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Loose Keys, Odd Honorees

Deciding who gets a key to the city is an interesting mayoral exercise.

Since the days of walled medieval cities, there has been no higher honor that a municipality can bestow upon a person than to present him with a key to the city. It is a symbol of friendship and respect, typically given to dignitaries--both foreign and domestic--and to important members of the community. In most places, keys are not dispensed liberally or lightly--perhaps no more than a dozen a year.

Then there's Hazard, Kentucky. Last year, this small town in Appalachian coal country, gave out 400 keys to the city. Mind you, 1999 was somewhat unusual--President Clinton visited in July and his whole entourage got keys--but even in a normal year, Hazard gives out 250 or so. Beachler Enterprises, one of several manufacturers who supply keys in bulk, says Hazard is its biggest customer. Bill Gorman, Hazard's mayor for 23 years, admits he doesn't like to be stingy with the keys. "Everybody from the Pope on down has a key to the city from Hazard," he says.

While Gorman is a friendly man, it is more than his generous nature that leads him to hand out the seven-inch brass keys so freely. He uses the keys as an economic development tool, a gesture to out-of- town guests--especially ones that are thinking of locating a business in Hazard--that they will remember. To make the experience even more memorable, he dubs nearly all guests with the title "Duke" or "Dutchess" of Hazard. (Never mind that the TV show was set in a fictional part of Georgia.) Even Britain's Queen Elizabeth is a Dutchess of Hazard.

Although Mayor Gorman boasts about the new businesses that Hazard has snagged in recent years, there's no evidence that their decisions are attributable to a $9 brass key, which, by the way, doubles as a bottle opener.

Generally speaking, city mayors tend to exercise more discretion and even make their keys intentionally scarce, so as to preserve the sanctity of the honor. Of course, foreign dignitaries almost always get keys: The Governor of the Mexican state of Jalisco picked up a key on a recent trip to Oxnard, California. Some are reserved for local citizens: Dayton, Ohio, gave keys to two elderly citizens this past New Year's for living in three centuries. A lot go to hometown heroes who made it big: In March, country music singer Chely Wright got a key from Wellsville, Kansas, where she grew up.

While big-city mayors may skimp on quantity when it comes to handing out keys, they seem to have a corner on quirkiness. Last Christmas, Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer gave a key to the city to Santa Claus, who was said to be bringing Detroit many gifts, including two new sports stadiums. New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani gave keys to the cast of "The Sopranos," a television series about mobsters that he says he finds "amusing." He also gave a key to soap opera star Susan Lucci when she finally won a Daytime Emmy Award for best actress on her 19th nomination.

But the quickest way to get a key to the Big Apple, it seems, is to either throw or hit a baseball exceptionally well. Home-run heavyweight Sammy Sosa, who doesn't even play in New York, received a key from Giuliani. Each of the New York Yankees got a key after winning the World Series in 1996, 1998 and 1999. Yankee pitcher David Cone, who got another key after pitching a perfect game last year, now has four of them.

Indeed, it is difficult to go wrong by giving someone--anyone--a key, even if the process seems somewhat arbitrary. The real trouble lies in neglecting to give one to a distinguished visitor. After the NAACP's Freedom Dinner in Kansas City last October, the local chapter president was outraged that Kansas City failed to provide a key to the guest speaker, New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial. Calling the situation "embarrassing," Kansas City Mayor Kay Barnes issued a formal apology and insisted that the incident was the result of an administrative oversight, and not an intentional snub.

It's a mistake, you can be sure, that Hazard's Mayor Gorman would never make.

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