2020 January Oak Cliff

TABLE

PHOTO BY DANNY FULGENCIO

LONE STAR BALLROOM

A self-professed Navy brat, neighbor Gary Rogers is at home meeting new people. Drawn to music since childhood, Gary achieved ASE certified mechanic status and later became a five-star professional chef before circling back to his true calling: dance instructor at Lone Star Ballroom, which he co-owns with Ann Michelle Muscato.

Gary implements career skills at the Ballroom. In addition to American-style dance classes – personal favorites are tango, waltz and fox trot – he chefs “Romantic Evening for Two” packages there, featuring a private three-course dinner with portable dance floor under the stars. “Dancing is fun and easy, with mental and physical benefits,” Gary says.

Boost confidence, de-stress and prepare for special occasions: Contact Gary at Lone Star Ballroom by emailing letsdance@lonestarballroom.com or calling 214-553-5188.

GARY ROGERS

LETSDANCE@LONESTARBALLROOM.COM

214-553-5188

FACES

OF DANCE INSTRUCTION

SEE NEW STORIES EVERY DAY ONLINE AT OAKCLIFF.ADVOCATEMAG.COM

PIECE OF THE PAST

Before Oak Cliff became part of Dallas in 1903, it had its own school. Oak Cliff High School was built in the Victorian stick style that was prevalent at the time. We’re uncertain of the exact location of this building, but it most likely was near the current site of Adamson High School. We know this building predates 1892 because that’s the year the Oak Cliff City Council

approved the building of a four-story brick schoolhouse on the southwest corner of Patton and Tenth streets. That school, originally called Oak Cliff Central High School, was later renamed for its first principal, W.H. Adamson.

EDUCATION

n A SUNSET HIGH SCHOOL dancer won a $3,000 scholarship that is typically given to athletes. GISELA ORTÍZ, a senior and captain of the Sunset Dance Company, won Telemundo and Wingstop’s student athlete of the month. She starts her day practicing dance at 6:30 a.m. on weekdays, before school starts at 9. She has a 4.0 GPA and is No. 1 in her class.

n THE SUNSET HIGH SCHOOL “Purple Marching Machine” band performed at Prairie View A&M University’s high school band day in November. Sunset has built up its marching band program over the past decade under the direction of Dallas ISD alumna RAMETRIA SMITH. Watch their performance at oakcliff. advocatemag.com.

n It’s an astonishing statistic for Dallas, the headquarters of AT&T, but it’s true: About 42% of households in our city lack internet service. In southern Dallas, internet speeds are slower, and fewer households have it. A grant from the 1MILLION PROJECT will pay for 5,000 WiFi mobile hotspots for Dallas ISD high school students in southern Dallas. The students are at SOUTH OAK CLIFF, LINCOLN, ROOSEVELT, MADISON, WILMER-HUTCHINS and PINKSTON high schools. They can take the hotspots home with them and use them throughout their high school careers. The mobile hotspots are free to the students, and they contain security and content-blocking to protect students online.

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contributors: George Mason, Patti Vinson, Carol Toler, Scott

Shirley

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contributing photographers: Kathy Tran

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ABOUT THE COVER

The view of Downtown from Townview Center high school.

Photo by Danny Fulgencio.

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AIRLINE CAREERS

THINGS TO DO

Get FAA approved maintenance training at campuses coast to coast. Job placement assistance. Financial Aid for qualifying students. Military friendly. Call Aviation Institute of Maintenance 800-481-7894

AIRLINE CAREERS

maintenance training at campuses coast. Job placement assistance. qualifying students. Military friendly. Aviation Institute of Maintenance

800-481-7894

Get FAA approved maintenance training at campuses coast to coast. Job placement assistance. Financial Aid for qualifying students. Military friendly.

AIRLINE CAREERS

Get FAA approved maintenance training at campuses coast to coast. Job placement assistance. Financial Aid for qualifying students. Military friendly.

Call Aviation Institute of Maintenance

800-481-7894

Lung Cancer?

Asbestos exposure in industrial, construction, manufacturing jobs, or the military may be the cause. Family in the home were also exposed. Call 1-866-795-3684 or email cancer@ breakinginjurynews. com.

$30 billion is set aside for asbestos victims with cancer.

Valuable settlement monies may not require filing a lawsuit.

Jan. 12

Family bike ride

Join Oak Cliff Bike Synergy for a bike ride with the whole family, starting at 10 a.m.

Where: Tyler Station, 1300 S. Polk St. More info: oakcliffbikesynergy.com

Tickets: Free

JAN. 11-FEB. 14 PILEDRIVER

Beefy men throwing each other around, while wearing masks and tights with high-waist briefs. It’s not just any night out in Dallas, it’s a lucha libre art show. Jose Vargas presents this group show focused on Mexican wrestling.

Where: Oak Cliff Cultural Center, 223 W. Jefferson Blvd.

More info: occc.dallasculture.org

Tickets: Free

Jan. 18

Vintage sci-fi

Enjoy Fritz Lang’s restored 1927 science-fiction masterpiece

“Metropolis” with the score performed live by Austin-based musician David Didonato.

Where: The Texas Theatre, 231 W. Jefferson Blvd.

