bye bye bull’s Ten years of Bull’s Tavern by James Douglas | pg. 12 Jennie Stencel and the NC Comedy Festival pg. 9 ConfederateWinston-Salem’smonumentpg.8Solarforpanelsallpg.4
Jennie Stencel and the NC Comedy Festival pg. 9 An ode to Bull’spg.Tavern12 A Place in the Sun A collaborative effort brings solar panels to low-income families in Greensboro by Sayaka Matsuoka | pg. 4
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He’s always been the type of Re publican who keeps a sharp pencil, going back to his days on the Win ston-Salem/Forsyth County School Board (1993-2000), though he’s also the sort of Republican who is hostile to the LGBTQ+ community — in 2012 as House speaker pro tem, he vociferously backed Amendment 1, banning same-sex marriage (which passed but was later found uncon stitutional by federal courts) and ended coverage of gender-dysphoria treatment for state employees (also later ruled illegal by a federal court). But he went to Winston-Salem State, so he can’t be all bad. And the guy found me $13 bucks, a dividend from a stock pur chase I had long for gotten; Sayaka found a bunch of money her husband had not yet claimed; a few others in the newsroom also cashed in. Folwell reminded me he found $1,000 for the International Civ il Rights Center and Museum in March, and another $778.86 for Greater Winston-Salem Inc. in May. These are not huge piles of money, but they add up. There is still $63,189,658.25 unclaimed in Forsyth County, and $83,508,796.64 in Guilford. These amounts haunt Folwell on pure principle, which in troduces a wonderful paradox about theForman.someone who believes that the government is a terrible steward of the people’s money, he is actually doing a fair job of it.
2 |FRONTUPSEPT.1-7,2022 1451 S. Elm-Eugene St. Box 24, Greensboro, NC 27406 Office: 336.681.0704 First copy is free, all additional copies are $1. ©2022 Beat Media Inc. TCB IN A FLASH @ triad-city-beat.com BUSINESS PUBLISHER/EXECUTIVE EDITOR Brian brian@triad-city-beat.comClarey PUBLISHER EMERITUS Allen allen@triad-city-beat.comBroach OF COUNSEL Jonathan Jones EDITORIAL MANAGING EDITOR Sayaka sayaka@triad-city-beat.comMatsuoka CHIEF CONTRIBUTORS Suzy james@triad-city-beat.comJamesFieldersDouglas ART ART DIRECTOR Charlie charlie@triad-city-beat.comMarion SALES KEY ACCOUNTS Chris chris@triad-city-beat.comRudd AD MANAGER Noah noah@triad-city-beat.comKirby CONTRIBUTORS Carolyn de Berry, John Cole, Owens Daniels, Luis H. Garay, Kaitlynn Havens, Jordan Howse, Matt Jones, Autumn Karen, Michaela Ratliff, Jen COVER: WS: Danielle Bull [photo by Jerry GSO:Cooper]Diana Rosario [photo by Sayaka Matsuoka]
EDITOR’S Brian Clarey
Folwell has always been the type of Republican who keeps a pencil.sharp
whereisFolwellaleevery these surerna’sNorthdays.Carolistatetreahasbeen raising his profile of late. He’s been the subject of a lengthy profile in the Assembly last month, documenting his battles with NC hospitals for cheaper healthcare. And he made an appearance at the NC Press Associ ation’s awards banquet last week, to present anThat’saward.where I caught up with him. We talked about the old days, when he was part of the GOP takeover of the Gen eral Assembly, of the new political environment in which he must now operate, and about Trump’s effect on North Carolina Republicans.Buthereally wanted to talk about his campaign to reunite North Carolinians with their cash through a state-sponsored website, nccash. com. It’s where unclaimed pay checks, stock dividends, bank rem nants and other pieces of financial detritus end up, just waiting to be picked up by their rightful owners. Every state has a program like this; Folwell just takes it personally.
NOTEBOOK WEBMASTER Sam LeBlanc Sorensen, Todd Turner FOURTHFOOTHILLSPARTYBLOCKBREWING’SSTREETVAGABONDSAINTSSOCIETY SATURDAY SEPTEMBER 3 7-10 PM 638 W. FOURTH ST. FOOTHILLS BREWING PAYING TRIBUTE TO “DURAN DURAN” Produced By The Downtown Winston-Salem Partnership downtownws.com by
Nickel-and-diming with Dale Folwell
THURSDAY Sept. 1 Garden Scientist @ Caldcleugh Multicultural Art Center (GSO) 5:30 p.m.
Angelo’s Artisan Market and Wise Man Brewing are hosting a fall market featuring unique, handmade items and gifts. Food trucks in attendance include Twin City Minis and El Burrito Bueno. Contact kris tin@catbirdartandevents.com if you’re interested in participating as a vendor.
