Pensacola Independent News

COVER STORY | Vol. 6, No. 25, June 22, 2006
(Little Rock and Back Again)
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Little Rock and Back Again

DUWAYNE'S AND RICK'S TRAVELOGUE

The last time I traveled out of town with Publisher Rick Outzen, we drank and sang patriotic songs with a crew of military prosecutors shipping off to Iraq to investigate Abu Gahrib atrocities. They asked us to imbed with their unit for six months.

We bumped into Escambia County Sheriff Ronnie McNesby and his hunting buddies, when they exited a Hooter's. We told Ronnie Mac we
were tailing him. He joked he was testing how far he could fly his helicopter. He hasn't talked to us since.

There were also spitball fights, barroom arguments and a tattoo contest.

And that all happened in one night two years ago on the Riverwalk in San Antonio at the annual conference of the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies, a Washington, D.C.-based organization of about 120 papers similar to the Independent News.

When we learned this year's AAN annual conference was in Little Rock, Ark.—within the driving range of Outzen's Army green 1997 Jeep Cherokee—we knew another road trip was in order. Things have been a bit dreary around here lately what with hurricanes, the mentally ill dying in custody at the Escambia County jail and a senseless, divisive debate about developing Pensacola's downtown bay-front.

We rolled into downtown Little Rock around sunrise, after driving 10 hours overnight through Alabama, Mississippi and Memphis, Tenn.

Once Little Rock was known as the City of Roses. "But that's too sweet a name for Little Rock, with her skeletons and shade," says Arkansas Times Associate Editor and Little Rock lover David Koon.

This is Bill Clinton's turf we're reminded, as we get lost in the Clinton Presidential Center and Park parking lot trying to find our hotel. Clinton's center looks like a space station with its solar panels and tin-colored, shoebox shape, which are part of a design to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions next to nothing.

Little Rock is also the home of Central High School where in 1957 then-Gov. Orval Faubus tried to prevent integration by using the National Guard to keep nine black students from going to school. Three weeks later, the students finally enrolled when President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent in 1,000 members of the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division.

MEMBERSHIP DENIED

We're here not just to escape Pensacola but to try and join this national newspaper club for the third time, not only to benchmark this publication but also to help in fighting the Goliath known as Gannett—the largest daily newspaper chain on the planet and owner of the Pensacola daily.

In 2002, AAN judges, although happy with the muckraking, found Republican U.S. Rep. Joe Scarborough's involvement and political agenda too much to swallow, calling the paper "weirdly right-wing." After he quit Congress and quit this weekly, we tried again in 2004 but members took offense to Outzen being on the Gulf Breeze City Council and compared its news and features to Fox News.

And in 2006? AAN loved Outzen this time and his "interesting and insightful" commentary on Rebuild Northwest Florida's finances and work but disliked our arts and entertainment coverage and use of New York Times columnists and articles.

After getting rejected yet again, a getaway to Elvis' Graceland a mere 90 minutes away was pondered. But in the end, we decided to meet as many people as we could, learn as much as possible and have as much fun as we could stand.

Besides we were staying in the plush Peabody hotel, where Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones stayed in March during their world tour. Peabody bellboys remain livid about the Stones, earning only $30 total in tips between them to haul more than 600 bags to rooms spread throughout the famous hotel.

The hotel's fame began back in the 1930s when then-General Manager Frank Schutt and his friend, Chip Barwick, returned drunk from a weekend hunting trip and placed some of their live decoy ducks in the hotel's large fountain. Unexpectedly, the three small ducks became a huge hit with the guests.

Today, ducks live on top of the Peabody's roof and are let down the elevator daily to the lobby where a red carpet is rolled out for them to the fountain, where they take their dip.

SING SING PRISON

The first person I bump into at the three-day AAN conference is Ted Conover. He's a free-lance journalist and author of four books, including his latest "Newjack," which was a Pulitzer Prize finalist and National Book Critics Circle Award winner.

"Newjack" recounts his 10 months as a corrections officer at Sing Sing prison in New York. I tell him about the rash of deaths of mentally ill inmates in custody at the Escambia County jail, including Jerry Preyer last week.

Conover winces, screws up his face and admits that being a prison guard "messed me up. I was able to do the job but it caused problems with my marriage. I began talking to my children too strictly. I felt it shrunk my character."

But he doesn't recommend I become a corrections officer or inmate at the Escambia County jail to find out what's going on. "People will talk. These people will nail themselves," says Conover, who also teaches journalism at New York University.

