Spotlights: Author & Page Louis Haselmayer
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Lennis Moore 12-13 Don Jones 18-19 William Weiershauser
24-27
Patricia Newcomer
32-33
Ann Klingensmith
38-39
Mildred Bensmiller
44-47
Welcome to the digital Design e-zine
Ed Kropa 52-53
This is the 60th anniversary of the first publication of the Design Magazine. The issues have always been print-based featuring writing and artwork from students, faculty and community.
Jerry Naylor 58-59 Jean Thompson 64-67
Literature: Author & Page
Art: Author & Page
Charles A. Watson
8, 11
Anne Dorrell 9
Karol Adamson
14, 16, 17
Ramon Taylor 10
J.A. Gonzalez
20, 21, 23
Joy Dow 15, 69
Brandi Stewart
28, 30
Xiaolan Liu 16, 37
Esther Waterman
34, 36, 37
Nikia Pyle 17
Katie Goodwin
42, 43
Emily Neely
Rachel L. Newman
48, 50, 51
J. A. Gonzalez 22
Ashley Worster
54, 56
Ann Klingensmith
Tiffany Sammons
60, 62, 63, 68
Brittany Robison 35
21, 49 29, 31
Mady Powers 36 Lance C. Ingwersen
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Dylan P. Morgan
41, 43
Ashley Worster
55, 63
Luke Stewart 57 Katie Goodwin 61
This issue of Design was a collaborative process with the Graphic Layout and Design II class providing the layout. These members include Jessica Ana Gonzalez, Dylan Morgan, Sydney Suesens, Karisa Streb, Casey Leffel, Katie Goodwin and Professor Ann Klingensmith. Writing submissions from Sigma Tau Delta and other students. And consultation with Dr. Jean Thomson, Dr. Maryellen Potts, Dr. Lori Muntz and Dr. Kevin Farrell.
ALASKA ORDINATION August 7, 1989 For Michael Pilgrimage is blessed quest to reach a holy spot where actioned is the will of God in destined plan for human life. Amid the birch and tapered spruce in log built church on tundra soil an ancient rite unfolds anew. The hands are laid. The words are said. My pilgrimage to share now ends; His pilgrimage to serve begins.
SPACE AGE: TOP SECRET When all disease is cured and hearts beat timelesslywhen cancer rots no lungs and bughouse beds are freewhen solar force drives all and geriatrics reignswhen man has hours on end and culture-leisure rarethen all that’s left is sin.
Three months in Italy in 1961 Rome – the domain of Caesar and Augustus – of Papacy and Church – of Garibaldi and Mussolini – the Eternal City on seven hills. On the Feast of Corpus Christi, Pope John XXIII celebrated Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament under the Arch of Constantine.
CORPUS CHRISTI-ROME I wait beneath a Roman sun as heat slacks down to twilight cool where Caesar’s stallion clashed bright sparks and sweat dripped wide in cobblestain. His glory wrought by clash of sword, from crack on skull or pierce to groin, is shrilled by trumpet, shout by slave, sham victory over flesh and pain. The crowd today is silent, rapt, for single focus holds each eye fast on that monstrance, radiant gold, which priest on foot bears slowly by. Through death by cross, by life from tomb, in power of broken bread and word, sure grace to rich each quest of soul floods out from Corpus Domini.
Louis Haselmayer
NAME |Louis Haselmayer PROFESSION | Professor/ Advisor/ President CONTRIBUTION | Founded Design magazine
Behind The
Scenes
L
ouis Haselmayer joined the faculty of Iowa Wesleyan College in 1952. Quickly he became advisor to Omicron Alpha chapter of Sigma Tau Delta honor society. The 15 student members must have deemed Haselmayer notably cosmopolitan and confident, for he launched an ambitious plan: the little Methodist college on the prairie would publish a literary magazine.
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Haselmayer had been educated at Williams and Yale, as well as General Theological
Writer and Poet
Seminary, the University of Paris, Oxford University, and the Goethe Institute in Munich. A man of learning and of firm faith, he looked to set a high standard in his new post. The academic year 19531954 saw the first issue of Design, the literary magazine published yearly since then. The unsigned foreword to that first issue noted that “a literary magazine is a venture of faith,” and “the visible record of an invisible life of creativity.”
Subsequent issues celebrated “the powers of imagination that can be uncovered and fostered within an academic community,” as Haselmayer wrote in the foreword to the second issue. Students and faculty met together to discuss their creative work, gradually shaping the form that it would take on the pages of Design. Haselmayer not only guided student work and the fledgling publishing venture but continued to bring his own writing to the group. His topics
often reflected his extensive travel and his grounding in Christian experience – he was an Episcopal priest as well as a professor of English. Eventually, Louis Haselmayer was also a president, serving IWC in that capacity from 1970 through 1982.
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Whatever Happened To..? “verie grave and profitable” complaint These are the days of instant food, instant preparation, instant consumption. Instant “stove- to-table - to-mouth” has great advantages for hurried humans, for cost cutting of kitchen personnel, for employment of cooks whose culinary skills is limited to reading On and Off Switches, for computerized management of gross and net profit. Something has been lost along the way. Luscious items of food will never be the same. But it is only a short time lag. Those of us who will remember will soon be dead. Customers will then be those who never knew anything better. Their past is the present. Their palates, attuned to the frozen and microwaved, will soon be universal. What has happened to the good, old fashioned baked potato? That massive Idaho pomme de terre was carefully washed and dried, pierced with a fork, placed in the oven and baked at a steady heat. It was carried to the table - unfoiled. There was the moment of expectation, the ecstasy of salivary anticipation. One broke the crusty jacket with the tip of a fork. A great cloud of steam arose “like incense before the Lord.” The potato was mealy, flaky -- a magic merger of dry and moist. Butter melted into the fluffy mass. It was lifted to the mouth in all its glory. After the contents had been consumed, the jacket was still crisp, awaiting more butter. Now the potato is encased in foil, shoved into an oven, partially cooked, reheated at the moment of need, or even worse, the raw mass is microwaved as the waitress hollers, “one baked...” It appears at the table in its formidable packaging. There is the moment of fear, hesitation, frenetic concern. One picks away at the hot silvery armor. Some bits seem to be cemented to the damp, limp jacket. One does not break the potato with a fork. One slices with a knife, sometimes with effort, into a soapy solid. A half baked, half steamed, half heated tuber. Only by a creative leap of fantasy could it be called - A BAKED POTATO. One balances hard pats of Oleo on the gummy surface. They slide off. Mixing Oleo into the potato is achieved by cuts and jabs of 6 knife and fork, -- merging solid into solid.
Louis Haselmayer
Behind The
Scenes
But we enrich the surface of this great staple of life. We pile on sour cream. We drip on melted cheese. One even has the option of plain sour cream, sour cream with chives, sour cream with chili. A world of DIPS THAT DRIP. But these are just cosmetic. The baked potato no longer exists in its own right, in its integrity, its soul satisfying charm. It is a chunk of something that serves as a prop for something else. A second total risk in most eateries -- from family restaurants to swank supper clubs -- is the greatest glory of midwestern waterways -The Cat Fish. I grew up on the Atlantic coast and the varied wealth of ocean fish and seafood. When I came to Iowa I discovered the catfish. What a wonder! Solid, boneless white meat so structured around the central spine that it could be lifted with ease and consumed with security. It captured me and soon rivalled the mackerel, the sole, the blue fish, the swordfish. I sang the praises of the catfish in New York City, Boston, London, Paris, Rome, Mexico City, Athens, Tel Aviv, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Berlin (East and West), Leningrad, Moscow, Munich, Vienna, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Peking, Shanghai.
