In a June 8th, 2022, Franklin Stove Blog (FSB) post “The end of truth-seeking in T-Town?,” it was announced that after ten years the FSB would publish its last post:

The Franklin Stove Blog was initiated in July, 2013, when its domain name “ttowntruthseeker.com was acquired. The first post was on August 8, 2013.

The Franklin Stove Blog first reported about the insanity of the 2013 municipal elections in T-Town, when University of Alabama students, who were bribed by the promise of free booze, rode to the polls in limousines to vote for a Machine supported candidate. Subsequent posts concerned under-aged drinking, the Covid pandemic, violence in T-Town and other issues. A blog about a sorority “Farm Party” during the Covid pandemic received the most attention. It was linked to in stories across the globe after it was referred to in a post in the Daily Beast by Olivia Messer “Alabama Sorority Gets Official Blessing for 600-Person Farm Party Just in Time for Holidays.”.

In one more year the Franklin Stove Blog will celebrate its tenth anniversary. It would seem appropriate that anniversary would be the right time to end the blog.

The song “The End” by the rock group The Doors contained lyrics that said:

This is the end, beautiful friend
This is the end, my only friend
The end of our elaborate plans
The end of everything that stands

This is the end, my only friend
The end

It hurts to set you free
But you’ll never follow me

In its last year the FSB continued its posts about T-Town and its sister city Northport. Actually the June 18, 2023 post “The More Things Change…The More they Remain The Same in Northport” was one of the most viewed in the ten year history of the FSB.

The story of Rose, the Spirit of the Crimson Tide, was the first “ghost writ” series published in the FSB. 

Its first entry “My Home Away From Life” was prefaced by:

This installation of the Franklin Stove Blog is a departure from the usual format.

It’s fictional, based on accounts of actual events.

It might even be considered a ghost writ post.

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.

The June 29, 2023 FSB post “True Love & Ghosts” concluded Rose’s story. She remains in Bryant-Denny Stadium, with memories of her one true love, Estelle.

Rose’s habitation of the stadium began with the demolition of Tutwiler Hall on July 4, 2022. It seems fitting that the last FSB will be posted on July 4th as well.

In the last ten years T-Town has increasingly become more and more a one “elephant” town, with the continuing expansion of the University of Alabama. Many businesses would not exist without the University’s growth.

A FSB “T-Town: A One Elephant Town?”in 2019 described the impact of the University on T-Town:

People who live in Tuscaloosa are acutely aware of the importance of the University and the impact that it has on their daily lives. Tuscaloosa is a “one elephant town.” An elephant is the mascot of the University’s sports teams. The Crimson Tide’s football team perennially wins championships. When a football game is played in Tuscaloosa the town’s population often doubles in size. The University is a major employer and contributes greatly to Tuscaloosa’s cultural life.

Of course, there are complaints about the University, which largely center around the bad behavior of some of its students. A civic group Tuscaloosa Neighbors Together did a survey in 2012 of opinion about living with students. As Jason Morton reported in The Tuscaloosa News, there was an “overwhelming opposition to any kind of student housing within a neighborhood.” Many of the problems that citizens have had with students can be attributed to underaged drinking.

The Historic District in Tuscaloosa has been steadily encroached upon by the University’s student population as the University has grown in size. For over a decade there have been complaints about vandalism, home invasions and property damage by students. Kelly Fitts, president of the Original City Association, once opined in The Tuscaloosa News about the “undesirable late-night activity and crime perpetrated by intoxicated patrons” of drinking establishments that are located in close proximity to the Historic District.

The City of Tuscaloosa’s wants to create an “experience economy” through its Elevate initiative and the concomitant local sales tax increase.

The City of Tuscaloosa is trying to cope with the Tuscaloosa Police Department‘s lack of manpower. Hiring of new officers takes place in a highly competitive market, with the University itself offering better remuneration for police personnel.

Anyone following local news will have noticed the weekly shootings and homicides in T-Town.

In coping with the area called The Strip alone much of the police force’s strength has been diluted.

The Tuscaloosa News‘ Jasmine Hollie reported on the city council’s move this summer to establish a moratorium on new bars and gastropubs. She wrote:

The Tuscaloosa City Council on Tuesday approved a moratorium that suspends the approval of conditional use applications for bars, taverns and gastropubs through the end of the year.

Tuscaloosa Police Chief Brent Blankley pushed for the moratorium during the June 13 meeting, saying the pause would help his department cope with serious staffing shortages. 

The Council seems to be inclined to override its moratorium whenever the latest and greatest idea emerges about a new watering hole.

Council member Lee Busby said, “The people in this city are going to let us know whether this is what they want, and want more of, or do they want more bars. They will let us know.”

Many people in T-Town feel that the needs of the few outweigh the many, when it comes down to anything involving University students though.

The University of Alabama boasted in 2018 that its presence “helped push Tuscaloosa’s population to more than 100,000 for the first time.”

The 2020 US Census count for Tuscaloosa said its population was 99,598. Jason Morton reported in The Tuscaloosa News that T-Town’s mayor Walt Maddox considered that to be an under count. Morton wrote:

“Going through this process validates our belief that there are thousands upon thousands – especially students – who were not counted in the Census,” Maddox said. “We have seen major apartment complexes that should have hundreds of students with only dozens of students … who participated in the census.

“And you can see student-driven areas of the city that should have thousands of people that should have been participating in the census and you have dozens, if not just hundreds of people participating.”

T-Town‘s economy is arguably driven by the University’s needs. Some of its “experience” economy includes watering holes that cater to students.

A 2018 FSB blog “Bar Codes” speculated on whether the business model of many bars includes serving underage drinkers.

