Shreveport Magazine Issue 9 by CDG Support

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For you, our amazing readers Shreveport Magazine has a vision. Our vision is to serve a greater purpose, and that purpose is to bring together creative minds to design a magazine

In This Issue 10

Food For Thought: Breaking Bread with Hoagies, Baguettes, and Buns

Michael Futreal: An Artist of Spaces & Places

The Pioneer Spirit of Shreveport

A Shreveportrait: Chloe DuPlessis

The Next Big Thing

The Shreveport Film Industry: Take Two

A Joycean Halloween

Reviving The Past: KCS CafĂŠ: a Part of Bigger Downtown Picture

According to Plan: The Story of Trent Wierick

It Takes A Village: How Caddo Schools & Afterschool Programs Help At-Risk Kids Succeed

Fall Into Awesome: Local Things To Do

Revelry

that evokes real emotions, private reflection, and thoughtful conversation. Our hope is that you will find a place in your home or business to kick back and indulge in inspirational stories of hope, innovation, triumph, and belief in a brighter tomorrow. Wherever you may journey within our city, you can find people, places, and things that make our community special, and a story that is well worth telling. We want our readers to help us mold a storyboard that is full of positivity and pride that energizes the hardworking, impassioned citizens of our community! You have a stake in this game, and we are here to support it! Positive & proud, Shreveport Magazine Team

Team Editor: Tara John

Publisher: Pete John

Subscribe for free at: shreveportmagazine.com

Lead Designer: Zack Fink

Advertising: sales@shreveportmagazine.com

Advertising Manager: Madeline Kawanaka

Editorial: editor@shreveportmagazine.com

Cover Design: Shannon Palmer

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Lydia Earhart 3

Jennifer Hill 6

Mary Catherine Rollo 9

Tara John 2 5

Shannon Palmer 8

LaVette Fuller

Pete John 1

David Elston, M. Div. 4

Michael A. Laffey 7

Contributors 1. Pete John has been a proud promoter of positivity in Shreveport and is a co-founder of the local lifestyle brand, SHREVEPORTANT. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Greater Chamber of Commerce and is VP of the Downtown Shreveport Unlimited. He’s a true family man, has a heart of gold, and possesses a “make it happen” attitude and grit!

2. Tara John has a lot of interests. After teaching local kids to read, write, and do arithmetic, she became the proud mama of Vera & Nora who bring her endless joy. While focused on rearing her girls with hubby Pete, she wished for a way to instill the “upbeat, feel good, happy” in her littles. Shreveportant & Shreveport Magazine are making these dreams a reality showcasing local stories that warm the heart, encourage activism, and, inspire constructive conversation.

3. Lydia Earhart has a passion for sharing stories that feature creativity, innovation and spark a light-hearted conversation. She is a writer, who believes in the people and inspiring stories she has heard throughout her career in journalism. After writing and editing for a variety of publications in Louisiana, Chicago and New York, she followed her heart to Shreveport.

4. David Elston is a native and current resident of Shreveport. Having moved away for his undergraduate and seminary degrees, he returned to his beloved hometown in 2014. He is married to Jessica Elston and is the father of Judah and Frances. Currently he works as the Counselor & Director for the Shreveport office of Biblical Counseling & Training Ministries.

5. LeVette Fuller is a teen services librarian and a founding member of Re-Form Shreveport, an organization committed to leading Shreveport in rethinking how we view our built environment for a more vibrant community. She believes that knowledgeable, engaged citizens are pivotal to shifting a community toward vibrancy and away from the status quo. LeVette volunteers for several community service and arts organizations, and thinks land use policy is a fun topic to bring up at parties.

6. As the daughter of a career U.S. diplomat, Jennifer Hill grew up overseas and then lived in different parts of the United States before moving to Shreveport in 2012. She has mainly focused on development work for non-profits in the area, including the Renzi Education and Art Center and Hap House, and has volunteered for numerous organizations, especially those that serve the disadvantaged and support the arts. She holds a Master of Public Administration and a Master of Russian Studies, and lives happily with her husband, daughter, an oversized puppy named Sherlock and two indoor cats.

7. Michael A. Laffey has taught English & Communication Studies at Centenary College of Louisiana since his arrival in Shreveport in the summer of 2003. His primary research interests have centered primarily on the roots of Southern American culture in all its vast dimensions. Despite his “Yankee” origins, he hasn’t the least intention to ever leave his adopted home.

8. Shannon Palmer is a Shreveport photographer with over 20 years experience who specializes in editorial and portrait work. You’ll often find her exploring the nooks and crannies of Shreveport’s downtown—shooting medium format film on her old Rolleicord to develop at home in the darkroom. When she’s not shooting photos, she’s in her printmaking studio working on woodcuts, engravings, and copper etchings to exhibit locally and sell on her Etsy store or website, www.shannonpalmerart.com.

9. Mary Catherine Rollo is never bored. She has created Photographic Art for over 25 years specializing in Fine Art work, Commercial, Portraiture, Musician, Elegant event and documentary photography. Her work can be seen in Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, Arkansas, Sweden and the UK and her Mural can be seen downtown in the Shreveport Commons.

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Payton H. Denney

Angela Vinet

Jenn Farnell 11

Madeline Kawanaka

Pat Viser 14

Eric Gibson 17

Mandie Ebarb 10

John-Paul Young 16

Zack Fink

Contributors 10. Mandie Ebarb is a ceramic artist, teacher, and curator of both art and words. Born and raised in Shreveport, Ebarb enjoys writing about the local people, places, and things that make Shreveport a better place to live. When she’s not covered in clay you can usually find her promoting local artists at the Agora Borealis or picnicking somewhere along Clyde Fant Parkway.

11. A native to Shreveport, Jenn Farnell of Fernhill Photography, likes dogs. She has also been photographing weddings and portraiture in the area for the past 7 years, finding joy in building relationships with her photo subjects and their dogs. Dogs, cats, apple pie a la mode from Deli Casino, and the outdoors influence her photographic style.

12. Wife, Mother, Science Teacher, Writer, Nature Lover. A former science teacher turned mother, turned writer - Angela Vinet enjoys writing for various publications all over North Louisiana as a freelancer. In her spare time, Angela writes children’s books and often finds peace in nature by hiking, kayaking and camping with her husband of 19 years, Robert F. Vinet, and three young boys.

13. John-Paul Young is a Shreveport native and the son of two Centenary College alumni. After more than a decade studying philosophy, linguistics, literature and law in and around New York City, he returned to Shreveport to create a sustainable farm on his family’s land, and show his neighbors how to make soil and food without irrigation or great expense. He and his partner own The Levee, a small farm-to-table restaurant at 520 East Kings Highway.

14. Pat Viser has a diverse background in marketing and public relations, with a specialized focus in writing and strategic planning. She has worked with clients including Williams Creative Group, SRAC, and St. Mark’s Cathedral, to name a few. Pat claims that she has PDD - passion deficit disorder, and it’s not that she is not passionate about anything, but that she is passionate about almost everything--her grandson Charlie currently topping the list as well as the stories of the art and artists on NW Louisiana.

15. Payton H. Denney is funny, hardworking, and talented. She is a financial planner by profession and a self-published author by happenstance. Her blog, Welcome to Denneyland, and her children’s book, Fantastic Freddy and the Bad Case of Paranoia, both started as a distraction from the stress of the daily grind but quickly turned into a way to share and connect with people both near and far.

16. Zack Fink is a graphic designer at Crawford Design Group. A graduate from Louisiana Tech University, he spends his time focusing on web and editorial design. He likes food and loves his wife.

17. Eric Gibson is a Shreveport resident and partner in Gorilla Tree Film Co. He specializes in making babies and movies and is the proud father of three beautiful girls. Devil’s Acid, his first feature film is set to debut in October.

