Hey, what’s up in Atlanta?

26 Jan

Atlanta, Indiana by Flickr user J. Stephen Conn

Sometimes when we get too bummed out here in Atlanta, Georgia, we like to check in on what other Atlantas are up to, to see if they’re living up to the hype, or even just making do. Makes us feel like we’re not alone in the world – somewhere out there, there’s another Atlanta, plodding along, learning valuable lessons through its constant mistakes, and just trying to make a name for itself in this crazy game we call life.

Atlanta, Illinois via www.atlantaillinois.org

Atlanta, Illinois: It’s hard to tell a lot of what’s up in Atlanta, Illinois, as the Atlanta Argus is updated online only monthly. The water leak on North Street will be repaired soon. There is a problem with unnumbered houses in the town that the council has to deal with. Dollar General needs a business license and the grocery wants to start selling liquor on Sunday.

There is so much to see and do in Atlanta, located along Route 66 and proud site of “the Bunyon Statue” of Paul Bunyan holding a hot dog and Illinois’ only eight-sided limestone public library and museum. You can get some great Atlanta souvenirs at the J. H. Hawes Grain Elevator Museum and find out where cornflakes come from in their new exhibit. Continue reading →

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Christmas judgment

21 Dec

It’s nearly the end of another year, which means it’s time to reflect on all the people who rubbed us the wrong way in 2011 and make empty threats about what we’ll do to them if they pull that shit one more time in 2012.

In the interest of Christmas cliches, we have compiled our annual naughty and nice list. Do you want the good news first or the bad news first?

Naughty
1. Kim Severson
2. Robbie Brown
3. Kim Severson and Robbie Brown on the same byline

Everyone’s still buzzing about Severson’s latest thing, “that pecan article” (come on, Hawkdogg hasn’t updated his MySpace page since March!), and we’re probably still rolling our eyes over Severson-Brown’s “black Hollywood” piece. (Good inventory of subtle offenses here.)

Oh, and let’s not forget Brown’s Waffle House crime story.

These are the issues that Atlanta and the South face. THESE ARE THE THINGS NEW YORK TIMES READERS NEED TO KNOW ABOUT TO CONTINUE SHAPING THEIR WORLDVIEW which apparently begins and ends with that one scene from Mame where Lucille Ball goes to Savannah to meet Beauregard Jackson Pickett Burnside’s family.

But these articles to which we’ve already alluded barely scratch the surface of what Severson and Brown are capable of! Sometimes they cover the ho-hum trend pieces for which The New York Times is famous, or they’ll hone in on one person in a human interest profile and won’t try to convince the readership that this one Bogart man or “Windy” (=Gone With the Wind fanatic) represents the whole of the South, all of it, every last person. But then there are the times they get carried away, lost in some grotesque scattershot caricature that they know readers from other geographic regions will read with glee.

Behold some of their most offensive clippings and anecdotes from the past year or so: Continue reading →

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Street hymns

29 Nov

Enough about Peachtree Street!
“Badstreet U.S.A.”  by Michael Hayes and The Fabulous Freebirds (from the 1987 album Off the Streets)

Shortly after this song debuted, Bad Street was renamed “Atlanta’s Historic Livingston Mims Motorway” to shed itself of negative connotations with the notorious and sloppy wrestler vs. punk blood feud that plagued the thoroughfare for the majority of the ’80s.

If I had to pick a real-life Bad Street Atlanta G-A, maybe I would go with the very south end of Moreland Avenue, past Coco Loco de la Noche. There are just a lot of beige nearly-windowless “sports” bars that seem like weathered men go in there every night and come out with nosebleeds, either from brawls over whether to play trashy honky-tonk or thrash metal in the jukebox, or because of snorting too much hillbilly heroin.

