Feeling Blue: Some People Are Born Freaks. Jim Hall Turned Himself Into One
https://citypaperarchives.com/story.php?id=17390
By Charles Cohen | Jan. 21, 2009
Feeling Blue: Some People Are Born Freaks. Jim Hall Turned Himself Into One
A video portrait of Baltimore’s “blue man” before he leaves town
https://baltimorebrew.com/2020/02/09/a-video-portrait-of-baltimores-blue-man-before-he-leaves-town/
Retired city planner Jim Hall talks about why he covered his body with one beautiful tattoo and much more
By Fern Shen 2/9/2020
from Baltimore Or Less http://www.baltimoreorless.com/2020/02/21568/
Jim Palmer, adopted at birth and pictured in 1979, had a Hall of Fame baseball career, never spending much time thinking about his birthparents. After 72 years, though, his wife put the pieces together. (Associated Press)
By Dave Sheinin (5/10/2018)
It would have been January 1945. It would have been somewhere in Manhattan, out where the Irish people gathered. It must have been cold out, driving Joe Geheran and Mary Ann Moroney indoors, into the same building and eventually the same room, maybe the same corner of a bar or nook of a kitchen, where they must have been overtaken by the same feeling and where one thing, as one thing is known to do, must have led to another.
They must have found somewhere to be alone.
They may have known each other already but probably didn’t — he, a dapper, 41-year-old, well-known man about town; she, a 37-year-old domestic to a wealthy family; both of them Irish immigrants. He was married, without children. She would marry just over a year later and quickly start a family with her new husband.
But on this night in January 1945, as fate would have it, Mary Ann Moroney got pregnant. Joe Geheran was the father.
This secret, dark and potentially explosive, may have belonged to both of them or just to Mary Ann because it isn’t clear whether Joe ever knew he would be a father. But regardless of whom it belonged to, the secret survived the subsequent birth of a baby boy Oct. 15, 1945, in a hospital on the east side of Manhattan, and it survived the baby’s adoption two days later. It made it to the grave with both Mary Ann and Joe, and it survived, as well, the life span of the daughter Mary Ann would have in 1946 and go on to raise.
And the secret would survive the first 72 years of that baby boy’s life, even as the world came to know and revere the man he grew into.
from Baltimore Or Less http://www.baltimoreorless.com/2018/08/hall-of-fame-pitcher-jim-palmer-long-wondered-if-hes-related-to-jfk-at-72-he-learned-the-truth/
Report of the United States Interdepartmental Social Hygiene Board
for The Fiscal Year Ended June 30 1922
Baltimore, Md. — “Back River” has been a by-word in Maryland for 20 years. Navy medical officers and the surgeons at Camp Holabird, Edgewood Arsenal, and Fort Howard, and perhaps those at the Veterans’ Hospital at Perryville, know it as a source of venereal diseases. “Back River” stood for “Goeller’s Place” and “Bob’s Locust Grove.”
Joe Goeller, with a large investment in an “amusement park,” had so entrenched himself with the local forces of law and order that he had nothing to fear except (he said to a board’s agent) the prohibition officers.
Federal inspectors in September, 1921, found upwards of 40 prostitutes operating with soldiers and sailors at Back River. Prostitution and bootlegging were the head liners on the “amusement” program.
Bob Mundon, on a smaller scale, imitated “Goeller’s Place” with “Bob’s Locust Grove.”
With the assistance of State authority the board brought the evidence before the courts. The proprietors were sentenced to six months in jail and fined $500 each. Their places are boarded up, and they are serving their sentences, having failed in their attempts at pardon.
The county police force that failed in enforcing the law was found to have been corrupted and a part of Goeller’s “Machine.” They were tried and dismissed in disgrace.
Investigations by the agent of the board in the city of Baltimore showed that houses of prostitution are on the increase. These were placed in the hands of the police commissioner. No action has been noted. The police commissioner claims that when houses are watched, raided and the cases brought to court for trial, the cases are indefinitely postponed, and it is hard to secure a conviction. One well-informed authority who has to deal with venereal diseases resulting from the situation, stated that Baltimore was one of the worst cities he had ever known.
