Seeing the light of day, one more time

Watch for our newest post coming around 9:30 p.m. CST tonight. We’ll show you how the crew completes uncovering the old sign.

Volunteers have partially removed cement plaster covering this 1947 Coca-Cola building sign on a vacant store in Pine Bluff, Arkansas.

Long enough is too long

For Paul Perdue of Dallas TX, a Pine Bluff, Arkansas native and a near-rabid history buff, the thought of ugly concrete plaster covering a hand-painted Coca-Cola wall sign completed in the late forties in his home town was absolutely, positively too much to bear any longer. He took matters in his own hands. Literally.

Click on the sign to see more pictures including the artists signature.

January 2, 2015, he wheeled up to the site and started chipping chunks of plaster from the underlying sign with his hot little hands. To his delight, the plaster, for the most part, did not pull the paint away from the bricks upon which the artist plied his brush. A corner of the sign was showing nicely.

Satisfied that it was possible to remove the plaster and let the sign see the light of day one more time, Perdue went to Facebook (he’s a Facebook aficionado extraordinaire) and explained what he wanted to do and asked for volunteers to help in the task. You can see more of the wall and a close-up of the sign artist’s signature emblazoned on his work on the Photo of the Week page at Corndancer dot-com. We’ll wait while you look.

The next day, volunteers showed up with scrapers and flat blade screwdrivers in hand. In a tad more than fours hours, in very cold weather, they had removed 60% or so of the offending plaster. They tell us they will return next weekend and complete their scraping and chipping. Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we plan to be there and record a bit of the work.

New Yeller

Not far from the old drug store wall is a building I have meant to shoot for a long time. The old structure in its new permutation looks like it would be more at home in South Louisiana or on one of the Caribbean Islands.

In a former life, this old building in Pine Bluff, Arkansas was a family residence and later, home to an architectural group, and then to a real estate company. Now it is a day care center and does a bang-up job of brightening its corner of the world.

We are a bit short on content this week, which means you waste less time reading this offering. Be thankful for this and other blessings.

Thanks for looking.

Joe Dempsey,
Weekly Grist for the Eyes and Mind

http://www.joedempseycommunications.com/
http://www.joedempseyphoto.com/
http://www.corndancer.com/joephoto/photohome.html

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