october
B A LT I M O R E ’ S
C U R I O U S
2006
F O R
issue no. 28
bad news: award-winning journalist tom fenton on media and democracy family heirloom: the rare apples of reid’s orchard dancing with the undead: a night at the zombie prom postcards from the edges: baltimore turns the camera on itself
Urba Urbanite nite
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october 2006 issue no. 28
F O R
B A LT I M O R E ’ S
C U R I O U S
issue no. 28
This replica of the Statue of Liberty sits atop the roof of Liberty Roofing, LLC, at 2127 Huntingdon Avenue. Robert Wirtz, owner of the company, says Liberty Roofing’s previous owner acquired the statue about fifteen years ago from a Baltimore department store that was closing, because it matched the company’s name.
2006
f e a t u r e s
october
october’s cover:
bad news: award-winning journalist tom fenton on media and democracy family heirloom: the rare apples of reid’s orchard dancing with the undead: a night at the zombie prom postcards from the edges: baltimore turns the camera on itself
52 breach of contract
in a divided political landscape, can americans find common ground again? by william j. evitts
the debates are heating up as candidates vie for your vote next month. while many of today’s partisans shout past each other, one writer wonders: have we completely lost our grip on the basics of american civics?
56
mad as hell a candid conversation with tom fenton on bias, democracy, and the failings of the american media by susan mccallum-smith
baltimore native tom fenton spent thirty-four years as a foreign correspondent for cbs news. last year, shortly after his retirement, fenton published bad news, taking all of the media (including cbs) severely to task for what he believes is the deteriorating quality of news coverage.
60
postcards from the edges of baltimore local arts group art on purpose put cameras in the hands of baltimoreans and sent them out into the streets. this is what came back. by bill mesler
peter bruun had an idea: give disposable cameras to residents of all ages in ten different neighborhoods and turn them loose. the result was not only fine art, but also a photographic document of baltimore through the eyes of its own.
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departments
19 what you’re saying
got something on your mind? this is the place for feedback from our readers
october 2006 issue no. 28
23
what you’re writing original, nonfiction essays written by readers this month’s topic: blunder
27 corkboard
six not-to-miss events around town
29 have you heard
people, places, and things you should know about
33
food: forgotten fruit a pennsylvania family farm brings heirloom apples to your farmers’ market joan jacobson
37 37
baltimore observed: dismantling the ghetto local initiatives attempt to give poor baltimoreans a choice for housing joan jacobson
43
encounter: they walk among us zombie culture in baltimore and all that it entrails catrina cusimano
47
space: inside st. stan’s a rare look at the interior of this fells point icon photos by anna santana and anne gummerson
67
sustainable city: design with the earth in mind an interview with sustainability expert david orr nicky penttila
43
71
out there: the creep that won’t quit the steady crawl of advertising into our lives tom lombardi
67
75
recommended
89
resources
94
eye to eye
books, bands, exhibits, and more
more information on topics covered in this issue
a closing thought, curated by art director alex castro
w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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A s e As o n of C e l e b r At io n
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Wednesday, October 18, 2006 – 7:30 pm
Jazz Guitarist Paul Bollenback draws inspiration from Puccini, Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, and his own muse in a program from his CD The Brightness of Being. Tuesday, October 24, 2006 – 8:00 pm
The Peabody Trio celebrates Shostakovich Wednesday, October 25, 2006 – 7:30 pm
leads the Peabody Singers in works by J.S. Bach, Dominick Argento, and Arnold Schoenberg.
Edward Polochick
8/23/06 3:19:38 PM
Urbanite Issue 28 October 2006 Publisher Tracy Ward Durkin Tracy@urbanitebaltimore.com General Manager Jean Meconi Jean@urbanitebaltimore.com Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth A. Evitts Elizabeth@urbanitebaltimore.com Guest Editor Matthew Crenson Executive Editor Heather Harris Heather@urbanitebaltimore.com Editor Marianne Amoss Marianne@urbanitebaltimore.com Copy Editor Angela Davids/Alter Communications Contributing Editors William J. Evitts Joan Jacobson Susan McCallum-Smith Contributing Writer Jason Tinney Art Director Alex Castro Production Manager Lisa Macfarlane Lisa@urbanitebaltimore.com Traffi c/Production Coordinator Bellee Gossett Bellee@urbanitebaltimore.com Designer Jason Okutake Web Coordinator George Teaford Administrative Assistant Catrina Cusimano
we look great from every angle
Senior Account Executives Keri Haas Keri@urbanitebaltimore.com Susan R. Levy Susan@urbanitebaltimore.com Account Executives Darrel Butler Darrel@urbanitebaltimore.com Bill Rush Bill@urbanitebaltimore.com Marketing Kathleen Dragovich Kathleen@urbanitebaltimore.com
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Intern Meghana Kulkarni Founder Laurel Harris Durenberger Advertising/Editorial/Business Offi ces P.O. Box 50158, Baltimore, MD 21211 Phone: 410-243-2050; Fax: 410-243-2115 www.urbanitebaltimore.com Editorial inquiries: Send queries to the editor-in-chief (no phone calls, please) including SASE. The magazine is not responsible for unsolicited manuscripts or artwork. Urbanite does not necessarily support the opinions of its authors. To subscribe or obtain assistance with a current subscription, call 410-243-2050. Subscription price: $18 per year. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission by Urbanite is prohibited. Copyright 2006, Urbanite LLC. All rights reserved.
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Urbanite (ISSN 1556-8105) is a free publication distributed widely in the Baltimore metropolitan area. If you know of a location that urbanites frequent and would recommend placing the magazine there, please contact us at 410-243-2050. Postmaster: Send address changes to Urbanite Subscriptions, P.O. Box 50158, Baltimore, MD 21211
editor’s note
quotes democracy is only a dream: it should be put in the same category as arcadia, santa claus, and heaven. —H. L. Mencken, Baltimore-born writer
de·moc·ra·cy (n): a government by the people
photo by Sam Holden
the spirit of democracy cannot be
we lost a great voice in the civic discourse of cities when Jane Jacobs passed away earlier this year
at the age of 89. In the introduction to her 1961 classic The Death and Life of Great American Cities , Jacobs tells the story of a public housing tower in New York’s East Harlem and the residents’ hatred of a rather innocuous green lawn. Why, Jacobs asked, would something as seemingly lovely as green space so enrage and frustrate a community? The neighborhood in question, Jacobs explained, had recently been leveled to make way for those housing towers. Few of the residents had a choice to live in the newly erected buildings. Others, their neighbors and friends, were scattered into units across the city. The residents hated that lawn because it represented an official vision of progress. But it didn’t much feel like progress to them. “Nobody cared what we wanted when they built this place,” one resident explained. “They threw our houses down and pushed us here and pushed our friends somewhere else. We don’t have a place around here to get a cup of coffee or a newspaper … . But the big men come down and look at the grass and say, ‘Isn’t it wonderful! Now the poor have everything.’” “There is a quality meaner than outright ugliness or disorder,” Jacobs wrote about the development in the ghetto, “and this meaner quality is the dishonest mask of pretended order, achieved by ignoring or suppressing the real order that is struggling to exist and to be served.” Jacobs was reminding us that true democracy swells from the ground up. What is that real order that is struggling to be served? What do the people in the communities truly want? Today, the public housing towers that Jacobs described are being torn down and replaced with new kinds of affordable housing. But, as Urbanite Contributing Editor Joan Jacobson explains in her article on Baltimore’s housing crunch, we are still struggling with how to serve the real needs of our entire community. Jacobson profiles two controversial projects that aim to give residents in poor urban communities a chance to choose the kinds of neighborhood they would like to inhabit (p. 37). And what do the citizens themselves want from the city? Baltimore’s Peter Bruun and the folks at Art on Purpose set out to answer that question with their ambitious Real City, Dream City project profiled this month by writer Bill Mesler (p. 60). The project took art to the streets, giving cameras to residents in ten communities and asking them to shoot what they love and hate about the city. These photographic essays became a springboard for discussion about the true wants and needs of residents in those neighborhoods. As elected officials at the helm consider policy, it is paramount for them to remember their connection to the constituency. Democracy is dialogue. It is the voice of a people spoken to and through their elected officials. It is fluid because the needs of the masses evolve. It demands a constant questioning and debate. It is also valuable for us to remember our own role in this process. If you’re anything like me, you have increasingly felt a disconnect between the government and the governed. It seems that the “of the people” part of democracy is getting lost in the frenzied partisan rhetoric. So in the height of the election season, as we prepare to make our collective trip to the polls, we asked Contributing Editor and U.S. historian William J. Evitts to take a step back and consider the very fundamentals of our democracy (p. 52). And since the writer is my father, I can tell you it’s a topic that’s stimulated some heated debate at our own family gatherings. I hope this issue will also give you plenty to talk about. —Elizabeth A. Evitts
imposed from without. it has to come
from within.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi, pioneer of civil disobedience and leader of the Indian independence movement
the thing about democracy, beloveds, is that it is not neat, orderly, or quiet. it requires
a certain relish for confusion.
—Molly Ivins, American syndicated political columnist
democracy! bah! when i hear that word i
reach for my feather boa!
—Allen Ginsberg, American Beat poet and writer
in a democracy, letting the people know
the truth is the essence of what it means to be free. —Barbara Boxer, American politician and current junior U.S. senator for California
in a good democracy, dissent is an
act of faith.
—J. William Fulbright, U.S. senator and founder of the Fulbright Program
democracy means simply the
bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people. —Oscar Wilde, Irish writer and playwright
there are two things which a democratic people will always find very difficult—to
begin a war and to end it. —Alexis de Tocqueville, French political thinker and historian
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contributors
behind this issue with guest editor matthew crenson
William J. Evitts is a historian, teacher, and writer with a special interest in American history and culture. He describes himself as a “synthesizer and explainer” and is especially interested in illuminating contemporary life through historical insight, which he did in this month’s feature article “Breach of Contract.” Educated at The Johns Hopkins University (bachelor of arts and doctorate) and the University of Virginia (master of arts), Evitts is the author of three books and numerous articles, and has edited two volumes of the forthcoming Abraham Lincoln: A Life. In addition to his writing, he also offers courses through the Hopkins Master of Liberal Arts Program and is one of Urbanite’s contributing editors (and Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth A. Evitts’ father).
photo by Jason Okutake
Susan McCallum-Smith Susan McCallum-Smith is a freelance writer, book reviewer, and fiction and screenplay editor. Currently she reads for The Baltimore Review and, as the literary editor of Urbanite, edits the “What You’re Writing” department and writes the fiction section of the new “Recommended” department every month. A graduate of the Johns Hopkins University Master of Arts in Writing Program and a native of Scotland, McCallum-Smith is completing her first novel while undertaking the Bennington Writing Seminars MFA. She has participated in the Sewanee and Bread Loaf writers’ conferences, the Kenyon Review Workshops, and the Robert McKee Screenplay Seminar. This month, McCallum-Smith interviewed former CBS News senior foreign correspondent Tom Fenton.
courtesy of Anna Santana
Anna Santana Photographer Anna Santana grew up in what is now known as Upper Fells Point, at a time when, she says, property values were weak but community values were strong. Santana’s photographs of the interior of St. Stanislaus Church appear in this issue. About her experience shooting the space, she says, “I was the only person inside the dark church on one of the hottest days in August 2005. I was walking through the church while feeling the statues’ eyes on me. I respected that it was once a place of worship.” Santana’s photographs have been shown in various places in East Baltimore and in the Baltimore Guide; she has been printing for commercial and event photographers and managing photographic studios and labs in Southeast Baltimore for more than twenty years.
photo by Jason Okutake
George Teaford George Teaford, Urbanite’s new part-time Web coordinator, is originally from Columbus, Ohio. He earned a bachelor of fine arts degree in studio art from Beloit College in Wisconsin and a post-baccalaureate degree from Maryland Institute College of Art. Teaford’s work (mixed-media installation) has been shown at Area 405 Gallery in the Station North Arts District. He has started to work in graphic design in the last year. Teaford’s varied interests include Ohio State football, architecture, and urban planning. He settled in Baltimore four years ago and currently lives in Mount Vernon with his girlfriend and their two Baltimore City cats.
Matthew Crenson is a political scientist who specializes in the study of urban politics and American political development. Born in Baltimore, Crenson earned a bachelor of arts from The Johns Hopkins University and a doctorate in political science from the University of Chicago. In 1969, he joined the department of political science at the Johns Hopkins University where he continues to teach today. Crenson is faculty director of the Baltimore Scholars Program, which provides full-tuition scholarships to graduates of the Baltimore City public schools who qualify for admission to Johns Hopkins. He is the author or coauthor of seven books, most recently Presidential Power: Unchecked and Unbalanced (with Benjamin Ginsberg) to be published this fall.
photo by Adam Schoonover
photo by Lisa MacFarlane
William J. Evitts
E
lections are the principal working parts of American democracy. But elections don’t seem to be working. Since 1896, voter turnout in presidential elections has generally been on a slide. It recovered temporarily during the Depression, only to crash again. And no wonder. What have elections done for us lately? The government grinds on, oblivious to public opinion or election returns. There was a time when low approval ratings or small victory margins might caution presidents against doing anything drastic. No more. Even before he was energized by the war on terror, President Bush, fresh from his 5-4 victory in the Supreme Court, pushed through a dramatic tax cut benefiting the wealthiest Americans and trashed a barge load of environmental agreements and orders left over from the Clinton administration. Citizens take a lot of abuse for the current state of American politics. They’re blamed for being politically uninformed, uninvolved, tethered to their TVs, PCs, DVDs, iPods, and cell phones, but disconnected from democracy. And it’s all true, but the blame is unfair. Americans of the past did not spontaneously rush the polling places. Political leaders mobilized them, persuaded them to become active. Today, leaders don’t work so hard to bring out the voters. Candidates don’t like to waste time and money on people who aren’t sure voters. They sift the voting records to identify those upstanding citizens who have turned out for the last several elections. This does nothing to expand the electorate. Of course, if the Democrats turned out more voters, they would probably win more elections. But the new voters might not elect the old Democrats. That’s why incumbent Democrats keep rounding up the usual suspects. Some political organizations don’t even do that much. Interest groups used to convince politicians to back their agendas by demonstrating grassroots support. Now, under legislation passed since the 1940s, they or their lawyers can get access to government regulatory agencies through requirements for public notice, comment, and hearings. Sometimes their lawyers used to work for the regulatory commissions themselves. Environmental organizations find that they can often get what they want, not by stirring up the citizens, but simply by suing the Environmental Protection Agency. None of this requires a show of citizen support. It doesn’t even require members. Most Washington interest groups these days have mailing lists, not memberships. Finally, think about our presidents with their executive orders, national security findings, executive agreements, signing statements, eavesdropping so secret even the secret court doesn’t find out about it, and of course the Patriot Act. Even if you don’t want to think about this very much, it should be obvious that presidents can get most of what they want without voters—even without Congress. Voting isn’t useless, but it isn’t enough. We need to come up with some other instruments of citizen influence. Here’s a place to start. Most of the really important things that our leaders do are done out of sight, but not campaign fund-raising. It’s all a matter of public record. We know who gave how much to whom. And we have Google. The courts tell us that giving money to political candidates is a form of free speech. Let’s show them what real free speech sounds like. Big-time campaign contributors are essentially public figures. They should get as much scrutiny as the candidates themselves. If they do, maybe they (and the candidates) will get leery about giving and getting political money. Then we can go after the TV stations that get fat on campaign ads. And it doesn’t have to stop there. Use your imagination. It’s the democratic thing. w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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urbanite october 06
update
what you’re saying
Your Space We want to hear what you’re saying. E-mail us at mail@urbanitebaltimore.com or send your letter to Mail, Urbanite, P.O. Box 50158, Baltimore, MD 21211. Submissions should include your name, address, and daytime phone number; letters may be edited for length and clarity.
Making a Place for Good Health Reading Fred Kent’s ingredients for designing healthy physical spaces (“The Art of Placemaking,” August) made me giddy with excitement over the parallels I saw for creating personal health. People struggling with chronic illnesses may benefit from approaching his ideas with curiosity and an open mind. As with place, seeking good health is a multidimensioned, passionate enterprise. I particularly liked, “You cannot know what you end up with.” You cannot know what you will end up with because “knowing” comes after the deed is done. Activity in both arenas requires a suspension of the need to know the outcome before proceeding. People with chronic illnesses grieve for what is lost—the sense of certainty that adhered to the old identity. Dismantling the old edifice and creating new empowerment zones in the psyche could correspond to creating healthy places in the environment. —Judy Mercier is a massage therapist who lives near Belvedere Square.
Marianne’s Space I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed “True Tales of MySpace” by Marianne Amoss (August). It was a wry but touching portrayal of the questing spirit one needs to cultivate. And the prose itself was supple and muscular. It was truly invigorating to read the essay. I hope essays by Ms. Amoss will become a regular feature in Urbanite. —Chris Toll is a poet and collage artist. He lives in Hamilton.
