Of Monsters and Men

“I am open and I am restless

Let me feel it out

Let it all come out.”

         “Alligator,” Of Monsters and Men

Of Monsters and Men is an Icelandic folk/pop group that supposedly got its name because several members believed in trolls. After winning a battle of the bands contest in Iceland in 2010, Of Monsters and Men scored an international hit, “Little Talks,” the following year.  The 2019 album “Fever Dream” contains the up-tempo “Alligator,” on heavy rotation on WXRT,  with haunting vocals by Nanna Hilmarsdottir.  The lyrics of “Waiting for the Snow” remind me of the city of Gary’s present situation, as U.S. Steel lays off steelworkers and residents await the impending changing-of-the-guard at City Hall:

This steel can’t carry me now

That things are rough

    . . .

I’m waiting for a vision

So I can feel brighter

I can feel lighter

I was surprised to find a “Parental Advisory – Explicit Content” label on “Fever Dream.”  I couldn’t imagine why until I read the lyrics of “Under the Dome,” which contains the lines “Fuck the way we were” and “Fuck all the times that I’ve fallen.”  I’d have never noticed the dreaded “F word” just listening to the melodic song that bears a slight resemblance to the 1990s Swedish synthpop group Ace of Base. 

When Toni staged puppet shows for Phil and Dave and school audiences, my favorite was “Three Billy Goats Gruff,” based on a Norwegian fairy tale popular in Iceland about a troll who lives under a bridge that goats must cross in order to reach the grass in the meadow. When accosted by the troll, the smallest billy goat convinces the troll to wait for his brother, who is bigger and juicier.  The second goat uses the same tactic with similar success.  After Big Billy Goat Gruff” was accosted, he knocked the greedy ogre into the water, and the troll was never seen again.

Initially, I mistook the band’s name for Of Mice and Men, thinking it was named after the 1937 John Steinbeck novella about two migrants, George and Lenny, in search of employment in California during the Great Depression. Lennie is strong but mentally disabled, George quick-witted but deluded into thinking he could be Lennie’s protector and one day own a piece of land.  Praised by critics, the book was banned by many library and school boards, supposedly for its vulgar language, anti-business slant, and seeming acceptance of euthanasia. Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath” (1939) initially met a similar fate. Now they don’t even rate a “parental advisory.” “Of Mice and Men” opened as a Broadway play in November 1939 and became a Hollywood movie two years later starring Lon Chaney, Jr. and Burgess Meredith.  A 1981 TV movie starred Randy Quaid and Robert Blake.

I was pleased to find Holly Jackson’s “American Radicals” in Chesterton library’s New Nonfiction display.  The book opens on July 4, 1826, when America was celebrating its semi centennial Jubilee with parades and speeches.  In New Harmony, Indiana, a utopian community set among 20,000 acres of timber forests and fertile farmland near the Wabash and Ohio rivers, founder Robert Owen, a Welsh-born industrialist and social reformer, warned his followers that in order to form the “more perfect Union,” as envisioned in the Declaration of Independence, it would be necessary to slay “a Hydra of Evils” -  the threefold horrid monster of private property, religion, and marriage.”  Owen concluded: “When we tore off the mask, the same hideous features were behind it – a sneering and gibbery spectre.”  This was America.” Of similar mind had been Revolutionary War hero Thomas Paine, author of “Common Sense” (1776).  Paine had coined the phrase United States of America but by the time of his death in 1809 was so despised for attacking organized religion that, to quote Holly Jackson, “no cemetery would bury him.”

At Chesterton High School’s 47th annual Madrigal Dinner, a fundraiser for the musical groups Sandpipers and Drifters, the room was made to resemble a sixteenth century manor hall.  Becca was cast in a starring role, Lady of the House.  Toni and I dubbed ourselves Lord and Lady MacBeth, and a herald announced our arrival; then a wench escorted us to the Lord Byron table.  While too religious for my tastes, the program was cleverly done, and the Christmas songs were enjoyable and enhanced by a 20-piece orchestra.  Becca had two solos, including “Oh Holy Night” as the Madrigal lords and ladies filed out. Jesters, jugglers, and lackeys entertained.  Afterwards, Becca’s friend Josh Sweet introduced me to his mother, a school nutritionist, and brother Jordan, a Purdue Northwest Hospitality and Tourism Management major.

A CNN “Heroes” special honored Staci Alonso, who started Noah’s Animal House at Shade Tree shelter in Las Vegas for women seeking to escape abusive relationships who wanted to keep their pets. Many abused women, she came to realize, continued to remain in abusive relationships rather than leave their pet behind.  The nine others honorees included Woody Faircloth, who donated RVs for wildfire victims, and Richard Miles, an advocate for ex-convicts.

building sewer on Gary Works construction site, July 21, 1906, courtesy CRA

Retired steelworker Robert “Mouse” Kolodzinski donated to the Calumet Regional Archives a letter book containing the correspondence of construction engineer Ralph E. Rowley during his first month on the site of the future Gary Works. Hired the previous winter by U.S. Steel Corporation, he began making plans for the railroad yards and what he termed the “New Indiana steel plant.”  Rowley moved into facilities purchased from the Calumet Gun Club, whose members for two decades had used the beachfront retreat for summer fun in Lake Michigan and winter trap shooting, tobogganing and sledding on sand dunes, and skating on the Grand Calumet River.  The B & O Railroad had established a Calumet Heights station for wealthy Chicagoans’ convenience.  Rowley’s progress reports often noted the inclement weather – snow, ice, cold winds -  that hampered work crews.  Rowley’s letter of April 8, 1906, included an inventory of items left in the clubhouse and 15 cottages by gun club members, including a bowling alley and shuffleboard.  “I think,” Rowley wrote, “we could devise some scheme by which [they] would pay for themselves in a short time and afford some amusement for the men after work hours.”  Rowley represented Steel interests on the Gary City Council for over 20 years, beginning in 1913, to the detriment, I believe, of working-class residents.