2023 steveboilard8 Comments

Much of this trip will be spent on US Highway 61, which is sometimes called The Blues Highway. It runs from the confusingly-named town of Wyoming, Minnesota, down to New Orleans. Until about 30 years ago the highway reached further north, passing through Duluth on its way to the Canadian border. Attentive readers (I’m looking at you, Peter D) will recall that I’d visited Duluth last May as I was traveling west across the country on US Route 2. While in Duluth I visited the boyhood home of one Robert Allen Zimmerman, who you and I would know today as Bob Dylan. Dylan famously released an album in 1965 called Highway 61 Revisited, an influential, landmark album with notable roots in the blues tradition. Dylan said this about that: “Highway 61, the main thoroughfare of the country blues, begins about where I began. I always felt like I’d started on it, always had been on it and could go anywhere, even down in to the deep Delta country. It was the same road, full of the same contradictions, the same one-horse towns, the same spiritual ancestors … It was my place in the universe, always felt like it was in my blood.”

For this trip I’m going to travel the southern part of the Blues Highway, through Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana. But first I’m starting in Nashville (pop: 690,000), from which I’ll head due west to pick up Route 61 in Memphis. Why am I starting in Nashville? Because the Roadtripper guide told me to.

I arrived in Nashville about 9:15 am this morning and “promptly” picked up my rental car. (I put “promptly” in scare quotes because while I went directly to the Dollar counter, the “workers” didn’t share my sense of urgency. The line ahead of me took half an hour to clear, one hapless renter at a time.Then, after finally getting to the counter, I cooled my heels while the “worker” used a single index finger to re-type all the data I’d already filled out online. (Bottom line: Don’t patronize Dollar.) Anyway, by 10:30 I was in command of a Chevy Trailblazer, making my way to the downtown Nashville farmer’s market.

By now you know that these road trips of mine don’t normally linger in big cities. But given that a theme of this trip is music (especially blues), I figured I should pay a little homage to Nashville’s iconic music scene. And who better to help me do that than the Jugg Sisters??

Brenda Kay and Sheri Lynn–The Jugg Sisters–kindly agreed to pose with their bus.

For decades now, The Jugg Sisters have been doing a comedy bus tour of Nashville’s music history. They created, managed, and have starred in the “NashTrash tours” that present tourists with the irreverent musical highlights of downtown Nashville. Recently, however, they’ve been farming out some of the tour guide duties to a new duo: Hank and Jenny. Today was only their sixth time giving the tour. For two hours, driver Darron drove the big pink bus while Hank sang country songs accompanied by his guitar, and Jenny mainly told him “that’s enough now.” Still, they managed to point out literally dozens of music-related sites and share tons of music-related trivia. I confess that I didn’t realize how big the music industry looms in Nashville. There are recording studios, halls of fame, museums, statues, music venues, theme restaurants, and on and on. Nashville has claimed an association with Elvis, Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton, Chet Atkins, Rosanne Cash, and a bunch of famous people I’ve never heard of. A person could easily spend a week here soaking up the music history.

My only complaint is that, as a country-music novice, I had a hard time separating the genuine factoids from the exaggerations and jokes. Still, the overall effect was to appreciate the musical importance of this city.

I should mention that today’s bus passengers were mainly just me and a group of 10 folks from Iowa. They let me take their picture, and when I asked them how I should identify the group in my blog, they said “Just call us the Iowa Shit Show.”

Hank and Jenny let us take a 10-minute break at lower Broadway’s honky tonk district to attend to our biological needs. I used the occasion to get my fortune told by one of those animatronic fortune teller booths. But instead of a Zoltar or a gypsy or whatever, this one had….Elvis. I took a video of it, just because I didn’t think you’d believe me.

