Old Dixie Highway is no more in Riviera Beach, Fla. Instead, motorists are driving on President Barack Obama Highway.
Riviera Beach officials renamed the portion of the highway in their city limits, and the new sign carrying the name of the nation’s first black president went up Thursday. Old Dixie, officials said, paid homage to an era that glorified slavery.
The name was “symbolic of racism, symbolic of the Klan, symbolic of cross burnings, and today we are stepping up to a new day, a new era,” Riviera Beach Mayor Thomas Masters told WPTV on Thursday.
One elderly lady claims to have seen a cross burning on this same highway. Some how I think she might get the opportunity to see another one.
But this is a good thing.
After all I it is well past time for Florida to start moving into the future and leave behind their racist past. I mean screw those old racists anyhow.
Having said that I hope the city has invested in a whole lot of back up "President Barack Obama highway" street signs, because you just KNOW the first dozen or so are going to be vandalized or stolen.
After all, this IS Florida.
Heck, if I ever end up on it, I am stealing the sign! But, I would display it proudly!
ReplyDeleteSo you're not a racist but it's OK to steal. That is a sad attitude.
DeleteI hope they save any & all vandalized signs: fodder for an artist's installation piece, in some future exhibition, when the signs will appear as racism does to many people now --
ReplyDeleteanachronistic --
that chronological inconsistency in some arrangement, especially a juxtaposition of person(s), events, objects, or customs from different periods of time.
Like a collection of "coon jiggers" (metal, mechanical, racist dancing toys), future generations will (I have to believe) just shake their heads in sadness that their ancestors were so unenlightened, and that it lasted so long, and in spite of the idea on which the United States was founded --
"All men are created equal." Why does that statement continue to elude Old Dixie Southerners?
"Why does that statement continue to elude Old Dixie Southerners?"
DeleteBecause too many of them still believe that blacks are NOT human and therefore not a man!
You are right, but it's not just black people, not at all. Anyone that is different than them is inferior.
DeleteIf it was the Mat Su, those signs would be full of buckshot
ReplyDeleteThis particular stretch of Old Dixie Highway is in a predominantly all black part of Palm County on the Atlantic side of Florida. Chances are the signs might, just might, last longer than they would on the Gulf side near Hudson, Fl, 45 miles north of Tampa. Possibly one of the most redneck infested rebel sores on the ass of Florida.
ReplyDeleteIt ALSO has a stretch of road called...you guessed it ... the Old Dixie Highway.
I escaped from that third world country back to good ol' MN 13 years ago and now live peacefully without nightmares.
I can go in to pay for gas without locking my car.
And I can go to the grocery deli without old farts muttering about Obama is a Kenyan and wondering which two pieces of cheese to buy. Or getting assaulted in the parking lot by a gun totin' meth crazy.
I speak fluent Spanish and love the ocean but I would rather park this butt in a cold freezer 6 months out of the year than live in Florida's hell on earth.
I fervently hope that more significant recognition comes for one of the greatest leaders this world has ever known.
That’s interesting, I moved from Columbus, Ohio about 30 years ago to Sebring,FL. Sebring of course is where the famous Sebring race occurs and that seems to be all many of the people there live for. But, in the rural areas outside of Sebring, and in some areas within Sebring is where many of the rednecks live. About a third of the people who live in Sebring during the winter are retirees from up north. I now live in Tampa where I moved to after living about 3 years in Sebring, and I was anxious to get out of Sebring to where there were more professional people and jobs.
DeleteWhat I have found is that many of our rednecks actually move to Florida from up north expecting more construction jobs and better weather. Many of them also move back up north after they find out the blue collar jobs pay is low in Florida and the weather during the summer is miserably hot. When I read something stupid that happening in Florida I too am shocked at their stupidity, but I know many of them are the ones who came from the North.
My impression is that those who came from up North with little money in their pockets are the ones who commit many of the petty crimes, fraud people out of money, particularly the elderly, and do most of the drugs in comparison to the Florida rednecks.
Racism is a problem but most of the native Floridians won’t talk about it or show it openly until they get to know you. Not the case with most of the blue collar rednecks from up north, who come down with an attitude.
So, I’ve lived in the rural areas of Florida and in some of the major cities, and know you’ll find much more professional and educated people in the cities than in the small towns on either coasts which is the normal in any state.
All I’m saying is don’t equate the rednecks with those in the cities with those who came from up North, or live in the back woods of Florida.
"the first dozen or so"
ReplyDeleteThey will need to stock up by the ream. I imagine the defacement will continue indefinitely. Sad but realistic. But it is a step forward. Good to see in Florida.
The rest of the article said that there is already an Obama Avenue or something in Palm Beach, so I the k this will be fine, except with the retired RWers who will now move out of the Palm Beach homes and up to The Villages where they belong.
ReplyDeleteUgh. The Villages.
DeleteThe signs will be safe, and the Villages is not located in in Palm Beach County.
DeleteThe Villages... pass me a barf bag.
DeleteFormer U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s 28-year-old grandson, Jeremy, has died, Carter told a church gathering on Sunday, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
ReplyDeleteThe newspaper said Carter, who two weeks ago said he is now cancer-free, appeared at the Maranatha Baptist Church to teach his regular Sunday school class and told church members that his grandson had died a few hours before.
The cause of death was unclear. The 91-year-old former president told the church Jeremy Carter had felt unwell on Saturday and that his mother discovered his heart had stopped after he went to take a nap at his family’s home in Peachtree City, Georgia, the newspaper reported.
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/12/former-president-jimmy-carter-announces-death-of-28-year-old-grandson-at-church-services/
How terrible.
DeleteHeartbreaking, especially during the holidays.
DeleteThis is so sad.
DeleteNo parent should outlive their child. So to no Grandparent should outlive their Grandchild.
Apparently he was feeling tired, laid down to sleep and never woke up.
Oh so sad!
ReplyDeleteBREAKING!
On Sunday, two weeks after making the cheerful announcement that there was no remaining sign of cancer on his brain, former President Jimmy Carter shared much more somber news with his church family in Plains.
His grandson, 28-year-old Jeremy Carter, had died just hours earlier.
http://www.ajc.com/news/news/local/hours-after-grandsons-death-jimmy-carter-teaches-s/npn6n/
Nothing but target practice for the local amosexuals. better them aiming at signs than the person.
ReplyDelete