Southern Bookman

Georgia Health News and WebMD score scoop on toxic chemical's release

A massive public protest has erupted over two suburban Atlanta plants spewing the cancer-causing chemical ethylene oxide into the air.

Galvanized by a report by the online news sites Georgia Health News and WebMD, residents near the Sterigenics plant in Smyrna and the BD plant in Covington packed two public meetings this week and demanded action.

Business-friendly Gov. Brian Kemp moved to halt the companies' toxic releases, while Democratic legislators and local government officials called for the plants to be shut down until further tests can be done.

Founded by my former Atlanta Journal-Constitution colleague Andy Miller, Georgia Health News has been an invaluable source of medical and environmental information for a number of years. It's a pioneering model for nonprofit online news.

The Georgia Health News' success gives hope that nonprofit online news sites can fill the gap in coverage left by the decline in daily newspapers across the nation.

As the public concern ballooned over the ethylene oxide emissions, I wondered what other toxic chemicals stew in Atlanta's air, emitted by vehicles and businesses. Carbon emissions keep rising as climate change advances locally, nationally and globally.

The same level of public outrage over the ethylene oxide releases is required to reduce carbon emissions and stop the worst effects of climate change. So far, most residents in Atlanta and elsewhere have ignored climate change's threat.

 

 

Carl A. Weiss Jr. convinced many that his father was innocent of Huey Long's death

The brilliant young doctor Carl A. Weiss Sr. fired the shot at the Louisiana State Capitol on Sept. 8, 1935, that led to Huey P. Long's death, according to the long-established official story.

After the encounter between Weiss and Long in the tumultous hallway between the Louisiana House and Senate chambers, the dictatorial Kingfish's bodyguards opened fire, killing Weiss with a fusillade of bullets. The 29-year-old suffered 62 wounds, according to reports. Receiving a single gunshot wound, Long lingered for 32 hours, dying at age 42.

Carl A. Weiss Jr. was an infant on the night when Long was wounded and his father killed. The younger Weiss, who died Aug 1 at age 84 at his Florida home, devoted his life to seeking to prove that his father was not Long's assassin, as recounted in a New York Times obituary Thursday. Like his father, and grandfather, Carl Weiss Jr. was a physician. He based his successful medical practice on Long Island.

According to the Times, Carl Austin Weiss Jr. discovered the details of his father's death at age 10 when he saw John McGrady's illustration in Life magazine of that wild Sunday night. The senior Weiss, a brilliant young Baton Rouge surgeon, shot Long with his .32 pistol, according to official reports.

But the younger Weiss believed that his father had not even been carrying a gun when he encountered Long for the third time that evening. He believed that Long's fatal wound came from a bullet that ricocheted from a bodyguard's gun.

Speculation about the Long assassination has spawned a number of investigations and books. LSU historian T. Harry Williams in his Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Long concluded that Weiss was the assassin, firing a single bullet.

Baton Rouge political consultant Ed Reed in "Requiem for a Kingfish: The Strange and Unexplained Death of Huey Long" sided with Weiss Jr.'s belief that his father was unarmed, and only sought to speak to Long. Weiss Sr. punched Long when the senator insulted him, according to Reed, and the bodyguards opened fire, inadvertently striking Long.

Reed and others believed that the bodyguards retrieved Weiss' .32 from his car, parked near the Capitol, and planted the gun near his body.

Baton Rouge journalist Lamar White in an in-depth article for the Pelican Brief web site supports Carl Weiss Jr.'s conclusion that his father was innocent.

Journalist David Zinman in the recently re-released 1962 book "The Day Huey Long Was Shot" gives a thorough account, without reaching a definite conclusion.

Long's assassination led to conspiracy theories from the beginning, including that President Franklin Roosevelt engineered the slaying. Reed and others say Carl Weiss Sr. was upset with Long because of legislation that would have removed his father-in-law from a judgeship in St. Landry Parish. But others discount that theory. Another belief is that the doctor was upset because Long claimed the family of Weiss' wife had Negro blood.

