Taylor Circle

Last week we moved a step closer to removing symbols of the city's legacy of white supremacy from its streets and public spaces. The committee charged with coming up with new things to call all of this stuff published its list of suggestions.  There are still a lot of things that need to happen before any of this becomes official, but the results so far are pretty good compared to what we expected. This could have ended up as a slapdash of bland cliches thrown together by tourism marketers. And maybe some of that is still evident but, mostly, this list has real depth. Rather than focus solely on entertainers, it highlights figures who fought for civil rights and escaped or defied slavery. Remember the purpose of this exercise in the first place was to counter a century's worth of damage inflicted by Jim Crow era propaganda. This list does fit that aim.  Heck, Mama D is on there. Who woulda thought?

Of course, it would fit that aim even better if the commissioners had taken our advice and renamed the traffic roundabout formerly known as Lee Circle for Dorothy Mae Taylor.  According to this, they did at least try. 

Commissioners initially considered naming Lee Circle for Dorothy Mae Taylor, the City Council member who was instrumental in desegregating Mardi Gras parades. But that plan failed to get enough votes from the commission. A proposal for Jazz Circle or Music Circle also was rejected.

“I definitely respect us trying to get a win for everyone by going with something generic but the whole purpose of forming this commission was to right wrongs and to acknowledge harm,” Commissioner Gia Hamilton said. “ I personally feel like it would be against my own personal beliefs to vote on something that’s generic.”

Before settling on (Leah) Chase, some commissioners sought to include Taylor as well and name the circle after both women jointly. That effort didn’t gain traction, either.

Nothing wrong with Leah Chase, to be clear. She belongs on this list somewhere. But it would make more sense to honor her in the Sixth or Seventh Ward neighborhoods her memory is best associated with.  Uptown was Dorothy Mae's territory. There really should be a statue of her scowling down at Rex as he passes around the circle every year (well... in the years to follow 2021, that is.) 

Anyway, despite our best efforts, and until  the"Chase Circle" designation is approved, it seems for now that the more appropriate Taylor to name it after is Phyllis.  After all she does own, or control, most of the property there. 

When Circle Bar co-owner Dave Clements arrived for an Oct. 8 meeting at the office of the bar’s landlord, prominent philanthropist and energy company executive Phyllis M. Taylor, he didn’t expect the dramatic good news/bad news dynamic that was about to play out.

The good news: Taylor would cancel the Circle Bar’s rent for the remainder of the year, and not seek back rent dating to March, when the coronavirus pandemic forced the storied Lee Circle bar/music venue to close. That gesture saved the Circle Bar, already cash-strapped before the pandemic, nearly $70,000.

The bad news: The bar would be required to start paying rent again in January, and its lease would not be extended past December 2021.

Taylor, whose fortune derives from a company responsible for one of the largest - and longest running - oil spills in US history, owns, through various companies and LLCs, the Circle Bar, the parking lot next door, and the office building across the way. She also purchased the property for and funded construction of the Greater New Orleans Foundation's massive "Center For Philanthropy" building that sits diametrically across the Circle from the bar.  

Given this information plus the fact that the "philanthropic" non-profit industrial complex completely dominates not only our economy but our entire system of government in 21st Century New Orleans,  it only makes sense that this be reflected in the nomenclature.

As for the New Orleans of the 20th Century, well, that is mostly gone now. Its old landmarks are dying away one after the other this year.  Oh well, goodbye to all that. Can't wait to find out all the exciting entrepreneurial ventures Gayle Benson is going to fund during the post-COVID phase of late capitalism. So much free real estate out there all of a sudden.

"It's so confusing to look at things these days"

RIP Dr. John 

His 2008 album, “City That Care Forgot,” offered his gritty meditations on Hurricane Katrina and the official response to the disaster that wreaked havoc on his hometown.

“None of my work has been as aggravated or disgusted as this record. I had never felt the way I do now, seeing New Orleans and the state of Louisiana disappearing,” he told Smithsonian magazine in the 2009 interview. “We've given the world jazz, our kind of blues, a lot of great food, a lot of great things. It's so confusing to look at things these days.”

This plus, of course, the passing of Leah Chase this week had some of us thinking in kind of a fin-de-siecle mode.

Ella Brennan, Fats Domino, Paul Prudhomme, Leah Chase, Dr. John—a generation that presented New Orleans to the world, and invented it in the process—all gone in the space of a few years.

— Brett Martin (@brettmartin) June 6, 2019

 

Chase's obits alone practically tell you the whole story of 20th Century New Orleans. For the better and for the worse, the elements of that century are rapidly receding now along with its icons. I know that sounds stupid.  But this is the mood this week. Probably we can throw into that reckoning the ominous situation on the river and beginning of Hurricane Season as well. For Mr. Clio here it called to mind the loss of Buddy D in January of 2005.  I thought also of Tootie Montana who passed in June of that year. Pivotal year, that one. But, again, maybe this is stupid. Not every passing is a portent.  Or maybe, actually, that's exactly what they all are. 

Anyway this week has been one hell of a year. Maybe let's take a day or two off.