Blog 9: Listening to Interviews and thinking about Zine 2

Reflections on Interviews

After listening to the new interviews, I was struck by overall how positive interviews were.   For example, Carol Harris, the pop-up cake lady, came there as a kid, always wanted to have a business there and seemed really happy about the plans.  Larry Brenner, the peanut guy, was on the Merchant Advisory Committee and knew about the plans.  He came across as less enthused, but still committed to the business and the Market, wanting to expand hours and get more diverse food options.  

The customers, except the woman from Pittsburgh, were long-time customers and also seemed committed to the market.   I particularly liked these:

Tyrone Speace: “Once upon a time on an early Saturday morning like this you wouldn’t have walking room in the market, it would be so crowded like.  It’s kind of a shame cause uh it used to be a meeting place for people, like where it was almost like spiritual you come and meet your friends and hang out for the top of the morning until noon and go home and do what you do.  But, yeah.  So it changed, but I’m glad it’s still here like.  And plus you used to see a more variety of ethnic people down here.  Everybody used to come to the market at one time. Hispanics, whites, whites, blacks, everybody used to be at the market at one time.  Now the ethnicity thing is mostly black people.”

Thurman Jennings:  “I don’t want it to lose its soul. Oftentimes when you come across any business really you have to consider whether or not it has its natural,    original personality as time goes forward, you know you lose a lot of the home-style feeling that you would have.  It goes commercial.  I wouldn’t want Lexington Market to go commercial.  But, I mean, you gotta think about business.  Who cares about home style when dollars are concerned for some people.”

“For me, Lexington Market is kind of like an embodiment of the spirit of Baltimore. In Baltimore, you really have the get up and go attitude. A lot of the residents, as far as I’ve you know encountered, don’t necessarily have the easiest ways of succeeding in life.  But it’s the will, it’s the drive that a person has that makes them go out and get and achieve.  um Lexington Market you look around at all the business shops and you look around at all the faces, it’s that same spirit that same drive, that same get up and go and I don’t know what the day will bring but, you know, let’s hope for the best.”

Thoughts about Zine 2.

            I am still pretty unclear about the second zine.   But to share a thought – I was struck by something Thurman Jennings said which was similar to an earlier quote from the Sun in 1907.    Here they are:

“And after all the very ugliness—for ugly it certainly is—of Lexington Market is one of the most satisfying qualities of this public institution.  In all its modern-ness Centre Market can never hope to rouse one-hundredth the enthusiasm which is materialized by one good scent of Lexington Market on a regular market day.”  – Baltimore Sun, Dec. 1907

Compare this is Thurman Jennings:  “It looks like the Harbor.  If I wanted to go the Harbor, the I’d go to the Harbor. . . .  I don’t want a Harbor for LM.  I think Lexington Market has a rustic feel, but you know everybody wants to clean up and modernize or, you know, up-scale it and it doesn’t really need that.   Sometimes old and dirty is good.  You know, we don’t want to think of it like that, but it is.”

I suspect that there are other parallels to be found, although I haven’t really looked.  I think I can find something about bringing together diverse people which would match up to a quote from Tyrone Speace about how crowded the market used to be.  

Another possible question for the zine/podcast is: how much does the actual building matter – or is it the function and the place.     

I am also interested in the question of whether it is supposed to be a grocery store alternative for local people or a tourist attraction.

Negative Comments

            Another issue to discuss is how to deal with the pretty consistent negative comments about the impact of the external environment, particularly drug sales and people using drugs.   Several interviewees mentioned this as a reason that people are scared to come to market or don’t want to bring their kids.  The most explicit interview was with Officer Harris who talked about how things have changed and in particular how people were coming from all over the East Coast to buy drugs outside the Market.   This concern for security seemed related to security inside the market as well, especially comments about customers in the market being hassled for staying in one place too long or not having a purchase.  

            In the vein of things staying the same, I must note that in the earlier days of the market, the most frequent arrests were for people being drunk and/or sleeping in the market.