It came to the table panfried in a light flouring to hold it intact or carefully baked in the oven. One could lift the skin with a fork, precisely eat away from the spine or filet two solid sides onto the plate. It fell away from the bone, dry and flaky. Now there are almost more ways to ruin catfish than there are cooks to ruin it. It is buried, entombed, in batter -- flour batter, pancake mix batter, cornmeal batter, beer batter, perhaps even Diet-Pepsi batter. It is dropped into deep sizzling fat like a FF pot. Or into the Microwave. It is carried to the table -- an armor plated object - sometimes golden, sometimes dark brown, sometimes a sinister black. One required a knife to strip away the protective shell. The fork descends to lift up flaky morsels. But there is no flakiness -- only dried out shreds, or even worse -- damp strings clinging to the spine with rubbery intensity. One has to yank or sever these filaments. It is no longer a jewel or nature, created for our enjoyments, but a ruined object of stream and pond. What a prospect of horror is that frequent sales pitch -- ALL YOU CAN EAT. And finally in this “verie grave and profitable”
We travel. We seek travel. We are intrigued with the exotic cuisine of other lands -European, Hispanic, Oriental. But how sad are some of these experiences as one encounters imitations that barely look like and certainly do not taste like the alleged item named on the menu. The best way to enjoy Americanized ethnic food is never to taste the real food in the actual country. Only one ghastly example. A regional emporium advertised extensively that it specialized in German-American cooking. With some hesitation, I paid for one expensive fiasco. The menu listed “Sauerbraten,” -- with adjectives extolling its Teutonic authenticity. What was placed before me? Washier haben wir? Three slices of pot roast similar to those used for hot roast beef sandwiches at trucker stops. These were glued by a thick brown gravy that appeared to have been ladled out of a can. Into that turgid goo had been stirred about a teaspoon measure of vinegar to give it the “sauer” effect. Sauerbraten is a rump of beef that has been marinated in a special brine for at least four to five days. It is then slowly cooked in a heavypot with a tight lid. Some of the brine is placed in the pot. But the lid must be tight. My mother, grandmother, aunts and sister always used a flat iron on top of the lid. Onions, carrots, celery could be added. After the long, slow cooking, the meat was softened to the degree that it could be parted with a fork. The sauerbraten before me had to be sawed with a steak knife. The gravy is made from the pot liquid and perhaps a bit more of the brine. Some German families stir in crushed ginger snaps. But the essential factor is the preparation, not the surface decor. This menu bilked the public. It was neither “sauer” nor “braten.” I cannot fight change. A new technological cuisine is here. One cannot go home again. I cannot engage in single or class action suits. I simply ask for new titles to describe the new order which tell the truth and do not evoke the past or the distant. STEAMED POTATOES IN DAMP JACKETS. DEEP FRIED RUBBERY FISH MEAT. POTROAST WITH CANNED BROWN GRAVY.
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The Wolves at St. Francis The night of the winter solstice and the new snow, the creaking bergs shoved against each other, unsettled in black liquid against the shore. The squeaky transmission bounced beyond the jetty, inviting a mist from the sea o’er speckled beach, a matrix of paw prints and cracked ice. Through unpacked snowy trails we rambled— past the monastery, the cemetery, and into the woods. Bolting among the skeletal aspens stark against the snow, we breathed in the gray and silent night, an amber street lamp illuminating a December fog. We followed the moving creek, black like twisty licorice. Through the woods it kept its banks for all renewal, pushing towards the shore. Past vacant stony grottos we coursed— no statues, visitors, nor rabbits to stir— ears piqued to the yelps from afar. At the clearing we stepped out of the forest with lost breath, tossing snowballs, listening to the howling, the only sound around. We finished at the stations reminded of the higher calling— the signals, the shore, on that dark winter’s eve.
Gazelles Anne Dorrell Collage
--Charles A Watson
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Awake
Tambourines and tangerines The changing sky I spy. A streaking sun, another star Its distant rays unknown. Bowing to this present joy What distant notes I play! Spin citrus, eternal myst’ry, We celebrate today. --Charles A Watson
Tantricized McKibbin Ramon Taylor Charcoal
Cyber connected, the matter will take shape at an undisclosed place and time. The struggle and clockwork will complete the jagged, diagonal design. Beyond his reach he trusts, she trusts and struts and only their words will meet. --Charles A Watson
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Anna’s Farm Revisisted Woodcut 13.5x10”
NAME |Lennis Moore PROFESSION | CEO of Midwest Old Threshers CONTRIBUTION | Woodcuts, Illustrations, and prints Katie in Red Woodcut 12x16”
Hollyhocks for Panel Woodcut 6.5x10.5” Iowa Memories Woodcut 13.5x4.5”
Printmaker Illustrator Lennis /Moore L
ennis Moore has contributed in important ways to the collaboration and artistic community that have shaped Design’s history.
Headed Home 12Woodcut 13.5x9
Moore grew up on a small family farm in Northeast Iowa and studied art at Luther College. Since 1978, he has served as CEO of Midwest Old Threshers in Mt. Pleasant. He has also continued to create art, notably woodcuts.
Behind The
Scenes
“The majority of my woodcut prints,” Moore writes, “depict the rural landscape. I grew up on a farm and have always been fascinated with the everchanging shapes, textures, and colors of the countryside. My eyes are usually drawn to some small, intimate portion of familiar surroundings; a snapshot if you will. The resulting images are my interpretation of that brief interlude with the land.” During the years when Mildred Bensmiller edited Design, she invited Moore to submit work.
The path of his work moved from perception through cutting and inking a birch plywood block to an image on the page. Sometimes his subject matter was typically rural and familiar – a mare and foal under a starlit sky, for example. In other instances, he ranged farther afield, rendering, for example, a Zuni pot. As the two developed a mutually appreciative working relationship, Bensmiller urged Moore to turn his attention to a new focal point: Iowa Wesleyan’s oldest building,
Pioneer Hall. As she wrote, Pioneer Hall “was the visible sign/Of pioneer vision . . ./. . . unadorned with spire or dome,/A prairie school . . . .” Moore’s images of Pioneer Hall, used as cover designs, capture the building’s substance and simplicity. Bensmiller’s words in the 1990 issue are fitting summary and tribute: “Our deep gratitude and admiration go to Lennis Moore who created the cover in keen empathy with the meaning and form of the 13 building.”