More info: thetexastheatre.com

Tickets: $14 in advance and $16 day of show

OPERATION BEAUTIFICATION

Beckley Club Estates joined the City of Dallas for Operation Beautification, when churches, neighborhood associations and other nonprofit groups are encouraged to clean up their neighborhoods. Beckley Club neighbors worked on a cold day in October, but the city moved the date for the event this year — it’s on May 16. Find more information at dallascityhall.com.

Photo by Danny Fulgencio

COMING AND GOING

[+] LA FITNESS opened at Wynnewood Village in December. The 34,000-squarefoot gym features cardio machines, strength machines, a Crossfit-style training area, free weights, an aerobics and dance studio, a cycling studio and three-lane lap pool. Memberships cost $20-$50 a month depending on the options you want and how much you can pay upfront. This is the second big-box gym to open in Oak Cliff this year. 24 Hour Fitness opened on Fort Worth Avenue in July.

[+] ANN’S HEALTH FOOD CENTER & MARKET

plans to open a new store at 2550 W. Red Bird Lane. General manager Ryan Muchrath says Ann’s is taking a space that’s just 2,500 square feet, and they envision it as a “healthy convenience store” with vitamins and supplements, some groceries, a smoothie bar and grab-and-go sandwiches and salads. If this smaller concept works, then the family owned company wants to expand it throughout the Dallas area. The store could open as soon as Jan. 1. The first Ann’s opened in Oak Cliff in 1984. Now there are two — the one on Zang and one in Waxahachie.

[-] SMALL BREWPUB closed its doors in December after five years in business at Jefferson Tower. “Our lease is up here on Jefferson Boulevard, and we’ve decided not to renew,” reads a statement on their Facebook page. The brewpub’s last day was Dec. 7, also their fifth anniversary.

[+] AMEGY BANK

is coming to the site of the original Gloria’s restaurant on West Davis at Llewellyn, across from Bolsa. Gloria’s moved to Fire Station No. 15 in Bishop Arts in January 2010. Construction began on a new building at the Llewellyn site about a year and a half ago. The Houston-based bank announced its expansion into southern Dallas last year.

#PICTUREPERFECT

Joyce Florist demolished its Atomic Age building on South Hampton in August. The florist moved into the former Dairy Mart building in 1971, and its new building, featuring a glass- enclosed pavilion, is under construction. Find this photo by Danny Fulgencio on Instagram, @OakCliffAdvocate

“Had it not been for my exposure to the arts as this little kid from Oak Cliff, I wouldn’t be sitting here today.”

—TERRY LOFTIS, the new executive director of The Arts Community Alliance (See page 10.)

BY THE NUMBERS

BRINGING BLACKLAND BACK

A group of 10 scouts and five adults spent a weekend in November clearing invasive grasses at Twelve Hills Nature Center, hauling away 21 contractor bags full of the unwanted vegetation. Besides that, they planted native Texas grasses and wildflowers. Spencer Burke (back row, far right), a 15-year-old sophomore at St. Mark’s School of Texas, organized the work weekend with Boy Scouts Troop 577.

WE CAN’T STOP TALKING ABOUT

HOW LATINOS SAVED AMERICA’S INNER CITIES.

$716,000

A new book on that topic offers Oak Cliff as an example of an urban neighborhood that Anglos all but abandoned starting in the 1970s, but thank God for la Raza, who held it down for decades. Now we are onto this wave of gentrification where the “creative class” takes credit for preserving cities while whitewashing neighborhood culture. A.K. SandovalStrausz’s new book, “Barrio

America:

How

Latino Immigrants

Saved the American City,” uses the Park City neighborhood of Chicago as well as Oak Cliff as case studies.

Terry Loftis’ new office is just across the plaza from his former high school, Booker T. Washington.He grew up in Oak Cliff and was accepted to the arts magnet for music. After a couple of decades in the marketing and communications business, Loftis decided he wanted to produce a Broadway show. He was co-producer on “Ann,” the musical about former Texas Gov. Ann Richards. Then in 2015, he produced “The Visit,” which was nominated for a Tony Award. And a couple of years later, he produced “Bandstand.” Now he is the new executive director of The Arts Community Alliance, known as TACA.The 52-year-old nonprofit raises money for performing and visual arts, which is delivered through grants. Last year, TACA grants totaled about $760,000, which was given to organizations as big as the AT&T Performing Arts Center and the Nasher Sculpture Center and as small as Cry Havoc Theater Company and Dark Circles Contemporary Dance.

What are you excited about?

To move TACA into a new area of relevancy. In 50 years, TACA has established a significant brand in the arts community. However given the changes in the cultural arts in North Texas, I think there’s opportunity. There are more diverse offerings in Dallas now than there ever have been. There’s a greater story to tell, and I think TACA needs to be on the forefront of that narrative.

What is the greater story?

We’re now doing programs where we’re going behind the scenes and showing the public what it takes to put a production on, what it takes to put an exhibit on. We’re becoming more than just grant funders to really contributing more to programmatic aspects of the cultural arts. Where I want to see it go is far beyond that. We should be the conduit to make sure there are no gaps in the system. If you have a smaller organization like Kitchen Dog Theater or Second Thought, how are we being a better resource for them to be absolutely successful? How can TACA be the catalyst to assist them with donor development, audience engagement, marketing, budget planning? My objective starting in 2020 will be to bring everyone together. Let’s put everyone together and see how we can all be a resource to help each other because that’s only going to help Dallas. So it’s being more of a resource to make them more successful instead of writing a check and saying, “we’ll see you next year.”

