Rocks in the Road

“There will always be rocks in the road ahead of us. They will be stumbling blocks or stepping stones; it all depends on how you use them.” Friedrich Nietzsche

Steve McShane

With very little warning word came that the Calumet Regional Archives (my campus home) has to be moved from our quarters on the third floor of the library.  Here’s Steve McShane’s recap of this bombshell:

  Our library director, Latrice Booker, called an “emergency” staff meeting, concerning the library renovation project.  We knew our library building was scheduled for a replacement of its mechanical systems, aka Heating, Ventilation, and Cooling this winter/spring and that the new mechanical system equipment would be installed in the northwest corner of the 3rd floor, rather than on the roof (sounds crazy, but that's the plan).  We learned that the contractors and facilities people want the entire 3rd floor vacated—books, furniture, computers, and, yes, people.  No one, except contractors, tradesmen, and facilities staff would be allowed on the 3rd floor beginning the first week of January and until sometime in the month of May (but today, we learned the project could extend to Fall semester). There will be no heat, no ventilation, no power, no computers/computer access.  There will be wires hanging down, ceilings torn out, and other construction debris and equipment.  I’m uncertain if I will even be allowed up there.  Of course, they’re concerned about safety and liability. 

  On Thursday, I took about a dozen contractors and facilities people, both locally and from Bloomington through the CRA and explained that the materials really shouldn’t be moved but rather protected with tarp over the shelving, but they were non-committal.   I asked Gary Greiner, the head of our campus Physical Plant department, if they had a plan to deal with the Archives in this project.  He just smiled and said they’re working on it.  I again stressed to Gary that I'd really prefer not to move the CRA off of the third floor.  There is just too much material, and I can't picture it going anywhere.  After the meeting, I walked Vicki (our VCAA) and Latrice through the CRA, to show them what an impossible task it would be. Vicki expressed concern that the contractors will have some flammable equipment, such as welders, which could spark and start a fire.  I confess I hadn't thought of that.  Latrice suggested that one option might be to move stuff temporarily to the second floor and then back again, doing so in phases.  I'm willing to consider it.

Sigh! Steve did secure three second floor carrels, including one for me, so I’ll have my computer, phone, a bookcase, and enough space for a desk and table.  Moving everything in the Archives elsewhere will be a gigantic task.  One possible option: a building on Grant Street occupied by the Fine Arts department for decade after the 2008 flood caused Tamarack to be condemned and until completion of the Arts and Sciences Building. By week’s end, with much help from Evar and Cortez from Physical Plant and Larry from Tech Services, I moved into my new carrel.  I made a dozen trips with light items and still left a few things behind.

Just as the library Holiday luncheon was about to begin, the fire alarm forced everyone to evacuate the building and not use the elevator.  I had to walk up to the third floor for my coat and then walk down two flights. While outside I asked Kathy Malone why the IUN choir would not perform at next year’s Holiday party.  Unbelievably, someone complained, about the song selection I suppose.  I told her the “12 Days of Christmas” singalong was the reason many people attend.  Three emeritus professors in the choir might cease attending without that motivation. Many others have urged Kathy to reconsider.

I pigged out on chicken wings, salad from Olive Garden, an assortment of raw veggies, and a tamale, plus several deserts. Librarian Latrice Booker invited the work-study students and planned some games.  The event lasted several hours; as I left to go home around 3:30, folks were striving to throw ping pong balls into cups and singing karaoke from their cell phones.  Megan Reinle started performing a lively number, so I sat on a stool and did hand-jive moves while swaying to the beat.

It was good to see retired librarians Tim Sutherland and Cele Morris, the latter interviewed by one of Steve’s students about her bowling days.  Before she left, I retrieved a copy of Steel Shavings,volume 43, for her that mentions her husband, physicist John Morris’ retirement reception, at which Dean Mark Hoyert delivered a hilarious recital of titles to some of John’s more abstruse scholarly articles.  On the cover was a photo of Anne Balay’s “Steel Closets”; the back cover contained a shot of Anne taken from the back wearing a “Steel Closets” jacket and the inscription, “Thanks for eight exciting years.” I noted that my vehement protest over Balay being denied tenure caused the university to disassociate itself from the magazine for two years.  The low point came after I made a case to the Faculty Board of Review that judging Balay’s service contributions inadequate was a travesty.  A day later, a patently untrue rumor circulated that I had called Dean Hoyert a homophobe.  One ridiculous story even had it that I uttered “homophobe” as Hoyert passed me in the hallway.  A fellow Marylander, Hoyert knew I respected him too much to stoop to such a level.

