Sam Burnham, Curator @C_SamBurnham I saw an interesting question on Twitter this week. NwGa Football was asking for opinions on why the state’s smallest classification, A, had the longest tenured coaches. My answer was that these small schools are more ingrained in the local community. The coaches become more of a fixture, the schools become more of a home to them. One must only look to Lincoln County's Larry Campbell who retired with 477 victories, 33 region titles, and 11 state championships. But really, this is more of a small town scenario than just a small school scenario. Way back when, Valdosta was in the largest school group but there was little chance of the New York Giants luring Nick Hyder away, much less some school in Atlanta. The City of Carrollton named the road Grisham Stadium is on after the late Ben Scott. Dalton has similar love for Bill Chappell. But this isn't just about coaches. It is about the stadiums, the traditions, the small towns that "roll up the sidewalks" at 5 pm on Fridays in the fall. I remember pulling into a vacant lot in Bowdon and paying the only human I saw in town outside the stadium $5 to park. That night I saw Larry Weathington's Bremen Blue Devils almost knock off Dwight Hochstetler's Bowdon Red Devils in "the Hole" - our old term for Bowdon's highly intense stadium environment, one of the biggest home field advantages you'll find anywhere. You can feel the excitement grow in the Cartersville crowd when the PA announcer places Weinman Stadium under a "Tornado warning." You know when Polk County is in the midst of Rockmart-Cedartown week. Pepperell's fire breathing dragon always "fires up" the crowd. Visitors in Trenton find themselves praying their defense can keep the Dade Wolverines out of the end zone and avoid hearing that air raid siren go off again. The mascots can be predictable - Indians, Eagles, Tigers. But there are also Atom Smashers, Syrupmakers, and Catamounts. The mascots show up on businesses in town. You may see tiger paws painted on the street. The teams are part of the local identity. If one of the kids signs with a college, especially a big one, he achieves a local hero status. Maybe you've heard of Herschel Walker, Garrison Hearst, Malcolm Mitchell, or Nick Chubb. In The South, this isn't just a game. It is a part of the culture. And it isn't just the team. It's the bands, the cheerleaders, and so many die-hard fans. Local eateries turn profits on fans heading to games. Local churches host after game events for students. You can't go anywhere on a Friday night where you don't see a cheese wagon bus headed to or from a game. Local radio stations broadcast shows that announce scores and allow fans to call in to share their pride in a glorious victory or in the face of a hard fought defeat. So if we're a little excited about the coming season, you'll have to forgive us. It's just a part of who we are. And we're thankful for it.
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Sam Burnham, Curator @C_SamBurnham Just over a year ago I was near Canton on business when I stumbled across a quaint but vacant roadside/lakefront lodge. As it was the sort of place I regularly photograph for use on our Instagram and/or blog, I stopped and took a few snaps. After posting it, an Instagram follower notified me that the lodge was used as a filming location for a new Netflix series called Ozark. I didn't think much about the show then but roughly a year later I got a little curious and decided to try the show. What followed was a strange phenomenon. The plot draws you in from the very beginning. But that is tempered with a sense of unease. To say Ozark is gritty is an understatement. Ozark isn't gritty. It's troubling and, at times, downright disturbing. But that discomfort is part of what draws you into the plot. Throughout Season 1 I kept watching, intrigued while still troubled. I think the trick is that the depravity of the characters is not gratuitous. The plots twists and turns on these terrible acts and events. It isn't dark because that is what is trendy, it is the development of complex characters and the story they find themselves caught up in. And it isn't just a slasher flick with just blood and gore. There is a lot of suspense as well intellectual and psychological plot devices. It's a drama but also a true thriller. The characters are well written and complex. The storytellers give adequate background to build these people, you get to know them, even if you'd rather not. Episode 8 is an out-of-sequence flashback that will have you scratching your head wondering what the purpose of it is before it twists a few times leaving you with deeper understanding of people and plot. I've long been fond of the acting pf both Jason Bateman and Laura Linney. Both are on top of their game in Ozark. Harris Yulin's character, Buddy, is impossible to hate. Esai Morales portrays probably the least scrupulous of all the roles