How did you come up with that plan?

It was common sense to me. TACA needs to be seen as the gold standard again in arts funding. It needs to be the gold standard in helping our beneficiaries develop who they are and what they do and do it better. Luckily I have the support of the board and the staff. I worked on the corporate side for most of my career and, insanely, decided to produce a few shows on Broadway.

But also, because of the fact that I’m also an artist, it brings a different perspective as opposed to someone sitting in this chair who has a management skill set and a fundraising background. I’m still a working artist. I still sing in clubs as much as I can. That’s a unique perspective that no one that’s been in this position has had before. When I say I have our beneficiaries’ interests at heart, it’s because I’m a performing artist. That enables me to be a change agent for the arts in Dallas using TACA as the catalyst to do that.

You have a lot of experience with fundraising from serving on the boards of Resource Center and Black Tie dinner.

The easiest thing about this job is asking for money because I’m not afraid to do it. And what makes it even easier is that I’m selling something that was engrained in me from the embryo. My mother was singing to us when we were still in the womb.

What is the job like so far?

Leaving Oak Cliff and driving over here every day … to get to come to this office, to be surrounded by the arts. To be able to look at the high school where it all started, it’s like coming home. It’s really cool for me, and I get these butterflies. Out of everything I did on Broadway, out of everything I did in a 25-year career in marketing and advertising. Who would’ve thought I’d be giddy getting up to go to work every morning? The timing was right for TACA, and the timing was right for me.

What other goals do you have for TACA?

Probably on a five-year trajectory would be to more than double the amount of revenue we produce that is going back out to our beneficiaries. That will be a process, not an event. The number of applicants we receive every year continually goes up. Not all of those organizations can be funded. In addition to giving more money, the other initiative is for those institu-

“I’m still a working artist. That’s a unique perspective that no one that’s been in this position has had before.”

tions who may not get in, for whatever reason, TACA also has to be there to say, “You didn’t make it this year. Here’s why, and here’s what we can do to mentor you to make sure that if you apply again, that you can get in.”

What can people reading this do to help your mission?

We just announced our Arts Ambassadors program. At a $25 level, you can become a member of TACA. It levels up to $2,500 for individual memberships. And come to our programs, Perforum and Let’s TACA ’Bout It. I hope to initiate a few more community wide events so that even if they’re not a regular contributor to TACA, they learn about the organizations that we give money to.

You left a lucrative job to take this position. Why is it so important to you? Had it not been for my exposure to the arts as this little kid from Oak Cliff, I wouldn’t be sitting here today. I would never have produced a show in New York. I would’ve never gotten on stage and sang. Being from Dallas, being from Oak Cliff, being a person of color running probably the oldest arts organization in Dallas, allows me the opportunity to reach into the communities where there are other Terry Loftises out there in grade school and middle school and high school who may not see where their future is going to go. My brand personally can help them do that, and TACA can help them for sure.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

STILL STANDING

STARKEY’S IS AN OAK CLIFF STAPLE, DESPITE MULTIPLE FAMILY TRAGEDIES

RODNEY STARKEY CHOKES UP A BIT WHEN ASKED ABOUT HIS MOTHER.

Beverly Starkey, who was called “Little Mama,” stood 4-foot-11, and her kids say she was a ball of energy.

She worked for Auto Convoy until she retired, but she also worked at Starkey’s Service Center on West Davis at Kings Highway up until five or six years ago, when she became physically unable. She died in her Oak Cliff home this past summer.

Her husband, George Starkey, opened Starkey’s 51 years ago, and it’s still in the family. Their son Rodney Starkey now owns and operates it.

There were four Starkey siblings, and they all grew up in Pleasant Grove and worked in the family businesses at the same time.

Three of them became mechanics, and one, Susan Starkey, was cashier/office manager for decades. Her brother David Starkey was the lead mechanic at Starkey’s for many years. Neighbors may remember him as the big guy who wore shorts and tube socks in any weather. But he died suddenly of a heart attack in November 2018.

That was only the latest tragedy the Starkey family has endured over the decades.

Rodney Starkey lost his son Rodney Starkey II, who the family called Little Rodney, in 1989. The 13-year-old eighth-grader was walking home from what was then John B. Hood middle school when teenage boys drove by in a truck and threw a crescent wrench at his head. Little Rodney was an honor student and played the clarinet. His mom, Linda, was

Story by RACHEL STONE | Photography by DANNY

FULGENCIO

“If you believe what I believe, that’s when the party starts, when you leave this world.”

Rodney Starkey, a third-generation auto mechanic, took over his family’s garage after the death of his brother, David, in 2018.

active in the PTA. She died of breast cancer in 2009. Rodney and Linda’s elder son, Shaun Starkey, died in a car crash in 2015 at age 46.

Susan Starkey’s only son, Stephen Middleton, died in a shooting in 2004, when he was 26.

All of George and Beverly’s grandchildren are gone.

“It’s part of life,” Rodney Starkey says. “If you believe what I believe, that’s when the party starts, when you leave this world. I’ve been able to make peace with a lot of stuff like that.”