Memories of Amish Country Thank you for your article on the Amish of southeastern Pennsylvania (“Sentiment and the Soil,” August). I lived in the middle of an Amish community in the northwestern corner of that state. I did my
undergraduate studies at a small college in an even smaller town. At midnight, the sole traffic light would go from green-yellow-red sequences to flashing yellow. Its largest parking lot was reserved for horse-driven carts and buggies. I recall watching men cleaning up after their animals and, in winter, tending fires in the hearths. Giggling Amish maidens would set up stalls outside the dorms to sell wonderful baked goods, and their late autumn cider was always a sell-out. Alcohol was taboo on both the campus and in the township. As the Amish did not pasteurize, we added raisins or sugar to half-empty containers of cider, then buried them in the snow. After a week, if it did not explode, you had a liquid that could either be consumed by foolish students who thought they were ever-so-wicked, or—perhaps—be substituted for jet fuel. My junior year, I had a cellar apartment in a small hotel I managed; I also waited tables at an excellent restaurant across the street. I returned one evening to discover a hastily conceived bachelor’s party for an even more quickly conceived wedding. This motley crew was the usual assortment of townie friends, frat brothers and two Amish lads lured in from the street. We adjourned to a burlesque theater thirty miles away. Judging by their responses, this was their first exposure to naked women. When dropped off at their farms, each said that he knew a fierce but worthwhile trip to the woodshed would be in his immediate future. For many years I often visited a friend who, with his infant son, returned to live on his parent’s farm. His mother was in frail health so an Amish girl was hired to assist with housework and childcare. On one visit I entered the large farmhouse kitchen where the teenaged girl looked perplexed and everyone else was rolling on the floor, holding their sides and laughing. (To understand the commotion, you need to know three things: First, another Amish term for someone non-Amish is “gay” because outsiders’ clothes are so much more gay and colorful. Second, Amish men will start a beard the night of their marriage. Third, I have had a beard and have been a “confirmed bachelor” for over thirty-five years.) I was told that the innocent lass just inquired why, when the family’s gay friend visited, he always left his wife at home. Thanks for the memories.
Charm City Roller Girls The Charm City Roller Girls had yet to kick off their 2006 inaugural season when they were featured in Urbanite’s November 2005 issue. Since then, the motley league has taken strong, fast strides toward becoming a prominent player in the growing sport. The league’s bouts have become sophisticated exhibits of showmanship fused with raw skill. Since the start of their debut season, the league has collected a large base of fans intrigued by sheer attitude wrapped in fishnets; many of the girls have “groupies,” who often come to bouts turned out in their favorite team’s colors (there are four teams under the Charm City Roller Girls umbrella). Half-time thunders with live band performances, while team mascots—like militaryinspired Corporal Punishment, who represents The Speed Regime—rally for sideline support. The girls’ most visible success came in July at RollerCon, the annual national Roller Derby convention held in Las Vegas. Charm City’s all-star travel team triumphed in every bout while scoring twice that of their opposition. “We made quite a name for ourselves on the national scene in just three short days,” says Mercy Less, aka Kristin Hendrick, of the Mobtown Mods. Success at RollerCon and consistently soldout bouts have fueled local interest. There are currently sixty women in the league, including the “Fresh Meat” girls—rookies yet to experience their debut bout. Rachael Vermillion, aka Bitchin Wiccan, is a member of Pittsburgh’s Steel City Derby Demons league. She traveled to Baltimore for the Charm City playoffs in August. “Baltimore’s defense is tough. The blocking is great,” she says. “You can really see the teamwork in there.” Vermillion, who has also traveled to Columbus, Ohio, to see the sport in action before bouts begin in her own town, is inspired by Charm City’s quality of play: “These girls definitely measure up. It makes me want to start playing right now. I can’t wait to get out there.”
—Catrina Cusimano
—Gary F. Suggars works in real estate with a special focus on historic properties. He lives in Canton. w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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illustration by Jonathan MacNair
what you’re writing
“What You’re Writing” is the place for creative nonfiction from our readers. Each month, we pick a topic. Use the topic as a springboard into your own life and send us a true story inspired by that month’s theme. Only nonfiction submissions that include contact information can be considered. We have the right to heavily edit for space and clarity, but we will give you the opportunity to review the edits. You may submit under “name withheld” to keep your essay anonymous, but you do need to let us know how to contact you. If you’ve already changed the names of the people involved, please let us know. Due to libel and invasion of privacy issues, we reserve the right to print the piece under your initials. Submissions should be typed (and if you cannot type, please print clearly). Only one submission per topic, please. Send your essay to Urbanite, P.O. Box 50158, Baltimore, Maryland 21211 or to WhatYoureWriting@urbanitebaltimore.com. Please keep submissions under four hundred words; longer submissions may not be read due to time constraints. Due to the number of essays we receive, we cannot respond individually to each writer. Please do not send originals; submissions cannot be returned. The themes printed below are for the “What You’re Writing” department only and are not the themes for future issues of the magazine itself.
Topic
Deadline
Publication
City Life Saturday Night What You Believe But Can’t Prove Second Chance Laughter
Oct 13, 2006 Nov 10, 2006 Dec 15, 2006 Jan 19, 2007 Feb 16, 2007
Jan 2007 Feb 2007 Mar 2007 Apr 2007 May 2007
B LUNDER My cousin
was murdered on Fourth of July weekend in 1997. Along with two other victims, she was shot to death while working at a coffeehouse in Washington, D.C. Months rolled into years and it seemed as if the shooter was going to get away with murder. Every possible scenario and theory was thoroughly investigated. Each time hope was crushed and the case hurled back to the beginning due to a lack of hard evidence. The shooter, however, in his extreme pompousness, had started to brag. He couldn’t contain himself. He had to tell others how clever he had been—to know that there would be a lot of cash in the store on a holiday weekend, to have staked out the joint in advance, to have figured out how to get in and out without a trace, to have been so clever that those dumb detectives would never catch him.
His ceaseless blabber proved to be his crippling blunder. Eventually, a reluctant witness came forward, enabling those “dumb detectives” to link him with crimes committed in another county. He was indicted in 2001, tried on forty-eight counts of criminal acts, and jailed for life. What does he brag about now? ─—Erin Mahoney is a lifetime Baltimore resident who is very proud of her city.
I’d just moved
to California but had returned to Baltimore for a visit. I was getting out of my car on Cold Spring Lane on my way to see some friends, when someone approached me quickly from the side.
“Excuse me, excuse me. Can I ask you a question?” I came to a decision two years ago to give money, more willingly, to those who need it. Therefore, when I think I see a request coming, sometimes I try to cut to the chase. So, I replied, “Sure. What do you need? A couple of dollars?” I realized almost instantaneously that I had made a terrible mistake. “What? No, man! I’m trying to get to Cold Spring and Loch Raven. Do you know where that is?” This guy was dressed nicer than I was. At this point I saw his wife, sitting in their SUV across the street. “Oh, yeah … sorry … yeah … it’s, uh … about two miles down that way.” “A couple of dollars!” he said. “Shit, man. I probably have more money than you do.” w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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I apologized again, and began to walk away. Half laughing and half insulted, he returned to his car, chuckling and shaking his head. “That’s some shit, man!” I thought to myself, who’s the Baltimoron now? —John Francis is a tobacco control program consultant for the California State Health Department in Sacramento.
Three night
classes per week. Forty students. One hundred sixty papers. A three-and-a-half-year-old daughter. A fifteenmonth-old son. One-thousand sixty diapers. A husband working in Africa for twenty-one days. I’d do the math if I retained the brain power. I’d thought being a Barely-Put-Together-Mommy was a fashion statement; apparently, it is also a security risk. At the end of this long, chaotic semester, my husband offered to look after the children so I could visit friends in Florida for a weekend in May. With a kiss, he sent me off to BWI. The half-hour cab ride itself was a luxury—absolute quiet. I got to the airport—home free. Then I got to security. The security agent looked at my driver’s license and flipped it back to me. “Your license expired five months ago,” she said. My birthday, January 4, right before the madness began. I blinked dumbly for several seconds. “She doesn’t know what I’m talking about,” the woman snapped to her co-worker, and pulled me from the line. I admit I have a tendency to get defiant, but instead I became the omega wolf. Eyes pleading and head slightly bowed, I would have rolled over on the ground and put my paws in the air if I thought it would help. Seeing my overdue haircut, pajama-style pants, and scuffed open-toe shoes, a security man took pity on me. He told me to go to the ticket counter and get an “SS,” a special-security pass. My belongings were rifled through, and they patted me down, yanking at my drawstring pants to reveal the top of my underwear. But I was niceness personified. Please, Unyielding Bureaucracy of Fear, please let me get on this plane. A beach chair on the sands of Fort Lauderdale. My favorite Thai restaurant’s Paneang scallops. Wine sipped in a Jacuzzi. Suddenly, they let me through. Trembling, I called my husband: “Can you FedEx me my passport?”
On the plane, I realized my license snafu meant I probably couldn’t rent a car. I was right. Yet, without two little ones in tow, I just grabbed a cab. I had a great time catching up with friends. I savored the scallops, knowing that my return trip would be easier. Then, I looked at my passport. It bore my maiden name, which didn’t match the name on my plane ticket. There was also a note from my family: We love you, Mommy. I took a deep breath. Okay, so which invalid ID would I use to get home? —Joanne Cavanaugh Simpson is a former staff writer for The Miami Herald and South Florida SunSentinel. She made it home to her family in Baltimore and her Johns Hopkins students, after opting to use her driver’s license.
I had to
convince my parents of lots of things during my teenage years. No, I hadn’t been drinking their alcohol, or attempting to change my grade in the teacher’s grade book, or intentionally driving on that man’s lawn. But now, at age 35, I find myself in the bizarre position of having to convince my mother that I am gay. The general population seems pretty easily persuaded that a person is gay;─if she drives a Subaru or he subscribes to GQ, we know what that means. But it’s proving a more difficult endeavor to sell my mother on the notion. My arrow-straight history and delayed self-awareness may be understandable sticking points. Still, I think that deep down she’d really rather it not be so. Four years ago I fell in love and began a relationship with a woman. Since that time, I’ve dated other women and lived an unequivocally gay existence. (Note: This does not mean that I sport a mullet, sit on parade floats dressed in leather, or hoard cats … yet.) My mom has been privy to all of this gaiety, but she still clings to her theory of daughter-nongayness. She believes my first girlfriend brainwashed me into her lesbian cult and I have since settled on picking up lesbians because it’s just too hard to find a nice guy. My sister wants me to end our mother’s confusion with a declaration, “I’m one hundred percent gay and that will never change.” I’d bet my E*Trade account that my romantic future is full of women only; nevertheless, I just can’t bring myself to pull an Ellen because I’m a true believer in the Kinsey scale and the complicated, fluid nature of human sexuality. It turns out, though, that I need to box myself in for my mom to hear me and accept who I am. Like
a bad politician, I’ve erred by not keeping it simple and staying on message. Therefore, I’m hiring a coming-out campaign manager whose first task will be to make me step up to the blackboard and write one hundred times over: I will never again tell my mother, “I’m open to dating men,” or utter the words, “I met a nice guy” in any context. —Lisa F. Orenstein is an attorney residing in Baltimore, who never imagined she’d be ruminating “out loud” on this subject matter.
Shortly after
I arrived in a small Buddhist monastery, the community was faced with a major decision. Should it spend a large portion of its money putting a new engine in the only vehicle available for transportation between the upper and lower hamlets of the village, or should the members continue to walk the few miles? The community decided to fix the vehicle. The repairs were made and the mechanic given responsibility for its maintenance. Things went smoothly until the mechanic heard the dinner bell while changing the oil. He left the car with the oil drained, to go and eat. While he was having dinner, someone else jumped in the car and headed toward the other community. The driver, of course, didn’t make it and destroyed the new engine. The community now had no transportation and not enough money to make repairs a second time. They held an emergency meeting. Everyone fell silent after the situation had been explained. Eventually, a nun said, “Oh, well, it seems someone made a mistake. What do we have to do to get the car fixed?” The community decided to borrow money to get the vehicle repaired, and the car resumed its trips between the hamlets without incident. No attempt was made to place blame or find fault for the problem. For as long as I was in the community, I heard no mention of the engine. Unlike the reaction of the community, my first priority had been to find a scapegoat, not a solution. Long ago, Ayya Khema, a German-born Buddhist nun, taught me the lesson of “recognition—no blame—change,” but I had obviously needed to see it implemented before I could recognize its power. ■ —Don O’Rourke lives happily in Hampden with his bride.
w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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CORKBOARD CORK The Great Pumpkin Patch Open Sun–Fri noon–6 p.m.; Sat 10 a.m.–6 p.m. 210 West Madison Street October 16–31 410-728-5545 www.firstfranklin.org
Who says you have to drive to the boonies to pick your own pumpkin? The First and Franklin Street Presbyterian Church in Mount Vernon turns its historic church courtyard into an urban pumpkin patch. Sales benefit the church and Navajo gourd growers in New Mexico.
Light up the Park This magical annual event lights up Patterson Park with sparkling lanterns, handmade by Baltimore residents. This year, the Lantern Parade includes a screening of parade director Molly Ross’ animated film Magic Lantern Show, an adaptation of Poe’s The Raven. Make your own lantern ahead of time at a Creative Alliance workshop, or make one at home using a kit; see website for details.
Parade gathers at Pulaski Monument at Linwood and Eastern avenues October 28, 7:30 p.m. Free 410-276-1651 www.creativealliance.org
Fall Fashion Check out this season’s hippest looks at the 49th annual Ebony Fashion Fair, titled “Stylishly Hot.” Models will strut down the runway wearing the latest creations of famous designers like Oscar de la Renta, Bill Blass, and Carolina Herrera.
Carl J. Murphy Fine Arts Center at Morgan State University 2201 Argonne Drive October 8, 4 p.m. Tickets $20–$40 443-883-4440 www.murphyfineartscenter.org www.ebonyfashionfair.com
I Believe I Can Fly It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s … a human-powered flying machine catapulting off a 25-foot ramp above the Inner Harbor! The 2006 Baltimore Red Bull Flugtag (German for “flying day”) pits twenty-five five-person teams against each other in an attempt to create the best flying machine.
Inner Harbor October 21, 11 a.m. Free www.redbullflugtagusa.com/Baltimore
What Daydreams May Come Baltimore composer and performer Lorraine L. Whittlesey’s original musical Einstein’s Dreams (It’s about time …) is based on and inspired by the book of the same name, which was written by Alan Lightman. The play centers on daydreams about time Einstein may have had during his days as a patent clerk.
Baltimore Theatre Project 45 West Preston Street October 27–29 410-752-8558 www.theatreproject.org
ANIMAL HOUSE The new yearlong exhibit at the American Visionary Art Museum, Home and Beast, opens October 7. The show is an exploration of both our relationship to home and our treatment of and responsibility to animals.
Open Tues–Sun 10 a.m.–6 p.m. 800 Key Highway 410-244-1900 www.avam.org
Photo credits from top to bottom: © Grinerswife | Dreamstime.com; photo by Mitro Hood; photo by Vandell Cobb for Johnson Publishing Company; photo by Christian Pondella; photo by Walter P. Callahan; Pawlonia Turtle by Abraham Lincoln Criss, photo by Dan Meyers
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have you heard . . .
edited by marianne amoss
Historic Preservation Certifi cate Program …
photo by Lisa Macfarlane
Baltimore’s stock of historic structures has given rise to many recent debates over the buildings’ viability and place in the city. The Historic Preservation Certifi cate Program, offered by Goucher College, offers both historic preservation professionals and the public a chance to learn more about the issues that affect Baltimore and the surrounding areas, and to apply their knowledge to current debates and discussions. Course topics include urban flight and rural sprawl, strategies and
conflicts involved in the preservation of historic buildings, preservation law, and maritime archaeology. Classes are offered at the National Trust Building in Washington, D.C., the Annapolis Maritime Museum, and online. Courses can be taken individually or as part of a comprehensive certificate program. Go to www.goucher.edu/hpcert. —Marianne Amoss
Day of the Dead …
courtesy of Baltimore Offi ce of Promotion and the Arts
On the Day of the Dead, or Día de los Muertos as it’s known in Spanish-speaking countries, Hispanics honor and remember their ancestors by visiting and decorating the graves of the dead and setting up altars on which photos and the favorite possessions and foods of the deceased are displayed. Café Azafrán, located in the Space Telescope Science Institute on the campus of Johns Hopkins University, offers its first Day of the Dead celebration from October 23 to 28. The weeklong event includes authentic and elaborate Mexican breakfast and lunch foods, a large commemorative altar, and live music.
A lecture on the significance of the festival will be given October 27 at 3 p.m., and a reservation-only dinner will take place October 28. The project is a joint venture of Café Azafrán owner and chef Irena Stein and artist Irma Vega de Bijou, who has been commissioned to make Day of the Dead altars at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art and Texas A&M University. Open Monday through Friday 7:30 a.m.–3 p.m. 3700 San Martin Drive; 410-338-4757; www.cafeazafran.biz. —M. A.
Free Cultural Events … A new initiative called Free Fall Baltimore has made the Walters Art Museum and the Baltimore Museum of Art free for at least one year. But that’s not all that’s free: More than seventy cultural institutions and organizations in the city will offer special no-cost programming from now through November, like music and theater events, classes,
lectures, and exhibitions. These include workshops at Baltimore Clayworks, a Center Stage street festival, and more. It will be an arts and culture free-forall! Go to www.freefallbaltimore.com. —M. A.
