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Annexations Abroad
Amid the lengthy round of send-off fetes for Victor Ashe, the new U.S. ambassador to Poland, Mayor Bill Haslam hosted one for his predecessor at the Jacob Building last week, with 900 in attendance. The crowd brought on a reception line that snaked back and forth throughout the building and took more than an hour to negotiate. Among those in line were Bernie and Barbara Bernstein, the attorney and spouse, who watched as others cut the line in front of them and kidded about the rush to send Victor abroad. (Ashe said in his brief address that there were those who’d be glad to see him 5,000 miles from Knoxville, but he also promised to return when his stint in the Polish capital concludes, and he offered an email sign-up list for those wishing “news from Poland,” and lots of names and addresses were on that list by the end of the evening). Bernie said he asked an acquaintance if he was planning to visit the Ashes in Poland, and the response was: “Not until Victor annexes [the Czech Republic and Slovakia].” Pressed on who the acquaintance was, Bernie declined and said just to attribute the joke to him. “I wish I’d thought of it,” he said.
Pizza Power
It’s a sign of the times that power lunches are now as likely at Tomato Head on Market Square as at Regas or Club LeConte. Last week, Mayor Haslam shared pizza with Ashley Capps of AC Entertainment, Chuck Morris of Morris Creative Group and Laurens Tullock of the Cornerstone Foundation, while across the room, the city’s economic development director, Bill Lyons, and last year’s mayoral runner-up, Madeline Rogero, dined separately as they engaged in spirited conversation over the direction of our fair, and fairly eclectic, city.
The Real Buyer Stands Up
OK, we were misinformed. Though well-placed rumors a few weeks ago had another downtown resident buying Susan Key’s residence/gallery at 29 Market Square, the real buyer turns out to be Farragut resident John Craig, who plans to renovate the three-and-a-half story building for mixed use: retail, office, and residences. He says he’s already talking to interested tenants. Craig has a special interest in the building: his great-grandfather, J. Frank Walker, kept his furniture store here in the 1920s. That’s Walker’s advertisement you can still see painted on brick from Walnut Street: PHONOGRAPHS/FURNITURE.
Key lived on the first floor, where she also kept her gallery, but never finished the building’s upper floors. Craig intends to begin construction on the unfinished floors, which may sustain three apartments plus a floor of office space, right away.
A vocal opponent of some of the recent changes to the square, and of the Sundown concerts, Key had led a small faction who promoted adding automobile traffic to the block. She reportedly intends to reopen her gallery elsewhere.
July 15, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 29
© 2004 Metro Pulse
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