Carl Weiss Jr. met Long's son, Sen. Russell Long, at a cordial lunch, both men distinguished elderly gentlemen. Russell Long reportedly came to believe that Carl Weiss Sr. was innocent, although he backed the official account in public.

The truth will remain unknown, but Carl A. Weiss Jr. made a persuasive case for his father.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The sun keeps setting on the British Empire

Kashmir. Hong Kong. Vestiges of the British empire always will be with us.

As former corners of the old empire implode, the British under Boris Johnson dream of reviving their economic glory, independent of Europe.

Trump adviser John Bolton assured the British this week that the United States supports a "hard" Brexit, and stands ready to enter a bilateral trade deal with our English friends.

No tariffs on Bentleys and Cadbury creme eggs. London will join the NFL. Britain and the United States will reunite into s single economic unit.

Once the United States was Britain's colony. Now, Britain will be our colony.

India and Pakistan glower over Kashmir. The world waits for China to crackdown in Hong Kong.

And Britain sinks further into irrelevance.

 

 

Aretha Franklin shakes the rafters in gospel documentary "Amazing Grace"

Aretha Franklin never left the church, her father exclaims in the documentary "Amazing Grace."

The film shot in 1972 shows Franklin recording her live gospel album "Amazing Grace" at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles' Watts district.

Unlike the album, her career best-seller, the film remained locked away for years because famed director Sydney Pollack failed to synchronize sound and action. Producer Alan Elliott discovered raw footage, fixed the technical problems with digital technology and completed an 89-minute film.

But before her death, Franklin prevented the documentary's release. After she died, her estate agreed to let the film come out in 2018.

Franklin grew up singing in the Detroit mega-church of her father, the Rev. C.L. Franklin, a nationally known evangelist. She'd already recorded her big popular hits in 1972, when she decided at age 29 to return to her gospel roots and record the live album. 

A regal presence in white caftan and robes, Franklin reaches a higher realm with her singing. As her father says in an electric appearance, her voice was a gift touched by God.

Performing gospel standards like "What a Friend We Have in Jesus" and the title song, along with pop-inflected numbers like Marvin Gaye's "Wholly Holy" and Carole King's "You've Got a Friend," Franklin marshals her vocal power like an ethereal instrument, reaching high notes that cause men to weep and women to faint.

Gospel powerhouse the Rev. James Cleveland is a commanding presence, extolling the audience with his booming voice, accompanying Franklin by singing and playing the piano, and conducting the fine Southern California Community Choir. At times overweening, Franklin softens his showmanship with warmth and his enthusiasm for gospel.

Under the direction of the young and vibrant Alexander Hamilton, the Southern California Community Choir steals many scenes. With silver vests and black shirts, the choir responds to Franklin with passion and energy. Their "amens," frenetic movements and spirited singing reveal the roots of  James Brown and other soul performers.

In one of the best moments, a male choir member with Afro and mustache fights back tears as Franklin improvises on "Amazing Grace." Her other-worldy keens and soaring and falling registers show a stunning virtuosity. Her father says she reached a "synthesis" of Mahalia Jackson and Cleta Ward. Her "Amazing Grace" mixes in elements of Eliza Fitzgerald and instrumentalists like Charlie Parker and Lester Young, blended into her special artistry.

Franklin's crack band of guitarist Cornell Dupree, drummer Bernard Purdie, bassist Chuck Rainey and keyboard player Kenneth Lupper make the oldest gospel hymns swing. As someone said, the blues gave rock and roll its rock, and gospel its roll.

The low-tech camera finds a surprise among the gray-lit audience, Mick Jagger and Charlie Watts, unrecognized by the congregation. The Rolling Stones at the time were recording Exile on Main Street in Los Angeles. That album's gospel flavors likely were influenced by Franklin's performance.