but does so in a manner that still had me liking him on some level. The cinematography and sound both are refreshing. In almost every episode, there is no intro audio, perhaps just ambient noise like birds maybe a passing car. "Ozark" appears on the screen in a small and simple font. It's perfect. The visuals are dark and cool, even the scenes of bright summer afternoons are still soft on the eyes. The scenery from the lake is mostly not Missouri, but Lake Allatoona, where I learned to ski as a kid. Except for the violent events, the show is quiet, almost as if it is being whispered to us. It mimics the peace of a lake cove. All of this while still giving us a top-notch soundtrack. It's not just the same old songs you hear in shows over and over. If you're older, you might get nostalgic. If you're younger, you might come to love some older tunes. There are themes that I have been refreshed to see. The city guys expected to find a rural landscape where the locals were naive, ignorant, perhaps even stupid. They found a much more alert and cunning population than they could have expected. Even some of the poorer characters have an intelligence, perhaps a sagacity that keeps them competitive. You see the Chicago types struggling against the people they tried to use. The people of the Ozarks are more than capable of looking out for themselves and cannot be hoodwinked easily. This isn't another liberal take on Middle America in which the wiser city folks win out over the rural buffoons, It is good to know that this show is filmed in Georgia. It is nice to see scenes in locations that I recognize. It is good to know that Georgians are benefiting from the business generated but the production work. If you have not watched the first season, you still have time before Season 2 hits Netflix on August 31. A word of caution, it is not a family program and if you are at all squeamish about mature audience programming, I'd say pass on this one. Sam Burnham, Curator @C_SamBurnham I never was a fan of Duck Dynasty or Swamp People. I tried them, they weren't my thing. But one thing I did notice about it was the subtitles. It was like watching a foreign movie when you know the language. I had a hard time believing there were people out there who could not understand what the people on the screen were saying. I mean, they're just speaking English. In the last few days I've seen some funny stuff online about LSU head football coach Ed Orgeron and the funny closed captioning that accompanies some of his speaking engagements and press availability. I must admit there are times that his accent gets thick and you gotta pay attention but I can understand him fine. The captioning is hilarious. I also enjoy the good-natured ribbing that Orgeron takes for his accent and I like the way he handles it himself. I am even happier that he has found work at major schools as there are many places where he would be subject to prejudicial discrimination for having such an accent. Many people would work to change their accent and mask their heritage in order to find work and avoid discrimination. So, in realizing there is a segment of the population that obviously needs these translations in order to understand the Southern dialects, perhaps there should be some considerations for those of us who might need some translation of dialects that are unfamiliar to us. Orange County Choppers is one example. They're making a return, or so I hear. When those two get riled up it can be hard to understand what is going on. Part of that is the screaming and the fact that every 3rd or 4th word needs to be bleeped out for decency. But a lot of it is because their accents get muddled and you can't understand it. Dan Akroyd trying to do a southern accent in Driving Miss Daisy needs subtitles so real southerners can understand what he is saying. Whatever it is, it ain't Southern. Then you start digging through the TV accents that are ubiquitous in media these days. Stephen Colbert jettisoned his South Carolina accent to make his voice sound like he's from...well...nowhere in particular. It is the most vanilla accent you've ever heard. It's not even vanilla bean. That's too exotic for it. Milquetoast. White bread. Sand. Nothing. Just boring blandness. Then we have some others. Fran Drescher, Joy Behar, Barbra Streisand. Your remote comes with excellent translation tools for people with these dialects: [V chan ^] and [mute]. Then there are the ever preachy, ever critical, ever arrogant accents of Trevor Noah, John Oliver, and Piers Morgan, those that sound a lot like you think Cornwallis or Gage might have sounded when they were trying to boss the colonists around. For them we just recall the sagacious advice of Lewis Grizzard, "Delta is ready when you are!" |
Sam B.Historian, self-proclaimed gentleman, agrarian-at-heart, & curator extraordinaire Social MediaCategories
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