MID-SOUTH MEMORIES
25 years ago — 1996
Only in Memphis could a coincidence this bizarre take place. On the same weekend we have an electionyear gathering of right-wing Christians and politicos hoping to gain influence on issues including homosexuality, and we have the opening of a gay-themed drama that rips the conservative agenda to shreds. Suppose Jerry Falwell will slip out of the National Affairs Briefing to catch “Angels in America” at Playhouse on the Square? I don’t think so. Tony Kushner’s two-part epic ranks right up there with the most provocative plays ever performed in Memphis. Shifting between an unhappily married Mormon couple, a gay couple destroyed by AIDS and real-life attorney Roy Cohn’s desperate attempt to avoid disbarment, “Angels” portrays an isolated, ambivalent populace torn by racial conflict, haunted by demons and struggling to face its true identity. Playhouse will present “Angels Part I, Millennium Approaches,” through Feb. 25. The University of Memphis will stage the sequel, “Perestroika,” April 11-21.
50 years ago — 1971
John Vaught, veteran of 24 seasons as football coach at the University of Mississippi, has completed his final campaign as boss of the Rebels, according to reliable sources from Oxford and other Mississippi cities. Reports late last night said that Vaught and C.M. “Tad” Smith will move into “emeritus” status and that Billy Russell Kinard, a former Ole Miss player and currently an assistant coach at the University of Arkansas, will replace Vaught as head coach with Frank “Bruiser” Kinard, now a Rebel assistant, stepping up to replace Smith as athletic director.
75 years ago — 1946
The City Board of Education yesterday announced it had given the “green light” to development of what has been estimated as a “million dollar” school project, including one of the most modern buildings in the Midsouth, at Poplar and Holmes. Designed to accommodate a minimum of 1,500 students, the new building will be located on the northwest corner of the intersection. It will face Poplar, extending about 525 feet along that avenue, and will have a depth of approximately 375 feet. The building will house grammar, junior high and senior high school students. Officials declined to estimate the cost of the structure, which is the first project in the long-planned postwar expansion program for the city public schools, prior to receipt of bids. However, previous announcements of postwar plans placed the Poplar and Holmes project in the $1,000,000 or more category.
100 years ago — 1921
While thoughts of a tender and beautiful sermon he preached last Sunday morning on “Home” still clustered in the memories of his hearers, the soul of Rev. Dr. Thomas Semmes Potts, minister and humanitarian, put out to sea early yesterday morning without any “moaning at the bar” as it crossed from the billowy shadows of earth into the restful depth of the Great Beyond. Dr. Potts passed peacefully away in Baptist Memorial Hospital, a structure for the good of mankind which he had helped to rear. When he was removed to the hospital at 8:30 Tuesday night, after suffering an attack of acute stomach trouble, it was not believed that Dr. Potts was critically ill. Only during the last two days had he been really ailing.