Franklin's voice sends the audience into emotional raptures. A female companion of  the gospel pioneer Ward faints, and two women rise for an impromptu, frenzied dance. Seated at the piano, Cleveland can't resist a glance at the shaking backside of one of the women.

The appearance by Franklin's father gives the film a dramatic boost. C.L. Franklin heads to the altar and gives an impassioned appreciation of his daughter. A forceful, calculated speaker, Franklin exudes an unsettling mix of religiosity and charisma, inspirational and seductive.

His pride at his daughter's career glows when he tells an anecdcote about someone he sees at the cleaners saying that Aretha should return to the church. He answers that she never left. Songs like "Respect" retain their gospel foundation.

Later, in a strange scene, Franklin wipes the sweat from his daughter's s face as she plays the piano and sings a hymn about a place where people never age.

Cleveland was a mentor to Franklin when she began singing in her father's church as a child. During the film, her impassive face reveals her reserves of power in the presence of the two dynamic men of the gospel world.

The film's recovery is itself a story of "Amazing Grace." Franklin's voice, the impassioned performances of Hamilton, Cleveland and the choir, and the fervor of the congregation are uplifting gifts to a wounded nation. A TV channel would provide a great public service by broadcasting the movie to a broader audience.

No Woodstock nostalgia

I won't be joining the nostalgia for Woodstock's 50th anniversary.

As rccently explored in the New Yorker, a 30-plus CD set is out that records every moment of the festival that trashed Mr. Yasger's farm in upstate New York in mid-August 1969.

Every song. Every groovy statement from a performer on stage. Every whir of helicopter blades. Every peal of thunder, and distorted buzz from a speaker. Every announcement, such as the one about the bad brown acid going around.

I wouldn't pay 5 cents for the package, but I did see some of the Woodstock documentary on TCM recently. Some of the performances held up, such as Joe Cocker's cover of the Beatles' "A Little Help From My Friends." John Sebastian with his hippie-dippie tie-dyed goofiness was endearing. Richie Havens' peace anthems sill stirred the emotions. In their first public performance, Crosby, Stills and Nash were show-biz pros.

But the fatuous 'far out" dialogue made me shudder. The interviews with the hippie kids were a testament to idiocy. The event was a statement of wasted opportunity, of a human dead-end.

As authors David Wallace-Wells in "The Uninhabitable Earth" and Nathaniel Rich in "Losing Earth" have detailed, the communal, earth-loving ethos of Woodstock had no long-term effect.

Rich shows how the oil companies derailed efforts to cut carbon emissions. Wallace-Wells documents how emissions have increased in the last few years. Now, the world is running out of time, if it hasn't already.

When I was a young hippie, speaking that same spurious lingo, I enjoyed Joni Mitchell's "Woodstock" with its line, "we've got to get back to the garden." Tbe garden is burning.

 

 

Elizabeth Strout revisits Olive Kitteridge

Elizabeth Strout in a novel coming out this autumn returns to her archetypal character, Olive Kitteridge.

The New Yorker in its current issue published a chapter from "Olive, Again" as a separate short story. The piece, titled "Motherless Child," is one of those rare works of fiction that achieve artistic power from simple language and ordinary domestic situations. The story made me wonder how Strout had given such emotional depth to her characters.

I didn't read the Pulitzer Prize-winning "Olive Kitteridge," a book of linked short stories that introduced readers to Olive, a retired school teacher living in a small city in Maine. A widow, the aging Olive's flinty perfectionism clashes with life's medocrities, leaving her in a constant stew of disappointment.

An HBO miniseries starring Frances McDormand as Olive, Richard Jenkins as her husband, Henry, and Bill Murray as her suitor, Jack, was fine. But despite the outstanding cast, the show didn't reveal enough of the characters' interior depths.

But "Motherless Child" showed that Strout, who lives in Maine and New York City, rivals Anne Tyler as a chronicler of family conflict, small daily heartbreaks and love's regrets. Like Tyler's Baltimore, Strout's Maine influences the characters' lives.

