Memphis

The Pyramid Arena , and initially known as the Great American Pyramid was originally built as a 20,142-seat arena located in downtown Memphis at the... banks of the Mississippi River. The facility was built in 1991 and was originally owned and operated jointly by the city of Memphis and Shelby County; Shelby County sold its share to Memphis in April 2009. Its unique structure plays on the city's namesake in Egypt, known for its ancient pyramids. It is 321 feet tall and has base sides of 591 ft; it is by some measures the sixth largest pyramid in the world behind the Great Pyramid of Giza , Khafre's Pyramid , Luxor Hotel , the Red Pyramid and the Bent Pyramid , both in Dahshur. It is also slightly taller than the Statue of Liberty. A statue of Ramesses the Great stands in front of the pyramid. In 2011, this statue was sold to the University of Memphis for the cost of $1. The Pyramid Arena has not been regularly used as a sports venue since 2004. The facility is currently being converted into a Bass Pro Shops "megastore.
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The FedEx Forum is an arena located in downtown Memphis, Tennessee. It is the home of the Memphis Grizzlies of the NBA and the NCAA Division I men's... basketball program of the University of Memphis, both of whom previously played home games at the Pyramid Arena. The arena officially opened in September 2004 after much debate and also a derecho wind storm on July 22, 2003, that nearly brought down the cranes that were building it near the famed Beale Street. It was built at a cost of $250 million and is owned by the City of Memphis; naming rights were purchased by one of Memphis' most well-known businesses, FedEx, for $92 million. FedExForum was financed using $250 million of public bonds, which were issued by the Memphis Public Building Authority . The venue also has the capability of hosting ice hockey games, concerts, and family shows. In 2011, Tony Allen referred to the FedExForum as "The Grindhouse." The nickname is gaining approval from the Memphis fan base. FedExForum was designed by architectural firm Ellerbe Becket. Concrete work done with the help of Dowco Construction and Apac. The arena is 805,850 ft² in size, covering 14 acres .
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The Memphis & Arkansas Bridge , also known as the Memphis-Arkansas Bridge or Memphis-Arkansas Memorial Bridge, is a cantilevered through truss... bridge carrying Interstate 55 across the Mississippi River between West Memphis, Arkansas and Memphis, Tennessee. Memphians refer to this bridge as the "Old Bridge" to distinguish it from the "New Bridge", or Hernando de Soto Bridge, upstream. The Memphis & Arkansas Bridge also carries U.S. Highways 61, 64, 70 and 79 from Memphis to West Memphis; it also carried U.S. Highway 63 prior to its truncation in Arkansas. The western terminus of Tennessee State Route 1 sits on the Tennessee-Arkansas boundary halfway across the bridge. Having been built before the introduction of the Interstate Highway System, the span was not built to Interstate Highway standards, lacking the concrete barrier between the different directions of traffic which was added later. It was also built with a sidewalk on either side of the roadway, positioned just outside the steel truss girders.
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Sun Studio is a recording studio opened by rock pioneer Sam Phillips at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee, on January 3, 1950. It was originally... called Memphis Recording Service, sharing the same building with the Sun Records label business. Reputedly the first rock-and-roll single, Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats' "Rocket 88" was recorded there in 1951 with song composer Ike Turner on keyboards, leading the studio to claim status as the birthplace of rock & roll. Blues and R&B artists like Howlin' Wolf, Junior Parker, Little Milton, B.B. King, James Cotton, Rufus Thomas, and Rosco Gordon recorded there in the early 1950s. Rock-and-roll, country music, and rockabilly artists, including Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Charlie Feathers, Ray Harris, Warren Smith, Charlie Rich, and Jerry Lee Lewis, recorded there throughout the mid to late 1950s until the studio outgrew its Union Avenue location. Sam Phillips opened the larger Sam C. Phillips Recording Studio, better known as Phillips Recording, in 1959 to take the place of the older facility.
