Preservation of U.S. History

In the midst of the national debate about confederate statues, we must take the discussion to new heights here in metro Atlanta.  As an Atlanta native who has lived all over country, it is unfortunate that the other cities valued and preserved their historic structures while Atlanta continues to tear them down without a second thought. Initially I thought it was because there are so many people here from other places that they don’t care??  Yet, at least half of our current City Council members (many have served 2-4 terms or 8-16 years), the Council President and the Mayor are natives.  Hmmm. So, how could this continue to happen on their watch??

A recent column written by metro area writer Maria Saporta, complete with reader comments, asks several other good questions about preserving local Atlanta history.  This history includes the precious home of Grace Towns Hamilton, the first Black woman elected to the Georgia Legislature and daughter of George Alexander Towns; an educator and man my elementary school was named after.

Grace Towns Hamilton in the House Chamber of the Georgia Legislature.  (Source GA History Center)

Grace Towns Hamilton House in grave need of preservation. (Photo by Brandy Morrison.)

http://www.atlantapreservationcenter.com/place_detail?id=15&pt=1

Maria’s article also includes African American buildings as Morris Brown’s Gaines Hall and Atlanta Life Insurance Company’s first home on Auburn Avenue. I applaud Maria for pulling together this important story because the sale and tearing down of two historic Atlanta churches to make room for a football stadium still makes me sick to my stomach.  And it makes me question why other historic churches all along Peachtree Street were built around like the church across from Colony Square.  And, how about the church next door to the Fulton County Courthouse on Pryor or the one across the street from the State Capitol on Washington…just to name a few.

I believe you will enjoy this article. And, I hope you will think of how you might be a part of a movement to preserve the African American and Civil Rights structures included in the article as well others across the state.

https://saportareport.com/forget-symbols-confederacy-instead-lets-preserve-african-american-heritage/

In conclusion, here is information about Pascal’s Restaurant.  It’s where I walked on rare occasions after being on the tennis courts all day at Washington Park, if I had money for one of their famous fried chicken dinners in the 1970’s.

 

Paschal Brother’s Restaurant & Hotel. Owned and used by Clark Atlanta as a student dorm until 2004.

http://socialshutter.blogspot.com/2013/01/atlantas-warped-civil-right-legacy-sad.html?m=1

This is an important quote from the 2013 article in the link above about how Paschal’s can be preserved;

“If the city of Atlanta can consider sinking money into a new football stadium to draw tourists to the area, shouldn’t it also invest in restoring Paschal’s and its surrounding neighborhood, which may have even greater tourist potential?”

The question now is:  Do we care enough to preserve it and similar important historic structures??

Thanks in advance for leaving your comments and sharing this blog. The more people who know, means more who might help with a full scaled preservation project.

How the Amazon Purchase of Whole Foods Affects You

Whether you shop at a Whole Foods or not, what Amazon is about to do with its’ newly acquired 500 plus stores affects you.  According to Melody Hobson of Ariel Capital Management and the TJMS “Money Monday’s” segment (on Atlanta’s KISS 104.1 FM), these 500 stores are located in America’s riches zip codes.  That combined with its’ five million Amazon Prime customers gives it leverage to change the grocery store business and affect how and where you shop.

Cincinnati based Kroger recently lowered their grocery prices and eliminated their 5%  senior discount on Wednesdays.  In an all out price war with Walmart, Kroger is not satisfied with their 9% market share.  Being the nation’s largest retailer, Walmart has 20% of the grocery market.

Here is the link for Melody’s segment about Amazon.  It will broaden your vision on how Amazon is aggressively increasing their market share and changing how we buy everything.  Now they are focusing on groceries which will affect the entire industry:

Money Mondays: How Amazon Just Made Groceries A ‘Whole’ Lot Cheaper

 

Buying a House is More Complicated Than Ever

According to Mary Gill, the WAOK 1380AM radio real estate expert, now is not the time to pay cash or put down a huge amount when you buy a house.  That advice can be misunderstood because in the past, it was the thing to do.  Now, with home prices being somewhat inflated, there is a high probability of you losing all your money until a market correction is made.

More to come…

Houston Holds On

After receiving a year’s amount of rain within two days, Hourricane Harvey leaves Houstonians and other Gulf Coast residents stranded in several feet of water.  Often called the 500 year flood, the media and social media is reporting it is much worse than what we see.  Houston mayor and Texan Governor.,,

King Statue Unveiling Draws Huge Crowd

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Early this morning with mild winds and a temperature of 70ish degrees as thousands gathered with the King family, elected officials, and other VIPs to witness the unveiling of the MLKingJr Statue. Others looked on from the south windows of the twin towers office building across the street.  It is appropriately situated placed on the east side of MLKingJr Drive at Piedmont Avenue and Capitol Avenue.

The mood of the crowd was festive, optimistic, and excited.  Dozens of news media and photographers jockeyed for best positions to get the best shots. The King family attendees included:  Christine King Farris (sister), Rev. Bernice King (daughter), and Farris Watkins (great granddaughter).

King Statue Unveiling Preparation

 

The morning of the MLKingJr Statue unveiling.

 

 

The Georgia State Capitol grounds are prepared for the ceremony at 10am.  The crowd started arriving hours before the ceremony.  Community leader Rita Samuels seated above in solid pink shirt and hat with family and friends.

