Similar to the Park Circle trolley cited in Rooby Tawr, Baltimore Transit Co. Streetcar No. 24 travels south on Roland Avenue past its intersection with Univer- sity Parkway in North Baltimore (c. early 1930s).

A Voice of Baltimore Feature, an excerpt from

     ROOBY TAWR, a novel in progress
     set in mid-20th Century Charm City
 
                             By Joel Foreman
 
It’s 1930. A crowd with drowsy early morning faces waits at a trolley stop in Northwest Baltimore a mile or two south of Park Circle. One of the faces is partially hidden and shuttered like a morning glory biding its time until the sun comes up.

This is Reuben Michael, known to friends and family as Ruby. He’s 30 and has a thick head of hair black as onyx. It’s long enough for a part-in-the-center brush-back, though this detail is concealed by the crown and wide brim of a hat snapped forward at a rakish angle.

As it’s chilly, Ruby has flipped up the collar of his sport coat to protect the skin above his shirt collar and bow tie. He warms his hands in his pants pockets, and though he hunches forward a bit, he’s still the tallest of the patiently waiting commuters. It’s a tall that’s more comforting than commanding. A kind of long-legged and agreeable nonchalance.

As the etiquette of the time and place calls for covert fleeting glances, most of the domestics heading toward their daily cleaning jobs take notice of the sole man among them. But just long enough to conclude: This white boy’s out of place. He oughter be going the other way. Downtown! To some office work.

One of the ladies thinks, If I didn’t know Rudolph Valentino died in ‘26, I’d suspect that was him waiting like the rest of us for the uptown No. 5. “The Sheik” hisself.

She resolves to report this bit of trivia to a friend later in the day.

Another of the ladies shooting a quick look at Ruby serves in a home where the menfolk have closets full of fancy duds. She judges that this one be making the best of some clothes that seen some miles. Knows how to care for them, though. Knows how to mix and match purty good. Knows how to make like he has more in his closet than he probably does.

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Back in the day, most gas stations in the United States offered full service at the pump, as in this 1958 photo advertising Chevron gasoline.

FILLING STATIONS EVERYWHERE ARE NOW ‘SELF-SERVICE’
AND ATTENDANTS HAVE BECOME VIRTUALLY OBSOLETE

Who would have ever figured everyone,
except chauffeured elected officials,
would be pumping their own gas?
 
By David Maril
 
As gasoline prices around Baltimore fall under $3 a gallon, there’s irony in our starting to pay less for fuel at the pumps.

For a number of years, as gasoline approached the $4 per gallon mark, it seemed the more we paid, the less service we received.

Making matters even more financially painful, our local politicians kept adding taxes to the price of a gallon for a highway and transportation fund that was too often raided for use in other areas.

Hopefully the Yes vote that convincingly passed on the Nov. 4th ballot — Question 1, making it harder to transfer these funds into other state accounts — will decrease the need for higher gasoline taxes to repair roads and bridges.

Many of our upper level elected state officials are chauffeured around and probably seldom if ever are concerned about keeping the gas tank full or even pulling into a filling station themselves. How many of them have dealt with the challenge we all sometimes face of trying not to drip gasoline on ourselves when we are headed somewhere for business or a social engagement?

How many have experienced the nuisance of attempting to remove the gasoline smell from our hands after filling up a tank?

From former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s not knowing the cost of milk when running for president in 2007, to Mitt Romney in 2012 being surprised he could order a hoagie on a touchscreen at a convenience store, there are far too many embarrassing examples of how out of touch most politicians are.

It would be interesting to know how many incumbents and candidates running for election around the country for governor, House and Senate have any clue as to what gasoline currently costs per gallon.

Many probably believe it’s like it used to be, years back, when gasoline was under a dollar and service stations made you feel like an important customer.

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Annapolis Republican Larry Hogan won a decisive upset victory Tuesday in Maryland’s gubernatorial election.

GOP INCREASES MARGIN IN U.S. HOUSE OF REPS.;
LT. GOV. ANTHONY BROWN CONCEDES DEFEAT

Presidential aspirant O’Malley nowhere to be found

‘THE BIGGEST UPSET IN THE COUNTRY!’
 
By Alan Z. Forman
 
In an election that just weeks ago wasn’t even expected to be close, Annapolis businessman Larry Hogan won a decisive victory Tuesday to become only the third Republican Governor of Maryland in 56 years and the seventh since the Civil War by defeating Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown, 52-47 percent, with virtually all of the state’s polling places reporting.

Upon declaring victory at his campaign headquarters in Annapolis, Hogan graciously thanked Brown and outgoing Gov. Martin O’Malley “for their eight years of service” to the people of Maryland, then said he would “begin tomorrow” to clean up what he termed “the mess in Annapolis” and restore integrity to state government.

