It's just about time for this blog's 4th Anniversary and I'm jumping the gun a little with this, but I'm ready to post it now, and since it's my blog, I can.
This anniversary post is unlike those I've done before ... while I'll probably add a few items about the past year's blog history later on, mainly, I won't. This year, I just wanted to post the above video as a thank you gift for frequenting Doug Dawgz Blog, just for your sensory enjoyment. This post has nothing whatsoever to do with Oklahoma City history, even if it has some bearing on mine, described below. In addition to watching the above video as much as you care to, you can download an mp3 file containing the song, as follows: If you're using Firefox, right-click on the upcoming link and chose "Save Link As..." and then identify where you want to save the file to on your computer. For IExplorer users, right-click on the link and chose "Save Target As ..." in the pop-up menu. Right-click here and do what I just said. If anyone is interested in downloading the actual flash files associated with the above video, say so in a comment and I see about making that possible.
I've been a big-time Bob Dylan fan since I learned of him in the early-1960s ... and I suppose you can even say that he has an Oklahoma connection since Woodie Guthrie was one his earliest influences ... but this post isn't about that. Back then, in my late teens-early 20s, of course, I didn't care about that sort of thing. I just liked his sandpapery nasal sound, his harmonica, and his sometimes mysterious words.
Of all of his many tunes, the one that has stuck with me most vividly is his Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, a tune which is about 11½ minutes long and occupies the full side of one of the two LP's contained in his fantastic 1966 Blonde On Blonde album. Click the image to see the full album cover.
For some reason, getting this old album out and hearing Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands was in my waking dreams this morning ... I am NOT kidding ... and upon getting out of bed I knew what I wanted my 4th Anniversary blog post to be ... the tune and, better still if available, the tune with a video. Low and behold, I found the perfect mix at Google Videos, and the video there is substantially the same as the video at the top of this page ... I tinkered with it just a little and saved it to my own web host for faster loading here. Unfortunately, the person who put the video together so very nicely is not identified at the Google source, but I thank him or her for the good job done, just the same.
Until doing research this morning about the tune, all these years I had no or little understanding of what the lyrics might have meant to Dylan. I just knew that, when I was in law school and for many years after that I could lay down on the floor, particularly if I was stressed, put a stereo speaker on each side of my head, close my eyes, and be mesmerized by the droning, repetitious, and intriguing imagery which spun out of the tune and lyrics. Over and over I would listen ... if ever there was stress reliever, this was it, for me.
Having read up on the subject this morning, the lyrics now make better sense. If you want help with that, I recommend this location at AllMusic.com. Who was the lady? See this link for the answer. Whoever put the video together was clearly rooted in the meaning to Dylan when assembling the video's imagery which is very nearly as well done as were Bob's lyrics which match the video above, below (other on-line lyric renditions don't exactly track those that were used in the album).
With your mercury mouth in the missionary times, And your eyes like smoke and your prayers like rhymes, And your silver cross, and your voice like chimes, Oh, who do they think could bury you? With your pockets well protected at last, And your streetcar visions which you place on the grass, And your flesh like silk, and your face like glass, Who could they get to carry you? Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands, Where the sad-eyed prophet says that no man comes, My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums, Should I put them by your gate, Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?
With your sheets like metal and your belt like lace, And your deck of cards missing the jack and the ace, And your basement clothes and your hollow face, Who among them can think he could outguess you? With your silhouette when the sunlight dims Into your eyes where the moonlight swims, And your match-book songs and your gypsy hymns, Who among them would try to impress you? Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands, Where the sad-eyed prophets say that no man comes, My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums, Should I put them by your gate, Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?
The kings of Tyrus with their convict list Are waiting in line for their geranium kiss, And you wouldn't know it would happen like this, But who among them really wants just to kiss you? With your childhood flames on your midnight rug, And your Spanish manners and your mother's drugs, And your cowboy mouth and your curfew plugs, Who among them do you think could resist you? Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands, Where the sad-eyed prophets say that no man comes, My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums, Should I leave them by your gate, Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?
Oh, the farmers and the businessmen, they all did decide To show you where the dead angels are that they used to hide. But why did they pick you to sympathize with their side? How could they ever mistake you? They wished you'd accepted the blame for the farm, But with the sea at your feet and the phony false alarm, And with the child of a hoodlum wrapped up in your arms, How could they ever have persuaded you? Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands, Where the sad-eyed prophets say that no man comes, My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums, Should I leave them by your gate, Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?