He spends one morning a week at a school in Forney mentoring students through Men of Honor. Otherwise, he arrives at the garage at 8 a.m., and he’s working to update and improve Starkey’s so that it could be here another 50 years.

When Starkey’s first opened in 1968, the block was busy with shoppers at Hodges Super Market across the street, and you could still get a full-service fill-up at Starkey’s.

The latter was true until about 1992.

At one point, the family owned two other Starkey’s, one where there’s now a carwash near Country Burger on Hampton Road, and one on Beckley and Colorado. They also had a U-Haul rental place on Zang at Davis, where the old Sonic was torn down for apartments.

David Starkey, although he was the younger brother, always handled the business side of Starkey’s. After he died, Rodney had to figure out how to do it on his own.

He found a mentor in the Automotive Training Institute, which has taught him basic things like keeping a customer database.

“We’re making plans to stay here,” he says.

Starkey’s recently signed a fiveyear lease, after many years of going month-to-month, with an option for a second five-year lease. The building dates back to about 1950 and was originally a Sinclair filling station.

“The little ol’ lady who owned the place never would sell it,” Rodney

Starkey says of the building. “She and my dad were real good friends, and her wish was that we get to stay here. Her son has honored that wish.”

Susan Starkey started hanging around her folks’ place on Waverly Drive after her son died and eventually moved in to help her parents at the end of their lives.

She’s a talented singer who leads praise and worship at Calvary Baptist Church. And she still lives in her parents’ old house. She hosted a small Thanksgiving dinner there in November for her two living siblings and a few friends.

“We’re all in recovery,” she says. “Because we all used to drink. Without the Lord, we wouldn’t be here.”

Beverly Starkey’s children gathered at her bedside when she was dying, singing songs and sharing stories.

One of their songs was “Four Feet Eleven” by the Christian singer Evie: “I’m 4 feet 11, I’m going to heaven, and that makes me feel 10 feet tall.”

CHURCH LADY SOUL FOOD

FAMILY LEGACY INSPIRED Kevin Winston to open a soul-food restaurant named for his two sons, Kendall and Karsen, who are 16 and 10, respectively.

“I wanted to leave them a lineage,” he says. “Something to pass down.”

The 46-year-old Roosevelt High School graduate has a doctorate in health administration and spent decades in the corporate world, most recently in upper management at Ready Ice.

The time was right to pursue his longtime dream of owning a restaurant based on his family’s recipes, and he opened Kendall Karsen’s Upscale Soul Food in the Golden

Kendall Karsen’s Upscale Soul Food

3939 S. Polk St., suite 305 214.376.2171

Hours: 11 a.m.-8 p.m.

Wednesday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Sunday, closed Monday and Tuesday

Triangle shopping center last summer. The main inspiration is Louberta Johnson, Winston’s grandmother, who rose at 4 a.m. on Sundays to cook for her church, Church of Christ at Dallas on Fordham Road. Known in the neighborhood as “Aunt Lou,” she also volunteered at the Dallas VA Medical Center. Winston credits her for teaching him and her other grandchildren to cook.

“She always had us in the kitchen with her,” he says.

Many of the recipes at Kendall Karsen’s come from her, and Winston even went to the trouble of getting a phone number

FROM KENDALL KARSEN’S GRANDMA STRAIGHT TO YOUR HEART

Story by RACHEL STONE | Photography by KATHY TRAN

DID YOU KNOW?

Owner Kevin Winston made the restaurant’s tables himself, and he branded them with the names of family members, bible verses and other clues about his life.

for the store ending in 2171, the same number Johnson had predating numerical exchanges.

There are also contributions from his mom, Josie, and his wife’s mom, Cora, as well as his own recipes, which he started perfecting in college, cooking for his friends at Texas A&M University.

Winston adapted the original recipes to make them a little heart healthier. He cooks with olive oil, with no lard or butter, for example.

The menu is simple — ribs, chicken and dressing, fish fillets (fried or Cajun), pot roast, chicken tetrazzini and liver and onions with a choice of two sides. You already know: greens, beans, cabbage, candied yams, mac and cheese, gumbo, etc., plus rolls and cornbread and house-made desserts.

The best thing about his career change, Winston says, is that his food makes people happy.

“I wanted to do something that brings me joy, and this restaurant has done that,” he says.

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Opposite page: Fried catfish with mac and cheese and greens on the side. Left: A rib plate with yams.

Enchilada’s

The rest of the story

THE ADVOCATE’S BEST PHOTOS OF 2019

Story by RACHEL STONE | Photography by DANNY FULGENCIO

All the photos that are fit to print don’t always fit into print. Advocate photo editor DANNY FULGENCIO shoots almost every photo you see in our publication. The exception is restaurant photography, which is primarily the work of Kathy Tran. But still, Fulgencio completes more than 300 photo assignments for the Advocate’s four monthly magazines every year. Despite this heavy workload, he does a dang bang-up job of it, even if we do say so ourselves.

Peace, love and tacos

HOW A TACO EDITOR INSPIRED US

How do you shoot Texas Monthly’s first taco editor with the taco in the foreground?

If you’re Advocate Magazines photo editor Danny Fulgencio, just tape that puppy to the lens.

Fulgencio photographed José R. Ralat for the November 2019 Oak Cliff Advocate at Trompo in the Bishop Arts District. It was such a saintly pose that Advocate senior art director Jynnette Neal put it on a candle.