Ode to the Yellow Brick Road Ruby slippers reflect off of the yellow brick road that lies beneath the feet of those lost souls searching through Emerald to find the elusive place that Dorothy calls home, Kansas. A song stuck in the wind; if I only had a brain floats as they skip carelessly onward while witches watch through smoky glass, sparkling ruby slippers reflecting off of the yellow brick road that lies forever in the minds of weary travelers. Rusted tin soldier and mangy lion fall into step beside a man of straw, each searching for salvation, while the elusive place that Dorothy calls home moves further out of reach, Emerald shines in the eyes of those who believe in the all-powerful Oz. Treacherous journey casts shadows over ruby slippers reflecting off of the yellow brick road that lies only in the minds of those brave enough to continue. Flying monkeys tear at their dreams as witch’s broom holds all of the answers, brain, heart, courage, oh my, of course Kansas, the elusive place that Dorothy calls home, not far from Emerald City in a place called Oz, where dreams come true if you believe hard enough. Follow your dreams not sparkling ruby slippers reflecting off of the yellow brick road that lies in the elusive place that Dorothy calls home.
--Karol Adamson
Mouse Joy Dow Graphite 14
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Sleep Pretty Princess With eyes wide shut, the dreams escape into the air that she breathes. wind takes them away leaves frost on her lips. tries to speak but words do not come they too are taken on the wind to drift far away into lost times. runs to catch up stumbles into the past where she can’t breathe. toxic life takes hold of all that she has become, a princess glitz and glamour. just a little longer and she can sleep, maybe dream, face in the mirror tells her she is nothing, opens old wounds. she drifts away, trying to escape the vice that holds her arms, black and blue with needle tracks. burns like acid but feels so good, to forget pain, disappointment, loss of innocence. this time is different, this time the pain will end, so sleep pretty princess sleep. --Karol Adamson
Untitlted Nikia Pyle Charcoal
Filling Me Pain comes first, then never-ending throbbing. I know you see the fear in my eyes, but words are impossible. You urge me open, move closer, we touch, I flinch. Hold still, you hiss. I close my eyes, gasping for air and hoping for relief.
Flowers Xiolan Liu Screen Print 16
When you are finished, the mask falls away. You leave me empty, drooling in Novocain bliss. --Karol Adamson 17
Don Jones is a well-respected Professor of Art at Iowa Wesleyan College. He is also an artist and world traveler. Don has been involved in Design since he joined the faculty at Iowa Wesleyan. He worked closely with Mildred Bensmiller on the selection of art works for the yearly publications of Design. He has also been a contributor to the magazine and has submitted numerous images, including the cover of the design magazine in 2012, which he based off of the Mayan calendar. His images are often studies in both design and composition. In his images he also explores the dynamics of light, color, value, texture and always the intellectual juxtapositions that show the “conversation� between traditional and contemporary elements of Mexican life. In his career at Iowa Wesleyan, Don has introduced international travel and has been a constant proponent for study abroad. He has taken 600+ students to Mexico over the last 34 years. There they studied first hand the art, architecture, and anthropology. With a focus on the intersection of these parts of the culture with contemporary, social, and political issues as they relate to the study of Global Issues.
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Photograph
Photograph
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Their Hands Their hands, their touch, the sight lingers in the darkest corners of my mind. Reliving it becomes a battle. It’s like taking a beating that leaves no marks, yet they are there imprinted beneath skin. The ones only I can see. Those unpleasant memories sneaking up taking a hold, as quick as the snap of fingers, trapping me back in time. Where childhood innocence gets tainted for their own twisted fulfillment. If I could go back and speak up I would. Because realization only came, when the haze finally lifted and by then it was far too late. There are days when they win; I will admit that. But the times when I win, their hold loosens a bit. There will a come a time, when the grip they have on me will cease to cripple and hinder me from living. And it will become a whisper in the wind, gone as fast as it came.
Sacks Emily Neely Charcoal
--J.A. Gonzalez
Cut With each pass deeper and deeper I go. Just breaking the surface. Looking for that release where the pain takes over, and everything else just disappears, For a small moment of time. --J.A. Gonzalez 20
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The Line It’s that line between the dates. The one we see laid in stone, that puts our lives back into perspective. It shows all the years gone and the ones that will never be. It’s only a matter of time before someone will look down at our line. --J.A. Gonzalez Beneath The Skin J.A.Gonzalez Mixed Mediums 22
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A Welsh Song Hen Benillion #16 William Weiershauser – Associate Professor of Language and Literature, retired in 2013 after a long career working primarily with writing courses and education courses. He advised Sigma Tau Delta – Along with teaching, Professor Weiershauser enjoyed translating poems and prose from Welsh and Latin.
A mi’n rhodio mynwent eglwys, Lle’r oedd amryw gyrff yn gorffwys, Trawn fy nhroed wrth fedd f’anwylyd, Clywn fy nghalon yn dymchwelyd. Gofyn wnes i’r gynulleidfa, “Pwy yw’r un a gladdwyd yma?” Ac atebai rhyw ddyn ynfyd, “Dyma’r fan lle mae d’anwylyd.” Trwn yw’r plwm, a thrwm yw’r cerrig, Trom yw calon pob dyn unig; Trymaf peth tan haul a lleuad Canu’n iach lle byddo caraid. - Anonymous
Among the Graves I walked among the churchyard graves where several bodies lay; My foot slid above my lover’s grave; I heard my heart stumble. I asked of those assembled there “Who is the one buried here?” The answer came from a senseless man, “This place is you beloved’s.” Lead is heavy; stones are heavy, The heart of every lonely man is heavy; Under the moon and sun, the heaviest of all Is bidding farewell to where a lover lies. - trans. by William Weiershauser
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Aubade You wake up so prettily with the sun, Your arms outstretched, a yawn, a smile, a sigh -No, not yet; tended sleep is not yet done; Drawing soft into sleep’s nature, you try Our morning which already has begun. Since I die, cruel me against that sleep conspires To hold again what the night held so we may now expire. You surrender to mutual desire; Slight sleep; yield to what with cunning inspires, And as a reborn cat senses for sense, Mewing to be fed, you come close, respire, Your strong long body lines arch straight and tense; Day beings now that morning pleasure’s done. You wake up so artfully with the sun.
- W.P. Weiershauser
ESSAY, ASSAY ON COFFEE This was meant as an essay on coffee-A long, hot drink of words. This was meant as an essay on coffee-Reclining in the pre-dawn light, my hand wrapped around a full cup whose steam seeps into my palm; Rupert drawing himself out between my legs, his paws draped loosely like new leaves. This was meant as an essay on coffee-Neighbors talking, laughing, whispering until noon; The radio and the breeze playing across the porch and our half-full mugs. This was meant as an essay on coffee-After asparagus and salmon, lingering over espresso capped with frothy milk floating in thin glasses. This was meant as an essay on coffee A midnight pot, faded stains stamped on student essays, incomplete "O's." This was meant as an essay on coffee-A gift from a former love, a pair of platinum etched bone-china cups and saucers, remnants of shared intimacies no longer sipped together. These pieces were meant as an essay on coffee-But what I have is this. -William P. Weiershauser
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Broken How could you say those words Words that cut so deep Covering them with lies That only make the ache worse Pain only caused by emotion A pain I never thought I would know with you Pain unimaginable to those who have never felt it Pain that burns deep in the soul A broken heart shattered into a million pieces Only time will suture the wounds Closure will eventually come With the love of another Brandi Stewart
Faithful Sentry Ann Klingensmith Intaglio 28
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A Sea of White Floating from the sky Like feathers falling down White and shining Tiny sparking crystals No two will every look the same Created with smooth edges and sharp curves A beautiful scene is formed Simply by crystals falling from the sky At first fall an untainted landscape is formed Representing the purity left in the world A sheet of white glistening upon the earth Purity destroyed only by the movement of others Soon footprints and stains will deform this magnificent beauty Just as humans have done to the rest of the world —Brandi Stewart
Fighter I fight everyday an invisible force One inside my own mind Created by the self Originally created as a protective barrier Yet it now takes over daily tasks I should be able to control its impact on my life But that goal is long lost It is winning One day I will control my own mind Through therapy Support And love
Ann Klingensmith
—Brandi Stewart
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Pat Newcomer served as director of the Chadwick Library at IWC and taught Spanish. After taking Mildred Bensmiller’s poetry class, she began writing poetry and contributed to Design magazine. When she passed away, a special issue of Design featured several of her previous works.