Have you heard of something new and interesting happening in your neighborhood? E-mail us at HaveYouHeard@urbanitebaltimore.com.
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have you heard . . . Arts Community … printed magazine (available for pickup in the Mill Valley area), the group aims to make it easier for artists and art lovers to find each other and work on projects that benefit both them and the community. To that end, earlier this year the group sponsored a Youthlight photographic contest in Hampden (Youthlight, currently directed by Urbanite contributing photographer Marshall Clarke, is a photography and media literacy project for Baltimore youth). Go to www.millvalleyarts.com. —M. A.
Opera … The performing arts season is here once again, and if you’re in the mood for some strings and stirring arias but not too sure if you’re up for a traditional opera, try Opera Vivente. Now in its ninth season, Opera Vivente’s mission is to attract new audiences to the medium and to produce works that feature local performers. Vivente’s productions are those not likely to be presented in the region, and may be more provocative stagings of traditional works. Unlike classical opera, there are no subtitles: All performances are in English. The intimate
setting in Emmanuel Episcopal Church and preperformance talks with the performers creates an unorthodox, dynamic environment for the audience. The 2006/2007 season opens this month with Mozart’s Cosi Fan Tutte performed on period instruments; it centers on the question of whether or not “women are like that”—in other words, unfaithful. Go to www.operavivente.org.
courtesy of Cory Weaver
photo collage courtesy of Eric Willison
Baltimore is a city of neighborhoods, many of which have been bettered by the collective work of community associations. The newly founded Mill Valley Cultural Arts Umbrella hopes to bring together artists in a similar way, specifically in the Mill Valley area (from Peabody Heights in the south to Medfield in the north). The group was founded in May by artists Allen Hicks, Eric Willison, Janice Pumphrey, and Jenny Ehrhardt ((pictured at left). “The arts are up and coming in that area,” says Hicks. “We are trying to bring it all together.” Through their interactive website and a
—M. A.
photo by Jason Okutake
Piano Bar … From the immaculate wooden bar to the 1929 vintage Mason & Hamlin baby grand piano, Jay’s On Read is ideal for late night jazz and wine with your lover. Owner Jay LaMont fashioned the piano bar after one of his own early bar endeavors in mid1970s Manhattan, where Truman Capote was a frequent visitor. Patrons can sit in the deep, inviting leather armchairs or at the bar while enjoying the piano playing in the background (always at a level that allows for conversation). LaMont has hired three permanent pianists/vocalists from around the country, along with local jazz pianist Joel Holmes. Dress up your martini with a selection
from the olive menu, which includes olives stuffed with blue cheese, sun-dried tomatoes, or the classic pimento; Manhattans are topped off with brandied cherries; and cocktails are mixed using freshsqueezed juices. During cocktail hour (4 p.m.– 9 p.m. nightly), enjoy a taste of port wine set out with cheddar cheese and bread at each table. Wines rotate monthly, with selections by Spirits of Mount Vernon down the street. Open Monday–Saturday 4 p.m.–1 a.m. 225 West Read Street; 410-225-0188. —Hellin Kay
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Nurturing and preserving each childʼs natural curiosity for learning.
The
���������� S C H O O L Preschool-Grade 6
Emerson Farm Middle School Ages 12-14
Students develop to their fullest potential as they work at their own pace in a dynamic educational environment.
Open Houses
10/25, 9:45 a.m. (Ages 2-3) 10/6, 9 a.m. (Ages 6-9) 11/3, 9:15 a.m. (Ages 3-6) 10/26, 9 a.m. (Ages 9-12) Please call in advance to register, 410-321-8555. Open houses usually last 90 minutes and are for adults only.
Falls & Greenspring Valley Rds. Lutherville, MD 21093
32
urbanite october 06
No w Off ering Spa Services, Waxing and Award Winning Hair Design 410. 327. 1300 www.a l pha studi oba l ti more .c om
located in historic f ells point 817 south bond street balt imore, md 21231
food
by joan jacobson
photography by
gail burton
Forgotten Fruit A Pennsylvania family farm brings heirloom apples to your farmers’ market
Above: The Reids of Reid’s Orchard, from left to right: Christopher, Kathy, and Dave, holding their rare apples
Dave Reid barrels through his one-hundred-acre orchard in Pennsylvania’s Appalachian foothills in a rickety pickup truck, unconcerned there is no road between the rows of fruit trees he shimmies past. He slows to shove his hand out the window and squeeze the peaches for ripeness. The fruit that Baltimore Farmers’ Market customers will buy this weekend is still warming on the trees, dripping like rubies and garnets in this mouthwatering fruit paradise. Reid and his wife, Kathy, have planted their groves over the last thirty years with dizzying varieties of peaches, plums, pears, berries, cherries, and grapes. But the one crop that has a special place in this verdant farm is the apple. In this valley fifteen miles west of Gettysburg that is prized for its soil (a soil called Highfield channery silt loam), Reid found prime apple country with orchards dating back almost two hundred years. The first farmer on this land, says Reid, planted an apple orchard and built a barn in about 1850. Reid, a farmer with a knack for preserving history, used the stones from the old barn to build a new façade and fireplace in their modern farmhouse.
But Reid’s reputation as a preservationist comes not from saving the stones of old buildings, but from saving heirloom apple trees from extinction. In the last three decades, the Reids have planted one hundred kinds of apple trees, of which sixty are heirloom (or antique) apples left behind in America’s rush to commercialize and dumb down the fruit industry, eliminating the relationship between the farmer and the consumer along the way. Today there are about two hundred apple varieties grown around the country, according to The American Gardener. Meanwhile, 2,500 kinds of apple trees are being preserved in a museum-like orchard in Geneva, New York, by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, including many from the forests of Kazakhstan, where the apple was born. (For further reading about apple history, try Michael Pollan’s engaging apple chapter in The Botany of Desire.) The Reid orchard’s remarkable variety of apples dates back to the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, and originally came from France, England, and other parts of Europe, many with arcane names like Westfield Seek-No-Further,
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Friends
peace
equality
community
truth
simplicity
School of Baltimore Since 1784
A stimulating and thoughtful academic community where individual differences are celebrated and students learn to think critically and question assumptions in a coeducational environment enriched by Quaker values.
Open House
for parents and students entering grades six through twelve: Sunday, October 22 • 2 pm
Imagine... Informational Tours for parents of students entering Pre-K through grade 5: Call 410-649-3211 to schedule an appointment.
5114 N. Charles Street • Baltimore, MD 21210 • www.friendsbalt.org
an old fashioned neighborhood grocery store, organic farmers market, gourmet specialty shop, European bakery, & supermarket all rolled into one. We are Whole Foods Market® the leading natural foods grocer in the country & we are right in your neighborhood! Harbor East 1001 Fleet St. 410-528-1640
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Feature of the Month It’s never too early to start thinking about the holidays!
Festive Flavors Thursday, November 9th please call individual store for hours of event
Join Whole Foods Market for a store-wide sampling of our favorite Thanksgiving foods. From our natural free range turkey to our pumpkin pie, we promise to put you in the holiday mood! While you are here be sure to meet with our Holiday Table Planners who can take care of all your Thanksgiving needs.
Free Parking! at both locations 34
urbanite october 06
Nickajack, and Duchess of Oldenburg. In addition to the heirloom varieties, they grow other unusual hybrid apples. One customer suggested that Reid grow an unusual hybrid called Red Haralson because the man recalled it from his childhood. Without a second thought, Reid went out and planted one hundred Red Haralson trees with fruit that is tart like a Winesap. The trees come from as far north as British Columbia and as far south as Tennessee and all grow nicely in Pennsylvania’s Buchanan Valley. Reid started growing heirloom apples twenty years ago simply because it was fun. One of his first antique apples didn’t go over very well though. Called a Sheepnose because it had a pointed shape like a sheep’s nose, it tasted terrible, Reid says. And it only kept for two days before losing its taste. He ended up using it for cider. Ten years later, the time was finally right for his customers to take the heirloom fruits seriously. Every time Reid pulled up an old Red Delicious tree, he replaced it with an heirloom tree or another unusual variety. Some he planted on recommendations that the fruit would be good and others he planted out of curiosity. He chose one apple called Mary Reid (a summer cooking apple) just because it shares his name. Many of the trees on the Reid farm are young and won’t yield a bushel of apples for five years after
being planted. Waiting that long to taste an apple can be quite suspenseful, says Kathy. “You bite into it with such expectation.” She pauses and makes a sour face. “And it’s a dog. The skin is like a toenail and it tastes awful. Then sometimes you bite into it and it’s ambrosia.” (Not
The Reid orchard’s remarkable variety of apples dates back to the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, and originally came from France, England, and other parts of Europe, many with arcane names like Westfield Seek-No-Further, Nickajack, and Duchess of Oldenburg. surprisingly, the Reids grow an apple from British Columbia called Ambrosia, which they describe as tasting like a Gala with a zip.) The Reids taste the many varietals when they are picked, and they
continue to taste them over several days to see how the flavor changes. They also leave them on their kitchen counter to see how long they take to get soft. Nickajacks, for example, stay hard on the counter for three weeks, whereas a McIntosh they pick one day is not the same apple two weeks later. The Reids also say the flavor of a McIntosh (Kathy’s favorite) improves from cooler nights on the tree when the sugar intensifies. They can easily tell one apple from another just from its appearance. If there is any question, either of the Reids can identify it by the texture of its skin or by tasting it. “It’s sort of like telling twins apart,” says Kathy. On a visit to Reid’s Orchard in July, the apples are just starting to fatten up on the trees. Reid walks among the rows, checking on nasty Japanese beetles and other pests. Occasionally, finding a tree with branches that hadn’t been thinned, he pulls off some of the little apples, dumping them on the ground, to force the others to grow larger. It is hard to imagine how he started this vast and complicated orchard with no farming experience. Thirty years ago, when other farmers were leaving the business, Reid was a house painter living in Frederick and working in Washington, D.C. “I had a lifelong dream of farming,” he says. “I was out of work one winter. I saw this place for sale. I was dumb enough and young enough to try continued on page 87
grades
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through
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ouse H n 2006 r 22, Ope
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e ctob PM ay O to 4:00 0 d n u S M 50 P 5 . 0 1:0 261 410. info:
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• The Lab School methodology successfully educates intelligent children with learning differences. • Give your child the chance to experience Sally L. Smith’s Academic Club MethodologyTM and approach. • Prepare your child for the future. Over 90 percent of students educated by The Lab School go on to our country’s finest colleges and universities. Call Diane Potts at 410-735-0034 to arrange a visit to learn more about this rigorous scholastic, arts-based, multi-sensory program. ®
Baltimore Lab: a division of The Lab School of Washington 2220 Saint Paul Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21218 www. labschool.org
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BALTIMORE OPER A COMPANY MICHAEL HARRISON, GENERAL DIRECTOR presents
BY GIOACHINO ROSSINI
October 14, 18, 20, 2 2 , 2006
The overwhelming odds faced by the ancient Greeks during The Siege of Corinth provide the dramatic impetus for spectacular arias and ensembles in this rare production of a true bel canto tour de force.
Starring: Elizabeth Futral, Vivica Genaux, Bruce Ford; Steven White (c), Elizabeth Bachman (d).
BY GIUSEPPE VERDI
November 11, 15, 17, 19, 2006
King Nebuchadnezzar’s enslavement of the Hebrews inspired some of Verdi’s most moving music, particularly the beloved “Va Pensiero”. Starring: Mark Rucker, Adrienne Dugger, Carlo Scibelli; Christian Badea (c), Roberto Oswald (d).
PERFORMED AT THE LYRIC OPERA HOUSE WITH ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS PROJECTED ABOVE THE STAGE. Tickets available from $45. Season Subscriptions available from $91. Call
410. 727. 6000 or visit
www.baltimoreopera.com
Opera. It's Better Than You Think. It Has To Be. 36
urbanite october 06
baltimore observed
by joan jacobson
photography by jason okutake
Dismantling the Ghetto Local initiatives attempt to give poor Baltimoreans a choice for housing
In the spring of 2004, Ike Neal moved his family of five from a bullet-riddled East Baltimore public housing project to a peaceful block of upscale Mount Washington. The move—though just five miles from one side of Baltimore to the other—was like trekking from a war zone to a virtual heaven, as far as Neal is concerned. The children no longer heed a standing order to “hit the floor” at the sound of gunfire and, as Neal’s wife, Veronica, puts it, “We have oxygen!” Their new home is much more than just a tidy house on a safe street. It is actually part of the Housing Authority of Baltimore City’s network of public housing units that offer federally subsidized rent. The Neals consider themselves lucky. There aren’t too many low-income tenants who get to choose their neighborhood—choice being a luxury few poor people in this city can afford. With median housing prices jumping 108 percent from 2000 to 2006 (from $65,000 to $135,000), Baltimore appears to be on the verge of its most dire housing crisis in decades. Despite the desperate need for affordable housing, today the city has a stock of 42,000 vacant housing units (with 17,000 abandoned structures) and forty percent of city tenants live in substandard housing. 2000 Census figures showed one-quarter of Baltimore families earning less than $15,000 a year. But help may be on the way. Two groups—the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Citizens Planning and Hous-
ing Association (CPHA)—have stepped forward with strategies that they say will give more families the opportunity to live in racially and economically diverse communities of their choice. Both the ACLU and the CPHA have put forth plans for integrating poorer families into a diverse network of neighborhoods with better schools, jobs, and transportation. These are not solutions for the politically conservative or those uncomfortable with racially and economically integrated neighborhoods. Rather, they provide solutions that strive to make this town a place where the operable word is “inclusive” not “exclusive.” “Mobility is empowering,” says ACLU lawyer Barbara Samuels. “Especially a decision by a parent to make a voluntary move to a new neighborhood to provide a better life for his or her family.” Samuels has spent the last decade in court trying to desegregate the deep pockets of poverty in Baltimore, pockets that are growing as gentrifying city neighborhoods become increasingly polarized from the poorer ones. With prices of once workingclass homes soaring, the underbelly of the city’s renaissance has regressed in poverty-stricken communities—almost exclusively occupied by poor African Americans. Earlier this year, Michelle Robinson, a former city resident who lived in a impoverished, drugridden neighborhood, testified in federal court as part of the lawsuit that Samuels helped file for the w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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urbanite october 06
ACLU. A judge had already ruled in 2005 that the federal government had erred by segregating poor African Americans in public housing projects in only a few parts of the city while failing to consider regional approaches to provide housing opportunities. Now the case is in its “remedy” phase, as the ACLU asks the judge to correct the mistakes of the past by ordering federal housing officials to help 6,750 families move to suburban areas over the next ten years. Robinson is one of the few who has already moved (with the help of the ACLU) from Park Heights to Columbia with a federal rent voucher. On the witness stand, she called the homes in the neighborhood she left behind “abandominiums.” Surprisingly, the city actually spent tens of millions of federal dollars just twenty years ago on housing and commercial revitalization in dozens of communities like the Park Heights neighborhood in the northwest and Poppleton just west of downtown. The Housing Authority of Baltimore City once renovated 2,800 rowhouses as public housing units—often the most sought after houses on their struggling blocks. But today, fewer than 1,000 remain due to poor management and vandalism. Compounding the management problem was the little-reported fact that between 1998 and 2002, the Housing Authority of Baltimore City was so inept that it was forced to return $117 million in federal housing vouchers for poor tenants, according to federal audits. Its reputation for paying landlords late—or overpaying them—prompted some reputable property owners to drop out of the subsidy program altogether. Though the housing authority has cleaned up its act (getting a clean bill of health from the fed-
eral government earlier this year), it was too late for many of the 15,000 Baltimore families who had been languishing on the waiting list for housing subsidies all those years. Today, the housing authority reports that there are approximately 8,000 families on the public housing waiting list and 5,000 on the waiting list for the Housing Choice Voucher Program (also known as Section 8 housing). This July, a city-council-appointed task force issued a comprehensive report to the council tackling the city’s entrenched housing affordability problems from many angles, including the use of zoning and tax laws. The fifty-eight-page report is
Between 1998 and 2002, the Housing Authority of Baltimore City was so inept that it was forced to return $117 million in federal housing vouchers for poor tenants. called At Home in Baltimore: A Plan for an Inclusive City of Neighborhoods. The task force was chaired by Michael Sarbanes, executive director of the Citizens Planning and Housing Association, a city nonprofit group that has been helping Baltimore neighborhoods for more than sixty years. “Where there is high opportunity, there is no affordability, and where there is affordability, there is no opportunity,” Sarbanes told a conference of housing advocates several months ago.
Though the task force report is limited to city remedies, Sarbanes’ CPHA is also studying the problem regionally and has found, not surprisingly, that in suburbs with good schools, plenty of jobs, and good mass transit, houses are prohibitively expensive. And in many Baltimore neighborhoods, houses are affordable, but the schools are failing and there is nowhere to work nearby. “The housing market is seriously out of balance,” says Sarbanes. The thirteen-member task force led by Sarbanes conferred with more than one hundred people and met for eight months. Of its many recommendations, here are some highlights: The city should establish an “Inclusionary Housing Trust Fund” that uses twenty percent of the city transfer and recordation taxes from property sales. The fund would finance a variety of tools that make homes affordable: financing for homeownership and rental housing, rent assistance, subsidizing rents for the homeless, financial support and counseling to people facing foreclosure, and financing development that will offer homes to people of diverse incomes. The report recommends that state laws be changed to streamline the process for acquiring taxdelinquent properties that could be used for redevelopment. The city now has a lengthy court process that allows a property owner more than a year to reclaim an abandoned property after failing to pay taxes or city utility bills. The cumbersome process often delays attempts by the city from taking it over for redevelopment.The report also suggests that developers be required (for the first time) to set aside some of the homes they are building for low- and
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Baltimore Clayworks
Mt. Washington Spa
A Baltimore Spa with a Meditterranean touch. Introducing a European cellulite program that works. Customized facials and massages. Featuring Valmont, Cellcosmet, Somme Institute, Spa Jet and Kerastase.