With your sheet-metal memory of Cannery Row, And your magazine-husband who one day just had to go, And your gentleness now, which you just can't help but show, Who among them do you think would employ you? Now you stand with your thief, you're on his parole With your holy medallion which your fingertips fold, And your saintlike face and your ghostlike soul, Who among them could ever think he could destroy you. Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands, Where the sad-eyed prophets say that no man comes, My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums, Should I leave them by your gate, Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?
The song lingers on after that with Dylan's harmonica doing the rest, slowly trailing off into silence. But, the song should be set for automatic immediate replay because there is no way to digest all this without at least half a dozen plays. But, maybe, that's just me.
If you want to read biographies of Bob Dylan, here are a couple of links: Click here for Biographies.com's bio ... it includes two or three very nicely done biographical videos which, unfortunately, are not capable of being embedding elsewhere. Another well-done biography appears here at Wikipedia.
At age 69, Dylan is still going strong. According to Wimgo.com, Bob Dylan and His Band will be appearing Friday, August 6, 2010, at 7:30 p.m. at the OKC Zoo Amphitheatre. Admission is $39.50 for lawn seats and $69.50 for VIP seating.
Don't expect to hear Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, though. If what I read on-line this morning is correct, he has never made a live performance of this magical song.
Blog statistics during the past year are shown below.
Thanks for visiting, and I hope that you'll come again.
Visitors in the past 10 days or so may have noticed some changes in Doug Dawgz Blog. I've reluctantly (reluctantly, since I didn't want to break something that wasn't broken) made major internal changes to the blog by completely changing the software template which is a pretty scary thing. What if everything that has been done in the past 3-plus years suddenly gets trashed with no backup? What if you (and I) liked the old setup better than the new? What if the Pilgrims had shot cat instead of turkey ... we'd all have pussy for Thanksgiving.
Pondering that last thought, and nudged on by my good friend Steve Lackmeyer who kindly informed me that it would be good for me to consider making some user-friendly changes to my blog (after which I initially told him that HIS Okc History blog was far less user-friendly than MINE), all things considered I decided to take his advice and make the precipitous plunge. So, now, though kinks remain to be worked out, Doug Dawgz Blog is different.
HOW? Aside from some "appearance" matters, some major substantive changes have and are being made.
Existing and future content is, I hope, not affected at all ... and that potential worried me just a little. But, all old content seems to be OK.
Blogger template modification has made at least two things much better than they were before:
Search. Search features are MUCH better than they were before. Try out the new "Search Doug Dawgz Blog" item in the left panel and see if you don't agree. Click here for examples of how the new search feature works.
Truncated Articles. New articles will be split into two pieces ... an introductory/preview part generally describes the article and is followed by a "... Read The Full Article ..." link which opens the whole article.
Clicking that link opens in a separate window or tab (depending on your web browser). When finished with that newly opened article, close the page and you'll be back where you started from.
All articles previously written have been modified to set them up in this fashion, and all future articles will have this method. With this change, page loading when browsing the blog should be faster and 5 abbreviated articles plus the opening index page are now visible on the same page.
Site Feed History/Downtown Blogs. This new feature presents preview snippets of the most recent articles listed in the group. Located in the left pane, click here for more detail.
Labels/Categories. In the new template, it is possible to show "Labels" associated with articles in the left panel and then click on a Label for a preview of all such items. All labels/categories have been revised for that purpose, and the labels are all present in the left panel.
Older Posts. At the bottom of each "new" page, in the lower right corner, a new link is present ... "Older Posts." You can click that link to move back to the 6 previous articles that have been written. This should be handy for those who want to browse and aren't looking for anything in particular. But, those who are wanting to find something in particular should use the new Search feature in the left panel or the general Index.
I'd appreciate any feedback, good or bad, that you'd care to give.
New Search Features. In its newer templates, Blogger (host of my blog, a Google component) has really spiffed up the search features in blogger. This shows two examples.
1st Example - Using Search. I want to search for "core to shore."
Search is in the left pane
Type in search text
Search results are returned in the main pane of the page, as shown below. Click on the images for larger views.
Notice the tabs at the top - the 1st tab is "This Blog."
Search results from websites listed in my left pane are also returned. A pair of examples are shown below for 2 other tabs.
2nd Example - Using Category Search. Similarly, searching categories (Labels) that posts are organized in returns results in the main pane. In the example below, I clicked on the "OKC Historical People" label. A list of truncated articles appears.
Site Feed For History & Downtown Blogs. In the left pane near the top is a new feature which shows snippets of the most recent posts from blogs having an Oklahoma City history and/or downtown focus, as shown below:
Others would have been added, e.g., OkcCentral.com, but they do not generate site feed so that the most recent post would be generated in this feature. It provides a quick way to see the most recent article written for the blogs identified.
