Re: [Harp-L] Maxwell Street




On Dec 30, 2008, at 12:14 PM, David Brown wrote:

Maxwell St. was "renovated" to expand the University of Illinois campus.

That's what they wanted everyone to believe.


Apparently the city felt the need to destroy a hundred year old landmark of
the city's history, and a historic landmark of blues and rock & roll, so
that university students would have places to get coffee and pita bread (I'm
getting old...and cynical).

It's a crime that the government does this in this country. This doesn't happen in other places (except Paris). Every city, town and village has a 'Dahn Tahn' section. Even a village has a place where 'what's happenin now' is de rigeur. In Baltimore, it was Baltimore st., in Pgh, it was the Hill Dist. In Mayberry it was the barber shop and in Pixley, it was Drucker's general store.


Unfortunately, when a particular area seems to exude a particular level of crime, it is considered blighted and the paranoid city planners must do something about it. Sooo, instead of having the (admittedly) small number of resident riff raff all in one easy convenient location (where they can be watched), they are scattered about to 'seed' new neighborhoods. Yes, the govt. can't seem to do anything about the people who swindle and cheat us out of billions, but just let someone get taken in a shell game and holy hell, break out the Nat'l Guard.

Not only does that destroy the birthplaces of local culture and nurturing grounds of the indigenous music and art, but it causes more problems than it solves. They do this in the interest of safety. What? Part of growing up is to learn how to deal with every day events. I mean, would you bungee jump 666 feet from the tip of the 999 foot Eiffel Tower? (consider the shape). Would you picknick on the lee side of the Tower of Pisa? (consider the plumbness). Would you swim in ANY Florida drainage canal? Would you run through the Oregon forests wearing a pork chop suit?

They moved the famous polish suasage stands
around the corner....but if you visit Chicago don't leave without eating
one.
I miss the market. It is the first place I learned and played harp in front
of an audience. I wish every blues fan and harp player on this list could
have visited it. The wealth of blues played at that market was unbelievable.
I saw many myself and I wasn't even there during the heyday of the 50's (I
grew up in the early 70's)

I was there in 61. It was as good as you could get.

The City moved the market across the expressway and cleaned it up somewhat.
The blues bus still sells blues and CDs, and you'll even catch a harp in a
street band sometimes, but without the ancient buildings, snappy huckster
salesmen, and stolen goods it just doesn't seem the same.

In other countries, the buildings are still there. smo-joe

The market is still open on Sundays and during business hours it is more
than reasonably safe. The location of the old market is as safe as any other
modern gentrified business district. Find the corner of Maxwell and Halsted
and consider it Mecca. Little Walter, Big Walter, and many many of the
Chicago greats played within a half block of that intersection. Muddy's
first record ( and I think Little Walter's) was sold from a store a stone's
throw from that intersection too.
The Chess Studio building is on a few blocks East of the market on Michigan
Ave.






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