Singing high praise for the trees Max and Minnie spared: ‘Last Farm in Town’

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last-farm-coverOkay, we’re behind the times. Last Farm Standing on Buttermilk Hill has no promotional video.

But, is this cool or not?

It has a song. A song recorded on August 30, 2013.

Well, okay. The book doesn’t own it.

But the song surely will become the official one of Phil Hardberger Park Conservancy, supportive caretaker of the former farmland on which Max and Minnie Voelcker spared the trees shading walkers and runners in Phil Hardberger Park.

This is what the vocalist, Michele McMurry, wrote about “Last Farm in Town” on August 31:

Doug (McMurry) and I recorded this song, which he wrote as a tribute to Phil Hardberger Park and the rich roots of the Voelcker dairy farm. Doug was inspired by a book titled “Last Farm Standing on Buttermilk Hill,” written by friend and colleague, Gayle Brennan Spencer.

As you may know, Doug is very involved with parks as a director of the Phil Hardberger Park Conservancy and former chairman of the City of San Antonio Parks and Recreation Board.

The neat part was Doug playing my dad’s 1964 Martin (D28) guitar.

Enjoy …

“The Last Farm in Town” by Doug and Michele McMurry…

Oh, and the photo in the video is the interior of Max and Minnie’s milking barn.

Farmers bring their bounty to Southtown

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Weekend mornings are meant for slow starts. I like to take full advantage of that concept and ease into the day. This means I rarely make it to the farmers markets at Pearl or the Quarry, but Heather Hunter and David Lent actually have brought one to my neighborhood, the Southtown Farmers & Ranchers Market in the parking lot of Blue Star.

I realize early risers get the best picks at a market, and yesterday, as the hand on my watch ticked toward noon, it definitely was too late to ensure a chicken in my pot. Fresh non-GMO and soy-free eggs and whole chickens were all sold out. But there was still an ample supply of most other things remaining for the lazy.

The market’s website profiles the vendors, so hop on over there to get acquainted with the farmers setting up shop every Saturday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. But produce isn’t the only thing available.

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For humans, there are raw milk cheeses from Dos Lunas and luscious pastries from Bakery Lorraine; well-behaved dogs can get rewarded with healthy treats such as savory empanadas stuffed with grass-fed beef or “ginger bones” from Katie’s Jar. Gretchen Bee Ranch harvests honey from 100 hives in 10 apiaries located in Bexar and three neighboring counties, and the beeswax candles are beautiful. Lunch for us can be solved with falafel wraps from Señor Veggie or whole-wheat spinach-filled paratha from Nisha’s.

My favorite sampling yesterday was the spicy Aztec dark chocolate from Peggy Cloar’s High Street Chocolate of Comfort. She said she developed her intensely flavored chocolates to accompany red wine tastings at vineyards. No wine around, but they tasted fine without.

September 2, 2013, Update: John Griffin writes about those interesting striped Armenian cucumbers…

Bart + Mimi: Locked in love on ‘O. Henry’s Bridge’

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Been watching “Bart + Mimi” for a while on morning walks, waiting to see if their public proclamation of love in Portuguese would multiply as love locks on bridges have around the world.

Multiplication is not desirable. A solitary lock is much more romantic, and cities where historic bridges are targeted struggle to cope with the weight of the demonstrations of love.

At first, I thought writing this blog would take much research into these cases, but fortunately “Mr. and Mrs. Adventure” spared me a lot of googling. They recently posted a blog on padlocked proclamations, including such sites as Via dell’ Amore in the Cinque Terre and the narrow 1828 Pont de l’Archevêché in Paris.

A few years ago according to The Independent, Parisian officials took action, only to be quickly reconquered by determined lovers:

A year after their mysterious disappearance, the “love-locks” of Paris are back on the city’s bridges, more plentiful and vibrant than ever despite lingering suspicions that unromantic officials from City Hall may again swoop with their wire cutters and remove the tokens of couples’ love….

In May 2010, Paris Town Hall expressed concern over the growing number of love-locks, saying: “they raise problems for the preservation of our architectural heritage”. It’s not only the Town Hall that expressed doubts; from time to time a dejected ex-lover has been seen desperately hacking at a padlock with a pair of pliers.

Shortly after this announcement, the bridge was found all but bare following a nocturnal clean-up.

Since the disappearance, lovers have shown their indignation by building-up collections once more….

The narrow pedestrian bridge in the King William Historic District on the south side of downtown Bart and Mimi selected to share their beijoes certainly looks the part. Some call the Johnson Street Bridge the O. Henry Bridge. Built in 1983, it replicates an earlier one removed from this spot during inartistic flood-control work completed in the 1960s. The 1880 bridge had been moved to Johnson Street from its original location on Commerce Street, where it served as an inspirational setting for writer Sidney Porter, or O. Henry.

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While the moniker O. Henry might sound romantic, his morbid short story of suicidal consumptives set on the former Commerce Street Bridge was not. The following is from his Fog in Santone:

The drug clerk looks sharply at the white face half concealed by the high-turned overcoat collar.

“I would rather not supply you,” he said doubtfully. “I sold you a dozen  morphine tablets less than an hour ago.”

The customer smiles wanly. “The fault is in your crooked streets. I  didn’t intend to call upon you twice, but I guess I got tangled up. Excuse me.”

The purchaser of the morphia wanders into the fog, and at length, finds himself upon a little iron bridge, one of the score or more in the heart of the city, under which the small tortuous river flows.

But Bart and Mimi’s lock has triumphed over the inherited gloom, assuming its role as one of San Antonio’s quills:

If peculiarities were quills, San Antonio de Bexar would be a rare porcupine. Over all the round of aspects in which a thoughtful mind may view a city, it bristles with striking idiosyncrasies and bizarre contrasts.

Retrospects and Prospects by William Sydney Porter (O. Henry)

Hopefully, their en amo voce will remain a single quill and not inspire a wave of others to turn the little footbridge into an obese bristling porcupine.