18. Madeline is a card-carrying Shreveport boomerang: she was born and raised in our fair city, left after high school and returned after twelve years of living in Texas, Ohio, and China. Rediscovering Shreveport and it’s fascination people has been Madeline’s passion since she returned

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BY ANGELA VINET | PHOTOGRAPHY BY JENN FARNELL

Food For Thought Breaking Bread with Hoagies, Baguettes, and Buns

ood is powerful—it not only nourishes the body, but also feeds the soul through the companionship provided by eating together. Locally owned and operated independent restaurants are a dying breed with large food chains popping up all over Shreveport and we the people that call Shreveport home need to remember the little guys. Surviving the stormy waters of the restaurant world can often feel like being an island floating in a sea of chain eateries, with the only life raft available being the loyal customers. Even in a world of chain restaurants, the foodies of Shreveport have proven their devotion to the hands that feed them time and time again. In late March of 2017, a loyal customer of Shreveport’s sandwich gem, Deli Casino Sandwich Shoppe simply asked the owner, Mr. Sam George, how business was doing with the construction on Kings Highway. After two years of construction, Dayle and Sam George, who have been making sandwiches for the past 39 years did not know how long they could stay in business. One Facebook post later, Deli

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Casino Sandwich Shoppe had lines out the door the very next day once word spread. With over 5,000 likes and shares, the Georges were touched by the outpouring of support from the community. They fed sandwiches to these loyal customers who had waited up to an hour and a half to get their hands on a “good to the last bite” sandwich. The Georges credit God for sending the help they needed. To the Georges, customers are more than customers, they are friends. This sentiment is the common thread amongst the independently owned food eateries here in Shreveport. Another example is South Highlands beloved Maxwell’s Market owner, Ross Barclay, who recently had a big decision to make. The delicious delicacies, seafood, and fine meats sold in Maxwell’s were in need of new cases and Barclay was faced with the question of whether to close the doors after 16 years or reinvest in his treasured store. Barclay posted on his Facebook page, “So it came down to a decision...one that has kept me up nights for a while,” he continued,

explaining that with the economy in a downturn, an increase in competition, and the need for a heavy investment he was left wondering if it was time to close up shop. But, at the end of the day, Barclay isn’t in this business for the money—he gives up holidays, weekends, and vacation time because it is more than just a store—it is his family and right where he wants to be. After posting his thoughts on Facebook, he turned off his phone and started the difficult task of out with the old and in with the new, drawing some blood and dropping one of the cases along the way. Incredibly, Barclay’s friends and employees pulled together to complete the arduous task so the gentle hum of coolers can continue being the lifeblood of his business. There was an overwhelming response to his post, which not only validated his choice to stay in business, but also provided the community with a platform to tell Barclay just how important Maxwell’s Market was to them. The special relationships these independent store fronts offer are what bonds the community to their favorite food spots. Barclay truly enjoys anticipating his regular customer’s needs hopping into action the moment their car pulls up by readying their regular order at the counter. Some customers even go behind the counter to watch their specialty cut of meat being cut because they feel at home in the store they know and love. Even delivering goods to regulars who become homebound, Barclay knows his customers by name and what they like to eat. Barclay was overwhelmed with the community outpouring of heartfelt appreciation and said, “If life got any better, I couldn’t stand it.” With the Barclay’s Best Andouille Sausage Dip as the crowd

favorite, I confess mine was gobbled up with the fresh baguette in the car for lunch right after our interview. Theresa Gullo Hamilton’s family has been in the business of feeding Shreveport for 39 years and said that they are a dying breed. Watching her grandparents prepare food and run their store, Gullos Produce and Restaurant, she grew up in the fields picking produce and continues the legacy her family started by preparing the casseroles and food for the restaurant. Gullos now has the third generation running the show and keeping customers coming back for more. Weathering the storm with several difficult years behind them, Hamilton lost her brother and parents within 18 months of each other by September of 2012. This left her as the only hope for the family business that they had all put their heart and soul into keeping open. “It’s a family tradition to put our heart and soul into this, its just what we do,” explained Hamilton. Burying her mother on December 22, 2011, she never considered not preparing the orders the next day for her customer’s Christmas dinners because she knew they were depending

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upon her. After a fire destroyed their family home and business in 2015, Hamilton walked through the ashes and never doubted rebuilding. The Shreveport community rallied with what Hamilton said was the most unbelievable thing—people lining up for their food all the way to the street. Hamilton is quick to point out that without the community’s support they will die and for their constant patronage she is eternally grateful. Working two jobs, Hamilton was thrilled when her son, Craig Hamilton came home to run the family business with his fresh ideas and marketing degree. “He helped his grandparents when he was knee-high to a grasshopper and customers watched him grow up,” said Hamilton. Craig is just as devoted to the customers as his forefathers were, even opening up on a Sunday to feed a customer who had recently lost his wife and wanted some comfort food—they did not want him to eat alone. The power of banding together in a positive way to make a difference was ever apparent again when Emerie Gentry, Shreveport’s community advocate rock star, wanted to do something to help our independent eateries. Forming a Friday Lunch Bunch group on Facebook, Gentry took matters into her own hands by writing the names of local places to eat on a popsicle stick to be placed in the Jar of Good Eats. Within two weeks, her simple idea bloomed into an outpouring of positive responses and love for the local independents at 1,000 members strong and growing. Gentry said it was heartwarming the support that the community gave and the Friday Lunch Bunch was born, with it’s sole purpose being to grab a friend and eat local. “It reaffirmed that our local culture and flair is very well

and alive if we can continue to support it,” Gentry passionately explained, “We are literally putting our money where our mouth is.” “One person can do something and make a difference—you just have to take that first step,” said Gentry who further went on to say she had to do something to help, which is just what she did. The first lunch bunch met at Weston McElwee’s Tejas Restaurant and boosted their entire day’s activity which rippled for several days after. McElwee was thrilled with the response and happy to see many new faces come in the following weeks as repeat customers from the initial lunch bunch. The continued sentiment here, interview after interview is that each eatery offered heartfelt gratitude toward their customers who are really not customers, but rather are more like family. In the end food bonds those that break bread, and the community that eats together stays together.

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Michael Futreal:

An Artist of Spaces & Places BY MICHAEL A. LAFFEY

PHOTOGRAPHY BY SHANNON PALMER

e have a fancy name for what Michael Futreal has made of himself—an autodidact—which means he is self-taught. He has taught himself to be an outstanding musician, composer, and instrument builder. Truth be told, as I have gotten to know Michael over the years, I have learned that this description barely scratches the surface. As he explains: “I fundamentally don’t care about musical genre, but instead pursue a freerange approach of modal and impressionist ideas, branching out as takes my fancy. Nevertheless, since people love to ask ‘what kind of music do you play?’ I usually say things like interplanetary mountain music, rural space music, and such—playful terms meant to open more space than they delineate.” (Teach yourself more at michael.futreal.com). His affinity with twentieth-century avant-garde jazz performer Sun Ra strongly influences the elaborate web Michael weaves in his music. “Sun Ra” writes Michael “was one of the most brilliant musical minds of the 20th century, completely iconoclastic. He’s a key inspiration for me because he so fundamentally did his own things, and they could include most anything you could imagine as music and many things you wouldn’t.” While Sun Ra claimed to have descended from the planet Saturn, more reliable sources tell us he was born and raised in Birmingham, Alabama, as Herman Sonny Blount. Ra called his band his Arkestra, and his inspirational musical vision looked backward into Ancient Egypt and forward into science fiction and space exploration. Although little about their respective musical styles is similar, other than a shared spirit and taste for adventurous exploration, Michael makes music following nearly identical principles and paths.

