TOWN TALK
k l a t OF THE TOWNS by bill beggs jr.
the metro
‘Bait and switch’ is a timeworn sales scam technique that we don’t encounter much anymore. Say, back in the day, you saw a print ad for a VCR (that’s video cassette recorder, for Gen Z and some Millennials) that featured a built-in alarm clock and coffee maker. There was no such thing, of course, but a great idea, right? Automatically makes your morning coffee, wakes you up and runs a tape of last night’s news before you even leave the bed. So, if Sunday’s paper ran an ad for the product at Famous-Worth’s and you hurried downtown to check it out, the salesperson tells you they’re sold out—but over here is a VCR that dispenses bubblegum balls and plays a song by Sonny and Cher. Not exactly what you wanted, but you need a VCR … and the rest is history. Metro dailies here, there and everywhere may not have run ads like that for decades, but online is where bait and switch is rampant
olivette
Christo, the self-described ‘irrational’ artist, created monumental public works, such as completely wrapping the Arc de Triomphe in France and the Reichstag in Germany in fabric. He might have been proud of the mailbox in Olivette that’s been wrapped entirely in duct tape, for years. This updates our piece from four years ago about this objet d’art, after a fashion, on the northside of Old Bonhomme. We took a blurry photo on a foggy April morning in 2018. Clearly, not much has changed in what we thought must have been some sort of temporary repair. At first. The owner of a metro art gallery regularly passes the mailbox on his bicycle. It always makes him smile. As this issue’s photo was being taken, a pair of walkers called out, “Instagrammable, huh?”
rock hill
BILL BEGGS JR. HAS WORN MANY HATS AT NEWSPAPERS, MAGAZINES AND IN MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS SINCE BEFORE THE ERA OF THE FLOPPY DISC. NOW HE JUST WEARS A HAT TO KEEP HIS BALD SPOT FROM GETTING SUNBURNT. YOU CAN REACH HIM AT WRTRS.BLCK@GMAIL.COM
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TOWN&style
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AUGUST 10, 2022
TTia triv
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today. Surely, you’ve seen photos at the bottom or on the side of certain webpages—a plastic water bottle jammed between a car tire and wheel well with the question, “Why place a plastic bottle on your tire when you’re traveling alone?” Click to learn why, and you’ve entered a slideshow where 50 frames of ‘click bait’ keep you engaged while you try to find out just what the dang bottle on the tire is all about. Well, after 50 clicks claiming to help you regrow hair, lose weight, erase facial wrinkles and other snake oil variations, you never find out. We looked closely at the bottle in one photo. The label is in Russian, and snopes.com, which sniffs out dishonesty everywhere in the media, first labeled the claim as ‘false’ in 2018. Well, if nothing else, the Russians are persistent. Next up: Why should you carry a crayon in your wallet or wrap your doorknobs in aluminum foil?
Trainwreck Saloon, situated in a depression at 9243 Manchester Road in Rock Hill, is but one among dozens of businesses damaged by the deadly, record-setting torrential rains that caused flash flooding throughout the metro. This wasn’t owner George Hansford’s first water polo game, if you will. On the tail end of Hurricane Ike in September 2008, Deer Creek also overflowed its banks and spilled into the low point on the busy thoroughfare. Hansford recalls that muddy water was even deeper inside the saloon that Sunday morning than it was early on July 26. Remarkably, the restaurant was up and running five days after the recent deluge. The phones still didn’t work and much of the bar equipment was damaged, but hot food, cold bottles of beer and cans of soda were plentiful. “The community and our employees have been very supportive,” he says. That’s a bit of an understatement. Workers from two restaurants lucky to be on higher ground had come down to lend a hand. “Farotto’s definitely helped out,” Hansford says. “And O.B. Clark’s in Brentwood.” At his establishment, which just celebrated its 40th anniversary last month, Hansford’s seen fire and rain. A three-alarm blaze in February 2019, which destroyed a Woodard Cleaning & Restoration warehouse just across the narrowest part of Hansford’s parking lot, was perhaps even more nerve-racking. His vintage wooden building, which has operated as a tavern since 1890, would have gone up in an instant. Through the night, Hansford kept his mind off a potential catastrophe by making sure first responders got breakfast and stayed caffeinated. But back to water: Just two days after the disastrous flooding on the 26th, heavy rains caused more serious flooding. Homes in south city that had just begun drying out were flooded by the River Des Peres a second time. Storm sewers throughout the CWE were overwhelmed, and Left Bank Books, among other stores and restaurants, had flooded basements. A friend who lives in a high-rise on Lindell Boulevard right across from the Cathedral had to take the stairs from the 18th floor several times a day to walk the dogs because flooding had disabled the elevator motors; reportedly, the undercroft of the Cathedral took on water, as well. But the Trainwreck and neighboring Rock Hill businesses were spared. “The water only came up to street level,” Hansford says.
WHAT DID CHRISTO DO FROM 1980 TO 1983 TO 11 ISLANDS IN BISCAYNE BAY OFF MIAMI?
LAST ISSUE’S Q&A Ralston Purina formed in the 1890s—and originally had a hyphen between Ralston and Purina. What were each of those two companies’ core businesses? A company named Ralston joined with a company named Purina in the late 19th century to form Ralston-Purina. It was a good match, as they were in similar lines of business: Ralston made whole-grain breakfast cereal; Purina made feeds for pets and livestock, from cat and dog chow to horse chow. The century-long partnership ended in 2001 when the company merged with Swiss conglomerate Nestlé.