Save the date for our annual Gala on October 21st featuring amazing auctions, savoring dining and glorious music. Visit our website for a complete list of events, including programming for FreeFall Baltimore.
1600 Kelly Ave. Spa: (410) 664-3400 Salon: (410) 664-4610
5707 Smith Ave. (410) 578-1919 www.baltimoreclayworks.com
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Specializing in Residential and commercial real estate. Bill Sherwood Broker
Open 7 days a week Happy Hour Mon - Thur. 4 - 7pm
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The Desert Cafe
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Savetta’s Psychic Reading
Past Present Future Available for parties and private gatherings. Specializing in Chakra Healing, Tarot Card, Palm, and Crystal readings.
Offering extraordinary Mediterranean cuisine and homemade desserts for lunch and dinner. Sample our mixed array of hummus, gyros and kabobs while watching belly dancing (fresh seafood on weekends). Finish your meal with a homemade baklava cheesecake among so many others. Visit us!
1621 Sulgrave Ave. (410) 664-9154
1605-07 Sulgrave Ave. (410) 367-5808 www.thedesertcafe.com
Something Else
Europa International Salon
A true full service salon. Our international staff prides itself on its understanding of proper, artful color and highlights application. If you’re looking for a different look, we know today’s styles - the look you want.
A fun eclectic mix of special occasion clothing and a large assortment of Flax Linens, sweaters, coats, jewelry, accessories, Mexican folk art, chatzkas, and Frida. Open Mon-Fri 11am-6pm Sat. 10:30am-6pm
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5701 Newbury St. (410) 367-1111
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Mt.Washington Village www.mtwashingtonvillage.com
*On the Light Rail
Directions: Take exit 10A (Northern Parkway-East) off I-83 to Falls Rd. Turn left on Falls Rd. Turn left on Kelly Ave.
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urbanite october 06
Despite the need for affordable housing, Baltimore City has some 42,000 vacant or abandoned houses.
moderate-income people. Projects with thirty or more homes would need to set aside a percentage of units for low- and moderate-income people, such as teachers, physician’s assistants, carpenters, and lab technicians. The number of units set aside would be greater if the developer is seeking rezoning or public subsidy from the government. This comes at a time when developers find Baltimore City a desirable place to make money. Unlike the past, when they shunned the city—or did business only if lured with financial incentives— this once dowdy town is finding itself the most popular girl at the development prom. Thus, the timing may be right to leverage that popularity with new rules about accommodating homes for low- and moderate-income tenants and homeowners. “We are looking for a common ground to allow the city to grow and allow neighborhoods of diversity of income because that’s what makes a more interesting city,” says Sarbanes. “When we talk about inclusionary zoning, we’re talking about everybody.” He cautions, however, that a requirement that developers build low- and moderate-income housing should come with welcoming incentives to keep developers building in the city. Baltimore City Housing Commissioner Paul Graziano was noncommittal on the task force’s recommendations, saying they needed further study. He said the city already requires mixed-income developments when city land or subsidies are involved. But he said there was not a “well thought out plan of action” by the task force and would not take a position on a broader use of the “inclusionary” housing plan for all city private development.
The ACLU, through its lawsuit, is taking a more aggressive regional approach to the affordablehousing dilemma. The organization wants to remedy the situation by requiring HUD to provide housing in higher-opportunity areas of both the city and the suburbs, especially areas that offer better schools and more job opportunities. Public housing residents are represented by the ACLU and NAACP legal defense fund. Together they now seek a court-ordered plan for helping 675 poor Baltimore families to move to high-opportunity neighborhoods (mostly in the suburbs) each year, over the next ten years. The families would receive
The housing market is seriously out of balance. Where there is high opportunity, there is no affordability, and where there is affordability, there is no opportunity. counseling to help them care for their new homes and would only move out of choice to be close to mass transit, job opportunities, and good schools. The ACLU feels strongly that the regional tactic is one way to address the need for more affordable continued on page 81
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Historic Hampden Hall Hampden with Harbor View
1416 Reisterstown Road 410-484-1022
Historic Hampden Hall, a former veteran’s meeting hall that looms above the shops at the Southeast corner of 36th Street and Roland Ave. has been converted into 14 loft style apartments
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Our experienced fitters will help you select styles from our large inventory to fit and flatter your figure.
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We’re on a mission to strengthen and revitalize the Baltimore neighborhoods that we share. Let’s do it together. We're a not-for-profit real estate lender committed to providing flexible loan options and exceptional services to home buyers and real estate developers.
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DAILY LUNCH & DINNER SPECIALS Join us for Sunday Brunch 11am - 3pm
Live Irish Music four nights a week! Texas hold’em every Thursday at 7pm 21 North Eutaw Street (across from the Hippodrome) 410.837.2100 Mon - Sun 11am - 1:30am
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urbanite october 06
Private Dining Rooms available in the old Bank Vault & Managers Office
Now Taking Bookings for Holiday Parties
encounter
by catrina cusimano
photography by michael northrup
They Walk Among Us Zombie culture in Baltimore and all that it entrails
Above: These days, it’s not unusual to see the undead (or at least people dressed that way) stumbling around the streets of Baltimore.
It’s Friday night and I’m standing in a parkinggarage elevator with four strangers: one city cop and three club kids eager to make their way to Power Plant Live! I’m dressed like a zombie and it’s the longest elevator ride of my life. A few curious looks are exchanged before we all silently agree to count ceiling tiles. Fortunately, Baltimore’s the kind of city in which a zombie in August earns little more than a glance. Baltimore’s first zombie prom is tonight, August 18, at Gardel’s Supper Club. The event is organized by novice filmmaker Matthew Pearce as a fundraiser for the film he plans to co-direct with his partner, fiction writer David Spencer. Spencer, who wrote the screenplay, geared the film toward two distinctive cult audiences: horror fanatics and Roller Derby junkies. Production for the film, aptly titled Roller Derby Zombies, is slated to begin this winter. It’s early when I arrive and relatively quiet. Pearce proudly guides me to a white garden trellis studded with convincing limbs and entrails.
For three dollars, couples can have their picture taken beneath the macabre adornment. “Fake intestines are just one of the things I learned how to make out of spray insulation years ago at special effects school,” he beams. Meanwhile, Spencer is selling merchandise and taking votes for Prom King and Prom Queen, Best Zombie Stagger, and Best Costume. He’s also taking names for those interested in participating in the upcoming film. The night is doubling as a casting call. As can be expected, the zombies don’t trickle in: They arrive en masse. Suddenly, the third floor of Gardel’s becomes a surrealist painting filled with bodies, lesions, unclaimed appendages, and even a few roller skates. The Charm City Roller Girls have arrived to support Pearce, Spencer, and their film. The energy of the 150 prom patrons proves that Baltimore has officially emerged as a prominent face in a nationwide zombie revival. For some involved, zombie culture is both social and political in nature; an expression of the catatonic state of American
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One day, I will travel the world singing Italian arias. Today I am a vocalist studying music at Carroll Community College. My teachers at Carroll know me by name, and they understand my dream. With their help, I am moving closer to realizing my ambition. Jamie Lippy | Class of 2007 | Carroll Community College
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thought. Others clamor to celebrate it as a cinematic trend with origins in the 1930s and a continued popularity through the decades. Everybody, however, likes playing dead. The works of zombie-film icon George A. Romero are being revisited. Modern takes on the genre—Feeding the Masses, 28 Days Later, and even the horrorcomedy Shaun of the Dead—are viewed with interest. Successful zombie walks, in which participants dress as zombies and stagger around highly populated public
Braaaaains, braaaaains, braaaaains ...
For some, it’s all fun and games, and even more fun and games when someone loses an eye.
areas, have taken place across the country; Baltimore celebrated its own June 18. Some Baltimoreans are even playing a game called Zombie Nerf War; groups are broken into hunters and zombies to produce a result that is something like Darkon with a touch of Bela Lugosi. For some, it’s all fun and games, and even more fun and games when someone loses an eye. “It’s just simple, all-out fun to resurrect the dead!” declares Pearce of zombie culture’s renewed popularity. Spencer, who has been quiet for most of the evening, disagrees. “Zombies are the ultimate soapbox to talk about things like commercialism, survival, fear, and terrorism. People talk about [Romero’s stance against] racism. I wanted to create a feminist movie,” continued on page 83
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photo by Anne Gummerson
space
Inside St. Stan’s A local photographer captures the interior of this Fells Point icon
Above: Anne Gummerson, another Fells Point photographer who lives a few blocks from the church, took this exterior photo of St. Stanislaus before demolition began.
When the rectory next to St. Stanislaus Kostka Roman Catholic Church came tumbling down at the corner of Ann and Aliceanna Streets in July, Fells Point preservationists may have wondered how the historic building slipped through their fingers. Although developers are demolishing several more buildings to make way for condos, they have said they will save and restore the main sanctuary—with its stained-glass windows in striking floral designs. But they might gut the interior to make way for a school. And though few have recently seen the inside, photographer and Fells Point native Anna Santana entered the church on a quiet summer day in 2005 to capture its interior. While the building itself had been shuttered from parishioners since 2000, Santana says that “everything looked to have never been moved, as if a Mass could take place at any time.” Some preservationists believe the interior is just as historic as the façade, says Johns Hopkins, director of Baltimore Heritage. But this 1889 church built for Polish immigrants has little more legal status against the wrecking crew than a modern 7-11. That is because neither the
church buildings, nor its surrounding Fells Point neighborhood, are protected by Baltimore’s Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation. With CHAP status, the developers would have to prove “economic hardship” to raze the buildings, says Hopkins. “It’s a high hurdle to meet.” The lack of protection is perhaps due to Fells Point’s long-held skepticism of government. The church buildings are not even included in the Fells Point Urban Renewal area, which does not bar demolition, but restricts redevelopment. The Polish elderly didn’t want any government intrusion, recalls Amy Glorioso Rynes, who was the city’s Fells Point planner for twenty years. She remembers some worried that an urban renewal plan might force them to remove the Formstone from their rowhouses. And that would have been unthinkable. On the subsequent pages, we share some of Santana’s photos documenting the interior space of St. Stanislaus. —Joan Jacobson
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Left and below: Images of the sanctuary in the upper level of the church. St. Stanislaus once filled both a lower and an upper church with a dedicated congregation.
all photos by Anna Santana
Right: The Roman Catholic Church played a major role in the Polish community in Baltimore in the late 1800s. In 1879, Polish immigrants raised a then-staggering $28,000 to purchase the land where St. Stanislaus sits to build the church itself. Much of the money was procured door-todoor with “penny� contributions from Poles and members of other ethnic groups in the Fells Point area. That first church was later torn down and the existing St. Stanislaus, which could accommodate the growing congregation, was rebuilt in 1889.
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Right: The priest’s dressing area, located in the back of the upper church, looks as though it is ready for a Sunday Mass even though the church has been closed to parishioners since 2000. Church attendance began to dwindle in the 1950s and went on a steady decline over the subsequent decades.
Right: In 1905, when Franciscan pastor Father Francis Pyznar took over the ministry, he enlarged the congregation area to include a lower church, which was carved out of the basement. The books sitting on the bench in this picture hold information on all of the marriages and baptisms that took place in St. Stanislaus since it was first constructed.
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Breach of Contract B y
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In a divided political landscape, can Americans find common ground again?
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oday’s overheated but sterile partisan arguments—what columnist Molly Ivins described as the World Wrestling Federation in political drag—have lost touch with the fundamentals on which America was built. Our institutions, our Declaration of Independence, and our Constitution took shape in a vanished world using assumptions and ideas now gathering dust in our civic attic. As we grapple for an agreement on proper policy, and communicate (or not) in slogans and sound bites, it may well be that the only way forward is back. We revere the founding fathers; perhaps we should also listen to them. Only when we understand what they built can we adapt it for our time. In early November 1620, a wooden vessel bobbed queasily in the ocean swell off the coast of Cape Cod. The Mayflower’s 102 passengers had spent sixty-six days crossing the North Atlantic in a boat whose cluttered deck was no bigger than a singles tennis court. They came to build a new community in a wilderness far beyond the reach of established authority. Solemnly, they all affixed their signatures or marks to a document committing them to combine themselves “together into a civil body politic.” This document, the famed Mayflower Compact, was a concrete example of a theoretical idea called a “social contract,” by which people living in an Eden-like state of nature created a government by common agreement. The general idea that government and society are created by a social contract is as old as Socrates, but when the North American British colonies were founded, government’s existence relied on the “divine right of kings.” God established government and set kings to rule over us. Obedience to the monarch is a duty to God, and the monarch’s rule is pretty much absolute. In the century and a half after the Mayflower’s passengers disembarked, however, many Europeans abandoned the God-made-us-do-it concept. They found the roots of government in rational beings creating social contracts. Generally, political thinkers began by imagining a “state of nature,” a time before society and government existed. Then they asked, How did government emerge from that? Of the many who tackled that question was Englishman John Locke, writing at the end of the 1600s, who best laid down the basics of what became the American view of government. In the state of nature, he reasoned, man has a right to life (because God gave it to him), and therefore to liberty (because life without liberty is useless) and to property (because in exercising liberty and supporting life man creates and needs essential property). But these rights were threatened by human imperfection, so mankind agreed to give up specific portions of life, liberty, and property to a common government for the protec-
tion of natural rights—a “social contract,” not literally written down as the Mayflower Compact was, but something we all understand and agree to. This was revolutionary stuff. Our rights are inherently ours, Locke said; God, not the government, gave them to us. Government, on the other hand, came from us, not God. The true sovereign is the people, who created government for their own purposes. If government misbehaves and trashes our liberties instead of protecting them, we can rightfully turn the rascals out. What took Locke and many other theorists volumes to explain, Thomas Jefferson distilled into one of the most brilliant and enduring statements of political principle ever penned—the second paragraph of our Declaration of Independence. “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” it begins. Only an American would have put it that way. We are all rational people and do not need a special class of experts and philosophers to explain things to us. “... that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Here is the doctrine of God-given natural rights. “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, ... .” The essential notion of social contract is here reduced to a single sentence. Next, “... that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.” After their successful revolution, this remarkable generation of Americans put the Declaration’s principles into the Constitution. The people’s representatives wrote it in a sweltering room in Philadelphia with curtains drawn and guards at the door. They began in late May 1787, and finished it by September. Accustomed as we are to having deliberative bodies spend four months just arguing about agenda, it is startling to remember that the most creative and longest-lasting written constitution ever penned was assembled in short order. Once the delegates conceived the Constitution, they sent it back to the people for ratification. The principle was made flesh; the people were the sovereign. We had made a fully articulated social contract, with the clear and express purpose “to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” Seemed simple enough. But the genius of the Constitution and the key to its longevity is that it sets a general framework and lets each generation fill in the specifics as conditions change. w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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The arguments began immediately. Alexander Hamilton, President Washington’s Secretary of the Treasury, whom Vice President John Adams derided as a “bastard brat of a Scotch pedlar,” wanted a loose interpretation of the Constitution so the government could act forcefully. Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson led the faction that wanted a strict reading of the document so that governmental power would be safely hobbled. Jefferson, a slave-owning, aristocratic democrat, contemplated a nation of small farmers where the only possible threat to liberty was government itself. History overwhelmed Jefferson’s vision. The world grew complex. Private power pooled into great corporations, the economy became national, then global. Our government necessarily claimed greater and greater powers in its pursuit of “the general welfare.” From protective tariffs, post-slavery Constitutional amendments and antitrust laws in the nineteenth century, to the New Deal, the Council of Economic Advisors, and aggressive civil rights protection in the twentieth century, we have steadily expanded what our government does for us. The rhetoric in our mouths may still be Jefferson’s, but the world of affairs we actually inhabit belongs to Hamilton. And that world has changed drastically since we adopted the Constitution. The Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area in 2004 contained more than twice as many people as the entire United States did in 1787. The simplicity that made self-sufficiency easy and normal is long gone. We are the most dynamic and powerful nation on a troubled earth, but we’re finding it devilishly hard to export our ideas of freedom and government. We are farther than ever from a state of nature, and accelerating. We may actually be at a crossroads. Though there is no shortage of positions loudly proclaimed, our debates are rarely focused and seldom productive. We talk past each other and retreat into positions we won’t compromise. So is the very basis of our government—a social contract among rational individuals based on essential goals—still relevant, or even coherent any more? Are there other ways to think about government? Are our political fundamentals from the 1700s failing us? One source of confusion is that the old, familiar liberal versus conservative argument about whether to employ government to pursue social ends has become moot. Today’s conservatives embrace the use of federal power and spend freely. What separates conservatives from liberals now is only the objects they want government to pursue. That shift in the terms of debate has disoriented us a bit. But, indeed, within the last thirty years some political thinkers have challenged the basic social-contract concept. “Communitarians” argue that Locke and his heirs are wrong to focus exclusively on the selfish individual and to think of society merely as a means of optimizing individual rights. Instead, communitarians emphasize that we are social creatures who live in communities and groups, that we have responsibilities as well as rights, and that our rights include not just “freedom” but also “positive rights” such as a good education and access to health care. They argue that “the exclusive pursuit of private interest erodes the network of social environments on which we all depend, and is destructive to our shared experiment in democratic self-government.” Loneliness, social isolation, greed, political alienation, and family breakdown are all exacerbated by classic social-contract thinking with its emphasis on the individual. This is not a socialist position; rather, it simply says that the communities we inhabit deserve as much political weight as the individual and his or her rights. Aside from the communitarian challenge, we have learned that not everyone around the globe believes our individualistic social contract model is universally valid. Singapore’s former prime minister Lee Kuan Yew (1959-1990), for example, says bluntly that for Asians a government “where the interests of society take precedence over that of the individual suits them better than the individualism of America.” But the vast majority of us still adhere to the ideals of the founders, even if we’d be hard put to recall where they come from. The main resistance to communitarian thought comes from people’s discomfort with abandoning the central emphasis on individual rights that has been our cornerstone.