Greensboro Parks and Recreation invites youth ages 7-12 to this free program full of outdoor science ex periments at the Caldcleugh Garden. These engaging activities educate participants about garden manage ment while incorporating chemistry, geology, ecology and meteorology. Find the registration link on the event page on Facebook.
Artist Support Grants Information Session
Darrell Hoots @ Frady’s Taphouse and Eatery (HP) 6 p.m.
20227,-1SEPT.FRONTUP|
CITY LIFE SEPT. 1-7
In partnership with ArtsGreensboro, Arts Davidson County, Davie County Arts Council, High Point Arts Council and the Randolph Arts Guild, Artist Support Grants is offering grants from $500 to $2000 to individual artists and groups of collaborating artists in Forsyth, Davidson, Davie, Guilford, and Randolph counties. Applications open Sept. 1, but join this online information session to learn more about the grant process before applying. Register at intothearts. org/post/artist-support
SUNDAY Sept. 4
WEDNESDAY Sept. 7
Beehive: The ’60s Musical @ Barn Dinner Theatre (GSO) 6 p.m.
SATURDAY Sept. 3 SUPtember Paddleboard Demo Day @ Oak Hollow Sailing Marina (HP) 10 a.m
Funk You is bringing their funky sound characterized by hard-hitting beats and powerful horns from Augus ta, GA to High Point. They’ll be joined by Funk Mob, The Kind Thieves and Ranford Almond. Learn more about the band and purchase tickets on the event page on Facebook.
Funk You @ Ziggys.Space (HP) 12 p.m.
@ Arts Council of Winston-Salem & Forsyth County (W-S) 5:30 p.m
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Fourth Street Block Party @ Foothills Brewing (W-S) 7 p.m. Foothills Brewing in partnership with Winston-Salem is shutting down Fourth Street block party featuring food, beer and a free Duran Duran tribute concert by Vagabond Saints Society. Find more information at downtownws.com
FRIDAY Sept. 2 NC Comedy Festival @ Idiot Box Comedy Club (GSO) Former WXII reporter and owner of the Idiot Box Comedy Club Jennie Stencel is hosting the NC Comedy Festival until Sept. 11, where more than 250 per formers from across the US and Canada will present standup, sketch and improv comedy shows at various venues in the Triad. Showtimes and ticket prices vary by show. Purchase at nccomedyfestival.com.
Send your events calendar@triad-city-beat.comto for consideration.
Stop by Frady’s for live acoustic tunes provided by the talented Darrell Hoots.
Fall Angelo’s Artisan Market @ Wise Man Brewing (W-S) 12 p.m.
Yoga @ Craft Recreational Center (GSO) 6:30 p.m. Join Milanda McGinnis every Thursday for an adults-only free flow yoga class. No experience is necessary to participate.
GetOutdoors Pedal & Paddle is hosting a stand up paddleboard demo day where you can try both hard boards and inflatables for free. Paddles and life jack ets will be provided. No registration required. Visit the event page on Facebook for more information.
by MICHAELA RATLIFF
Barn Dinner Theatre Presents “Beehive: The 60’s Musical,” the coming-of-age tale of 6 young women from the 60s featuring hits from the decade like “My Boyfriend’s Back” and “Son of a Preacher Man.” Call 336.292.2211 to reserve seats.
Mega Mega Mega Group Show Closing Reception @ Greensboro Project Space (GSO) 6 p.m. Mega Mega Mega founder and artist Peter Schroth organized an online art gallery at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic so artists’ work could still be seen. Now, that art is on display in the real world thanks to a partnership with Greensboro Project Space. Join the artists for a closing reception featuring live music from David Childers. Visit megamegamega. net for more information.
“I like it for the simple reason that God blessed me and blessed someone else to tell me about it,” Hunt says. “Therefore, I agreed to getting the solar panels.”
In general, they were looking for homes with owners who qualified as low-in come. They also had to make sure that the homes were in good enough shape to have the panels installed. Once Community Housing Solutions came on board, finding the homes proved to be easier because of the work the organization has already done in the community.
“So far, the saving for the 10 homes combined has been about $4,000,” said Brandon Pendry of Southern Energy Management, an energy-efficiency and solar power company. “That’s an average of $400 saved per family.”
hen Wynetta Delois Hunt’s living room ceiling started leaking a few years ago, she didn’t think fixing it was going to be such a transfor mative process.
Taking up most of the surface area on the back of her roof are more than a dozen brand-new solar panels.
A collaborative spirit he installation of the 10 solar projects, which were set up in Novem ber 2021, was due to the combined efforts of four different organi zations: the national HBCU Clean Energy Initiative, NC A&T State University’s Center for Energy Research and Technology, Southern Energy Management and Community Housing Solutions. It started with the HBCU Clean Energy Initiative, a national advocacy group for community development around clean energy. In the last few years, the organiza tion has been conducting roundtables to bring funders on board to complete some of their work. In 2020, the JPB Foundation awarded the group $700,000 to install solar panels for moderate-to-low-income families across the country. After con necting with Southern Energy Management in Raleigh and A&T, Greensboro was picked as the project’s first city.