Many of the minors who are admitted into bars in T-Town are University of Alabama students. The University, according to College Factual‘s The University of Alabama Student Age Diversity Breakdown, has 34.5% of its nearly forty thousand students in the 18-19 age group and 30.9% in the 20-21 age group.

Since the total enrollment in 2017 was 38,563, that means that over 24,000 students can’t be legally provided with alcohol. Many cannot even be admitted into bars.

Enforcement of the restrictions on alcohol service are complicated not only by the large numbers of students that frequent bars in the campus vicinity but by the common use of fake IDs.

Fake IDs were the subject matter of FSB’s 2017 post “A Tale of Two IDs”:

The use of fake IDs to obtain alcohol in Tuscaloosa is a commonplace practice. High tech IDs can cost hundreds of dollars. It is a law enforcement nightmare. Many people who can pay hundreds of dollars for a fake ID would not be deterred by such a fine.

The 2018 FSB post “Blackouts & The College Aged Brain” dealt with neurobiological research on the binge drinking and blackouts that are common for students.

In 2020 the FSB posted about problems associated with game day weekends in T-Town. “Saturday Nights In T-Town” included an image of police restraining an inebriated patron on The Strip.

A 2015 report in SB Nation by Steven Godfrey and Matt Brown said that “The Tuscaloosa Police Department spent $544,459.50 on overtime pay to police all seven Alabama home games in 2014.” Some of the expense, which should be far greater in 2020, doubtlessly is related to the activities on football weekends at campus bars.

If much of what has been posted on the FSB has seemed like a broken record, that is likely because some problems that have existed in the last ten years have been intractable. And many aspects of the problems have not been dealt with elsewhere.

As T-Town has grown, so have its problems. That’s to be expected of its infrastructure. But many problems are unique to its being a college town. No one would’ve anticipated the violence associated with the growth in numbers of college students. And, at the root of that violence, is a drinking problem. T-Town has a drinking problem that just won’t go away.

This installation of the Franklin Stove Blog is a departure from the usual format.

It’s fictional, based on accounts of actual events.

It might even be considered a ghost writ post.

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.

Hey, it’s me, Rose–the Spirit of the Crimson Tide.

Francois de La Rochefoucauld wrote that “true love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about and few have seen.”

My feelings for Estelle came as close to “true love” for me as anything in my short life. I’ll always wonder whether, if I had been able to bring Estelle home for Christmas in 1968, I would never have accidentally shot myself. 

I remember that Estelle was searching for me after the Christmas break in Tutwiler Hall, a place where I’d just begun to haunt. She’d bought me a present. I never found out what it was. When she found out about my “suicide,” her eyes welled with tears and her body shook as she sobbed uncontrollably. I wish I could have reached out to her, as my spectral form stood right next to her. I would’ve told her that what happened wasn’t really a suicide. It was just me being stupid and melodramatic. That was the beginning of my over fifty years of haunting Tutwiler Hall. 

Sometimes I think that many Bama fans love football, coaches and players as much as they love anything or anybody else. Since Bryant-Denny Stadium is likely to be my final home away from life, I guess I’ll be surrounded by people who are in “love.” Of course there will always be the Rolltards who only love winning.

I wonder how many relationships have perished due to football? Of course some fans who are couples come to games wearing garb that represents opposing teams. I guess they’ve worked out their differences? Their love of football and each other may even make their relationship stronger.

I remember hearing about a coach whose wife on one hot Spring Practice day dumped all of his worldly possessions on the side of the practice field. Some coaches, I suppose, are tempted into extra-marital forays. There are people who are attracted to coaches, like they are to politicians and religious figures, and holy wedlock isn’t a barrier to their amorous pursuits.

I remember reading in Freshman English a sonnet by Shakespeare. I committed it to memory.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds 

Admit impediments. Love is not love 

Which alters when it alteration finds, 

Or bends with the remover to remove. 

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark 

That looks on tempests and is never shaken; 

It is the star to every wand’ring bark, 

Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken. 

Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks 

Within his bending sickle’s compass come; 

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 

But bears it out even to the edge of doom. 

If this be error and upon me prov’d, 

I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.

I may spend an eternity in Bryant-Denny stadium but I’ll always cherish my love

The Franklin Stove Blog (FSB) has posted a number of articles about T-Town’s Li’l Sister city.

In 2015 the FSB opined: “N-Port or Northport may be more like a red-headed stepchild than a sister.”

The Tuscaloosa News once described the City of Northport’s Council in an editorial:

Over the years, the Northport City Council seemed to draw its character from the rough-and-tumble riverboat crews that made their northernmost landings in that city and blew off steam in its taverns. At times, it didn’t seem like the mayor and city councils of the past accomplished much, but it sure was good theater.

The 2016 FSB post Too Much Monkey Business asked:

Did three Council Members  decide on their own that Northport, Alabama, would be better off without its City Administrator? Does it matter that the former City Administrator Scott Collins rode off into the sunset to work as a City Manager in a small Tennessee town in his new Audi? After all, four of Northport’s Council Members voted to award  him with a generous severance package and health insurance.

The FSB post The Good Ship Northport gave details about how Northport officials had “been jumping off the good ship Northport.”

It included an account of how its Finance Director Kenneth McKeown had been given the “bum’s rush”:

On February 9, 2017, in a federal court Northport Attorney Bruce Henderson was reported to have said that McKeown had “acted inappropriately during a February 2016 training trip he took with a woman who worked for him in the finance department.” McKeown now works as Biloxi, Mississippi’s administrator. It would be reasonable to assume that either people in Biloxi are not concerned about the sexual harassment charges or McKeown is not guilty.