The excellence of Strout's story, along with a recent immersion in Joy Williams' short stories, restored my faith in American fiction. I've been dismayed at the banality of most stories published the past few years in the Southern Review, Paris Review, Sewanee Review and other literary journals.

Once showcases for engaging and daring stories, the literary journals now offer stories with uninteresting characters, murky plots and pedestrian language. The stories resemble each other in their inability to make everyday experience memorable. The same is true of most of their poetry.

Strout, Tyler and Williams are members of a generation that has built upon the tradition of great American short stories. The literary journals raise alarms of a genre in decline.

Will Jimmy Buffett demolish Fiddlin' John Carson?

Jimmy Buffett's company wants to build a monstrous Margaritaville development in downtown Atlanta, destroying the building where Fiddlin' John Carson in 1923 recorded the first national country hit.

The Margaritaville plan sounds like the kind of high-concept debacle that has plagued the city for years. Remember Planet Hollywood and the ESPN Zone? These urban pleasure palaces sizzle for a few years, then fizzle out, leaving a hole in the urban fabric.

Buffett's development across the street from Centennial Olympic Park would bring the destruction of a small building at 152 Nassau Street where Carson recorded "That Little Old Log Cabin in the Lane" in 1923, along with "The Old Hen Cackled and the Rooster's Going to Crow."

Famed New York talent scout Ralph Peer recorded country singer and fiddler Carson and several local black performers at the building for Okeh Records. Despite Carson's wavering voice and the recording's scratchiness, "The Little Old Log Cabin" caught fire. The song's success led to a flourishing Atlanta recording industry, which eventually faded away as country music found a permanent home in Nashville.

Unless architect and downtown resident Kyle Kessler can succeed with a last-ditch effort to save the 152 Nassau building, the original site of Atlanta's recording industry will disappear, according to an excellent article Tuesday by the AJC's Jeremy Turley. Despite Kessler's online petition that has received 8,000 signatures, the Buffett company is preparing for the imminent demolition of the 152 Nassau building, Turley reported.

A deal with former Mayor Kasim Reed led to the Margaritaville developers receiving building permits for a 21-story Wyndham Hotel and time-share condos above an amusement park, according to the article. The city planning department sought to stop the project, but the developers threatened to sue. Reed then told the company he would support the plan if the luxury hotel were included, the newspaper reported.

Designed to draw aging affluent Parrotheads, the development will be near the giant downtown Ferris wheel, State Farm Arena, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, the College Football Hall of Fame, the World of Coca-Cola and the Civil Rights Museum.

Despite these attractions, someone would have to be pretty wasted in Margaritaville to buy a time-share in downtown Atlanta. The Buffet company's plan contains all the signs of those Atlanta developments that have crashed in the past.

Ace AJC columnist Bill Torpy sounded the alarm in May about the threat to the Nassau Street building. The preservationists don't want to prevent Buffett fans from having their fun. They only ask that the Margaritaville plan incorporate the building in some way.

But the developers say they need to destroy the building to install a garbage facility, or a restaurant "grease trap," according to the AJC.

The preservationists point out the irony of a Buffett enterprise removing a major landmark of Atlanta's music history. Buffett began his career performing in small Atlanta clubs, according to Torpy and others.

The building on Nassau street isn't that distinctive, and has housed many businesses over the years, including a "Gone With the Wind Museum."

The Buffet corporation could easily find a way to preserve the place, perhaps as a museum of Atlanta's musical history, including Buffett's career.

The country pioneer Carson has a darker tie to Atlanta's history. He stirred anti-Semitic fervor by performing on the street during the Leo Frank murder trial in 1913. Frank, whose innocence has been established by historians, was convicted for the slaying of Mary Phagan and subsequently lynched by a mob in Cobb County.

Along with its place in music history, the 152 Nassau Building should be preserved as one of the last downtown sites dating back to that turbulent era of Atlanta's past.

