I had actually been searching for an image of the plaque on the South side of Kenan Fountain (which proved impossible to find) when I found this image of Harry Potter with the claim he had run for Mayor of Wilmington in 2008. I did not bother to verify this, but found it amusing enough to post Harry's picture. For the record, BIG BILL SAFFO won the contest. I guess the citizens preferred a REAL MAN!!!
>>> FUNNY that I lived for about three weeks in Raleigh before moving to Wilmington, two of those weeks homeless after my parents who allowed me to live in their house the first week, unceremoniously had the Police evict me and filed papers not allowing me back under threat of Trespass Charges -- WITHOUT ASKING ME OR HAVING HARSH WORDS OR OTHER WARNING FIRST AT ALL!!!
I suppose that my father, a few nights before, shooting the windshield of my Pontiac Vibe with his BB gun the night of the full lunar eclipse (immediately after it at about 3:30 in the morning, to be precise), should have keyed me to my parents' DEEP PSYCHOSIS, but Dad DID pay to repair the windshield when he also paid to replace the driver's-side, back-seat window that thieves had broken in Conchas Chinas, Mexico (just below Puerto Vallarta) to steal my wallet, passport, and, strangely, all my undies -- soiled and not -- a short time before (using my birth certificate) I had driven back to the US.
Well, I'm not in the mood to go over a lot of old history today. Suffice it to say I've had a REAL BALL in Wilmington since arriving and finding that just like in the heyday of the wealthier branch of my Kenan Family, Wilmingtonians are conflicted by Kenans. HA!!!
You see, Kenans are generally ALL sexual and political libertarians of the FIRST ORDER, and THAT gets the panties of a lot of HYPOCRITES into QUITE A TWIST!!!
I remember well the day last spring when I met Tim Kenan at the Duck n' Dive bar on Dock Street. He already knew of me (before many people did), and was with his fiancee as well as his male lover who was to be their Best Man in their wedding -- the three of them in their cups, and, including me (but not Tim), enthralled by Tim's nicely cut body, his tiny nipples erect in the cool wind.
We realized Tim probably shares my great-grandparents with me (although he is probably a generation of two further removed). The farm he lives on near Burgaw might well be the one my Great-Grandad Murphy was able to get back after the Civil War.
Of course I'm "gay as a goose" as is Thomas S. Kenan III of Chapel Hill -- now head of the Family Enterprises and Charitable Trusts -- and I MUST say, the BEST ALLY A PERSON COULD EVER HOPE TO HAVE!!!
On his side, Mary Lily's best friends, Pembroke Jones and his wife Sarah, always traveled with Pembroke's male lover, and Mary Lilly's brother Will (William R. Kenan, Jr.), who had been Flagler's right-hand man in the Florida ventures as well as having built some companies of his own (his Western Block Company was the largest manufacturer of block and tackle and other maritime hardware in the US at the time), never had children by his wife, and then moved in with his life-long male secretary Scotty after Mrs. Kenan died.
And then there is the strange case of my own father, William Scott Kenan, who was born in Burgaw and grew up all over Pender and New Hanover counties after the Great Depression hit and the burning down of his father's cotton and tobacco barns made the family virtually homeless -- Grandma Laura dying at about the same time and Granddad Joe turning seriously to drink.
Dad graduated from New Hanover High after only eleven years of MULTIPLE schools (quite a feat, if you ask me!!!). He used to tell me his nickname in high school was "Middle-leg" and from what I dimly remember, all I can say is a horse is a horse is a horse!!! (No untoward implications intended or deserved.)
After serving in the Navy in sonar in the North Atlantic and Mediterranean, Dad landed eventually in San Francisco where he sold gifts in the "most expensive department store in the city." Dad liked to brag that he'd sold many gifts to William Randolph Hearst's buyer -- gifts intended for Hearst's lover, Marion Davies, including an alabaster bowl.