The problems furrowing our brow today may not lie in the fundamentals but in the administrative details. Our huge and complex nation now has a social subcontract, run by middlemen. In their 2002 book, Downsizing Democracy: How America Sidelined Its Citizens and Privatized Its Public, this month’s Urbanite Guest Editor Matthew Crenson and co-author Benjamin Ginsberg reveal the extent to which individuals and interest groups now access government directly through lawsuits, lobbying specialists, and administrative rulings. Mobilizing citizens, they argue, is now just a pointless nuisance. Americans have become customers of government services in a process eerily reminiscent of a commercial marketplace rather than a public forum. Add to this the niche markets of passionate single-issue groups, and the result is a great deal of noisy talk camouflaging the breakdown of sincere public debate about big issues. Politicians play to their base. The base hires a professional lobbyist and files lawsuits. The real political action lies in confirming judges and administrators, because they now have the power that used to belong to Congress. The outcome is that no matter how exasperated we are, we can’t seem to affect things. The latest CNN poll numbers as this is being written, for example, indicate that more than sixty percent of Americans disapprove of the war in Iraq, a number that one would never guess from the lack of political activity against it. We’ve turned the matter over to the government, and without a citizen draft or an immediate tax bill for the war, we seem divorced from the issue even if most of us have an opinion. We just trade barbs in the blogosphere and give negative performance ratings to both Congress and the president. We (“the people”) no longer remember the ideal of a social contract, no longer quicken to the idea that the government actually belongs to us. For Jefferson’s idealism and Hamilton’s realism to work for us now, we first have to remember what they were. Then recall that we overwhelmingly do agree on the basics of the social contract. All our noisy arguments are tempests in Locke’s teapot. Let’s consciously re-enact the social contract, awakening to the principle that government is nothing more than us, using powers we confer and that we can direct, modify, increase, or take back. Franklin D. Roosevelt, a president who wielded government action with great gusto, said, “Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a president and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.” The back-to-political-basics debate boils down to two questions. First, what is it we want our government to do for us? Specifically, are there things it must do other than just protect life, liberty, and property? Second, what parts of our life, liberty, and property are we willing to give up to support such a government? Take a few moments to make simple lists of things you think government should do and what sacrifices you would be willing to make in return. Compare your list with someone else’s. See if the two of you can come to consensus about these fundamentals. Do it in a group, over coffee. Spread across three hundred million Americans, the debate on this would be acrimonious and heated, but it would engage the real issues and perhaps get us somewhere. What we cannot do safely is let things drift as the gulf between the government and the governed continues growing. Though it’s funny to recall the old punch line, “I don’t vote because it only encourages them,” in truth, frustrated detachment is a losing strategy. Things hang in the balance. Educator Robert M. Hutchins warned, “The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.” And, he might have added, ignorance of its principles. But Common Cause’s John Gardner offers an alternative vision: “The citizen can bring our political and governmental institutions back to life, make them responsive and accountable, and keep them honest.” Then he reminds us, “No one else can.” ■ Join the conversation: Go to our website (www.urbanitebaltimore.com) and tell us what you think our governments (federal, state, local) must do for us, and the essentials that you are willing to pay taxes to support. Then tell us what government does that you do not think is necessary.
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Mad As Hell
By Susan McCallum-Smith Illustration by Deanna Staffo
A candid conversation with Tom Fenton on bias, democracy, and the failings of the American media
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here is nothing wrong with making money off of the news,” says Tom Fenton, former senior foreign news correspondent for CBS. “I wouldn’t have had a career without that. But somewhere, in the rush for profit, the job itself of the media was forgotten. It is extraordinarily difficult to get past the gatekeepers a story that goes against the grain, a story that tells us something that we don’t want to hear. My classic example, of course, is Osama bin Laden.” In December 1996, Fenton and a CBS producer arranged an interview with then little-known Islamic terrorist Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan. The 60 Minutes television team wasn’t keen on the idea or willing to fund it and neither was the CBS foreign news editor. “Our bosses saw him as an obscure Arab of no interest to our viewers,” Fenton wrote in his book Bad News, published in March 2005. “More concerned with saving dollars than pursuing the story, they killed the project.” But Fenton persisted, and in early 1997 succeeded in accessing material via a London-based Arab journalist who had just interviewed bin Laden. The journalist reported bin Laden’s hatred of America and his violent intentions toward it. Fenton forwarded the interview to CBS, only to be told there were “too many foreign names” in the story. Subsequently, the first televised interviews of Osama bin Laden by American journalists were conducted by Peter Arnett of CNN in March 1997 and by John Miller of ABC in May 1998. “Do you still feel furious when you think about that?” I ask. Fenton raises one silver eyebrow. “That is one of the things I will never forget till my dying day.”
On a crisp November afternoon in 2005, I walk to Tom Fenton’s London home through the genteel neighborhood where Chelsea blends with Knightsbridge. In my bag, I carry a newspaper with dour headlines in its folds: the French declare a state of emergency following twelve days of riots; Saddam Hussein’s trial lawyer shot dead; the United States government refuses to confirm or deny claims by the Washington Post that the CIA has secret prisons abroad. In his first-floor apartment, Fenton helps me remove my coat. He looks trim and groomed in a double-breasted suit, crisp shirt, expertly knotted tie, and polished shoes. He directs me into a large drawing room-cumstudy, before disappearing into a galley kitchen with the remark that he will bring tea. Fenton was born in Baltimore in 1930. After graduating from Dartmouth College, he served nine years in the United States Navy, witnessing Castro’s arrival in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, in 1953. He began his career in journalism at the Baltimore Sun as a domestic then foreign correspondent. In 1970 he joined CBS to conduct the first interview with American hostages following the PLO hijacking. Over the next thirty-four years he
reported on international conflicts from CBS bureaus in London, Moscow, Paris, Tel Aviv, and Rome, and from the field, including the India-Pakistan War (1971), the Arab-Israeli War of 1973, and the Cyprus War (1974). He conducted the first interview with Ayatollah Khomeini following the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in 1979. Along with reporting from the first Gulf War (1991), he also monitored the former Yugoslavia’s descent into chaos and genocide in Central Africa. He is the recipient of eight Overseas Press Club Awards and four Emmys. “The problem is not fairness and balance,” he replies, to my first question about the challenges of reporting the news. “People talk about fairness and balance all the time. The problem is thinness. It’s the lack of news. That’s where you get bias.” In retrospect, he explains, the mainstream media failed the American public by not providing enough context and depth prior to the war in Iraq, by not analyzing if it was possible, or even logical, to “use an army as a blunt instrument to promote democracy in the Middle East.” The media are not responsible for America entering the war, but he contends “our job is to see things that are coming down the road and to alert the public, and then, as a corollary, we have a responsibility to make sure that the people who are supposed to be protecting us are doing The problem is their job, keep their feet to the fire. The not fairness and problem is that we work on the wrong side of the filter. The filter is the executive probalance. People ducers, the editors—the people who detalk about fairness cide what gets on the air, and what doesn’t and balance all the get on the air.” Context and depth can be found in the time. The problem media, he admits, provided you are willis thinness. It’s ing to spend time on the Internet or read some of the more obscure journals. The the lack of news. communications revolution has changed That’s where you the delivering of mainstream news but not get bias. necessarily the gathering of it, with the exception of blogs and citizen-journalists clutching cell-phone cameras and BlackBerrys. He believes Americans know they are underinformed. “But most people still get their news from television. God help them.” Fenton’s book, Bad News, was published following his retirement in December 2004 from CBS. In it, he lambastes both the Clinton and Bush administrations for what he perceives as the dire state of American foreign policy and takes all of the media severely to task (including CBS) for what he believes is the deteriorating quality of foreign news coverage. He saves his most pointed barbs for Fox’s use of what he calls “parachute journalw w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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urbanite october 06
ism”—such as when Geraldo Rivera, accompanied by foxy correspondettes, reported from the battlefields of the Afghan War, and for the blinkered tabloidism of many local and national television stations, which still advocate a news policy based on “if it bleeds, it leads.” “I could not have published the book while I was working at CBS,” Fenton acknowledges. “Although the media take it upon themselves to criticize all and sundry, they are very thin-skinned when it comes to criticizing their own work. And I’ve become a media critic. I’ve become an advocate for something. And I come from the old school of journalism where you at least give the appearance of neutrality and try not to take sides. But I feel very strongly about the direction in which the American media have been going, especially in the last fifteen years since the end of the Cold War.” He interviewed television colleagues for his book, including Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw, and Peter Jennings. Some of them proved cagey interviewees, as they were, at that time, still working for major news networks. Overall, he says, the reaction to his book has been “uniformly positive.” Walter Cronkite, former CBS news anchor from 1962 to 1981, proved Fenton’s staunchest ally. “It is not the journalist’s role to educate,” Cronkite said. “It is, however, our role to inform in such a way that the educators can have the raw material to teach.” Without an educated populace, Fenton contends, the news service is a service without an end user. Cronkite admitted he no longer watched the CBS Evening News. “There’s nothing there,” he told Fenton. “Nothing but crime and sob sister material.” I mention a book, The Elements of Journalism, whose authors Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel assert that journalists work for the citizens of their country, and I ask Fenton if he agrees with their assertion. “Just as firemen or doctors do,” Fenton says. “You are performing a public service. Also, they should work for the story. You have to be very nosey, and you have to be driven by this desire to grab the viewer or the reader by the lapels and tell them, ‘Look what’s going on! See what they’re doing?’ If you want to call that truth, that’s what we’re working for. A lot of journalists, and I’m sure I was one, work for the advancement of their own careers. But when that becomes more important than the story or than the truth, you’re in trouble, and we’ve seen some pretty bad examples in recent years. Jayson Blair, Judith Miller, and others.” Fenton’s portrait of the current American media landscape is bleak, though he does concede one bright light. “National Public Radio, NPR. They give you news in depth, with context. They give you international news. They don’t stop at the shores of our country. The public responds to news that actually tells you what you need to know, that doesn’t try to titillate you or give you infotainment. Because we’re not very good at entertaining. I’d much rather watch The Daily Show than the CBS Evening News if I’m looking for entertainment. In fact, sometimes you get more news on The Daily Show.” One subject guaranteed to raise Fenton’s ire is the recent trend by media corporations to “repackage” international news from other sources and present it as though they had shot the footage firsthand. Repackaging news is “very dangerous,” Fenton says. “All of the major networks put news on the air that they cannot verify.” I wonder how a business practice, which appears ethically questionable, could become so prevalent and accepted. Many media organizations, he explains, did the same thing with their foreign bureaus that the American government did with their overseas intelligence services following the end of the Cold War. They closed them down to save expense, and began either to subcontract or to rely on third parties for information. Because it is extremely expensive to have journalists’ boots on the ground everywhere where newsworthy events may occur, news collection services such as Reuters or the Associated Press now provide the bulk of the international data and footage seen and heard on American television. “You notice when you watch CBS, NBC, CNN, and the others,” Fenton says, “that they often have the same clips.” The networks can neither confirm nor deny if such footage was staged or directed. Nevertheless, it’s married to stories taken off the wire services based on local reportage and
then “you wrap it in a package and you slap the CBS or ABC logo on it, and the correspondent will narrate on camera so you see his face.” Thereby making the viewer assume, I clarify, that the news we are watching has been investigated by that particular correspondent. “The networks don’t have reporters covering the Muslim world on a permanent basis, not just the Arab, but the entire Muslim The networks world,” Fenton continues, “and you could argue that that is of some interest and don’t have reportimportance to us. You send somebody in ers covering the after the fire’s broken out, but you want to Muslim world on be there when it’s smoking.” Fenton confirms that many internaa permanent basis, tional journalists still work extensively not just the Arab, in the Middle East and similar hotspots but the entire around the world, hotspots largely deserted by their American counterparts. “How Muslim world, and much do you see on your evening news you could argue about what’s happening in Africa? Or the that that is of some former Soviet Union? Or Central Asia? There is a huge war going on in the Congo, interest and imporand we don’t see it at all.” tance to us. I question whether the American media are not covering such massive news stories because they simply have no journalists available or because network executives have decided that the stories are not newsworthy. “I think it’s the latter,” Fenton says. “But they’re also not covering it because it’s expensive to cover Africa, and they’re black, and they’re far away. It’s like the old journalistic rule of thumb: When you have a catastrophe, one American is worth two Brits is worth five Israelis. And by the time you get to Bangladeshis, you’ve got to have ten thousand of them to die before you may be interested in covering it.” He shakes his head. “America’s window on the world has the shutters down.” These days Fenton gets his news from The New York Times, the French paper Le Figaro, and British papers The Guardian, The Times, and The Telegraph. He believes the best investigative journalism is in magazines such as The New Yorker and The Atlantic Monthly. The Atlantic Monthly announced in May 2005 that it would reduce its fiction offering in order to make space for more nonfiction narrative reportage. “Today there is an urgent need,” read its editorial, “and a corresponding hunger, for this kind of writing.” Fenton is not surprised by the decision. Investigative journalism is just too difficult and expensive for the television networks to tackle thoroughly and well, he argues. It is also “anathema to the people who are only interested in the bottom line.” I ask Fenton if there is a media structure that could offer an alternative to the current system of news programming in the United States. “The BBC, with all its warts,” he suggests. “It’s not a model that can be transposed elsewhere, but because of some quirk in the British character it works here.” Fenton is referring to the fact that the BBC is required under its charter to operate free from any political or governmental influence. Its fifty-plus news-gathering bureaus and 250 foreign correspondents around the world are similarly bound. CBS, by contrast, at the end of 2004, had a total of three news-gathering bureaus overseas, consisting of eight foreign correspondents, four of whom live in London, and no permanent correspondents at all in Eastern Europe, Moscow, Cairo, Beirut, Beijing, or anywhere in the Arab world or the Muslim world at large, including Pakistan. The BBC’s reputation for rigorous, unbiased reportage, combined with previous BBC investigations into Chinese political and human rights issues, caused the Chinese government to demand that Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corporation, remove the BBC’s World News channel from his satellite offerings before it would allow him access to the enormous Chinese market. Murdoch agreed. continued on page 85 w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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Midtown-Edmondson, by Yasmin
postcards from the
Druid Heights and Upton, by Joy
Photographers of all ages participated in the Real City, Dream City project. The photographers whose work is shown here are remarkably young. Joy is a high school student. Yasmin, Maya, and Dajanae are in elementary school.
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urbanite october 06
Pigtown/Washington Village, by Maya
edges of baltimore
Local arts group Art on Purpose put cameras in the hands of Baltimoreans and sent them out into the streets. This is what came back. B Y
B I L L
M E S L E R
On one side of the photograph, a line of simple brown brick houses stands with a group of African-American children crowded onto one stoop. Facing the older homes, on the opposite side of the street, is a line of brand-new three-story rowhouses, simultaneously stifling and affluent, clean but lifeless. In the center, a graffiti-tainted street sign slices the picture, like the city itself, in two. Helen Keith, the mother of the photographer, sits in a makeshift classroom on the third floor of the Church of St. Paul the Apostle on Washington Boulevard and glowingly elaborates on the dualistic theme of “what was and what’s going to be” she sees in her daughter Maya’s photograph: The crime and disrepair their Pigtown neighborhood has struggled with, yielding to the forces of urban renewal, growth, and hope. The photographer herself, an adorable 7 year old, listens patiently before offering her own inspiration. She was looking to document something negative, something that captured her exasperation with the trash that litters the area and the frequent shootings she has heard around her house that have left her “scared and afraid.” But ultimately, she settled on the scene for more earthly reasons. “I was wondering,” she says, “why would somebody write on a pole?” Maya’s photo is one of hundreds produced in a series of ten photography workshops held throughout the city by the local arts activist group Art on Purpose as part of its Real City, Dream City project. The idea was to give disposable cameras to residents of all ages in ten different neighborhoods, give them lessons in photography techniques and a bit of history, and turn them loose on their own neighborhoods. The result was not only fine art, but a photographic document of Baltimore through the eyes of its own, often marginalized, residents—snapshots that explore, in the words of Art on Purpose’s hyperenthusiastic director, Peter Bruun, “the positive, the negative, and the possible for their neighborhoods.”