Now a real road – Auburn Avenue.
“Auburn Avenue” by The Spirit of Atlanta (produced by the legendary Tommy Stewart, from the 1973 soundtrack to the never-made film The Burning of Atlanta)

This whoooooole album is sooooooooooo goooooooooooooood. I can only imagine what the movie for which it was recorded would be like. What was the plan for “Buttermilk Bottom“? I am dying to see the heavy nightlife scene for which that was likely intended. There’s also “Hunter Street” (now MLK Drive – thanks jolomo) which is clearly scored for a police chase scene. And if you like funk woodwind and brass riffs, you’ll love the instrumental “Down Underground“!

Here’s one last song with street undertones, while we’re on the subject of Tommy Stewart. Continue reading →

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Happy Thanksgiving

23 Nov

Woman in corn field, surrounded by harvest vegetable crops, holding a live turkey, Georgia, 1930s

Man holds an axe, looking down at turkeys in front of him, November 1940

Continue reading →

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A wonk down memory lane

23 Nov

There are days and weeks when we literally cannot remember why we live in Atlanta other than because all our stuff is already here. Only a force as powerful as the History Twins can nurse us back from full-on fatigue to just dull listlessness.

Hey, snap out of it, you! This is truly one of the most amusing, ineffable episodes of them all. Especially if you like grand sweeping staircases and the letters “DOT” flying in your face. Oh, and more visuals with FOOD. You’ll see soon enough.

Here’s how the third-to-last episode of The Making of Modern Atlanta starts:

WHOA WHOA WHOA!! What is this? Clearly we are impeding on some sort of fancy dinner and similarly fancy conversation…

Dr. White: “…Maybe when we’re shooting The Making of the Modern Riviera.” [Inhales goblet deeply.]
“Mmm, delicate fragrance. Fine taste. Robust but not ill-mannered. Ah, what’s the vintage?”
Continue reading →

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History Twins, will you mayor-y me?

25 Oct


We are officially over the hill with The Making of Modern Atlanta. The second installment aired in 1993, two years after the first four episodes. The History Twins were still high off their regional Emmy nomination for “How We Played The Game” and ready to rock the PBA audience demanding more, more, more History Twins! This reinforced confidence in their game led to a few new snazzy enhancements on the series, like wackier introductions to each episode, Dr. White accenting his safari jackets with a little color base, and a new design to the titles and whatever it’s called that tells you the name of the person talking on the screen.
Our fifth episode of TMOMA starts at City Hall, with the words we all dream of hearing spoken to us one day…

“Mr. Mayor, Professors Crimmins and White are here to see you.”“Who?” Continue reading →

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Autumn architecture

19 Oct

We know it’s fall when we start noticing the argyle church on Briarcliff Road again.

The house next door is totally bricked out in bouclé, too, though you can’t tell here. We call this part of Briarcliff “Sweater Row”.

While you’re cruising the Druid Hills Halloween decorations and wooly Tudor architecture, do stop by Callanwolde for Tom Zarrilli‘s “Faces of the Yards of Clutter” show.

Previously: Atlanta’s pagan roots

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The episode with the inevitable Field of Dreams allusions

18 Oct

Wow, it’s been a while! We have not abandoned you, gentle readers, and have in the past month learned a valuable lesson about unplugging one’s DVD player from all those other things. And during football season! Of all the times to not be able to watch this:
That’s a baseball field but later on they get to football.

In our last viewing of The Making of Modern Atlanta, the History Twins explored the mysterious suburbs and exurbs, where all the Pier 1 Tuscan Heritage Collection wine racks and Rubbermaid bids used as children’s furniture in the world cannot keep up with the sprawling tentacles of cul-de-sacs and Colonial Williamsburg strip malls. (I know, I know; that run-on sentence is inconsistent because this show was filmed in the early ’90s and Tuscan decor didn’t hit big time until a decade later.) And if this is the first time you’re joining us on our serial exploration of The Making of Modern Atlanta, please start back here.)

Now we will explore the next means by which Atlanta has expanded beyond its capabilities for quality and long-term sustainability: major league sports. The History Twins LOVE sports.

Literally the first sentence of this episode has a Field of Dreams reference. “Atlantan Billy Payne heard a voice: ‘If you build it, they will come.’” So now we know that this, like many of the episodes of TMOMA, will be framed in the context of Olympics anxiety: “Have we made it? Is Atlanta Losersville or a big-league city?”