The Tuscaloosa News reported that, “McKeown testified Thursday that he did nothing wrong and that his behavior on the trip could only be considered inappropriate ‘if somebody was trying to make something out of it.’ He told [U.S. District Judge] Coogler he was placed on leave less than 24 hours after discovering an expense account that a support technician told him only Collins could access.”

The game of musical chairs that was played in Northport in filling its City Administrator position after the departure of Scott Collins seemed to go on forever.

A FSB post on July, 23, 2016 concerned the “use of reserve funds by the City of Northport to pay general operating expenses” included former Mayor Bobby Herndon’s theory about Collin’s resignation:

Mayor Bobby Herndon said that former City Administrator Scott Collins had moved money from a reserve fund and replaced it, an act that should have resulted in only a slap on the wrist by the Civil Service Board. Herndon said that Collins’ resignation is in some way associated with this common practice of shifting funds and accused Council members of “sneaky snake moves.”

The use of reserve funds may have been used to pay bills in the past. But under the leadership of Mayor Bobby Herndon and former City Administrator Collins and with the advice of the LeCroy auditing firm it was thought by some to have become a standard practice.

Included in the post was a reference to a 2011 Tuscaloosa News article by Adam Jones that reported that Scott Collins had requested that emergency reserve accounts be created:

Collins asked the council to consider setting up in city code an emergency reserve account for both the city’s main operations and its water and sewer operations. He suggested the savings account for both be about 10 percent, or about $2 million for the general budget and $1 million for the water and sewer budget.

In August, Collins said he was able to transfer $1 million into a general fund reserve account and $300,000 into a water and sewer fund reserve. It can be used to start the reserve funds and fully fund them by the end of 2012, he said.

Former Mayor Donna Aaron, at a 2017 Chamber of Commerce of West Alabama‘s Northport Community Engagement Dinner addressed the city’s debt:

Aaron said the focus was on passing a lean budget, paying off the city’s substantial debt, and ending the practice of borrowing from the city’s water and sewer fund to make payroll, among other key concerns.

An article by Tuscaloosa News reporter Jason Morton in April, 2021 provided a history of Northport’s search for a City Administrator:

Morton wrote:

In the search that dates back almost two years, the Northport City Council voted unanimously on March 23 to hire [former Tuscaloosa City Attorney Glenda]Webb as its permanent, full-time administrator.

It’s now held by interim city administrator and former Tuscaloosa County probate judge Hardy McCollum, who agreed to assume the position in a temporary capacity in August 2019.

That’s when then-City Administrator Bruce Higginbotham stepped down after less than two years on the job. Higginbotham was hired in September 2017 to take over after  a series of interim city administrators following the resignation of Scott Collins in April 2016. Collins stepped down abruptly and left no one to oversee the day-to-day operations of the city.

Collins himself was hired to fill the position that had been vacant since longtime city administrator Charles Swann was ousted from the job during a reorganization of city personnel in July 2007. At that time, then-Mayor Harvey Fretwell said the position was not needed and he would perform the duties of both the mayor and the administrator.

City Administrator Glenda Webb was reputedly on a vacation when the Northport City Council recently voted on the possible sale of its community center.

Discussion of the Community Center sale, as reported by WVUA 23 News Student Reporter Chaney Scott, took place under heated conditions.

Chaney Scott reported that District 2 Council Member Woodrow Washington took exception to the irate crowd of citizens that packed Northport’s city hall:

Washington said that in this town of around 30,000, people want to sell this property where children who come to play have to use the bathroom in a playground porta potty.

“They just aren’t as vocal as the 300-plus citizens who came to our Monday meeting,” Washington said. “Out of 30,000 people, there’s somebody saying to sell, they’re just not coming up to us saying “Sell! Sell! Sell!”

When Scott Collins had been the City Administrator in 2009, there had been talk at first of curtailing the community center’s use.

According to a staff editorial in the Tuscaloosa News:

Northport City Council would be wise to pause long enough to fully consider the suggestion of City Administrator Scott Collins to stop leasing the Northport Civic Center for private events outside normal business hours.

The city is lucky to have such a facility. Many cities, including Tuscaloosa, would like to have a place to host conferences and events. Our area has too few venues for banquets, meetings and exhibitions.

Collins also floated the idea in 2015 about leasing the heritage museum site for retail development, as reported in The Tuscaloosa News by Ed Enoch:

“We are very, very early in any discussions,” Collins said.

However, Collins said the discussions, so far, include a lease of the property and shared access to the museum footprint through an existing entrance for the community center on Park Street. As part of the proposal, the museum would move to a new location on another city-owned property, he said.

Resident Amy LeePard presented the council with a draft proposal to protect the park space around the community center and museum from future commercial development by dedicating it for use as a city-owned community park and greenspace.

Jody Jobson warned that the residents didn’t want see anything built on park property.

The park has been a fixture in the lives of longtime residents of the city, Jobson argued.

“Now a national chain wants to come in and, because of tax dollars, they want to sway you to do it,” Jobson said.

Reportedly the site was being considered by a Krispy Creme donut franchise.

A Facebook page “Save the Northport Community Center Park” helped spread a petition in opposition to any change in the center’s status.

Eventually the idea was dropped.

Today, plans for the community center property involve its sale to the Beeker Property Group.

In October, 2018, Stephen Dethrage reported in The Tuscaloosa News that the Northport City Council had voted to tentatively accept a $3.5 million proposal from Beeker group to purchase its civic center. Ultimately plans for the sale were dropped. District 5 Council Member Jeff Hogg said that after the “due diligence period, the city and the developer determined the larger project wasn’t feasible.”