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It is the most ambitious project Art on Purpose has undertaken since Bruun founded the group last year, and it represents the kind of art-meetssocial-activism raison d’etre he had in mind from the outset. Bruun came to Baltimore twenty years ago to attend the graduate program for painting at MICA. Years spent as an artist left him disenchanted with the gallery system, which, he says, turns art into a “commercial object.” Inspired in part by German sculptor Joseph Beuys, a World War II fighter pilot who went on to become an activist and a leading voice of the German Green Party, Bruun began to embrace art as a vehicle for social activism, in the spirit of what he describes as “the medieval model of art, or the African model, where the artist directly serves the community interest.” It is the social activism aspect of Real City, Dream City that Bruun sees as most crucial. Out of the hundreds of photographs, twenty were turned into postcards, with text written by community leaders and residents. They have become letters to the powers that be, pleas for change. The postcards will be featured at a number of local shows, including an exhibition at the Eubie Blake National Jazz Institute and Cultural Center October 5 through 28. Art on Purpose and its partners (the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhoods, the Neighborhood Design Center, the Safe and Sound Campaign, and the Parks & People Foundation) hope to draw a number of local politicians and other civic leaders to an event at Eubie Blake in late October, just prior to the midterm elections. (Go to www.artonpurpose.org for specific event details.) The postcards will also appear in a supplementary album available during a show at the Baltimore Museum of Art entitled The City Real and Ideal, an exhibit of fifteenth- to eighteenth-century prints of cities, running October 11, 2006, through March 11, 2007. Real City, Dream City was inspired in part by the BMA show. Elizabeth Rodini, curator of The City Real and Ideal and adjunct associate curator in the Department of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs at the BMA, thinks the two will make a perfect fit. Rodini says that printmaking represented a revolutionary turn in the world of art, a new medium that allowed artists to “communicate ideas broadly to more people than painting had. In this sense, the technology of printing had a democratizing potential and the potential for social activism.” Photography is another step in that same progression. “Photography is even more accessible, in that you don’t have to be an expert to take pictures.” Each neighborhood’s unique character emerges in the Real City, Dream City photographs, but those taken in Midtown-Edmondson are particularly powerful. They have a distinct edge that embodies the devastation of the inner city—a young boy flashing gang signs, a dog barking behind a chain link fence—all the more remarkable because the participants were exclusively elementary-school children. At the Midtown Edmondson Avenue Improvement Association, in a barren little building not far from the streets described in David Simon’s The Corner, Zelda Robinson, a community activist who helped run the Real City, Dream City workshop, sits at a desk, wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words, “It’s all about the children.” Robinson doesn’t need much prodding to launch into a litany about the disintegration of the neighborhood she has lived in for the better part of sixty years. But when she gets around to pulling out packets of dozens of photos the children in the workshop had taken, her austere-grandmother demeanor is replaced by a long, Whoopie-Goldberg-like smile. “I don’t know what I expected,” she says. “But when I saw these, I was in awe. It makes you wonder just how far they can go. “You know,” she continues, “for some of these kids, East Baltimore is like a foreign country. They have no cultural exposure. We used to have musical programs, art programs. When I was in school, we even had square dancing. I didn’t know how the kids were going to react to this project, but they loved it. Every day there would be some new little boy at the door saying, ‘Can I come in?’ And I had to let them in.” ■
Midtown-Edmondson, by Dajanae
—Bill Mesler is a Baltimore-based freelancer and a regular contributor to Urbanite.
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Botani . Fresh botanical goods. From funky cut flowers, plants and herbs to all-natural candles, soaps, aromatherapy and eco-friendly stationery. Come in, make an arrangement and cut your own soap!! 846 W. 36th Street• 410-889-4025 * flowers@botani846.com
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Golden West Cafe. “Green chile, green chile, green chile! A million New Mexicans can’t be wrong.” Open Wed.-Mon. 9am-10pm, Bar open till midnight. Closed Tuesdays. 1105 W. 36th Street • 410 889-8891
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sustainable city
by nicky penttila
An interview with sustainability expert David Orr
courtesy of Oberlin College
Design with the Earth in Mind David Orr is a tireless campaigner for environmental sustainability, especially through the design and construction of buildings and landscapes. Orr, who earned a doctorate in international relations and holds three honorary degrees, gives scores of lectures and interviews each year on sustainability, ecological design, and how to teach students to be environmentally aware, and also leads the environmental studies program at Oberlin College. He was awarded a Bioneers Award in 2002, a National Conservation Achievement Award by the National Wildlife Federation in 1993, and the Connecticut General Assembly has cited him for his “vision, dedication, and personal passion� in promoting the principles of sustainability. His latest book, Design on the Edge: The Making of a High-Performance Building, describes the decade-long effort to initiate, organize, fund, and build the Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies at Oberlin, a working model of ecological design and the first substantially green building built on a college campus. On October 18, he will be in Baltimore talking about ecological design for healthy communities as part of the city’s Architecture Week. (Urbanite is a sponsor of AIA Architecture Week. For more information go to www.aiabalt.com.)
we provision ourselves with food, energy, shelter, waste cycling, livelihood, and health. It is the careful meshing of human purposes with the larger patterns and flows of the natural world and the study of those patterns and flows to inform human purposes. Q. The high-performance Lewis Center has been declared one of the thirty Milestone Buildings of the 20th Century by the U.S. Department of Energy. Were you surprised at the difficulties you encountered in the decade it took to plan, design, and build the center? A. No. Within any organization, college, or corporation, ecological design requires a shift in perception to include systems, patterns, and a long-term view of economics. It requires, in other words, organizational learning, which can be made more difficult than it otherwise has to be. Q. What pleasantly surprised you about the process? A. How easy it is to design out waste. Energy efficiency is the best example. Energy use in typical buildings can be cut by one-third or more by stateof-the-shelf technologies at very attractive payback times. Good design can substitute for a large fraction of the costs of buying, maintaining, and eventually replacing expensive heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems. Q. What are characteristics of healthy communities?
Q. What is ecological design? A. Ecological design begins in the study of natural systems and processes to inform the ways in which
A. Healthy children for one, a derivative of parks, well-conceived open spaces, clean air and water, good schools, good parenting, a locally based econ-
courtesy of Oberlin College
Below: The Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies at Oberlin College
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urbanite october 06
omy that creates good work for their parents, and a public infrastructure that includes public transit, bike trails, libraries, and a robust civic culture. You see it in neighborhoods in lots of places. Many communities and towns across the United States have taken their future into their own hands. Chattanooga, Tennessee, once one of the dirtiest cities in the United States, has turned into one of the best small cities. Cleveland, Ohio, a rustbelt city, is becoming a leader in the application of ecological design. The same kinds of things are happening in many small towns across the country where sustainability, efficiency, and resilience are now part of the planning dialogue.
year. The common features of decent cities include growth boundaries to prevent sprawl and deflect investment back to the urban core, a shift away from the energy sources of the industrial revolution to renewable energy, a change in building patterns such as those promoted by the U.S. Green Building Council, investment in schools and education, and again, an active and robust civic life. People should be proud of Baltimore. You are the trustees of a great American city. Make it a city that your great-grandchildren will cherish.
Q. What should we be demanding of our political and social leaders?
Q. At the same time, suburban communities around Baltimore have been burgeoning; some call it sprawling.
Q. Can urban communities be healthy communities? A. Yes, as shown by Curitiba in Brazil, by Portland, Oregon, and by sustainable city initiatives in hundreds of cities worldwide. In a world more than half urban, we will have to give serious attention to the ways in which health is the standard for urban development. Q. Baltimore has been losing population over the past decades. Is there an ideal size for a city? A. Plato thought there was, but that was a world of maybe one hundred million. World population is now 6.5 billion and growing by about 70 million each
A. It won’t go on much longer. Rising prices for gasoline will eventually cause us to retrace our steps back toward more concentrated cities. The peak of world oil extraction, whether this year or fifteen years from now, will change a great deal of what we now take for granted as a matter of right. Q. What actions can we take in our daily lives to contribute to the solution? A. Join the effort to make a rapid and thoughtful transition from fossil fuels, such as coal, oil, and natural gas, to renewable energy provided by wind, direct solar, and biomass.
A. Accountability and foresight in decisions of war, peace, justice, fairness, and the environment. Specifically, U.S. political leaders have ignored the largest issue looming ahead and therefore the steps necessary to avert the first truly global crisis since we emerged as a species. It is not global warming, but planetary destabilization—driven by higher temperatures, larger storms, rising sea levels, changing ecosystems, and changing disease patterns. The science is clear and so, too, are the solutions. They begin in an energy policy that moves us toward higher efficiency and eventually to an economy powered by sunlight and wind. This ought not to be painful, though it can by stupidity be made so. It is, on the contrary, the convergence of the right thing to do with the smart thing to do. Our grandchildren will come to see it as merely the obvious course of action and will be amazed by our bovine obtuseness on such things as automobile efficiency or our subsidies of roads and cars but not public transportation. ■ —Nicky Penttila is a Baltimore-based freelance writer who is working on her second novel.
(410) 235-7979
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to think,
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urbanite october 06
A Sense of Accomplishment
www.glenelg.org
by tom lombardi
courtesy of Saatchi & Saatchi
out there
The Creep that Won’t Quit The steady crawl of advertising into our everyday lives
Above: This ad campaign, launched by advertising firm Saatchi & Saatchi this March for a limited time in Manhattan, placed a vinyl image of a cup of Folgers coffee over a manhole cover.
I’m strolling through Times Square when a blond guy in underwear and flip-flops passes me. Do I stare? Nah. Even if he were naked and walking on his hands I wouldn’t give him the time of day. We have an unspoken agreement in this city: Ignore all creeps. Now, if it were a woman walking around in her underwear … I’m sorry, what was I writing about? Oh—the underwear guy. Anyway, as he nears, I notice he has the words “Freshpair.com” stamped onto his abs. Getting a closer look at the URL, I can tell by the freshness of the ink that it’s not a tattoo. He heads toward a white tent that’s been set up at the corner of Seventh Avenue and Broadway, where some other models, male and female, wearing only undies, are commingling. A line of pedestrians has formed outside the tent. Turns out they’re waiting in line for free underwear from Freshpair.com. Gnarly or stupid? Either way, it caught my attention. Ladies and gentlemen, ad creep is upon us. According to Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, a nonprofit organization that
“protects communities from commercialism,” ad creep is “the creep of advertising into every nook and cranny of our lives and culture.” Think of ads that utilize nontraditional media to catch your eye: schoolbooks, bathroom walls, flesh, sidewalks. Moving away from the underwear tent, I find myself gawking at a Cingular billboard on Broadway that says, “Hate dropped ____?” On the sidewalk below, a gigantic chunk with the word “calls” written on it stands on the concrete as though it had fallen. Throngs are forced to walk around it. Suddenly, someone hands me a fan with text promoting Chicago the Musical. “If it were raining,” Morgan Lamarre says, handing out fans to dozens of passersby, “I would have given you a Chicago poncho.” “And a hat in the winter?” I ask. “No,” he says, “but some shows have given out gloves. And Frisbees. And chewing gum.” “Does it sell tickets?” “Yeah, but at the same time you don’t want to be blatant about it ’cause people are kind of skepti-
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Open House
Notre Dame Preparatory School
Saturday, October 21, 2006 11 a.m.–1 p.m. Upper School 2:30–4 :30 p.m. Middle School
For more information, call 410-825-0590 or visit www.notredameprep.com GIRLS • GRADES 6–12 • INDEPENDENT, CATHOLIC, COLLEGE PREPARATORY SCHOOL
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Op en H Ouse , K ~12 sunday, October 22 at 11:30 a.m. LOwer scHOOL VIsITIng Days 8:15-9:30 a.m., november 9, December 14, January 11
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F O u n De D I n 18 4 4
Cultural Arts and Travel Society
“Kiddie” C.A.T.S. Performing Arts Series for Children ‘06-’07 Season Preview
Step Explostion
Featuring“Nu Era”
Featuring Step Afrika
Smithsonian Associates Discovery Theater on Tour “Going The Distance”
Sat, Oct. 14, 4pm
Sat. Nov. 4th, 8pm & Sun. Nov. 5th, 3pm
Fri. Feb. 9th, 11am & 4pm, Sat. Feb. 10th, 4pm
Season Opening Red Carpet “Kiddie” Gala
For more information or season brochure call 410-433-5383 or visit www.culturalartsand travelsociety.com All performances take place at Murphy Fine Art Arts Center on the campus of Morgan State University
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cal of too much advertising. Wicked is the best-selling ticket, but all you see from them is a billboard. They have, I guess you’d call it, ‘street credibility.’” Is it me or have advertisers gotten aggressive? At least food’s off limits, right? Wrong. Egg-vertising. CBS is etching its logo, along with slogans for this year’s fall lineup, onto thirty-five million eggs that will be distributed in grocery stores. A company called EggFusion developed the laser imprinting technology in order to etch freshness dates onto eggs. Bradley Parker, founder of the company, decided to think outside the carton. I don’t know about you brunch-goers, but advertising on something that comes out of a chicken makes this consumer feel … eggs-istential? Has the advertising world gone bananas? Why, yes. For its fall “yellow” campaign a few years ago, ABC printed its logo and slogans onto fruit stickers that were pasted onto bananas. The term “ad creep” was coined, says Carrie McLaren, ad critic and editor of Stay Free! magazine, by one of her subscribers. Gregory Solman, West Coast editor at Adweek in Los Angeles, upon hearing of the term ad creep for the first time, joked, “That’s not creep—it’s more like a full-scale march.” He said a doctor once pitched him an idea for a rubber urinal splashguard with lenticular tech-
nology. Lenticular printing refers to an image that changes when turned, as in the winking eyes seen on the old Cracker Jack box prizes. The doctor wanted to produce these splashguards for beer companies, so patrons would drain their bladders onto the ad. “There is the demonstrable fact that there are
That’s advertising today— more “drivers,” the same limited number of traditional spaces, and an urgent search for effective nontraditional ways of getting the message across. more advertising minutes per hour than ever before in television history,” says Solman. “You can presume that simply based upon the number of companies that advertise.” Imagine if the cars in your city tripled overnight. Where would people park? Some drivers would get pretty inventive. That’s advertising today—more “drivers,” the same limited number of traditional spaces, and an urgent search for effective nontraditional ways of getting the message across.
So if this whole thing is making us uncomfortable, whom do we blame? Was advertising “back in the day” less aggressive and more wholesome? “Whether there’s ever been a sphere that was sacrosanct is quite another thing to determine,” says Solman. “People longingly look back on television shows that were plainly sponsored.” Okay—there’s got to be a downside to advertising on all sorts of surfaces. “Coca-Cola faces the problem that their logo is so familiar on the American landscape,” says Solman, “that a great percentage of the population no longer notices it.” Sadly, not all creeps—or ads—can be ignored. So what will ad creep look like in the future? I don’t want to think about it. As for now, I’m going to close my laptop. Shut off my cell phone. Go for a walk. And breathe. I still have one medium no ad campaign can reach. My soul. ■ —Tom Lombardi's fiction is forthcoming in McSweeney's Quarterly and has appeared in Nerve, Fence, and McSweeneys.net, among others. He lives in Los Angeles.
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Magic of Mercy
The
Celebrating 45 years of women making a difference.
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photo of Caleb Stine and The Brakemen by Dan Stack
recommended
Music
By Robbie Whelan
With new, disheartening singles by Lionel Ritchie, John Mayer, and Paris Hilton slowly grating on the subconscious, one must turn to the local scene for inspiration. Much of the Baltimore music to come out recently, such as retro-pop band The Payola Reserve’s album One Long Apology,, is easiest to find on band websites, on the download (like iTunes, Rhapsody, MySpace, and others), and at local record stores. Payola’s urgent-sounding rock is mindfully straight-ahead— music meant to evoke a simpler time, when girls were all pretty and cars were all flashy and fast. Heavy vintage guitar lines sound like homey pedal-steel, but the songs, like “Seasick On Shore Leave” with all its empty lines about T. S. Eliot, James Dean, and “historicizing your feelings,” are sometimes easy to tune out. ’s CD is available at shows, through Hampden’s Alt-country songwriter Caleb Stine’s Atomic Books (www.atomicbooks.com) and on his website. He and his band, The Brakemen,, play both original songs and covers of country and folk classics regularly at the Waterfront Hotel, a rootsy Fells Point beer hole. In May they finished recording their first album, October 29th,, in a Hampden church, and a few of their tracks premiered on WYPR’s The Signal in September. Stine’s songs have a prominent sense of place to go with their southern, Son Volt-ish twang. He sings about crossing the border and “this dry land” in the domestic-abuse ballad “Devil,” and croons, “How little I know about you!” to the cornhusker state in “Oh, Nebraska.” The fantastic “Since Sunday” is a letter to friend who is packing off to Barcelona while the singer heads west to California. Stine’s voice is earnest and honest, and his band (with its acoustic rhythm section and discreet electric guitar lead) keeps things simple. It’s good stuff.
