“Watch the turtle. He only moves forward by sticking his neck
out.” Louis V. Gerstner. Jr.
Illustration by Arthur Rackham, 1912
IBM’s CEO for ten
years beginning in 1993, Louis V. Gerstner, Jr., wrote about his experiences
heading that venerable multinational corporation in “Who Says Elephants Can’t
Dance” (2002). The quote about the
turtle is both a Spanish and a Korean proverb and a take-off on a similar
statement by Harvard University president James Bryant Conant that began, “Behold the turtle.” Gerstner, an MBA from Harvard Business School,
may first have heard the adage there.
The saying, “Slow and steady wins
the race” is the moral of Aesop’s Fable about the Tortoise and the Hare,
where a confident rabbit lay down and napped while the turtle kept trudging
along and reached the finish line first.
As Maryland PhDs, Ray Smock and I sometimes referred to ourselves as
terrapins (the university mascot) or simply turtles.
Lightning over BP Refinery in Whiting; NWI Times photo by Jonathan Miano
As befitting the
end to the wettest June in memory, a thunderstorm swept through the Region
overnight, accompanied by tornedo warnings, knocking out power to thousands,
and leaving us without Comcast for a few hours.
I slept through it all but then noticed my bedside clock flickering,
evidence that we briefly lost power. The
pond by Bob Calvert’s place is so high the snapping turtles that he feeds are
coming up onto the pier.
On the fiftieth
anniversary of passage of the 1964 Civil Right Act Channel 56 correspondent
Hillary Powell interviewed me about race-relations in Northwest Indiana. A half-century ago Richard Hatcher took office
as an at-large Gary council member. Under
Mayor A. Martin Katz an omnibus civil rights ordinance outlawed discrimination
in employment, housing, schools, and public places. When I mentioned that Indianapolis mayor William
Hudnut was one of the few downstate officials that treated Hatcher with
respect, Hillary said she was from Indianapolis and had heard of him. I suggested she investigate the Anne Balay
case, one of the top local stories of 2014. Maybe she can get a shot of Anne driving a
16-wheeer. Powell stayed in the Archives
another hour or so examining old Post-Tribunes
and other materials. I impulsively
hugged her when she said good-bye, and she seemed pleasantly surprised. She was nicely dressed but her shoes looked uncomfortable;
I’d think she’d be forgiven for wearing something more practical, being that
she was a one-person crew, handling the camera as well as asking the questions.
Maurice Yancy said he
enjoyed my Senior College appearance in Steve McShane’s class. He read excerpts from a Rudy Kapitan interview,
about being in a Catholic seminary as a teenager. Rudy ultimately decided to leave in order, as
he put it, “to find out what life was
about. I’d never dated or held a girl’s
hand or kissed a girl. How am I going to
make a lifelong commitment to lead a celibate life?” Here’s the final paragraph that Maurice read:
“Telling my
parents was very difficult. I came close
to having a nervous breakdown. My
brother was in Massachusetts in the military.
I stayed with him for a month until I got letters urging me to ‘come on
home.’ I was positive I’d be going back
to the seminary but instead got married.
I became a teller in 1952 and stayed there 32 years. I raised sic children.”
Rudy was a gentle
soul whose autobiography we have in the Archives. Son Rudy, Jr., died tragically when a train
struck his car shortly after he left his parents’ house on his way to a Chicago
Bears game.
U.S. lost to
Belgium despite a heroic performance by goalkeeper Tim Howard, who has become a
media darling and even got a phone call from President Obama praising his
performance. Like the German win over
Algeria, the game was nil-nil until extended play and the final 2-1. The Americans, though thoroughly outplayed, had
a chance to win in the 88th minute and an excellent chance to score
a second goal in overtime.
In “A lovely day in
– Gary?” Josh Noel of the Chicago Tribune
wrote:
“Yes, Gary is a wounded city. But I ate well here. I met good people. I saw pristine nature. I drank first-rate local beer. I saw the house where Michael Jackson grew
up. I marveled at the city’s urban
ruins. I filled my gas tank for #3.89
per gallon. It was a well spent 12
hours.”
Noel described the
air as clean and the Lake Michigan shoreline as spectacular if one didn’t look
in either direction where factories spoil the view. He noted the $28 million renovation of
Marquette Park and ran into attorney Greg Reising, who provided the only sour
note of the day when asked whether the Aquatorium’s refurbishment could be seen
as a metaphor for Gary coming back from the brink. Reising said: “No, Gary is in continual decline.
I’ve been waiting for it to hit bottom for 50 years. I haven’t heard that thud yet.” If the 72 year-old curmudgeon was trying to be
funny, it did not come out that way in print.
above, Ethan and Isabella Ruddell; Marquette Park shots by Alex Garcia
At Miller Bakery
Café Noel chatted with City Council president Kyle Allen, who described the
columnist’s next stop - 2300 Jackson
Street – as in an old-timers’ neighborhood with many of the same families
residing there as when Michael was rehearsing with his older brothers in the
tiny bungalow. It’s safe, Allen told
him, adding: “Don’t believe everything
you read in the newspaper.” After interviewing
MJ fans and gaping at the ruins of City Methodist Church, abandoned for almost
40 years, Noel had a beer and sandwich at 18th Street Brewery before taking in
a Railcats baseball game. Leaving the
park, he heard over the loud speaker “ABC” by the Jackson 5. Noel offered readers “a piece of advice for your summer travel plans. Spend a day in Gary.”
top, photo by Colin Kern of his parents; below Rebecca Lane (r), photo by Sarah Moran
Deputy
superintendent Garry Trayham, subject of Jeff Manes’ column, is retiring soon
after a 37-year career with the National Park Service, including 17 at Indiana
Dunes National Lakeshore. Proud to have
exposed inner city kids to the diversity of he dunes environment, Trayham told
Manes:
“We have plants from
the arctic that meet plants from the desert in this location. Arctic bearberry
grows here in a small marsh and we have prickly pear cactus, which grows at
places like West Beach. We have more species of orchids than the state of
Hawaii. This a major viewing spot for migratory birds in the fall. We have
populations of deer, beaver, muskrat and coyote. There are a number of
different species that meet and cross here. We have the Karner blue butterfly
here, which is a threatened and endangered species. This is one of the few
places on the planet that they’re still left. It’s a special place and we just
want people to value it.”
The Post-Trib’s “Quickly” column contains
many comments about whther or not the newspaper is giving too much attention to
the controversy over same-sex marriage.
Several people have complained about photos on two men kissing and
someone accused Jerry Davich of “stirring
the pot” with his advocacy of everyone’s right to marry whomever he or she
pleased. A majority of respondents have
sided with him and accused the critics of being bigots.
On Amazon someone
has listed “Gary: A Pictorial History” for $373,208.34. I kid you not – somebody’s idea of a joke
(???!!!).
In Murrieta, CA,
protestors chanting “Deport, Deport!” and “Impeach Obama” prevented three buses
carrying immigrants, mostly children, from reaching a processing station. In the past eight months authorities have
picked up approximately 52,000 unaccompanied children, most from El Salvador,
Guatemala, and Honduras. Comparing the action to keeping Jewish refugees out 75
years ago and repeating lines (“Give me
your tire, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free”) from
Emma Lazarus’ poem “New Colossus” that are on a Statue of Liberty plaque,
Samuel A. Love observed: “The Amerikkkan
way.”
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