Some of us have been around the Block a few times—and around Pack Square and Pritchard Park and McCormick Field and the French Broad River and ... well, you get the drift. My own memory, such as it is, goes back to the days when the only reasonably passable road into town from the east went through a two-lane tunnel. Sigh. Beaucatcher Mountain was a lot prettier back then.
Herewith, a quiz that covers recent decades in the Paris of the South. How well you score will likely depend on how long you’ve been here. If you score more than 25 points, you probably remember the first Bele Chere. If you score 28, you probably can explain what Bele Chere means.
1. Which decade saw the I-240 cut blasted through Beaucatcher Mountain?
2. Which local landmark has particular relevance to our constitutionally protected right to petition for the writ of habeas corpus?
3. Which year saw the rise of the BB&T building?
4. Which architect designed the Akzona-Biltmore Building?
5. Where was the Asheville Transit Station located before it moved to Coxe Avenue?
6. Where did Laughing Seed Cafe first hang its shingle (back in 1991)?
7. Which sport occupied McCormick Field when baseball left town for a few years?
8. Who headlined Asheville’s first Bele Chere festival in 1979?
9. In which decade did the WNC Nature Center open in its current location?
10. Which presidential candidate visited Asheville in 2004 and 2007?
11. In which decade did the Biltmore Estate first open to the general public?
12. In which decade was the Asheville Civic Center completed?
13. What type of business occupied the building at the northwest corner of College Street and Broadway in the 1990s and early aughts?
14. What type of business occupied the Orange Peel in the years when it wasn’t a music club?
15. Where did the Grey Eagle Music Hall first set up shop?
16. When did Barley’s Tap Room open for business in Asheville?
17. What current gallery storefront used to boast a wide selection of vintage pastel toilets?
18. What type of business preceded the French Broad Food Co-Op in its Biltmore Avenue location?
19. In which decade did Blue Spiral II open its doors?
20. In which decade did the Young Men’s Institute become the YMI Cultural Center?
21. In what year did Cafe on the Square begin serving meals?
22. On which downtown street was Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe first located?
23. Dinner for the Earth was a natural-foods store located just north of downtown, near the present-day Greenlife Grocery. What happened to that business?
24. What influential Asheville band was, in the mid-’90s, briefly signed to hip label Sub Pop?
25. Mellow Mushroom occupies a former Pure Oil Gasoline station. What legendary Asheville eatery occupied the building until the early ‘90s?
26. What building faced the Basilica St. Lawrence until its demolition in 2006?
27. In what year did The Chocolate Fetish first tickle Asheville’s fancy (or fantasy)?
28. What local music club was named for something famous painter Van Gogh lost?
Scroll down to see answers
1. 1970s
2. The Vance Monument. North Carolina governor Zebulon Baird Vance was the only Confederate state governor to insist on preservation of habeas corpus during the Civil War.
3. 1965
4. I.M. Pei
5. Pritchard Park
6. On the lower level of the YMCA on Woodfin Avenue.
7. Stock-car racing for three years in the 1950s.
8. No one. The big musical event of the festival was Shindig on the Green, featuring event regulars the Stony Creek Band. David Holt played two sets of hammer dulcimer tunes on Saturday afternoon.
9. 1970s
10. Rep. Dennis Kucinich, candidate for the Democratic nomination
11. 1930s
12. 1974
13. Beanstreets, a coffee shop/cafe
14. A roller-skating rink
15. Black Mountain
16. 1994
17. The Haen Gallery (formerly Johnson’s Plumbing).
18. A car dealership
19. Never, there is no Blue Spiral II. Blue Spiral I opened in 1991.
20. 1980s. It was constructed by George Vanderbilt as the Young Men’s Institute in 1892 for use by his black craftsmen and functioned as Asheville’s black library from 1926 to 1966.
21. 1989. Before that, it was an Army-Navy surplus store.
22. Haywood Street, four doors north of its current location.
23. It became Earth Fare and moved to Westgate.
24. The Blue Rags.
25. Stone Soup.
26. The St. Justin Center, used for religious classes (originally built by National Cash Register)
27. 1986
28. Vincent’s Ear.
Commenters email addresses are never displayed. Please do not insert HTML code.
To create a live link, simply type the URL (without http://) and it will be active.
There are no comments for this entry.