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01/26/12The Mystery of the Old Postcard — SOLVED!Yesterday I posted an image of a postcard, mailed in 1909 to a young man in Memphis named George Cooper James, which contained a rather puzzling message. Well, I must say that we have some exceedingly intelligent people in our city, because it only took a few hours for one reader to break the secret code. Someone named Tim (last name unknown, I'm sorry to say), left this comment on the original blog post: It reads: "Dear Cooper, when are you going to write to an old friend? How are your mother and father, hope you are well and having a good time." Tim explains, "It doesn't have any punctuation or separation of words, and 'write' is even broken up on separate lines. I don't know the bottom 3 characters — might be a key for shared... |
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01/25/12A Very Mysterious Postcard from 1909I like a good mystery as much as the next fellow, but this one has me stumped. My pal Paul Craig recently sent me a scan of a rather battered old postcard, with this message: "I recently won an eBay auction for a very odd and unusual postcard. The front [a view of Main Street] isn't very interesting. The back, however, certainly is. Have you ever seen anything like this?" No, Paul, I haven't. The message seems to be a complicated mix of mathematical symbols and Greek letters. Is it a message? A code? A math equation? It certainly reminds me of secret codes the Lauderdales used during the war, between the American branch of the family, and the relatives who stayed behind in Switzerland, but that's about as far as I got with it. The postcard itself... Posted at 01:36 PM | Permalink | Comments: 11 |
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01/24/12The Amazing Mario — As You've (Probably) Never Seen Him BeforeIn the February issue of Memphis magazine, I tell the story of one of our city's most fascinating characters, pizza-pie man and health-food guru Mario DePietro. Now, I'm not going to give anything away here. You'll have to wait for the February issue. But what I wanted to share with you is this very bizarre photo, which I found in the Special Collections Department of the University of Memphis Libraries. Special Collections, as I hope you know by now, acquired all the old photo files of the Memphis Press-Scimitar, our city's afternoon daily, which folded in 1983. I have turned up wonderful photos of people, places, and events there. And sometimes those files give you — and me — a glimpse of the minds of the Press-Scimitar editors. Now, as I just... Posted at 12:03 PM | Permalink | Comments: 3 |
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01/21/12The Secret L-O-V-E House in MemphisGiant crop circles that appeared overnight in English wheat fields were — some people believe — coded symbols for aliens approaching Earth from distant planets. The mysterious Nazca lines that stretch across the desert in Peru were, perhaps, designed to be landing strips for extraterrestrial spacecraft. And, in our own country, the massive burial mounds formed in the shape of snakes and other creatures by Native Americans more than a thousand years ago were — well, archaeologists are still scratching their heads over those. Closer to home, for years a house in Midtown carried a secret — a brightly painted message to aliens, airline pilots, helicopter news crews, and anyone else who happened to fly over it: LOVE. One day, it seems, homeowners just west... Posted at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments: 7 |
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01/19/12Gaston Park — A Great Old Postcard ViewI've written before about John Gaston, and the restaurant, hotel, hospital, and park that bear his name. I won't repeat that charming story here, except to point out that Gaston wanted his property on South Third converted into a public hospital after his death. But the city decided it would be too hard to transform the sprawling mansion into a hospital, so in 1929 they tore it down and turned the estate into the park that still stands on the site today. I had never seen a good photo of Gaston Park in the early days — until I came up with this wonderful old postcard in the collection of the Lauderdale Library. I admit it doesn't show as much of the grounds as I'd like, but it does indicate the place had concrete walkways, benches, and what seems to be... Posted at 01:37 PM | Permalink | Comments: 2 |