 Mark Hoyert

There has not been an Arts and Sciences Holiday party since Hoyert’s assistants Diane Robinson and Dorothy Grier retired, due in part to budget cuts and silly rules about not serving food from outside sources.  Hoyert shined at those events, often singing a familiar song with lyrics referring humorously to recent division doings.

From a Christmas card I learned that Beverly Arnold, wife of high school friend, will need yet another heart operation. I’ve never met her but we’ve frequently talked on the phone.  She has already overcome great odds and is a fighter.  My former bridge partner Dee Van Bebber, in her late 80s, is in hospice care.  Her son-in-law answered my phone call and reported (ominously) that she is resting comfortably. Her daughter read my recent email to her.

“Laverne and Shirley” star Penny Marshall passed away at age 75.  With a few exceptions, I’ve never been a big fan of sitcoms but could appreciate Marshall’s zany brand of slapstick reminiscent of Lucille Ball.  Of course,  I loved “A League of Their Own,” which she directed, with Geena Davis, Madonna, and Rosie O’Donnell cast as World War II-era baseball players.  The film contains the famous Tom Hanks line, “There’s no crying in baseball!”

At Chesterton library I checked out “Heirs to the Founders: The Epic Rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun, and Daniel Webster” by H.W. Brand.  The three statesmen represented the West, South, and Northeast respectively and strove to find ways to deal the two great issues left unresolved by the Founding Fathers: slavery and federal sovereignty versus states rights. ” In the library’s video room I found a Kurt Vile CD, “Wakin’ on a Pretty Daze.”  Nephew Bob, a fellow War on Drugs fan, knew that Vile was one its founders and was familiar with Vile’s current hit “Loading Zones.” Two bands he recommended I check out are Caamp and the Tesky Brothers.

Dave Serynek arranged a mini-reunion for members of Porter Acres softball team at Flamingo’s in Miller.  Omar Farag arrived wearing a Santa hat, having come from several appearances as St. Nick, and the bar patrons made a big fuss. One glorious year four decades ago, we were Woodlawn Park league champions. Several guys remembered umpire Chuck Tomes, who I see at duplicate bridge.  Sam Johnston asked how IUN librarian “Annie” Koehler was doing. They’re both Izaak Walton members, but their building in Portage burned down two years ago.  He lamented that his one claim to immortality, a photo of members of an undefeated Babe Ruth youth league team sponsored by the chapter, was lost in the fire. I reminded him of a Porter Acres team photo in a Shavingsissue.  About a dozen of us vacationed in the Bahamas, during which his nickname became “the Bahama llama.”

After we checked into our ritzy Bahamian hotel, a greeter ended her welcome spiel by asking, “Any questions?”Paulie’s hand went up, and he asked if she could get us another pitcher of the rum punch. Upon learning that beer cost five bucks, we found a liquor store selling cases, no matter what brand, for $24.  We spent the week drinking Heineken.

Everyone had favorite anecdotes.  Once, when we defeated a team comprised of motorcycle club members, they wanted to fight us in the parking lot.  Omar got them to party with us instead.  Centerfielder Tom Byerman often showed up for games half-tanked.  One evening an opponent was a player short, so a spectator filled in.  I struck him out the first two times, a rarity in slow-pitch softball.  Next time he came to bat, Byerman strode all the way to the infield despite my protestations.  The guy hit a line drive over Byerman’s head.  After the ball was already past him, he threw his glove in the air but didn’t even turn to run after it.  At the Playboy casino a security guard spotted someone in our group smoking a joint in the courtyard.  First he ridiculed itds punt size, then threatened stiff jail time, and finally demanded $25 a person.  My family was walking along the beach and escaped the shakedown.

It was Ivan Jasper’s birthday, so we left a message on his phone.  He was our leader, and the team disbanded after he moved to the Virgin Islands.  We all had Ivan stories.  In our banner years we played in a Woodlawn Park tournament that included all classes. Against a team clearly our superior with me on the mound, we held a 7-3 lead, amazingly, going into the seventh. In the top of the inning they tied the score. It would have been worse except for spectacular plays by both Paulie and Ivan.  In the bottom of the seventh, I got a hit and was on second with two outs.  The next better got a hit to left, and Ivan, coaching third, indicated I should stop there.  I ran home anyway, knowing we’d get slaughtered in extra innings. A good throw would have nailed me, but the ball skipped by the catcher.  We won, but Ivan was still furious at my disobeying him.

 Paulie, David, Jimbo, Omar, Sam, Rocky at Flamingo's

Everyone had favorite anecdotes.  Once, when we defeated a team comprised of motorcycle club members, they wanted to fight us in the parking lot.  Omar invited them to party with us instead, and they agreed.  Centerfielder Tom Byerman often showed up for games half-tanked. One evening we went against an excellent team that was a player short, so they got a spectator to fill in who I struck out the first two times up, a rarity in slow-pitch softball.  Next time he came to bat, Byerman came all the way in to the infield despite my protestations.  This time the guy hit a line drive over Byerman’s head.  After the ball was already past him, he threw his glove in the air but didn’t even turn to run after it.

