MAN ABOUT TOWN: Man about the Little City

By GEORGE SOUTHERN
Falls Church Times Staff

Twice I’ve poked fun at the City’s “branding initiative,” so I was pretty surprised when the Economic Development Authority nevertheless invited me to their grand unveiling of the new slogan for Falls Church: “The Little City.” Call them magnanimous.

However, I was in Charleston, SC, when word came down, so I missed the presentation. Later, during a call to our son, I asked if he had read about “The Small City” yet. “It’s Little City,” my wife corrected me.

I should remember that, because like commenters Scott Taylor and Barb Cram, I loved “The Little Engine That Could.” But I guess the brand engineers realized it would be a rip-off to call Falls Church “The Little City That Could.”

Driving home on I-95, I was attuned to city slogans. I never realized there were so many. New York’s “The Big Apple” is of course the best known, and then there’s New Orleans’s “The Big Easy.”

And then there’s Dunn. As we passed Dunn, NC, my wife, who normally is the least critical soul in the world, said, “Dunn – what kind of name is that for a town?” The Dunn city fathers must also have felt that Dunn lacked a certain something, because they too now have a slogan. The next billboard read:

DUNN – The Dump Truck Body Capital of the World

Who knew?

Next came Wilson, NC, with a slogan I committed to memory:

WHY just think about it
WHEN you can go there
WHERE exit 121
WILSON

Very alliterative, but – if you just think about it – is it really going to make anyone veer off onto exit 121 to explore wonderful Wilson?

I grew up in North Carolina, and the state had long promoted the slogan “Variety Vacationland.” But in 1969 our neighbor to the north blew that out of the water with “Virginia Is For Lovers,” followed by a red heart. That was cutting edge titillation for the time and it still works 40 years later. In 1977, New York City stole the idea with its “I (red heart) New York” logo.

But back to The Little City. I can understand where the slogan’s trying to go, and, indeed, I chose to live in Falls Church for its “littleness.” I long wondered why we didn’t call ourselves the Town of Falls Church. It just seems presumptuous for a municipality of 11,000 to call itself a city — like a little college that suddenly changes its name to a university.

Only recently did I learn that under an arcane Virginia state law we have to call ourselves a city because we’re not affiliated with a county. Meanwhile, the Town of Vienna, although a third larger than Falls Church City, gets to use a friendlier, cozier descriptor.

So while I’m big on “Little,” I’m not wild about “City.” The Man About Town is more of a, well, Town kind of guy. Ideally, Falls Church would be a village, but even I would agree that calling ourselves a village would be a ridiculous affectation.

And speaking of ridiculous, how about this:

That’s from the Smith-Gifford PowerPoint presentation. They want to rebrand the GEORGE bus, and they do have a point: GEORGE doesn’t identify with the City at all, unless you know that George Washington slept here. Arlington’s ART bus makes a lot more branding sense than GEORGE.

But The Little City bus? Can you envision our button-down bureaucrats boarding this magic bus to go to work? Will they wear Mickey Mouse Ears for the ride?

No, there’s just too much cutesiness about The Little City – especially with that festive script. Maybe that’s what the City Mother and Fathers dream of our being, but it’s just not us, and I don’t think it ever will be. Because it doesn’t take a Little City to raise a child.