ART courtesy of Smithsonian American Art Museum
By Bill Sebring
Baltimore is blessed with the American Visionary Art Museum—the country’s cathedral of outsider art—and yet, according to critic Robert Hughes, what may be the nation’s finest example of religious visionary output resides fifty miles to the south in the freshly renovated Smithsonian American Art Museum. The SAAM’s humble crown jewel, janitor James Hampton’s remarkable Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations’ Millennium General Assembly—a collection of 180 objects, fashioned
secretly in an N Street garage from foil, light bulbs, and jelly jars—has rewarded a diverse public since 1970. The silvery “FEAR NOT,” hovering over the winged chair, at once admonishes and welcomes. While closed, the museum added the library-like Luce Foundation Center to the Old Patent Office Building it has occupied since 1968, putting more than 3,300 additional objects on view. Kiosks allow visitors to access information on any artwork, in the form of artist biographies, video clips, still images, and audio interviews.
FILM
Horror, of all cinematic genres, is fertile ground for possibility, which is why I don’t understand Hollywood’s insistence on digging through graveyards for old bones. Classics are slashed and brought back to life in hopes of commercial success due to cult acclaim. The result is something like Frankenstein’s monster: It resembles the original, but has no soul—just better-looking actors. The Omen and The Exorcist have been possessed. The Shining is a mini-series. They even got you, Leatherface.
photo by Aleksander Bochenek | Dreamstime.com
By Catrina Cusimano For now, I clutch the films they haven’t bothered with: I Spit on Your Grave, the ultimate rape-revenge, starring Camille Keaton (Buster’s grandniece), sixties low-budget cult classics Carnival of Souls and The Brain That Wouldn’t Die, and Night Tide featuring a young Dennis Hopper pining for a girl who believes she is descended from killer sea creatures. Above all, I promise to guard Tod Browning’s 1932 Freaks with my life. May they never be perfect; may they never be improved.
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Canton Waterfront
1400 Lancaster, Penthouse 1002
Amazing home on the end of the North Shore Pier has it all! Incredible water view from every room, Gourmet kitchen w/ Viking, custom baths w/ granite, vessel sink & TV’s, multiple balconies, gated 2-car parking, surround wiring, 2 way FP in Master & master bath, 3rd level terrace & walk in closets. This is the ultimate city home w/great water views, parking & security! Visit baltimoreshowcase.com for virtual tour.
Make this luxury penthouse with beautiful water view in Inner Harbor East your city getaway! 1800+ sqft, 2BR, 2.5BA, Master bath with marble tile and vanity, walk in closets, 2 balconies, floor to ceiling windows, tile floors, custom kitchen with granite countertops & stainless steel appliances, fireplace, 2 secure parking spaces & 24hour security. Visit baltimoreshowcase.com for virtual tour.
Fells Point
704 Milton
Three magnificent stories of SPACE, SPACE, SPACE! 4 BR, 4.5 BA, roof top deck with great city views. Large kitchen, separate dining room with tray ceiling & architectural columns. Beautiful cathedral ceilings, hardwoods and skylights. Third floor is huge master suite w/ bedroom, 2 baths and sitting room or 2BR, 2BA. Offered at $515,000. Visit baltimoreshowcase.com.
This home Features high-end appliances, sought-after location, smart design & fine finishes. Luxury living at its best! 3500sqft+, heavy duty elevator, 2 Mstrs, 10ft ceil, 2 car garage, tray ceilings, attention to detail, cntrl vac, premium intercom, high-end baths, wood floors & large decks. Buyer pays transfers, 5 year tax credit! 4 units available - Visit baltimoreshowcase.com for virtual tour.
Canton
2022 East Pratt Street
3303 Elliott Street
Great big renovated house with 3 car parking, 4BR, 3FB, EOG, tree lined, Gourmet kitchen w/ island, maple HW’s throughout, built-ins, wetbar, wine cooler, close to park,2 rooftop decks, single spine steel open riser stairs, 2 zoned HVAC, exposed brick throughout, stained glass lvn room windows, 3 FPs (not working), 3 entrances, courtyard, full bath on each flr. 2 attics. Visit baltimoreshowcase.com.
Newly Constructed 3 lvl garage THs in great Canton location, close to water, the square & dog park. Classic design w/ modern touches. This 5 unit project is under way & should be ready for delivery 11/15/2006. 3 interior units 16ft wide & End units to be 20ft wide. Contact Ron for floor plans & list of finishes. New construction tax credit available for this project.. Starting at 650k. Visit baltimoreshowcase.com
Canton Water View 2335 Boston Street #5
Welcome to North Shore and experience the ultimate urban lifestyle! Sophisticated colonial 4 story TH with relaxing water view, 2-car garage, 4BR,including penthouse master suite with walkin closets, balcony and soaking tub, 2.5 baths, granite counters in large kitchen. Nestled on the edge of Fells Point and Canton,. Offered at $779,000. Visit baltimoreshowcase.com.
urbanite october 06
Canton
107 Ann Street
Butchers Hill 2 Car Garage
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Inner Harbor East
2327 Boston Street #16
Canton Cove Waterfront 2901 Boston Street, Unit 316
Zen-like Canton waterfront residence with a panorama that will not fail to impress. Distinctive by design 18ft walls of glass & 2 expansive balconies provide an awe-inspiring residence perfect for your exciting lifestyle. Enjoy your privacy w/24hr front desk/security. Storage unit & 2 private parking spaces included (1 garage space). Additional storage & studio unit available.
recommended
fiction
By Susan McCallum-Smith
When planning a winter break, consider the following options: Strolling across a war zone accompanied by a Mujahidin double-act with an enthusiasm for killing people and making children cry? Driving across America with a blabbermouth and a family of four in a rented Ford Impala? Or sharing cruise-ship bacteria with two thousand of your new best friends? A few weeks after the fall of the Taliban, Rory Stewart walked across the mountains of Afghanistan from Herat to Kabul, relying on the kindness of strangers for food and shelter. His mesmerizing account, The Places in Between, describes a journey where triggering a land mine is more likely than catching a tan. After a particularly hard day struggling through fourfoot-high snow drifts, he is overtaken by a British Special Forces jeep tracking remnants of the Taliban. “You,” shouts the driver, “are a fucking nutter!” Stewart’s bed and breakfast options are somewhat limited; the medieval etiquette and political ideologies of local warlords make dinner conversation akin to Russian roulette. “He better be careful or we’ll do to him what we did to the CIA officer in Kunduz,” remarks one host, to the chuckles of his companions, hand grenades dangling from their belts. Unlike many travel writers, Stewart doesn’t use his journey as an opportunity for autobiography or musings on the human condition. “I sat down and wrote a long letter to my parents, in case I was killed,” is the closest he comes to confession. Stewart takes the hackneyed maxim of “living in the moment” and personifies it.
“ I N T I M AT E SURROUNDINGS”
A little of Stewart’s reticence and a lot tighter editing would have benefited the latest release from Robert Sullivan, the author of 2005 bestseller Rats. A testament to the nonfiction publishing world’s mania for the subtitle, it’s called Cross Country: Fifteen Years and Ninety Thousand Miles on the Roads and Interstates of America with Lewis and Clark, a Lot of Bad Motels, a Moving Van, Emily Post, Jack Kerouac, My Wife, My Mother-In-Law, Two Kids, and Enough Coffee to Kill an Elephant. This rambling yet entertaining account of exploring the nation’s highways in search of the real America beyond Conestoga wagons and Chuck-E-Cheeses leads Sullivan to conclude, finally, that America is the road. Before booking a Brazilian wax, warming up for the conga line, and learning how to secure a life-jacket over a tuxedo, you may want to read David Foster Wallace’s title essay from his 1997 collection A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again. On a Caribbean cruise, Wallace undertakes a side-splitting anthropological study of the American tourist en masse. White visors, wicker purses, and pastel polo shirts are just some of the defining characteristics of the bovine-like species he labels Perigrinator Americanus. DFW (as the artsy-fartsy literati call him) is such an engaging writer that I forgive the acronym and his footnote fixation. If traveling further than the mailbox sounds too hazardous, decamp to the safety of the La-Z-Boy with Claire Messud’s new novel, The Emperor’s Children. Messud has accumulated a small but loyal following since
her first book, When The World Was Steady (1995), captured attention for the elegant clarity of her prose. This fourth effort guarantees her a much-deserved larger audience. A set of self-absorbed thirty-something New Yorkers struggle to achieve personal and professional fulfillment before their lives are turned upside down by the tragedy of September 11. This comedy of manners requires, and holds, a reader’s rapt attention. Look out for Messud when the glitzy literary prizes are announced; she is an author who has mapped the intimate twists, turns, and byways of the human heart. ■
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The information is accurate as of date of printing and is subject to change without notice. Wells Fargo Home Mortgage is a division of Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. All Rights Reserved.
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Dismantling the Ghetto continued from page 41 housing in the Baltimore area, while also addressing housing segregation. “There is not enough affordable housing [in the city] that is in decent condition,” says Samuels. “Therein lies a major problem with Baltimore. The housing authority and HUD have not been trying to house people in parts of the housing market outside Baltimore City where there is additional rental housing in good condition.” Graziano, who serves as both the city’s housing commissioner and the executive director of the housing authority, puts an emphasis on a citycentered approach. “Our focus is rebuilding and creating opportunities within the city and we are moving quite nicely in that direction,” he says. One of the city’s solutions is the recent formation of a $59 million affordable-housing trust fund. The money will be used, in part, for “blight elimination,” says Graziano, to assemble land and buildings for redevelopment. The very formation of this fund underscores the tensions in Baltimore between the housing ‘“haves” and “have-nots.” Call it “the battle over safe zones.” In 2005, the city council stalled its approval of a $305 million city-backed convention center hotel after religious leaders demanded that tourists’ interest be balanced with the needs of Baltimore’s poor. In June of that year, Bishop Douglas I. Miles, representing Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development (BUILD), angrily accused City Council
President Sheila Dixon of reneging on a campaign promise to back BUILD’s neighborhood revitalization plan. Dixon, he said, sought “safe zones for tourists while we have no safety,” according to the Baltimore Sun. The pressure resulted in the $59 million fund, pledged by Mayor Martin O’Malley’s administration to persuade council members to vote for the convention center hotel. It did the trick. The hotel is being built and the trust fund was born. (This is a different fund from the one recently recommended by Sarbanes’ task force.) Graziano says the housing authority is working on other projects to accommodate the housing needs of people of all economic levels, including projects in the neighborhoods of Barclay, Poppleton, Reservoir Hill, and Uplands. One large project in East Baltimore will include five hundred units of mixedincome homes. Samuels acknowledges the complexities of the situation. “There is no magic bullet that is going to solve the housing problems of Baltimore. There is no magic bullet that is going to solve poverty in Baltimore, and no magic bullet that is going to undo our history of segregated housing and segregated neighborhoods.” However, she says, “There are an array of tools in the toolbox that have to be used in a coordinated way, which we have never done before. Breaking down patterns of segregation gives low-income Af-
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rican Americans opportunity. Some tools to achieve this include a strategic use of the federal voucher program, and a strategic targeting of future affordable housing to higher-opportunity areas. Inclusionary housing methods can be one way to do this. For Ike Neal, the solution is personal. When he moved to Mount Washington, he could hardly believe he was living in such a nice house. “To me it was not real,” he says. Neal remembered being offended several years ago when an angry crowd of residents in Northeast Baltimore voiced opposition to having any public housing tenants scattered in their neighborhoods. “We tried to get them to view us in a different light,” he says. “We’re not animals. We just needed opportunities.” Today, Neal believes he has finally gotten that opportunity in an integrating community where he has befriended his new neighbors. “Last year was our twenty-fourth wedding anniversary,” he says. “We had a big party and everybody came—black and white. “The ladies across the street are our best friends,” he says. “And they know we’re from public housing because I told them.” ■ —For nearly twenty years Joan Jacobson covered housing and neighborhoods in Baltimore City for the Sun and Evening Sun, including stories about slum landlords, housing speculators, and the misuse of federal housing dollars by city agencies and nonprofits.
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They Walk Among Us continued from page 45 he says, explaining that his female characters are the film’s action heroes. “Wow.” Pearce is shocked. “I had no idea he thought it was political.” Meanwhile, at the first beat of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” a large number of the undead flood the floor. Though it’s obvious that the crowd in Gardel’s is reveling in the kitschy nature of modern zombiedom, Spencer has a point: Theories about the origin of zombies have evolved along with the
In every instance, the zombie proves to be a physical manifestation of society’s collective fears. changing state of the world. During the early half of the twentieth century, zombies were the byproducts of damning international exploration, as in 1936’s Revolt of the Zombies. In later films, like Romero’s 1968 classic Night of the Living Dead, the undead are a result of radiation exposure from a fallen NASA satellite that had been circling Venus.
Nowadays, the modern zombie is produced by a pandemic. In every instance, the zombie proves to be a physical manifestation of society’s collective fears. In the corner, Marty Day promotes the zombie Web-comic he writes, Dead of Summer. Scenes from Night of the Living Dead play on the wall beside him. Day, having met Romero recently at a horror convention, feels honored to bask in the glow from the projector. As we talk, Day tells me he is soothed by the acts of cannibalism to my left. “Gas prices might go up, BGE rates will definitely go up, but these guys are still eating brains and there’s something comforting about that.” After thanking Pearce and Spencer for a lovely evening, I decide I have to leave before they draw any contest winners. My makeup is decidedly subpar, and I’m pretty certain I don’t stand a chance for Prom Queen. The real horror tonight was a high school memory revisited. Suddenly, the long elevator ride back to my car seems all the more daunting. Zombies always bring friends, and I went to the prom alone. ■ —Catrina Cusimano recently graduated from Towson University. She is considered Urbanite’s resident “living dead” expert.
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Mad As Hell continued from page 59
Murdoch’s News Corporation is one of the eight multinational entertainment conglomerates that own the movie, television, music, magazine, and newspaper corporations within the United States (and elsewhere), and therefore control the dissemination of domestic and international news. They are, in descending order of size: General Electric (NBC, Universal Pictures, Focus Features, Bravo), Time Warner (CNN, TBS, TNT, America Online, Warner Bros. Pictures), Walt Disney (ABC, ESPN, Miramax, Touchstone, Walt Disney Pictures), Vivendi Universal (European Cable, Universal Records, Def Jam), News Corporation (Fox Broadcasting, Twentieth Century Fox, Sky, Star TV, New York Post), Bertelsmann (Random House, Sony), CBS (CBS, UPN, Showtime), and Viacom (MTV, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, Paramount Pictures, VH1). The fundamental objectives of these conglomerates, it could be argued, are to increase market share and maximize stockholder value. The requirement of news divisions to be profitable has caused, as Dan Rather told Fenton, “fear in the newsrooms.” News managers no longer feel empowered to decide which news stories take priority and must struggle for quality reportage within the confines of the system. When the hit reality TV show Survivor first aired during 2000, the contender who had just been kicked off the latest episode often turned up the next day on the CBS Morning News. This tidy confluence of events was orchestrated by the media corporation Viacom, which at the time owned both Survivor and CBS. It has become frequent business practice for the entertainment divisions of media corporations to stage news, which their news divisions are then required to cover. “Do you think it’s going to get worse?” I ask Fenton. “When the media giants say it’s not about the money, is it about the money? Are we bang up against capitalism run amok?” “I’ve thought about this long and hard.” Fenton leans forward in his chair. “In theory, the FCC should be our watchdog. It’s a toothless tiger. Most people don’t know that their local television station is there by the good grace of the government and that it must, supposedly, meet certain requirements. If you complain hard enough, and there are enough of you complaining, perhaps, they might even lose their licenses. All the FCC has to do is just lift its little finger.” Fenton One of the problems says. “And they are not doing it in the with twenty-four-hour area where they really have the greatest responsibility, the responsibility cable news is that of providing real news to an informed you have a lot of time electorate.” to fill, and a lot of it’s The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was created in filled with chatter. Talk 1934, in part to ensure that no single is the cheapest thing broadcasting company gained excessive control over America’s public you can put on the air. airwaves. The FCC granted each broadcaster a license to use a specific portion of the radio signal spectrum, while the spectrum itself remained public property. In exchange for the license, the broadcasters were required to provide programming that served “the public interest, convenience, and necessity.” Furthermore, broadcasters could not own a newspaper and a broadcast station within the same city. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 changed everything. By removing a national cap on radio ownership, it allowed media companies more and more access to the public airwaves, while the definition of “public interest” remained vague or mired in controversy. “I’m afraid the only answer is pressure from the public,” says Fenton. “Remember Howard Beale in Broadcast News? ‘I want you all to get up and get out of your chairs.’” He lifts his arms aloft like an inspired preacher, “‘and open the window and shout, I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!’”
