What's this got to do with Memphis? Well, it reminds me of the old Leonard's barbecue joint on Lamar. A neon sign out front showed a pig, wearing a top hat and swinging a cane, with the words, "Mr. Brown Goes to Town." A fine sign, indeed (and relocated to the Leonard's in East Memphis). But what was even better (as far as signs go) at the original location was the smaller neon sign inset into a wall of the building, showing a pig relaxing happily as he was being consumed by the flames of the barbecue pit. I can't remember if that one also got moved to the new location.

The point is that quite a few BBQ places tend to show the pigs having a good old time, just as they are about to be cooked and eaten. That's weird to me, because I can't think of a single steakhouse that shows cows enjoying their last moments in the slaughterhouse. Not even seafood restaurants seem to show fish on their journey to our stomachs. So why is it okay for us to see pigs on Death Row?

Of course, sometimes you'll see it with chickens, too.

Even though I haven't been able to find a photo of it, one of my all-time favorite neon signs stood in front of Jack Pirtle Fried Chicken on Poplar, just east of Cleveland, which showed a line of chickens running across a diving board and then leaping — to their searing deaths! — into a steaming bucket of grease. A pair of neon drumsticks sticking out of the same bucket was an especially nice touch, I thought. Kind of showing the "before" and "after" of the chicken's demise.

They tore the sign down when they demolished that particular Jack Pirtle. An AutoZone stands on the site today. If anybody has a photo of the sign (preferably in color), please send it to me.

In the meantime, I have a curious hankering for some sausage ...

I wanted to share an interesting old photograph that I found tucked away in a Central High School yearbook. It's an aerial view of the three old Memphis bridges that cross the Mississippi at the South Bluffs area. (Click on it to enlarge it.)

The view is looking eastward towards Memphis from Arkansas. From left to right, you have the Harahan Bridge (1914), the Frisco Bridge (1892 — called "The Great Bridge" when it first opened), and the Memphis-Arkansas Bridge (1949).

What's really interesting is that if you look very carefully at the top of the photo, at the easternmost end of the Harahan Bridge, you can see a portion of the insanely complicated one-way road system that gave automobiles access to the roadways that were suspended on the outside of the bridge. They were added later, you see, and there was no space to put them inside the bridge spans.

In the May issue of Memphis magazine, I give an account of Confederate Park — what used to be there, how it came about, and what changes have taken place there over the years. Stop what you are doing right now and go read it. Here I thought I'd just share with you some old postcard images of the park, so you can see the then-and-now changes for yourself.

Take a close look at the last two postcards, which seem to be identical (they're on the next page). But one shows a pair of steamboats in the Mississippi River, and one doesn't — which gives you an example of the liberties that postcard artists took with their subjects, and is just one reason that old postcards are sometimes not the most reliable sources for historians.

But they're still fun to look at, nevertheless. Here you go:

Let’s get something straight right now: Nobody is buried beneath the Doughboy Statue in Overton Park. Instead, the massive monument honors “the memory of Memphis and Shelby County men who gave their lives to their country in the Great War,” according to the massive plaque mounted on its base. And back then, they were talking about World War I. The plaque holds the “1917-1919 Honor Roll” and carries 230 names. I am ashamed to say there’s not a Lauderdale among them.

The old Doughboy has endured its own battles, that’s for sure. It was the brainchild of the local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, who raised funds “with the aid of a grateful public and schoolchildren” (according to a smaller plaque mounted on the back of the base) and hired an out-of-town sculptor named Nancy Coonsman Hahn to erect a monument to America’s fighting spirit. Although I’ve been unable to find out just how much the piece cost — and let me tell you it is indeed one big chunk of bronze — I did turn up old newspaper articles that tracked a subscription drive to raise funds for its massive stone base, and that alone was $3,500.

Anyway, the statue — depicting a grim-faced U.S. Army soldier clambering over a rock with his bayonet drawn — went up in Overton Park on September 21, 1926. And some people were certainly not happy with it. Michael Abt, a Tech High School art teacher and sculptor (who gained fame for designing most of the Cotton Carnival floats), caused quite a stir in the newspapers back then by calling the statue “the attack of a vicious beast.”

In the September issue of Memphis magazine, I tell the compelling story of the little green cottage on South Front Street, which opened in 1939 as a Pure Oil Station (above). The building went through many owners over the years, and is now the property of a nice fellow named Kris Kourdouvelis, who lives next door and uses the old gas station for storage.

Yesterday I received an email from a Memphian named Kenneth Pasley, whose uncle was the original owner of that station. Here’s what Kenneth had to say about it:

"I worked at that station for my uncle, William Willingham, from 1956 to 1966, when I graduated from CBU. My uncle Bill owned the station from about 1938 to 1970, when he retired and closed it. During the war, Bill’s younger brother Tommy left school early every day and ran the station. When Bill returned home from France, in 1945, Tom spent time in the Army Air Corps, then moved to Walls, Mississippi, and opened a Pure Oil Station on Highway 61, just north of Twinkle Town Airport. Henry Halbert may have owned the little station in question before Uncle Bill, but he did not own it after 1938. Henry Halbert ran the Pure Oil Service station at 836 South Third (Third & Iowa), when my other uncle, Reggie Willingham, went into the Army Air Corps. Reggie took the station back over when he returned from the war. Henry then went on to open “Halbert’s Auto Supply”.

Thanks for the additional information, Kenneth.