On Sept. 14, 1969, David Selby was grand marshal of the “I Am An American Day Parade” in Baltimore, Maryland. It was a huge event: Crowd numbers were estimated to have topped 200,000 for the Sunday parade.
“Thousands of teen-age girls swarmed next to the reviewing stand, where Mr. Selby sat throughout the day, screaming at the top of their lungs,” reported The Baltimore Sun the following day. “One police officer, who helped escort the television performer during the parade, said the youths were ‘behaving themselves’ and had caused little trouble, but another officer attempting to control the crowd indicated the police had some difficulty. ‘Motorcycle escorts don’t mean anything,’ he said, adding ‘They knock over the motorcycles.'”
The newspaper also included the following quote from Selby, taken from a speech he delivered to the crowd: “With all the troubles and problems we have today, I wanted to tell you it’s really not so bad to be an American.”
At 1124 today, #BCoFD and #BCoPD responded to a vehicle fire at 1620 Whitehead Ct. in #Woodlawn. Subject had sprayed aerosolized deodorant and then lit cigarette. Patient was transported to Bayview Hospital Burn Unit with serious injuries. ^TR pic.twitter.com/H21xy7A9Rt
— BACO Public Safety (@BACOPoliceFire) March 1, 2018
Body spray, lit cigarette cause apparent explosion in Woodlawn, police say
A man was injured and at least two vehicles were damaged in an apparent explosion in Baltimore County.
Police were called around 11:22 a.m. to the parking lot of the Restaurant House in the 1600 block of Whitehead Court in Woodlawn.
A man was inside a company vehicle with the windows down and the ventilation system blowing air out when he used a power stick body spray — a flammable aerosol — and it circulated in the vehicle before he lit a cigarette, police said.
At that time, there was a “sudden, violent expansion of air” that created a booming sound, shook a nearby building and blew open the car trunk, doors and opened the hood, police said.
A nearby vehicle was also damaged, police said.
The victim was walking and talking when first responders arrived, but he was taken to a hospital as a precaution.
from Baltimore Or Less http://www.baltimoreorless.com/2018/03/baltimore-axehole-douses-self-with-body-spray-lights-cigarette-blows-up-car/
Celebrated Summer Record Store owner Tony Pence recently posted a photo of one of my favorite signs in Baltimore: Umberto’s – The Total Look. In the early-through-late 90s I spent many hours at the bar next door: Dead Freddies. And every night when I left with a belly full of chicken wings and beer I’d look at that dirty, dimly lit sign and laugh. (It was a loving, fond laugh.)
One of Pence’s friends noted that the local Baltimore band Asthma Castle parodied the Umberto’s sign:
Odder than the sign is the story about the shooting that took place at Umberto’s:
Shooting at bar leaves 2 men hospitalized; Suspect in police custody, but motive, events leading to attack are in dispute
By Peter Hermann (The Baltimore Sun , 10/20/1998)
David Steele had just closed his Harford Road bar, Dead Freddies, when a regular customer returned and began pounding on the door. Steele reluctantly opened up, afraid his friend wanted to continue drinking.
“He said, `I’ve been shot,’ ” Steele said yesterday, recalling the early Sunday shooting outside his tavern in Northeast Baltimore. “I thought he was kidding. Then he lay face down on the sidewalk.”
Police said a man who lives across the parking lot from the bar aimed through a scope and fired nine shots from a rifle as patrons emerged, hitting Michael Ferro, 33, and his brother, Stephen Ferro, 27, who were about 60 feet away. Both survived.
Michael Ferro collapsed at the door, lying on top of a sidewalk advertisement for the bar — a chalk outline of a body holding a frothy mug of beer.”
Article continues: “…Police said a search of the suspect’s apartment, beneath Umberto’s Total Look Salon, turned up an M-16 rifle, two other military-style assault weapons, ammunition and a cross-bow.”
This Maryland-shaped Walmart item … doesn’t really look like Maryland
By Wesley Case (The Baltimore Sun, 2/28/2018)
It happened again, Walmart.
After a 2016 blunder involving a University of Maryland T-shirt, the retail company has been criticized by Free State residents again — this time for a wooden craft in the shape of Maryland … that doesn’t look like Maryland.