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They looked for homes that they had worked on that had new or recently re paired roofs. They wanted ones that were energy efficient already with roofs that were unobstructed by trees or other buildings. Many of the homes they identified that had been repaired are owned by older adults or disabled homeowners like
These days, as drivers go by, they’ll see the newly installed shingles on Hunt’s roof as well as the maroon awning that stretches across the front of her home. They might notice that her porch has been recently painted, the neatly trimmed shrubs and hostas that round out the landscaping. A little harder to discern are the objects that peek out just above the roofline on either side of the brick chimney. Once in Hunt’s backyard however, the picture becomes more clear.
The local organization has made a name for itself through providing repairs and ownership opportunities to low-income homeowners in Guilford County. After the tornado ripped through homes in East Greensboro in 2018, the organization helped rebuild or repair many of the affected houses. They’ve also been working in partnership with A&T to weatherize local homes. In November, Wynetta Hunt called Community Housing Solutions to fix her roof. That’s how she became a candidate for the solar panels.
“A&T reached out and asked, ‘Hey, do you know of any homes in East Greens boro that would be good candidates for solar panels?’” said Gene Brown, the president and executive director of Community Housing Solutions. “That’s how we got involved.”
Hunt, who has owned the small two-bedroom house off of Freeman Mill Road in the Smith Homes neighborhood for almost three decades, is one of 10 Greens boro homeowners who had solar panels installed on their homes last year. A collab orative partnership between a number of local and national organizations made it possible to provide the energy-efficient structures, normally quite expensive, to the homeowners for free.
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“A&T brought forward partners that they already had including Community Housing Solutions,” said Henry Golatt, the chief of strategy and partnerships for the HBCU Clean Energy Initiative. “Those relationships led us to the 10 homes that got done.”
PHOTO BY SAYAKA MATSUOKA
‘Life changing’ effort brings free solar panels to low-income families in Greensboro Sayaka Matsuoka Wynetta Delois Hunt stands in front of her home in the Smith Homes neighborhoodGreensboro.of
Collaborative
One of the reasons is due to the confusing nature of the current solar market. A predatory market t’s not uncommon for door-to-door salespeople to walk through neighborhoods, trying to sell homeowners solar panels. And many of them are predatory in nature, according to Brandon Pendry of Southern Energy Management.
“The solar industry is insanely wide in North Carolina,” Pendry said. “Basically there is a mix of two different pricing structures. One is local installers who price things in a fair manner at one level and then there’s the national tier of installer. These are companies where you would know their name more than you would know ours. They price their panels 30-40 percent over market and they do it through misleading marketing terms like ‘heavy-cash back incentives’ on the front end or ‘no payments for a year.’ Those are the kinds of programs they are market
5 20227,-1SEPT.NEWS| NEWS I Hunt who have limited mobility, while new homes built by CHS tend to be owned by younger families or families with single parents. Many of the homes are within a few miles of A&T.
Despite the good intentions of the project however, the organizers found that they had a barrier to overcome when it comes to selling people on solar panels, even when they are free.
“One of the things that we learned from this project is that a lot of families are unfamiliar with solar,” Powell said. “Some of them were very reluctant to accept this gift. There were legitimate questions that people had.”
“We wanted to find houses within the footprint of A&T,” said Bob Powell, a re cently retired associate professor in the college of engineering at A&T. “We wanted the houses to be in our community and have appropriate solar access.”
The system works by having the panels convert sunlight into electricity. An inverter converts the energy from the panels into electricity for the home. Extra energy gets put back in the grid, helping to offset future bills. “Especially now, with inflation and everything going up, it’s always good to have a little extra to put away for emergencies,” Rosario said.
“I shot Gene an email and I said, ‘I’m interested in this,’” Rosario said.
The North Carolina Sustainable Energy Association has a code of conduct that is meant to curb this kind of predatory behavior and the association lists compa nies it has deemed fair on its site. Southern Energy Management is on that list.
According to Pendry, the average cost to install solar panels on one’s home is about $25,000. A report by Consumer Affairs lists the average price for North Carolina homeowners at about $14,000. Still, that’s a lot for a low or even mid dle-income family.
“We look at what our standard pricing is and we see what we can afford to make a tiny profit or just break even,” Pendry said. “The goal of this project isn’t to make money, it’s to make sure people who are underrepresented in our solar world are represented.”
“They didn’t want to show it to me because they say a lot of people get scared because the home wasn’t renovated,” Rosario said. “I came and I saw it and I said, ‘That’s my home,’ and I wanted to be a part of fixing it…. I had to just envision the vision.” After buying her home through CHS, Rosario joined the board of the orga nization, which has a requirement that a third of the members have to be repre sentative of the low-income community. Then, last year, Rosario heard about the solar-panel project and CHS’s involvement.
