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Monday, July 27, 2009

Daily Diversion / Hannan William Walker: Grey-eyed Man of Destiny

Posted by Caleb Hannan on Mon, Jul 27, 2009 at 11:07 AM

click to enlarge william_20walker.jpg
If you're a fan of This American Life, or good storytelling in general, you're going to like the Memory Palace. The Memory Palace is a podcast recorded by public radio reporter Nate DiMeo. Working out of his Los Angeles garage, DiMeo takes historical anecdotes he finds fascinating and then builds a three to five minute story around them. Being an admitted dunce when it comes to history, especially Nashville history, I was happy to see that one of DiMeo's latest actually centers around a guy who was born and raised here. If you don't know the story of William Walker, forever immortalized by this historical marker on 6th Ave., I'm not going to spoil it for you. Rest assured, though, that anyone who tries to invade Mexico with only 46 troops is well worth learning about. For a five-minute education on one of Nashville's original badasses, click here to listen to "Presidente Walker."

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Gus van Sant made a movie about William Walker some years ago that was mostly overlooked. He stuck a bunch of anachronisms in it (like scenes with helicopters). I think the point was to compare Walker with US policy toward Nicaragua in the 1980s.

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Posted by BoydBBiggs on 07/27/2009 at 12:24 PM

P.S.:
Ironically, either under Bush I or Bush II, I believe, we appointed as US ambassador to Nicaragua a guy whose name was William Walker. Hardly anyone in the US knows the story of the original Walker, but the irony was not lost (nor was it appreciated) by folks in Central America. It would be as if Japan chose a guy named Hideki Tojo to be their ambassador to the U.S.

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Posted by BoydBBiggs on 07/27/2009 at 12:27 PM

BBB, I believe that wasn't Van Sant, but rather Alex Cox.

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Posted by The OG DG on 07/27/2009 at 2:01 PM

Thanks for the clarification DG. I was just about to say I seriously misunderstood "Finding Forrester."

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Posted by Caleb on 07/27/2009 at 2:28 PM

Yes, Alex Cox. Sorry. Director of Repo Man.
The latter-day William Walker served as US ambassador to El Salvador, not Nicaragua, from 1988-1992 under Ronald Reagan. (His appointment DID stir controversy throughout the region.)
Boyd B. Biggs regrets the errors and is happy to set the record straight.

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Posted by BoydBBiggs on 07/27/2009 at 2:43 PM

The William Walker marker is at the corner of Commerce & 4th; The buldings in the BKG are the AT&T tower and the giant glass dildo were the chamber of commerce is at

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Posted by elzorro on 07/27/2009 at 2:46 PM

Walker features prominently in a recent biography about Cornelius Vanderbilt.

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Posted by Bill Fletcher on 07/27/2009 at 3:02 PM
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