I also pick up a couple of good tidbits of advice from Will Swaim, who became OC Weekly's founding editor in 1995, and Tim Keck, The Stranger Publisher who co-founded The Onion in 1988, while attending the University of Wisconsin.

Swaim's pub is based in ultra-conservative, John Birch-loving Orange County, Calif. The OC Weekly printed a cover after the 2004 election of a real, undoctored photo taken of President George W. Bush giving the one-finger salute, with the headline "Mission Accomplished." It got the weekly thrown out of many of its distribution sites, he recalls.

"Our enemies say we're obsessed with sex, that we're commies," Swaim says, laughing as he speaks on a panel analyzing tabloid and magazine covers. "We know what our enemies expect and we never want to let them down."

Keck says alt-weeklies, which are known universally for their fearless, combative, edgy and often-provocative coverage, can sometimes go too far, during a discussion on newspaper blogs.

It's hard to believe coming from Seattle's The Stranger, which is home to Dan Savage, a syndicated sex columnist who seemingly has no boundaries. Keck admits he has had to censor Savage, telling him at least once "Dan, you can't say that on the blog about the governor."

The comment draws a roar of laughter from the crowd of publishers, editors and reporters. The Stranger's current issue features Savage's yearly judging of the best amateur porn videos.

CLINTON SPEECH

But the best one-liners at this conference are the ones that Clinton unloads during a nearly 90-minute speech and Q&A session on the conference's last day—Saturday, June 17.

Other featured speakers had included Little Rock's retired Gen. Wesley Clark, the former Supreme Allied Commander of Europe and Democratic presidential candidate; and Susan McDougal, who spent 22 months in jail for refusing to answer Prosecutor Kenneth Starr's questions before a grand jury about her partnership with the Clintons on the Whitewater development.

Arriving 30 minutes late, Clinton busts another stereotype when he holds up two sheets of paper and promises they contain his entire speech.

Looking trim in a black suit, blue shirt and gold tie, he then jokes, "The greatest thing about not being president anymore is I can say whatever the hell I think. The troubling thing is you don't have to care what I think anymore."

He also brings the house down when asked what his role would be, if he became First Man and Hillary Clinton served as president.

"I would do whatever she wants, although I have no idea what that is," he says. "I would not do whatever I was asked not to do."

However, while saying she would make a good president because of her experience as a New York senator and First Lady and subtly campaigning for her throughout his speech, he adds that "I honestly don't know" if she'll run in 2008.

Jokes aside, Clinton preaches his "unifying theory," calling on Democrats and Republicans to end divisiveness and demonizing and to work for economic and social solutions in the best interest of the nation.

He refuses to Bush bash when given the chance. A sincere sounding Clinton says Bush has a lot of "intuitive intelligence," and adds, "I like him now…even though I disagree with him most of the time." And although friendly with Bush, he does criticize the president's administration for governing on "ideology instead of evidence."

Also—perhaps playing to the audience of 500 weekly newspaper members—Clinton says: "Often, when I travel around, I try to read your newspapers. You tend to fill in the blanks more, so you fulfill a very important function and I thank you for that."

BIG MAX

One reporter-editor who has covered Clinton extensively is Max Brantley, now an Arkansas Times editor.

Outzen and I attend a fish fry held at the Historic Arkansas Museum, the highlight of which is spending time with the seasoned journalist, who spent 19 years covering Arkansas politics before joining the alt-weekly in 1992.

Brantley and his paper made national headlines recently because they so upset Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee with their investigative reporting that the Republican blackballed the Arkansas Times from all press conferences and any press releases.

Brantley breaks so much news regarding the inner workings of Huckabee's administration on his blog (www.arktimes.com/blogs/arkansasblog/) that the other reporters, who are allowed to attend the press conferences, ask their questions based on what he posts.

Just this past week, the Arkansas Times broke the story that Ted Suhl, director of a youth home called Lord's Ranch, provided a jet to Huckabee, his wife, his daughter, a staff member and at least one security officer to attend the North Carolina Republican Party convention in Raleigh June 2.

Brantley and the Times report that Suhl and others tied to Lord's Ranch have given thousands of dollars to past Huckabee campaigns and six years ago earned its first contract from Arkansas to provide services to troubled youth.

Clinton recalls Brantley and Arkansas Times Publisher Alan Leveritt "gave me hell, too."