 James Madison

When Omar brought up Trump in disgust, the rest of us agreed not to talk about him.  He said, “No more than 5 minutes,”and someone immediately replied, “Five minutes are up.”  As Trump recklessly vows to shut down the government if Congress won’t appropriate 5 billion dollars for his stupid wall, Ray Smock wrote:

James Madison’s famous quotation from a letter he wrote in 1822 is relevant at this time in our history when we are bombarded with falsehoods and when we have been denied information to help us understand what is going on. This is what Madison wrote:  “A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.”

I ended the day with a couple LaBatt Blues and listening to Kurt Vile’s “Wakin’ on a Pretty Daze,” which includes the track “Never Run Away.”  When Steve McShane first broke the news about the Archives needing to relocate, he joked, “Maybe I’ll take early retirement.”  Steve’s steady hand and expertise will prove invaluable as we begin a year of uncertainty with rocks in the road ahead.  I countered, “Maybe we can look at this as an opportunity for expansion and better temperature control of our facilities.” He reacted with a faint attempt at a smile.  But we’re carrying on.  “Never Run Away.”  True both for beloved colleagues and loved ones.

Loading Zones

“I park for free

One stop shop life for the quick fix

Before you get a ticket

That’s the way I live my life

I park for free.”

Kurt Vile

 Kurt Vile

Kurt Vile, 38, was born in Lansdowne, Pennsylvania, and like members of the War on Drugs, my favorite band,  has spent most of his career in the Fishtown neighborhood of Philadelphia near where Toni grew up.  In fact, along with Adam Granduciel, he was a founder of the War on Drugs but parted ways after the release of their first album, “Wagonwheel Blues” (2008). The two remained friends, however, and Granduciel continued to play with Vile’s backing band, the Violators, for another five years. “Loading Zones,” my current favorite song, is on the album “Bottle It In.”  Vile explained: “The original inspiration to this song was me literally driving around my own town of Philadelphia, thinking about how, in your mind, or in real life, you own your town once you’ve lived there long enough.”  After complaining how difficult it is to park legally in the “City of Brotherly Love,” he added: “[But] there’s all kinds of loading zones you can creep around in. And it’s also sort of just a way of life. It’s sort of like a ‘Sopranos,’ gettin by on the back streets–except no murder.”  Vile’s previous hit, “Pretty Pimpin’,” begins:“I woke up this morning and didn’t recognize the man in the mirror.”  

At my emeritus office in the new Arts and Sciences building I picked up a week’s accumulation of mail, something I do infrequently.  There is no elevator in the south end of the two-block long building, where my room is, and the 30 steps to the second floor are tough on the knee.  In addition, there is no parking anywhere near the north entrance except for a loading zone. I do occasionally park there on quick stops, popping the trunk of the Corolla as if I’ll be loading something into it when I return.   Awaiting for me in my office were four pieces of mail: a permission slip from former trustee James Dye that allows access to our recent interview; two copies from John Cain of South Shore Arts of the “Gary Haunts” exhibit booklet that contains my historical essay; an announcement and thank you note from Scott Bocock of the Cedar Lake Historical Society (I evidently became a member automatically when I spoke to the group); and a package containing Steel Shavings, volume 47, that I had sent to Steven High at Concordia University in Montreal.  The post office returned it because it didn’t contain a required customs form.  WTF?

above, Joe Petras; below, Dick Hagelberg, Jimbo, Steve Spicer (photo by Jim Spicer) 

On Saturday I took James bowling and to Culver’s.  His English class is reading “Great Expectations” by Charles Dickens, not a book I’d recommend for teenagers.  At noon I attended Big Joe Petras’ Marquette Park Playground fundraiser at Miller Bakery Café, an event that has previously been held at Arman’s and Miller Pizza.  Over the years Big Joe has raised thousands of dollars.  I ran into many old Miller friends, including Jim and Steve Spicer, Jack Tonk, Dan Simon, Ron Cohen, Rich Gonzalez, and Dick Hagelberg, who treated me to a pint draft from Eighteenth Street Brewery, first located in Miller but now in Hammond. I was home in time for the IU victory over Butler, 71 to 68, in the Crossroads Classic on a last-second 30-foot miracle shot by freshman Rob Phinisee (below).  The Hoosiers trailed until the final two minutes, but Juwan Morgan kept them in the game with 35 points, a career high.

