MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Richard Ransom reporting:
Tonight's "Ransom Note": Memphis is once again getting no respect.
Yes, we have many challenges. But our music and our barbecue are at least two things we can be proud of.
And where is the world's first museum dedicated to the art of barbecue going? Kansas City.
The museum opens next spring. Billed as a place "where barbecue comes alive," it will feature the primary regions for barbecue, including Memphis, the Carolinas and Texas.
Nothing against Kansas City, but in this country, barbecue was started in the South by enslaved Americans.
They used pork - not beef - cause they had to. And that's just like how we make it here.
We're still smarting from the 1980s when they put the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.
And I'll never understand why the National Museum of African American music - which opened just three years ago - was built in Nashville.
In all three cases, those projects were built because each city found public and private dollars to build those projects - money we apparently don't have.
But don't lose hope, folks. As one commenter posted on Reddit, "Maybe someday Memphis will get a museum. The museum of missed opportunities."
What do you think? Join the conversation by emailing me at rransom@abc24.com or reach me on my social media.