Michael’s early musical awakening occurred when he first encountered the dulcimer. It was an especially fateful, fruitful discovery as it steered him, via libraries and used bookstores, down a path leading to English folk music. Michael describes the old time Appalachian music of his native region as “essentially English folk music that got left out in the woods to undergo divergent evolution.” So, he began teaching himself how to play these rustic string instruments so common in his childhood surroundings. When he discovered that his bank account was not deep enough for purchasing the instruments that would give him the tonal quality he sought, he decided to build his own using the natural materials of his environment. It’s not only the local mountain dulcimer that he has taught himself to build, but also chromatic dulcimers, tonehole flutes, and a unique stringed electric gourd (he calls it his “gourdtar”). He uses homemade instruments to produce, in his words, “music that evokes both the familiar and the otherworldly, projecting how they are, or can be, intertwined. If it’s mountain music,” Michael says, “I want it to be Martian mountain music.” Michael speaks fondly of his early years in rural North Carolina, an environment where he was encouraged by his parents to

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cultivate what he calls his “maker mindset.” “When I was very young,” he muses, “I was quite taken with fantastic imagery in the movies, particularly the stop motion animation of Ray Harryhausen and his disciples. It wasn’t enough to enjoy the fantastic imagery of the movie worlds, however, I had to know how this kind of filmmaking worked so I could create worlds too.” He did learn and he now applies those lessons by mixing from a rich, colorful, multiple media palette (You can get a taste of his audio and video creativity at youtube.com/buckofutreal). Since building his own recording studio, Michael has brilliantly crafted the Michael Futreal/Twang Darkly universe we know today. He records, produces, and distributes his work in ways that fall outside the boundaries of the standard commercial music business model. You see no talent scouts, record label promoters, or booking agents. Nearly all of his work is made available online in a vast collection of digital formats. Material objects you can hold in your hands are also available at the Agora Borealis in downtown Shreveport. Fortunately for us, the Shreveport artistic community is enriched by the presence of creative producers and makers like Michael Futreal and Twang Darkly. He presently sees his role in his adopted com-

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munity with clear, bright eyes, saying “I think it helps any community to remember that serious, ambitious artists aren’t only from ‘out of town.’ We’re right here too, drawing attention from other arts folks around the world.” Michael’s artistic standing has enabled him to be twice selected by highly regarded organizations as an Artist-in-Residence. When asked to explain the value of his Artist-in-Residency experience, he noted, “both of my residencies have taken place in nature preserve settings, and it’s very compelling to take part in the interpretive work intended to help folks more broadly feel the value of unspoiled natural settings. If I can create a piece of music and film that evokes the wonder of being in a particular landscape, that’s a role I can play in steering society towards being a bit less cavalier about seeing the world only as a pool of resources to be exploited.” Michael brought his rural space

music aesthetic to the Red Rock National Conservation Area in Nevada in 2015. In 2017, he was in Sweden capturing images and sound samples to be used in upcoming pieces. He brings it all back home saying, “I hope my experiences encourage other Shreveport artists to seek out residencies and similar opportunities. When stories are told of local artists being invited to create outside of our community, that’s a reminder to Shreveport art patrons that we’re making a ‘scene’ here that they can help to reinforce and grow.” Michael Futreal will be performing at the Cirque du Lake Block Party on Friday September 29th at Agora Borealis. If you miss that performance, he will be performing both solo and with his trio at the Red River Revel in early October and he will be dropping a new solo recording called Woodshed this fall as well. Please dig deeply into this magical bag of gifts and tricks.

I think it helps any community to remember that serious, ambitious artists aren’t only from ‘out of town.’ We’re right here too, drawing attention from other arts folks around the world. SHREVEPORTMAGAZINE.COM

855 Pierremont Rd, Ste 138, Shreveport, LA 71106

THE PIONEER SPIRIT OF SHREVEPORT By LeVette Fuller | Photography by Shannon Palmer

n a balmy Tuesday morning, a cadre of community leaders including Mayor Ollie Tyler, members of the Shreveport City Council and several Caddo Parish Commissioners, gathered with business leaders and entrepreneurs in the sleek, modern foyer of InterTech 1 to celebrate the Third Anniversary of the Entrepreneurial Accelerator Program (EAP). Before the unveiling of the Entrepreneurial Wall of Achievement and ceremonial cake-cutting could commence, the esteemed group listened to a celebration of achievements from EAP Executive Director David Smith. “If you had told me we would be syndicating our tech ideas all over

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the country I would have said ‘no we’ll be regional.’ I was wrong. $49 million in capital investments have been made in North Louisiana startups. That’s California investment dollars and New York investment dollars invested right in here Shreveport!” Smith introduced Mayor Tyler and Commission President Steven Jackson who both gave exuberant reviews of the program’s accomplishments and potential. Mayor Tyler echoed Smith’s remarks that “EAP has already brought a lot of talent back to Shreveport” and that there is potential for this to continue. Commissioner Jackson reminded the audience that this type of partnership between the private and public sectors is similar

investors to present their businesses. Making it to this step is no small accomplishment—the EAP has viewed over 400 ideas in the past three years, and of those ideas, 43 have become portfolio companies. From the startups vetted and launched by the EAP, 107 tech jobs have been created with an average income of $55,000. Additionally, EAP has turned $6 million of Louisiana investment dollars into $33 million dollars of outside money invested in local startups. They have provided many of these startups with the opportunity to refine their ideas via other venues within the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Shreveport, such as CoHab, a local business incubation nonprofit. The EAP is a public private partnership between the City of Shreveport, Caddo Parish and the BRF, with funds from the parish and the city being matched by BRF. The initial agreement is for a five-year period in which EAP aims to become self-sufficient, or find other avenues of support. EAP is not a standard accelerator, with a 14-18 week curriculum that then sets entrepreneurs on a path without continual support. They, instead, see startups from the back of a napkin idea all the way to serial entrepreneurs with well-established business. They are unique in that they assist entrepreneurs on different trajectories and at various stages from diverse industries. Most accelerators focus on one area, such as biomed or pharmaceuticals or software. EAP takes on all products, all industries, and all services. The goal of EAP is to build an entrepreneurial ecosystem. Beyond the rigorous training protocol and the diverse assortment of industries within its ranks, EAP is uniquely equipped to change the city. This is a team that is keenly aware of the benefit of Shreveport’s small city vibe. To take on so many different types of projects in so many fields, the team leverages their strengths to maneuver in areas where they have depth and to leverage advanced social networks (who knows who) when it is necessary to reach beyond their personal spheres of influence. In Shreveport, where everyone is connected by two degrees of separation, this engages a lot of social capital. This connectedness is an asset to getting things done in Shreveport that wouldn’t be possible in a larger market. Many team members have moved back to Shreveport from much larger markets because it’s so apparent that they can bring people together here to get things done in a way that is gratifying. The vitality of the EAP ecosystem is contingent upon its infrastructure as well as the vision of the leaders at the helm. Dave Smith’s vision for the future of EAP and its contribution to the vibrancy of Northwest Louisiana is simultaneously a life cycle. They hope to guide projects from start to finish, with a web like network leveraging social capital to connect protégés with resources available within the community. To strengthen the entrepreneurial ecosystem

Entrepreneurial spirit is “Pioneer Spirit”, and the addition of innovative, determined and creative people to our city will inspire excellence in every facet of our community

to the synergy that has made Austin, Texas a vibrant, fertile sphere for creativity and innovation. There is a lot to celebrate. At this anniversary party eleven new success stories were added to the EAP Wall of Entrepreneurial Achievement. These are all companies that are either launching or on the brink of launching. They are a diverse group of startups ranging from a pet education nonprofit to a film production company, from urban farming to pharmaceutical development. These startups have been vetted and deemed viable to be mentored within this rigorous program with the hopeful outcome of meeting face to face with angel

