Monthly Archive for April, 2005

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Fridays After 5 Lineup Announced

Published by Waldo Jaquith on April 26, 2005 in Music. 10 Comments

Fridays After 5, in its latest incarnation, has announced both the location and the lineup for the first half of the season, WINA reports. It’ll be held at the corner of First Street and Garrett Street, behind the Pink Warehouse, its location until the amphitheater exists again. The bands in the May-June chunk of the season include Indecision, Alligator, the Chickenhead Blues Band, and the Hackensaw Boys.

Those who don’t follow these things closely may appreciate knowing that the city sold the rights to the public amphitheater to developer Coran Capshaw last year, he promised to maintain some incarnation of Fridays after 5, and the Charlottesville Downtown Foundation closed shop in January, since without Fridays, they’ve got no revenue stream.

Update: John Yellig has the story in today’s Progress.

UVa Posts 5,000 Hours of WH Tapes

Published by Waldo Jaquith on April 26, 2005 in UVa. Closed

Aerial writes: “The Presidential Recordings Program at the University of Virginia has made available almost 5,000 hours of tapes recorded by six U.S. presidents from 1940 to 1973. They can be listened to for free at Whitehousetapes.org.”

Kind of off-topic, but cool enough to mention here. :) News.com has the story.

The Daily Progress March

Published by Waldo Jaquith on April 25, 2005 in Meta News and Music. Closed

Paul Richards, of Nellyford, has composed a march entitled “The Daily Progress” — it is, in fact, an ode to that very newspaper. Richards is a trumpet player in the Charlottesville Municipal Band, and the piece will get its first performance on Tuesday night at the band’s Spring Concert at PVCC.

Believe it or not, this is an old tradition. In the newspaper that is the object of Richards’ affection, John Yellig writes:

With Richards’ composition, The Daily Progress takes its place alongside other newspapers with their own marches, such as the Chicago Tribune and the Washington Post, which had its ditty penned by the legendary composer John Philip Sousa.

The tradition of dedicating marches to newspapers originated in the 19th century, when bandleaders hoping for prominent billing sought to flatter editors by dedicating compositions to their publications. Oftentimes, the song in question had been recycled several times over at previous stops along the tour.

“The Daily Progress,” Richards said, is an original.

The promotion seems to be particularly good for the Progress, who has received a write up in Editor & Publisher as a result of the original work.

This One Guy Doesn’t Like Our Decals

Published by Waldo Jaquith on April 24, 2005 in General News. 9 Comments

This just in from WINA: Some guy from Greene County thinks that Charlottesville’s car decals are “too fancy.” Thanks for that, Howard Huffman of Ruckersville. We’ll get right on that. And thanks, WINA, for the hard-hitting journalism.

A Brief History of C’ville Superintendents

Published by Waldo Jaquith on April 22, 2005 in Education and Politics. 8 Comments

Because I have terrible time management skills and, currently, writer’s block on my class-assigned paper topic, I want to lay out the history of Charlotteville superintendents for the past few years, since I found a little back reading to help get a sense of how we got where we are today.

  • 10/19/2001: Bill Symons, superintendent since 1996, announces his intention to retire in June of 2002.
  • 05/01/2002: The school board announces that they have three finalists to replace Symons, whose retirement is 60 days away. Those are Jean Murray, Albemarle’s assistant superintendent for instruction; James Bughsley, deputy superintendent for Charlotte-Mecklenburg County Schools in North Carolina; and Kriner Cash, superintendent for Martha’s Vineyards Public Schools. Two of the three candidates are black, which is noteworthy because there is pressure on the board to appoint a black superintendent. A decision is due in five days.
  • 05/25/2002: Cash, the board’s stated #1 pick, declines the offer.
  • 05/29/2002: Pughsley, the board’s stated #2 pick, accepts the job of superintendent in Charlotte, NC. Murray, the board’s last choice, withdraws her application. Now there are no candidates.
  • 06/14/2002: Murray leaves her job to become superintendent of the Stafford County school system.
  • 06/27/2002: City Council refuses reappointment for all three school board members whose terms are ending, appointing Peggy Van Yahres, Michael Heard, and Bill Igbani. This clean sweep was said to be a result of the board’s bungling of the superintendent hiring process.
  • 08/19/2002: Ron Hutchenson, who had been named as a stand-in until the board could name a superintendent, is hired on a two-year basis, giving the board some breathing room to hire a new superintendent.
  • 05/27/2004: Dr. Scottie Griffin is named superintendent.

I have now read and written the word “superintendent” so many times that it’s lost all meaning to me.

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