Debate Night

“I got no quarrel with the Midwest,

The folks out there have given me their best.

I lived there all my life, I’ve been their guest,

I sure have loved it, too.”

    “Katmandu,” Bob Seger

Nothing like listening to Detroit rocker Bob Seger in the car.  WXRT was focusing on 1975, a year when The Captain and Tennile (“Love Will Keep Us Together”) and John Denver (“Thank God I’m a Country Boy”) ruled the AM charts.  I was listening to FM’s WMET, which exposed me to the likes of Bruce Springsteen (“Born to Run”), Led Zeppelin (“Kashmir”), ZZ Top (“Tush”), Pink Floyd “Wish You Were Here”), Aerosmith (“Sweet Emotion”), and Kiss (“Rock and Roll All Nite”).

After Nick Didonna suggested that I throw the ball out rather than drop it at the foul line, I bowled two practice games with better results.  Cressmoor owner Jim Fowler complained about the recent no-smoking ban.  Patrons constantly go out to smoke; when winter comes, there’ll be problems with folks tracking in snow.

NBC’s David Gregory hosted a Massachusetts Senate debate between incumbent Scott Brown and Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren at the UMass campus in Lowell.  Asked to name a Supreme Court justice he admired, Brown said, “Scalia.”  When the crowd groaned, he added the names of Roberts, Kennedy, and Sotomayor – but not Elena Kagan, formerly Dean of Harvard Law School, whom he opposed for confirmation.  Brown tried to exploit the fact that Warren claimed to be Native-American on a college application because she was part Cherokee.  The crowd booed when Brown said he opposed the Dream Act.  Even though he talked much more than Warren, when called on it, he used an obviously pre-planned “zinger,” telling her to let him finish a statement because “I am not a student in your classroom.”

I am sharing the Dorothy Riker Hoosier Historian Award with Carl E, Kramer, director of the Institute for Local and Oral History at IU Southeast and author of “This Place We Call Home: A History of Clark County, Indiana.”  I’ve been told there won’t be time for honorees to make acceptance speeches.  Too bad because I would have noted that in grad school my fields of interest – social, contemporary, oral, local, and family history – were generally looked down on.  Being a Sixties “history from the bottom up” believer, however, I became interested in Latinos, steelworkers, immigrants, and others who don’t necessarily leave written records to examine or get into traditional history books.

I have been exchanging a flurry of emails with California cousin Tommi Adelizzi.  Working on the family genealogy, she wanted to know my father Vic’s profession (chemical engineer), college (Pitt), how he met Midge (through a mutual friend in Easton PA), and employer (Penn Salt). Her granddaughter Natalie applied to Bucknell, my alma mater, and wants to be a history major.  I offered to send her my latest Shavings, “Calumet Region Connections,” and she sent me Natalie’s address in Oakton, VA.  Tommi informed me that our sixth great-grandfather was Virginia planter George Eskridge, guardian to George Washington’s mother Mary Ball after her parents died.  Mary named the future “Father of our Country” after Eskridge, an attorney who served in the House of Burgesses for 30 years until his death in 1735.

above, George Eskridge; below, Wildermuth Mansion in Aetna

 

Joelle Gamble wanted information about a mansion in Aetna that she and her husband have been renovating.  It was built in the Tudor Revival style around 1940 and there is nothing remotely like it in that section of Gary.  Someone told her that attorney Ora Wildermuth (credited with being the city’s first librarian) built it, but I discovered using city directories that 45 year-old realtor Fred Wildermuth lived there.  Ora was 13 years older than Fred, and they both were born in rural Indiana near Star City, so they may have been brothers.  Kendall Svengalis has a 2003 photo of the “Wildermuth mansion” in his “Gary, Indiana: A Centennial Celebration.” 

Jerry Davich posted a great AFSCME ad attacking Romney that made use of two workers who collected trash at his Oceanside La Jolla mansion, as well as a fireman.  Interspersed were clips of Romney chastising Obama for wanting to hire more teachers and fireman and disparaging the 47 percent who don’t pay taxes.

My sister-in-law urged everyone leaning toward Obama to read Friedrich Hayek’s “The Road to Serfdom,” a 1945 diatribe against German fascism and Russian communism. The darling of some free market neo-liberals, Hayek would have scorned Bain Capital, I believe, as a perversion of free enterprise. Romney’s old company took advantage of corporate-friendly government policies to fleece unsuspecting businesses.

Toni goes all out when the grandkids come for dinner.  Monday it was ham baloney, noodles and peas.  Tonight it’s spaghetti.

The Presidential debate was quite boring, with both candidates simply reiterating their views on taxes, the deficit, and the economy.  After about an hour, I turned the sound off and simply observed hand motions, facial expressions, and the like. Most pundits are claiming Romney won because he didn’t screw up and seemed aggressive while Obama was more passive and failed to go on the attack as ardent progressives had hoped.  It is normal for incumbents to seem lackluster in initial debates and for challengers to gain momentum from appearing to exceed expectations.  Let’s hope when the topic turns to foreign policy or social issues, the result is different.  Silliest moment: Romney professing love for Big Bird while threatening to defund PBS.  Altogether it was a very disappointing evening for those, myself included, who had hoped Obama would skewer the Republicans’ flim-flam man.