One of the rare non-music-related sites Hank and Jenny pointed out was the Marathon Motor Works. You’d never heard of it either? Apparently for five brief years in the very early 20th Century, Nashville had its own automobile company. An engineer named William Henry Collier at the Southern Engine and Boiler works in nearby Jackson decided in 1909 to try his hand at a new technology called the motor car. For a few years thousands of the vehicles were produced, but the whole operation slowed and ultimately died about the time of World War I.

It’s an intriguing story, so after NashTrash I returned to the Marathon Motor Works on my own and puttered around for a couple of hours. I was entranced by this place. Notably, the century-old buildings are remarkably well-maintained and they house museums related to the marque as well as various independent, tourist-oriented shops. (One of them is the antique shop from the TV show American Pickers.)

*Parts of the complex predate Marathon.*

There are said to be only eight surviving Marathon automobiles. (Their production just before World War I made them highly susceptible to scrap metal recycling as part of the war effort.) Impressively, five of those remaining cars are on display at the Motor Works. Numerous other artifacts are also displayed.

*One of the few extant Marathon cars. This one is a roadster.*

I’m not sure why this car plant resonated with me so much. Part of it is just the novelty of a short-lived, hundred-year-old automobile factory that’s still standing. This particular operation is not flashy like some museums can be, so you feel like the environment isn’t that different at all when workers were casting wheels and assembling frames.

After Marathon I made another transportation-related visit to Nashville’s Union Station. Surely you’re familiar with Union Stations in other cities (Washington DC, Chicago, Louisville, Los Angeles, etc. etc). There must have been scores of them back in the Golden Age of Railroading. Nashville’s Union Station was built in 1898 and was in operation until 1979. It was slated for demolition, but local preservationists and others managed to save it from the wrecking ball. Today it is a luxury hotel, retaining the main structure and many of the appointments from its heyday.

*Union Station is the gothic-looking building on the right.*

Finally it was time to leave Nashville. I got onto I-40 West toward Memphis, and made it to the halfway point at the town of Jackson, TN (pop: 68,000). Jackson has lots of music history in its own right. For example, it’s the birthplace of Big Maybelle and of Denise LaSalle. I’m spending the night here and will report more about Jackson in tomorrow’s post. But I did want to highlight the Greyhound station I saw on Main Street. Check it out:

It’s a beautiful art deco, streamlined structure built in 1938. It closed in 2018, but quickly was restored and maintained as a historic structure. There was a young lady cleaning the outside windows when I drove by, and she told me it recently became the third restaurant called Doe’s Eat Place. (Doe’s has its own interesting history dating back to the 1930s which you can read here.) Since it was dinner time I went in and had the best fried shrimp I’ve ever had. I also chatted with the employees, who were all friendly and seemed to love the idea of a down-home restaurant in a converted Greyhound station.

*Chris and Kendall provided southern hospitality.*

*Since I’m spending the night in Jackson, I went back to the Greyhound station/Doe’s Eat Place to get this picture of the restored neon signage.*

And thus we’re almost done with today’s blog post. All that’s left is the….

BREW OF THE DAY

For all its good points, Doe’s Eat Place has a boring beer menu. So after dinner I went to Hub City Brewing, which is just down the street. The bartender explained to me that Jackson is known as Hub City because of its strategic location halfway between Nashville and Memphis. It’s at the crossroads of I-40, US 45, US 70, US 412, and various state routes. It also was historically a railroad hub. (Alert readers will recall I visited Casey Jones’ home and his grave here in Jackson three years ago when I drove across the country on Route 70.)

Anyway, Hub City Brewing makes a healthy assortment of beers, including a few good porters and stouts. I chose the Snowplow Vanilla Porter. The first thing you notice about this beer is how dark it is, like a Starbucks cold brew. It has just enough foam to visually remind you it’s not a coffee but a beer. The nose is slightly sweet, with vanilla notes (as you’d expect) but also with a little molasses or brown sugar.