Neal, a practicing Catholic with a sense of humor, even fashioned a “prayer,” in case anyone feels like they need a taco novena.

“May your tacos always be authentic. May you find the spice level you desire. May your tortillas always be handmade. Grant unto thee the perfect blend of flavors, be they of the persuasion of corn or flour, Tex-Mex or street. Peace, love & tacos.”

Mike Sannie in the garden A VOLUNTEER WITH SPIRIT AND STYLE

Fulgencio shot this photo for a story in the August Advocate about the historic preservation work that the allvolunteer Friends of Oak Cliff Parks has accomplished over the years.

Fulgencio captured volunteer Mike Sannie watering weeping Arizona cypress trees at Kidd

Springs Park.

Sannie, “is our amazing volunteer” who kept 36 trees watered in the park’s restored Japanese garden all summer, board member Cynthia Mulcahy says.

“He looks like Monet from the show I just saw at the Kimbell,” she says.

Paint – Windows – Siding Gutters – Framing

All bark, some bite THE FACE ONLY A MOTHER COULD LOVE

Ziggy doesn’t care for male humans.

He’s had a hard life, OK? Rosemary Monterrosa found him, while block walking for the SPCA of Texas, with a bullet in his knee and metallic fragments throughout his body and suffering from a double case of “cherry eye.”

They weren’t sure he would make it, but lil Zig is now thriving at home with Monterrosa.

Taking a photograph of him, however, was also a challenge.

Ziggy growled at and “really wanted to bite” our male human photographer.

But Monterrosa managed to keep the dog calm long enough for some adorable

portraits. You would never know he had murder in his heart for the guy behind the lens.

Monterrosa works as an outreach coordinator for the SPCA, and she’s made it her mission to get dogs off of chains.

Even though it’s illegal to keep dogs tied up in Dallas, there are plenty of people who still do it. Monterrosa’s group, Broken Chains, spends their weekend mornings building dog runs for previously chained animals. They also give them water pails, flea treatments and anything else they need for a life outdoors. She takes the work a step further, checking on every dog they’ve unchained at least once a month in case the pets need anything.

Sign up to volunteer with Broken Chains at spca.org/volunteer.

Tattoo views FRIDAY THE 13TH IN WEST DALLAS

A new tattoo shop opened in West Dallas on Friday, Sept. 13.

Singleton Tattoo threw a huge grand opening party offering small tattoos designed by Will Heron, the artist known as Wheron, for $31.

Tattoo marathons are a tradition among tattooing shops on Friday the 13th. Elm Street Tattoo famously offers “13” tattoos for $13 and eventually based the Elm Street Tattoo and Music Festival around its Friday the 13th tradition.

A Wheron mural depicting black-andwhite cactuses also adorns the exterior of the Singleton Tattoo’s building.

Will Heron organized the second-annual Wild West Mural Fest, part of Art Walk West, in November.

Too hot to handle

AUTHENTICITY DOWN TO THE FIRE

Chef Justin Holt’s new Bishop Arts restaurant, Salaryman, is a little piece of working class Japan, Texas-style.

The small restaurant’s décor includes a lot of local touches. Oak Cliff artisans made all of the plates and bowls the restaurant uses, for example.

And the attention to detail is impressive. Boston-based artist Jason Vivona hand drew the wallpaper design, which depicts the Basan, a mythical Japanese fowl.

There’s also an Australian $20 signed by Chuck Norris hanging on the wall, but that’s another story.

The coals for the yakitori grill are not local; they’re imported from Asia.

This is bincho-tan, Japanese charcoal that is different from typical lump charcoal because it’s baked at a higher temperature. Bincho-tan is oak wood that’s carbonized in a kiln, and after that, the kiln is opened and flooded

with oxygen so that it burns extremely hot. Then it’s snuffed with dirt and left to cool. The result is charcoal that’s denser and higher in carbon content than lump charcoal.

Before he even started working on Salaryman, which opened in 2019, Holt had the idea that he would learn to make bincho-tan and possibly become a purveyor of Japanese charcoal in Texas.

“That turned out to be a crazy load of work and way more than we have time for now,” he says.

But his experiments in charcoal did result to the restaurant’s logo. It’s designed from a high-resolution photo of one of Holt’s homemade bincho-tan ends.

Keeping an eye on cops

EZEKIEL TYSON SITS ON THE POLICE OVERSIGHT BOARD

It’s not a job that will make you the most popular person in Dallas.

The first meeting of the newly revamped Community Police Oversight Board, which coincided with the Amber Guyger murder trial in October, erupted in chaos.

It turned into a shouting match between police officers and citizens after they realized there would be no public comment during the meeting.

A police oversight board, which reviews criminal allegations against police, has never been smooth sailing in Dallas. The new board is unpopular with some because there are no current or former law-enforcement

personnel on the panel. Others complain that some members believe the police need less oversight.