Later, he and his "best friend" landed in Cincinnati, OH, and while I do NOT know all the details, before you could say "Jiminy Cricket" Dad's friend was shot in the head and Dad converted to Catholicism before marrying my mother, Ruth Anne Meyer of Brookville, IN. The death was officially listed as "Russian Roulette Suicide" according to BOTH my parents -- and told to me MANY times, back when I was young.
It was later -- in the late 1950s and into the 60s -- that we had the dinnerware with swastikas on it -- the dinnerware my aunts do NOT remember ever seeing in my mother's parents' house -- even though Mom has always claimed she inherited them.
And it was during our years in Louisville, KY, that my father (a low-level accounting clerk for Sun Oil Company) received gifts from a Vice President of the Pepsi Cola Company -- someone I NEVER heard the name of nor knew my parents to associate with socially or any other way. It was in Louisville that my mother took at least me (and I think my sister Jane as well) to see President Kennedy speak (although my parents had been STAUNCH Nixon supporters and claimed FURIOUSLY that the only reason ANY Catholic voted for Kennedy was because of religious agreement).
This speech, it was reported in the next day's paper, had the LONGEST APPLAUSE EVER RECEIVED FOR JOHN FITZGERALD KENNEDY, and I swear, every five or ten years I remember that and give a single clap so that I can ALWAYS BE THE LAST PERSON CLAPPING FOR PRESIDENT KENNEDY.
ALWAYS.
After we moved to West Chester, PA, shortly before President Kennedy's assassination, and Dad worked seemingly around the clock to computerize Sunoco's credit card center in Wayne, PA (in the years since then he has always claimed -- disingenuously -- that he has NO affinity for computers, and I've NEVER seen him use one. >>> 12/31/11 ERROR CORRECTION: Dad DID have a computer in the 1990s when they lived in Wilmington, and might have used it after moving to Raleigh in 2000 for a couple of years, but has NOT been on one in years now. Mom occassionally used an old laptop I gave her a few years ago, but rarely).
Mom and Dad BOTH seemed to find new friends in Pennsylvania by pointedly telling people that the thing they missed most about Louisville was the Louisville Courier-Journal -- founded by Robert Worth Bingham who had probably given Mary Lily Kenan syphilis during a college sexual dalliance, then later married her after the death of Henry Flagler and after the excruciatingly painful tertiary stages of the disease brought Mary Lily low and she had become addicted to cocaine and laudanum to help with the pain.
The precise details of Mary Lily's death -- if in fact the THREE exhumations and autopsies ending in 1989 actually proved anything conclusively -- have never been revealed by family historian Thomas S. Kenan III, although 60 MINUTES did a piece on this in 1989.
* * *
>>>: I leave you with two things for now: something I posted on huffingtonpost.com and an email exchange with my sister Jane:
As a North Carolina Kenan -- the family who contributed much to the history of North Carolina and the Nation, including Gen. James Kenan's stand with other Patriots on the banks of the Cape Fear River, which was the FIRST armed resistance to the Crown over the Stamp Act (although the Yankees winning the Civil War, they claim the Boston Tea Party, which was later), founding of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on land they donated (with some other key families) and have liberally supported education since, in NC and BEYOND -- I'd like to say that I am shocked by the ignorance of those who would SPURN GOD and all GOD'S CREATION by denying rights to ANYONE based on race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or even hair style!!!
That said, take a look at the back-and-forth between me and a very thinly disguised Republican State Sen. Thom Goolsby, who thought he could pretend to be a "neighborly grandmother" (Republicans like to cross-dress). Also some thoughts about the Senator's relationship with his HOT (and very nice) "front-man" from his law office on Walnut Street here in Wilmington:http://scottkenan.blogspot.com/2011/12/riding-wave.html .
The North Carolina Family Policy Council's use of a violent image to promote the state's proposed amendment banning same-sex marriage has ignited controversy among lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights advocates. The photograph, which can be found on page 13 of the winter 2012 issue of the organization's Family North Carolina publication, shows a traditionally-dressed bride and groom being targeted b...
Scott Kenan
10:22 AM (4 minutes ago)
To Jane
Hi Jane,
Thanks for this -- and you are correct, you DID say as much as all this to me before. You still have not considered that event more carefully, so I'll make my case in detail now.