Any comments about the above or other suggestions about improving Doug Dawgz Blog are welcome and appreciated.
This blog began on July 15, 2006, with the post Getting Started and it is now three years old. Other than a required change of uniforms (above) it has pretty much stuck with its intended plan: Present for any that want to read Oklahoma City history (past, present, future) and well as OKC in the NBA. I won't claim that my research underlying the articles is flawless — I learn something new most every day — but I do claim that I make every effort to thoroughly research what I write about and that the written articles produced here are as accurate as available sources will allow.
Jump to the parts of this article that may interest you, below:
THIS YEAR'S STUFF. Much if not most of the articles done during the past 12 months are "buried" in a pair of off-blog collections but which are accessed via the blog: The Ultimate Deep Deuce Collection and The Vintage Clickable Map. So, if you never enter those areas, there's lots that you will not see. For a slide show which contains one graphic from each of about 140 items done this year, click the button below and the flash file will load. It's a bit big at 14.6 MB, so be patient while it loads. Turn off your sound if you don't like the Flaming Lips' Do You Realize, the state's official rock song despite Oklahoma House Republicans' efforts to avoid that. Unless you interrupt it, run-time for the flash slide-show is about 7 1/2 minutes. You can jump around by categories (general history, Deep Deuce, clickable map, books, today, miscellaneous, and Thunder) and you can stop the video any time you like.
BLOG HISTORY. Earlier, I posted a 1st year retrospective and then a Year 2 In Review article, and this one is the 3rd such commemorative. At least in part, the inspiration for this blog were the posts of the "Downtown Guy" in a now-distant past. Will the Downtown Guy ever come back? Will he ever reveal his true identity? Will he ever again leap tall buildings in a single bound? One day, I hope that he will do all three. In my estimation, at an earlier time the Downtown Guy's blog posts were the primary internet stimulus for interest in Oklahoma City history. Come on, Clark, it's time to come out of the closet!
Oh, well, back to topic. I said in the beginning that the blog's focus would be Oklahoma City history, with a sub-interest on Oklahoma City's involvement with the NBA. With occasional diversions, I've not often veered from that focus. 3rd YEAR STATISTICS. The blog's statistical history is graphically shown below (click on graphics for a larger view):
Graphically that detail is shown below:
In the main, the blog's "hits" and "page views" have shown a healthy progression ... each year more than the last. The past year almost doubled the hits during the 1st two years combined. It's hard to complain about that, with the immediate past 12 months averaging 7,152 hits and 11,971 page views per month. The 3-year cumulative totals are (using the past 12-month average to extrapolate for the full current month of July) 157,559 visitors and 237,536 page views. MY TOP TEN PERSONAL FAVORITES. It's kinda hard to pick — should such a list be (a) those I enjoyed doing the most, or (b) those which I perceive to have added the most to Oklahoma City's reservoir of available on-line history? Dunno. The list below is probably a blur between the two criteria and is in random order.
Vintage Clickable Map. If you know the name of the building you're wanting to track down, it might be simpler to use the Vintage Map Index Page. This is a long-term project. Presently, the Vintage Map includes mini-articles (some are larger) on between 80-90 buildings or areas in the vintage map which is bordered by N. 18th Street and S. 15th Street on the north and south and by Klein and Stonewall on the west and east.
Ultimate Deep Deuce Collection. This project was actually a spin-off of the above and includes about 33-34 mini-articles in or around Deep Deuce, all of which can be accessed by an interactive flash-map or by using a linked index. Unlike the more general Vintage Map Collection, the Deep Deuce Collection is done (unless/until I learn more to add, of course).
Angelo C. Scott's Story of Oklahoma City (complete book). I have scanned all 208 pages of this delightful and incisive history by land-runner Angelo Scott and it is completely available to you in two formats -- html and a downloadable PDF file so that you can stick it on your own computer, if you want. Scott and his brother produced the very 1st newspaper published in Oklahoma City on May 9, 1889. Scott went on to garner numerous other accomplishments and was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 1933. About the book, Bob Blackburn, without peer in the list of Oklahoma historians, said, "Angelo added to his contributions by writing one of the most touching histories of Oklahoma City ever published." This was actually intended by be a gift to my blog's readers today, but I couldn't wait and jumped the gun on June 21, three weeks ago. The book covers Oklahoma City's first decade or so.
Population & Area Histories of OKC are two companion articles about the size of our town. The population part traces official census information for 1890 through 1970, inclusive, and contains extracts from official census records which pertain to Oklahoma City as well as Oklahoma, generally. The second article is about space and answers this question in great detail: "How did Oklahoma City ever get this sprawly-big?" -- roughly, that's about 39 miles east-west and 28 miles north-south, with lots of pockets which are not part of Oklahoma City proper.