The movie Fenton mistakenly identifies as 1987’s Broadcast News is, in fact, 1976’s Network, directed by Sidney Lumet. Network won four Academy Awards, most notably for its lacerating screenplay by Paddy Chayefsky. Network’s plot is well known. A dispirited newscaster, Howard Beale, announces he will blow his brains out on national television. His news division is now required to make a profit and he senses all his years of journalistic integrity have come to naught. Realizing Beale’s unscripted apocalyptic jabbering about the state of the nation is producing phenomenal ratings, the network executives transform his evening news show into a glitzy entertainment, complete with an orchestra, soothsayers, prizes, and a live studio audience. Every evening Beale preaches to the masses, and one of his sermons is worth quoting in part: You and sixty-two million other Americans are watching me right now … Because less than three percent of you read books. Because less than fifteen percent of you read newspapers. Because the only truth you know is what you get over this tube! … This tube is the gospel. … This tube can make or break presidents, popes, and prime ministers. … And woe is us if it ever falls into the hands of the wrong people. … Because this network is now in the hands of CCA, Communications Corporation of America. … And when the twelfth-largest company in the world controls the most awesome goddamn propaganda force in the whole godless world, who knows what shit will be peddled for truth on this tube? So listen to me! Television is not the truth! … We’re in the boredom-killing business. … We’ll tell you anything you want to hear. We lie like hell! We’ll tell you Kojak always gets the killer and nobody ever gets cancer in Archie Bunker’s house. Paddy Chayefsky eerily predicted the consolidation of the media under fewer and larger entertainment conglomerates, the transformation of news divisions from public service operations to profit centers, the rise of reality television, and the development of a new cocktail called infotainment. News shows now have celebrity anchors, theme tunes, and catchy trailers. Major news events are titled like movies of the week: Attack on America! Katrina’s Wrath! Terror in London! Jackson on Trial! “One of the problems with twenty-four-hour cable news,” Fenton says, “is that you have a lot of time to fill, and a lot of it’s filled with chatter. Talk is the cheapest thing you can put on the air.” This turns our conversation to the dangerous brew of media, money, and politics. Considering Fenton’s assertion that the integrity of news is under threat within the context of the increasing privatization of the public airwaves and the low American-voter participation (according to several data sources, between 55.3 percent and 60.3 percent of eligible voters voted in the 2004 presidential election), one could conclude, I suggest to him, that we don’t, in fact, govern ourselves at all. Will it ever be possible, I ask, to change the nature of the relationship between the media and the electoral campaigns? “Yes. Stop selling airtime to candidates,” Fenton says. “Give them the free time instead. Most northern hemisphere democratic countries do that. But it’s such a huge money-making machine every two years for the American television companies that it would take a revolution to get them to do that. They have one of the most powerful lobbies around. They control your politicians’ access to their electorate.” It is a dry, chilly evening. The newsstand at the Tube station displays the evening’s headlines on sandwich boards: Tony Blair loses Commons vote to extend police holding period for suspects without charge to ninety days; Kate Moss bounces back after drug scandal; Charles and Camilla complete U.S. tour. I return to my hotel room, order some food, and switch on the news. Desperate Housewives actor Page Kennedy has been fired from the show. And three hotels have just been bombed in Amman, Jordan. Early reports list fifty-seven dead, and over one hundred injured. ■
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Forgotten Fruit continued from page 35 ple) and when he sprays he uses “a new generation of sprays” that are considered less toxic and safer than older pesticides. The amount of work at such a farm appears overwhelming to an outsider. But the Reids get their
In the last three decades, the Reids have planted one hundred kinds of apple trees, of which sixty are heirloom apples.
Heirloom apples ripening on the tree
something new.” He bought the first twenty acres in 1976 and later bought an adjacent farm with another eighty acres. The second purchase rejoined the bulk of what had been the original 1850 farm. Today, the Reids’ grown children (Maggie, 25, Caitlin, 23, and Christopher, 22) all work on the farm. Reid, modest and self-effacing, says the only skill he carried over from house painting was his ability to climb a ladder. What he knows now—eight thousand fruit trees later—he learned from other farmers, from reading books, and from trial and error.
As he traipses through the orchard, weeds of all kinds wave knee-high between every row of fruit. “It’s not the prettiest farm,” he says. “Look, the weeds are terrible.” Reid may apologize for the orchard’s untidiness, but he doesn’t apologize for refusing to use herbicides to kill the weeds. “We’re minimalist when it comes to pesticides. We use as little as possible,” he says. He believes the weeds harbor insects that are beneficial to the trees. He uses pesticides only when he has to (for destructive Japanese beetles, for exam-
energy and inspiration, says Kathy, from knowing who will consume the fruit of the seeds and trees they plant. The Reids sell their fruit exclusively at farmers’ markets (three in the Baltimore area and three in Northern Virginia), refusing to do business with supermarkets or processing plants. This puts them in the excellent position of knowing what their customers want. “We’re farmers and direct marketers,” says Kathy. “Going to farmers’ markets is a different creative act than actually growing the food. These people we see at the market are part of our family.” Reid believes the reason for the interest in heirloom fruit has to do with his generation getting older. “They want to know what stuff used to taste like, how this apple begot that apple,” he says. “And,” adds Kathy, “they want their kids to know that all food doesn’t come wrapped in plastic from Giant.” ■ —Joan Jacobson is a regular contributor and sometime editor for Urbanite. She also spent 28 years reporting for Baltimore’s Sun and Evening Sun.
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Page 1
resources
33 Forgotten Fruit
75 Recommended
Reid’s Orchard sells fruit at three Baltimore-area farmers’ markets: Saturday mornings from 7 a.m. to noon at the Waverly Farmers’ Market (East 32nd and Barclay Street); Sunday mornings from 8 a.m. to noon at the Baltimore Farmers’ Market downtown, under the Jones Falls Expressway (on Saratoga, between Gay and Holliday streets); and Thursdays from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Towson Farmers’ Market (Allegheny Avenue, between Washington Avenue and York Road).
Music: Caleb Stine and The Brakemen’s website is www. calebstine.com; The Payola Reserve’s website is www.thepayolareserve.com. Both bands are playing shows in Baltimore this month; see their websites for information.
The aim of website Commercial Alert (www.com ercialalert.org) is to “keep the commercial culture within its proper sphere;” it contains articles and information on fighting ad creep. Stay Free! magazine (www.stayfreemagazine.org) is a Brooklyn-based publication that “explores the politics and perversions of mass media and American culture.” Spacing magazine (spacing.ca) is a Toronto-based publication that deals with urban issues; the associated blog, Spacing Wire (spacing.ca/wire), contains some commentary on ad creep.
ng comi month: next
Guest Editor: George Baca
Film: The Exorcist (directed by William Friedkin, 1973); The Omen (directed by Richard Donner, 1976); The Shining (directed by Stanley Kubrick, 1980); I Spit on Your Grave (directed by Meir Zarchi, 1978); Carnival of Souls (directed by Herk Harvey, 1962; remake directed by Adam Grossman and Ian Kessner, 1998); The Brain that Wouldn’t Die (directed by Joseph Green, 1962); Night Tide (directed by Curtis Harrington, 1961); Freaks (directed by Tod Browning, 1932). Fiction: The Places in Between by Rory Stewart (Harcourt, 2006); Cross Country by Robert Sullivan (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2006); A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again by David Foster Wallace (Little, Brown and Company, 1997); and The Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud (Alfred A. Knopf, 2006).
D
ity l a u
photo by Gail Burton
71 The Creep that Won’t Quit
Art: The Smithsonian American Art Museum is located at 8th and F streets NW in Washington, D.C.; for more information, call 202-633-1000 or go to www. npg.si.edu or www.americanart.si.edu.
To read about the Reid family orchard in Pennsylvania, see page 33.
,
y, dichotom ings h t r the and o carpet. we keep under the
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Lisa Ciofani
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tasha@mtglender.net 170 Lakefront Drive Hunt Valley, MD 21030
The Red Canoe Bookstore Café
Creative Writing Workshops with award winning author
Certified Iyengar & Hatha Yoga Meditation–Workshops–Retreats Nationally Registered Teacher Training
Jonathon Scott Fuqua
Explore the art of children’s story writing, fiction writing, or memoir.
Day, Evening & Weekend Classes ✹ First Class free for first time yoga students
For info, times, & reservations call (410) 444-4440 or visit www.redcanoe.bz 4337 Harford Rd. Baltimore, MD 21214
12 A West Aylesbury Rd. Timonium, MD 410 308 9950 • syoga.com
Bikram Yoga
Roland Park Driving School
THE ORIGINAL “HOT YOGA”
“We’re on it” Are you? Are you in on the Secret? www.buildingbaltimore.com
MVA CERTIFIED LICENSED CLASSROOM/DRIVING INSTRUCTOR
Beginners Welcome in All Classes New Students: $20 for One Week of Classes
• DRIVER IMPROVEMENT CLASSES • 3-HOUR DRUG & ALCOHOL CLASSES
VOTED “BEST YOGA STUDIO” By Baltimore Magazine 2003.
• DRIVER MENTORING
THE ROTUNDA BUILDING 711 W. 40TH STREET, SUITE 205 BALTIMORE, MD 21211
Yorktowne Plaza Shopping Center 40 Cranbrook Road in Cockeysville
410-683-YOGA www.bikramyogabaltimore.com
410-467-7737 410-215-8867 cell www.rpds.net
Feed Your Heart Women’s Growth Center is a small, non-profit collective of therapists. We offer individual, couples, family, and group therapy for women and men, empowerment workshops and professional development. Women’s Growth Center Since 1973 5209 York Road #B12 410-532-2GROW (2476) By Appointment Only
1st Time Buyer Imperfect Credit Good Credit
Chocolate cafe & Tea Lounge
Fine Swiss Chocolate Premium Estate Loose Tea
Karen D. Dapp, Mortgage Banker
We will customize the perfect gifts & packaging to suit your company’s or your special occasion needs.
Atlantic Home Equity 170 Lakefront Drive Hunt Valley, MD 21030 office 888.683.7001 cell 443.604.4740 fax 410.771.0480 email kdapp@mtglender.net
62 village square – The Shops at Cross Keys Baltimore, MD 21210 410.532.8500
Serving MD, PA, VA, DC, DE
Made In Metal
jewelers’ tool and supplies F u n c t i o n a l Fi t n e s s I n t e g r a t i v e Therapy is a studio that specializes in p ro v i d i n g p h y s i c a l t h e r a p y f o r p e r s o n a l wellness, weight management and management of joint pain.
Physical Therapy. Personal Training. Wellness Coaching. 336 N. Charles Street,Lower Level Baltimore, MD 21201 P h o n e : 4 1 0 - 8 3 7 - 0 4 4 0 Fa x : 4 1 0 - 8 3 7 - 3 6 0 0 Email:sdavid@ffit.net w w w. f f i t . n e t
MIM
M.I.M. studios
bench time and private rooms for rent in a fully-equiped metalworking studio
gallery M.I.M.
unique and affordable fine art with a focus on handcrafted art jewelry
Jo-Ann Aiken, Owner 3600 Clipper Mill Road, Suite 130 Baltimore, MD 21211 (410) 662-6623 www.madeinmetal.net
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Baltimore’s Best Kept Secret
7 Twelve
Wednesday - Sunday Late Night Happy Hour
Your Ultimate Local Convenience
9pm - 10:30pm
812 Guilford Avenue Baltimore, MD 21240 410-244-8678
$1 Drafts & Rails 1728 N. Charles Street 410-528-0174
RESTAURANT, BAR & LOUNGE Don’t Mess with Tex-Mex! Sample items from our authentic Tex-Mex menu. Enjoy Classic Margaritas, Sangrias and Cerveza!
Because You Deserve To Be Pampered!
1014 N. Charles Street Baltimore, MD 21201 (410) 783-1971
Located at 1003 N. Charles Street in Mt. Vernon 410 752-3333
GiGi - Just Delicious Savory sandwiches, mind awakening coffee, fresh smoothies Mt. Vernon’s cozy cafe. Our savory sandwiches made with fresh ingredients and smoothies with real fruits take you to healthy and delicious experience. Free wireless access offered. For more details and catering info, please visit our website at freshgigi.com or contact gigi324@gmail.com
COBBER’S PUB & CAFE Cobber’s is a place where good people can enjoy great food and some cold amber fluid with some friends.
the Terrace at Tatin outdoor fall dining
1218 North Charles Street Baltimore, MD 21201 (410) 727-0713
1005 N. Charles Street 410.685.1554
BEST imore of balt
Baltimore Hottest Entertainment Complex
Gaudét Jewelry ®
Hi-Tech Industrial Dancefloor Video Bar Distinguished Pub
...death defying earrings...
p::443/852.3918 f::410/276.1555
1001/1003 N. Charles Street Baltimore, MD 21201 410.752.7133
www.gaudetjewelry.com
Voted BEST New Restaurant — Baltimore Magazine 2006
Eden’s Lounge
Nina’s Expresso Bar
DANCE FLOOR 2 Full Bars MARTINI ROOM Special Events LIVE ENTERTAINMENT
www.edenslounge.com 15 W. Eager Street, Balt. MD 410-244-0405
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photo by maja schon, dreamstime.com
Sexy Lounge Ambiance
“Because somethimes you need a jolt” 600 N. Calvert Street Baltimore, MD 21202 410-385-2800
Outside Dining on the Terrace | Lunch & Dinner Happy Hour & Lite Fare | Brick Oven Pizzas Complimentary Parking 4 4 3 . 2 7 8 . 9 110 | WWW.BRASSERIETATIN.COM 105 WEST 39TH STREET, BALTIMORE
we look great from every angle
Custom-decorated cakes for any occasion, any party theme, and any budget, that taste as great as they look. Delivery available.
2105 Gwynn Oak Avenue • Phone 410.944.1711
BaltimorE Choral Arts PrEsEnts
A BaltimorE PrEmiErE
LEt My PEoplE Go! Sunday, October 29, 2006, 4 p.m. Murphy Fine Arts Center, Morgan State University A spiritual journey along the Underground Railroad with the Choral Arts Full Chorus, Morgan State Choir and City College High School Choir. White Space Deleted
Tickets: $20–$50
Black & White Space Intact
SALON GIOVANNA voted “Baltimore’s Best Salon” - 2006
.. ..
-new beauty magazine
Beaux Arts Weekend! Art Exhibit & Sale Benefit Event Saturday, November 11, 10 a.m.– 6 p.m. Scottish Rite Masonic Center 3800 North Charles St., Baltimore
hair skin care
nail care massage
6071 falls rd., mt. washington
410.377.2700 salongiovanna.com
Over 100 talented area artists and artisans! Family activities: Eiffel Tower block-building, Black Cherry Puppet Theatre & more! $10 in advance; $15 at the door. Children Free! Presented by Whiting-Turner Contracting Company
Call 410-523-7070 www.baltimorechoralarts.org Tom Hall, Music Director
The Power of Many Voices
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eye to eye
Just what is going on here? Who is that creature? What of all those crying things at the top? I could look at this for a long time and constantly find new elements, I think. The artist, Andrew Liang, was born in Taiwan and is a founding contributor of Splotch, a submission-based online publication featuring visual work that examines popular themes in our culture. He enjoys Indian buffet, Chinese carryout, and the Mount Royal Tavern. “Pig means laziness,” says Liang about this painting. “At the top of the painting are people’s heads, crying, their tears raining down: tears of disappointment and sadness, which create the water at the bottom of the piece. The pig is sitting on a chair that has thin legs that cannot support its weight and will eventually break. The pig will fall into the pit if the chair collapses. The pit is hell. The pig wears a warrior tattoo, a warrior battling a snake. “The pig is holding an umbrella, blocking the negative tears. But the umbrella is too small and can’t shield its entire body. There is a window behind the pig, but we will never know what is outside the window. The pig can escape and stop being a pig if he is willing to venture into the unknown.” —Alex Castro
Pig Andrew Liang 2005 watercolor 18 x 24 inches
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CAREER. FINANCES. RELATIONSHIPS. AT LEAST WITH AN IMPREZA, YOU CAN CONTROL THE ROAD. IT’S WHAT MAKES A SUBARU, A SUBARU. THE ALL-WHEEL DRIVE 2006
SUBARU IMPREZA 2.5i SALE PRICE
$
16,974
LEASE PAYMENT
OR $
IIHS TOP SAFETY PICK GOLD RATING
189
PER MONTH
29 mpg HIGHWAY
Full power, cruise, AM/FM/CD ALL WHEEL DRIVE, 173-HP 2.5-LITER ENGINE, 4-WHEEL DISC BRAKES WITH ABS, 4 STANDARD AIR BAGS. Price excludes tax, tags & freight, includes all rebates and incentives. 48 month Subaru lease based on 12,000 miles per year. $189 per month for 48 months, $699 Down. Does not require a security deposit. Impreza: EPA fuel economy estimate - 22 City/29Highway, actual mileage may vary.
Remember All Roads Lead To PENN! THE ALL WHEEL DRIVE SUBARU IMPREZA comes with 173-HP boxer engine and highest possible IIHS crash test rating*. Plus, it’s the only car in its class with road gripping All Wheel Drive. It’s stable, even when everything else feels out of control. Visit Penn for a test drive today. *Based on Insurance Institute for Highway Safety 40-mph offset frontal crash test, 31-mph side impact test, and 20-mph rear impact test. The ABC’s of Safety: Air bags. Bucckle up. Children in backseat.
subaru.com
North Point Blvd. & Kane St., I-95, Exit 59, Eastern Avenue or I-895 Exit 12 Lombard Street
410-633-9000
Toll Free 1-800-736-1296 • www.pennsubaru.com RETAIL SERVICE HOURS: M-F 7 am - 6 pm Sat. 8 am - 3 pm w w w. u r b a n i t e b a l t i m o re . c o m o c t o b e r 0 6
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