According to Zillow, Hunt’s home was valued at about $40,000 in 2014, the year she inherited it. Over the years the value has steadily risen to an average of about $70,000, but in the last six months, after the home got the panels, the value shot up to about $93,000. And that makes Hunt happy because she plans to give the home to her daugh ters who she hopes will sell it and split the money between them and their children.
According to Pendry, SEM is the oldest solar company in North Carolina and started back in 2001. Since 2010, the company has been a certified B corporation that has focused on participating in several community initiatives. That includes working with the HBCU partnership and Habitat for Humanity in the Triangle. Through those relationships, the company provides solar panels at a discount.
In addition to working with the previous homeowner, Hunt worked in the homes of some of the wealthiest families in Greensboro. Some of them were members of the Morehead family that had owned the Blandwood Mansion downtown in previous generations.
All of the homes with the new solar panels are owned by Black and Brown fami lies, Golatt said. And that has a lasting impact.
Christmas cards from the Morehead family sit next to cards from her own rela tives in Hunt’s living room. Growing up in a poor Black family as one of 12 children, Hunt said that working
Rosario’s home, which is located off of Gillespie Street about 10 minutes from Hunt’s home closer to A&T’s campus, has also seen a significant increase in value in the last year. In 2018 when Rosario bought the home, it was valued at about $68,000. In December 2021, the value had shot up to $122,000. Now, it’s at about $140,000 according to Zillow.
ing. The price that you pay ends up being quite a bit more than what the program is worth.”Because these tactics are widely used within the industry, Powell said they had to work with the homeowners to build trust.
In November 2021, Rosario got 17 panels installed on her roof. Since then, her electricity bill has decreased significantly. “My light bill was coming in $120, $130 every month,” Rosario said. “My hus band has the TV on all the time, my son be playing games and my daughter’s TV is on all the time. You know, cooking and appliances are running. We always have the A/C running in the summer. In the winter, the heat is always running. So I’m pretty sure that has something to do with it.”
Eventually, she hopes to be able to use those extra savings to help her kids, aged 11 and 15, when they go to college. “It’s tough out here so I want them to have a little head start if they decide to move,” she said.
In Wynetta Hunt’s case, she said before the panels were installed, she was paying about $65 for her electric bill for her 900 square-foot home. These days, her bill comes in at around $15 per month.
“The industry is on the upswing,” Pendry said. “Actors take advantage of the lack of knowledge so the burden falls on all of us. It falls on the installers, the me dia to report those things well.… Our hope is that as the industry grows, there will be light shed on those things.”
Of course, not all of the homes’ value change can be attributed to the solar pan els. As has been reported for months, the housing market has been red hot, with prices skyrocketing nearly 20 percent in the third quarter of 2021, compared to the same period in 2020. Still, for low-income families, particularly Black and Brown families, who have struggled to build wealth over generations, the extra savings as well as added value from solar panels can be immeasurable.
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Since connecting the panels to the grid in January, her bill has consistently come in between $30-75 — a 50 percent decrease.
“We had to let people know we are not those people,” Powell said.
Big savings, increased value n 2014, Diana Rosario purchased her first home through Com munity Housing Solutions. Initially, she and her fiancé were just looking for something to rent but found out that they qualified for a home through the organization. The one she got was a fixer-up per. It didn’t have any flooring, had no appliances, but the roof had been recently renovated.
Rosario’s home is about 1,150 square feet with three bedrooms and two baths.
‘They are for all the people’ hen you think about environmental injustice, Black and Brown communities have been exploited by dirty fuel, hog farms,” said Henry Golatt, with the HBCU Clean Energy Initiative. “These programs we want to be able to lift up what it means to clean up and use clean energy.”
In addition to educating people about solar, the organization teaches budgeting and financial behavior modification to deploy the savings on a monthly basis and build generational wealth. And for Wynetta Hunt, just having the solar panels is a point of pride for her. Hunt inherited her home eight years ago after living with the homeowner as his primary caretaker for years. Hunt had gone to nursing school and worked as a homeaid at the time when the previous owner passed away. “He left everything to me,” she said.
“I still keep in touch with the families that I have taken care of,” Hunt said.
“When you’re retired, you have a fixed income,” Hunt said. Plus, Hunt found that the value of her home increased after she installed the solar panels. “I know years ago when I moved here the value of it was really low, but after I saw I had work done to it, you know the city rides through and can see it’s had improvements done and things like that,” she said.
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“Solar is still not an affordable product for regular Americans,” he said. One such American is Diana Rosario.
Rosario, who is Hispanic, said that she, too, had always assumed that solar panels were only for the wealthy.
But seeing how it’s helped her, she wishes more senior citizens like her would take advantage of the opportunity if they get it.