Somehow, I feel the answer to that question will be both.
Continue reading →

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Hot trainny mess

15 Sep

According to the most recent audience reach and customer demographic analysis by the Pecanne Log market research division, the average reader of this blog is a 57-year-old white male who makes 46.2 online purchases a month, is a model train hobbyist, reads rail timetables for pleasure, and eats Jimmy Dean products four meals a week.

These findings are likely due to the fact that Pecanne Log’s only reader is Thomas Wheatley, and that’s just when we pop up in his Google Alerts for himself. We also might be like the 80th result when Thomas Wheatley googles “Sam Massell’s Celebrity Transit Policy Alaskan Cruise 2012.”

Anyway, all this goes to say that the average reader of this blog might also find interest in Burnaway’s annual art party fundraiser, happening this Saturday night:

  1. The theme is “trains”
  2. Tickets can be purchased online
  3. Thomas Wheatley will be performing
  4. There will be food trucks (of course) but it’s cool if you bring your own Jimmy Deans

To make up for there being no Atlanta cookie cakes for sale this year, here’s some TRAIN FASHION.

Southern Railway, Southern Streamline Train; March 1941

Continue reading →

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The Making of Modern Suburban Atlanta; or, The Great Dunwoody Tennis Boom of 1991

14 Sep

Now we all know how everyone left the city (on roads, in their cars) but to where did they go? That’s what episode three of The Making of Modern Atlanta is all about.“The development of suburbs and exurbs raise many thorny issues for the making of modern Atlanta.”

The History Twins meet us by Arabia Mountain in DeKalb County. I love when they both go casual at the same time. Continue reading →

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Wi-fi on Ponce

2 Sep

These are REAL wireless networks along Ponce de Leon Avenue.

This one is at the intersection of Ponce and Boulevard. Spooky!!

This one popped up like a block east of the Clermont Hotel/Lounge.

Can you even imagine what the passwords are??

Follow-up note: Just realized there is now another Church’s Chicken on Ponce that is very close to where the old one was, so the wi-fi network was not my phone being haunted by a deceased fried chicken restaurant like my initial reaction implies. Sorry.

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The History Twins: Forget all your troubles, forget all your cares…

1 Sep

How could there even be another episode of The Making of Modern Atlanta after that last one? What more is there to say about Atlanta?

First of all, it may take a bit of explaining to tell you what’s going on in this picture below. Once upon a time, there was a “construction” industry in Atlanta. They actually “built” “buildings” rather than just setting off news stories about planned developments. These “buildings” and their corresponding “construction” required a great deal of “money” that came from “jobs” and “investments”.
Now you might better comprehend the context of this episode.

It begins with our good friend Tim Crimmins anxiously scaling the heights of the Peachtree Plaza.
Continue reading →

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The Making of Modern Atlanta: 20 years later

30 Aug

The year: 1991. The Olympics: Five years away. Atlanta: Hadn’t done a thing to prepare itself for the event it was pinning its every hope and dream for the future on.

Enter: THE HISTORY TWINS.
Ready to blow the lid off this whole “Atlanta” thing – for the entire world to see, on Public Broadcasting Atlanta, with the help of that shadowy group called the Georgia Humanities Council.


 Continue reading →

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Atlanta’s music scene

8 Aug

In 1970, on this very day in history, somehow Atlanta got a centerfold in Billboard for having a happening music scene.