Ray Smock passed on this observation from historian Lewis Gould: “The late Gore Vidal once said that television was a barrel that has no bottom. The intellectually inert performance of two mediocre American politicians last night in Denver illustrated the enduring truth of Vidal's insight. Under the self-indulgent and flaccid guidance of moderator Jim Lehrer, President Barack Obama and former governor Mitt Romney traded pre-digested talking points for ninety minutes. Romney was more aggressive, though no more coherent, than in his stump appearances. Obama seemed oddly disengaged and surprised that he had to respond to his opponent's sallies.  But the horse-race moments were less significant than the evident decay of the format of televised debates as a genre. In the back and forth about such wonkish arcania as Dodd-Frank, the allegedly sinister Medicare advisory board, and the proper level of tax rates, what was an average viewer to conclude about the future of the nation? Complex ideas crammed into two minutes of staccato speech confuse more than they enlighten. If Americans face serious choices about the future, their judgments must include a recognition of another persistent truth about this moment in the history of television. Each new presidential cycle sees the medium's handling of debates become worse than the one that occurred four years earlier.”

I responded: “History should have taught me that expecting Obama to dominate was wishful thinking.  The press loves a tight horse race and will emphasize appearance over substance 99 times out of 100.  Nobody, especially the press but me included, wanted to sit through an arcane discussion of taxes, deficit projections, and economic statistics.  We wanted THEATER, zingers, witticisms, gotcha moments.  Obama chose to be Presidential while Mitt was the epitome of a well-prepped Organization Man. Let’s hope most Americans feel more comfortable with the good man in the White House than the rich man who offers few clues on what he might do if he replaces him.”

Chris Matthews was apoplectic over Obama’s missed opportunities to go after Romney, saying, “What was he doing?  He went in disarmed.”  Prior to the first 1960 debate, he said, Nixon’s handlers told the vice president to “Erase the assassin’s image” while Bobby Kennedy told his brother, “Kick him in the balls.”  That’s what Obama needed, someone to fire him up.

A Fair Chance

“Dreaming of Maria Callas

Whoever she is.”

  “E-Bow the Letter,” R.E.M.

WXRT focused Saturday on 1993, one of my favorite years musically.  In a single set I heard a live version of XTC’s “The Things We Used To Do on Grass,” “Low” by Cracker and “All Apologies” by Nirvana.  Later came “Mr. Jones” by Counting Crows and “Because the Night” by 10,000 Maniacs.  Although R.E.M.’s “Automatic for the People” came out late in 1992, the single “Everybody Hurts” was big in 1993.

Thanks to a heads up from Karren Lee, we attended “Opera Night at the Gardner Center” at the old Miller Drugs, now an art gallery.  Friends were on hand included Gene and Judy Ayers, Nancy and Ron Cohen, and Kate and Corey Hagelberg.   Larry Lapidus presented his documentary “La Divina: The Life and Career of Maria Callas.”  Not being an opera buff, I knew little about Callas other than she once was the mistress of Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis.  Born in New York City, reared in Greece, and trained in Italy, she revolutionized opera with her skill as an actress, breathing life into roles she played.  One critic referred to B.C. and A.C. – before and after Callas. Watching clips of her performances, what struck me was how little her hands moved (Ronald Reagan employed a similar technique in his public speaking).  Emotions came almost entirely from facial expressions; when she did make a motion with her fingers or arms, it was all the more dramatic.  Growing up, punk rocker Patti Smith, who sang back-up vocals on R.E.M.’s “E-Bow the Letter,” wanted to be an opera singer like her idol Maria Callas.

Phil’s family saw Lights in the Night in downtown Grand Rapids, which is part of the ArtPrize festivities.  Miranda took a cool photo that she put on Facebook. 

Sunday after gaming we attended “Shout: The Mod Musical” at Memorial Opera House in Valpo with Kate and Corey, whose parents were on a European cruise and had left us their tickets.  The play followed five British young women during the Sixties and employed such familiar songs as “To Sir with Love,” “Downtown,” “Son of a Preacher Man,” “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” and the Isley Brothers classic title song. The women write letters to “Shout” magazine’s prudish advice columnist, who dispenses such bromides as: get married, have kids, change your hairstyle, try a new nail polish color, don’t be a slut.  In the end she’s fired and replaced by one of the five. An elderly in front of me was singing and swaying so much I expected her to get up and twist to “Shout.”  Though the play touches on sexism and female stereotyping, the one was upbeat and celebratory of women enjoying more freedom to chose what lifestyle to pursue.

Caught the end of the Redskins’ exciting win over Tampa Bay and stayed up for the Eagles victory over the hated NY Giants.  Field goals, one made, one missed, decided both contests.  In between I listened to Band of Horses and Green Day.  Thanks to the Houston defense I remained undefeated in Lane Fantasy Football despite foolishly playing Houston’s ben Tate and Buffalo’s Steve Johnson.  Americans blew a big lead in failing to capture the Ryder Cup from the Europeans, not that I really cared.

The new issue of Indiana Magazine of History contains my review of “Thyra J. Edwards: Black Activist in the Global Freedom Struggle” by Gregg Andrews as well as two excellent articles about Gary and the Region.  “Concrete in the Steel City” by Christopher Baas, subtitled “Constructing Thomas Edison’s House for the Working Man,” discusses efforts to build fireproof affordable housing by utilizing a method patented by America’s most famous inventor of constructing a complete domicile with a single cement pour.  While the idea enthralled urban reformers, U.S, Steel’s motivation was simply profit-oriented.  By 1914 92 units were available, occupied by Tin Mill foremen, clerks, and skilled workers, most of whom came from plants in the East.  Located within the Northside First Subdivision rather than in the Southside immigrant wards, they served their purpose well, but no further construction of these models took place in the Steel City, concrete being more expensive than wood or brick.  Baas concludes, “That many of the century-old houses are still occupied is a testament to their design and quality of construction, and further evidence that costs were their downfall.”