“I know a lot of people in my church and all over the world are paying these high bills,” she said. “I wish more people knew about the solar panels.”
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Right now, Golatt said that they are aggressively looking for additional funders to do more projects like the one in Greensboro. They also installed solar panels on four homes in Winston-Salem earlier this year. Currently, they’re starting a similar project in Charlotte.
“For us, it’s been life changing,” she said.
“The average home we serve is offsetting 80 percent of their energy use,” Pendry said. “From an environmental standpoint, that’s the equivalent of 68,000 miles not driven or about four or five cars off the road per year, and that’s just these 10 homes.”Through an app set up by Southern Energy Management, homeowners can also see how much energy they are saving every month. Many of the families were surprised at how quickly their costs went down.
“They said, ‘Oh, I don’t want to be bothered by this,’ or, ‘I don’t want to be bothered by that,’” she said.
Rosario, who works as a sales manager at Cricket Wireless, said she would sometimes ride along with her fiancé who works as a delivery driver for“WeAmazon.would go to these, you know, whiter neighborhoods and a lot of them have solar panels,” she said. “And I would be like, ‘Those are cool but they’re really expensive.’”
With a volatile economy combined with the drastic effects of climate change, having solar panels can be a lifeline for low-income homeowners like Rosario and Hunt.According to an analysis by Princeton University from 2020, the impacts of climate change “are more likely to be felt disproportionately by those who suffer socioeconomic inequalities. In the United States, people of color are found to be particularly more vulnerable to heatwaves, extreme weather events, environmental degradation and subsequent labor market dislocations.” Solar energy can help alleviate some of those effects by offsetting energy output.
“I was working in these white homes and they had wallpaper in their bathrooms,” she said. “I had never seen no Black people with wallpaper; I liked it.” Years later, Hunt got wallpaper installed in her own home. When she first found out about the solar panels, Hunt had a similar reaction. Her daughter had seen homes with solar panels as she drove to and from work, but most of them were on homes in white neighborhoods.
And for Rosario who doesn’t plan on selling her home but envisions keeping it in the family for generations to come, she says she’s grateful she had the opportunity to be a part of the project.
One of the notable things about this project is the number of partners and col laborations that formed to make it possible. Gene Brown with Community Hous ing Solutions said that the model could be replicated in other cities if organizations are willing to work together.
Rosario said that she told a few of her friends who are interested, too. “It means a lot especially around here,” she said. “You know, this is not one of the best neighborhoods, but maybe it will give other neighbors motivation, like ‘Maybe we could have them here.’ This is not just for, you know, high-class neigh borhoods. Of course, we got them at no cost so it’s something that you would have to save up for.”
“There is a spirit of collaboration and partnership in the way we’re doing things,” he said. “None of us are here to serve our own organization. Instead, we’re focused on the homeowner and how we can provide a greater benefit for them.”The right partnerships plus increased awareness of solar energy in general could help fund future projects, Brown said. “Here in Greensboro, the fact that we installed solar panels, that can have a ripple effect,” he said. “This project has gotten some exposure throughout the state. I would think the success of this program has the potential to spread in North Carolina and across the country.”
The back roof of Diana Rosario’s house is covered by solarmultiplepanels.
As far as getting others on board, Hunt said she’s talked to a few of her neigh bors about solar panels, but they don’t seem interested.
“We want to get to a scalable model that’s financially feasible,” Golatt said. “Once we get to a certain level of awareness of free solar, we’re looking at diversi fying how to provide to low-income households who maybe just pay 10 percent to make it more scalable.”
7 20227,-1SEPT.NEWS| NEWS for rich, white families made an impression on her.
PHOTO BY SAYAKA MATSUOKA
“They are for all the people regardless of what race they are,” sheDianasaid.
“I was just shocked,” Rosario said. “I was just like, ‘Oh my god.’” ‘It’s been life changing’ iven the success of the project, the collaborators are cautiously optimistic about growing the program. Of course, because of the grant that the HBCU Clean Energy Initiative received from the JPB Foundation, the 10 homeowners in Greensboro didn’t have to pay anything to have the solar panels installed. In the long run, the organizers know that this isn’t a sustainable endeavor.
“One of the challenges is that free panels are not sustainable,” said Powell. “But what we’re getting out of this is validation and testimonials so people can see that yes, this stuff is wonderful.”
“I don’t know anyone who is Black like me who has them,” Hunt said. But she wants everyone to have access to them.
“I always had heard that they’re so expensive and so I was like ‘Okay, well that’s not something I know I can afford,’ right?,” she said. “So it never really crossed my mind.”