Sunday I made French toast and bacon, watched the morning news shows, addressed about 70 Christmas cards, and watched my two favorite NFL teams the Chicago and the Philadelphia, win important games from Green Bay and the L.A. Rams respectively, the Bears to clinch the NFC Central and the Eagles to keep their playoff hopes alive.  The only fly in the ointment: I got eliminated in the Fantasy semi-finals as Houston running back Lamar Miller was injured early in his game with the Jets, my starting QB Carson Wentz didn’t play, and backup Nick Foles hardly ever threw to my tight end Zach Ertz.  Had I played either Dalvin Cook of Minnesota or Chris Carson of Seattle in place of Miller, I’d have won.  As it was, I’d have beaten any of the other semi-finalists.

At the Archives two Ball State grad students, Carrie Vachon and Nick Miller, were working on a grant project to create a virtual museum on the history of civil rights in Indiana.  They were very interested in my publications, especially the Gary pictorial history and my Tracesarticle on Reverend L.K. Jackson.  I suggested several sources on Mexican Americans and referred them to these documentaries: an “Eyes on the Prize II” episode highlighting the 1972 National Civil Rights Convention at Gary West Side High School; “Hoosiers: The Story of Indiana,” based on Jim Madison’s book; John Hmurovich’s “History of Gary”; and an episode of the WFYI series “Across Indiana” on Mexican Repatriation.

 left, Alex Karras; below, Dick the Bruiser

I ran into Mike Chirich, a Lew Wallace grad, and we talked about Gary sports history. He played junior varsity football and recalled legendary Coach Eddie Herbert.  We traded stories about Alex Karras, whom I wrote about for a Traces article and whom I interviewed by telephone shortly before he died.  Suffering from Alzheimer’s, he joked that I could call him the next day and we could have the same conversation since he wouldn’t remember the one we just had. Chirich knew about the Detroit sports bar that Karras had a financial interest in, where he evidently placed bets on games, causing the NFL commissioner in 1963 to suspend him from playing for a year.  During that time he became a professional wrestler and supposedly got into a bar fight with Dick the Bruiser (William Afflis, a former Green Bay Packers lineman) shortly before their scheduled match. According to Chirich, Dick the Bruiser was taken to jail supposedly bleeding from the head due to being struck by a pool stick.  Karras visited him, and “The Bruiser” bragged that the publicity should bring about a full house for the match.

 Janet Jackson, Robert Smith of The Cure, Stevie Nicks

2019 inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame include Gary’s own Janet Jackson as well as The Cure and Radiohead, all deserving.  Others include Def Leppard, Roxy Music, Stevie Nicks, and the Zombies, a Sixties British band whose hits include “She’s Not There” and “Time of the Season.”  

Welcome Initiatives

“Time to get up

Time to go to class

Time to tell bigots who bother me

To kiss my ass.”

         “Time,” Morning Bishop (1979)

Morning Aarona Bishop moved to Gary in 1967 and after raising more than a half-dozen kids graduated from IU Northwest in 1980 at age 38.  A few years later, she founded a children’s theater troupe at the YMCA, which became the Morning Bishop Theatre Playhouse.  Bishop also directed productions with adults at a variety of Gary locations.  Thanks to numerous grants, she was able to find a permanent home on Lake Street in Miller beginning in 2004.  Morning Bishop Dilworth passed away in 2015, and as her obituary stated, “she was a wife, mother, advocate, and complete community force.”

The NEH (National Endowment for the Humanities) awarded Liz Wuerffel and Allison Schuette (above) a hundred-thousand dollar grant for their Welcome Project initiative, “Flight Paths: Mapping Our Changing Neighborhoods.”  They are partnering with nine area organizations, including IUN’s Calumet Regional Archives.  The project, in their words, will feature “a multi-media initiative  to help users engage and analyze factors contributing to de-industrialization and the fracturing of neighborhoods, communities, and regions in post-industrial America.”  They conclude: “Flight Paths will prove an invaluable source to anyone who wants to understand why – fully 50 years after the height of the modern Civil Rights movement – the extent of both racial segregation and racial inequality in the United States remains as jaw-dropping as ever.”

Jimbo and Ron at Lake St. Gallery book signing; on left is Ken Schoon

Ron Cohen arranged for VU History professor Heath Carter and I to have lunch with him in Miller, and we ended up at Bakery Café after finding Captain’s House closed.  We talked about ways area History departments have periodically cooperated in the past (unfortunately, not much) and future possibilities. I have spoken in Heath Carter’s class on the Civil Rights movement in Northwest Indiana and offered to talk about Jacob A. Riis in an upcoming one covering settlement houses during the Progressive Era.  In the Spring Carter also has a seminar on Trump’s America, which will trace past Evangelical and populist movements and compare the present administration with previous presidents.  With Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen and National Enquirerbuddy David Pecker plea bargaining with regard to paying hush money to  porn star Stormy Daniels and a Playboyplaymate Karen McDougal, it would be ironic if the House of Representatives brought impeachment charges against him on matters of sex, as Republicans did with Clinton.  I hope lawmakers concentrate on more important matters (actual “high crimes”) in regard to Russian interference in the 2016 election.

