passed away in 2015 after suffering a stroke.)
Franklin Square
North Bruce Street
March 14, 2013
25. Nether World
Stepping from his “wheat paste mobile,” a battered, pale blue compact, street artist known as Nether unfurls his latest work. It’s a 7-foot-by-5-foot black and white drawing of a fictional character he’s created—the dark, unseen city employee who secretly nails the (real) ubiquitous red “X” marks on Baltimore’s vacant rowhomes and buildings deemed unsafe for firefighters.
Nearly every house on both sides of this West Baltimore block has a red “X” on its boarded windows.
Sometimes the 23-year-old travels by bicycle, with a basket attachment holding his bucket of homemade paste in place—while he straddles his 16-foot pole and brush—riding, he jokes, “like Harry Potter.” Today, he drove because he needs his collapsible ladder.
Meanwhile, a girl, maybe 10, in a pink sweater, large black-rimmed glasses, and a big Afro, peers from a door in one of the few inhabited homes behind him. A couple of dolls, a ball, and several plastic cars sit on her front stoop and her younger brother, still in his school khakis and blue shirt, leans out to watch, too. Nether takes just 15 minutes to set his ladder and paste his poster, alternately dipping his brush into the gooey bucket and pushing it across his two-piece poster, placed side-by-side on the boarded window across the street from the kids.
Suddenly, the image of a bandana-masked man, hammer in one hand, red “X” in the other, stares down from the vacant brick rowhouse, as if the character had been caught in the act on the near-desolate street. As Nether steps from the ladder, making sure he hasn’t missed flattening any spots, the little girl opens her door. “I like your art,” she says. Her brother agrees. “I like it, too.”
“Thank you,” Nether responds, turning around. “Do you like to draw?” he asks the children, who nod, affirmatively.
“Well, you know, I’m sure you’d get in trouble if you drew on the walls inside your house,” Nether tells his young audience. “But I bet if you drew outside on the sidewalk or on the walls, no one would mind.”
(Postscript: Justin Nethercut and Elise Victoria founded Arts + Parks in 2017, an organization that seeks to blend street art and purposeful landscaping to create holistic spaces for Baltimore neighborhoods.)
Upton
Pennsylvania Avenue
March 30, 2013
26. Sneaker Show
“How much for these?” asks a 20-something man, gently holding a pair of red Nike Air Jordans IIs, originally released in 1986.
“Gimme a price,” responds Ahmad Bennett. “I’ll work with you.”
“How much do you want for these Grant Hill’s?” chimes in another, looking over a pair of Fila hightops from the former Duke star’s Orlando Magic days.
Bennett, a vendor with two tables full of vintage 1980s and early 1990s NBA shoes—plus a rack of Bulls and Celtics warm-up jackets—is selling his gear at the packed, third annual Baltimore Sneaker Show. “This is what I do,” Bennett says, explaining that he tracks down sales of vintage and limited-edition sneakers online and through his network of connections. “Basically, it’s hustling.”
More than 1,200 people have turned to the Shake & Bake Family Fun Center, paying $30 to peruse the best sneaker collections in the city and beyond, mingle, eat, and dance. With the disco lights and local hip hop artist Greenspan pushing a thumping beat, it feels more like a night at a club than an afternoon inside an old gym.
Cameron Wecker, a 22-year-old Elkridge Furnace Inn manager, ultimately wins the $500 prize for the best collection. Wecker first began collecting sneakers when he stopped growing for several years as a child—his feet remaining the same size for a long period. Then, following successful treatment for his rare genetic condition, the 5-foot-5 inch winner began collecting again after he and his feet (size 8) stopped growing naturally.
His prize shoe? An autographed left foot, size-23 game sneaker, worn and sent to him by Shaquille O’Neal when the future Hall-of-Famer played for the Miami Heat.
“You can’t really understand how big it is until you see it,” Wecker says. “It’s nearly two feet long. It’s wider than my chest.”
Milton-Montford
East Biddle Street
May 11, 2013
27. Poor People’s March
“We’re coming together today to stand up for a working class agenda,” says Rev. Cortly “C.D.” Witherspoon, leaning into a microphone in a light drizzle on a trash-strewn vacant lot. About 150 people, some from out of state and all in comfortable shoes—including union members, Occupy protestors, immigrant, peace, and civil rights activists—gather around the Baltimore chapter president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Some are here to highlight specific claims of police brutality—46-year-old Anthony Anderson died from injuries suffered during an arrest in his lot last fall—and others protest attacks on voting rights. Everyone wants more jobs, more investment in public education, and better pay for low-wage workers.
They’re preparing to walk to Washington, D.C. in commemoration of the original Poor People’s March 45 years ago this weekend. Their route will take them past City Hall, across Martin Luther King Boulevard, and down Route 1. They’ll sleep in College Park before arriving in D.C. Sunday.
Civil rights attorney Faya Touré, founder of the National Voting Rights Museum in Selma, AL., follows Witherspoon to the mic. “My brothers and sisters . . . we cannot be single focused. Some of us just want to fight for welfare rights, employment rights, jobs, environmental rights, but there is . . . one struggle.”
Witherspoon leads the marchers, holding signs that read, “JOBS NOT JAIL,” and “WORKER + IMMIGRANT RIGHTS NOW,” through East Baltimore. He alternates between call and response chants (“What do we want? Justice! When do we want it? Now!”), and speaking directly to curious residents, either passing by or looking out their windows toward the commotion.
“Hard-working people of East Baltimore,” Witherspoon says, glancing up past Tench Tilghman Elementary/Middle School and a block of rowhouses—both of which have seen better days. “We give tax breaks to developers and corporations to build their headquarters, but where is the investment in our neighborhoods? In our community? In our schools?”
“Amen,” says a woman leaning out of her rowhouse front door.
Parkville
Putty Hill Avenue
May 11, 2013
28. Alcohol Free
Channeling Jerry Garcia with his gray beard and sunglasses, Scott W. strums, “A Friend of the Devil.” Next, Romana S., a young woman with long ginger hair, steps to the stage and delivers a passionate (if ironic) rendition of the traditional Irish drinking song, “Johnny Jump Up.”
“Oh never, oh never, oh never again.
If