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for North Louisiana requires acknowledging the gaps in capacity that exist from an academic standpoint. Many accelerators exist within settings with higher populations of students and larger numbers of doctoral research candidates who may be generating a multitude of intellectual property within an academic institution. Where most would see obstacles, Smith sees opportunities. Because of the current dearth of productivity within the academic sphere, EAP provides assistance guiding entrepreneurs through the patent process so their intellectual property is protected. This is not a bad problem to have since there is a correlation between the number of unique patents filed in a community and the number of quality jobs generated. The increase in demand for patent training has led to LSUS offering a patent class through the Department of Business, which is taught by attorney Charles Houloubek. These incremental changes are a harbinger of a culture change and a change in our community’s perception about our entrepreneurial capacity. The city has not reached fever pitch for entrepreneurs, but incremental increases may become exponential as capacity grows. One of the criticisms of EAP is that Shreveport’s entrepreneurial culture will never fully launch because of the lack of access to a major university such as the University of Texas in Austin. Smith responds with pragmatic optimism, stating, “we have LSU Health Science Center, and that’s not just a teaching hospital but also a research hospital.” At this point in the conversation, analyst Julie Gilley interjects, “how many college students are there along the I-20 corridor?” Smith responds, “about 115,000.” He adds that an ambitious future goal for the EAP will be to harness the potential of these college students by supporting research at academic institutions along the I-20 corridor, with the intent of creating synergy between entrepreneurs and universities. This begins by recognizing the potential and capacity of the LSU Health Science Center and Segue Science Management. The Health Science Center is a major reason for the existence of the EAP and its principal, BRF. The EAP is a division of the BRF-Biomedical Research Foundation, an organization founded in 1986, with a mandate to build our knowledge based economy at LSU Health Science Center to diversify the local economy at a time when oil and gas was in a significant decline. The foundation was formed with a $60,000 grant and now has a budget of $500,000 and 330 employees. Since inception, the BRF has developed 56 labs for the med school and opened an institute that has resulted in LSU Medical Center tripling its research and thus improved talent recruitment and retention. In 1995 the BRF developed the first PET imaging center in the state and then commercialized it and scaled it globally. Following this success, BRF

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created a 300-acre science and research park with 28 owned and operated facilities. In 2012, it became clear that biomed research didn’t have enough capacity locally for them to stay focused on that one industry. It was time to broaden, deepen, diversify and the company name changed to Building our Region’s Future. In 2013 Governor Bobby Jindal threatened to privatize all hospitals in Louisiana. The potential closure of LSU Medical center would have been devastating to Shreveport. Enter John George, the director of BRF with years of experience running, and recently selling twenty hospitals around the country. BRF came forward with a $20 million-dollar investment to take over LSU Medical Center. University Health Hospital opened its doors in 2013 and brought the $43 million-dollar deficit to zero in its first year. An incubator for startup companies may have a symbiotic relationship with an academic institution wherein entrepreneurs seek out innovations patented at a university that they may license and commercialize. This creates a revenue stream for the university that enables more research from more scientists. By mentoring scientists within the sphere of LSUHSC, EAP is helping to create this capacity in Shreveport.

Enter success story, Dr. Alana Gray and co-founder Dr. James Cardelli of Segue Science Management and more recently Segue Science Labs. The appeal of working with EAP for Dr. Cardelli was the business knowledge and enthusiasm of the team of mentors and analysts, “I was in academics for years and approached the EAP because I had an idea about a company, and within three months had an office at InterTech 1”. Cardelli states that while he knew the science, EAP were, “very good at financial projections and business models and they are a driving force for the entrepreneurs”. The Segue team have two companies in the EAP portfolio and have started four companies with the EAP. The most recent company is Segue Science Labs which will be their pharmaceutical discovery division. The opportunity to develop these companies and become a serial entrepreneur is giving young scientists like Cardelli’s partner Dr. Alana Gray an opportunity to develop a career and build a life in Shreveport. Dave Smith might say that what Drs. Cardelli and Gray contribute to the ecosystem isn’t just their business ideas and the addition of a few more scientist to our community, but also an expansion of our capacity to be a breeding ground for more innovation. While a goal of the EAP is to help strengthen pathways between academia and

commercialization, there is also a determination among the visionaries within the EAP leadership to be inclusive and to maintain a diversity of projects. Michael Billings, founder of Cotton Street Farms will tell you that when he approached EAP his idea was literally still a sketch on a napkin. “We had the concept in theory but we hadn’t looked at logistics or hard numbers for the potential to be a success.” Cotton Street Farms will be an indoor, year-round hydroponic herb and vegetable farm servicing Shreveport-Bossier City. Billings credits mentor Caryn Chalmers with helping him recognize the viability of his idea and getting his concepts primed for investors. EAP assisted with developing a financial plan, but Billings had to do the hard work of creating a business and marketing plan. Billings’ company has gone from the back of a napkin to an “almost functioning” company in eight months. He just needs to finalize his building. It is the intrepid grit and determination of Dave Smith, Julie Gilley, Caryn Chalmers, and Michael Mazure that echoes through the discussions with several entrepreneurs. This is the “x-factor” that is vital to creating the entrepreneurial ecosystem that White and his team want to create. Shreveport has undeniable potential and has

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been recognized on lists for its favorability as a place to launch new businesses because of the low cost of living, low cost of labor and business-friendly tax incentives. However, it is just as often criticized for poor health outcomes and low academic standing. The key to counteracting those negatives will be a change in attitude toward a “growth mindset” like the one that already exists within the offices of the EAP. This isn’t coddling entrepreneurs, but rather teaching creative idea people how to think like business people. A major key in the vision for EAP as a catalyst for change in the entrepreneurial culture of Shreveport is diversifying the economic landscape. Two new startups are launching with EAP support that are based in film production. Eric Gibson and Jonathan Kudabeck of Gorilla Tree Inc. met via the Louisiana Film Prize and began making short films together in 2012. Gibson, a Shreveport native, honed his film production skills on the sets of feature films produced in North Louisiana when the film industry took root post-Katrina. Kudabeck, a native of Hot Springs, Arkansas, directed and produced an adventure travel television program prior to relocating to Shreveport with his family. Gorilla Tree will produce and distribute films from Shreveport, LA. Their goal is to cultivate local investments in film so that the local community will benefit from the revenues created by the production. Kudabeck recognizes that their platform is unconventional for this community, but they are ready for the challenges. He says, “the biggest challenge is film business doesn’t fit the typical business plan model.

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There is a lot of risk no guarantees. Eliminating risk and increasing guarantees means being creative.” Priscilla Adams of Priscilla A productions is creating feature-length and short films that explore the human condition while focusing on challenges facing the African American community. She is also cultivating a commercial clientele in order to diversify streams of income for her production company. Adams relocated to Shreveport after a twenty-year absence to explore film opportunities. As she was arriving back in Shreveport, those opportunities were dwindling. She confided to a family member, Pastor Bernard Kimble, that she was planning on moving back to Dallas, Texas because film production opportunities were so low. Pastor Kimble suggested EAP as a potential solution for Adams. “You’re not just wasting breath when you’re talking to me because I’m a doer and I follow up on stuff”, she said confidently while discussing her experience with EAP. This is the attitude that combined with the support of her EAP mentor resulted in her company making it to the Wall of Achievement. The primary goal is keeping talent in Shreveport and building capacity so that we may welcome more talent to the area. Entrepreneurial spirit is “Pioneer Spirit”, and the addition of innovative, determined and creative people to our city will inspire excellence in every facet of our community. It starts with celebrating the determination seen in our homegrown talent who are willing to bring their ideas to life with community investment in this community. Comprehensive financial growth is the pragmatic goal for North Louisiana, but this isn’t just beneficial to the business community. Smith explains that when new entrepreneurs become a part of our community, “They’re not just passionate about their tech and what they’re doing but they’re passionate about education and they’re passionate about the environment. Every time we get someone to stay or to move here, it raises the bar for the community.”