Oak Cliff-based lawyer Ezekiel Tyson, a former assistant district attorney in Houston, is there for unity. He is Dallas City Council District 10 representative Adam McGough’s appointee to the board. Here are two takeaways from his November interview in the Lake Highlands Advocate.

n The bygone Citizens Police Review Board had no budget, no staff and virtually no power. “The new board has a little more oomph to it. We actually have a budget for a staff of three, including a director, administrative assistant and investigator,” Tyson says. “If we aren’t satisfied with [internal investigators’] ultimate recommendation, then our investigator can launch their own investigation.”

n The complaints they review are all over the map. “We had everything from one lady who said she was assaulted in the police station when she was supposed to be giving a statement, and I believe her allegations bordered on sexual as well as physical inappropriate actions. Then on the other hand, we’ve had stuff that’s as simple as people who said, ‘Well I went to file a police report for missing checks and instead of walking me through the process, the officer on duty shrugged me off because I was homeless.’”

■ Reading/Writing Workshop Model

■ STEM Lab, Art, Music & Library Time

■ Spanish, PE and Recess Daily

■ Low Student-to-Teacher Ratio

■ After School Care & Enrichment Programs

■ Convenient to Downtown Dallas

ADVOCATE BEST

neighborhood’s favorite things

You voted, check out the list of winners and runners-up in categories ranging from Best Place For Kids to Best Burger from last year. Get ready to vote for Best of 2020 in a few months.

oakcliff.advocatemag.com/ best-of-2019-winners/

THAT’S YOUR DJ

WANZ DOVER HAS GIFTS FOR YOUR EARS

Story by RACHEL STONE | Photography by DANNY FULGENCIO

DJ Wanz Dover, one of Dallas’ favorite local rock stars, has been on the scene for over 25 years.

GO AHEAD, ASK DJ WANZ DOVER TO PLAY YOUR REQUEST.

There is a chance he will blow you off. It is quite presumptuous to ask a professional musician and DJ to play your song, after all.

But more likely, he will surprise you with a deep cut from the artist you want to hear, or he might play a farout cover of the song you requested. For example, Kokolo Afrobeat Orchestra’s cover of Duran Duran’s “Girls on Film.”

“I don’t want to say I’m a jerk about it, but if someone says, ‘Hey, play Michael Jackson,’ then I find a deep cut from a Jackson 5 album from the 1970s that everyone forgot about,” he says. “Someone says, ‘Play Funkadelic,’ because they want to hear one of three Funkadelic songs that are played on the radio, and those are the three that I don’t play.”

Dover, a 25-year veteran of the Dallas music scene, fronts the excellent rock band Black Dotz. He put out a successful ambient record. And he makes dance music that people enjoy all over the world.

But in our neighborhood, he is the guy sitting at the bar with his laptop on Friday nights at Nova. He recently celebrated nine years as the resident DJ there.

He also holds a residency at the Midnight Rambler Downtown, and he gets DJ gigs all over. But the one at Nova is different. There’s no DJ booth, nothing to separate him from the people he’s playing for.

“It’s more like I’m Norm at Cheers than a DJ at a club,” he says.

He plays whatever he wants, except for dance music.

“My programming is how I feel and who I meet at the bar that night,” he says. “It’s always rooted in funk and soul as a the base. Afropunk, ’60s garage rock, ’60s French yé-yé. When Bowie died, I came in and played

Bowie for nine hours.”

He says he feels a duty as a DJ to offer “edutainment,” to give our ears music that is familiar but unknown.

There is a balance of introducing new music and attempting to expand perspectives without speaking down to the audience.

Sometimes he plays four hours of funk songs that are sampled in wellknown hip-hop tracks.

“That’s a neat trick,” he says.

One of Dover’s most successful projects as a solo artist was “Music for Hospitals,” an ambient album he composed after he injured himself falling off the stage at a Black Dotz show and had to have emergency surgery. He was in the hospital for 15 days and almost died. When he was released, he composed one track every day for seven days and named the album in tribute to Brian Eno’s 1978 album, “Ambient 1: Music for Airports.”

He put it up online and asked people to pay what they wanted.

“It really connected with people because it came out of a very sincere place,” he says.

Fans often send it to friends who

are in the hospital, he says. And he loves that people find it useful and touching. It’s calming, all in major keys, beautiful and understated, but a step back from cheerful.

Even though it turned out to be a surprise hit for him, he made the record for himself.

Dover’s health is fine now, but he still listens to “Music for Hospitals” every night when he goes to sleep.

That’s also turned out to be Dover’s prevailing attitude about music. He doesn’t compose because he thinks he’s going to become an international rock star in his 40s.

“I have the ambition, creatively, but I don’t have the ambition for success. Now I make music for much more selfish reasons,” he says. “It’s really all about expression. I make art because I have to, and I don’t know what else to do because that’s all I’ve ever done.”

If you like Wanz Dover’s music, you are in for a treat this year. He has so much unreleased music that he plans to put out a new release every month in 2020.

“Why not just put it all out?” he says. “That way, I can listen to it all on Spotify if I feel like it.”

By SCOTT SHIRLEY

‘What the Bible

One criticism progressive Christians often receive is that we “don’t take the Bible seriously.” Even as a young Southern Baptist, I would often hear this cited as the problem with mainline churches like the Methodists. However, it seems that my critics and I have a different understanding of what it would mean to take the Bible seriously.

Often, in conversations with those from conserving traditions, they will present a barrage of Scripture quotations as arguments. I’ve never been good at memorizing Scripture, and my memory gets worse as I get older, but I’m also a little skeptical of its purpose. Ostensibly, it is an argument from authority: “The Bible says it. I believe it. ’Nuff said.” However, when these verses are lifted piece-by-piece out of any context, it is difficult to say what they mean. And so the authority upon which they might rest is thin.