A Question of Ecology Eagles fly. Men fly. Eagles touch the quarry. Men touch the button.
Behind The
Scenes
Writer and Librarian / PoetPoet
NAME | Patricia Newcomer PROFESSION | Professor CONTRIBUTION | Poems
Eagles see the blood, hear a cry. Men see the fire, hear a thud. I wonder. If eagles had learned to bomb their prey. Would more eagles survive today?
November A gauze of early snow has not bound up bristling scabs of stubble. The ragged land awaits soothing drifts of winter, shades drawn down across the sky, and time to heal the wounded
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fields.
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The Greatest Show
My life is a balancing act, a circus show with wires stretched tight. A pole across palms, plates poised and set in motion, spinning one atop the other. High wires stretch above an emcee who draws attention to the center ring where plates are poised, set in motion, spinning while a lion roars, pawing the air before submission. A Master of Ceremonies draws attention to clowns who enter riding trikes and making mischief while a lion roars, pawing the air before submission. High-flying trapeze artists perform spectacular maneuvers as clowns enter pushing kiddie cars and making mischief with cotton candy, balloons, and peanuts. High-flying trapeze artists are spectacular while performing maneuvers with the balance of my checkbook. Clowns demand cotton candy, hot dogs, and nuts. Due dates deadlines, housework, and bills are juggled with my checkbook on a tight wire, upsetting the balance as plates begin to fall, one by one. Juggling due dates, deadlines, housework, and time, I forget ball games, conferences, and party treats as plates begin to fall, one by one, crashing to the ground. I forget ball games, conferences, treats, and parties as I strive for balance with a pole across palms hoping I don’t crash. My life, my circus. --Esther Waterman
Expressive Self Portrait Brittany Robison Graphite & Textiles
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Poetry Lesson
Affinity for Roe
Perfect is not Perfect but boring. And Reality cannot be written to suspend disbelief. Reality exceeds belief. Words are clichĂŠ even as thought and yet they tumble from mind to mouth, from pen to pristine paper.
We walked through fields of springtime flowers, waded creeks and spent evenings giggling in backyard tents before summer brought double drive-in dates and bonfires with blankets, wine, dances, and moon shine. Your family was mine, and mine was yours and we grew into women through weddings and children, heartbreak and fear, loss and reunion. Time changed life, but not the love that made us friends.
Read my imperfection, my clichĂŠd reality, teacher. Create me. --Esther Waterman
--Esther Waterman
Mady Powers Painting 36
Xiolan Liu Monotype 37
Printmaker & Professor Ann Klingensmith
Artist Statement: By any gauge. I am a traditional artist approaching images with a figurative vocabulary. What I am trying to understand is an old concern: form, light and shadow, and movement created by mark and color. That is an under lying structure for almost all of my work, whether it be dog, mask, crow, or human form. These are subjects that I have built long relationships with and by working again and again with the same ideas, try to uncover something more than what I know about the image and myself. Dogs for the past 20 years have comprised another focal point and are an often-revisited subject. But they are not dogs to me as in canas domesticus. And like the more recent crow, they have become props in the landscape of rural Midwest, specifically southern Iowa. They mark the passing of seasons. Sentries, dog or crow, in 38
the landscapes of late fall and early spring when the surface of the earth seems very empty. No longer do rows of beans or corn separate the earth from the sky. The tones of the exposed earth and remaining dried vegetation are contradictory. The images are places for light to shape the form and for the shadow to play on the ground. Yet, these are not innocent pictures of dogs. And crows are never innocent. Tensions rise out of the animals' posturing where light creates shadows that become voids. Often times other shadows enter the frame and raise questions as to the relationships between the suggested form and the subject. I want to heighten this unease through the decisions I make about the composition. These animals serve to slice composition and underscore the edge. In recent years, the idea of season change and renewal has become more subtly explored. The container bulb: forced into life in the middle of winter, the Chrysalis that holds a life that is transforming. These are also suggestions of change and change suspended. The comment that a friend made “sometimes the most precious gifts are wrapped in barbed wire�, has held my imagination as I work with these images like analogies and await some transformative gesture. Obviously as an artist, I do not want to explain away my work. I want the viewer to make a connection to the work - to feel an emotion - to have the image linger, to recognize the shadow and welcome and remember their experience with the images, like a dream memory.
Pinned Charcoal 40 x 28
Allegory Linocut 16 x 26
Five Crows Graphite 24 x 12
All the things I Lost Linocut 24 x 18
Fire and Water Woodcut 18 x 24
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Still Life with Bags Lance C. Ingwersen Charcoal
Brown Nut Dylan P. Morgan Linocut 40
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Frost
Untitled
You can write to me of beautiful seas or all the waves in the ocean. You can speak to me of lovely things, like kindness and devotion.
“Autumns Monologue” plays in the leaves of every single tree As an ode to memories dances in the golden threads of your eyes. As if forever was something I could endure, To choose the emptiness behind your smile Or to drift free, To crumble, To fall
Then write about morning skies, crisp and oh so clear. Or speak of future things like happiness so near.
—Katie Goodwin
You can write of trails and trials, of roads where they diverge, And ignore all other things, like lust and every sinful urge. Then write of serenity, ignore all human desire, But of all these things you write and speak, you'll only be a liar. —Katie Goodwin
Fiberglass Cut my fingertips on the shards of you spread before my feet. Fibers stuck so deep within that you became a part of me. Tried to fit the pieces back in their place, hoped to put a smile back on your face. Got too tired of lifeguarding you from drowning in yourself. Stepped back and watched you float, it seems you never really needed me. Still bits and shards are in my hands so deep inside and I realize: I am not a part of you. But you’re a part of me. —Katie Goodwin
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Autumn Fire Dylan Morgan Linocut
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Final Reflections on Reading a Final
A Pioneer Vision The "Institute Building" was the visible sign Of pioneer vision rooted in fertile loam, Unnamed and unadorned with spire or dome, A prairie school; by purpose and design,
This is a fine kettle of fish, A mess of pottage, a dish Of hash, unseasoned and half-baked, A semester's smorgasbord served up faked, Unpalatable to follow And too much to swallow. Somebody's goose is cooked. –Mildred Bensmiller
"A substantial edifice." The founders planned It "2 stories high," rectangular, of brick, "28 x 54." Its thick Oak floor joists hewn from virgin timberland. They opened the walls. Through those windows, light Illumined uncharted skies, the pulsing frontiers. . . . And they opened its doors to those who would study there. We call it Pioneer Hall. It has earned its right To that name. One hundred and forty-five years In continuous use: a pioneer vision, real and rare. –Mildred Bensmiller
Design Pioneer, Poet, Writer, & Professor
Mildred Bensmiller Mildred Bensmiller was a true daughter of the Midwest, yet her interests spanned all areas of learning. Educated at Parsons and the University of Nebraska-Kearney, with additional study at several universities, she devoted herself to the students of Iowa Wesleyan College and celebrated the pioneer vision reflected in the college’s founding. She loved the land of the American Midwest and the people who worked it.