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Chloe DuPlessis BY LYDIA EARHART

ost children have an idea of what they want to be when they grow up. Popular professions include doctors, teachers, veterinarians—which all share the common theme of children wanting to help others. As a high school student at Booker T. Washington, Chloe’ DuPlessis imagined herself as a grown up, dressed in a charcoal suit, hair blowing in the wind, wearing plum lipstick with a briefcase walking fiercely. “It could’ve been downtown D.C., New York City or downtown Shreveport, it didn’t matter,” she said. After four years of college at the University of New Orleans, DuPlessis was getting ready to begin her master’s degree in international studies at Tulane. However, right before school began, Hurricane Katrina placed DuPlessis where she never thought she would be, back in her high school room sleeping on Winnie the Pooh sheets. “I had to reevaluate things. I told my mom, I just need to be prayerful and I need to focus and be back home. So I resigned from my job [working in the financial aid department] because there were so many unknowns. I said, ‘Maybe there’s a reason that I am back in Shreveport.’” DuPlessis starting volunteering and working with the youth at the same high school she had graduated from four years prior. Devoting her time to students and professional development, she gained a deeper love for her school and neighborhood. As her presence in the school continued, community members kept encouraging her to run for a position on the school board. At 26, she became one of the youngest candidates to run for the Caddo Parish School Board in District 3. Though her campaign failed, she still felt like she needed to work in the community. Fate allowed her

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to meet former Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover at a Civil Rights community event honoring her mother—the first black student to integrate Caddo Parish Schools. She impressed Glover and joined his campaign, later following him to city hall where she accepted the job as his executive assistant. For four years, she was constantly on, working feverishly for the community and Shreveport’s mayor. “I managed all of the youth programing and development, special interest groups for nonprofits, grant writing and the community based efforts. It was a beautiful experience but when my husband proposed, I knew that I could not continue at that pace because you are never off. You have to live your job and for so long as a young woman, I thought that was what I wanted.” It wasn’t that DuPlessis didn’t see herself working hard, when she pictured herself in her career back as a high school student she was fiercely walking—not running. “I loved [my job at the time], but I knew that if I did not invest my energy in other areas, I would have nothing for myself,” she said. Again, she needed to re-evaluate. The result of paying attention to “the energy and signs” directed DuPlessis to become her own boss and develop DuPlessis Consulting. Her consulting company represented government businesses, taking into account the relationships she had developed from years prior. Her business was taking off, but a creative

We are committed to helping creatives realize their creative potential and build strong, sustainable businesses and prosperous lives of purpose doing what they love.

energy would cause her to switch gears yet again. The DuPlessis Agency did, in fact, begin on a napkin but the initial thought crossed her mind during a conversation she had at her husband’s graduation from LSU-Shreveport in the digital animation program. She kept getting questions about how creatives can get a job, brand themselves or make money. With a goal to help creative entrepreneurs flourish, DuPlessis gained 35 clients in the first year with the DuPlessis Agency—her second business. “We are here to support [creatives] and make sure your business is healthy and sustainable, connect you to resources—all those things that most creatives don’t want to deal with.” The DuPlessis Agency also works with aspiring entrepreneurs. “We ask them, what would you do if money was not an issue? Then we ask the follow up questions—which is what a lot of people don’t ask. What are you extraordinarily gifted at? Because often times, we will love something, but we don’t have the skill set for it. Sometimes those skilled sets cannot be developed, [those skills have] to be innate.” The DuPlessis Agency is “creative support for creative entrepreneurs” with the goal to help clients monetize their passion. “As artists and creatives sometimes we can get so much in our head, we forget our own value and we forget the value that our work has to other people.” The book, Monetize Your Passion, began as a resource and orientation guide to new clients of the DuPlessis Agency. After most clients read through the book, those creatives shared the words of DuPlessis with others seeking out their own passions. This past spring, the Monetize Your Passion conference launched in conjunction with a book tour. The conference had its initial run in Shreveport and will move on to New Orleans with a scheduled Oct. 14 date. “[The Monetize Your Passion conference] established that wherever we are coming from, we are all here to learn and support each other,” she said. The Shreveport event brought together creative professionals from across Louisiana, Texas, and Florida and was similar to, in her words, “speed dating with content for creative entrepreneurs.” Three years, 48 clients, 22 brands, four art shows and one global arts fellowship in Cuba, is the current resume of the DuPlessis Agency. “This is my governing light and it is amazing to be almost 40 and have that awareness and calling. Through our agency and our work, we are committed to helping creatives realize their creative potential and build strong, sustainable businesses and prosperous lives of purpose doing what they love. When you think of the impact to our clients, their families and loved ones and the potential to positively transform people’s lives it is amazing. And I am so honored to be a part of that.”

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The Next Big Thing Shreveport’s finest architectural landmarks were built by an economy based on harvesting oil deposits from our land during the first half of the 20th century. While oil has played a critical role in the economy historically, there is a natural resource that could change the city of Shreveport. To be the basis of a strong and durable economy, this resource needs to not only be abundant in our area, but also needs to be financially efficient to harvest and use. Finally, it needs to be dependable from year to year. But by our good fortune, we have just the resource to fit this need. It is abundant—so abundant that it gets in the way when it isn’t harvested for use. It is inexpensive to harvest and use, at the minimum requiring only a shovel and a good morning’s workout. This resource is even pretty dependable from year to year—averaging between four and five feet per year. That’s right, this resource is our rainfall. These feet of free water fall like manna on our roofs, streets, parking lots, driveways and heads. They collect in the low spots in our yards, our poorly drained streets, our paved ditches and bayous, and eventually the Red River. Sure, some months are hot and dry, but they aren’t always completely dry. In fact, the Augusts of 2016 and 2017 were so

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wet that it has made the dry season here hard to identify. The water dumped in summer thunderstorms and winter showers sheets off of our pavement, roofs, and hard clay ground to flood our streets and ditches and damage our downstream neighbors. Such a huge amount of this precious natural resource becomes a nuisance to daily life when it rushes into our drains all at once. If this water is delayed on its downhill journey by absorbent surfaces on top of the ground reshaped with a little digging—instead of being rushed immediately into drains—it becomes extremely valuable as a form of passive irrigation. It just takes a little know-how. There is in fact a way to catch the rain cheaply and use it with minimal further effort to create clean soil and grow fresh healthy, delicious food. For the past two years, I have been digging and building simple, curved, water catching garden beds at my family farm, my house in Highland, the yards of a few friends, and behind my small restaurant, The Levee. With friends at Re-Form Shreveport and Shreveport Green, I have started ongoing projects on a larger scale in Highland Park and at the Food Bank of Northwest Louisiana. I want to tell you how it works so that you can start to gain the benefits of our bountiful rainfall, instead of just the annoyance of our floodwaters. First let me tell you a story about a clever city that caught its water to grow food. There is a mid-sized city quite similar to us in climate—it’s on the same latitude and has about the same amount of rainfall from year to year. It generally has hot humid summers and mild wet winters. But this city can’t predict what months will be wet and which will be dry—just like us. And it waited for decades for some industry or investment from outside to revive its economy after fossil fuel production lagged and manufacturing moved overseas. Some private citizens in this city decided to pick up their shovels to dig level trenches and install terrace-shaped gardens on contour lines on their own private property and in neglected public spaces, like parks and the land surrounding large parking lots. These gardens were basically free to make, because the ingredients were waste

materials: logs, woodchips, grass clippings, leaves, and manure when it was available. All this free dead plant material piled up on trenches that caught water quickly decayed into smaller and smaller particles until it was fine, rich, black soil. This soil was better than could be purchased, because it was full of living organisms and already in the right place to grow plants. Every time it rained, the runoff water from roofs and pavements would flow downhill, and, drop by drop, get stuck in the terrace-shaped trenches, soak into new soil, and be available for absorption by plant roots for weeks, or even months. This all took place without any further effort at irrigation. City officials who managed parks and public spaces took notice of this new type of garden and liked what they saw. The gardens were cheap to install and after a year or two they became highly productive. Even on a small scale, officials could see that the gardens caught water and held it uphill out of the drainage system, restoring groundwater and reducing the floods that had annoyed many residents and caused plenty of damage to cars and homes over the years. This city took a low-cost gamble to make a bunch of these gardens. They focused on building these gardens in public spaces, nature strips, the lawns around parking lots, around public buildings and on the slopes beside its numerous highways. Garbage trucks were rerouted to collect the leaves, sticks and grass clippings separately from household trash, and took all of it to make compost in its garden sites. They immediately

noticed a savings in fuel cost, since the gardens were usually a closer drive than the landfill. Now, instead of just endless high costs for mowing all these spaces, this city has retrained and hired many new ground crew employees to plant and harvest fresh produce from its many passively irrigated gardens. The land maintenance budget there has flipped from a