 Karen McDougal

At Chesterton Y I partnered in bridge with octogenarian Dee Browne for the first time, and we did well despite being unfamiliar with each other’s tendencies. There were five and a half tables.  After having very few biddable hands, the round we sat out we’d have had a grand slam.  Several top area players competed, including life master Trudi McKamey and Dave Bigler, who thanked me for the DVD copy of our interview and is making one for his grandson.   My best hand was when I doubled a 4-Heart bid (I held five Hearts including the Ace King as Dee was void in them), which went down four, earning us 800 points for high board.  Barbara Mort, learning that Toni plays but doesn’t like duplicate, invited us to her place on a Monday evening when she and Kris Prohl deal out practice hands. Toni promised to consider it after the holidays.

above, Billy Foster; below, Tanice Foltz and Bonnie Neff

I was disappointed that jazz pianist Billy Foster did not play at IUN’s Holiday party, but at least the choir re-assembled for a fifth year under Kathy Malone’s direction.  With Rick Hug indisposed, its lone male member was retired Education professor Ken Schoon.  Once again, the highlight was audience participation for “12 Days of Christmas.” On the seats were slips of paper instructing what you’d represent; mine read“2 Turtle Doves,”meaning that on 11 occasions, I was to stand and sing that line. Old pro David Parnell coached me on how to bob my head in a pecking motion.  Near us Sociologists Chuck Gallmeier and Kevin McElmurry twirled as they belted out “A partridge in a pear tree”a dozen different times.  Will Radell was leading a group of swans a swimming, while choir members were acting out all the verses, Tanice Foltz most expressively. Afterwards I chatted with historians Jonathyne Briggs and Diana Chen-Lin; both have daughters in college that I first met as young kids.  Chancellor Bill Lowe noted, “I see that you’re wearing a tie,”and I replied, “Yes, it matches my sneakers.”  It’s part of our yearly routine since at a previous Holiday celebration he quipped that my tie went with my sneakers. When Garrett Cope was in charge of arrangements, the event was held in the Savannah gym and featured entertainment by Gary high school choral groups. Now downsized, it takes place in the conference center, and few faculty attend.  The food was plentiful, and I took two beef sandwiches and two brownies home for Toni’s dinner.

 scene in "Blue Velvet"

Neither Alan Barr nor George Bodmer attended despite the former having retired this semester, which just ended, at age 79 and the latter scheduled to depart in the spring.  Doug Swartz quipped that he’ll soon be the old man in the English department.  Each previous spring, Barr has taught a film class. A couple years ago, I audited one on erotic movies and saw such notable classics as “Sex, Lies, and Videotape” (1989) and “Hiroshima Mon Amour” (1960).  I recall Alan telling the students that most worthwhile films are made outside the United States.  A critique was due each week, and Alan wanted them succinct, thematic, and original rather than a lengthy summary of what happened or what other reviewers thought. Barr liked my essay about a scene in David Lynch’s nightmarish “Blue Velvet” (1986) where drug dealer Dean Stockwell is lip-synching to Roy Orbison’s sorrowful lament “In Dreams” (about a lover existing only in one’s sleep) while crazy Dennis Hopper mouths the words nearby and a man dances with a snake.

 Barr (white shirt) retirement; to his right, Bodmer, Mary Russell, Doug Swartz

Both Barr and Bodmer have been forces to be reckoned with regarding faculty governance and staunch believers in the primacy of research in tenure and promotion decisions, although not, unfortunately, in Anne Balay’s case.  For years, until they began shunning me over that matter, they were fond lunch companions. Some years ago, Bodmer was seriously injured when struck by a car as he was jaywalking across Broadway.  While he was recuperating, I sent him an Anne Tyler novel.  He later told me that his wife enjoyed it.  Since then, he’s frequently predicted he’d be remembered as the person responsible for getting traffic lights installed near the spot of his accident.  In addition to his scholarly output in children’s literature, Bodmer does minimalist etchings (he’d often send me home with samplings to elicit Toni’s opinion). Unless I’m mistaken, he taught a class to homeless Chicagoans.  While his sardonic classroom persona and biting criticism of mediocre work (criticisms leveled at Balay) turned off some students, others, including son Dave, poet Sarah McColly, bowling buddy George Villareal, and steelworker Dave Serynek, found his classes stimulating.  Serynek told me that he ended his academic career with a bang, reading Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita” in Bodmer's class.  George used to wear a Chairman Mao cap, once changed a flat tire for me, and has a cool wife. 