Bond Lifestyle: “The James Bond’s 007 Special Blend cans featured attractive women posing in front of famous London backdrops. The brand was pulled when National Brewing learned that it might have been a good idea to check with the estate of Ian Fleming about using its trademarks for a commercial product. The cans are highly valued by collectors, and currently can fetch more than $500.”
from Baltimore Or Less http://www.baltimoreorless.com/2018/02/national-brewing-companys-james-bonds-007-special-blend-1968/
In the summer of 2016, Naomi Karzai, the bar manager of Pen & Quill — a slightly upscale restaurant blocks from Baltimore’s Penn Station — heard an unwelcome rumor from a bartender friend. “I didn’t believe him,” she recounted later, “but I was nervous.”
Word was that Pikesville Supreme — a solid, unassuming, spicy yet smooth rye whiskey born in Maryland and beloved by Baltimoreans — was going out of production. So the next time the bar’s alcohol distributor stopped by, Karzai bought 20 cases. “It’s good and inexpensive,” she said of the whiskey, which retailed then at about $18 for a 750-milliliter bottle. “It does all of the things that we Baltimoreans like.”
In October 2016, Heaven Hill Distillery, which produced Pikesville Supreme, officially confirmed the news. At that point, the hoarding began in earnest. The Wine Source, a liquor store in Baltimore’s Hampden neighborhood, sold close to 700 bottles of Pikesville in the month following the announcement. (In previous months, the store had sold an average of 84 bottles of Pikesville, says manager Lauren Loeffler.) “Most of the people I know have their own little stashes,” Van Smith, an erstwhile Baltimore City Paper reporter and Pikesville Supreme devotee, told me in June. He had bought five cases of Pikesville — at $150 a case — from Canton Crossing Wine & Spirits in December 2016.
At this Saturday’s show, pull up a Holiday drink and come watch our creators discuss…
PANELS:
3:00 - 3:45 // Dialogue & Scenes - What is the process like behind creating a fully fleshed out scene, from writing the dialogue to visually composing the whole scene?
4:00 - 4:45 // Humor in Comics - Do you write funny comics, or like to insert humor into your stories? What does it take to make people laugh?
from Bmore Into Comics https://bmoreintocomics.tumblr.com/post/168537669454
Tis the season to get your cool, creative and one-of-a-kind holiday gifts from our comic books and art marketplace!
Local comic book creators show, sell, and talk about their work. Free and open to the public, featuring a Free Comic Book Library and drink specials all day!
On Sunday, Oct. 29th, 2000, I visited HELL HOUSE, “a spiritually-based adventure that takes people on a 7-scene journey, each scene depicting the hell and destruction
that Satan and this world can bestow on those who choose to not serve Jesus Christ.” HELL HOUSE has become so popular that the church in Denver that originated the concept has packaged the program and sold it to churches throughout the country. This year it made its debut in Baltimore. I stood in line for an hour at the Kingsway Christian Center with other devout Christians waiting to see the horrors unfold.
After our chilling wait we are introduced to our “Personal Demon,” bedecked in devil’s robe and white “ghoul” makeup with “666” painted on his forehead. He even has “devil” contact lenses — the same ones all those wacky goth kids are wearing these days. We are led to the first scene of Hell House: a funeral parlor, where a teenager has died of AIDS. We are seated in real church pews, with an organist and a minister preaching. It’s like “Scrooge” — they don’t notice us, and they don’t notice our “Personal Demon” making a mockery of the funeral. “Out of the closet and into the casket!” he taunts as the mourners cry and wail. We hear a 12-year old girl in the group mutter “My uncle was gay and he’s not going to hell!”
Next we are led to the ‘Abortion Scene.” A spread-eagled teenaged Christian portrays a “knocked-up” “’ho” covered in blood. A doctor with a forceps twiddles between her legs occasionally pulling up a piece of bloodied liver and tossing it into an oversized mixing bowl as she screams and cries out. At this point we realize we weren’t the only non-Christians in the group as we hear cries of “This is SICK”! Our “Personal Demon” tells us that “a few beers, a few joints, and now THIS!” as he laughs demonically. “That was the next Billy Graham” he exclaims, pointing to the mixing bowl of bloodied parts and leading us into the next room.