I was an anonymous reviewer for Katherine Turk’s “‘A Fair Chance To Do My Part of Work’: Black Women, War Work, and Rights Claims at the Kingsbury Ordnance Plant.” For Gary women recruited to make ammunition at a plant located 40 miles away in rural LaPorte County, the work was dangerous but the wages worth it. Once positions were filled for the assembly lines designated for black women, Kingsbury officials ignored further applications from others. The President’s Committee on Fair Employment Practices (FEPC) received numerous complaints of discrimination in hiring practices and working conditions.  As Turk writes, “”African American and white women did not intermingle at leisure time.  On the job they ate lunch and took breaks in separate areas.  At white women’s insistence, separate bathrooms were designated for women of each race.  In the event of an air raid, workers knew to proceed to the bomb shelter specific to their race as well.”

On my advice Turk made use of Steel Shavings oral interviews with Mary Kay Maisal, Robert Gyurko, Joan Cobb, Wanda Jones, and Adrana Turner.  In a footnote making use of Sanita A. Turner’s “Working and Jitterbugging” Turk wrote: “The wartime economy created unprecedented new opportunities for Adrana Turner, who moved to northwest Indiana from Georgia in 1943 when she was eighteen.  She worked frying donuts until she finished high school, when she found assembly line jobs at General American and Pullman-Standard.  In 1945, she had saved enough money to but a house in cash.”

I congratulated Indiana Magazine of History editor Eric Sandweiss on the excellent IMH issue, and he wrote that the Ordnance article “benefitted a LOT” from my feedback and asked if I’d review another article about housing in East Chicago.   I agreed.  Coincidentally, I received word that I was selected to receive the Indiana Historical Society’s 2012 Dorothy Riker Hoosier Historian Award “as nominated by Eric Sandweiss.”  I mentioned it to Steve, and he said he wrote a letter on my behalf.  A winner last year was Donald E. Pitzer, author of “America’s Communal Utopias” and “New Harmony Then and Now.”  I’ll receive the award at a Founders Day Dinner in Indy in early December.

While cleaning my teeth Dr. John Sikora showed me a 1973 Post-Trib clipping of an article I wrote about Ruth Nelson, who was a distant relative of his wife.  They got a kick out of my wild hair in the accompanying photo.  I asked John if he wore his hair long back then, and he said, no because his dad was a barber.  Once when the old man visited him at IU, he gave him five bucks and told him to get it cut.  That was one of the only times someone other than his father cut his hair while he was alive.  I told him that my dad bought a kit and cut my hair a few times but that we’d always fight about the length until finally it became too much and he gave up.

Perhaps not realizing (or not caring) that the Bears were playing Dallas on Monday night football, Bernie Holicky moved up the condo board meeting from 7:30 Wednesday so it would not interfere with the Presidential debate.  Under pressure from the bank and realtor, we dropped our liens on a unit whose owner has been in bankruptcy so that a short sale could take place and we could start collecting the money from the new owner.  For most of the meeting we discussed landscape needs and finally wrapped things up around 9:20, just before Devin Hester scored a TD to help Chicago crush the Cowboys 34-17.

Band of Horses

“Break out everybody in the jail,

Let’s get it on.”

    “Dumpster World,” Band of Horses

I picked up “Mirage Rock” by Band of Horses and Green Day’s “Uno!” at Best Buy in Valpo after stopping by Barnes and Noble and finding “Valor” in the Biography section.  There was only one left; wonder how many they’ve sold.  I keep missing community affairs manager Michele to see about a book signing.  “Mirage Rock” has all types of interesting songs ranging from harmonious ballads to rousing rockabilly, while Billie Joe Armstrong, Tre Cool, and Mike Dirnt (Green Day) simply rock out, exactly what I’d hoped for after hearing “Nuclear Family” on WXRT.  After finishing Lawrence Samuel’s “The American Dream,” both “Dumpster World” and “(The Death of a) Nuclear Family” contain nightmarish lyrics.  “There’s no hope for any modern world,” the Band of Horses declare, so “bring on the booze,” “bust out the drugs,” and “let’s get it on.”

Driving along 80/94 I spotted a billboard for Amherst Asylum.  I did a double take until I realized Halloween season was near and the advertisement was for a haunted house. Already leaves are turning yellow, red, and brown.

A pumped Jonathyne Briggs posted the cover of Journal of the History of Sexuality, which included his article “Sex and the Girl’s Single: French Popular Music and the Long Sexual Revolution of the 1960s.”  He was especially delighted that the photo showing two French “copines” (gal pals), Francoise Hardy and Sylvie Vartan, posing with the “French Elvis,” Johnny Hallyday pertained to his chapter-length contribution.

At lunch Jonathyne and Brian O’Camb discussed the problem of texting in class.  Jonathyne got so upset at one student that he thought it best to leave the classroom for a minute.   Anne Balay takes iPhones away from offenders.  “I use my ‘mom’ voice, and it works every time,” she said. Former colleague Rhiman Rotz would go nuts when students interrupted his train of thought.  I’d get annoyed if someone appeared to be using a computer for something other than note-taking.  Occasionally cell phones would ring, but usually it was by mistake or a family emergency, and the students were invariably apologetic.  Now some adolescents can’t get through a meal (or a college class) without partaking.

Versatile Amy Adams (saintly Sister James in “Doubt,” bitchy Charlene Fleming in “The Fighter”) shines in “Trouble with the Curve” as crusty Clint Eastwood’s daughter Mickey (for Yankee great Mantle).  She takes time off from her career as a high-powered workaholic lawyer to join the old man scouting a North Carolina prospect for the Atlanta Braves.  Eastwood had better material to work with in “Gran Torino” but again personifies the aging tough guy better than anyone, whether yelling at his penis for taking so long to piss (“Ha! Ha! I’ve outlived you”) or railing at the garage he bumps into for being to small.  He tells Mickey he’ll put a bullet in his head when he can’t take care of himself.  The old codger smokes cigars, ridicules vegetarians and doctors, and, breaking a beer bottle, threatens to cut the throat of a guy in a bar who put his hands on his daughter.