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The National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee, USA, is a privately owned complex of museums and historic buildings built around the former... Lorraine Motel at 450 Mulberry Street, where Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on April 4, 1968. Major components of the complex on 4.14 acres include a museum and the Lorraine Motel and hotel buildings. The complex also include the Young and Morrow Building at 422 Main Street, which was the site where James Earl Ray initially confessed to shooting King. The complex additionally includes the Canipe’s Amusement Store at 418 Main Street. The store is next door to the rooming house where the alleged murder weapon, with Ray's fingerprints, was found. Included on the grounds is the brushy lot that stood between the rooming house and the motel. The Museum traces the history of the Civil Rights Movement from the 17th century to the present. The complex is owned by the nonprofit Lorraine Civil Rights Museum Foundation. It is located on the south edge of Downtown Memphis, Tennessee in what is now called the South Main Arts District and is about six blocks east of the Mississippi River.
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Morgan Freeman is an American actor, film director, aviator and narrator. He is noted for his reserved demeanor and authoritative speaking voice.... Freeman has received Academy Award nominations for his performances in Street Smart, Driving Miss Daisy, The Shawshank Redemption and Invictus and won in 2005 for Million Dollar Baby. He has also won a Golden Globe Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award. Freeman has appeared in many other box office hits, including Unforgiven, Glory, Seven, Deep Impact, The Sum of All Fears, Bruce Almighty, Batman Begins, March of the Penguins, The Bucket List, Wanted, The Dark Knight, and RED. Morgan Freeman was born in Memphis, Tennessee, the son of Mayme Edna , a teacher, and Morgan Porterfield Freeman, a barber who died in 1961 from cirrhosis. He has three older siblings. Freeman was sent as an infant to his paternal grandmother in Charleston, Mississippi. His family moved frequently during his childhood, living in Greenwood, Mississippi; Gary, Indiana; and finally Chicago, Illinois. Freeman made his acting debut at age 9, playing the lead role in a school play.
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Cybill Lynne Shepherd is an American actress, singer and former model. Her best known roles include starring as Jacy in The Last Picture Show, as... Betsy in Taxi Driver, as Madeleine Spencer in Psych, as Maddie Hayes on Moonlighting, as Cybill Sheridan on Cybill, and as Phyllis Kroll on The L Word. Shepherd was born in Memphis, Tennessee, the daughter of Patty , a homemaker, and William Jennings Shepherd, who managed a home appliance business. Named after her grandfather Cy and her father Bill, Shepherd won the 1966 "Miss Teenage Memphis" contest at age 16, and the 1968 "Model of the Year" contest at age 18, making her a fashion star of the 1960s, resulting in fashion modeling work through high school and after. According to Shepherd's autobiography, it was a 1970 Glamour magazine cover that caught the eye of film director Peter Bogdanovich. His then-wife Polly Platt, claimed that it was she who upon seeing the cover in a check-out line in a Ralphs grocery store in southern California, said "That's Jacy," referring to the role Bogdanovich was casting — and ultimately offered to Shepherd — in The Last Picture Show .
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Justin Randall Timberlake is an American singer-songwriter, actor and businessman. He achieved early fame when he appeared as a contestant on Star... Search, and went on to star in the Disney Channel television series The New Mickey Mouse Club, where he met future bandmate JC Chasez. Timberlake became famous in the late 1990s as the lead singer of the boy band 'N Sync, whose launch was financed by Lou Pearlman. In 2002, he released his debut solo album, Justified, which sold more than 7 million copies worldwide. The album was a commercial success, spawning the hits "Cry Me a River" and "Rock Your Body". Timberlake continued his success with his second solo album, FutureSex/LoveSounds , debuting at number one on the Billboard 200 chart, and produced the US number-one hit singles "SexyBack", "My Love", and "What Goes Around Comes Around". Timberlake has won six Grammy Awards and four Emmy Awards. His first two albums made him one of the most commercially successful singers in the world, each selling in excess of 7 million copies. He also has an acting career, having starred in films such as The Social Network, Bad Teacher and Friends with Benefits.