Hell House documentary. Although this did not take place in Baltimore the script is the same.
We are next led into a high-school cafeteria where a group of teens are studying their Bibles during their break. In storms a short, 12-year-old Trench Coat Mafia clad youngster who breaks into an utterly amazing rant about how he hates his parents, his life, God, and especially those annoying Bible-studiers at the next table. He pulls out a handgun and holds it to a girl telling her she must renounce the name of God or die. “I can’t!” she pleas. He pulls the trigger as flames shoot from the gun and we are all deafened by the noise. She falls over dead on the floor with a huge bloody gunshot wound to the head.. Luckily she wore her earplugs on the way to school that day.
Next we see the drunken-driving scene with a real wrecked car! Dad is sprawled on the hood, mom is dead in the passenger seat, and a bloodied baby doll is in the back. Our “Personal Demon” laughs about how many lives Satan takes due to booze cruises and suddenly Dad falls off the car and comes to life! “Our Baby!” he cries. “This Bud’s for you!” our personal demon retorts!
We next enter a dark room to the strains of Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.” A frustrated teen sits in his room staring at his black light “Korn” poster. He throws his homework in the air and suddenly a backwards-masking demon appears, putting suicidal thoughts in the teen’s head courtesy of Metallica’s music, obviously downloaded from Napster. The teen is overwhelmed by the demonic voices telling him to “Do it!” and suddenly in the darkness w e see a flash of light and a loud bang from a gun as the teen falls over dead.
We are next led through Hell, which is a long corridor with teens in ghoulish makeup screaming behind prison bars. “Please help me! No one told me it would be like this” they scream as they reach out towards us and try to grab us as we stumble through cobwebs and strobe lights..
We are then led to the lair of Satan himself, sitting high on a throne decorated with a goat’s head 20 feet in the air! He recounts all we have just seen, in a soliloquy even better than the Columbine kid’s. His throne is hydraulically lowered and he comes towards us and stands inside a fluorescent pentagram. I notice his red face paint and prosthetic Lucifer chin. He looks just like the Satan on Underwood Deviled Ham! He continues his rant, getting right in the faces of people. The 12-year-old girls continue to scream: “My uncle’s gay and you can’t say he’s going to hell!” Our “Personal Demon” and a Christian security guard hover over her and tell her to “Be Quiet!”, while Lucifer himself directs his teen pregnancy barbs at this group. “You thought it would be a party!” A mid-40’s lesbian couple yells out: “What’s wrong with you people? We want our money back! This is DISGUSTING!” Satan only pauses briefly, and then directs his outrage at them. Suddenly Jesus himself appears – a middle-aged white guy in a choirboy’s robe with sparkle make-up.
Jesus then leads us to “Heaven” which is a room draped in white sheets with a pulpit and some chairs. This is the scariest room of all, as we are asked to bow our heads and pray! The middle-aged lesbians scream “You are all a bunch of ASSHOLES! We want our money back! How the HELL do we get out of here!” The preacher says “We are not forcing you to stay, here is the exit.” The 12-year-old girls follow. I devoutly bow my head in prayer hoping to see more action, but alas, that is it for Hell House. They pray for 30 seconds, tell us they hope our life has been changed, and try to push tracts and church schedules on us. I leave the church laughing my ass off.
HELL HOUSE costs $5 and is located at Kingsway Christian Center, 7403 Gum Spring Road, near Golden Ring Mall in Baltimore County. Tonight, MONDAY OCT 30th, is the very last night. I SUGGEST YOU GO! Open 7-11 pm
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Atomic Books, “Literary Finds for Mutated Minds” 1806 Maryland Ave, Baltimore, MD 21201 * 410.625.7955
Online Catalog, Live Spycam & more at www.atomicbooks.com
Shorpy.com: Baltimore circa 1905. “Oyster luggers at the docks.” Panorama made from two 8×10 inch glass negatives. Detroit Photographic Company. View full size.
from Baltimore Or Less http://www.baltimoreorless.com/2017/08/baltimore-oyster-luggers-1905/