A researcher visited the Archives inquiring about Cudahy, a working-class neighborhood near the East Chicago - Gary border until it was razed to make way for the toll road and Cline Avenue.  Roy Dominguez lived there when his family first came up from Texas.  A hundred years ago the Cudahy Packing Company produced Old Dutch Cleanser and also repaired refrigerator railroad cars.

Paula DeBois is searching for information about St. Augustine’s Episcopal Church at 2425 West 19^th Avenue in Gary, which will be celebrating its eighty-fifth anniversary. It has a mostly African-American congregation although for the past 20 years its pastor has been Father David Hyndman, nephew of political prisoner Katherine Hyndman, jailed during the Red Scare.  In particular Paula has questions about a photo of Reverend Wallace Wells and others attempting to desegregate Marquette Beach. It might be from the 1949 Beachhead for Democracy demonstration.

Phil directed a TV show with guest Peter Yarrow of the legendary folk trio Peter, Paul, and Mary.  Mary Travers passed away, but (Noel) Paul Stookey is still performing solo. Phil and Delia attended Yarrow’s concert that evening.  Peter’s daughter and her male life partner sang with him.

Ray Smock sent me an essay he wrote 12 years ago called “Plebiscite: A Tale of Politics and Elections in the Not Too Distant Future.”  In a 2007 Author’s Note he wrote: “Presidential debates are not debates at all but short-answer quizzes by self-serving celebrity-journalists.  The American people are polled constantly on everything from politics to their favorite peanut butter. The news consists of hearing about the latest polls taken by the news organization presenting their polls as news. Then we are polled about how we feel about the latest poll.”

Ryan Farag sent me the almost finished eBook version of “The Signal.”  The next step is to get it uploaded onto Amazon and then market it.  An IT staff member helped me read it on mobi.  I took motes on what steps he took but could never do it myself.

I borrowed a Vee-Jay box set that I’ll use during my upcoming talk on founder Vivian Carter.  I’ll not only play “Goodnight Sweetheart” and “Oh What a Nite” but show how the record label pioneered of genres by playing excerpts from John Lee Hooker (electric blues), Staples Singers (gospel), Jimmy Reed (funk), Jerry Butler (soul), and r and b flavored rock ‘n’ roll (Dee Clark).

Returned Jackie Gipson’s call.  She was watching Ryder Cup golf so declined my offer of lunch.  I ate half a sandwich from Redhawk Café and bowled three practice games at Cressmoor but still can’t find the pocket with consistency.  Wednesday Ryan Dulla’s 280 was more than I scored in the first two games combined.  Time to retire, get lessons, or purchase a new ball.

Before defeating Tampa Bay on the strength of Alex Rios’ three hits, the White Sox had lost nine of their last 11 games to fall two games behind Detroit.  It was fun while it lasted unless the Tigers stumble.

Tempest

“Low cards are what I’ve got

But I’ll play this hand whether I like it or not.”

   “Pay in Blood,” Bob Dylan

Two Rolling Stone issues came within a day of each other, with Dylan and Adele on the covers.  Critics are raving about Dylan’s “Tempest,” which contains songs about the Titanic and John Lennon, as well as a Western swing tune, “Duquesne Whistle,” a doo wop ballad, “Soon After Midnight,” a love song of sorts, “Long and Wasted Years,” as well as the political outrage (“another politician pumping out the piss”) of “Pay in Blood.”  “The Tempest” was one of William Shakespeare’s final plays, and Dylan’s friend and mentor Pete Seeger wrote “Full Fathom Five” using lines directly from Shakespeare’s play

IUN’s Radiation Therapy Club was selling corn of the cob in the library courtyard elote style, like Mexican street vendors sell it, using not only butter but mayonnaise and grated cotija cheese.  Talk about wretched excess!  It was delicious but hardly healthy.  When I went to wash my hands, I looked in the mirror and discovered I had mayo all over my face.

Anne Balay, up for promotion and tenure, wanted a letter of recommendation.  I concentrated on her scholarly output and papers I heard her deliver.  Concerning her forthcoming book “Steel Closets,” I wrote in part: “Anne developed an interest in oral history and labor studies, two of my fields of specialization.  Eager to acquire expertise at conducting interviews for her study of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered steelworkers, she attended an Oral History Association conference and picked my brain for tips to utilize and pitfalls to avoid.  She was a frequent visitor to IU Northwest’s Calumet Regional Archives, of which am co-director, in order to learn more about the culture and inner workings of the steel industry both from a union and management perspective.  What I especially admired was that she did not go into the project with a pre-conceived thesis or set of conclusions.  While passionate about the value of her work, she is anything but doctrinaire and is refreshing open to unraveling the subtleties, complexities, and contradictions that make social history such a fruitful and fascinating field.”

For dinner we walked from our condo to Sage Restaurant with Anne and Emma Balay and Mike Olszanski and Sue O’Leary.  Sue wore a “Women for Obama” button obtained while working at Obama headquarters in Michigan City.  She had another larger campaign button on her purse and reported that a woman with a Southern drawl came up to her and called her brave for displaying it openly.  Emma heads to L.A. in two days and filled us in on being an extra on the New Zealand set of “The Hobbitt.”  Since Oz was a steelworker for over 30 years, Anne’s book was a topic of conversation.  Mike pointed to the bureaucratization of the USWA as one reason that the union is not responsive to the need for protecting LGBT members from harassment a priority.  Anne claims her new Facebook profile picture bears a striking resemblance to her dad.

 

My review of Lawrence Samuel’s “The American Dream” cannot exceed 200 words, so I had to leave out any mention Steven Watts’s “Mr. Playboy: Hugh Hefner and the American Dream” or Barack Obama’s “The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream.”  Studs Terkel wrote “American Dreams: Lost and Found” in 1981 and then after 8 depressing years of Ronald Reagan, “The Great Divide: Second Thoughts on the American Dream.”  Neither made my final revision.