Most of the stories in this section of the weekly magazine are of the boosterish quality that exemplifiy anything that the city’s movers and shakers could twist enough arms to get written about them in the national press, when they weren’t already writing it themselves in the local media.
Continue reading →

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Finally! GSU’s school spirit: “The life here is so urban where we learnin’”

14 Jul

Remember that terrrrrrrrrible song by the GTGs of Georgia Tech, called “The Ratio“? And that embarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrassing UGA Orientation Leader music video, “Party in the UGA“? Georgia State University finally has its own peppy music video – “Bleed Blue” – the opening notes of which sounds a little like the overture to Red, White, and Blaine. Undergraduates probably feel deep pride for this college football-inspired theme, whereas I just admire Frenchy P.k.A. JeenyuZ’s silky Jermaine Stewart locks.
(via GSU’s library blog)

Anyone can related to wanting salads with raisins and ranch dressing! Anyone can relate to wanting a class in the “fancy” (relatively – by GSU standards) and over-air-conditioned Aderhold building where “you can follow me as we walk past the homeless/in Woodruff Park, yeah, I kind of feel like they my homies.” Anyone can relate to wanting to dance in a tube top in a Downtown plaza! That’s why this video is so universal, regardless of one’s affiliation with GSU or not.

Frenchy917 has so many other Panther spirit videos on YouTube, too. SO MANY.

Previously: State budget cut threats have gone too far

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Little 5 Points, 1990

1 Jul

We won’t ruin any of the beautiful moments in this clip from People TV‘s Atlanta Lifestyles by describing them with vulgar words. Just watch!

Previously: Autumn refreshment

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Sneak peek!

29 Jun


This past weekend while researching the second installment of Pecanne Log’s Rural Explorer, which has been a full year in the making, we snooped around Cedartown. I had to go ahead and post these pictures and urge you to make haste to Cedartown because last Friday wrapped a shoot for an upcoming Billy Bob Thornton movie in downtown Cedartown. This was/is a gigantic deal for the little town, and a gigantic deal for me as the whole downtown is still done up like it’s in 1969 small town Alabama (the setting). I’m not sure how long the “set” will be up, or if the production crew took it down on Monday – but if you’re going up that way for the 4th of July weekend, check it out if you love good old-fashioned window dressings!

Continue reading →

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Poncey-Highland’s construction boom

14 Jun


Do we really need two stories of hot dogs? No, this isn’t a hypothetical question; do we as Atlanta residents need two stories of gourmet hot dogs? I have been waiting on a hot dog retailer to start in this city for YEARS but frankly, I just think two stories of hot dogs is one too many. It just is!


And a block south, we have been struggling to comprehend Buddy’s strategy and corporate vision through its recent aesthetic improvements – taking down the iconic Buddy’s lettering, painting the awning, transforming from a Citgo into a Chevron, etc. Still, they have not done a thing with that flower shop that was supposed to be the King of Pops’ shop, and the latest development is a small shanty town on the north side of the store. Seriously, what is going on at Buddy’s?

Previously: Unsolved mysteries

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Boys of Summer, Part I

14 Jun

Helloooooo Georgia Historical Society Senior Historian Dr. Stan Deaton, star of Today in Georgia History!

For the record, until Councilmember Alex Wan grows back his surfer hair, we will not be featuring him as a Pecanne Log Boy of Summer!

Well, maybe for old times’ sake we’ll post one screenshot of his previously wavy locks just to remind us how it used to be:
Thank you to the special tipster who sent us that screenshot.

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A brief filmography of Xernona Clayton

6 Jun

The street renaming controversy has gotten everyone in a lather over what constitutes a boulevard, if things should be named for living people, if Centennial Olympic Park should be renamed Thomas Patrick Wheatley Contemplative Park and redesigned as a traditional Irish garden/a potato field, etc., etc., etc. But the biggest question in the comments of every local internet news source is, “Who is Xernona Clayton?” Since people do not curse Ms. Clayton’s name whenever they get lost in Downtown Atlanta trying to find Trader Vic’s but instead just keep running into one block of loading docks and parking garage entrances after another, and since she has a first name that starts with an X, everyone is curious about this future namesake of some sort of City of Atlanta property (a plaza). However, one correct answer to this popular query about her identity that I haven’t yet seen is, “Co-star of the 1974 horror film The House on Skull Mountain.”
(Senator Leroy Johnson also makes a brief appearance as “Mr. Ledoux”, an attorney.)

Well, this is just leading us to more questions; specifically, what is the house on Skull Mountain? Obviously, guys, this is it:
Continue reading →

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