Levon Helm, the coolest drummer/vocalist ever in the history of ever, looks to finally get a statue in Helena, Ark., his hometown.
Actually, the statue is going up in a town just down the street from Helena--that is, Marvell, his actual hometown.
Actually, his hometown was just north of Marvell, a small place called Turkey Scratch.
Those who've grown up in rural Arkansas will understand. Home may be in one town, the official mailing address in another, and you tell people you're from the other one down the road. ("I live in North Little Rock, actually Sherwood, actually Gravel Ridge . . . .")
The paper said that the cotton fields around Turkey Scratch sometimes are trodden by out-of-towners looking for Levon Helm's boyhood home or, selfies being popular today, maybe just the city limits sign of Turkey Scratch. So now an effort is underway to install a statue in Marvell, seven miles away. (Marvell has the advantage of being on U.S. 49.) Some folks also want to restore his boyhood home in . . . somewhere in Phillips County, certainly. Maybe it's been moved to Marvell by now. It's hard to keep up.
The Levon Helm Legacy Project is raising money to re-do the home and commission a bust of the man, so folks will have a goal on their pilgrimages.
They say rock and roll can't die. But rockers do. Levon Helm died in 2012 after suffering from throat cancer. (They should've never taken the very best.)
Some of us think that it's long past time to put up a marker/memorial for this man who inspired so many. And give the rest of the state another excuse to go on a barbecue hunt in Phillips County.
Pulled into Helena, was feelin' 'bout half past dead . . . .
Editorial on 07/30/2017