It’s incredibly drinkable. It’s malty without being cloying, and it’s roasty without any of the acidic sharpness a porter sometimes can have. The mouthfeel is meatier than your typical porter as well, reminding me a bit of a stout. With an ABV of 7.2 percent, this warms you a bit but it doesn’t kick your ass the way an imperial stout (my preferred beer) can. I give it 4 out of 5 stars.

*If you ever find yourself in the Hub City, get yourself one of these!*

Puns · Road trips

Weiser trip: Bonus content

July 30, 2022 steveboilard4 Comments

Although the main work of my Weiser trip (i.e., to track down the haunts of my Grandmother Burley) was completed and reported yesterday, I thought I’d add these final items that amused me during my more-than-one-thousand-mile round trip.

First, let me offer these final photos from the regional museum in Weiser:

One of the two creepiest displays at the Snake River Heritage Center.

…and the other one. (I love how composed these people are. They look like the wise men gazing down at the baby Jesus in a creche.)

Now, a few photos from various points of my trip:

“You had me at Unforgettable Restrooms.” Said no one ever.

Ruins of an old gift shop near Donner Summit, along the original Route 40 (which was superseded by I-80). The building was constructed in 1938, and the gift shop’s biggest sellers were said to be “owl ashtrays made from pine cones.”

I took a different route home than the route I took to Weiser. Recall that I’d taken I-80 to Winnemucca, and then headed north on US 95. For my return, I headed east out of Weiser and into Oregon for about 150 miles along Route 20, and then I headed south on US 395 for about 350 miles to Sparks, Nevada, and which point I headed west on I-80.

I’ve made a number of trips along US 395 in recent years (typical mentions are here and here). Most of my journeys along US 395 originated at its southern terminus in the Mojave. I can’t remember getting any further north than Hallelujah Junction (where 395 meets CA 70 in Lassen County). On my return trip today I extended my coverage to US 395’s more northernly section, from Burns, OR down to Hallelujah Junction. Even though US 395 is quite hot and desolate this time of year, it never ceases to intrigue me.

Elks Lodge in Alturas on US 395. The building was built in 1917 as the administrative offices of the Nevada-California-Oregon Railway Company.

Now this is something you don’t see much anymore. It’s just standing there on the side of US 395.

That phone booth on us 395 reminds me of the Wind Telephone in Japan (shown here). It was featured on This American Life in 2016.

Previousy, the furthest north I’d been on US 395.

Last Chance Joe stands 36 feet tall at the Sparks Museum. He had been in front of the Nugget in Sparks since 1958, but recently the casino’s new owners told him to vamoose. I was reminded of a photo of the dismantled figure being shipped by rail in 1958.

For perspective, look at the size of the two men on the left of the flatcar.

I know this motel predates 1960’s *Psycho*, but if you owned it, wouldn’t you have changed the name?

Off of 395, near Foresthill (close to Placerville) is this sad gravesite. Old Joe was a stage horse (i.e., he pulled a stagecoach) who was shot by a highwayman during a holdup. The miscreant was never caught. Old Joe was buried where he fell, and a second memorial to the beloved horse (photo below) was added in 2001.

On the side of US 395. Evidently the arrow-straight road was too tricky for the driver.

Unfortunately for me, the truck was carrying nothing more interesting than a bunch of empty cans.

Finally, I was so taken by the following groaner that I’m instituting a Detwiler Memorial Pun Contest. Here’s a finalist. See if you can top it:

The winner of the Pun Contest will receive this handsome can-shaped pencil holder that I literally picked up on my drive…

Road trips · trains

Getting Acquainted with Weiser

July 30, 2022 steveboilard1 Comment

Did someone say “Getting Acquainted with Weezy?”

Have you ever had one of those days were everything works out perfectly?

Me neither. But today came pretty close. At the end of this blog post I will reveal why.

I left my cheap motel room in Ontario, Oregon, crossed the Snake River, and before you could sing the first stanza of “Here We Have Idaho” (which we all know is Idaho’s official state song), I was in Weiser.