At that time -- and as you have previously acknowledged -- you and I had not had direct or indirect contact for a week or more. What you might not have known was that Allen and I had not had contact for at least three or four days -- possibly as long as a week, but I think less than that. (Do you begin to see why Allen asked you not to let me know he talked to you???)
I also understand that you judged my behaviors and words to be "very manic and psychotic" quite honestly -- but had failed to consider the facts of MY experience, and indeed, much of your own experience in our family over the years we have been alive. Had you done THAT, you might not think I was either manic or psychotic -- although I certainly was agitated in my frustration because so few people (particularly family), were willing to listen to me and consider the logic and facts I was presenting. You had all decided that because I had a diagnosis of bipolar, you could simply dismiss anything I claimed as "manic and psychotic" instead of using your own minds and research to see if there was actual truth to what I said.
While I love you (all of you) deeply and that cannot be harmed, I have had to separate myself from those of you who continue to keep your heads in the sand. You will eventually have to face the truth about our family, and it will be NO PICNIC. I have TRIED (but, I'm afraid failed rather miserably) to lead you, Mike, and Julie (especially -- Dad already knows and has expressed his pride in my actions and his love of me) to see the truth without having to experience the EXTREME loss of wealth and family -- and MORE -- I have had to endure. I have always prayed that I could relieve YOU ALL of AS MUCH OF THIS AS POSSIBLE. You see, I have known all along that I can handle it -- and I have willingly endured all that I have endured (and have no scars, regrets, or grudges -- or visible or invisible aging).
I got a story I'm gonna make a FORTUNE off, eventually!!!
You might have noticed on my blog that I side-ways pitched producer Scott Rudin's executive assistant a couple of days ago. But Rudin (because of his association with John Uecker) is problematic -- and that association might not actually be real. I'm still awaiting a response. But I am also to meet next month with Linda Lavin and her husband Steve Bakunas, who are very committed to Wilmington, theater, music, historic and community restoration, etc. And while Rudin is the top US film producer today, I'm not sure I wouldn't prefer to work with someone younger, smaller, and hungrier. I'm sure all that will work out in time.
Anyway (getting back to the original point), I'm certain Allen contacted you after being contacted by either Patrick Stansbury or Christal Presley (as an intermediary). Allen had had no contact with me for several days at least, I had NEVER been suicidal, and the police showed up to try to commit me only 20 - 40 minutes after Patrick's email conversation with me which started with his offering $100.00 per share for my 380 shares of company stock, his in-steps taking that down to $10 then $1 then $0 inexplicably, suspending me then firing me with claim he "was on the way" to file Restraining Orders so I could not contact Pentagon Publishing co-workers (a legal impossibility -- and in fact he WASN'T and DIDN'T).
But the kicker was that (and I DO have that email trail still, but not close so I cannot quote precisely) he claimed I had "burned all my bridges" and was hated by not only my family but friends and work associates. He went on to say that it looked like the only avenue I "had left was suicide." 20 - 40 minutes later, the cops (acting on YOUR phone call) showed up at my door. I soon had them laughing about it and they left. Over the next month, I endured FIVE of these visits by cops -- two or three times accompanied by a shrink nurse -- trying (unsuccessfully) to commit me. The last one, I was told, was initiated by Julie.
So, do you have an alternate explanation of what really happened??? If so, I'd like to hear it -- and ALSO one from Julie explaining HER actions.
I see you have a gmail address now, which I had not been aware of. I'll send this back via both your addresses (confusingly, gmail somehow associated Julie's address with your name, so it might look like THREE times sent to you). I'm copying the rest of the family as well as maybe this email will help explain my position to others.
All my love,
Scott
On Fri, Dec 30, 2011 at 6:07 AM, Jane Kenan wrote:
The reason I called the police was because Allen had called me as he felt you were suicidal. You had been acting very manic and psychotic for quite some time so I was willing to believe you might be in danger.
He did not want me to tell you he had called me and I honored that for awhile.
Jane
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