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Lisa Marie Presley is an American singer and songwriter, also known as the "Princess of Rock and Roll". She is the only child of Elvis Presley, and... daughter of Priscilla Presley. Lisa Marie Presley was born at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, exactly nine months after her parents' wedding. She lived at Graceland, Elvis' Memphis estate, until her parents separated in 1972. Following their separation and subsequent divorce, she divided her time between living at Graceland with her father and in Beverly Hills with her mother. This arrangement continued until her father died on August 16, 1977, after which she lived exclusively in Beverly Hills. When her father died, Lisa became joint-heir to his estate with her grandfather Vernon Presley, and her great grandmother Minnie Mae Presley. Following the deaths of Vernon in 1979 and Minnie Mae in 1980, Lisa became the sole heir and inherited Graceland. On Feb. 1 1993, her 25th birthday, she inherited that estate, which has grown to an estimated $100 million. On April 8, 2003, Presley released her debut album, To Whom It May Concern.
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Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul,... Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its "100 Greatest Singers of All Time" list, as well as the ninth greatest artist of all time. She has won 18 competitive Grammys and two honorary Grammys. She has 20 No.1 singles on the Billboard R&B Singles Chart and two No.1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100: "Respect" and "I Knew You Were Waiting " , a duet with George Michael. Since 1961, she has scored a total of 45 Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Between 1967 and 1982 she had 10 No.1 R&B albums—more than any other female artist. In 1987, Franklin became the first female artist to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Aretha Louise Franklin was born in a two-room house in Memphis, Tennessee, at 406 Lucy Street. She was the third of four children born to Barbara and C.L. Franklin and the fifth of six overall in between past relationships by her parents.
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Albert Greene , better known as Al Green, is an American gospel and soul music singer. He reached the peak of his popularity in the 1970s, with hit... singles such as "You Oughta Be With Me", "I'm Still In Love With You", "Love and Happiness", and "Let's Stay Together". In 2005, Rolling Stone named him #65 in their list of the '100 Greatest Artists of All Time'. The nomination stated that "people are born to do certain things, and Al was born to make us smile." The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted Green in 1995, referring to him as "one of the most gifted purveyors of soul music." Green has sold more than 20 million records. Green was born in Forrest City, Arkansas. He was the sixth of ten children born to Robert and Cora Greene. The son of a sharecropper, he started performing at age ten in a Forrest City quartet called the Greene Brothers; he dropped the final "E" from his last name years later as a solo artist. They toured extensively in the mid-1950s in the South until the Greenes moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan, when they began to tour around Michigan. His father kicked him out of the group because he caught Green listening to Jackie Wilson.
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Cybill Lynne Shepherd is an American actress, singer and former model. Her best known roles include starring as Jacy in The Last Picture Show, as... Betsy in Taxi Driver, as Madeleine Spencer in Psych, as Maddie Hayes on Moonlighting, as Cybill Sheridan on Cybill, and as Phyllis Kroll on The L Word. Shepherd was born in Memphis, Tennessee, the daughter of Patty , a homemaker, and William Jennings Shepherd, who managed a home appliance business. Named after her grandfather Cy and her father Bill, Shepherd won the 1966 "Miss Teenage Memphis" contest at age 16, and the 1968 "Model of the Year" contest at age 18, making her a fashion star of the 1960s, resulting in fashion modeling work through high school and after. According to Shepherd's autobiography, it was a 1970 Glamour magazine cover that caught the eye of film director Peter Bogdanovich. His then-wife Polly Platt, claimed that it was she who upon seeing the cover in a check-out line in a Ralphs grocery store in southern California, said "That's Jacy," referring to the role Bogdanovich was casting — and ultimately offered to Shepherd — in The Last Picture Show .
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Justin Randall Timberlake is an American singer-songwriter, actor and businessman. He achieved early fame when he appeared as a contestant on Star... Search, and went on to star in the Disney Channel television series The New Mickey Mouse Club, where he met future bandmate JC Chasez. Timberlake became famous in the late 1990s as the lead singer of the boy band 'N Sync, whose launch was financed by Lou Pearlman. In 2002, he released his debut solo album, Justified, which sold more than 7 million copies worldwide. The album was a commercial success, spawning the hits "Cry Me a River" and "Rock Your Body". Timberlake continued his success with his second solo album, FutureSex/LoveSounds , debuting at number one on the Billboard 200 chart, and produced the US number-one hit singles "SexyBack", "My Love", and "What Goes Around Comes Around". Timberlake has won six Grammy Awards and four Emmy Awards. His first two albums made him one of the most commercially successful singers in the world, each selling in excess of 7 million copies. He also has an acting career, having starred in films such as The Social Network, Bad Teacher and Friends with Benefits.