 Bodmer etchings

Doris Guth at Mel Guth's funeral service (2016)

At Hobert Lanes the Electrical Engineers took 5 of 7 points from Better Without Phil (the name of a former teammate who left to form his own team), which spotted us 99 pins a game.  Five frames into the match, we had squandered the 99-pin lead and trailed by 60 pins.. from then on we pretty much bowled them even. Both Terry Kegebein and I finished the series more than 50 pins over our average; I rolled games of 165, 146, and 158 with only a handful of strikes but just one split.  Opponent Larry Ramirez has a mean lefty hook.  Twice he threw gutter balls followed by several strikes in a row.  “I got mad,”he said both times.  Our Mel Guth Seniors league selected Doris Guth as our sportswoman of the year.  A few years ago, the Engineers won two games from her team, Best Friends, and when she began the third game with two strikes, Dick Maloney said,“Take it easy on us.”  Doris replied with an expletive.  Last week my 765 handicap series was second highest to Jaime Delgado’s 772. Next week is the Holiday banquet, and opponent Phil Magdiak promised to bring fresh smoked Polish sausage from Misch brothers grocery in Calumet City. I’ll bring my usual, deli pickles.

ABC nightly news ran a feature on Genevieve Purinton, the 88-year-old originally from LaPorte reunited with her daughter Connie thanks to DNA findings.  Christina Caron, the New York Timesinvestigative reporter who broke the story, emailed me that Genevieve had moved in with her sister before giving birth at age 19 at Gary’s Mercy Hospital because her mother had warned her that her father would “kill” her if he learned about the pregnancy.

Valued Archives volunteer Maurice Yancy gave me a hand-made Happy Holiday card with this composition:

  Back in the day I thought I was

All that . . . an a bag of chips, 

Today I’m an old guy with memories

Flapping lips!!!!!

I met Allison Schuette and Liz Wuerffel at Hunter’s Brewery in Chesterton.  We celebrated the NEH grant coming through, and I suggested they get in touch with Kenny Kincaid at Purdue Northwest so they could expand their “Flight Paths” to include Latinos from the Indiana Harbor district of East Chicago.  Latinos comprise approximately 7 percent of Valparaiso’s population, they told me. Many, I’m sure, trace their family history to either Gary or East Chicago.  One of their interns interviewed her father, Steve Walsh (below), formerly a Post-Tribune investigative reporter and now affiliated with a San Diego PBS station.  Walsh once covered the statehouse in Indianapolis during legislative sessions with regard to matters affecting Northwest Indiana.

Hammond Doings

“Lead me back to the place I'm from
Past the farms and debris
You can see it from the highlands
As you roam 'long the range”

         “Come to the City,” The War on Drugs

While doing research in the Archives for a Hammond book similar to Jerry Davich’s “Lost Gary,” Times reporter Joseph Pete, seeking anecdotes, asked me for memories of Gary’s neighbor city.  After noting that the late historian Lance Trusty was the leading expert, I suggested he consult historian Joseph C. Biggot’s essay in “The Encyclopedia of Chicago,” which traces Hammond’s origins to Ernest Hohman’s stagecoach stop during the 1850s and George H. Hammond’s post-Civil War slaughterhouse.  I told him of paying 20 dollars at the grand old Parthenon Theater (in 1974, seven years before it closed) to watch a closed-circuit direct feed from Kinshasa, Zaire, of challenger Muhammad Ali defeating undefeated heavyweight champ George Foreman with his so-called rope-a-dope strategy.  Beforehand, a rowdy audience cheered and jeered during a softcore porn movie and openly made bets on the fight.  Around then I attended a talk by Hammond native Jean Shepherd at Purdue Cal, who beforehand was presented with a dozen White Castle sliders. At the Hammond Civic Center Phil and Dave played indoor soccer games, coached by Bob Laramie.  

In 1979, while I was faculty adviser to IUN’s Northwest Phoenix, the editors ran excerpts of Economics professor Leslie Singer’s report commissioned by the city of Hammond about its declining downtown, recommending that steps be taken to counteract perceptions of the city as predominantly black.  Mike Nommensen produced a ribald cartoon purporting to show Singer telling an African American baby, “Get out of town.”  At the last minute, after threats from Singer’s SPEA dean John Hunger, the editors deleted the cartoon.