John A. Browns. In addition to the mini-article in the Vintage Clickable Map, there's this major article which traces in detail the once fabulous John A. Brown Department Store from its earliest roots until its eventual absorption by Dayton Hudson and last to Dillards. The downtown Brown's was the largest in the state and occupied about 3/5 of a city block. We ain't never gonna see anything like Brown's again.
Famous Kiltie Band (also, see Famous Kilties In Shamrock). While many have seen picturesque postcard of the "Famous Kiltie Band" at the Civic Center, most probably don't know much about them -- and that they really were indeed famous. The band served as Oklahoma City's popular ambassador from 1922 until 1990 or so and this article tells the story about the band and its leader Capt. Everett G. Fry who was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 1938.
Devon Tower. Oh my god. I'm still having to pinch myself about this one to be sure that it was and is real! Construction of the new headquarters of Devon Energy Corporation is scheduled to begin this fall -- it will be a 54 story, 925' iconic skyscraper that will be the tallest building in Oklahoma and cost at least $750 million! As a guest of my good friend Steve Lackmeyer, I got to sit right there with him in the front row (just like a real Jimmy Olson cub reporter) and watch the August 20, 2008, announcement and presentation which left those in attendance with no ability to speak and their jaws locked wide open.
Oklahoma Skyscraper City Circa 1931. This article is sort of a companion piece inspired by the above. It describes Oklahoma City's downtown building history generally but focuses on 1931's "Great Race" between the Ramsey Tower and First National Bank. With these buildings completed, Oklahoma City was tied with Philadelphia for 12th place in the rank of cities with buildings of 33 stories or greater -- which is to say, only 11 U.S. cities (in order, New York, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago, Detroit, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Seattle, Baltimore, Houston, and Kansas City) had buildings having a greater number of stories than Oklahoma City did and Oklahoma City truly was, at that time, Skyscraper City -- it having two buildings taller than were present in any of the following: Boston, Minneapolis, St. Paul, San Fransisco, Dallas, Memphis, Los Angeles, Miami, St. Louis, Providence, Milwaukee, Denver, Ft. Worth, Tulsa, Atlanta, New Orleans, Indianapolis, Phoenix, Portland, Salt Lake City, Sacramento, and San Diego, which rounds out the top 35 in ranking order.
The Civic Center. Inspirational credit for this article goes to the outstanding blogger Blair Humphreys and his great imagiNATIVEAmerica blog. The article traces the development of the Civic Center, an area running along Couch Drive from Broadway to Shartel in the days of the Great Depression. Couch Drive replaced the east/west Rock Island and Frisco rail tracks which divided downtown from its early days until 1930.
Jim Crow In Oklahoma City. This article traces in considerable detail the racial discrimination enforced upon black people by white people by "Jim Crow" laws in Oklahoma generally and Oklahoma City particularly, including but not limited to the imposition of martial law on Oklahoma City by Gov. Alfalfa Bill Murray in May 1933. It is not a happy story, but it is finally a triumphant one in the end.
Another personal favorite and one which I take no credit for is the article which presented the beautifully stunning view of Oklahoma landscapes by oklavision.tv. In fact, it is so good I'll embed the video here, one more time:
I thank each of you for visiting Doug Dawgz Blog during the past year and I hope that you'll keep on coming back for more Oklahoma City history.
Since 2005, Mike at Okiedoke.com of Little Axe, Oklahoma, fame, has undertaken the arduous task of receiving nominations in 12 categories for "Okie Blog Awards." Only active Oklahoma bloggers can nominate, and only active Oklahoma bloggers get to vote in this peer-to-peer annual Oklahoma blogger event. Voting for the 2008 awards ends on February 7, 2009. Up to 10 nominees in each of the following categories are possible:
Best Overall Blog
Best Political Blog
Best Family Blog
Best Humor Blog
Best Audio Blog
Best Looking Blog
Best Unusual Blog
Best Writing Blog
Best Culture Blog
Best Commentary Blog
Best Inspirational Blog
Best Commercial Blog
Just as in prior years, the list of nominees presents at a glance some of the very best Oklahoma blogs, and, even if you can't vote, the list of nominees gives a great starting point for discovering what you may have been missing in the Oklahoma blogosphere.