In just eight years, with the clever reshaping of our unused land to hold water uphill and the efficient reorganization of our waste materials to make compost and soil, we can recreate our economy constant, unrewarding cost, to a highly profitable enterprise. Lots of jobs have been created there by the need to harvest all the tomatoes, squash, kale, lettuce, broccoli, carrots, all grown on city land. When the thousands of fruit trees planted on this land matured after a few

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more years, people there realized an economic boom had set in. Now many private residents there have joined in catching the rainfall in this simple way and growing valuable food plants, ornamental flowers, and even timber for building. Many new entrepreneurial businesses related to food preparation and service have sprung up. Cafes, jelly companies, pickle makers, salsa businesses, juice and beverage producers, and their shops have filled in the buildings left empty by earlier industries. Now, many of these businesses sell their products on the national and even international market. Practically everyone in this city who wants a job can find one, either growing, harvesting, or preparing food, or building even more of these gardens. People who can’t or don’t work still rely on food pantries, but these are now all filled with fresh produce to give away. Schoolchildren tend water-catching gardens on their campuses for thirty minutes a day and provide almost all the produce they eat in their cafeterias. This is a huge cost savings to the educational system, plus a rare form of education for the students. The best part is the food festivals—there is a festival marking the peak harvest time of over twenty delicious plants—and these draw tourists from a radius of more than 200 miles. Next, this city has announced a plan to grow large crops of plants for its native pharmaceutical and cosmetics companies to refine, package and market for high prices. Essential oil manufacture and indoor avocado and banana groves are in the works as well. Because the set up and maintenance costs are so low for this type of food production, and because the financial rewards are so great, this city has balanced its budget and produces a surplus after decades of deficits. Conservatives and liberals there are cooperating on a proposal to reduce and eventually eliminate property and sales taxes—and one day perhaps it will pass. Private citizens with these rain-catching gardens have much larger discretionary incomes, too, since they rarely have to buy any fresh fruits or vegetables and restrict their grocery shopping to packaged foods, many of which are produced right in their own town. All these benefits came to this city and its happy residents when they realized that a precious natural resource—clean, fresh water—was readily available for the taking. They quickly saw that capturing this water in a leveled garden helped moderate the damaging cycle of flood and drought that they’d been used to. By transforming rainwater from a nuisance into a valuable ingredient in business, the city also transformed itself. Now, instead of leaving and perpetuating the “brain drain,” high school and college graduates start new businesses based on all this food. Older “kids” are moving back home to enjoy the revival of culture there, and to get decent paying jobs in a place that still enjoys low real estate prices. I have held back the name of this prosperous paradise for dramatic effect, because it is familiar to all of us in its pre-gardened form. This wealthy and happy city, living and growing on the enormous resource of its plentiful, passively harvested rainfall, is Shreveport, Louisiana, in the year 2025. That’s right, in just eight years, with the clever reshaping of our unused land to hold water uphill and the efficient reorganization of our waste materials to make compost and soil, we can recreate our economy. I know this because I’m just one person, and with the help of a couple friends and a single piece of heavy equipment, I have in only two years made a more or less barren

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clay grassland into a series of gardens that grow enough produce to supply my small restaurant. I did this without chemical fertilizer, pesticides, purchased soil, or even water collection tanks, and without adding water beyond what the gardens catch and store. The design system for these super-efficient, inexpensive, longterm gardens is called Permaculture, and it consists of a bunch of clever ways to save time, energy, and reduce waste while growing surpassingly delicious food. Studying Permaculture (which means “permanent cultivation”) showed me that I could use the tiny lifeforms that live in healthy, homemade soil to grow valuable plants while I’m doing other things. Since I moved back to Shreveport in 2014, I have built over twenty of these permanent gardens, some large, some tiny, which all catch water every time it rains and supply it to plants for weeks and months afterward. The city has started to support these projects, which are going on in Highland Park and the Food Bank. SPAR, Shreveport Green and Re-Form Shreveport are some of the groups that are getting involved in remaking our city from the ground up, starting literally with the ground. Everyone who has tried it finds that in a couple of mornings with minor labor, you can build a garden that requires no more digging for decades, and nearly every yard in town can accommodate one. So if you’re interested in The Next Big Thing for our economy, I’ve got the answer for you. It’s the most valuable substance in the universe, the basis of all life, and it’s falling on our heads. It’s the water in our rainfall, and harvesting and storing it in the ground for valuable use is cheaper and easier than harvesting any other natural resource. I hope you’re interested in learning how to put your lawn-care energy into a productive and beneficial use, and that you’ll swing by The Levee to taste the homegrown food and learn to make some in your own yard. We are just a few years away from boundless prosperity, once we get started.

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The Shreveport Film Industry: Take Two BY ERIC GIBSON PHOTOGRAPHY BY JENN FARNELL

nce upon a time, Shreveport was buzzing with celebrities and movie stars. The future was bright and Shreveport was on the map. Due to the unfortunate circumstances following Hurricane Katrina in the southern region of the state, and an influx in drilling work in this region, Shreveport saw new residents from around the United States looking for new opportunities. Locals were sticking around learning the ropes of the film industry and local businesses were expanding to meet the new needs. Then, the bottom fell out of both industries. First a major change in the profitability of drilling occurred, which ultimately led to the State suspending the buyback program on the tax rebates. This ultimately caused out of state financed production to head to Atlanta or elsewhere. So, where does that leave us now? Well, as far as film is concerned, it left us with something great—a local workforce that knows how to make movies. Louisiana was once ranked third in the nation in film productions as far as volume is concerned, behind Los Angeles and New York. At the time of that ranking Shreveport was constantly busy with work, which gave locals the time to learn valuable positions on crew and also allowed time for the development of local infrastructure necessary for productions. Also, over the past five years, the Louisiana Film Prize, a short film festival with a fifty-thousand dollar grand prize, gave us an actual canvas to test our skills and compete against other filmmakers. All of these factors, plus the fact that Shreveport provides free filming locations for Caddo Parish owned facilities, made this a premiere place to film. Louisiana’s original 2008 film and production tax incentive program was the primary reason film productions flocked to the state. Louisiana was offering a generous tax credit on the amount a production would spend and then buy the credit back for eighty-five cents on the dollar. For example, if a production spent ten million dollars, and they received a 28% tax credit, then they would receive a $2.8 million tax credit. The state would then buy back the tax credit for $2.46 million to the producers. Los Angeles and New York based film producers flocked to the region to benefit from these incentives. In 2015, the state suspended the buyback program, which meant that producers weren’t receiving cash for filming here anymore. By this time states like New Mexico and Georgia had established a viable tax credit program so it was easy for productions to make the move. Where does that leave the film industry in Shreveport today? The state invested heavily into the film industry but it didn’t receive the dividends it had hoped to receive. It was successful in building

