Backlit

“Backlit from a gold moon this night

I hear lake-wave loud as seas

Off a breaker-wall, like slipping gravel”

         William K. Buckley, “Backlit: Lake Michigan 2003”

 from Tennessee band Backlit's Facebook

When I talk to Steve McShane’s Indiana History students about their oral history assignment – interviewing a duplicate bridge player and then keeping a journal of their subsequent correspondence – I’ll give them copies of my “Ides of March 2003” Steel Shavings (volume 36, 2005), titled “Backlit.”  The word means illuminated from behind, and in 2005 there was an Ohio band by that name.  Searching Google, I found no trace but discovered a Tennessee rock group called Backlit that formed in 2009.  Wonder if any Ohio band members are in it.

 Catrina Pierce in 2017

Perusing the Index of volume 36, which includes student ID mugshots, I still remembered many contributors. Sheridan Halberstadt, the daughter of good friends Jef and Robin, wrote “Holy Rollers and Tongue Talkers,” about a weekend visit to a religious college she attended the previous semester.  Edwina “Eddie” Aponte had a sweet jump shot playing for the IUN Lady Redhawks.  Charles Mubarak was an A+ History major and hoped to become a lawyer but struggled to pass a required math class.  Shirley Starkey invited me to several subsequent Christmas holiday parties.  Joe Hengstler was in Planetary Blues, a band out of Valparaiso, which still exists but, sadly, without Hengstler.  I made use of numerous journals in a section of “Gary’s First Hundred Years” that epitomizes my finding value in social history from the bottom up.  Here’s an example:

  Methodist Hospital receptionist and switchboard operator Catrina Pierce went shopping at Rainbow Fashion Cents and A.J. Wright in Village Shopping Center.  The six-foot IUN student was going clubbing in Chicago that night and in a journal wrote: “Around ten I put on a baby blue two-piece skirt outfit with a white shirt that ties up in front and white knee-high boots.  I was looking sharp.”  After dancing at Secrets, she and two friends stopped at Skate World at Tri-City Plaza, which featured a deejay and adult skating from midnight until5 am.  Arriving 15 minutes till closing, they checked out the scene and then left.

 Marie in 2016

In the “Ides of March issue” is a journal I kept in 2003.  In the Editor’s Note I wrote: “Is Clio, the muse of history, truly served, one might legitimately ask, by diary notations of a 61-year-old’s favorite musical groups (WILCO and Sonic Youth)?  Or by reprinting the profane chorus to 2003’s most provocative hit by 50 Cent (‘You can find me in the club, bottle full of bub . . . so come give me a hug if you into getting rubbed’)?  Call me jaded, but from my perspective as a social historian who came of age intellectually during the Sixties, I see merit in this.”  On March 4, I recorded that Marie Grosskurth returned from Mardi Gras with a necklace for me that someone on a float tossed to her. Marie’s journal mentioned being at the Roadhouse in Valpo, where Dave’s band Voodoo Chili often played, when President George W, Bush appeared on TV to read a belligerent ultimatum to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein.   The next night Grosskurth and friends checked out Club O, a strip joint in Illinois.  I wrote:

  Marie’s cousin Anne Marie wrote a memoir about being arrested for underage drinking.  She believes Portage cops mistreated her because she is part Filipino.  More likely, heavy-handed tactics stemmed from her simply being a teenager.  Marie is friends with “A” student Shelley Welden, who is juggling school, work, and being a single parent but has the pluck I think, to go places.  I wish her good fortune, but the odds are against her.  In a civilized country, like Sweden, she’d be helped out in her plight.

at European market; photos by Kim Pickert

Nephew Beamer Pickert arrived with wife Kim and five-year-old Nico, making the 12-hour trip from Thurmont, Maryland in a single day.  Dave’s family joined us for Thai food; while others went for a walk, Tom Wade came over and we taught Beamer Machi Koro, the first of numerous board games enjoyed over the next 24 hours, including Lost Cities, Exploding Kittens, and a version of Clue based on Game of Thrones.  Saturday, at Chesterton’s European market, Nico loved petting dogs, playing by the water fountain, and tipping street musicians.  He purchased a four-dollar flute and played a duet with an accordion player.

 Javi Baez slides home safe

With WGN cameramen capturing U.S. Navy Blue Angels from the Chicago Air Show flying overhead, the Cubs won a weird extra-inning game against the Blue Jays. After Toronto scored two runs in the top of the tenth, in between a hit batsman both Kyle Schwarber and Javier Baez struck out only to reach first on passed balls.  Baez stole second and scored the winning run with a spectacular slide after recent acquisition Alex Avila stroked a sharp single to right.

 Richard Russo

In “Trajectory” novelist Richard Russo, 68, wrote with humor and pathos about men in their sixties dealing with illness, retirement, loss of sexual vigor, memory impairment, and other crises of impending old age. All four stories contain a colleague, friend, brother, uncle or some other relative who is an overbearing blowhard. Rehashing weekend highlights with Gaard Murphy Logan, I recommended “Trajectory,” knowing that she’d enjoyed Russo’s “That Old Cape Magic” and that one story takes place in her native state of Maine.  She promised to add it to an already formidable list.

 Grace Teuscher on way to Bowling Green, KY, to see the eclipse

Chancellor William Lowe and IUN student look at eclipse through telescope

Exiting IUN’s library to join eclipse watchers at Moraine quad, I first was disappointed at the apparently cloudy day, but the sun was out!  The university had provided telescopes, binoculars, and glasses with special filters that folks shared after all had been taken. Chris Young was there with his entire family.  It was the first day of Fall semester, and Chancellor Lowe marveled at the free entertainment.  Students were taking backlit selfies with the eclipse providing the background.

I sent Steel Shavings, volume 46, to IU Executive Vice President for University Academic Affairs John S. Applegate and mentioned in an email that he’s in it.  He replied: “Uh oh! J.”  My July 11, 2016, blog entry reads: “Mark McPhail resigned as Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs after his attempts to implement policies mandated by the Indiana Higher Education Commission and endorsed by John Applegate, IU Executive Vice President for University Academic Affairs, were continually undermined by IUN’s powerful ‘Old Boy’ network.” 

I received an email from Emiliano Aguilar (above), a PhD student at Northwestern who while writing a seminar paper at Wabash College came across Ed Escobar and my book “Forging a Community: The Latino Experience in Northwest Indiana: 1919-1975.”   He’s looking for a thesis topic dealing with Latinos from Northwest Indiana.  I invited him to come to the Calumet Regional Archives and added:

One possibility for your paper might be “The Arredondos: A Family’s Journey.”  “Maria’s Journey” by Ramon and Trisha Arredondo has an introduction by distinguished historian John Bodnar attesting to its importance, but basically concentrates on the matriarch rather than her many offspring, who have been quite successful.  Several, including former Judge Lorenzo Arredondo, are available to be interviewed. You could do a study about cultural retentions based on the family over several generations.  I’d make “Maria’s Journey” (I wrote the Foreword and helped edit it) a high reading priority.