Doug Dawg is pleased to have been nominated again (his 2006 and 2007 nominations flopped at the polls ... I want to see those darned exit polls and I want to see the f***ing chads!) for Best Culture Blog. I'm not sure that what I actualy do here is culture, but of the categories that exist it may be the closest description that fits this place in the list. In any event, I'm proud to have been nominated three years straight, an honor by itself, even if the "love" for an Okie Blogger award remains unrequited. Romeo, oh Romeo, where are thou Romeo ..." or something like that. Gawd, I'm listening to what I've written and it is hopelessly lost in some other world. Oh, well ... life goes on. A blogger cannot vote for his/her own blog. So, not being able to vote for myself, how did I cast my vote for Best Culture Blog?I ain't tellin' (the 1st letters are Ok and the phrase is feminine) but I did vote for someone other than me, below! Check out the list for Best Culture Blog and and vote as you think best (Okie bloggers only):
Some of my personal favorites have been nominated, too ... but I won't mention any names since I don't need to be making any more enemies ... I take that back:I will mention two:Steve Lackmeyer's OKC Central as the Best Commercial Blog (commercial since it is sponsored by the Oklahoman); and I favored Michael Bates' Batesline for the Best Overall Blog.
Batesline.com. As to the Best Overall Blog, even though 9 other great blogs were nominated, I favored Batesline, not only because it's a great blog (even though we differ when it comes down to some of the details ... I'm a reasonable liberal, he's a hopeless conservative) (just kinda kidding) but also because Michael has to put up with a shitload of crap (including pending litigation) from the successors to the once fine newspaper earlier owned by Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Sr., the Tulsa Tribune which came to be owned by the Tulsa World. (I may have this wrong ... I'm certainly not a Tulsa expert ... I'll fix the text as I learn better). Whether a person's viewpoint be "liberal" or "conservative," free speech should prevail against all comers in the United States of America. Newspapers, the Oklahoman and the Tulsa World are having hard times these days. The surviving remnant of that once noble Tulsa newspaper seems to think that lawsuits against ombudsmen like Michael will help it survive. That's ridiculous.
As far as I'm aware, Micheal stands alone in Oklahoma by (a) straightforwardly identifying himself, (b) saying exactly what he thinks, (c) even if doing so results in costly litigation, and (d) he does this all on his own without a protective umbrella of some kind.
Truth is, we have no ombudsmen in Oklahoma City that are completely independent and comparable to Micheal Bates. Steve Lackmeyer comes close but he is tied to the Oklahoman, and, hence, is not as free-to-speak as Michael is. Yes, anonymous voices at OkcTalk.com pop up but, in the main, they don't shed their anonymity, preferring, for whatever reason, to remain obscure, hidden, and protected, and, as result, nonthreatening to the status quo. I mean, who could give a squat about what "MoonJune94 says: whatever," when it gets down to the real world of putting up or shutting up. At city hall, who gives a flying fish about what some anonymous poster has to say. It's meaningless. But, when Micheal posts, it's not. Does what he say matter in Tulsa from a practical perspective? I don't know.
All I know is that when Michael Bates posts something in his blog, you know who he is and where he's coming from. He and his blog are not anonymous. Straightforward speech is found there, like it or not, and he is not shy about taking captives. You know who he is.
Can you say (with a straight face),
Lawsuits against free-thinking ombudsmen will help the Tulsa World survive.
I didn't think so ... the words will catch in your throat. Even if you can say "ombudsmen" without torquing it out of shape like GW did with the with the word "nuclear" -- a fleeting last pass for GW: it is noo-clee-ur and not noo-cu-ler. Those times, gladly, are now gone by. We may not ever have to cringe ever again when a President of the United States emaciates the word the "nuclear!" Michael may not agree.
Steve's Blog. As for Steve's blog, in less than a year since it began, Steve's blog has arguably established itself as the best place to go to find out what's going on in the "Oklahoma City history unfolding" department and if you don't go there regularly, you should!
If you want to check out the seriousness with which the Okie Blog Awards are taken (and want a good laugh), check out how Today In Idabel Oklahoma viewed its chances against its Best Commentary competition. It's a hoot!
To vote or simply peruse through the list of nominees, go here, and have a nice day.
I promise to get back to "traditional" Oklahoma City history soon (well, the Thunder is part of Oklahoma City history, isn't it?) but I feel the need for speed in being sure that the Oklahoma City Thunder faithful know about something important that has happened in the blogosphere concerning the team. That something important would be the new Daily Thunder blog.