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Lisa Marie Presley is an American singer and songwriter, also known as the "Princess of Rock and Roll". She is the only child of Elvis Presley, and... daughter of Priscilla Presley. Lisa Marie Presley was born at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, exactly nine months after her parents' wedding. She lived at Graceland, Elvis' Memphis estate, until her parents separated in 1972. Following their separation and subsequent divorce, she divided her time between living at Graceland with her father and in Beverly Hills with her mother. This arrangement continued until her father died on August 16, 1977, after which she lived exclusively in Beverly Hills. When her father died, Lisa became joint-heir to his estate with her grandfather Vernon Presley, and her great grandmother Minnie Mae Presley. Following the deaths of Vernon in 1979 and Minnie Mae in 1980, Lisa became the sole heir and inherited Graceland. On Feb. 1 1993, her 25th birthday, she inherited that estate, which has grown to an estimated $100 million. On April 8, 2003, Presley released her debut album, To Whom It May Concern.
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Thomas "Hitman" Hearns is a retired American boxer. Nicknamed the "Motor City Cobra" and more famously "The Hitman", Hearns became the first boxer... in history to win world titles in four divisions. He would also become the first fighter in history to win five world titles in five different divisions. Hearns was named Ring Magazine fighter of the year in 1980 and 1984 and is best known for his fights with Sugar Ray Leonard, Marvin Hagler and Roberto Duran. Born in Grand Junction, Tennessee on October 18, 1958, Hearns was the youngest of three children in his mother's first marriage. With her second marriage, six children joined the first three. On her own, Mrs. Hearns raised Tommy and his siblings in Grand Junction until Tommy was five years old, and then the family moved to Detroit, Michigan. Hearns had an amateur record of 155–8. In 1977, he won the National Amateur Athletic Union Light Welterweight Championship, defeating Bobby Joe Young of Steubenville, Ohio, in the finals. He also won the 1977 National Golden Gloves Light Welterweight Championship.
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Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul,... Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its "100 Greatest Singers of All Time" list, as well as the ninth greatest artist of all time. She has won 18 competitive Grammys and two honorary Grammys. She has 20 No.1 singles on the Billboard R&B Singles Chart and two No.1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100: "Respect" and "I Knew You Were Waiting " , a duet with George Michael. Since 1961, she has scored a total of 45 Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Between 1967 and 1982 she had 10 No.1 R&B albums—more than any other female artist. In 1987, Franklin became the first female artist to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Aretha Louise Franklin was born in a two-room house in Memphis, Tennessee, at 406 Lucy Street. She was the third of four children born to Barbara and C.L. Franklin and the fifth of six overall in between past relationships by her parents.
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Robert Benedic "Ben" Browder is an American actor and writer, best known for his roles as John Crichton in Farscape and Cameron Mitchell in Stargate... SG-1. Born in Memphis, Tennessee, Browder grew up in Charlotte, North Carolina. His parents were race car owners and operators. He attended Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina and graduated with a degree in psychology. He was a star player on the Furman football team. Browder met his wife, actress Francesca Buller, while studying at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. Browder appeared as a recurring guest on the U.S. television show Party of Five as Sam Brody in its 3rd season in 1997. Browder and Buller moved with their two children to Australia during the production of Farscape , on which Browder starred as American astronaut John Crichton. Buller played several guest roles on the show. The two returned to the United States in 2003 following the cancellation of Farscape. He has received two Saturn Awards for Best Actor In A Television Role for his acting in Farscape. He appeared in the 2004 movie A Killer Within, co-starring C. Thomas Howell and Sean Young.
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