I showed Joseph Pete my Eighties Steel Shavings(volume 28, 2007) that contains Lance Trusty’s “End of an Era: The 1980’s in the Calumet.”  The population of Hammond, “seemingly the least changed city in the Calumet,” Trusty wrote, “dropped from 93,714 to 84,000”and lost “its downtown and most of its industrial base.”:

  State Street resembled a devastated European city of 1945. Some life remained on Hohman Avenue, even after Goldblatt’s, the very heart and soul of old Hammond, closed. The Hammond Timesescaped to Munster and became The Times of somewhere, and NIPSCO, after a major rebuilding, moved its engineering and planning divisions to a vacant insurance building in Merrillville.  Downtown’s chief tenants were the growing St. Margaret Hospital Complex, the First Baptist Church, NIPSCO’s corporate headquarters, banks, and one bustling retailer, the Army & Navy Store.  The old downtown had gone the way of the trolley car and the buggy whip.

In an editor’s note to volume 28 I wrote: 

  Celebrating its centennial in 1984, Hammond had its first Republican mayor in 30 years.  Thomas M. McDermott had handily defeated Edward Raskosky after ridiculing the incumbent’s “urban renewal” efforts to convert the former Goldblatt’s, in the challenger’s words, into “the world’s largest flea market.”  Post-Tribunepolitical reporter Jim Proctor labeled Hammond a “wrinkled old city with a dead downtown and a declining population.”

The Eighties Shavings, titled “The Uncertainty of Everyday Life,” includes personal accounts of the tragic 1982 Cline Avenue Bridge ramp extension accident that resulted in 13 deaths and 17 serious injuries.  Ryan Cramer wrote:

  My mother was in the backyard of our small house in north Hammond when she heard a loud boom, followed by sounds of fire trucks and police sirens.  Then she spotted helicopters in the air.  “I remember it like yesterday,”she declared a quarter-century later. From TV she learned that the Cline Avenue extension had collapsed like a row of dominoes.  She knew one of the victims.

IUN student Andrew Laurinec wrote “Snowing Soap Flakes”: 

  My family lived in the Robertsdale neighborhood of north Hammond nestled between a popcorn factory, Lever Brothers, and the Amoco refinery.  Depending on the wind direction, you’d either smell popcorn, soap or whatever kind of noxious gas the oil plant was burning off at the time.  Sometimes at night Lever brothers would release a cloud of smoke and God knows what else into the air.  It was not unusual to see people washing their cars early in the morning. After all, there was already soap on their car.

1984 Hammond Clark graduate Jane Shimala recalled memorable moments during her largely unsupervised teen years:

  My first year at Clark I met Mary Anne, whose barren home life was similar to mine. She babysat for three children, and I usually kept her company.  We had free reign of the house and sometimes cooked, watch movies, and talked on the phone. One day we took the parents’ beautiful white Cadillac for a joy ride.  Though just 14, I had practiced my driving skills with my father in a parking lot, so I took the wheel.  We cruised up and down 119^thStreet with the radio blasting “Like a Virgin” by Madonna.  With the kids in the back seat I managed to go down several one-way streets the wrong way. Several senior citizens yelled at me, but we didn’t run into any police.  At that age we thought we were invincible, and that day we were.

  Two years later, my parents went away for the weekend, leaving the house to me, my 17-year-old dropout brother, and his live-in girlfriend Karen.  Of course, we threw a big party. The month before, Jim had been in a terrible car accident and suffered a collapsed lung.  During the party Karen pushed him down the stairs, and next thing I knew paramedics were in the house.  We assured them Jim was fine and that they could be on their way. Looking to retaliate, I found Karen passed out on the front lawn.  Before she crashed, she managed to throw a brick through the windshield of Mary Anne’s boyfriend.

Hammond native Melissa described herself as a “rock and roll girl” and told IUN student David Vanette:

  In 1981 I was all of 14 when I first got stoned.  Every now and again I’d go to school, but, really, I just stopped by when my mom dropped me off. I got a good view of the hallway leading to the back exit, and that was about it.  I got kicked out of Clark and sent to Hammond High, high being the key word. Not that I was getting high all the time, but a large majority.  It was fun, and there wasn’t really anything else to do in Hammond.  So I starting out small time smoking weed.  That’s about as far as it got.  Tripped on acid once in a while, but that was rare. I just enjoyed the Roller Dome skating rink and hanging out with friends.

Roller Dome in heyday and in last incarnation

Built in 1952, the Roller Dome on 730 Gostlin Street featured a live organist playing various types of music on a Wurlitzer, depending on the audience.  It closed in 2008 and reopened for a few years as an indoor soccer facility.1984 Hammond Clark graduate Jane 

 Ray Emory, 97, at Pearl Harbor ceremony

Despite the numerous commemorations resulting from World War II navy vet George H. W. Bush’s death, Pearl Harbor Day passed almost unnoticed, as public memory fades. Heather Nauert, former FOX commentator selected by Trump to be U.N. Ambassador, claimed our alliance with Germany dated back to D-Day.  The 1941 Japanese attack motivated Bush to become a navy pilot right out of high school.  Just 20 survivors attended the ceremony on Oahu near where five battleships sank and where over two thousand sailors lost their lives. 