Called Phil, our Fantasy League commissioner, to acquire a running back on waivers.  Talked to Tori about her volleyball exploits and congratulated Anthony on scoring two goals in each of his last two soccer matches.  Alissa posted a great photo of “Buddy” taking a shot on goal.

I ran into Anne Balay at a ceremony dedicating the Frank Caucci Languages, Cultures, and Listening Lab.  Among the speakers were administrators, a family member, and retired Spanish professor Angie Prado Komenich.  I told Angie that I inherited an old-fashioned tape recorder once used by foreign language students to hear audio tapes of French and Spanish words and phrases and that it came in handy for interviews with Sheriff Roy Dominguez in doing his autobiography. On back of the program was a brief bio stating that Frank “valued diversity and inclusiveness, in particular with regard to gender rights, and the rights of lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgendered people.”

The Electrical Engineers won two of three games despite my worst night in recent memory.  I couldn’t get my ball to hook except when I didn’t want it to, and my first two games were so bad I moved over to the right and just aimed for the head pin.  Frank and Duke both struck out in the tenth frame that enabled us to eke out game 2 by four pins.

A researcher was in the Archives looking for information about Cudahy, once a working-class neighborhood near the East Chicago border with Gary until it was urban renewed to make way for the toll road and Cline Avenue.  Roy Dominguez family lived there when they first came up from Texas.  A hundred years ago there was a Cudahy Packing Company that produced Old Dutch Cleanser and also repaired refrigerator railroad cars.

Apple of My Eye

“Land on the Dunes

Land on the Dunes

Land on the Dunes

Land on the Dunes.”

    “Overnight Jet,” Alda Reserve

Land on the Indiana dunes has been used for housing and heavy industry but also for recreational and preservationist purposes.  When the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore forced us (and other leaseholders) from our home atop a sand dune in the vanishing community of Edgewater, a ranger estimated that the house would be demolished in the spring of 2011.  It is still standing 18 months later.  I have no desire to visit until the property is reduced to nature.  The park came into being during the 1960s due to a compromise between environmentalists and advocates of industrial development, namely steel mills.  Fortunately our condo is just down the road from Dunes State Park and close to Waverly Beach.

Services at Ogden Dunes Community Church celebrated the life (and mourning the passing) of Bob Selund, who I’d always sit with when the Merrillville History Book Club met.  My friend was a biology teacher in Highland before becoming a lawyer.  He and wife Judy were once in our bridge group, along with the Hagelbergs, Passos, and Copes.  He’d greet folks with a big smile and booming voice, and a large crowd was on hand to pay respects, including Judge Ken Anderson and Lake County surveyor George Van Til.  The service was two Christian for my taste, but I enjoyed a hymn entitled “As the Deer (pants for water)” that called Jesus a “real joy-giver” and “apple of my eye” (a phrase found, to my surprise, in the Bible).  A member of the Save the Dunes Council, Bob loved camping, and Toni and I once visited the Selunds and the Passos at their campsite at Dunes State Park.

Toni and I visited the Grand Valley State campus in Allendale, MI, to see granddaughters Miranda (a freshman) and Alissa (the apple of our eye, just hired to work with the overseas studies program). Though located in an isolated area, GVSU was quite impressive and accommodates over 20,000 students.  Miranda, very grown up and collegiate, took us to Uccello’s Ristorante in nearby Wayland, which had delicious meat loaf and Cole slaw among its buffet offerings. In the afternoon we attended Tori’s cross-country meet, the first such event I ever witnessed.  We situated ourselves in an area where we could see the runners pass by on three different occasions and then walked over to the finish line.    Below,Victoria Abigail Lane                                     

Tori, her school’s top runner, finished thirteenth out of about 80.  Near the end, when a girl passed her, she broke into a sprint and beat her to the finish line.  After we checked into Hampton Inn, I swam laps and used the whirlpool before eight of us, including Anthony (fresh from soccer practice) went to Chili’s.

At the ArtPrize Festival in Grand Rapids were 1,517 entries vying for prize money totaling $360,000.  Many were outside, and the largest concentration was in or near The B.O.B. (Big Old Building).  Quite a few artists were on hand to explain their work and make a pitch for people’s vote. Weston Rayfield titled his shadow-box “100 Years” and had vintage newspaper front page stories about Charles Lindbergh’s trans-Atlantic flight and the killing of bank robber John Dillinger’s in Chicago and illustrations dating from the end of the Civil War to the arrival of the Beatles and including mention of.  The piece “Earth Undone” showed a world map with depictions of ecological disasters such as Chernobyl and destruction of Brazilian rain forests.  A three-dimensional art object consisted of Scrabble tiles spelling out arts and entertainment icons such as Upton Sinclair to Joe Cocker. My favorite, “Friends,” by Nigerian-American Nnamdi Okonkwo, was a sculpture of three full-bodied African women on a bench.

 Before the Smithereens concert Saturday at Memorial Opera House in Valpo, Dave, Angie, Corey Hagelberg and I met at Buffalo Wild Wings a block away on Lincolnway.  Not a wing man, I enjoyed a burger.  We speculated whether the band would go acoustic, but they blasted for two hours, mixing in early Beatles classics with Smithereens hits such as “A Girl Like You,” “Only a Memory,” “Blood and Roses,” and “Blues Before and After.”  Bass player Severo Joracion, formerly with the Bangles, joined original band members lead guitarist Jim Babjak, drummer Dennis Diken, and frontman Pat DiNizio.  A few geezers left early holding their ears, but the crowd, mostly Fortysomethings, really got into it.  Folks were dancing in the aisles, and many jumped at DiNizio’s invitation to come down front for the lengthy finale.  Sitting in front of us were Jerry Davich and Karen Walker, who reiterated their intention for me to be a guest on their Friday Lakeshore radio show.