8 |OPINIONSEPT.1-7,2022 OPINION EDITORIAL Jen Sorensen jensorensen.com
Winston-Salem’s (former) Confederate monument and history’s dustbin elieve it or not, we’re still talking Winston-Salem’sabout last surviving Confeder ate monument that once stood in front of city property on a promi nent downtown corner. But no more: The statue has been gone since March 2019 — just about a year after Silent Sam was torn down at UNC-Chapel Hill — and the city sold the building in 2014. And anyway, nobody is really sure who owns the statue, which should affect how the North Caro lina Supreme Court will rule on it. But the Daughters of the Con federacy — yes, still a thing — has laid claim to the statue, though they cannot prove ownership of it, according to arguments by Win ston-Salem City Attorney Angela Carmon. And there’s no way the city will put that thing back in the public eye. “We understand there are citi zens in Winston-Salem who value that statue,” she said. “We want to put it somewhere where it’s safe... so it can be enjoyed by individuals who enjoy seeing such monu ments.”Monument backlash began long before the Charlottesville Unite the Right skirmish, where counter-pro tester Heather Heyers was killed by a white supremacist “defending” that city’s Confederate statue. Most Americans did not realize how many of these monuments were put up at critical periods in US race relations, like the end of Reconstruction and beginning of Jim Crow in the late 1800s, and the passing of the Civil Rights Act in The1960.Winston-Salem statue was erected in 1905, not long after the US Supreme Court made the “sep arate but equal” decision on Plessy vs. Ferguson and seven years before the city enacted a citywide segregation ordinance These are the days the Daugh ters of the Confederacy want us to remember.Mostegregious is that the DotC are asking for “reparations” for the losses they incurred from the statue’s removal and storage. This word choice is not accidental — the case for reparations due to Black Americans affected by cen turies of slavery, segregation and white supremacy is well made. Reparations go not to the op pressors, but to the people who suffered under the injustice repre sented by that statue, which once stood in front of the courthouse in the busiest part of downtown Winston-Salem.Butliketheircause, the irony is lost.
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Since 2018, Stencel has run the North Carolina Comedy Festival, which will celebrate its fourth year starting Friday. The festival brings in about 300 acts from all over North America to Greensboro for 10 days; about 80 of the acts are local.
Stencel quickly got to work holding auditions for comedy troupes at the Cultural Arts Center downtown and the city’s first comedy group was born.
CULTURE
Sure, many in the community might recognize as the goofy traffic rapper from her TV news stint in the mid aughts, but these days, she’s just trying to keep the funny shit going. Not literal shit, although sometimes that’s part of her job.
“I’m the only full-time employee here,” Stencel says. “I clean the toilets. I don’t even do that in my own house.”
Cut to two decades later, there’s three troupes and more than 100 local stand-up comics that are active in the area. And Stencel thinks that the Idiot Box has a lot to do with that.
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Jennie Stencel and her husband founded the Idiot Box when they moved to Greensboro almost 20 years ago.
theFindingfunny:20yearsin,JennieStencel reflects on Triad comedy scene by Sayaka Matsuoka
In the last decade, the club has helped bolster the careers of many come
“In the last five to 10 years, we went from doing an open mic here and there to, ‘How do we make comedians out of who lives here? Who wants to do this as a hobby or a career or who wants to learn everything they can and go to New York or whatever?’” she says. “So that became a huge focus.”Inaddition to hosting regular shows every week, the Idiot Box puts on workshops for those looking to get into the industry including ones for im prov, stand-up and sketch. Plus, the club also helps up-and-comers figure out how to get headshots, reach out to bookers and market themselves. And that’s put the Triad on the comedy map.
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ennie Stencel is the unofficial mom of Triad comedy.
“When I first came here there wasn’t much,” Stencel says of the local scene. “There was just one comedy club, the Comedy Zone, and they were bringing in bigger acts but they didn’t use locals as much.”
For the last two decades Stencel has given countless hours of her time and energy into building up the local comedy scene. After moving to Greensboro from Chapel Hill, she opened Idiot Box to create a place for comedians to find their footing. “This comedy club, the intention is to grow local and regional talent,” she says. “We do bring in big acts, but that’s not really the focus. The focus is to help people that want to be creative have a place. So, we feature a lot of locals or North Carolina comics every week so you don’t have to move to a major city to get on stage.” And so far, it’s worked.
SAYAKA MATSUOKA
“This type of design isn’t really a huge money maker….I like helping the com ics. We really like seeing people from start to finish. From too scared to get on stage to where they’re a main player; it’s pretty cool.” Still, she’s not sure anyone is crazy enough to keep doing what she’s been doing.
“But if you’re wanting to buy it, I will sell it to you,” she laughs.
“It’s an amazing place to do comedy because you become such a better comedian so fast. You don’t walk in the room and everybody’s exactly from where you grew up and exactly the same thought process. You have to think about what you’re saying. You have no idea the background we all have, so it does help you think through your concepts more clearly.”
This year’s North Carolina Comedy Festival kicks off Friday and runs through Sept. 11. Find tickets and more info at idiotboxers.com.
“Our audience is super diverse; Greensboro is super diverse,” she says.
