Around the Nation

NORTH CAROLINA

Officials plan to sell King statue

ROCKY MOUNT — Officials in Rocky Mount think the best way to pay for a new statue of Martin Luther King is to sell the old one.

The sculpture created by Erik Blome of Figurative Art Studio in Crystal Lake, Ill., was unveiled in June 2003. Local residents complained that it looked nothing like the civil rights leader.

A panel recommended this month that the city commission Chicago-area sculptors Anna and Jeffrey Varilla to replace the statue. But city leaders balked at the $140,000 cost.

City Council members told City Manager Steve Raper to make a plan to sell the Blome sculpture for any price as quickly as possible.

PENNSYLVANIA

Group intends to upgrade Warhol house

PITTSBURGH — It could be called Andy Warhol’s first studio. But it’s a little disappointing.

A bare light bulb hangs on two wires from a rafter of the roofless ramshackle porch. A rusted scaffold was left standing on the porch apparently abandoned in the middle of the job. The windows are caked with dirt, and some are broken and boarded up.

But the last place Mr. Warhol lived in Pittsburgh before moving to New York could see better days if a neighborhood group — including his older brother — has its way.

Mr. Warhol moved into the two-story, brown brick home in 1934, when he was 6, with his father, mother and two older brothers and lived there until 1949.

The Oakland Planning and Development Corporation has told the city it would like to buy Mr. Warhol’s childhood home. The city plans to get control of the property during a treasurer’s sale tomorrow and settle any other debts so it can be sold to the group.

ALABAMA

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