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“She shaped Design for a quarter century” Bensmiller delighted in language and ideas. Keenly observant, she crafted poems to embody and convey the full individuality of a subject. Her poems might be elegiac or wickedly humorous or sharply questioning. While she wrote often about familiar places and processes, she also drew on her wide travel. Many of her poems won awards, including Sigma Tau Delta’s Judson Q. Owen prize.
The poems that she wrote modeled, for her students, curiosity and craft. In the classroom, whether she was teaching Shakespeare or modern poetry or rhetoric, she pressed those values and drew out from her students the insights that they had barely realized. Sigma Tau Delta provided one more setting for Bensmiller’s gifted teaching. She worked with the honor society and its magazine from the time she
joined the faculty, in 1961. After she became chief advisor in 1980, she shaped Design for a quarter century. Under Bensmiller’s leadership, images in Design became more abundant and varied. She experimented with different types and colors of paper and encouraged colleagues and students to explore the visual possibilities for the magazine.
However, the essential quality and character of Design continued. Bensmiller wrote in the foreword to the 2005 issue that “ though each work is intensely personal, we invite our audience to reflect and share in the experience.” With each issue of Design, the Iowa Wesleyan College community continues the creative endeavor that Bensmiller honed. – Jean Thompson
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The Wait for a Knowing I have taken to listening for strange voices, To peering around half-opened doors, Watching the skies for some inexpressible sign. I neither want nor expect explanation. They have already made voluminous autopsies, Expounded endlessly on the modes of dissection, And offered up their opinions--erudite, grave… Their magic has revealed nothing at all. I look for a bush flaming madly, or a sighting Of chariot wheels, or a single crescendo sound That has no discernible beginning and end. –Mildred Bensmiller
The Auction It is like most household auctions-a rite of disposal --crockery, curios, boxes of jars from the cellar, a stack of old calendars, somebody’s pink ruffled gloves.... I have come to inspect the lawn chairs, billed as “near new.” But someone has reached them first: stolid and still, they have established themselves. The circle of chairs holds me out, an intruder, as unwelcome as death.
“These was Cory’s best lawn chairs,” one says, “Set in ‘em every Sunday afternoon.” Old eyes burn fiercely inward, six heads nod in unison. Feet fixed on top the ground, they hold on to that familiar space , against another time, another place. –Mildred Bensmiller
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Why I Love Cats One June afternoon, my mother and I returned from the store and we heard a little squeak. We then saw an emaciated black figure emerge from the bush by the house. Out of the kindness of our hearts, we rushed to get this tiny cat some food and water. Today, she still squeaks and now also runs freely in the warmth of our home. Her name is Kitty, and she is the wild, weird, little troublemaker of the house. I have always loved all types of cats but she makes me smile, laugh, and my heart burst with joy. I love cats due to their unique personalities. I love cats with long hair, short hair and no hair. I love cats because of the little pads on their furry feet. I love cats because of all the different markings they have on their coats such as multi-colored splotches, spots and half mustaches. I love cats because they are sneaky if they don’t wear a collar with a bell. I love cats when they circle your feet in a sign of affection. I love cats because you can tell their mood just by the swift movements of their tails. I love cats when they head-butt you to get you to pet them, and my cat does this frequently, to my face (put this down there?). I love cats because they go to the bathroom in a box. I love cats because everyone knows cat owners do not own cats, cats own them. I love cats because when they are happy they purr. I love cats because they close their eyes when they are happy. I love cats when they decide to run through the house in the early morning. I love cats that are friendly and loving. I love cats when they bathe in the sun to get warm. I love cats that curl up on your lap and take a nap simply because they can. I love cats because they love me. I will forever love cats because they are unique individuals. I love my cat because she likes to chitter when she sees birds outside. I love my cat when she lies on the floor and stretches her body out so I can pet her belly. I love my cat when she meows back at me. I love my cat because she will follow me everywhere when she wants my attention. I love my cat because she thinks that everything is a toy, including my toes. I love her even when she decides to be mischievous and knock things around. I love my cat because she has a half mustache. I love my cat even though she gives me little “love marks” from either her sharp little teeth or her back claws. I love when she gets her back feet kicking when you try and pet her belly when she doesn’t want you to. I love the way she is helping me describe her, while sitting in front of me. I truly adore her and wish I could see her and my other cat every day. Writing reminds me of all their perks and flaws. I love cats and I love my cats because they are cats. –Rachael L. Newman 48
Kitchen Emily Neeley Charcoal
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In My Heart: Grandpa and His Tractor
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It was only a month after he passed away. Here I was, lying down, ready to feel the needle pierce my skin. To have the adrenaline in my body pick up and to get the relief I needed for the painful event that had happened. I am at the tattoo parlor getting my memorial tattoo for my grandpa. What I had envisioned was something simple. What was produced was something extraordinary, something I would have with me for the rest of my life. It is a picture of his 1943 Farmall tractor. The tractor he let me ride on down the highway, the tractor that I watched him mow and rake hay on. This tractor was now going to represent my grandpa, a tall, broad man who always wore overalls and a ball cap over his white and grey wavy hair. The safety I felt when I was around him would now be a physical part of me, not just a mental part. Growing up, my home life wasn’t spectacular. Being an only child, one would think it was great: it wasn’t. I grew up obeying my father’s every word and doing everything in my power to keep him happy. My father worked the third shift at Iowa State Penitentiary as a Guard. Although I don’t remember it, when I was younger my mom had to keep me quiet simply so I wouldn’t wake him up while he was sleeping. Being quiet continued for the 17 years I spent lived with him. If he was upset, everyone felt his wrath. All of that emotional abuse led me to want to escape the home I was raised in. One of the ways I could do this was by spending the weekend with my grandparents. My grandparents lived about an hour and thirty minutes away from Fort Madison, Iowa. They lived on a forty acre farm in between two small Missouri towns, Downing and Lancaster. My mom would drop me off with my grandma when she got off work on Friday night. My grandma and I would then make the drive down to the house. The house was my safety. I knew that there, I wouldn’t get yelled at, I could sleep as long as I wanted, and I would be accepted as myself. One of the main differences at my grandparent’s house was that we ate dinner as a family, sitting around the table; unlike my house, where we sat in front of the T.V. or at the kitchen counter. As I grew older and my grandma retired, I visited less and less. I lost my escape and had to find other means to cope. I still did what I usually did when I was getting yelled at for by my father. I stood there and took it with tears streaming down my face. At times I even got yelled at for showing the emotions of hurt and sadness. Once I was done being put down, I would retreat to my room and cry some more. One night when I was a freshman in high school, I went out with my boyfriend and some friends to see a movie. I ended up being out past my curfew. When I arrived at my house, the yelling and cussing started immediately. By this time, I had learned to do what was being done to me. I yelled and cussed back. I said something to my father and he back handed me in the face. I rushed to the phone to call 911 because that is what you are supposed to do when someone physically assaults you. The yelling continued and I tried to explain what had happened. I was accused of lying. I yelled back and was on the verge of walking out the door. My father grabbed at me and I attempted to kick him and then proceeded to push the computer chair at him. I didn’t call 911 and I didn’t leave the house because of my mother.
