Only in New Orleans, # 1,000,006

From the Louisiana Digital Library:

"View made on Mardi Gras Day, that shows a large, cross-dressed man cavorting on the median in front of the Katz and Besthoff pharmacy at 841 Canal Street at the corner of Dauphine in the Central Business District. The Maison Blanche building at 901 Canal Street is partially visible at left. A streetcar heading towards the cemeteries, is passing the K&B building. A number of pedestrians are visible and, at left, there is a photographer looking into the viewfinder of a Brownie-style box camera. The cross-dressed man wears a mask and wig and is attired as a very young girl wearing an oversized, knee-length dress. Floral bracelets, worn at each elbow, and workman's gloves complete the ensemble. See also 2003.182.162
Date 1919-03-04"

Not to mention a large pair  of shoes.

Photograph by  John Tibule Mendes, 1888-1965

I Can't Help It! or Sluggo Redux!

After reproducing the last picture of Sluggo voicing his counter- cultural desires, I found this one, courtesy of Jim Woodring.

This panel obviously depicts Sluggo's successful achieivement of his stated goal in that panel and then some.
Allen Ginsburg, eat your heart out!

I'm tempted to write an entire essay on Sluggo (whose last name is Smith, BTW) as his very existence seems founded on a Zen- like acceptance and subsequent rejection of materialism and life in America in general. But I'm not, as it would run counter to Sluggo's deep- rooted world view, stated again and again by Ernie Bushmiller, Sluggo's eager amanuensis.

The Story of My Life

Wherein we revisit sub-genius philosopher Sluggo once again, and, hopefully, not for the last time. Thanks to mouffetefatale for this Flickr image.

This is pretty much what happened to me in 1966- 7:

The Feminine Mystique

Three beautiful photographs of the same beautiful woman, from the great Shorpy site:

What do we know about her? The photographs are from 1900, so we know she was alive then and we can safely assume she's dead now. Who was she? We don't know. The top picture is captioned simply, "Amorita", the second is "Thisbe" and the third is  "Model, hair down" or "The Nubile Savage". This last is probably the name Dave from Shorpy gave her. Photographer, unknown. Originally published by the Detroit Company.

What we do know is that beauty is timeless and contemporary no matter what the age and that at some point, back on the  cusp of the old century, a photographer and a model came together to create three sensual masterpieces.

New Blog Recommendations

One of my favorite parts of this blog is the "I Like These" section, to the left. I'm always amazed at how much great information and inspiration is out there, for free, at the tips of our fingers!

I've updated this section a little, added a few and eliminated one (Comics World- copyright violation, no surprise there: the guy had digitally reproduced almost every comic ever done. Great site while it lasted.)

Here are some of the new ones:

Scratchy Grooves: An archive of the shows of DJ Bill Chambless from WVUD FM in Newark, Delaware

Victor Moscoso: Posters and artwork from '60's psychedelic visionary Victor Moscoso

Ernie Kovac's blog spot: What can I say? The guy was brilliant!

Paleo Future and Modern Mechanix: Longtime L by L readers are aware of my obsession with the lack of the cool future promised to us in the past. These guys are obsessed with it also, but they also do the archiving of that past vision of the future. Which makes the present even more frustrating.

Black Wing Sketchbook: lovely loose drawings from Jenny Larew

Drew Friedman: Beautifully drawn and wonderfully twisted. Also, unlike me, he did blog about R. Crumb's August birthday

Happy Labor Day, everyone.

I'm With The Band

A series of New Orleans- related band pictures, from the Louisiana Digital Library:

Buddy Bolden's Band, with Buddy 2nd from right, standing. I've seen this photograph printed the opposite way as well: no one seems to know which way is correct. Half the instruments are held backwards in both versions.

The Original Creole Orchestra, 1912

Papa Jack Laine when he was still Baby Laine, Alexandria, La.

The Tuxedo Jazz Band

The Tuxedo Jazz Band again with Clarence Williams seated in front

Strekfuss Bros Orchestra w/ Louis Armstrong, third from left and Baby Dodds on drums. This orchestra played smooth music on the Strekfuss Steamboat Line.

Louis Armstrong's Orchestra with the band from the Municipal Boy's Home, where Louis learned to play.

Unidentified Jazz Band

I think this is Joe Oliver's Band, but I lost the ID- oops!

Louis Prima's Band. Prima is on the left

Prima's Band again with Prima in the center. Stacking and centering the instruments seemed to be the thing to do in these pics.

More Armstrong- he had such cool band pics!

Bunk Johnson's Band with Connee Boswell in a rare pic showing her customized wheelchair.

Dear New Orleans

Dear New Orleans  "is a for profit/social good photography company that shoots messages of love and hope, happiness and creativity.
Their flagship theme is 'Love Notes to New Orleans.' But they shoot events for companies and people who believe too that a simple message and a beautiful face inspires us all. Their social good component is their chief charity, evacuteer.org."

Recently they held a book signing of their portraits and a great time was, one assumes, had by all.

Two portraits stood out for me in particular, primarily because I like both these men as musicians and role models in general.

The first picture is of Mac Rebennac aka Dr. John, last seen here with our friend Irving Banister. The second is of bass player extraordinaire George Porter Jr., of the Meters, etc.