Road
to Perdition
 Dallas,
Texas, my home town, is a funny sort of place. We like
to name our main thoroughfares after political
or local business hot-shots. This drives Beloved Girlfriend
crazy as she's from Detroit, where roads are referred
to using nice, sensible numbers.
For instance, the previous main loop around Dallas
is known
on maps as I-635, but we invariably call it "The
LBJ Freeway" or just "LBJ". That
road was recently supplanted by an even larger loop
around the
city, SH 190, vexingly designated "The President
George Bush Turnpike". This, of course, refers
to Reagan's miserable little failure of a vice president
rather
than the Worst President of all Time but the effect
is still gallingly the same.
It's not all bad, though.
Whenever it's time for the traffic report I get to
hear news of stalled vehicles and simple human misery
associated
with the name of a full-fledged war criminal.
We have roads named after famous folk like Ronald Reagan
and Tom Landry, politicians like Sam Rayburn and Jim
Wright, and a long list of who-dats like Julius Scheppes,
Marvin D. Love, John W. Carpenter,
Woodall Rogers, Angus Wynn, plus someone
named C.F. Hawn.
But there's no road in Dallas named
after John F.
Kennedy. Yeah, Dallas is mean that way. Still mean,
actually.
We also have a road named for Martin
Luther King , Jr. , but, of course, it's in a predominantly
black part of town, which is, when you think of it,
antithetical to his message of inclusiveness. Dallas
is mean that way.
We're hardly unique in our reverence for the good
doctor. In fact, over 650 U.S. cities have named a
road after Mr. King (which means it's vital to put
the correct Zip code on your letters) but do
you know
how many
roads
in
the U.S. are named after Albert Einstein, possibly
the world's most famous physicist?
According to Wikipedia, one, in Norman, Oklahoma.
That may not seem fair but at least he has an element
named him, and how many of us can say that?
Without doubt we owe a great debt to
the men and women whose scientific discoveries have made life better for us all,
so would it kill us to replace a few Elm and Main
Streets with some Galileos or a Niels Bohrs? Maybe
even Hedy Lamarr, who invented the frequency hoping
spread-spectrum.
Just sayin'.
=Lefty=
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