At the visitor center. Evidently their “great respect for and interest in education” didn’t extend to proper use of apostrophes.

But more important than punctuation, Weiser has done an impressive job of preserving historic structures. The downtown in particular has dozens of well-maintained, functioning buildings that my Grandma must have walked past or even visited. These include the following:

The Odd Fellows building. It was constructed before 1903 (for the town newspaper dated November 25, 1903, mentions a social held there. “It was one of the pleasantest social events of the season.”

In the cafe on the building’s first floor I had a cup of coffee and a cinnamon roll the size of a small watermelon. I asked the barista about the building’s history but she said she’s new in town and didn’t know much about it. It turns out she’s from Sacramento–pretty much where I’d just driven from.

Danika–a fellow Sacramento-area transplant, now relocated to Weiser.

2. The Star Theater. It moved to its current location in 1917 (when Grandma was six). It was a vaudeville house that also showed silent movies. Today it is used for live theater productions and other events. It looks like it’s been extensively modified since 1917. I wished I could have peeked inside.

Surely Grandma must have seen a show here. In her memoir she admits to an affection for vaudeville.

3. The Red Store. One of the oldest buildings in Weiser, The Red Store dates back before the turn of the 20th century. I couldn’t find an exact date of construction, but the old signage on the west side of the building (left untouched by the owners, who’ve otherwise repainted the building) appears to be late-19th century.

4. Knights of Pythias Lodge. In her memoir Grandma writes that her father (aka my Great Grandfather Burley) “occasionally went to a card game at the Woodmen of the World Lodge, which he had joined in order to qualify for their life insurance.” I couldn’t find any evidence of the Woodmen lodge in Weiser, but I did find this very cool old lodge building from the Knights of Pythias. The building was constructed in 1904 and sits prominently on the main drag, so doubtless it was familiar to Grandma.

The Knights of Pythias (KOP) was founded as a fraternal order during the Civil War. Like many fraternal organizations, its purpose was primarily to provide assistance to its members and their families when serious illness, death, or some other crisis befell them. It’s not unlike Great-Grandpa Burley’s joining the Woodmen of the World to get life insurance. Also like many other fraternal organizations, the KOP was a secret society that was steeped in rituals borrowed from foreign cultures.

The Weiser chapter of the KOP closed in the middle of the 20th Century, and parts of the building have been used primarily for storage since that time. Then, a few years ago, some boxes were discovered that contained costumes and props for the KOP ceremonies. Some of these are now on display in the regional museum. I took a few pictures of them:

From an era when cultural appropriation wasn’t frowned upon.

This must have been a fun part of the initiation ceremony…

The Knights of Pythias still exists as a fraternal organization, though its numbers have dwindled. Sen. Chuck Schumer is a member. I’m not making this up.

5. Weiser Depot. Weiser lobbied for the Union Pacific to bring its mainline to their town. But they only got a shortline. Still, the UP built them this beautiful Queen Anne-style depot in 1907. In her memoir Grandma talks about taking various train trips, but I don’t know if she ever boarded at this particular depot. Still, she must have had occasion to visit it. Some years ago trains stopped stopping (can I say that?) in Weiser, and the station closed. It’s been restored and for awhile it was a museum, but when I saw it today it was empty.

Trains still come by on the tracks, but they don’t stop at the station.

Handbill at the regional museum. Is the illustration mocking “Mr. Weiser Citizen”?

6. Clausen’s Hardware Building. I couldn’t find when this was built, but surely Grandma must have seen it. This became an ACE hardware store in the middle of the last century, but it recently closed.

The brown paper on the windows suggests there’s something brewing.

7. Site of the Wheaton Theater. In her memoir, Grandma writes that she and other schoolchildren sang “in the town hall, which, apparently anticipating events that never materialized, the town fathers had given the name of Opera House. Actually it was nothing more than a hole in the wall.” The only building that had been described as an opera house (that I could find) was the Wheaton Theater, which was constructed in 1908 and was destroyed by fire in 1937.