After I was sent to my room that night, I wanted nothing more than to run away. I wanted to finally be away from the pain and suffering of living with this man who was supposed to care for me but never did. I wanted to be someplace safe, some place where I knew I wouldn’t be hurt in any way. That place was my grandparent’s house. My grandpa had never raised his voice at me and would never lay a hand on me. He would have protected me from harm. But at that moment, he wasn’t there to protect me from my father and I was alone. I missed grandpa at several family events and it occurred to me that I would be missing him forever when we found out that he had stage four cancer in his lungs, liver, and bones. How could this happen to such a sweet, caring man? He could not have been that bad in his past. So why him? Why the man who meant the world to me? He got treatment, but the cancer was progressing so fast that the likelihood he would go into remission was slim. On Friday, June 6, 2012, my mom got the call at approximately four in the morning. My grandpa had passed away. My mom woke me up after she talked to my grandma to tell me. I was groggy and half asleep but I knew one of my worst fears had happened. As a girl, I had always envisioned my reaction to his death as nonstop crying. But I did not shed one tear that morning. I got up and went to work. I informed my boss what had happened. All I wanted was to get off a few hours early because I planned to go down to the house to be there for my grandma. When I arrived at the house to console my grandma there was this emptiness in the house. I knew I needed to memorialize him. I knew it would be a tattoo. I had planned to get one for him since I first started getting tattoos at the age of eighteen. I just didn’t know how I was going to represent him. Should I get his portrait and pay a lot of money? Should I get a train locomotive because he was a worker for the Burlington Northern – Santa Fe Railroad? I went back through the pictures. I found the picture of me sitting on the back of his truck watching him rake hay. This is how I knew my grandpa, as a farmer. I then found other photos of him with his tractor. Then it came to me I was going to use his tractor to represent him. So I scheduled the appointment to get it, the 1943 Farmall, permanently on my body. I chose the location of my left calf knowing that eventually a memorial for my grandma would go on the right one. I lay there for two and a half hours, managing through the pain of the details and color being applied by a three-pronged needle that continuously pierced my sensitive skin. Now when I go down to my grandparent’s house, a piece is missing. All the farm machinery, the tools that my grandpa worked with, and that 1943 Farmall tractor has been sold. Although the house had been under renovation since before my grandpa passed, it is even more complete now. I know it is the same house with some of their pictures on the walls, but it is different than the safe house I went to as a child. To this day, and as long as I visit that house, that large, broad man in his overalls and ball cap over wavy white and grey hair will not be waiting to embrace me, tell me he loves me, and keep me safe from harm. –Rachael L. Newman 51
A Bike Moment I day-tripped the Fairfield to Fort Madison segment of RAGBRAI last summer. There is only one hill of mention on that route. As I started up I was in behind someone and I didn’t have the oomph to get around. Luckily I was in a gear to just sit there behind and grind it out. Doing so, I began to hear strains of the Rocky theme which became more pronounced and louder as we climbed and damned if I didn’t get goose bumps. Here was this girl off the the side next to her bike playing a bugle, just finishing as I made the top. Everybody was thanking her – I offered the goose bumps and the person in front of me said the same. So this was this girl’s RAGBRAI thing – get to the top of a decent hill, help the riders immediately behind, jump on her bike and find the next big hill. She probably only played once that day and I hit her concert exactly and it was really cool!
The artist’s world is limitless. It can be found anywhere, far fromm where he lives or a few feet away. It is always on his doorstep. -Paul Strand
Cropduster Morning It is a cropduster morning Cool, clear and still. And he is out And close Doing his dance. The engine burbles, then rumbles The prop buzzes Then again and again. Should I wake the kids And try and find? Na, he’ll be done before we get there. I’ll just lie here and listen.
Rest Area Picnic Is there a country song that plays with the idea that the only vacation we have is a picnic at the rest area out there on the interstate? If not, it seems like there ought to be.
Professor & Writer NAME | Ed Kropa
Casey Leffel
PROFESSION | Registrar
Ed Kropa, Registrar Emeritus, civic volunteer, car aficionado, and keen observer has been and continues to be a valued contributor to Design Magazine. His work is often direct but with a twist, succinct stated all while reflecting on the complex realizations and exchanges of his experiences.
CONTRIBUTION | Writer
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Laura: One-sided reflection The plaintive stares and the mournful passages The wistful sighs built into timeless refrains Mask wounded egos, and denied advances. Make beauteous the worn trials and pains, Of the hunted; plagued with frazzled madness Unable to escape from the poet’s iron chains. One weeps for the love unrequited Focusing in as the rejected complains; Never noticing the subject, increasingly un-delighted Understanding at first, but soon she strains To be kind, calm, cool, composed and quiet As her sanity crumbles, and she, who patience no longer contains As this incessant word-smith immortalizes his idol While mad, harangued, and chased, she wishes to reject the title. –Ashley Worster
Snowshoe Movement across the large stark white field, The only thing not frozen in place. The white world of the field is disrupted by a chase of life and death. Distant and tiny, explosions of snow spark up Individual flakes catch the sun, Sending bursts of ever changing colors in to the sky, A trail of rainbows that slowly sink back to earth. Six feet, five feet, four feet, twisting ever closer One with the snow; grey, white, fluffy; the hare soon flashes past Claws flashing, its pursuer follows shortly behind. They quickly disappear, leaving nothing But a demolished trail of churned snow in their wake The only evidence of life in a cold ice-coated field –Ashley Worster
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Haunted Mask Ashley Worster Charcoal
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The Death of a Leaf The leaf sits perched on the highest point of the yard in a young tree riddled with branches. No clouds darken the sky above allowing the sun to further scorch the surface of the tree, and in turn the leaves that once drew energy for it. Glowing brilliant scarlet from the sun that now leeches the life from it with every ray, it hangs there, color changing as the sun arcs across the sky. Deep burgundy stripes run across its exterior, made by the shadows thrown behind the now useless and lifeless veins etched into its surface. Ragged holes also dot the leaf’s face, made by little hungry creatures that once stole food from the tree by devouring its surface. Each breath of wind shudders its ever weakening grasp; dragging through the ragged gaps in its body and further shaking its hold. All of its five points crumble to dust as its own nonexistent weight slowly bows it toward the earth below. Its stem is bent and broken in places, gripping the rest of the branch tenaciously, dead and dry as it is. The branch on which this relic of summer hangs swings with the wind as well; bare and patchy in places from the loss of its foliage, asleep until spring. Finally, there is a snap, all but inaudible, and the leaf gets wrenched away from the tree once and for all. The wind is not finished however, now the leaf gets flung around, slamming into its yellow and brown brethren unwittingly knocking a few of them loose to fall alongside it. Gravity intervenes as well, once again fighting the wind for its new toy, dragging the leaf away from the roller coaster ride of the breeze. Back and forth it flies, brushing against the scratched and crackled brown tree bark.