Rather like a wedding, the new blog is a marriage involving something old and something new. Ever since I made my OKC NBA References & Peep Shows article, it included a couple of Thunder blogs, Thunder World by Royce and Thunder Guru by Joe, both fine blogs, among others. Joe is from Oregon and he's been an avid Seattle Sonics fan for 20 years and he is one who likes to follow the team, whatever its name and wherever it lives. While not alone among SuperSonics fans in those respects, there are certainly many more former Sonics fans who don't share his perspective. On the other hand, Royce is an OU graduate with a degree in journalism. His former blog, Thunder World, was a valiant and solid effort but, earlier on, he allowed all comments to be posted however scurrilous and scumbaggy they were. Such comments were legion, so much so as to dissuade many Oklahoma City Thunder fans from participating there. Not long ago, Royce began moderating comments to get rid of the trash talkers and that worked pretty well.
But, now, those two former blogs have merged into a new blog, owned by Royce, called the Daily Thunder, and it is simply outstanding. It has a clean, crisp appearance with great content supplied locally by Royce and Joe.
Click the image below for a larger view
The new blog is an ESPN TrueHoop Network affiliate and is Oklahoma City's representative in that emerging ESPN network. From the blog, you can quickly open other TrueHoop affiliate blogs, such as the New Orleans Hornets 24/7 blog which was one of my favorites when the Hornets were in town. A Thunder fan might enjoy reading what the competition's blog has to say on the game day vs. a particular team. As you can see, below, the TrueHoops bloglist doesn't yet cover all teams, but I'm sure that will come. Those included are quality NBA blogs that talk hoops, not trash.
ESPN's NBA team pages can also be quickly opened in the blog and you can open ESPN's Thunder, or other team page, in a click.
ESPN's most recent NBA videos can be immediately viewed in the blog's right panel, as illustrated here. I've added Daily Thunder to my Thunder links as you can see above.
I encourage those of you who are Oklahoma City Thunder fans to visit, and participate, in this fine new Thunder blog. It is a class act and is more than deserving of your support.
While working on saving files in anticipation of creating a new template for this blog this morning, I got a call from my good friend Steve Lackmeyer with the Oklahoman and co-author of OKC: 2nd Time Around, and he asked what I thought about making page 2 of today's Oklahoman. "Huh?" I said (utilizing once again my remarkably high command of the English language). He asked if I'd read my paper this morning, and I said, "No, I'm trying to upgrade my blog ... have you seen my last blog post?" "No," he said, he'd not been there and done that just yet!
So, I went outside and frantically ripped open the plastic container which contained my new present rather like Ralphie in the movie A Christmas Story with his hands a-blazing when opening up his new Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle on Christmas morning in Hammond (I originally said Terre Haute, but thanks to a comment by Scott Selva, below, I stand corrected), Indiana, oh so long ago!
And there it was, on page 2, just like he said!
You don't have to be "good" with friends like Steve, just being lucky enough to have friends like him is enough! Thanks, Steve! And, of course, if you don't regularly do so already, visit his great OKC Central blog to get breaking news about our fair city. Besides that, be sure to check out his upcoming Arcadia book, Bricktown, when it becomes available a few months from now. I've seen a draft of it, and you'll need to have it in your library, and that's a promise from Doug Dawg! By the way, Steve's photo at the top of this article was taken on March 4, 2008, at the March 4 Vote's watch party ... so maybe Steve is also enjoying Disney World and a pony and all that other stuff, just like me! PLUS, this morning, I finally got a phone call from a ticket rep for our new NBA team ... I was sweating not having had such a call sooner ... so far, it has been quite a lucky day for Doug Dawg all the way around!
NOTE: This very preliminary blog post was made in September 2008 and was not intended to be completed here. For the complete article about this 1903 Chamber of Commerce book, click here.
First, the administrative "trouble" note. Somehow, I've managed to screw up my template -- it works fine in Firefox but in IE Explorer the left panel doesn't appear. I've tried to do quick fixes but none have worked.
Soooo ... I'm preparing to create a new template altogether, one which will have some of the newer "Blogger" features which are not available in this earlier-style Blogger template, such as expandable articles so that only a small portion is shown if you don't want the whole article to load initially. My concern in making the transition, though, is that earlier posts may get "lost" in the process. So, before I make that transition, I'm doing something which I should have been doing all along ... SAVING copies of existing articles to my computer, just in case I need them for reconstruction after the template change occurs.
This will take a little time, not sure how much, but hopefully just a few days.
ON EDIT, Tuesday September 2, 2008: Ha ha. The joke's on me! Turns out, the problem wasn't with my blog's template, it was with a particular post that sort of "self-fixed" when run in Firefox but did not in IE Explorer! That post (Springlake via Arcadia) has now been fixed so all should be well when the blog runs in IE Explorer. But, since I've started my "saving articles and template change" project, I'll continue with it since it is best to do that, anyway. On further edit (9/6/2008), I'll go ahead an post the answers since the revised template will be delayed for awhile: Click here for the answers. NAME THAT BUILDING. While that's being done, here are a few photos and drawings from a marvelous old "book" -- a 1903 Chamber of Commerce book put together to tout the merits of Oklahoma City to those outside the community. Click on any image below for a larger view.
