Editor’s Note: Some might tell you that Memphis is the biggest small town in America. We would say that Memphis is a patchwork of small towns — in the form of distinctive neighborhoods — stitched closely together into the form of a city. So we’re highlighting some of the city’s best towns, if you will, by spotlighting some of our classic neighborhoods. Maybe this will remind you to revisit an area you don’t call home, or to identify more strongly with the one you do.
I moved to Memphis in 1991, fresh out of college, and found home in Midtown. Loved life in Midtown in my 20s and well into my 30s. But with two young children and life growing more active by the hour, my wife and I chose to move to the actual center of the city in 2006. We found our new home in East Memphis.
We live in what could lazily be called a “leafy” neighborhood. (If you live in a Memphis neighborhood without trees, I wonder if you actually live in Memphis. Main Street has natural shade, for crying out loud.) My neighborhood would more aptly be described as buzzing. I can be on Summer Avenue in less than 10 minutes on foot . . . and must cross the Shelby Farms Greenline to get there. I can reach Poplar Avenue — behind the wheel of a car — in less than five minutes, and must cross Walnut Grove to get there. Thanks to these arteries of transportation and, importantly, Sam Cooper Boulevard, I can be virtually anywhere in the city of Memphis in less than 20 minutes. And having raised those two children from our “leafy” little nest, I needed to be anywhere and everywhere, often at the same time.
You like small-town life? Grab a spot in line at Gibson’s Donuts and you’re likely to strike up a conversation with a University of Memphis coach, maybe even a Tennessee senator. Does yesteryear grab you? Spend Saturday night at the Malco Summer Drive-In, and stay for the double feature. My wife and I went to a drive-in movie (ahem, The Great Outdoors) for our first date, so this is a brand of nostalgia I find healthy. Prefer to dine like royalty? Restaurant Iris wins this magazine’s poll — in one category or another — annually and can now be found in the Laurelwood Shopping Center, also home to havens for readers (Novel) and runners (Fleet Feet). Mind and body, always.
Speaking of mind, East Memphis is home to the Benjamin L. Hooks Central Library — yes indeed, a large building with books, and thousands of them — that would be the envy of many larger cities. A delightful children’s wing on the ground floor, areas for group study, microfilm machines (remember those?), and a room devoted solely to local history. Friends of the Library hosts two book sales every year (April and October), a pop-up playground for those who love the written word. And you’ve got to see the public art outside the Hooks entrance: “scrolls” that make you feel smarter just by staring at the sidewalk.
I can’t sing the praises of East Memphis without spotlighting White Station High School. There are private schools to find in this part of the city, but you will find no better slice of who Memphis is than in the halls — talk about buzzing! — of White Station. Once over dinner, my family discussed the number of languages that can be heard among the Spartan student body, and we stopped at eight. We probably under-estimated. If it takes a village to truly raise a child, we had one of the global variety five days a week. We were active parents, but we learned more from the students we met than they did from us.
Outdoors? Galloway Golf Course is the finest public 18 in town. Memphis Botanic Garden reminds us that green matters and that an outdoor concert is, and will always be, a primo picnic venue. And did I mention that Greenline? I can bike less than three miles from my home in East Memphis and feed turtles. I can feed turtles. It’s the city life for me.