At Chesterton library I checked out two early CDs by The War on Drugs, who lived in the Philadelphia’s Fishtown neighborhood when recording them. I returned Anne Tyler’s “Vinegar Girl,” praised by” People for its irresistible humanity and unerring “ear and eye for familial give-and-take.” Francine Prose wrote: “Anne Tyler’s novels are invitations to spend time in the houses of the Baltimore neighborhood that she built – house by house, block by block – over her long and bright career.”

Ray Smock’s latest, titled, “If I Was a President and the Congress Called My Name” begins:

    It was 1973 in the middle of the Watergate Scandal that Paul Simon’s song “Loves Me Like a Rock” made it to number 2 on the pop charts. It captured the disillusionment and the angst of those years, when we discovered that our president was a crook. The third verse of the song hit me like a rock on the head at the time. It seemed so perfect. Now, 45 years later, Simon’s song still resonates.

If I was a president
And the Congress called my name
I said now who do, who do you think you're fooling?
Who do you think you're fooling?
I got the presidential seal
I got the presidential podium
And my momma she loves me
She loves me
She gets down on her knees and hugs me
She loves me like a rock
She'd love me like the rock of ages.

We all knew that Richard Nixon was hiding behind the presidential seal. He and his lawyers kept using the concept of “executive privilege,” to avoid complying with the investigations of special prosecutors and the House Judiciary Committee and the Supreme Court, that eventually brought him down. When I heard the song in those days, I always pictured Nixon hiding behind the presidential podium, peaking out to see if anyone was after him. Only a mother’s love could save him or forgive him.

  President Donald J. Trump is about to have several powerful entities call his name. Starting in January, Congress, in the guise of several major House committees, could call his name, and Trump, no doubt, will hold up the Presidential Seal and hope it has the power of Kryptonite to weaken the resolve of Congress to take him on. But will the Presidential Seal and the Presidential Podium be enough to stop the investigations of Special Counsel Robert Mueller? Or will Trump be able to ward off prosecutors in the Southern District of New York and other places, where investigations and lawsuits are pending?

  Each day, it seems, we learn new sordid details. A month after Trump’s inauguration, the Saudi government paid for 500 rooms at the Trump Hotel in DC for a program to bring U.S. servicemen and women to DC. Once in the luxury hotel the guest were sent to Capitol Hill to lobby against a bill the Saudis opposed. The Trump Hotel, owned by the president, netted $270,000 for this program. No one has charged the president with violations of the emoluments clause of the Constitution, where accepting anything of value from a foreign government is forbidden. But add this to the list of high crimes and misdemeanors that could become Articles of Impeachment in 2019.

At the condo Becca and two friends made lemon mousse for a Chesterton French class assignment with Angie’s assistance.  Members of the choral group Sandpipers, they frequently broke out in song.  I was nearby and occasionally intermingled with them. I’d love to interview them about their lives, seemingly so different from Hammond teens in the 1980s. 

 Bears defense celebrates, USA Today photo

Weekend sports highlights include IU’s one-point roundball win over Louisville and Chicago’s upset of the L.A. Rams, 15-6, thanks to brilliant play by a Vic Fangio-coached defense and despite a poor day for QB Mitch Trubisky.  After eight dismal seasons missing the playoffs the Bears are finally earning their reputation as “Monsters of the Midway.”  Sunday we attended the Memorial Opera House matinee of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” then dined at Pesto’s.  Leftovers from my “rather large”(to quote from the menu, which didn’t do it justice) serving of lasagna should be good for several meals.  Saying hello from a nearby table was bridge buddy Barbara Stroud, who introduced me to two grandchildren attending VU.

 Tom Rea and Chuck Tomes

Duplicate bridge player Chuck Tomes, a former Math teacher whom I first met when he umpired Porter Acres softball games, has scored over 70 percent with several partners. Barb Walczak’s Newsletter congratulated Tom Rea and Tomes on a 72.69% at Charlie Halberstadt’s Wednesday Valpo game at Banta Senior Center.  Tomes recalled: “We plussed 18 of 27 boards, avoided major mistakes, got a lot of breaks, and had a lot of laughs.  Our Mexican two-Diamond opener got us a great contract for a top board.”  Note: a Mexican (Romex Bidding System) two-Diamond opener generally indicates a strong, game-forcing hand, either balanced, with long Diamonds or with three strong suits and either a void or a singleton.