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a highly trained crew base and establishing an infrastructure for the State, but something was still lacking. States like Georgia are having tremendous success with their tax credit program and it was modeled after ours. What’s the difference? The studios. In Atlanta, local studios were established to take advantage of the tax incentives. These studios developed their own content, and then distributed their products out to market. Once profits were made from sales of their films and or TV shows, that money was then paid back to the state. For Georgia, it’s a much more beneficial arrangement because they are seeing a greater return on their investment. The State of Louisiana, not wanting to lose a key part of its identity, worked diligently to not only bring filming back to this region but to create an environment where the industry can evolve organically without the reliance of tax credits. They set up tax credits for local studios that qualify as a QEC (qualified entertainment company,) which incentivizes out of state productions to use local studios, plus provides tax breaks for full time W-2 wage employees. It also expands the credits for local resident in-state productions outside of the New Orleans area. The new state regulations also offer greater incentives to out of state productions, including raising the buyback amount to 90 cents, which will put Louisiana back on top as far as incentives are concerned. This will hopefully bring films back to the region at a level similar to what was seen in the past. Shreveport also offers something else for filmmakers that makes us unique. Local filmmakers ban together each year and make hundreds of short films in this region. Whether it’s helping out of town filmmakers or each other, we all work with the spirit of helpfulness for our community. This opportunity to make so many films plus work crew on so many large productions creates an environment perfect for local studios to emerge. We have city officials like the Shreveport Film Commission’s Arlena Acree working diligently to promote film for this region, along with the city’s overall accommodating attitude when it comes to helping productions in any way possible. I believe Shreveport will see a new emergence of the film industry which incorporates locals and outside large scale productions. We chose Shreveport as our home to start this region’s first production and distribution studio. With the generous buyback program and tax breaks on hiring full time employees along with the amount of highly trained crew and infrastructure available, Shreveport is the perfect home for our studio, Gorilla Tree Film Co. We will be premiering our first feature film “Devil’s Acid,” a dark comedy horror film this October in Shreveport.

Local Filmmakers ban together each year and make hundreds of short films in this region. Whether itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s helping out of town filmmakers or each other, we all work with a spirit of helpfulness for our community.

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n the world of local Academy Award-winning short film maker, artist and author William Joyce, kids rule. After all, he is the “Guardian of Childhood,” the flyer of Fantastic Books, the collector of “Brave Good Bugs” and the writer of Rolie Polie Olie. With Joyce, holidays also rule, especially Halloween, so who better to orchestrate the most tremendous Trick or Treat to date than the eerily enchanting, ghoulishly graphic and frighteningly fantastical William Joyce! Joyce’s Halloween creations are not simply scary stories, but a collection of stupendous spiders, spine tingling skeletons, spooky skulls, and generally scary stuff from his Halloween parties that Martha Stewart featured on her show. On Friday, October 13 the Shreveport Regional Arts Council will unveil a Halloween extravaganza that transforms artspace at 708 Texas St. in downtown Shreveport into a House of Joycean horrors. Ghouls, goblins, and ghosts will give you a sneak peak into two hauntingly hallowed exhibitions during an opening night party with “Boo Bites” and live entertainment, all for a $10 admission fee and a cash bar. “I always thought when I was a kid that holidays—especially Halloween—should be bigger. You should make a big deal out of holidays because they don’t happen very often. So when I got old enough and had enough money, I decided that I would just do Halloween and other holidays the way I wished they had been done when I was a kid,” said William Joyce. “Now the Shreveport Regional Arts Council has given me the chance to share my Halloween collection with everyone. And what better way to do it than to create vignettes at artspace. The show will be a perfect start to a month of hobgoblins, skeletons and lots of “BOO!,” added Joyce.

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“William Joyce’s Halloween collection of bats, skeletons, artworks, and thousands of creepy - but friendly- spiders, including his famous giant lawn arachnid will weave a web of Halloween Magic in artspace from October 13 to November 4,” said SRAC Executive Director Pam Atchison. “It will also be a frighteningly fun place to host your very own William Joyce style Halloween Carnival, Homecoming Celebration and Fall Festival, and will be available for rentals. Wouldn’t it be scary, if someone beat you to booking the best date for your monster bash?” added Atchison. Throughout the five weeks of the exhibition, ghost stories will be told on the spooky performance stage and eerie live music can be heard! Pumpkin carving and painting as well as face and body painting by professional artists will be featured Halloween activities to get you ready for Pumpkin Shine or the Halloween Costume Party of the Century! Adding to the macabre atmosphere, 65 local artists’ who toured the 100-year-old Forest Park Cemetery with historian John Andrew Prime will display their works in an exhibition entitled, “InGraved,” opening upstairs in CoolSpace at artspace beginning Saturday, October 14. This exhibition will include the visual, literary and performance work of Northwest Louisiana artists inspired by the history and scenes of the 100-year-old Forest Park Cemetery. William Joyce himself will be a guest at the fabulously freaky Friday October the 13th gala of ghastly proportions at artspace from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Join Bill at the party and get a taste of how “Horribly Halloweenie” the five weeks of his exhibition are going to be. Don’t be afraid! Come out and party with Joyce as we unveil the gist of his juicy Joycean imagination.

John Pickens

BY MANDIE EBARB | ART BY GLEN P. WEBER PHOTOGRAPHY PROVIDED BY LSUS NOEL MEMORIAL LIBRARY

Reviving the Past KCS Café: a Part of Bigger Downtown Picture

here was once a time in Shreveport’s history when the railroads hailed supreme. Four railroad companies operated out of the city and with them came people and thriving businesses, especially for downtown. Shreveport became a hub for travelers with passenger lines coming and going from both the East to West Coast line and the North to Gulf Coast line. In response to this growing industry, the Kansas City Southern and Shreveport and Gulf Terminal Co. built Shreveport Union Station in 1897. Union Station served a number of different passenger lines over the years with its most memorable being the Southern Belle beginning in 1940. Facing east on Louisiana Avenue, the busy Union Depot would sometimes

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see up to 35 trains a day. Passengers would stop and spend the night on their journeys, staying at railway hotels like the Jefferson Hotel right across the street and having a bite to eat at what is commonly referred to as the KCS Restaurant. Upon arrival at Union Station no one would have been able to miss the giant, glowing, graphic billboard of the KCS Southern Belle sitting atop a small triangular building on the north side of the station. Tucked between three railroad tracks on Louisiana Avenue sits a small café built in 1922. Opened in 1923 as the Queen Café because of the nearby Queen and Crescent Route, the café changed names several times until 1945 when it became Fox’s KCS Restaurant.