It’s an amazing place to do comedy because you become such a better comedian so fast. “ “
open mics, I give a speech and explain what free speech is be cause I don’t think people understand it anymore,” Stencel says. “I just say, ‘We’re going to make the assumption that we’re all good people; we’re gonna start from there. And then we’re gonna try to find the funny in things that we want to find the funny in.’” That of course doesn’t mean that Stencel allows derogatory or hateful speech in the club. Recently, she kicked a comic off the stage during an open mic after they made some offensive jokes. But for the most part, she wants audiences to understand that comedy is a form of storytelling; it’s going to resonate differently for each person because our lived experiences vary.
10 |CULTURESEPT.1-7,2022 CULTURE Spacious outdoor amphitheater | FREE Midday Mountain Music Music Center Road, Galax, VA | Parkway Milepost 213 (866) 308-2773, ext. 212 dians including Jourdain Fisher, Evan Williams, Julie Marchiano, Sayjal Joshi and Maddie Wiener. “The club is like a mom figure, I think,” she says. “I’m not going to say that I am, but I’ll say the club is. It sort of creates this feeling of, ‘Hey, we can all come to this home and do this thing.’” But the last couple of years have been tough. After all of the years of running the business, Stencel admits that 2020 was the first year that the club was set to make a profit. And then, well, you know.“From January to March was the best we had ever done and I was just about to start taking a paycheck,” she says. Plus, there’s also been a marked shift in comedy in the last several years, particularly after the polarizing effects of the 2016 election. More people have become sensitive to language use and the acceptability of topics that people can talk about has narrowed, and that heavily affects comedy, Sten cel says. She says she didn’t have people walk out of shows until the last four“Beforeyears.our
As she looks forward to this year’s comedy festival and beyond, Sten cel says she probably has about five solid years left in her. After that, who knows?“It’shonestly a really hard labor of love,” she says about running the club.
Danielle Bull opened Bull’s Tavern on Fourth Street back before Innovation Quarter or Industry Hill was ever a part of the downtown landscape.
I remember her father, Darrell, doing maintenance when Bull’s was first opening. He built the bar and the weathered polished tables with wood from an old train car. He made the cabinets behind the bar, the various stages throughout the years, the signs over the stage. He’d join customers on some days and act as a sort of goodwill ambassador over drinks.
“I was 29, and at a crossroads in life,” she says. “I thought back to the days when I bartended and how happy it made me.”
Bull had a corporate job but had grown bored. Taking a cue from other small venues, she had a “vision of creating a ‘music bar’ with the communi ty feel of a bar and the production quality of a venue.”
“I never had an investor or partner,” she says, “which was probably a mistake on my part… I was also so determined to execute my vision, I don’t think it would’ve worked for the best anyway.”
“He never wasted even an inch of material and made a lot from scrap,” Bull says. She sends over a few pictures of a proud father helping, building, smiling in the early days of the tavern.
by James Douglas In the Weeds: An ode to Bull’s Tavern by James Douglas ecades come and go; they can fly by in an in stant. One day, you’re off work on a Friday night, charging from bar to bar, talking your way into shows, shots and other people’s beds. The next, you find yourself in a quaint, ranch-style house with a well-groomed yard and you start to understand what David Byrne was laying down oh so many years ago: “This is not my beautiful house! This is not my beautiful wife!” That’s if you’re lucky. A lot can happen in a decade, flitting as it may Daniellebe.Bull arrived on the scene a decade ago; this week she is hanging up her hat and her spurs shall jingle jangle no more. Not on Fourth Street, at least. In 2012, Bull opened Bull’s Tavern next to Recreation Billiards, which opened in 1947, further cementing the block as a quintessential part of Winston-Salem’s nightlife. Rec had become a smokey, divey pool bar over the decades with old “Winston-Salem Street Scene” posters plastered on the walls, where shady locals (myself included) drank underneath the dilapidated sign that used to hang outside (It now hangs over the bath rooms). The owners have recently thrown some money into it and cleaned it up for the new young blood that was starting to come downtown. They saw potential in what Fourth Street could attain again, as did Bull. By the time Bull acquired the spot, it had gone through a few failed itera tions as a downtown bar. It was formerly Club Mod and before that, Speak easy Jazz, and when Bull took it over in 2012, downtown felt different. We didn’t have Innovation Quarter or Industry Hill at the time. It wasn’t quite the Wild-West-Punk-Club-Winston of the nineties, but the Money (outside inves tors, developers, politicians, robber barons) wasn’t fully aware of what was happening there either. It was still possible for a single person of limited means to open a sizable bar across the street from the Stevens Center, and so she did.
As Bull’s increased in popularity, Winston-Salem’s nightlife expanded as well. The bar never went without live shows for too long and as other small
12 |CULTURESEPT.1-7,2022 CULTURE
PHOTO BY JERRY COOPER D
The crowd roared in approval, and continued to party. Danielle, right, with her mother Lisa.