 

 

 

 

 

A morning walk, as the planet burns

I've been walking in the morning, enjoying cooler temperatures and low humidity in Atlanta.

Those I meet along the way comment how nice it is, compared with the 90-plus days of a week or so ago.

Morning brings hope: The newly risen sun shining through the trees. People walking their dogs. Folks driving off to work.

Meanwhile, in Paris, temperatures rise above 100 degrees. Paris!

In London, insufferable heat has replaced the mild summers of Shakespeare's plays.

A new report in the British journal Nature found that warming is now uniform across the globe. For most of the last 2000 years, warming and cooling have occurred at different places at different times, even events like the Little Ice Age. But now, temperatures keep rising at the same time over most of the globe.

It's a beautiful morning. They used to not seem so rare.

Musician Doug Kershaw's "The Ragin' Cajun" a story of redemption

Louisiana performer Doug Kershaw's "The Ragin' Cajun" finds joy and redemption in a rough life of setbacks and self-destruction.

To be published in October by Mercer University Press, "The Ragin' Cajun" tells the common musician's story of numbing performances, drug addiction, poor life choices and unscrupulous managers and record producers.

The book stands apart from other rock memoirs in the literary quality of its revelations about Cajun culture.

Along with the Cajuns' well-noted joy, humor and musical talent, the book discloses the culture's violence, depression and propensity for addiction.

Sadly, it also details how cultural repression and existence on the edges of American life led to deep feelings of inferiority. In recent years, Cajun music, literature and cuisine have found long-overdue recognition.

Written with the novelist Cathie Pelletier, the book brings light to a little known and vanished way of life. Kershaw spent his first years on a houseboat on Louisiana's Mermentau River, where his Cajun family eked out a primitive swamp existence before World War II.

His father, Daddy Jack, precariously supported the family as a fisherman and trapper while his mother, Mama Rita was mired in punishing work. Their life seems medieval in its lack of modern comforts.

Unlike the happy portrait in Kershaw's signature song "Louisiana Man," his father was a violent drunk who frequently beat his mother and threatened the rest of the family. In a gruesome and gripping account, Kershaw tells how his father killed himself with a shotgun.

Despite Daddy Jack's violence, Kershaw remembers him fondly as a hard-working, resourceful man who generally treated him with kindness. Father Jack also gave his son the gift of music. And, the inspiration for "Louisiana Man," one of the best songs of the rock era:

"He's got fishing lines strung across the Louisiana river,
got to catch a big fish for us to eat.
Setting traps in the swamps catching anything he can,
he gotta make a livin', he's a Louisiana man,
Gotta make a livin',  he's a Louisiana man."

The book's Dickensien story gains narrative power when Mama Rita moves the family to the small town of Lake Arthur. There, Kershaw, who began playing a fiddle fashioned from a cigar box, launches his musical career playing "Jole Blon" and other Cajun favorites outside a cafe.

The strength and perseverance of Mama Rita were a constant rock for Kershaw until her death. The book relates how she gained her own slice of fame from Kershaw's career.

Kershaw and his brothers Pee-Wee and Rusty begin playing in the rough Cajun clubs in Jennings, La. Eventually, Kershaw and his brother Rusty find regional success on radio and early TV. Beset by unscrupulous managers, the Kershaws make their first recordings and land regular engagements at clubs along the Highway 90 strip around Lake Charles near the Texas border.

Now performing as a duo, Rusty and Doug record a couple of hits and land a spot on the most famous country show, the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn. The book gives recognition to the group as rock pioneers. Fusing traditional Cajun music with country and the blues, Rusty and Doug helped create rockabilly, the driving force of early rock.

After Rusty decides to leave the duo, Doug Kershaw continues as solo performer and songwriter in Nashville, hanging around with other future stars like Kris Kristofferson and Roger Miller. As with other musicians rising to fame, Kershaw gets hooked on drugs, in his case alcohol, amphetamines and eventually cocaine. Apparently he avoided heroin, which has wrecked so many musicians' lives.

