It’s listing. So does that mean it’s a Craig’s List box? Or maybe this is what happens when cold hard news sits out in the hot sun too long. Anyway, very interesting find.
This reminds me, after Southline went out of business, I lugged home one of the street boxes. (I didn’t realize at the time that I was technically stealing… I thought they’d all be junked, but I later found out they’d sold them to somebody who repainted them and put them back into service for another publication, so I deprived them of the proceeds for one box. I think the statute of limitations has probably run out now, anyway, though.)
The thing weighed a TON! I waddled it a block to my car, puffing and heaving. Then when I got it home I worried it up the steps to the back porch, pausing several times to curse and catch my breath.
After settling it onto the porch with a resounding boom, I inspected the interior. There was a concrete block in the bottom! I guess that’s standard procedure to a) keep the boxes from blowing over in a high wind and b) to keep all but the dumbest thieves from confiscating them.
I kept it for a couple of years and finally realized it was kind of a stupid thing to have. I actually don’t remember what I did with it… maybe I put it back out on the street, giving people false hope (or dread) that Southline had resumed publication. Maybe I took it to the Salvation Army and claimed $500 off on my income taxes (thus perpetrating two crimes with the same artifact). ((Haha, just kidding, Mr. IRS agent!!)) Maybe I still have it around here somewhere. Maybe somebody turned it into a herpetarium — which would actually be a pretty cool repurposing of an old newspaper box. Probably ApartmentTherapy.com has already done the newspaper-box-as-herpetarium thing to death and was sick of it three years ago. Probably i should knock it off now.
Thanks for a great photo, and for the blog — I’m enjoying it.
Hollis Hildebrand-Mills 
It’s listing. So does that mean it’s a Craig’s List box? Or maybe this is what happens when cold hard news sits out in the hot sun too long. Anyway, very interesting find.
This reminds me, after Southline went out of business, I lugged home one of the street boxes. (I didn’t realize at the time that I was technically stealing… I thought they’d all be junked, but I later found out they’d sold them to somebody who repainted them and put them back into service for another publication, so I deprived them of the proceeds for one box. I think the statute of limitations has probably run out now, anyway, though.)
The thing weighed a TON! I waddled it a block to my car, puffing and heaving. Then when I got it home I worried it up the steps to the back porch, pausing several times to curse and catch my breath.
After settling it onto the porch with a resounding boom, I inspected the interior. There was a concrete block in the bottom! I guess that’s standard procedure to a) keep the boxes from blowing over in a high wind and b) to keep all but the dumbest thieves from confiscating them.
I kept it for a couple of years and finally realized it was kind of a stupid thing to have. I actually don’t remember what I did with it… maybe I put it back out on the street, giving people false hope (or dread) that Southline had resumed publication. Maybe I took it to the Salvation Army and claimed $500 off on my income taxes (thus perpetrating two crimes with the same artifact). ((Haha, just kidding, Mr. IRS agent!!)) Maybe I still have it around here somewhere. Maybe somebody turned it into a herpetarium — which would actually be a pretty cool repurposing of an old newspaper box. Probably ApartmentTherapy.com has already done the newspaper-box-as-herpetarium thing to death and was sick of it three years ago. Probably i should knock it off now.
Thanks for a great photo, and for the blog — I’m enjoying it.
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Thanks for the great reply and wonderful writing!
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