The Julian Price-Xpress connection

Posted on by Meg MacLeod
Asheville resident Julian Price (left), shown here with David Quinn, gave his time, energy and money to revitalize downtown.

In the early 1990s, Julian Price and Jeff Fobes began working together to transform Jeff’s tiny monthly eco-newspaper called Green Line into the snappy, colorful, popular weekly — chock-full of local news and features — that we know today as Mountain Xpress.

The Xpress offered Julian a place to express his quirky, contrarian outlook via various articles and op-eds on subjects ranging from pornography to spousal abuse to poorly timed pedestrian crosswalks.

Julian’s relationship to Jeff, along with his being able to express himself freely to the public in the forum of Green Line-turned-Mountain Xpress was a much-needed anchor for Julian. Jeff and the Xpress helped him to remain in Asheville and to continue believing in himself and in his work here, despite his many dark fears and doubts.

InterPlay leader Meg MacLeod was Julian’s wife and a co-conspirator in his work. Currently she is collaborating with others on the Julian Price Project to illustrate Julian’s values and strategies, which helped make downtown livable for everyone and to inspire impassioned activists. Interested? Contact megfrolic@yahoo.com.

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4 thoughts on “The Julian Price-Xpress connection”

  1. Anne Craig

    Julian did so much for Asheville and yet he seems to still be unrecognized by our community. I would hope that someday, a park or a greenway or a restored building is named for him with a placard about his contributions.

    • Jeff Fobes

      Hi Anne: it seems to me that the most important thing is that we, as a people, learn from the past — both our successes and failures. Julian played a big part in our past– but I’ll bet he would dislike formal recognitions. My hat is off to him and I imagine him giving us his wry smile in return.

      • Anne Craig

        Hi Jeff ~ you knew him and I only knew him to say hello to, so you definitely know better. We need to know our past to appreciate and learn from it. And, I sometimes think that all the people who move here now because Asheville is what it now is, should learn how it got that way. At least our library should have articles of some of his contributions which I trust they do.

        • Jeff Fobes

          UNCA does have a special collection for Julian Price materials. And I hope the upcoming issues of Xpress will help explore how Asheville evolved!

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