Brantley is a big man standing about 6-foot-5 with silver gray hair. His eyes light up when he hears that Outzen grew up in Greenville, Miss. "I tried to get a job at the Delta Democrat Times in 1972, but they didn't have any openings," he recalls.

MISSISSIPPI'S FINEST

He did get an interview with publisher Hodding Carter or "Big Hodding," who won a Pulitzer Prize for his editorials against segregation and racism.

Brantley asks if we have eaten at Little Rock's Doe's Eat Place. After Hodding, it's the second most famous thing to come out of Greenville.

The finest steaks in all of the Mississippi are cooked at the hole-in-the-wall restaurant, which is located in a rundown black neighborhood. Patrons must enter through the kitchen to get to the dining area.

"Doe" is Doe Signa whose sons—who now own the eatery—went to St. Joseph School with Outzen. Their Aunt Flo always made sure the St. Joe boys were treated like royalty.

Over the years, the Signa boys, Charles and Dominic, have been most successful at franchising restaurants in Arkansas—Fort Smith, Fayetteville, Hot Springs and Little Rock.

In reading the convention brochures, we had discovered Doe's Eat Place was just a few blocks from The Peabody Hotel. We did treat ourselves to what Outzen calls "the best steaks in the world."

After a few wrong turns, we find Doe's on the corner of Markham Avenue and Ringo Street. It's an abandoned corner grocery store in a not too good part of town with a security guard sitting on a bench outside the front door.

Inside is no better. The tables and chairs look like they were thrown out of the Coffee Cup, when it was renovated in 1973. The floor tiles are missing in several spots. The only redeeming sight is a wall filled with photos of Clinton, Tom Cruise, Kid Rock, Ray Charles and other celebs, who have eaten here.

We order cold beers, a dozen hot tamales—Doe's other specialty—two small green salads and a 6-pound sirloin steak cooked to perfection and served sliced on a platter with steak fries. After barely being able to stand up and walk out of the restaurant, we agree to open a Doe's in Belmont-Devilliers, if given a chance. It was worth every penny of the $100 tab.

REBEL TALES

AAN conference over, we hit the road for Pensacola Sunday morning, June 18. Whizzing down Interstate 55 at 7 a.m., we pull off at Como, Miss., to swing by Outzen's alma mater, the University of Mississippi.

The detour to Ole Miss takes us on bumpy back roads with hairpin turns and past the Sardis Dam and into Oxford, Miss.

Outzen begins reminiscing and provides a tour of the area and campus. He says he made a name for himself in 1978, when as student body president, he tried to get the Lafayette County commissioners to allow stores to sell cold beer. You had to buy it unrefrigerated and put them in a cooler or freezer at home. The measure failed.

At Ole Miss, we see the bullet holes on the Lyceum columns that were made in 1962 when the National Guard took over the campus to protect James Meredith, who became the first black student at Ole Miss. Some Mississippians shot up the building where Guardsmen were holed up with Meredith over night, so he could register for classes the next day.

Behind the Lyceum is the campus library, which once housed the University of Mississippi post office whose most famous postmaster was Nobel Prize winner William Faulkner.

By all accounts, Faulkner was a terrible postman. The author refused to deliver magazines until he read them. He hired all his drinking buddies as part-time postmen and played cards with them all day. A postal inspector was called in to investigate and forced Faulkner out.

Later, when Faulkner was asked about his postal experience, he replied, "Thank God I won't ever again have to be at the beck and call of every son of a bitch who's got two cents to buy a stamp."

The Mississippi library is adorned with another Faulkner quote from his Nobel Prize acceptance speech: "I believe that man will not merely endure; he will prevail."

As we head out of town, we stop at the gates of the chancellor's residence that was originally owned by a wealthy Ole Miss booster. When Dr. Porter Fortune was the chancellor, the booster died and bequeathed the home to the university.

There was only one problem with the beautiful mansion. The master bedroom had a toilet mounted in front of a picture window that overlooked the campus. Mrs. Fortune had it removed, but the window stayed.

After stories like this, there's no question about it. Our next road trip is to Portland, Ore., in 2007 for the next AAN annual convention.

Hey, event organizers have already promised us it'll be the "most outrageous convention ever," since it's home to spewing volcanoes, strip clubs, pubs, assisted suicide, medical marijuana, giant shoe companies, indie rock filmmakers and more strip clubs.

duwayne@inweekly.net

InWeekly

Little Rock and Back Again