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01/18/12Okay, Now Meet Stella Stevens When She Was a Student at St. Anne SchoolIn our December issue, I told you about Stella Stevens, the Memphis girl who went on to fame and fortune in Hollywood. Most of our readers, it seems, knew bits and pieces of the life of Stella — real name: Estelle Eggleston — but there seemed to be some confusion about where, exactly, she attended school while she was living in Memphis. I later turned up an old yearbook photo from Sacred Heart that showed the young girl when she was in the 10th grade there. But some readers insisted that Stella/Estella also attended St. Anne School on Highland, which would have been much closer to her home on Carrington than Sacred Heart. Even so, the evidence was lacking. And then I got a nice email from one of our city's top-top historians, Dr. John Harkins, author of... Posted at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments: 3 |
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01/07/12Meet Stella Stevens Before She Became "Stella Stevens"In our December issue, I tell the story of Stella Stevens, the movie star and pinup queen who was born in Mississippi but raised in Memphis. Back then, she was known as Estelle Eggleston, and she grew up in a little brick house on Carrington, just east of Highland. As a young girl, Estelle/Stella attended St. Anne School on Highland, and at some point transferred across town to Sacred Heart School, at the corner of Jefferson and Cleveland. Although that school closed years ago, the Lauderdale Library has yearbooks from Sacred Heart, so I thought I'd share one of the pages from the 1953 annual, showing little Estelle in the 10th grade. She looks rather sad here, in her unflattering dress and saddle oxfords; I wonder if she had any idea that within just a few years she would be... Posted at 11:24 PM | Permalink | Comments: 1 |
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12/21/11Remember When You Did Your Last-Minute Christmas Shopping at ... FIRESTONE?Times have changed. Half a century ago, Santa didn't have to trek back and forth to his workshop at the North Pole when he needed to refill his bag with toys for Memphis boys and girls. And neither did Mom or Dad, looking for that last-minute holiday gift. Hard to believe, maybe, but back then all you had to do was drive over to the local tire and auto-supply store, and take your pick from an astonishing selection of merchandise. This December 1940 window display at the Firestone Auto Supply and Service Station, located downtown at the corner of Third and Washington, announced, "Gifts for All." And boy, did they mean it. Just look at the Firestone Super Chief wagons, Stanley tool chests, Teddy Tooter and Woofy Wowser pull toys, boxing gloves, Treasure Hunt and... Posted at 03:36 PM | Permalink | Comments: 3 |
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12/18/11Tommy Doran, the "Armless News Boy"Memphis has always had more than its share of colorful characters. Here's the latest example: While rummaging through an old bookstore years ago, I turned up this old black-and-white postcard for "Thomas F. Doran, Armless News Boy." Although part of the caption at the bottom has scuffed off, you can still read: "LOST BOTH ARMS JUMPING ON FREIGHT TRAINS WHEN TWELVE YEARS OF AGE." The photo shows the boy — more of a young man, really — neatly dressed in a jacket and nice straw hat — signing his name while holding a pen between his teeth. Nothing on this undated card suggested Doran was a Memphian, however. But I learned more of his story one night while I was lounging in my La-Z-Boy and reading old copies of Yank magazine, published in... Posted at 06:45 PM | Permalink | Comments: 3 |
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12/15/11Lost Memphis: The Hi-Way Tourist HomeUnion Avenue, as you may know, was once a fine residential street, lined with grand homes, though it really takes quite an imagination to picture it that way. During the 1940s and 1950s, especially, the street began to evolve into the cluttery commercial artery that it is today, and the private homes along it changed with the times as well. In 1951, Mr. and Mrs. Chester Beard converted their handsome residence at 1268 Union into the Hi-Way Tourist Home (shown here on an old stained postcard), as a place for weary travelers to rest their heads. Not a bad location, I guess, since it was right across the street from Methodist Hospital. Why "Hi-Way"? Well, Union Avenue, then and now, carries State Highways 64, 70, and 79 through our city. Those travelers had a... |
Ask Vance is the blog of Vance Lauderdale, the award-winning columnist of Memphis magazine and MBQ: Inside Memphis Business. Vance is the author of two books: Ask Vance: The Best Questions and Answers from Memphis Magazine's History and Trivia Expert (2003), as well as Ask Vance: More Questions and Answers from Memphis Magazine's History Expert (2011). He is also the recipient of quite a few nice awards, the creator of several eye-catching wall calendars, and the only person we know with a vintage shock-treatment machine in his den. 