Book Cover -- the original cover was probably different
Dean Schirf, Corporate Secretary of the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, kindly allowed me to scan any pages from this book that I'd care to. Although the images are rather grainy, they are nonetheless good since they show a number of images from 1903 Oklahoma City days. This book will eventually be the subject of a much larger article -- consider this one to be a teaser and a little guessing game.
# 1 - Where was this 1903 panorama taken from? Hint: The view looks to the southeast
#2 - Where was this race being conducted?
#3 - What is this historic downtown building?
#4 - Another historic building -- what is it?
#5 - Yet another historic building -- what is it?
#6 - Still another historic building -- what is it?
#7 & 8 -- Advertisements The book contained advertisements for local shops, including the frisky Southern Club, not shown here. But here are a pair I thought you might enjoy.
Verrry interesting!
Answers
Vantage Point for #1 – Emerson School. This photo was taken from Emerson School at NW 6th & Walker looking southeast over what was a largely residential "downtown" area with the warehouse district in the background. "Downtown" in 1903 was largely focused along Broadway ... the further west one went the more residential what is today's downtown became. According to Vanished Splendor II, the original Emerson was built in 1894 but burned to the ground in 1917 along with all of the records of the Board of Education which were stored there. The current-day Emerson was built at the same location. The annotated pic below shows the location of Couch Drive today although the path was the location of railroad tracks at the time.
Colcord Park. Charles F. Colcord was president of the Colcord Park Corporation, which owned a tract of one hundred and sixty acres in the city devoted to public amusement and recreation, including the baseball park, the race track, Delmar Garden, etc. Colcord Park was part of that area immediately southwest from the corner of Reno and Western.
India Temple.This 1902 building, now with a facade on its exterior, is at the SE corner of the Sandridge (formerly Kerr-McGee) campus. From 1913-1917, it served as the temporary quarters for the Oklahoma Legislature until the State Capitol Building was done. Sandridge hasn't yet said what it will do with this very historic Oklahoma City building.
St. Anthony's Hospital. This was the 1st "permanent" St. Anthony's hospital, at the same location as today. This structure was built in 1899 at 1000 N. Lee, then outside Oklahoma City's limits.
Culbertson Building. This 1902 building sat on the Broadway "jog" at Grand (now Sheridan), later with the Phillips 66 sign on its top, and many early day photos were taken from its top looking north on Broadway.
Overholser Opera House. This photo shows the building being constructed at 217 W. Grand (now Sheridan) in 1903 a bit west Robinson. Later, this building became the Orpheum Theater, and, last, the Warner, OKC's 1st Cinerama theater. In the later days, a Beverly's Chicken-in-the-Rough was immediately east of it, next to which was the Colcord Building.
Soooo ... what's happened during Doug Dawgz Blog 2nd year of existence? Lots of stuff!It's been an amazing twelve months of Oklahoma City history (aside from me anticipating our new NBA team's colors -- but black & gold works for me)!
The detail is below. But, if you want, click on a flash file link for a "video review" that you might want to see ...
THE YEAR'S TWO BIG STORIES IN PICTURES & MUSIC The videos will open in separate and larger windows (IE Explorer) or tabs (Firefox) (I may add a couple of other videos later)
About 3 minutes
About 6 minutes
The Statistical Detail. Here's some comparative data as of July 11, 2008, over the then almost-two years of this blog's life:
Click image for larger view
The Detail
Last 500 Visits (US Only) — many overlap so don't bother counting
Last 500 from Planet Earth
I continue to be very happy with the blog's reception and growth! It's no match for the deserved popularity of Charles G. Hill's excellent Dustbury, but "we" (that's the imperial "we") are quite pleased!
The Articles. Here's a synopsis of articles posted since July 15, 2007, through July 11, 2008.
THE CENTENNIAL. First and foremost, Oklahoma's Centennial occurred during the past 12 months, and was it grand! I certainly was not able to cover it all, but several articles had the Oklahoma Centennial as their focus:
NBA In OKC! After a couple of years of false hopes and expectations, the "impossible" did occur — Oklahoma City did become a "Major League City!" Even if bordering on the surreal, and even if I keep pinching myself to be sure, it did happen! Last year's blog articles focused upon our Hornet's Legacy, Sleeping in Seattle, and such. Self-proclaimed writers, such as the self proclaimed ultra-wise Greg Doyel said in 2006 that it would never happen — Oklahoma City would never, never, never become an NBA city. "It's not gonna happen," he said. His counterpart in that article, Greg Wyshynski, was proven more prophetic, because it did happen!