Today, the People’s Furniture building occupies what is said to be part of the site that was once the Wheaton. Looking at the picture, I’m guessing that People’s combines the old Haas Building (from 1909) and the old Wheaton Building.

For some reason, that ugly siding was all the rage in the 1950s and 1960s.

This is the alley side of the People’s building. Are those bricked-up arched spaces the windows that appear in the historic Wheaton Theater photo above?

8. Site of the First National Bank of Weiser. In her memoir, Grandma writes that her father (my great-grandpa Burley) had a sometimes-stressful job with the local bank, and that her mother “took her position as wife of a bank officer very seriously and felt she must live up to it.” However, the 1915 City Directory identifies Great-Grandpa Burley as being an “Asst Cashier First National Bank.” I wouldn’t think to call that a “bank officer.” But evidently the whole family felt Great-Grandpa had a high level of responsibility.

Sadly, the First National Bank of Weiser no longer stands. In its place there is a vacant lot, next to which stands a new(ish) Zions Bank. None of the staff at Zions could tell me anything about the old First National Bank.

The vacant space which used to be Great Grandpa’s bank. Grandma one visited him there after falling into a vat of chocolate. I’m not making this up.

9. The Intermountain Institute. Although Grandma probably never was on the campus, the Intermountain Institute was a boarding school whose extant buildings date back to 1907–a few years before Grandma was born. The Institute closed after Weiser constructed a public high school in the mid-twentieth century. Today, one of the Institute’s main buildings (Hooker Hall) is home to the Snake River Heritage Center, which has historical artifacts and exhibits related to Weiser and the surrounding area. It’s at this Heritage Center that I saw the Knights of Pythias regalia.

10. Grandma’s Childhood Home. Weiser’s 1915 City Directory lists Great Grandpa Burley’s address as 931 West 3rd Street. Now, Grandma writes “Our first home was close to downtown, and Papa’s job at the bank was only a few minutes away. But in Papa’s eyes the pasture on the other side of the fence was always greener, and so we moved often.” So it’s not clear how long they lived in this house; I only know they were there in 1915.

So today I drove out to West 3rd street, and the house is still standing!

Part of the back yard. It’s not clear to me whether the shop/garage building was there in Grandma’s day.

As luck would have it, just as I arrived a woman was parking her car in front of Grandma’s old house. And it turns out she’s the current owner! Stephanie (for that is her name) and her husband bought the house about six years ago, and they’ve made some considerable repairs and improvements.

Stephanie, holding a copy of Grandma’s Memoir.

Their work to the house includes some sheetrocking of walls, moving a bathroom, and converting the attic space to bedrooms. But still there is plenty of the original house that Grandma would surely recognize. And how do I know this? Because Stephanie, bless her, invited me in and showed me around. I was literally walking in Grandma’s footsteps.

Original kitchen pantry. Grandma’s oatmeal (or whatever she ate for breakfast) would have been stored here.

Original lath and plaster wall, exposed from remodeling work. Stephanie reports that she found grandma-era newspapers in the walls, perhaps being used for insulation.

In her memoir Grandma writes of occasionally sleeping in screened porches. Could this be one of them?

The living room, where Grandma lovingly describes the family Christmas celebrations.

So that’s why I opened this blog post with remarks about the day going to well. I came to Weiser to learn more about my Grandmother. And while I didn’t learn a lot of new facts, what I already knew somehow gelled became textured as a result of spending some time in her childhood home and walking the streets of her town.

And so, feeling satisfied, it was time for me to hop on la machine and head back toward Placerville…which, as it turns out, is the hometown of Stephanie’s husband. Small world, isn’t it?

(Tomorrow I’ll share other photos and remarks from the 1000-mile round trip to Weiser.)