Sunday after winning two of three board games at Dave’s, our court hosted the condo picnic, postponed due to inclement weather the previous day.  It was a small but sociable group; almost everyone from our court attended, including Marva, Ken and Christine, new neighbors Nicole and Mike, Sue and Dave, and octogenarian Joan Gucciardo, who when the conversation turned to tattoos exclaimed, “I have one.” During the Red Scare school officials ordered kids to be branded with their blood type.  They stopped the practice when an embarrassing large number did not match the type of either parent.  Joan spent many hours at the Country Lounge, nicknamed Hunky Hollow.  Sue once needed to talk to her husband, whom she knew was there, and dialed information.  When she asked the African-American telephone operator the number for Hunky Hollow, or perhaps Honky Hollow, she replied, “Are you shittin’ me?”

I’ll start next month’s talk on record company entrepreneur Vivian Carter by noting that throughout the twentieth century there has been a white market for black musicians, especially among young people, starting with ragtime, jazz, and blues and continuing with swing bands and crooners such as Cab Calloway, Nast King Cole, Lena Horn, and the Ink Spots. Little wonder baby boomers in the 1950s sought out music that reflected their hopes, fears, and dreams.  Then I’ll play 1956 hits, “The Magic Touch” by the Platters and “My Blue Heaven” by Fats Domino.  The former was a ballad similar to Ink Spots hits, while the latter added a rock and roll beat to an 1920s standard.  After telling how Henry Farag got hooked on doo wop music after hearing the Vee-Jay recording “Oh What a Nite” by The Dells (a group from Harvey, Illinois, led by Johnny Funches) on Vivian Carter’s radio show, I’ll solicit memories of people’s first rock and roll awakenings.

Ron Cohen attended a weekend Woody Guthrie tribute in Brooklyn that featured performances by Pete Seeger and Steve Earle.  Back for a Monday evening book signing at the Savannah Gallery, he introduced Fred Chary as the person who hired him and me as someone who started the same day he did in the fall of 1970.  Student Rhonda “Red” Woodville performed four numbers, demonstrating her dexterity on acoustic guitar, two Woody classics (“Nora Lee” and “So Long, It’s Been Good To Know You”) and two of her own compositions.  Nora Lee was both Woody’s mother’s name and the name of his daughter, the apple of his eye and curator of his personal papers.

My Fantasy team had a good week and would have defeated The Powerhouse in a rout had Anthony not had the Bears’ defense and had Aaron Rogers not scored a paltry 9 points.  Even so, I triumphed 90 to 78 and am the only undefeated team.  Luck has been with me.

Jesus Is Just Alright

“I don’t care what they may say

Jesus is just alright, oh yeah.”

    Doobie Brothers

I put on The Doobie Brothers’ Great Hits CD to hear “China Grove” but really dig “Jesus Is Just Alright with Me.”  First recorded in 1966 by the Art Reynolds Singers, the Byrds released a version in 1969 and the Doobies recorded it in 1972 even though the band members weren’t particularly religious.  As one told a reporter, however, what’s the point in being an atheist and believing that once you die, that’s it?  It became a crowd favorite at concerts, and hippies in the Jesus Movement took the “just alright” to mean cool, as in someone who cares about the poor, the sick, and others considered losers by the larger society.

In the social history of IU Northwest that Paul Kern and I produced one of my first students, Milan Andrejevich, recalled that because his parents took lots of vacations, he’d have parties while they were gone, resulting on one occasion in a blown speaker that I was complicit in causing.  “Lane loved to dance,” he said, “and was always trying to put on the Doobie Brothers’ ‘China Grove.’”

Talk about coincidences.  Colin Kern asked his Facebook friends to copy the fifth sentence from p.52 of the book they’re reading.  On that page in “Valor” Roy Dominguez and I quote from “Educating the Calumet Region,” the Shavings issue I did with Colin’s father, where Donald Young is quoted as saying this about the IU Northwest Police Chief who mentored the future Lake County sheriff: “Chief Andy Lazar made you realize that mistakes happened but that one should learn from them.”  Paul Kern posted this sentence: "While I was carrying on this debate in my own mind, a crowd of Spaniards arrived, led by their major-domo, who, with the headstrong rashness of his race, bade them go in and take the vase and give me a good beating."

Tuesday felt like autumn, and fewer IU Northwest students were showing bare midriffs, legs, and arms.  In the Student Union party games were in progress, including two folks playing Twister.  When Milton Bradley put out the game in 1966, critics accused the company of marketing sex in a box.  Indeed at parties where women wore mini-skirts the pretzel-like gyrations could be quite revealing.  Now a half-century later it has acquired respectability and is enjoyed by all ages. 

The Business Division free barbeque featured hot dogs, burgers, chips, cookies, and pop.  In line were my Tuesday lunch buddies, and I chatted with Anne Balay’s daughter Emma about her New Zealand experiences as an extra in “The Hobbitt.”  She attended Anne’s Gender Studies class on “The New Momism” (the myth that women are only truly fulfilled through motherhood) and Tiger Mothers (a phrase from Amy Chua’s tough love handbook “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.”

Vying with stories about Romney’s latest political gaffe (insinuating at a private fundraiser that the 47 percent of Americans who don’t pay taxes are freeloaders) and anti-American riots in the Arab world from Libya to Pakistan is the furor over the French magazine Closer publishing photos of Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Windsor, sunbathing topless.  The Royal family is threatening to sue even as Kate and her hubby, the heir to the British throne tour Malaysia seemingly unfazed by it all. Nude photos of Prince Harry cavorting with Los Vegas party girls recently were making the rounds.  Those Royals love to get naked.