Whether Beeker group will be allowed to follow through on its new plans to buy the community center property will likely depend on what the “silent majority” of Northport citizens want. Council member Woodrow Washington seems to think that selling the property is a popular idea opposed only by a vocal minority.

But, in any event, the circus must go on in Northport. The clown car is jam packed after all.

For years the Franklin Stove Blog (FSB) has posted about the troubles brought on by T-Town‘s bar culture.

It’s not what Alfred, Lord Tennyson had in mind in his poem Crossing the Bar:

Sunset and evening star,

      And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,

      When I put out to sea,

   But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

      Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out the boundless deep

      Turns again home.

   Twilight and evening bell,

      And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell,

      When I embark;

   For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place

      The flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to face

      When I have crost the bar.

But it seems as if the City Council is about to make some bar owners cross.

The Patch‘s Ryan Phillips wrote about the Council’s discussion about a temporary moratorium:

The Council’s Public Safety Committee discussed the resolution during a special called meeting Tuesday and the first of two public hearings for two recent applicants will be held Tuesday night during the regular council meeting.

According to the resolution, the current workload for TPD has reached a point where its resources are stretched too thin to effectively address public safety issues associated with increased alcohol-based establishments. What’s more, Tuscaloosa Police Chief Brent Blankley has said that the required mandatory overtime and long hours for the city’s police officers to address these public safety issues have increased the present difficulty to recruit and retain police officers

Ultimately, city leaders believe suspending conditional use applications for bars and gastropubs will provide an opportunity to evaluate the impact of these establishments on the community and consider appropriate regulations to mitigate adverse effects. If passed, the resolution would go into effect immediately and would expire on Jan. 1, 2024, unless otherwise acted upon by the Council.

A June 13th, 2023 article about the possible moratorium on new bars and gastropubs by Tuscaloosa News‘ Mark Hughes Cobb quotes Council Member Lee Busby:

“The people of the city, they’re going to feed us what we need to know during that period; I guarantee it. The people in this city are going to let us know whether this is what they want, and want more of, or do they want more bars. They will let us know.”

The problem that T-Town has had with bars is mostly due to the bars on the edge of campus that cater to University of Alabama students, and other young people. Many of them are not of legal drinking age.

The “people of the city,” if that index would apply only to permanent residents, would likely approve of anything the city did to curtail the problems associated with campus watering holes.

The FSB reported in 2019 about the political dynamic that began with the election of Council member Lee Garrison:

In 1997 Lee Garrison was the first student elected as a District Four Council member. A December 28, 1997 Tuscaloosa News article “Election Contested” described the election challenge that Garrison’s opponent filed:

What is a resident? That has become the central issue that could decide whether Councilman Lee Garrison retains the Tuscaloosa City Council District 4 seat he won by 84 votes in the August election. Opponent Don Brown contested the election claiming Garrison benefited from the illegal votes, largely cast by students who don’t need residency requirements.

A University of Alabama senior and former Inter-fraternity Council President, Garrison and his forces registered hundreds of college students to vote. One of the issues became whether students or permanent residents could control the district election.

Another FSB post was about the notorious 2013 contest, where Lee Garrison successfully ran for chair of the local school board:

The Greeks now own the dubious honor of controlling Tuscaloosa’s District Four. In 1997 an undergraduate student who was President of the University’s Inter-fraternity Council Lee Garrison was able to secure a seat on the Tuscaloosa  City Council with the help of The Machine Vote at the University. Coming from a well known Tuscaloosa family Garrison garnered support from families living in its Historic District neighborhoods, as well as the support by University students in the Greek system.

In his first year on the Council Garrison attempted to use The Machine’s vote to prevent the School Board from becoming an elected body by adding a “straw poll” on alcohol use to the referendum on electing the board. His last minute effort to register students was the subject of a 1998 story in the Tuscaloosa News in which the AEA representaive Walt Maddox, who successfully ran for a seat on the Council in 2001 and for Tuscaloosa’s Mayor in 2009, was quoted.

“It’s no coincidence, Maddox said, “that the nonbinding referendum votes include alcohol sales. That would be the single most motivating factor to bring college students to the polls. It is also no coincidence that Mr. Garrison. who serves on the City Council, is registering voters to vote not only on the alcohol issue but also on the elected board referendum.  I would imagine that Mr. Garrison is instructing the students to vote against an elected school board.”

There’s one thing that will draw the student vote out–alcohol. Whether it’s the promise of free booze or alcohol use issues, a coterie of students will come out to vote. And, in T-Town‘s municipal elections, only a relatively small number of votes can make a difference.

An interesting YouTube video describes the effect of alcohol.

This is what happens to your brain on alcohol. It’s obvious alcohol affects the brain – but even though it seems to affect everyone differently, there are a few chemical reactions that alcohol is stimulating in everyone’s body while they’re tying one on. Things may get a little blurry as Neuroscience Ph.D. candidate Shannon Odell takes you through what’s scientifically happening as she continues to drink.

Of course alcohol affect the brains of younger drinkers in a more profound way. A FSB post concerned the effects on booze in the student brain. Students commonly engage in binge drinking:

“Early binge drinking can have long-lasting and significant effects on the brain, and the results of this study offer evidence that gene editing is a potential antidote to these effects, offering a kind of factory reset for the brain, if you will,” said study senior author Subhash Pandey, the Joseph A. Flaherty Endowed Professor of Psychiatry and director of the Center for Alcohol Research in Epigenetics at UIC.

The bars may just be “too full for sound and foam.” If the Council takes steps that will have “crost the bar,” will “such a tide as moving seems asleep” impact T-Town‘s politics?