Hogan also pledged that he and Lt. Gov.-elect Boyd Rutherford — who will become the Free State’s third consecutive African-American lieutenant governor — would “roll back as many of the 40 tax increases” instituted by the O’Malley Administration “as we can.”

As Brown delivered his concession speech to a disappointed crowd of supporters, which included Maryland Reps. Elijah Cummings (D., 7th), C.A. “Dutch” Ruppersberger (D., 2nd) and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D., 5th), Governor and presidential aspirant O’Malley was conspicuously not in attendance.

Hogan received more than 847,000 votes to Brown’s 770,500. In his victory statement he noted that it was “the biggest upset in the country!”

On the national level the Republicans took control of the U.S. Senate, winning at least one more than the six seats needed for a GOP majority and catapulting Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky into the post of Majority Leader, succeeding Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada.

Earlier in the evening the 72-year-old McConnell won reelection to his Senate seat by defeating his 35-year-old Democratic challenger, Alison Lundergan Grimes, in one of the most expensive and hard fought contests of the campaign cycle.

The Republicans also increased their margin in the U.S. House of Representatives but with an influx of more conservative members than before.

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The new Horseshoe Casino Baltimore opened 10 weeks ago with much fanfare, including promos by Md.’s gover- nor and Baltimore’s mayor, and now is touted by sign- age on highways leading into the city from Washington.

IS GAMBLING BALTIMORE’S BIGGEST ATTRACTION?
ARE THE ORIOLES AND RAVENS LESS IMPORTANT?

Weak candidates and horrendous campaigns

OLD-FASHIONED BASEBALL VERSUS NEW
 
By David Maril
 
While wondering how many touchdown and passing yardage records the great Baltimore quarterback John Unitas would be shattering if he were alive and playing in today’s pass-happy NFL, it’s interesting to note the following:

 Would someone in Baltimore explain why there’s a sign on the Baltimore-Washington Parkway heralding the fact that the Horseshoe Casino is two miles away while there’s absolutely no mention of the Orioles’ and Ravens’ stadiums or the Inner Harbor?

Is this a sign that city officials and political leaders feel casino gambling is what Baltimore is all about, and that travelers entering the city, after driving up from Washington, BWI, Annapolis and points south, don’t need to know about the more established and historical attributes that Baltimore has to offer?

How about a tasteful, well-designed sign welcoming people into “Baltimore, the birthplace of the Star Spangled Banner”?

Would it hurt, along with deciding to recognize the Orioles and Ravens, to mention the Baltimore Museum of Art and Walters Art Museum, along with Inner Harbor and city attractions?

With this type of short-sighted, sloppy thinking, you can almost expect some city politician to propose modernizing the national anthem, changing the words to “O! say can you see by the dawn’s early light, what so proudly we hailed from the Horseshoe Casino.”

 This $10 billion, or more, proposal to build a maglev high-speed railroad line that would get passengers from Baltimore to Washington in 15 minutes, and be extended through the Northeast Corridor as far as Boston, has little chance of getting funding and political backing.

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 Where the Apple “geniuses” dwell: In the “Emerald City of New Oz”
  The Apple Store on Fifth Avenue, New York City, USA (a/k/a Oz).

COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY MEANT
TO BE USED, NOT WORSHIPPED

Bowing down to the Macintosh god;
overdosing on ‘Apple (Store) juice’

TECHNICIANS ARE TERMED ‘GENIUSES’
 
By David Maril
 
If a politician campaigning for election ever wanted a captive audience for the purpose of shaking hands, telling a few jokes and making hundreds of empty promises, the perfect setting would be outside an Apple computer product store hours before a new device is introduced for purchase.

These computer fanatics have an insatiable thirst for whatever new product the computer giant invents or modifies and delivers.

Between Apple Watch, Apple Pay, iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, the legion of tech groupies are wired to stand in line for hours by the thousands, outside all of these stores to welcome and marvel at the arrival of new products.

Me? I don’t get it.

Sure, computers are terrific at performing functions related to writing, researching, communication, business and hundreds of tasks and duties too lengthy to list here.

And Apple has impressively forged the reputation of making complex computer technology more user friendly than PC technology and Windows systems.

But you know something, I think this is a lot of nonsense and many of my Apple friends are taking it too far. If you listen to them, working on a Windows PC computer is one step above going back to the Stone Age and you risk becoming obsolete.

The truth is that both types of computer systems are functional, helpful and useful. I’ve split my time evenly between the two systems and I don’t have a preference. As long as the computer works and performs the specific tasks I need, I am satisfied.

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