Sunday, October 04, 2009
Silly Americans
People were complaining that the Saints and Brees weren't getting enough attention, so
USA TODAY featured him on the front page of their super duper Fri/Sat/Sun edition with this wonderful little factoid [in the article]:
Brees is more average Joe than "Broadway" Joe Namath, the Jets icon. He has a 120-year-old house in the city's oldest neighborhood.
The Gambit alerted us that this factoid was regurgitated by the
Grey Lady:After Brees came to New Orleans, he moved into a 120-year-old house in Uptown, the city’s oldest neighborhood. For the first month, neighbors filled his porch with Southern delicacies, leaving biscuits, brownies, even seafood.
Instead of at hello, New Orleans had Brees at gumbo.
The city's about to celebrate its
tricentennial, and editors at
two major papers didn't blink when they read "120 year old house" and "the city's oldest neighborhood" in the same sentence.
Granted, it amuses me that there's plenty of New Orleanians who look at Uptown, this relatively new "American" side of town, as an inauthentic appendage. Not long ago I was listening to two guys in conversation. The first guy was trying to convince the second to do something, but the second guy was having none of it.
"You're trying to take me past Canal Street," the second guy told the first.
"Huh?" said the first.
"He's not interested," I explained.
---
1718: La Nouvelle Orléans is established at what is now called the Vieux Carré. About a century later "Uptown" started taking shape.
Labels: Les Bon Temps
8 Comments:
thanks for catching the oldest neighborhood in new orleans lie.
i was digging the gray lady on my porch this morning
with a cig and some coffee when i caught that quote.
you had me at gumbo was also a w.t.f. moment.
me and the wife decided that if it brings folks to town it's all good since we both work in the service industry.
we rated the article silly instead of offensive.
um if the city is some 300 years old then it would be easy to have a house be 120 years old in the oldest neighborhood. Now as to the hood being the oldest I cant speak to as I dont know. The oldest hood in NO I bet has a brand spanking new home as well there has to be some crass McMansion builder in NO.
Algiers is older than Uptown, too. Journalists have no clue.
"um if the city is some 300 years old then it would be easy to have a house be 120 years old in the oldest neighborhood."
Um, no.
"The oldest hood in NO I bet has a brand spanking new home as well there has to be some crass McMansion builder in NO."
Again, not so much.
So you are telling be that every building in this hood is more than 120 years old? (no family decided to rebuild their home in the 1920s, no carpetbagger bought land from destitute old money families and built new homes in the 1880s/90s?) and the with all the flooding not a single home had to be torn down and rebuilt in this entire hood?
I am skeptical very very skeptical
If we are still talking about the oldest neighborhood in NO, that is the FQ, and it does contain several buildings newer than 120 years old - these are typically large hotels which front onto Canal and thus are technically in the Vieux Carre. There are no "new" houses like you mention, nor would any be likely to be built, nor could there be any McMansions. It's clear you have never been to the FQ - the majority of the buildings date to Spanish rule which is over 200 years ago now. In the Garden District (which dates to American rule starting after the Louisiana Purchase), where Brees lives (not really far Uptown), there was no flooding, but again, McMansions as we know them are not possible due to the space restrictions in such a dense urban setting. Also, there are severe planning restrictions in the FQ and Garden District, which would be governed by thhe Vieux Carre Commission or the HDLC. In fact, even as far Uptown as I live, such structures are not practical, as the price of land is exhorbitant.
Anon: Also, the logic of it is this: yes, while it would be technically possible to have a 120 year old house in the "oldest" neighborhood in a city, such a fact would be totally unremarkable in a city with neighborhoods that have been preserved (structurally, give or take the occasional fire) for centuries. The French Quarter is such a neighborhood-- you should visit it some time. Surely the editors at the NYT understand this. 120 years is remarkable (but certainly not unique) in Uptown. Hell, my uptown house is 110 years old. So, the statement, while theoretically possible, was an indication that something was factually wrong with that false, recycled "oldest neighborhood" claim.
Atrocious journalism. The first time that I was in New Orleans, I got cleaned out entirely. Only the fact that I had an entire section of Frontier Airlines in stitches about my experience got me a flight to Denver where i went and got cash and then went back to Stapelton airport and tried to pay for the ticket and was informed that I was a now a legend in Frontier airlines. That everyone knew that I was a total horndog and they would watch me in the future. Embarrassing. Logic, none, but amusement factor had to hit 100 per cent. When I flew to Edmonton Albert, the personnel gave me a free flight if I told what I did up there. OK, Fort Edmonton was a reconstruction and the ladies there who came from the eastern Canadian provinces. were eager to party. Three dates in one day with a long haired hippy were outrageous, but i was in good physical shape. Frontier flew me home for free.