The HBO “Bama Rush” documentary has receieved ample press coverage, including a story by The Tuscaloosa News‘ Mark Hughes Cobb.

In a May 23, 2023 article, Cobb wrote:

The film’s trailer hinted at much of “Bama Rush”‘s flair: arrays of cameras displaying TikToks; crimson-and-white glamour at a Bryant-Denny night game; lovely imagery on and off campus; a slew of slow-motion running women; talk of power, status and prestige, about how boys rank sororities according to hotness; about top-tier sororities vs. bottoms; and how The Machine believes it controls everything, which this film’s completion, and streaming on premium service Max, calls into question.

Another recently released film (on Netflix ) Victim/Suspect also concerns campus life. Nancy Schwartzman’s documentary is about the efforts of the Center for Investigative Reporting‘s Rachel de Leon.

Daily Beast‘s Nick Schager reported, among other cases of alleged police misconduct, on the tragic story of University of Alabama Kappa Alpha Theta sorority member Megan Rondini. He wrote:

Schwartzman’s film argues that was the case with Megan Rondini, who in 2015 accused TJ Bunn Jr. (who hailed from a prominent local family) of rape, and was then charged with theft for taking cash from him for a post-assault taxi. Video from the interrogation room […] makes plain the stark difference between the cops’ handling of Rondini and Bunn Jr. In the aftermath of this ordeal, Rondini took her own life—citing the rape and cops’ bullying as the reasons.

When Rondini‘s suicide was reported in The Tuscaloosa News by the newspaper’s staff, there was a reference to a statement by the Bunn family which claimed that an “internet blog article” … “potentially defamed an honest man, a reputable family, and institutions that are the foundation of our community.”

The Buzzfeed article that the Bunn family’s statement referred to had claimed that the Rondini case “was mishandled by local law enforcement, medical providers and the University of Alabama.”

A full page ad in The Tuscaloosa News entitled “Character Assassination In The Internet Age” had been released by the Bunn family’s attorney as reported in the Daily Mail by Cheyenne Roundtree and Snejana Farberov. The ad asserted that the Rondini rape case “is now before the Court, and in an open court, ALL the evidence, the text messages, the statements she made, photographs on her phone, everything will be aired for consideration.”

An attorney for The Tuscaloosa News filed a motion for the release of investigative records from the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff’s Office.

When the texts were released, some were silly exchanges between Rondini and her sorority sisters. One urged Rondini to essentially “go for it.” What the texts show, more than any culpability of Rondini in her own rape, is the vacuous nature of thinking about sex that seemed to be shared by some in the Greek system.

As part of the outcome of the Rondini rape case, a civil suit against the University of Alabama was settled. A wrongful death lawsuit in federal court against TJ. Bunn Jr. was dismissed after a a settlement with the Rondini family had been reached.

But T-Town has seemingly yet to hear the last about the Rondini case, as demonstrated by its inclusion in the Netflix documentary on “bullying by cops.”

This installation of the Franklin Stove Blog is a departure from the usual format.

It’s fictional, based on accounts of actual events.

It might even be considered a ghost writ post.

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.

Hi, it’s me, Rose again. I’m the Spirit of the Crimson Tide, living in my home away from life–Bryant-Denny stadium.

It’s been hard to ignore the going ons of the sorority sisters. After all many of the campuses’ main sorority houses are located on Colonial drive right outside of the stadium. They even once came right into the stadium.

Remember when I wrote about the bid day in the stadium? “Bid Day on Sunday was when all those girls found out which sorority they would be joining. The screams from the selected girls would’ve been blood curdling, if I had any to curdle. Then they started running out of the stadium. It reminded me of one of those zombie movies that George Romero used to make, except they were sprinting and screaming at the top of their lungs and the zombies just silently staggered along in a shambling walk. Like the zombies, they seemed irrepressible.”

I knew that HBO had been doing a documentary about Bama sororities.

I just got hold of a copy of the latest Crimson White, which somebody had brought into the media center in the stadium. There was a story about the HBO documentary in it.

One of the voiceovers that was quoted in the story was, “Not to be dramatic, but this documentary could end Greek life as we know it.”

I really can’t see anything affecting Greek life though.

For the last week I’ve been watching students pile all of their junk into cars to head home. For a while it seemed that a lot of girls were wearing tangerine colored exercise shorts with black crop tops or tank tops.

I’ll bet, after the finals, some couples visited one of their favorite haunts — Lake Nichols. Lake Nichols is about five miles out of town. There have always been some students who jump off of the cliffs there, but most just sunbathe on the rocks. Police supposedly have patrolled the cliffs on the lookout for drunk swimmers. Sunburnt, tipsy lovers saying goodbye for the summer–what a sight that must be! I’m sure that the cars parked at Lake Nichols must have tags from several states.

The HBO documentary will probably just be another recruiting tool for the Greeks.

Of course there will be a lot of cellphone calls in May when HBO releases it. “Ew, I looked so gross. If I’d known they were shooting that day, I would’ve have at least washed my hair. But you looked great!”

What captured the attention of the documentary’s producers in the first place were the ubiquitous Tik Tok posts made by sorority sisters in 2021. Alabama Rush Tok posts were viewed by more than two billion people! The posts were about the girls’ tacky fashion choices and how they decorated their rooms with junk from Hobby Lobby.

The HBO documentary will, just like the Rush Tok posts, feed the emotionally insecure sorority sisters’ never-ending narcissistic appetite. But it won’t end Greek life in any way.

This installation of the Franklin Stove Blog is a departure from the usual format.

It’s fictional, based on accounts of actual events.

It might even be considered a ghost writ post.

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.