Tom Higgins’s daughter Nancy asked friends to send him happy eightieth birthday wishes.  Here is what I’ve written: “As I’ve gotten older, I have made a special point to seek out for inspiration folks ten years my senior, who are still active in the community and doing vital things.  You are certainly one of those people, writing histories of Gary schools and contributing to the Calumet Regional Archives in efforts to preserve regional history.  I am especially grateful for your support of Steel Shavings, both for your autobiographical essays about Holy Angels, Horace Mann, your radio career and a close-call boating mishap, and in having me on television to plug the magazine.  My son Philip directed one of those appearances on Channel 56, and it was a joy being on several shows with you and Wally McCormick, who never failed to ask what I thought of returning to a single-class basketball tournament. A true mentor, you have labored well in the service of Clio, the muse of history.  Keep on truckin’.”

The “Hig-man,” as I called Tom, has a ready smile and an endless repertoire of anecdotes and jokes. He was a big fan of zany Spike Jones, whose City Slicker Band did satirical takes on popular tunes of the day using cowbells, whistles, gunshots and weird vocals.  My parents were fans, and I recall as a kid hearing him on the radio at breakfast.  Jones had an original number 1 hit in 1947 with “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth.”

The season premier of HBO’s “Broadway Empire” takes place on New Year’s Eve 1922 with characters portraying crooner Eddie Cantor, gangster Al Capone, and Warren G. Harding’s corrupt Attorney-General Harry Daugherty.  There’s mention of a Harriet Duncan, a composite of aviatrix pioneers Harriet Quimby and Amelia Earhart, attempting to fly across the U.S.  Disgraced FBI agent Michael Shannon (Michael Shannon) is now a door-to-door salesman mouthing French guru Emile Coué’s mantra, “Every day in every way I’m getting better and better.”

In my intro to Sheriff Roy Dominguez’s Soup and Substance talk I mentioned how Sociology professor Bob Lovely set up special Saturday study sessions to ensure that students understood the course content. Roy sometimes attended, even when he didn’t have to, because they were so interesting.  Others at IUN who provided invaluable help to him were Elsa Rivera in Special Services, Chief Lazar, and Communications professor Camille Schuster.  Student Life director Scott Fulk put up large signs of the cover of “Valor” and provided beef vegetable and cream of broccoli soup.  About 30 folks attended, including buddies Ron Cohen and Steve McShane, John Attinasi (former head of UTEP), Mike Olszanski of Labor Studies, Minority Studies prof Raoul Contreras, and Anne and Emma Balay.  Roy was charming and eloquent, and the five copies of his book went fast.  Roy’s media consultant Manuel Corazzari videotaped the program, moving around to capture different angles and crowd shots, and will put the finished product on YouTube.

 Got a chuckle out of George Bodmer’s latest’s Oscar cartoon.  Just as a neighbor helped him with a sledgehammer, George came to my aid years ago when I was having trouble operating a jack while changing a flat tire.  After a miserable bowling night I stayed up for Band of Horses performing “Knock, Knock” on Letterman from their new CD “Mirage Rock.”

Gangnam Style

“I have my own style

It’s Gangnam style.”

    Psy

The latest pop star is a 34 year-old Korean who calls himself Psy (sigh: that’s how it’s pronounced).  Since “Gangnam Style” went viral on YouTube and soared to the top of the I Tunes charts, Psy has been enjoying his “15 minutes of fame” to the hilt.  He and a bevy of Korean beauties appeared on Friday’s Today Show before a huge crowd, and gave the regulars lessons on how to dance Gangnam style (it’s like a horse rider galloping to a techno drum beat).  Gangnam is a district in Seoul where young folks go clubbing.  The Korean lyrics, translated, include this nugget: “I am a man who drinks coffee bottoms up before it cools down.”  The following evening Psy made a surprise appearance in an SNL skit and the audience went wild.

Sports Illustrated carried Thomas Lake’s moving article “The Boy They Couldn’t Kill.”  Twelve year-old Chancellor Lee Adams is one of the most courageous people I’ve ever read about. Twelve years ago Carolina Panthers wide receiver Rae Carruth wanted his pregnant mother to get an abortion.  When she refused, he paid someone to kill them both.  She died but first gave birth to Chancellor and provided testimony that implicated Carruth, who is behind bars. Chancellor’s brain was deprived of oxygen, resulting in his being permanently disabled with cerebral palsy.  Grandmother (G-mom) Saundra Adams has been a godsend, taking him to physically therapy and nurturing him to the point that he competed in the Special Olympics.  As author Lake remarked, “If a kid like this can be so happy, what right do I have to complain?”  I told Bill Pelke, founder of Journey of Hope . . . From Violence to Healing, about the article and he plans to read it.

Nancy and Ron Cohen invited us to her daughter Elizabeth’s wedding Saturday at Tryon Farm in Michigan City.  The weather was perfect, and hens provided background clucking during the ceremony.  Ruge Meats roasted a pig.  In use were the most interesting porta-potties I’d ever seen, attached to a vehicle with toilets that flushed and running water from a spigot.  In the men’s was also a urinal, and one slightly drunk guy emerged saying that two people could go in at once.  Nobody took him up on it.  If one line got too long, women used the men’s unit and vice versa.

Guests included Sue and Joe Farag (once known as “the blond Farag” to distinguish him from his many siblings, now he is white-haired like brother Omar). One guest had a funny anecdote about getting revenge on a bailiff who was always playing practical jokes.  Pretending to be an attorney’s secretary, she asked him to page a Jack Meoff. He repeated the name in the courtroom several times before gales of laughter caused him to realize he was saying “Jack me off.”