The authority on which they ought to rest is thousands of years of contemplation of the meaning of the divine and of human existence and what we are to do in light of that. To sustain that authority would mean matching the seriousness of that contemplation. It would mean taking seriously what the Bible actually is and what it is not.

To start, the Bible is a library, not a book. To ask, “what the Bible says” on any given topic is likely to yield a multitude of answers.

The Bible is not “life’s instruction manual.” Yes, it contains thousands of years of wisdom. We should care what it says. As the author of the Second Letter to Timothy says, it “is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” But that is not unbound from our own reason and experience. It is useful in these ways, not through bumper-sticker phrases, but through deep reflection on the narratives it presents and through a thorough evaluation of the many witnesses that come together in its pages.

The Bible is not inerrant. I’m honestly not even sure what that would mean. It has internal contradictions. Many of those who

care the most about “what the Bible says” don’t read the languages in which it was written. If they did, they would be forced to wrestle with the issues of transmission, translation and interpretation that have yielded more than 600 versions. Simply put, to call the Bible inerrant sets forth a standard for truth and consistency that no text could meet – certainly not one that is thousands of years old and passed through the hands of so many people.

WORSHIP

BAPTIST

CLIFF TEMPLE BAPTIST CHURCH / 125 Sunset Ave. / 214.942.8601

Serving Oak Cliff since 1898 / CliffTemple.org / English and Spanish

9 am Contemporary Worship / 10 am Sunday School / 11 am Traditional

GRACE TEMPLE BAPTIST Come to a Place of Grace!

Sunday Worship: English Service 9:30am / Spanish Service 11:00am

831 W. Tenth St. / 214.948.7587 / gracetempledallas.org

DISCIPLES OF CHRIST

EAST DALLAS CHRISTIAN CHURCH / 629 N. Peak Street / 214.824.8185

Sunday School 9:30 am / Worship 8:30 am - Chapel

10:50 am - Sanctuary / Rev. Deborah Morgan-Stokes / edcc.org

EPISCOPAL

CHRIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH / ChristChurchDallas.org

Sunday School: 11:15am /Mass: 9am & 10am English, 12:30pm Español

Wednesday Mass: 6pm English, 8pm Español / 534 W. Tenth Street

METHODIST

KESSLER PARK UMC / 1215 Turner Ave./ 214.942.0098 I kpumc.org

10:30am Sunday School/11:00 Worship /All welcome regardless of reed, cr eed, color, culture, gender or sexual identity.

NON-DENOMINATIONAL

KESSLER COMMUNITY CHURCH / 2100 Leander Dr. at Hampton Rd. “Your Hometown Church Near the Heart of the City.”

I’m never interested in an argument about such things. Those who believe the Bible can be used in these ways do so, not because of reason and evidence, but because it fills emotional needs for certainty and community. I’m okay with that until it’s used as a weapon to lift themselves up and tear others down. When their certainty is only the certainty that they matter and you don’t, when the Bible is used to wall off those who belong from those who don’t, I think they have betrayed the promise of the Word of God.

Because that’s what the Bible really is: a promise. Taking it seriously means wrestling with all its problems and still understanding it as sacred. It has been set apart by our tradition to give hope. It contains within its pages images of what a saved world looks like. It gives us stories that instruct us and inspire us toward that salvation. Our task is to make the promise come true.

Scott Shirley is the pastor of Church in the Cliff. The Worship section is underwritten by Advocate Publishing and the neighborhood businesses and churches listed here. For information about helping support the Worship section, call 214.560.4202.

10:30 am Contemporary Service / kesslercommunitychurch.com

TRINITY CHURCH OAK CLIFF / Love God. Love Others. Make Disciples. Sundays 10:00 am / Worship & children’s Sunday School 1139 Turner Ave. / trinitychurchoakcliff.org

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

says’

On taking the Good Book ‘seriously’

To ask, “what the Bible says” on any given topic is likely to yield a multitude of answers.

By RACHEL STONE

Baby, things change

Oak Cliff in the 1920s

Welcome to the ’20s, Oak Cliff. Silent movies accompanied by live orchestras, sparkly kneelength dresses with chunky boots, people riding motorcycles with no helmet, elaborate facial hair. That could be New Year’s Eve at the Texas Theatre, but we’re talking about the 1920s.

As we say goodbye to this century’s teens, let’s take a look at the Roaring ’20s, backward and forward.

STREETS AND SIDEWALKS

The Dallas Automobile club’s big initiative for 1926 was requiring drivers to use consistent hand signals, and deciding what those should be, for left turn, right turn and stop. Modern turn signals weren’t invented until 1938. Club members also wanted to make sure that police were enforcing “the new headlight law,” according to a story in the Dallas Morning News Historical Archives. One of the club’s main traffic concerns was congestion at both ends of the Houston Street Viaduct; they wanted to find a way to build a second viaduct to Oak Cliff. One was built, the Jefferson Viaduct, in the 1960s.

Watch in 2020: The project to repave and build new curbs and sidewalks on West Davis should be completed soon. After that will come work to turn Tyler and Polk into two-way streets with a roundabout near Kidd Springs Park.