Hey, it’s me, Rose, the Spirit of the Crimson Tide. My home away from life was full of football fans for the 2023 A-Day game. The A-Day game is an exhibition game that occurs after Spring practice. Preparations had been going on for weeks. But the sudden influx of living souls was overwhelming.

I’m sure that many of the football fans that showed up were sitting in areas of the stadium that they’d never be in during the actual season. In fact, many wouldn’t be able to even afford a ticket. The A-Day game is open to the public, free of charge. The stadium was about half full of the usual number of fans, very few of which were students.

The Million Dollar Band played. But the band members were wearing tee-shirts instead of their official uniforms. I’m sure that they were happy about that!

The actual play seemed artificial of course. There was some hitting, but not the vicious kind you’d see in during a heated game with a rival like Auburn. Of course it was hands-off for the quarterbacks. I’m not a sports expert by any means but nothing on the gridiron looked too impressive.

In the back of my mind was the memory of how things went on an A-Day game weekend that occurred a couple of years ago when there was mayhem on The Strip.

The reason things got so out of hand had a lot to do with a rap artist who had been heavily promoted by the Twelve/25 bar. Tuscaloosa police had hundreds of calls that weekend. The Strip on Friday had been packed with mostly young people. Some cars that were parked nearby were found to contain automatic weapons.

I’ve found out, from reading copies of The Crimson White that were in the media area, that the owners of Twelve/25 filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city. The bar is owned by blacks and they think that white-owned bars are being treated favorably.

When the city closed Twelve/25 in 2020, because the bar was in violation of occupancy limits that had been set by the state in response to Covid, there weren’t any accusations of racism. Response by the police to the fracas that occurred when Twelve/25 had booked a popular rap artist during an A-Day game weekend hadn’t been a civil right issue either.

It’s ironic that the crowds that are attracted to Twelve/25 consist largely of white students. Many of those students who enjoy seeing black performers and athletes would never want them to be part of their society. White fraternities remain just that–white. Those little red-neck, white boys would be creeped out at the thought of a black person being their “brother.” Sorority sisters have been blatantly racist too, even though there is a smattering of black sisters in their mist. Not too long ago a sorority’s president made the news because of a social media exchange at a club which included the words “I’m gonna yack…cigs, weed and black girl.”

I didn’t hear gunshots coming from the direction of The Strip this weekend. I guess the new police precinct on The Strip might be working. Of course, I’m pretty sure that Twelve/25 didn’t book a rap artist this year. Maybe its owners are waiting to see what happens in court? Then they’ll be able to resume packing people in the bar like sardines.

Alabama is in the news again. This time the story’s about a shooting at a birthday party in the small town of Dadeville.

Jeff Amy, an Associated Press reporter, wrote:

Alabama law enforcement officers Sunday were imploring people to come forward with information about a shooting that killed four people and injured 28 others during a teenager’s birthday party.

According to Al.com‘s Ramsey Archibald, Alabama was ranked fifth in the nation for firearm deaths in 2021. He used data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In January, The Tuscaloosa Thread‘s Brittany Marshal wrote about an interview with Tuscaloosa‘s Mayor Walter Maddox. He was responding to a January 2023 murder that occurred on The Strip. Maddox said:

“I think what bothers me the most is, there’s never any reason to take anyone else’s life. So many times in these cases, it its absolutely unbelievable what provokes people to pull out a firearm or semi-automatic weapon and take someone else’s life. It’s senseless, it’s reckless and inhumane.”

In 2018, The Alabama Daily News‘ Caroline Beck wrote about the Alabama gubernatorial race in which Maddox ran against the incumbent Kay Ivy. Ivy criticized Maddox for having banned guns in 2006 in city-owned facilities in Tuscaloosa. Beck opined:

Maddox’s proposal for more ‘common sense gun laws’ may not be as radical as other liberal politicians have suggested, but Ivey knows that in a state where half the population owns firearms, painting Maddox as anti-gun can be an effective tactic.

Any “gun control” measure proposed in the Alabama Legislature is likely to fail. As reported by 1819 News‘ Craig Monger, the National Rifle Association is up in the air about gun laws that are currently being proposed. Monger wrote:

Permitless carry, also called constitutional carry, passed the Alabama legislature in 2022. The new law removed requirements for lawful individuals to obtain a permit to carry a concealed firearm. The law also added a provision to inform law enforcement of the presence of a weapon when asked.

State Rep. Chris England (D-Tuscaloosa), in response to the law that ended the requirement for a person to get a permit to legally carry a concealed handgun in public, sponsored House Bill 12 (HB12). The bill would create new penalties for those who fail to inform law enforcement of the presence of a firearm.

Whether any such new penalties would have prevented the tragic shooting that occurred in January on The Strip by a former University of Alabama basketball player is debatable. CBS News and many other national media outlets reported on the incident where the gun that was used had been in the backseat of a star athlete’s car. The “permitless carry” law allowed the player to legally have the gun in his car.

England also sponsored House Bill 28 (HB28), which would remove the exemption for persons with pistol permits to carry a weapon on school premises.

(The Franklin Stove Blog has repeatedly reported on gun violence on The Strip, including the recent post “The Strip–A Fool’s Paradise?”)

In a state such as Alabama, where half of its population is packing, any laws that restrict gun ownership in any way seem to be doomed to fail.

Many guns that are on the street are illegally acquired. In 2018, Tuscaloosa News‘ Stephanie Taylor reported on what former Tuscaloosa Police Chief Steve Anderson said:

“Guns stolen in auto burglaries account for the majority of illegal guns ending up on our streets and in the hands of criminals, juveniles and people suffering from mental illness.“

As reported by Ryan Phillips in The Patch, current Tuscaloosa Police Chief Brent Blankley said:

“I think it’s the culture, especially with our young people it’s shifted. People used to have a fist fight, now they just shoot each other … Until as a culture and and community we change, and we change especially our young people, I don’t know if this is going to go away.”