Hank Aaron Supports Kaepernick

Hank Aaron was interviewed by Roland Martin of The Tom Joyner Morning Show, Black America and and TV One.  He quoted Jackie Robinson on the flag, protests, statues, etc. The video on the link below allows you to see the interview of the home run king telling why he supports Kaepernick:

Hammerin’ Hank Aaron Stands With Kaepernick

What do you think about Kaepernick not being able to get an NFL team to sign him?

Do you agree with the call to boycott the NFL until a team signs him?

Four Days Until Unveiling of M.L.King, Jr. Statue at GA Capitol

The countdown has begun and Georgians are eagerly waiting Monday’s unveiling of the M.L.King,Jr. In just four days, we will witness an honorable tribute to the man who whi believed in peaceful protests and other non-violent means to equal justice and equal rights for all.

In the pictures above, workers at the Georgia Capitol are preparing the base for the statue.

Texas Commissioner Ellis Weighs in on Confederate Statue Debate

In the midst of all that is going on across metro ATL, Georgia and the country; however, this background piece on the Confederate Monuments is important. It is from Texas Commissioner Rodney Ellis who eloquently states the real history…not one created by “The Lost Cause”.

“The tragic events in Charlottesville this past weekend–where a young woman lost her life standing up to bigotry, two state police officers died in a related helicopter crash, and many more were injured–have once again ignited the debate over Confederate monuments on public grounds. Public monuments that depict Confederate generals as inspirational heroes and other celebrations of the Confederacy serve a revisionist, whitewashed history. That history intentionally downplays the horror of slavery and valorizes the Confederacy that fought to defend this most evil institution, nearly destroying a young nation in the process.

As I’ve argued for many years now: Confederate monuments, symbols, and other tributes belong in our museums and history books. They do not belong on our street signs, at our schools, in our parks, on government property, or other public spaces because who and what we choose to publicly honor should reflect our shared values and an accurate portrayal of history.

In order to understand why Confederate monuments should come down, it’s important to understand why they ever went up in the first place. The vast majority of Confederate monuments and statues were built during the Jim Crow era as part of the revisionist movement now known as the Lost Cause, which recast the Civil War as a fight over states’ rights and denied slavery was a major cause for war even though the historical record clearly proves otherwise. One such example can be found on the grounds of the Texas Capitol, where a Confederate monument falsely asserts that “the war between the states was not a rebellion, nor was its underlying cause to sustain slavery.” The Lost Cause mythology framed the Confederate rebellion as a noble cause and falsely taught several generations that the Civil War was a war of aggression against the South, outright denying that slavery and maintaining a system of racial oppression were the central, detestable causes of the Civil War.

Source: Southern Poverty Law Center and Mother Jones

Portraying themselves as the victims of the Civil War helped Southern states deny responsibility for slavery and its aftermath while providing fertile ground for the oppression and disenfranchisement of Blacks living in the South during Jim Crow. Confederate monuments played a significant role in this revision of history and helped cultivate support for the violent bigotry and institutionalized discrimination that defined the Jim Crow era, which heavily contributed to the structural inequalities and racism that challenge us to this day. The torch-lit display of hatred that marched on the University of Virginia’s campus last week deliberately intended to instill fear by evoking the savage imagery of lynchings carried out during Jim Crow. Those mostly young men marching with hate in their hearts offer a devastatingly clear example of how these monuments are still used to distort history and promote a corrupt value system that openly embraces racism and inequality.

Confederate monuments do not preserve history–they revise, distort, and deny it. They continue to draw blood from deep wounds that won’t heal until our past and present are reconciled. This can only happen if we fully and finally acknowledge the painful truths about slavery, the Civil War, Jim Crow, and the racial inequality that persists to this day. We can no longer abide false narratives about the darkest moments in our nation’s history or ignore the ways in which those dark moments still cast shadows on today. Whether it’s white supremacists reviving campaigns of racial terror or the more insidious institutionalized discrimination and racial disparity that exists in our schools, our politics, our economic policies, and our criminal justice system–we must shine a light on all of it to expose the underlying structures of racism that need to be torn down.

Together, we must work to remove monuments praising the Confederacy that still stand in public spaces throughout Houston, Harris County, and Texas and embrace historical truths over whitewashed revisions. As part of this effort, I am requesting the county perform a comprehensive review of all county buildings, roads, statues or other symbols related to the Confederacy and recommend whether changes are warranted. We must always be unequivocal in our condemnation of bigotry, hatred, and racism wherever it may be found. However, it is not enough to simply strike down theses symbols of racism–most importantly, we must tear down the existing structures of racism that create and maintain ongoing racial barriers to equal education, economic opportunity, and fair and just treatment under the law.

This means we must also do the hard but necessary work of rebuilding those structures on a true foundation of justice and equality. And wherever racial barriers stand or once stood, pathways to opportunity must be opened to all people. It is only then that America can fully live up to its greatest promise and be redeemed of its original sin.”

More on The Lost Cause:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_Cause_of_the_Confederacy

Please weigh in with your thoughts on Confederate stoitpcomments

The New York Twelve

“The New York Twelve” is a group of Black and Latino NYPD officers who have sued the NYPD over their corrupt policies.  Sean King’s investigative report on these officers will be…