JERRY COOPER
The final shows were a celebration of the joy and camaraderie that everyone experienced there over the years. Bull got up and thanked the crowd on Saturday night with some memories, shout-outs, and some promises.“Don’tbe
This past week has been a bittersweet revival of what made Bull’s special. Many supporters, former employees, bands who’ve played over the years, couples who met there, the downtown bar community, have all made appearances to celebrate that little corner of the world. The patrons represent these microcosms of culture. The main regulars act almost as ambassadors when they visit other bars in the area. They can make alliances, trade goods, and even start wars with the new business es down the street who call them “ the poors,” or “those bastards.” It’s a badge of honor. You can claim a bar as your own. You can love it like your own. You can be as much a part of it as you can stand. Some bars serve as a surrogate family for those without one, or as a pressure release from your actual one. When it’s done right, a bar like Bull’s has a purpose for every person that walks through the door. It’s yours to fiercely defend, to celebrate in, or it can be a place to mourn losses. The finality of Bull’s isn’t mournful to Bull. It’s a meaningful end to something that was inher ently good.
13 20227,-1SEPT.|CULTURECULTURE venues closed, it remained viable and thriving. It was a place to pop in for a karaoke bout, to see a new traveling band or an old favorite. It was also a place to grab a quick drink during an intermission of Bizet’s Car men across the street or a shot to calm the nerves before a blind date.
sad because something is coming to an end,” she says, “Be glad it happened.”
Doug Davis, a longtime Winston musician with the Plaids and Vaga bond Saints Society, among others, said in a tribute post on Facebook that they went on to “play some [their] favorite shows at Bull’s, including a semi-regular tradition of Anti-Valentine and Halloween shows.”
SHOT IN THE TRIAD BY CAROLYN DE BERRY Summit Avenue, Greensboro
14 |TRIADTHEINSHOTSEPT.1-7,2022
Guilford County Schools are back in action. Featured here is Miss Lina Porter’s Schoolhouse at the Greensboro History Museum.
15 20227,-1SEPT.PUZZLES| ‘Point the Way’ — it feels like a lack of direction. SUDOKU LAST WEEK’S ANSWERS:Across 1. Ragnarok deity 5. Pang 11. Director Duplass 14. Intentionally low-cost items at Costco or Trader Joe’s 16. Ab ___ (from the beginning) 17. Hands-on environmentalists, so to speak 18. “Stupid Flanders” 19. Hi-___ clothing 20. “Rashomon” director Kurosawa 22. “Pericles, Prince of ___” 25. “That’s ___” (“The chances are pretty low 29.here”)Events that are fairly suspicious 33. Data path to a satellite 34. Mind’s I? 35. Rural road sign pictograph 37. “The Pioneer Woman” host Drummond 38. Song you may have to distract yourself out of 41. 23andMe material 42. “Game of Thrones” actress Chaplin 44. Luau side 45. Region with an anthem 47. Stylish 50. Earn $200 in Monopoly, possibly 51. Las predecessors 52. Tumbler 55. “Goodfellas” group © 2022 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com) © 2022 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com) CROSSWORD 57. Tombstone letters 58. 1996 Travolta/Slater film (or what’s found in the theme answers) 66. Homebrew output 67. Cicero or Seneca, e.g. 68. Donut container 69. Praiseful poets 70. Boldly resist Down 1. Estadio cheer 2. Med school grad 3. “Equal” prefix 4. Sydney’s state, for short 5. Lois, in a 1990s series 6. Capital on the Vistula 7. Ugandan despot Amin 8. “The Matrix” character 9. Wolfhound’s warning 10. French “attempts” (where we get the liter ary form from) 11. “Big Yellow Taxi” singer Mitchell 12. Affirm positively 13. Skywalker’s mentor 15. Cox of “Orange Is the New Black” 21. Britney’s ex, in 2000s tabloids 22. “My ___ Party” (Busta Rhymes song) 23. ___ Belova, one of the Marvel characters known as Black Widow 24. At-bat stat by Matt Jones 26. Starting to form, like a storm 27. Shakespearean “false friend” 28. “Buon ___!” 29. Cannes currency 30. Giraffes’ relatives 31. Try the number again 32. Guadalajara guys 36. Money in Johannesburg 39. Little joeys 40. What Snickers Almond replaced 43. Deadly slitherers 46. Points for a slam dunk 48. Mr. Potato Head maker 49. Stir up, as trouble 52. Take quickly 53. Stitch’s animated partner 54. ___ predator 56. John Lennon’s in-laws 59. TV host Serling 60. “Cheerleader” singer of 2015 61. ___ in “kilo” 62. ___ Racer (1987 Nintendo game) 63. Relative of a hwy. 64. “That can’t be good” 65. Bitingly ironic