In T-Town, a smoking gun has ended the lives of many of its residents. In T-Town and in Alabama there are frequent incidents of the tragic loss of life that is due to gun violence. When such violence erupts at a birthday party or involves a star athlete, there are banner headlines. Otherwise, gun smoke just pervades the atmosphere and is hardly ever noticed.

The owners of Twelve25, after being rebuffed in court in a federal lawsuit that claimed the city was discriminating against the bar because it was owned by blacks, may roll the dice in a local court.

City Attorney Scott Holmes said that some gastropubs, had morphed from restaurants to, not just bars, but to “mega-bars,” with hundreds of patrons.

If such establishments had a lounge license it would harder, if not impossible, to pack under age drinkers into their venues.

Sec. 3-41 of Tuscaloosa‘s municipal code states:

It shall be unlawful for any person to be in, on, or upon the licensed premises of any establishment licensed by the alcoholic beverage control board of the state as a lounge retail liquor licensee, in violation of any state law regulating the age of persons allowed on such premises.

Of course under age patrons might succeed in entering a lounge by using a fake ID. Having an establishment classified as a “gastropub,” where food service is offered until morphing into a bar, was a good workaround.

Tuscaloosa Police Department‘s Chief Brent Blankley at the January 17th, 2023, Tuscaloosa Pre-Council meeting said, “I’d like to remind the Council that gastropubs have had issues–that they have been turning into full-fledged bars.”

On February 28, 2023, the City Council amended the city code Sec. 7-33 – Revocation of license or privilege to obtain a license. If a business application “contains false or misleading information or an omission of a material fact,” then its license can be revoked. A proposal for a gastropub, for example, might not accurately depict the intended operation of the business in a way that is more like a lounge than a gastropub.

The ordinance would restrict a gastropub’s occupancy limit. Twelve25‘s practice of removing tables and chairs after food service ended had allowed hundreds of people to be packed in like sardines.

Lawyers for Twelve25 actually said that 287 “patrons” were contractually allowed.

Twelve25 began as a sports bar that Mayor Walt Maddox once praised as offering the “three things I love in life: beer, food and sports.” On an A-Day weekend in 2021 when Nle Choppa, a rap artist from Tennessee, appeared mayhem broke out.

Emily Enfinger reported on the A-Day game weekend incidents in the Tuscaloosa News:

Tuscaloosa police responded to a total of 271 calls for service on the day of the A-Day game, the 24-hour period from early Saturday morning through early Sunday morning.

Several incidents that occurred overnight resulted in multiple arrests and six weapons, including an AK-47, being confiscated by police, according to a Tuscaloosa police news release.

Lee Busby, the Council member for the District Twelve25 is in, once asked, “How many casualties” will be city be “willing to endure” as a result of making it so easy for people to consume alcohol?

Twelve25 was once publicized as a Mecca for University of Alabama students. The Crimson White‘s Grace Schepis wrote in 2020:

Twelve25 will be home to three distinct internal sections: a main VIP section to the left, a central restaurant area and a traditional bar layout to the right. With maximum flexibility as the main goal, Jarrett hopes for the possibility to entertain simultaneous events in each section of the bar. 

T-Town‘s Mayor Walt Maddox, said this about gastropubs, “You have a lot of places in Tuscaloosa that masquerade as a restaurant, but they’re really a bar.”

Has Twelve25 become a pariah in T-Town? Is it the victim of racist Tuscaloosa city leaders, as the attorneys for Twelve25 assert? Or is it a just good idea that went bad?

This installation of the Franklin Stove Blog is a departure from the usual format.

It’s fictional, based on accounts of actual events.

It might even be considered a ghost writ post.

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.

Hey, it’s me, Rose, the Spirit of the Crimson Tide, again. I’ve had few distractions at the stadium since the football season is over. Of course, the annual A-Day game will take place in the Spring. But, for now, many of my thoughts involve memories of life on campus that have nothing to do with the gridiron.

The 55^th anniversary of the Mỹ Lai massacre in Vietnam occurred on the sixteenth of March in 1968. That gruesome tragedy took place during my last year of life.

Images of the horrors that took place in South East Asia would likely be banned today from many social media outlets. Such things as the severed ears of Vietnamese enemy combatants that GIs collected and the naked little girl running down the road from her napalmed village may actually have paled in comparison to the dead bodies of children, women and elderly Vietnamese that Lieutenant William Calley Jr. killed in the Mỹ Lai massacre.

When I first arrived on campus it was compulsory for all male students to participate in the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, either Army or Airforce.

I got to know the goofy white boy who I wrote about having once dated a black girl.  He told me about his experience with ROTC. Ironically he had such poor vision that ultimately he was disqualified for military service. You could be blind as a bat and probably have to march around on the Quad with a M1 rifle if you were a male student. He eventually dropped out of school anyway and burned his draft card.

The sole purpose of many male students for attending the University, aside from getting the elusive “meal ticket” in life, was to be deferred from being drafted. Instead of being classified as 1-A in the Vietnam Draft Lottery, as students, they were classified 1-S. I read that some people joined the National Guard, hoping that they wouldn’t be wading in the rice paddies of Vietnam.

The “nearly blind” guy told me about a situation that he’d stumbled into. Freshman Orientation in 1967, took place where Alabama Governor Wallace had “stood in the school house door” — in Foster Auditorium. He felt lost and overwhelmed until a friendly bunch of guys at a ROTC table, as he explained to me, “treated him like a real human being and not a computer punch card.” In those days the cardboard cards were de rigueur for anything involving a computer.