The deejay mixed in classic dance tunes such as David Bowie’s “Modern Love” with songs of recent vintage such as “Pumped Up Kicks” by Foster the People.  No “Gangnam Style,” but the floor was packed with Thirtysomethings and a few of their seniors such as Tanice Foltz and the father of Jeremy Moore, the groom.  Some would put their arms around a partner to make it appear that the person had four hands. Sylvia Manalis, married to Rich, a friend of Ron’s from high school, took a photo of my old colleague and me. 

Ryan Maicki, the brother-in-law of the groom, wrote a hilarious account of Hobart high school high jinx for my class entitled “Bad Seeds” that’s in my Nineties Shavings “Shards and Midden Heaps.”  When I talked to the Hobart Kiwanis, I had several audience members read excerpts, including Judge James Moody and former mayor Linda Buzenic.  Parts of it got lots of laughs but Ryan also wrote poignantly about his buddy Bowman, who “had fun down to a science” but died in a car crash.

Lawrence R. Samuel’s “The American Dream: A Cultural History” examines a concept as old as America, one with myriad meanings having to do with opportunity, security, liberty, and happiness.  The book’s starting point is 1933, the year FDR took office, when historian James Truslow Adams wrote: “What is the next chapter in the epic of America?  What is the prospect for the fulfillment of the American Dream?”

Sunday Ron had a signing for his Woody Guthrie book at Angela’s in Miller.  Beforehand I gamed at Dave’s and then we had lunch and played bridge at Hagelberg’s. For health reasons we cut the day short.  I spent the evening rooting for the 49ers, especially tight end Vernon Davis, who was on my Fantasy team. 

The reality show “Breaking Amish” follows four Amish young people and one Mennonite who leave their communities, even though they realize they are certain to be shunned, and travel to New York City.  Two of them had been adopted; Sabrina wants to get more in touch with her Italian and Puerto Rican heritage.  Jeremiah has had a lifetime fascination with cars, planes, and other motorized vehicles he is unable to have back home.  In episode one there is a memorable scene of him cutting grass with a puny hand-mower and saying, in so many words, “WTF, isn’t this ridiculous?”  Once in The Big Apple, he decides he wants to be a taxi driver.  Suzanna, who describes herself as “Amish in my heart,” wrote: “My concern is just who are the people who gathered together these Amish young folks and herded them to New York.  It seems they victimized them. Whoever made it was obviously out for sensationalism.  I hope most of them go back but I am sure it is not the lifestyle for everyone and some communities are truthfully just way too restrictive.  New Order Amish are a lot more lenient.”

The NWI Times ran Jane Ammeson’s review of “Valor,” entitled “Rogelio ‘Roy’ Dominguez shares journey of his family to the Calumet Region.”  On their website were two comments.  “Mytwocents,” who had posted something sarcastic when “Maria’s Journey” came out, wrote: “Another immigrant struggle story.  Arredondoes of East Chicago vs. Dominguez’s of Gary.”  Maxwell Edison replied: “Did you read the book, mytwocents? I did and thought it was a great read! I love reading and like biographies best. Most of the bio's I read are published from prominent Universities; I know I'm getting quality material there. I'd highly recommend you buy a copy, read the book, and then you could make an intelligent comment. Good reading to you.”

Continuing my exchange with Vice Chancellor Malik, I wrote: “In the time you have been at IU Northwest you have provided both stability and innovation in a position that was badly in need of a strong, steady hand.  To further cement your legacy I am hoping that you consider ways to give sustainability to the Liberal Studies master’s degree program.  As you may know, efforts to launch Liberal Studies started three decades ago (when F.C. Richardson and John Kroepfl headed up Arts and Sciences) and only came to fruition after the tragic death of Robin Hass Birky, thanks to the commitment of your predecessor (Kwesi Aggrey) to finish what she had been working for as a testament to her memory.  Unfortunately, the degree program was never properly funded and virtually all offerings were simply cross-listings with undergraduate courses.  There is a proven demand for the program, but many students (Mary Lee, for example) have already taken most of the courses as undergraduates.  There are also limitations on the number of directed readings courses students can take and a requirement that they first complete a core curriculum first.  Your reply to a previous email suggested that emeritus faculty could teach courses gratis or that one-credit courses might be a way to get around the 15-student minimum regarding class size.  Both are possible perhaps, but what I believe is necessary is more flexibility and a fuller university commitment to a program that could be a model for other IU campuses.  After all, the main thing that distinguishes Indiana University from Purdue and other state institutions is its primary commitment to the Liberal Arts.”

Right after I sent that email, Chancellor William Lowe sent out the stunning announcement that David’s administrative assistant, Lydia Hairston had unexpectedly passed away.  I emailed Malik: “my condolences about Lydia, a sweet person whose passing I’m still in shock about, as you must be.  I still recall running into Kwesi Aggrey after he had just heard the news about Robin (Birky, assistant vice chancellor) dying (when a semi ran a red light and slammed into her) and how broken up he was.  Later he made a special trip to our campus with his family to see the plaque dedicating the Women’s Studies room in Savannah to her.”  Previously they had visited her gravesite.

Once, waiting for Malik, I took along a history of New Zealand, expecting that he might be late for our appointment.  Lydia Hairston offered to phone me when he returned, but I told her I was enjoying my book.  She inquired about it, and I mentioned that for thousands of years giant flightless birds similar to ostriches called moa lived on New Zealand’s two islands, but after the arrival of the Maori, they quickly became extinct because the Maori found them so delicious.  To my surprise the anecdote nearly moved her to tears, demonstrating what a compassionate person she was.

With bases loaded and one out in the eighth inning of a critical White Sox-Tigers contest Dewayne Wise tagged up on second on Adam Dunn’s apparent sacrifice fly and got thrown out at third before Gordon Beckham crossed home plate.  The bonehead play felt like a “Bartman moment” (forever etched in the memory of Cubs fans), but Chicago survived and defeated Detroit 5-4 to go three games up with 16 to play.