Battling his addictions, poor business decisions and disastrous first two marriages, Kershaw perseveres and achieves success, thanks to an appearance along with Bob Dylan on Johnny Cash's national TV show. From there, Kershaw's fame grows as a frequent performer on TV, in Las Vegas, and in international concerts. He also records several hits.

But his personal life collapses. As financial worries mount, his addictions worsen. Later sections of the book grow less appealing. Brutally honest, Kershaw gives an unpleasant self-portrait of an unreliable, abusive personality. He explodes at band members and gains a bad reputation for showing up late for performances. His volatile behavior led to the hackneyed nickname echoed in the book's title.

Redemption comes with his marriage to his third wife, Pam. Despite starting a family with Pam, Kershaw continues his destructive behavior until Pam insists that he change his ways. With that dose of tough love, Kershaw at last finds tranquillity.

Assisted by his co-author Pelletier, the 83-year-old Kershaw tells his story in a frank, sometimes vulgar voice. His accounts of seeking to overcome addictions can be grueling, but he remains engaging even at the worst moments.

His earthy humor and folksy anecdotes reflect the Cajun joie de vivre that enabled them to overcome poverty and persecution. The book displays the story-telling power of "Louisiana Man."

The Mercer University Press deserves praise for publishing "Ragin' Cajun," which belongs among lauded recent memoirs by Bruce Springsteen, Keith Richards, Bob Dylan and Neil Young. Along with giving an in-depth look at the music business, Kershaw and Pelletier illuminate a forgotten segment of Cajun culture.

The book provides a valuable discography, including recordings Kershaw made with his brother Rusty, who died in 2001. Kershaw's extensive recordings, including those of traditional Cajun songs, warrant in-depth exploration.

With his Cajun novelty numbers and crowd-pleasing antics, Kershaw has been discounted as merely a niche musician. A dynamic performer, stylish songwriter, distinctive singer and accomplished fiddle player, Kershaw stands with the recently deceased Dr. John, Allen Toussaint and Fats Domino in the top tier of Louisiana musicians.

And, as this book richly illustrates, among the state's best storytellers.

 

Who will sound the alarm as daily newspapers die?

The collapse of the American auto industry or Silicon Valley would bring widespread alarm. Our broken Congress might even take action to save these vital components of the U.S. economy.

But the death of the American newspaper industry brings indifference. As the Nation's Eric Alterman outlines in his latest media column, local newspapers are endangered. Reporting staffs are slashed to the bone, resulting in little oversight of local and state governments.

While the loss of local reporting and commentary are lamentable, the loss of newspaper jobs weakens local economies Alterman concentrates on news staffs, but newspapers also have ad salespeople and circulation departments. Once, newspapers employed hundreds of printers and press operators, but technology eliminated those trades. Now, the industry's white collar workers vanish. As Alterman notes, PR firm jobs proliferate as newspapers die.

While the collapse of Mad magaine drew anguished cries from aging Baby Boomers, few mourned the death of the Youngstown, Ohio, Vindicator, as Alterman points out. Now, a city with a population of half a million has no newspaper.  Not only will the residents of the declining industrial city receive no local government coverage. They won't have local stories on the Buckeyes or Cleveland Browns.

Alterman praises heroic Miami Herald reporter Julie K. Brown for uncovering the Florida deal in which accused sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein received a lighter sentence. But Brown's series stands out in a barren landscape; the McClatchy company, which a few years ago had a reputation for quality journalism, has carried out severe staff cuts at the Herald.

Google and Facebook's control of the Internet ad market starves newspapers in medium sized cities like Youngstown and larger ones like Denver and Miami.

With rising online subscriptions, national papers like The New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal thrive. But the deaths of daily local newspapers are a code red for those newspapers as well. In a few years, as Trump-style ignorance and racism burn out of control, newspapers may no longer exist.