Parkway prank: Sign for Oxford road altered in reference to mound debate
Aug 01, 2009 | 4401 views | 23 
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An altered sign for Leon Smith Parkway in Oxford is seen Friday morning before it was taken down. Photo: Trent Penny/The Anniston Star
The person replaced "Leon Smith Parkway" with "Indian Mound Pkwy" by sticking white paperboard on the sign. The addition was written in blue and red marker and included a black sketch of the hill the mound is on.
By 9:30 a.m., the sign was restored to its normal condition.
Oxford police said the street department removed the sign.
Officers had not decided if they would pursue an investigation or if any law was broken.
The person answering the phone at the street department said the department had no knowledge of the sign and hung up on the reporter.
The modification appeared to be an expression of displeasure with Oxford's recent removal of dirt from a hill near the Oxford Exchange shopping center.
Archeologists say American Indians built a stone mound on top of the hill as long as 1,000 years ago.
In the past, city officials said the dirt was destined as fill for a Sam's Club store under construction nearby.
Officials reversed that statement this week.
They also said the hill would not feature more development, counter to earlier statements.
Mayor Leon Smith also claimed the mound was the result of natural forces, despite an archeological report commissioned by the city that says it is man-made.
I don't know that either is true or false.
We have a hero(ine)!
(suiting up).
They are mentioned in old letters and no one knows their purpose but that they are of Indian origins is certain.
It is just as certain that they should be left alone. We have destroyed too many pieces of Indian culture already. Someday we will wonder where all the evidence of our past has gone.
Citizens of Boston! "This could happen to YOU"
Well, did he ever return, no he never returned and his fate is still unknown, he may ride forever on the Smith shame Parkway, he's the man who never returned.......
I agree with anna.bell Lee. " It is more prettier"
I'd thought privately about doing the same myself, but I'm such an old coot now, with a bum right foot, that I figured I probably wouldn't make it back down the step-ladder, and when the Oxford police had finished empting their pistols into me, Leon "Smokey" Smith would declare my demise to be, like the mound itself, just the result of "natural causes."
But you DID it, when I only thought about it! I was reminded of the explanation by that frail, tubercular poet, John Keats, who once was walking down a London street and with a cry of delight suddenly joined with a happy heart into the midst of a tavern brawl that had spilled out the doors in front of him: "The morality, sir, was questionable; but the excitement of MORAL ACTION was delightful."
Now we are all law-abiding, prudent citizens here, and I'm sure we will all one day enjoy a fine meal inside the restaurant that Mayor Smith has promised us he envisions atop the former Indian mound, but between now and then, there are those I-20 signs guiding tourists to Oxford. . . yes, sir, there are those I-20 signs.
But if you go to the top to sign in, you get a box that automatically signs you name. At least that is what I think. Try it both ways and see. And try it from both sign in places with hitting the back button a different number of times. You will get two different kinds of boxes. One of them does not give your name automatically in the post.
I wish you would make it possible to edit comments on this site. I guess I should have spell checked myself. Also...I was logged in and it posted my comment under anonymous and I wasn't anonymously signed in.
Oh the inhumatity of it all!!