In the latest Observer, the always interesting Jim Schutze gives a lesson in recent Dallas history. Here’s Jim’s take in a nutshell:
Dallas used to be run by the Ku Klux Klan. But it became urban and urbane in the 1950s and ’60s. Then “outlanders” arrived in the ’70s and ’80s. They turned the city into the land of saguaro cactus and steel guitars. Now, thanks to places like Oak Lawn, Dallas is becoming “cooler and cooler.” Then, this capper:
My wife and I ate dinner on a weeknight recently at Bolsa, a restaurant on West Davis in Oak Cliff. The place was jammed with people who looked like they had been teleported from the streets of SoHo in Manhattan. And that’s a good thing.
Dallas losing its identity to New Yorkers or NY wannabes is a good thing? Then again, if you contend the city’s Greatest Generation wore white sheets, I guess the idea makes sense.
23 comments
The Ku Klux Klan was sadly very influential here:
http://www.dallashistory.org/history/dallas/topics.htm
“Over 13,000 people were reportedly members of the Klan in Dallas, including the district attorney, the sheriff, the police commissioner, the police chief, judges, doctors, lawyers, bankers, ministers, businessmen and journalists. Overall, the presence of the Klan was widely accepted, even as newspapers reported kidnappings, beatings, and even the branding of “KKK” on one man’s forehead.”
Given the number of falsely imprisoned black men that have been exonerated by Craig Watkins over the last two years your sarcastic remark about the Greatest Generation wearing white sheets doesn’t sound quite so sarcastic anymore.
Glenn – I know you write for the city magazine, which means boosterism is paramount, but your summary and pull quote are misleading. I think this sentence summarizes Jim’s article.
“…a powerful force surging beneath the surface of official politics continues to make the city molt, shed and re-emerge as a bright new being.”
Jim’s article is pro-Dallas, not anti-Dallas.
Well, all I know is I donned my colorful native garb the other night and stood around outside Bolsa looking diverse and vibrant and nobody noticed. Are weeknights better?
Schutze is a rambling madman.
Seriously? That’s the Schutze piece “in a nutshell”? I guess you missed the part about the community garden issue.
In a nutshell, Dallas’ worst blogger is still in full effect.
That’s quite a stretch to take a fact that Jim mentions and then state that he believes Dallas was at its best when the Klan was in charge.
Jim Schutze writes a column about race and concludes that white people are evil and urbanites from Manhattan are our savior? Who could have seen that coming? Yet another fine piece of original reportage from Mr. Schutze.
Schutze is burning brightly these days. Skeptical realism mixed with hope: love it, fear it, I dig it.
And as for Bolsa, and as a long time Oak Cliff resident, I tried to go there this weekend because of D’s great food reviews. We left, too crowded and jangly. Little known secret is the tiny stand across the street from the “Bag” has the best authentic tacos in town (though probably not kosher or halal). It’s called El Si Hay.
Anyone else notice the irony that while NYC is suffering an immense out-migration of people, their economy is in shambles and NY state recently came in dead last in a comparison of how happy people are, and simultaneously people are moving to DFW and Texas at an incredible rate to get away from places like NY and California, the “urban planner” types want us to be more like those places?
No thank you.
If the Dallas Blog-0-Sphere was Rollerball, Jim would be Jonathan E and Wick would be Bartholomew.
And when was the last time D reported on the (still in 2010!) whites only Dallas Country Club?
Hey Glenn, here’s a tip: After denigrating one of the World’s great religions, Hinduism, it’s not to smart to complain when another writer accurately recounts Dallas’ sad racial history.
Second tip: Go to the library check out Schutze’s book “The Accommodation: The Politics of Race in an American City” the “Eye On The Prize” wouldn’t hurt either.
Being Whites’ Only has hurt to coverage in D:
http://search2.dmagazine.com/search/find?q=Dallas%20country%20club
@Grumpy Demo – did the DCC turn down your membership application again?
Schutze need to keep his sorry ass in The Peoples Republic of East Dallas. Oak Cliff has bee just fine without him.
We will never be New York nor will we be LA, yet we love to compare ourselves to both. It is time that we became a more progressive version of whatever it is that we are.
El Si Hay is a little known secret? Is that why the parking lot is always crowded beyond capacity, and it takes 30 minutes to get a freaking soft taco?
I urge those who feel impelled to comment to first read Schutze’s column carefully all the way through. It has its goofy moments, but it doesn’t say what Glen says it says.
Either Glenn suddenly has a legion of followers that are different from most of the readers here, or he likes to post comments under a fake name.
Hannibal, the NYC out-migration has been offset by a influx of new residents and natural population growth. NYC currently has the highest population it’s ever had. Large cities typically experience more severe “churn” than smaller cities.
Saguaro cactus and Steel Guitars? Really? Steel guitars came to town with Bob Wills. Saguaro cactus is Arizona. That metaphor won’t grow here without rather extreme measures. Maybe that’s normal for Jim, I’m not a regular reader.
Jeebus, I’ve rarely encountered so many misreadings in one set of comments, but then the original post did a pretty fine job in that direction already. It’s a positive, holiday column from Schutze, folks, it’s Schutze writing about what’s good in Dallas, the small-bore community stuff that’s not often found in the official, big-business, big-development, alpha-male histories. Hunter distorts Schutze’s (quite accurate) remark about the Klan’s influence in Dallas in the ’20s and ’30s to make it a slander against the entire town — to fit his easy dismissal of Schutze as simply anti-Dallas — and then people like Don in Austin miss the point about how popular (read: Eastern and Hollywood) misconceptions keep seeing us with saguaro cactus in the landscape. Yes, they’re indigenous to Arizona, Don, which is Schutze’s point for pete’s sake. They’re not the real Dallas, like a lot of ideas about this city — even his own old ones, Schutze concedes. I vote with Bill Marvel: read the column and forget the People’s-Republic and white-guilt slanders about this town’s best city columnist.
@Surly Dog: Thank you for saying that. I am just now getting around to reading Schutze’s column. I really enjoyed it. Glenn — though he is a co-worker, and I love him dearly — really missed the point. As did many of the commenters.
Folks, go read the column before you comment. Cheers to all.
Timmy, Timmy, Timmy: The post wasn’t about Jim’s “point,” which I guess was how awesome grass-roots movements (like community gardens) are. It was about Dallas history as interpreted by Schutze. And, as long as we’re getting all serious and high-minded about this, I thought Jim’s take in this case was simplistic and condescending.