These developments received Doug Dawgz insatiable interest in this topic vis a vis the following articles during the past 12 months:
After PBC's purchase of the Sonics and the 10/31/2007 passing of its drop-dead-date for getting an up-to-date-arena in the Seattle area, and while the Hornets were still on shaky ground in New Orleans, I wondered, "Where are we?" in this article
ARTS STUFF. Arts and arts-related projects are part of what makes a city "a city" and gives it soul and character. A few such events were covered during the past twelve months:
TRAINS & TROLLEYS. Oklahoma City's trains and trolley history is a work-in-progress and will be substantially expanded after this post, including updates to at least a pair of posts and the final installment of OKC Trolleys. But, a lot was done during the past twelve months:
Trains Part 2 — more train maps; 1920s through present; a downtown divided; the 1923 great floods; Union Station; Santa Fe Station; No Trains; Trains Return (Amtrak); Remnants & Train Museum
Part 3 — my introduction to the Dean Schirf Collection, his articles, Greater Chamber of Commerce photos of Union Station and Rock Island images, and Amtrak
Part 3A — Photos & history by Dean Schirf, train afficionado extra ordinaire (to be updated in a few days)
BIOGRAPHIES & SUCH. Sometimes famous, sometimes not, these stories focus on people who have significantly contributed to Oklahoma City's history. This past year, these items were done:
That's about it for Year 2 in review, and my thanks go out to those of you who visit and comment and have supported this endeavor. The past twelve months have been a heck of a great year for Oklahoma City's history, past, present, and that which is yet to come! By the time Year 3's summary is posted, the OKC "somethings" will have enjoyed its first NBA season, we'll have an image of that great new Devon skyscraper, biggest in the state, and much more! Stay tuned ... Doug Dawgz prediction is that Year 3 will be even better than this fantastic year has been, and that's saying a heck of a lot!
Louis’s Top 7 Savory Summer Hits
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Always the contrarian, Louis slipped a bit under the weather this week, so
instead of asking him to review the canned chicken noodle soup collection
from...
Operation Scissortail - Our Latest Book!
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[image: devon book cover]
We are very happy to announce the release of our latest book, "Operation
Scissortail," a narative history of the construction o...
Saturday in the Park..on a 113 degree day
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For those who don't know, there is a reason I've gone very quiet at such a
pivotal moment for Downtown OKC. I accepted a position in Cleveland, Ohio
and I...
Of all of his many tunes, the one that has stuck with me most vividly is his Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, a tune which is about 11½ minutes long and occupies the full side of one of the two LP's contained in his fantastic 1966 Blonde On Blonde album. Click the image to see the full album cover. 
ESPN's most recent NBA videos can be immediately viewed in the blog's right panel, as illustrated here. I've added Daily Thunder to my Thunder links as you can see above.
THE CENTENNIAL. First and foremost, Oklahoma's Centennial occurred during the past 12 months, and was it grand! I certainly was not able to cover it all, but several articles had the Oklahoma Centennial as their focus:
NBA In OKC! After a couple of years of false hopes and expectations, the "impossible" did occur — Oklahoma City did become a "Major League City!" Even if bordering on the surreal, and even if I keep pinching myself to be sure, it did happen! Last year's blog articles focused upon our Hornet's Legacy, Sleeping in Seattle, and such. Self-proclaimed writers, such as 
SOME GREAT MAPS. I'm a map lover, to be sure, and during the year I posted a few that I either planned, owned or came across, they being ...
ARTS STUFF. Arts and arts-related projects are part of what makes a city "a city" and gives it soul and character. A few such events were covered during the past twelve months:
BUILDINGS. Several historic, and planned for, buildings were covered during the year. They were:
AREAS OF THE CITY. A few articles focused on important historical areas of Oklahoma City, past and present.
TRAINS & TROLLEYS. Oklahoma City's trains and trolley history is a work-in-progress and will be substantially expanded after this post, including updates to at least a pair of posts and the final installment of OKC Trolleys. But, a lot was done during the past twelve months:
BIOGRAPHIES & SUCH. Sometimes famous, sometimes not, these stories focus on people who have significantly contributed to Oklahoma City's history. This past year, these items were done:
MISCELLANEOUS OTHER STUFF. Articles not falling into any of the above particular groups were done, also. They include:
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