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Dizzily spinning, shedding fragments like a rain of confetti from each impact, the leaf barrels along in the general direction of the ground. This time when the wind interferes with its path, the leaf slows to a drift now moving side to side, less of a whirlwind, now more of a float. Closer and closer it sinks until finally it comes to a well-deserved stop on the ground. Significantly more ragged, with more holes and an huge chunk of its side torn off, the leaf rests. It’s once rich red color has been marred into brown and dulled by its position in the shadows. The surface of the leaf is now broken and scratched and considerably frailer. Its stem is unrecognizable, hanging on by a thread of fibers, dangling and still fluttering from the fall. It is dark where the leaf lives now, the shadows crossing its face are black instead of burgundy, cast by the tall grass where it now resides. Once it was a part of the tallest greenery in the area, now the grass dwarfs the leaf, looming over it. Blades stand through the holes in the leaf; others are bent slightly beneath it, holding its weight with ease. Hungry little creatures reside here as well, black scuttling beetles and red marching ants and several more; but as of yet they ignore the leaf crawling around it and under it on tiny stick like legs. Finally cool and shielded from the unrelenting sun, even the dark ground underneath the leaf exudes coldness. The leaf can wait now for the next cycle of the year to take its course; and for the moment all is calm and thus one small piece of fall is at rest. –Ashley Worster
Tree Luke Stewart Charcoal
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Professor & Illustrator NAME | Jerry Naylor PROFESSION | Professor CONTRIBUTION | Illustrator
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Casey Leffel
J
erry Naylor remains an active member of the Mt. Pleasant community today.
He served IWC as an associate professor of German, then took up the mantle of director of RSI (Responsible Social Involvement) – today’s Service Learning – in 1982. He is a member of Sigma Tau Delta, the English Honor Society and sponsor of Design and provided support and direction for the publication.
Mr. Naylor studied calligraphy, and for many years created the colorful covers of Design. Once he entered a contest held by the US postal service for decorative envelopes and one of his calligraphy projects was chosen and toured the United States in a traveling exhibit. He is keen on languages and enjoys talking to strangers in restaurants – a friendly out-going guy.
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My Baby Sister Like most sisters I want you happy and healthy But you are not just any normal person You were born with many health problems And I wish many things for you I wish I could take away your pain That physical pain you deal with on a daily basis And the emotional pain you feel as well I wish I could make everyone see you and not your physical appearance They would see a beautiful young girl That has the most caring and feisty personality I know I wish I could fulfill all of your dreams The one where you wish you was normal And the one where you wish to meet Jorja Fox I wish I could take away your fears The ones you try to keep to yourself And the ones everyone knows about I wish I could make this world a nicer place for you A world where you don’t feel rejected And a world where you don’t have to be scared to grow up I wish I could make your life easier But as mom always says “God doesn’t give you what you can’t handle” So baby sister You push past all that pain You show people who you really are You fulfill your dreams You push aside all your fears You make this world a better one And you can count on me to make your life easier I know you can do whatever you want How? Because I know you are strong Beautiful Sweet Funny Smart And sassy I know you can do it Because I believe in you And will always be there for you 60
Kat Katie Goodwin Graphite 9X12” –Tiffany Sammons
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The remains of my heart: A story of my life When we are born, we come with a heart that is already welcoming, loving, and warming. As we grow into childhood, our hearts get bigger or smaller, depending on the experiences we have been through. Mine became bigger, but had already begun showing some damage. As a child, I was loving and innocent. I wanted to save the world and still do. I wanted to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, care for the weak and wounded, give hope to those who needed it, and to take my sister’s pain away. My sister is physically handicapped and had to go through many surgeries when she was young. I remember sitting in a room and hearing my sister scream and cry because they were trying to put the IV in and it wouldn’t go in right. I often would become quiet and space off in class when my sister had surgery. I wanted to protect her and still do. Having to grow up fast to help with my sister made school a little difficult for me. Boys were cruel and girls were even worse. I had a group of friends and did not venture too far from that group. Many times I was cast out for something ridiculous, but welcomed back in eventually. My friends were pretty and I was not. They had more confidence than I did and I seemed to be in their shadow. Middle school came and I started my rebellion faze. I resented my sister for getting so much attention from everyone. I wanted to be grown up and free from all rules. Glasses and braces entered my life in 6th grade. Boys were more than cooties. Even after all that time in middle school, I do not remember many happy memories. Boys were now full of hormones and still not interested in me. Girls seemed to become even more dramatic and cruel than before. Cliques formed and people stayed in them, not daring to break free. I felt closterphobic for three miserable years.
College came and everything began to look brighter. My innocence was coming back, though would never be like it was when I was a child. Pain and heartache had damaged it. As college went on I began gaining confidence in myself. Boys came and went, as did friends. I still spoke to the friends I had in high school, but soon they were leaving my life one at a time. My heart began to grow again and open up. Now, I am a senior at Iowa Wesleyan College, and seem completely different now. That person I was in middle school or high school is gone, but I see parts of her every now and then when things in my life get rough. I have a future ahead and not despair, anger, or depression. I have friends and family I know I can count on. And while my heart is not as new looking as it was when I was young, it is tough and big. I still want to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, care for the we weak and wounded, give hope to those who needed it, and to take my sister’s pain away. But now, I also want to help educate the uneducated, and put a smile on everyone’s faces. We all go through tough times, but together we can help everyone’s heart grow and heal with time. This is the remains of my heart…… –Tiffany Sammons
High school brought even more damage to my heart. Boys began turning me down, and not very nicely. Rumors spread like wild-fire and were vicious. Grades and who you hung out with began to matter to everyone. Drinking and sex was what everyone wanted to be doing and talking about. The social norms begin to blur when u enter as a freshman, and completely blind you by the time you graduate. When I was a junior, I began cutting myself to relieve the pain I was feeling. But I eventually stopped. I found a group of friends that seemed to make me happy. I started dating a guy when we were seniors and my life seemed complete, until halfway through, I became depressed and angry. I was tired of all the annoying boys thinking they were cool and could do whatever they wanted. Writing became my out lit for my feelings. My grandmother died just a couple months before I graduated and my boyfriend became more distant. Before I knew it, my life came stumbling down after I graduated. I became depressed and needed an out. Losing my grandmother and my first love around the same time almost seemed unreal. I was miserable and lonely. I felt like a piece of my heart had died. I began taking anti-depressants and started to get my life back together. 62
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So baseball offered company and drama and a grand Series win.
