Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Daily Dose of Blairmont 105

As places in America lose their individuality and meaning, names too mutate into meaninglessness. The American corporate mind has a moronic genius for this kind of thing.
                      - James Kunstler, The Geography of Nowhere

I must confess to spending a while puzzling over one of the latest Blairmont shell company names, "Larmer LLC".

"Larmer". What could it mean? Where'd it come from?

Paul McKee's companies frequently bear names formed by a head-on collision between two elements. "Blairmont", for example, comes from the street names Blair and Montgomery. "MLK 3000" is a reference to the southern boundary street of McKee's target area, though I'm not clear on where the 3000 comes in (the number of persons to be kicked out?) "Sheridan Place" is taken from JeffVanderLou's Sheridan Avenue, which McKee will surely recreate in the image of St. Louis's heights of Victorian splendor, the private Place streets. "McEagle" combines McKee's last name with the ultimate symbol of American patriotism, presumably because, hey, what kind of pinko communist is going to argue with an eagle? And "WingHaven" continues the bird theme while offering a vision of refuge (from all the suburban drek around it?), and perhaps trying to steal a little Frank Lloyd Wright cachet to boot.

The meaning of "VHS Partners" continues to elude me. Vashon High School? Some sort of videotape reference?

So how was "Larmer" created?

  • 2244 Montgomery Street (Larmer LLC, March 2008, $55,000)


May 2008

Could it named for Blairmont's most common next-door neighbor, St. Louis's Land Reutilization Authority? LRA. LARmer.

Maybe, maybe not. But it's just another way that Larmer fits the Blairmont/Paul McKee M.O. to a T.

1 comment:

Chris said...

Maybe it's his favorite hockey player, or perhaps where McKee is from in Ireland. Try Googling it; it's pretty interesting.