He was a real “freshman” for sure. He signed up for the University of Alabama Army ROTC’s “counter-guerrilla corp.” I’ve never found out if this ROTC unit was fully legit. Males who were in it wore special berets with lightning bolt crest emblems. As a demolition “specialist” he quickly rose to the rank of a sergeant.

The way he explained it to me was like this. The corp’s leader was the son of a regular Army general who commanded the University’s ROTC program. The son was somehow able to procure live ammunition and military rifles for the cadets to play with. Also he obtained dynamite, fuses and blasting caps.

On one of the special field trips the cadets blew up cliffs. The “demolition specialists” climbed up a hill but they had left blasting caps and fuses on the ground below. A farmer, who must have heard the noise that they were making, discovered the demolition equipment and looked up at the cadets who were perched on the hill. He must have been very puzzled.

He said that they once buried sticks of dynamite and bags of ammonium nitrate based fertilizer in the ground. Then they lay down and joined hands in a circle around where the explosives were buried. When the explosives were ignited he was tossed into the air. He got a face full of dirt, and dirt in his mouth and in his clothing but was not injured.

I can’t imagine that the Army would ever have sanctioned students running around with loaded high power rifles and explosives. On field trips the cadets wore a uniform — olive fatigues without any identification on them that could be tied to the ROTC or University. Of course they  also wore the black berets adorned with a cloth shield patch that had a black and red field divided diagonally by a white lightning bolt.

He started doing “independent research” on Vietnam and learned about the white phosphorus munitions, defoliants and napalm that were being used by the US in Vietnam. He became increasingly disaffected from the ROTC program and started arguing in class with the military instructors about the morality of the war. One instructor told him that he’d be court marshalled in three months time if he ever enlisted.

On one field trip that took place in sub-zero weather, he developed pleurisy and was hospitalized. The regular Army officer who was supervising the cadets told them to eat a lot of beans and sleep snuggled next to another cadet, so that they could provide “internal gas heating” for each other. He decided to sleep alone.

He told stories about cadets rappelling from the top of women’s dormitories and going on panty raids. But the story about the cadets who derailed a train topped the list of mishaps.

After drills on the Quad some of the cadets would invariably go to a their favorite local watering hole Nicks. I was told that one day, after becoming sufficiently inebriated, they went out on a long trestle railroad bridge over the Warrior River to jump off of it. They had done this sort of thing before but that day was particularly chilly. After the first student warrior leapt into the river, he realized how freezing cold the water was. He yelled up to his comrades not to jump. While they were trying to walk off the bridge a freight train came along forcing them to move to the side. Then the train stopped, stranding them on the bridge.

After what seemed to them an objectionably long wait for the train to move one of them got what must have seemed to be brilliant idea at the time. If they just uncoupled a car from the rest of the cars that were on a downward slope the cars would roll down the track to free the bridge so that they could walk back out on it. This brilliant scheme lost its luster after the decoupled cars rolled down the track with such a momentum that they derailed. In a panic the remaining two jumped into the icy river. They were eventually all accosted, dripping wet and chilled to the bone, on the river bank by the local police.

They were put in separate cells in the local jail and were interrogated by the FBI. The fact that their uniforms had no ROTC markings made them look very suspicious. A regular officer who was a ROTC instructor got them off the hook. To reward the officer the group of rowdy students took him to an out of town eatery The Cotton Patch. On the way back the students and the Army officer, who were all well fortified by celebratory imbibing, were caught driving way over the speed limit on the highway back to the University.

They were all jailed. An even higher ranking Army officer had to use his influence to free them all, so the story goes.

Although the University is no longer overshadowed by its ROTC program, it still pays obeisance to the armed services. Before every football game in the stadium there’s a ROTC color guard, often with a woman cadet included. A military flyover moments before kickoff is a proud tradition. U.S. Special Operations Command para-commandos, yelling “Roll Tide,”  float onto the field on some occasions.

Back when I first enrolled, the University’s President Frank Rose advised the US Army as a member of the Advisory Panel for ROTC Affairs. Rose was even Chairman of the Board of Visitors in 1968 for the United States Military Academy at West Point. He believed, that under President Lyndon Baines Johnson, America could have both “guns and butter” in The Great Society. As the Vietnam blunder crescendoed, Rose probably never lost faith in LBJ. Then, while I was still alive in 1968, LBJ announced that he had decided not to seek his party’s nomination for president. He would no longer lie about the disastrous war.

Vietnam was not the last military misadventure that has occurred during my time as the Spirit of the Crimson Tide. It seems to me that all US Presidents have wanted to be war-time Commander-In-Chiefs. Some have led the country into more dire straits than others. As far as I’m concerned, they’re all a bunch of war criminals.

One of the newest buildings at the Capstone — Hewson Hall — was named after the former CEO of Lockheed Martin, Marillyn Hewson. Lockheed Martin is the world’s biggest arms manufacturer, and world’s biggest exporter of arms. During America’s many military misadventures the company has done very well.

One of Lockheed Martin’s most profitable planes, the F-35, will not be likely be seen flying over Bryant-Denny Stadium though. The F-35 is considered to be one of the Pentagon’s most expensive boondoggles. It has been said that the F-35 will not have a ghost of a chance in combat. Although I certainly qualify as a ghost, I’m no expert in aerodynamics.

So much for the military and ROTC. Maybe there will soon be some stuff about football to think about. Until then I’ll be in Bryant Denny Stadium. Roll Tide Roll!