BUSINESS

Sears & Roebuck Co. announced in October 1929 that it planned to open 18 stores in Texas, including one on Jefferson Boulevard. Sears opened in Jefferson Tower that year; its last location was on the site of what is now Fiesta Mart. That closed in 1975 when Sears opened at Red Bird Mall. The Sears & Roebuck distribution center on South Lamar was built in 1915 to service catalog business across the region.

Watch in 2020: Uber broke ground in November on its Dallas headquarters building in Deep Ellum, where it plans to offer thousands of high-paying jobs just a 5-mile commute from our neighborhood. The tech unicorn hasn’t proven itself to be real yet, though. Uber’s stock prices are on a steady downward trajectory; the San Francisco-based company laid off 1,000 people in July; and it lost billions of dollars in 2019.

WHISTLING DIXIE

The local newspaper in 1925 ran a story about O.A. Gilliam, who lived on Lancaster Road and said he was a picket guard for Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s horse Traveller. Gilliam tells an overtly racist story about capturing a black Yankee soldier, except he doesn’t say “black.” He also recounts personal conversations he supposedly had with

Lee, including his bragging to Lee about capturing the Yankee. The City of Dallas unveiled its bronze statue, Robert E. Lee on Traveller, as part of the 1936 Texas Centennial Celebration, in June 1936, with President Franklin D. Roosevelt in attendance.

Watch in 2020: The statue was removed in 2017, and Lee Park was renamed Turtle Creek Park. A golf resort that’s owned by Dallas billionaire Kelcy Warren in the far West Texas town Lajitas bought the bronze at auction for $1.4 million in 2019. The city plans to spend that cash removing the Confederate War Memorial, a granite pillar surrounded by four Italian marble statues of three Confederate officials, near the Downtown convention center.

Continued on page 31

Photo courtesy of Getty Images

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ADVOCATE PUBLISHING does not pre-screen, recommend or investigate the advertisements and/or Advertisers published in our magazines. As a result, Advocate Publishing is not responsible for your dealings with any Advertiser. Please ask each Advertiser that you contact to show you the necessary licenses and/or permits required to perform the work you are requesting. Advocate Publishing takes comments and/or complaints about Advertisers seriously, and we do not publish advertisements that we know are inaccurate, misleading and/or do not live up to the standards set by our publications. If you have a legitimate complaint or positive comment about an Advertiser, please contact us at 214-560-4203. Advocate Publishing recommends that you ask for and check references from each Advertiser that you contact, and we recommend that you obtain a written statement of work to be completed, and the price to be charged, prior to approving any work or providing an Advertiser with any deposit for work to be completed.

Continued from page 29

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THE ARTS

The Oak Cliff Little Theater produced George Kelly’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play “Craig’s Wife” in the auditorium of Oak Cliff High School [See page 5] in October 1928. Kelly was the uncle of Princess Grace of Monaco, and the play has been made into a movie three times. The Oak Cliff Little Theater formed in 1926 as an offshoot of the Oak Cliff Fine Arts Society, which is active to this day.

Watch in 2020: The Bishop Arts Theatre Center produces “Loving and Loving,” Feb. 5-23. It’s a play about Richard and Mildred Loving, an interracial couple who were arrested for being married in 1958 Virginia.

PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION

A news item from October 1929 informs readers that Mrs. Ada Jones would continue operating the bus line she owned and operated because of a “loophole,” the fact it was outside the Dallas city limits, in the town of Lisbon. Other small towns surrounding the original Oak Cliff had recently been annexed to Dallas, and an expanded city bus line on Ewing Avenue offered low fares to connect to the streetcar. Lisbon, now the part of Dallas surrounding the Dallas VA Medical Center, had not yet annexed. So Mrs. Jones got to keep her private bus connection with its high fares.

Watch in the 2020s: The city has $8 million to extend the new Dallas streetcar from Union Station down Young Street to the convention center. The city and DART plan to connect the streetcar, via Elm or Commerce, to the McKinney Avenue Trolley as soon as 2023. Our end needs a connection from Bishop Arts to Jefferson. Maybe this decade? The old streetcar, which ceased service in 1959, once ran down Jefferson from Zang to Tyler.

MUNICIPAL SERVICES

Artesian wells still supplied Oak Cliff’s water in the 1920s. Sounds great, right? Well, not always. “The pure artesian water is ordinarily warm in the summertime and reaches a point sometimes too warm for domestic use.” Developer Charles A. Mangold, whose Cliff Towers was nearing completion on Colorado Boulevard in 1929, told a reporter that the residential building’s 25,000-gallon water tanks would feature a cooling and heating system delivering water at three temperatures, including just above freezing, achieved by “a mechanical process of an iced spray system.” What a luxury in the Texas summer. Commercial buildings in Dallas only started getting air conditioning in the mid-1920s. Home air conditioners didn’t come on the market until about 1928.

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TO ADVERTISE

Watch in 2020: City Council has proposed changing rules for how bulky trash is picked up and recycling brush, yard and food waste. The council didn’t take up the issue in 2019 as expected.

We Get North Oak Cliff

In this neighborhood, you need a proven professional to help you find what you’re looking for. As Dallas’ experts on our city’s close-in communities, no one gets Oak Cliff quite like the pros at David Griffin & Company. Buying? Selling? Call 214.526.5626 or visit davidgriffin.com.