Behind The
Scenes English & Literature Professor, Emeritus
NAME | Jean Thompson
PROFESSION | Professor CONTRIBUTION| Writer
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We deeply appreciate the opportunity to strengthen our intellectual, creative community as provided by Dr. Jean Thomson’s guidance during her sponsorship of the Omicron Alpha chapter of Sigma Tau Delta. In Walden, Thoreau writes, “We belong to the community,” and our community is challenged to excel by Dr. Thomson’s contributions, which have included her deliberate, attentive workshop commentary and the model of her own writing. Dr. Thomson consistently has promoted with eloquence and sensitivity the talents and interests of the chapter members. We are grateful to be members of this community with her. - From Design Magazine 2009 on Thompson Retirement.
A Baseball Company
In the autumn evenings of 1960, when I was 13 and my father had just died of a massive heart attack, I turned to baseball. I had been following the pennant races regularly and enthusiastically, but now the daily broadcasts of games became my most sustaining company. I listened to Pirates games, and I liked best the games from the coast, the broadcasts starting around 10:30 in Pennsylvania (when it was 7:30 in Los Angeles or San Francisco) and running into the early morning hours. I sat at a barrel-chested desk with a fuzzy, green blotter neatly centered on the writing surface. For night games, I turned on the little desk lamp with fluorescent tubes. (continued on the next page)
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A Baseball Company continued.... In the autumn evenings of 1960, when I was 13 and my father had just died of a massive heart attack, I turned to baseball. I had been following the pennant races regularly and enthusiastically, but now the daily broadcasts of games became my most sustaining company. I listened to Pirates games, and I liked best the games from the coast, the broadcasts starting around 10:30 in Pennsylvania (when it was 7:30 in Los Angeles or San Francisco) and running into the early morning hours. I sat at a barrel-chested desk with a fuzzy, green blotter neatly centered on the writing surface. For night games, I turned on the little desk lamp with fluorescent tubes. The light came on slowly. My transistor radio, sitting on the desk, might crackle a little. I kept the sound turned down very low; I was the only listener, and hunched close over the radio and caught every word. Just to my right on the desk sat our bulky black telephone, but I don’t think that it ever rang while I was listening to a game. Bob Prince, with what seemed to me a vast knowledge of baseball people and lore and a gravelly voice, always had the call of the game for KDKA. The pirates were not very much like the Yankees or the Dodgers, revered names, perennial powers. The pirates played at Forbes Filed in Pittsburgh, a city widely regarded as gray and gritty—a declining Steel City, characterized by brawn, not finesse or culture. It had been a long time since the Pirates challenged. The hadn’t won a pennant since 1927, when Paul Waner led the National League in RBI’s and won the batting title. But in 1960 the Pirates had the right combination: workmanlike Dick Groat at short and bespectacled Bill Virdon in the center; lithe and gifted Roberto Clemente in the right; Vernon Law followed by ace reliever El Roy Face on the mound; and, at second, blue-collar Bill Mazeroski. I had cared about the Pirates’ fortunes before daddy died, but afterward I followed the games with new intensity. His death was sudden, unexpected. The news jolted our lives out of comfort and routine into utter disarray. As shock gave way to tears, Daddy’s sister and brothers and their husband and wives arrived for the funeral. I accepted every hug that was offered and overheard Aunt Ester telling someone, “Jean Ann would like us stay longer than we can… poor thing.” When all the relatives had gone home, to Cumberland Country in southern Pennsylvania or to Cleveland, and no more kind friends and neighbors appeared at the door with gelatin salads or pie, I went back to school My eighth grade classmates, having no idea what to say, elected me class president. At home, my mother consumed by grief, seemed to me to cry constantly, sometimes weeping with my grandmother for company; I grew afraid of all the tears. No one thought to invite a thirteen-year-old girl to talk, so listening had to do. In the darkened house, during the worst hours of late evening and early morning, I sat in a tiny circle of light and sound, a circle of human voices and order. There was no “dead time” during the broadcast of a Pirates game. When Bob Prince paused, crowd noise filled in, or the crack of the bat brought the action just a little closer. In my house, where to few voices now rose and joined, the radio filled the nights with a companionable sound. My world of radio baseball offered the assurance of certain perfect human presence, dependable but impersonal and undemanding. Robert Finch, a Fine
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nature writer who focuses on Cape Cod, has speculated in “North Beach Journal” about what is would be like to spend a year alone on barrier spit: “I would let the personal dry up or seep slowly out, regarding all inner turmoil as external, the tortuous and self-conscious processes of thought as trivial and of no account.” Radio baseball became my barrier spit for a few crucial weeks when I could bear neither my own thoughts and feelings nor the silent, tearstained world I lived in. I listened to all the games, right through the seventh game of the World Series and what Baseball Commissioner Ford Frick called “the most dramatic finish to a World Series I’ve ever seen.” I never had .the slightest illusion that either a disappointing late-season loss or a critical win in the World Series was for me, as though players and announcers knew and cared about me-and yet, in a sense, the games were for me simply because they reached me, found me in my little spot of light in the dark house. I was there as good fortune in the Series shifted from Pirates to Yankees and back again, there as the Series went to the decisive game, there in the bottom of the ninth, the score tied 9-9. Mazeroski, relegated to eighth place in the batting order, came up. Though scouting reports called for a low curve ball, Ralph Terry served up a high fast ball, and Mazeroski sent it over the left field wall. Listening to the wildly excited call of the game, I followed him around the base paths, saw him pull off his cap as he rounded second base, whirl his arms, and gallop home with the winning’ run. So baseball offered company and drama and a grand Series win. But it also offered something else important to me: even in a good year, a year when the Pirates won the World Series, baseball incorporated loss. There was no pretense that it didn’t exist, or didn’t matter. Just clearly as I could see Mazeroski rounding the bases, I could see the Yankee fielders, faces set, shoulders slump. But the loss, while real, was shaped and patterned confined. Two years ago, before my son Nate had a change of heart signed up for Little League, he said, “I don’t want to play baseball because it’s three strikes your out,” That, I think was just the appeal for me in the 1960. Three Strikes and you’re out: three outs and the inning’s over; lose the game, and suit up again tomorrow; lose the Series—or win—and start planning for next year. My world as changed of course, since 1960, but I still follow baseball. Though I will turn on the television for an occasional “big one” –perhaps Nolan Ryan going for his 300th win—Radio baseball is my mainstay. I live in Iowa for now and follow the St. Louis Cardinals, On summer evenings, Mike Shannon and Jack Buck, or maybe, now his son Joe, will have the call for a Cardinals game that is most likely meaningless in terms of the pennant race yet unfailingly offers up some source of interest, some question to be answered: is Brian Jordan ready for the big leagues this time up? Could Mark Whitten Homer four times in a single game? Every Now and then, as the batter steps out of the box, Jack will recognize, by name, a listen who “never misses a game”; Often the fan is an elderly person, sometimes residing in a retirement or nursing home. Jack’s ton expresses admiration: I suspect that many people would feel a pang of pity. But I remember a thirteen-year- old Pirates fan and share one moment of perfect, sympathetic recognition, acknowledging baseball company; then I join in listening for the next pitch. – Jean Thompson
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Mom and Dad You are my mom You are my dad Don’t be angry Don’t be sad Just like when you Picked me up when I was down I will not let you fall I will not let you frown I know times are tough But that is life, it gets rough Just stand up, I’ll dry your tears I’ll hold your hand and take away your fears We will be ok We’ll get through this Together we will do anything Together we will make life bliss –Tiffany Sammons
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