“I can still remember the smell coming from the café was heavenly,” recalled artist Glen Weber, “hamburger and onions, maybe.” The artist has since moved to New Orleans, but has fond memories of his childhood in Shreveport when his dad would take him to Union Station to watch the trains. He says after Katrina happened in 2005 he began having dreams about Shreveport and his childhood. “I felt this desire to relive the happy memories of my past,” he said. After months of research and help from some other railroad enthusiasts, Weber recreated the KCS Restaurant from his childhood in a painting. Weber paid close attention to as many details as he could, including its orientation to the night sky. Memories about the restaurant’s ice cream and cantaloupe, freshly cut steak dinners, and homemade pies and cakes can still fondly be recalled. The café was a little taste of Shreveport many have not forgotten. Eventually railroad transportation began to decline and the grand Union Station closed its doors. November 3, 1969 was the last day of operation for the depot and two days later a fire broke out in the station’s basement. The station was soon demolished leaving nothing but a concrete slab, a few ceramic tiles and steps that lead up to where the watchtower once looked over downtown Shreveport. Without the station to sustain business, the KCS Restaurant closed its doors only a few years later in 1971. The building has stood vacant now for nearly 45 years. KCS Restaurant is not the only building in downtown to succumb to the fate of vacancy and disrepair over the years. You need not walk for too long in downtown Shreveport without coming across a building with historical significance. Fortunately, new life is beginning to take root for some of these historical landmarks. One man in Shreveport-Bossier City is making it his goal to revitalize historical buildings and investing in his community. Greg Solomon, owner of Solomon Construction, Inc. has taken on quite a few projects over the past several years. Solomon has renovated a building he now leases at 1618 Marshall St, loft apartments at 716 and 718 Edwards St., the Short Line Food Court on the corner lot of Marshall and Fairfield, and now he has brought life back to the KCS Restaurant. “It was a mess when I first bought it,” says Solomon. “There was trash everywhere, spray paint, and leaks had washed a lot of the plaster away.” Solomon bought the building in 2013 and began renovations in 2015. Utilizing old photographs of the café in its glory days, Solomon and his team were able to recreate most of the original elements of the building that had been lost to time and disrepair. You can still see the ghost writing on the side of the building, and the round vent from the kitchen. Chandeliers now hang down from the original ceiling tins and authentic blue bottle glass windowpanes can still be seen in the top row of windows. He was able to restore the original plaster walls of the building whose north wall curves along with the railroad tracks beside it. “You can still see the holes in the floor from where the bar stools once stood,” Solomon points out. One of the café’s unique features is the

Fox’s Restaurant (1946): Photo Courtesy of LSUS Archives and Special Collections- Noel Memorial Library

tile mosaic in the entryway that reads Ablon’s, one of the restaurant’s many names. “It’s always been a café and it’s my hope that it will go back that way,” says Solomon. The building is now for lease but will not stay empty long if there are no takers. Solomon plans on turning the property into an event space with a fully equipped kitchen. The Red River Valley Railroad Historical Society has expressed some interest in utilizing the building as a railroad museum. Ideally they would like to display their collection of railway equipment like a steam locomotive, caboose, diner and coach, on the old Union Station site across from the café. Things are happening in downtown Shreveport. Murals are popping up on the sides of buildings, businesses are moving in and there are events and activities that are bringing more and more people into the streets of downtown. The KCS Restaurant is just one of the many buildings downtown receiving the care and attention many have longed to see. When a community takes pride in their city, and its history, the passion spreads and creates growth. Lasting and meaningful change takes a lot of hard work and dedicated people. It’s time to take notice of the incredible changes happening in downtown Shreveport.

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According to Plan The Story of Trent Wierick

“Beloved LSU professor killed in biking accident.” I couldn’t believe it. In an attempt to reconnect with my favorite professor from college, I found myself reading her obituary instead. In June 2015, she was hit by a truck while cycling north of Baton Rouge. She had been dead for months and I didn’t have a clue. After the shock wore off, I had a lump in my throat for days. So, when I recently heard that my childhood neighbor, Trent Wierick, had also been hit by a truck while biking and survived, I had to get the story. To begin, Trent is no ordinary athlete. As he put it, “Exercise is my drug of choice.” Besides having the knowledge and training for it as a physical therapist, Trent has the drive and dedication to compete in one of the most challenging athletic events in the world—an Ironman triathlon. This grueling athletic event covers 140.6 miles: a 2.4 mile swim, a 112 mile bike, and a 26.2 mile marathon. Participants must complete the entire race in less than 17 hours. Trent completed his with six hours to spare. One day during a training season, to work off the stress of some personal issues (to which we’ll return), Trent joined a group of cyclists on a route just south of Shreveport in Frierson, LA. At one point in the ride, there was some unexpected roadwork, which changed the cyclists’ path for a moment. In that moment, the group had to make a sharp turn, something for which his particular bike was not designed. Making a wider turn than the rest of the group, Trent found himself swung out into the outside lane, “I looked up and saw a truck heading my direction.” In the words of Jason Wienland, a close cyclist friend, “I heard that sound that every avid cyclist knows—carbon crunching against metal—and I knew what happened. Without even looking back I knew what happened.” The crunch Jason heard was Trent’s bike and body colliding with a 4000-pound truck going 45 mph. “The next thing I remember is laying on the ground,” Trent says. “And I did a systems check at that point and noticed that I couldn’t breathe at all. I waited for a second thinking maybe I just got the wind knocked out of me, and the air would come back.” Jason Wienland, who was by his side, saw bubbles start to come out of his mouth and grew even more concerned, “I knew he was going into some kind of respiratory distress...I thought he was going to die” Trent vividly remembers those moments on the edge of life and death, saying “I couldn’t feel any air in my lungs. I felt this gurgling in my chest. Then I had this conversation with God and asked, ‘Is this it? Am I going to die here? If so, that’s fine, I’m prepared to die and spend eternity with you.’ Then I felt God wrap his arms around me and comfort me and say, ‘I’ve got something more I want you to experience in this life.’ And after that, I was calm. I was at peace. And from that point on I knew I was going to be all right.”

48 FALL 2017

After that short moment, Trent says, “I felt air begin to trickle back into one of my lungs.” Over the next few days in the hospital, Trent went through multiple operations, some of which were risky and rare. All twelve ribs were broken on the left side, many of them in multiple places on the front and back of his rib cage. The doctors gave him a “9” on a scale of 1-10 for severity of injuries. In addition to the ribs, he had a collapsed lung, a flail chest, a fractured left scapula, bruised kidneys, and a fractured vertebra. The doctors actually said that they typically only see these kinds of injuries on people who are already dead, but because of how good of shape he was in physically, his body was able to sustain the injuries and keep him alive and breathing. He went through major surgery in which his rib cage was put back together with metal plates and screws. Despite the dire situation, Trent says that throughout his stay in the hospital, “I never worried about anything else in the hospital because of that experience [with God]. I knew I was going to be all right.” And indeed, the surgery went well and his condition improved. Two weeks after the surgery, he was discharged from the hospital, after which he underwent months of intense physical therapy. Defying all expectations (both the doctors and his own), Trent not only learned to walk and move normally, but fourteen months later he did another triathlon event, placing 89th out of 1200. Being a patient instead of the physical therapist providing the treatment, Trent learned the value of empathy in his own work as a PT at The Edge Physical Therapy in Shreveport, a practice he co-owns with long time friend and training partner, Anna Moore. On its own, that is quite a story. A near-death experience. Major surgery. Two weeks in the hospital. Months of physical therapy ending in a return to his beloved sport. That is quite a story of survival and victory and willpower. But there is actually a second story interwoven throughout his cycling accident that is quite different in nature. In Trent’s words, “The wreck is a big part of the story, but the biggest part of the story is that we had gone through four years of infertility before.” Up to that point in his life, things had come fairly easily for him. When they weren’t easy, with hard work

he was able to get what he wanted. But this was not the case for him and his wife Molly in their desire for children. For once in his life, there was something that he couldn’t do on his own. Looking back on that season he says, “I had never had to completely rely on God. During that infertility period, I was helpless. There was nothing I could do. I learned what it was to be totally dependent and reliant on God during that period.” Trent found his Ironman training a healthy place to vent his frustration about their struggle. During those four years, he and his wife Molly had gone through nine IUIs, three IVFs, and two miscarriages. About a month before the accident, they realized that their most recent procedure didn’t work when Molly miscarried again. Frustrated and angry one day about the miscarriage, Trent went cycling to vent some emotions. That day was June 14, 2012—the day of the wreck. After hearing how life-threatening his injuries were on the way to the hospital, Molly prayed, “God, I’ve got nothing to offer you. But if you save my husband, I’ll never ask for a child ever again.” She was willing to give up anything for her husband’s life, even her deep desire for children. A few days later, when Trent was waking up from his rib-plating surgery, he looked over and saw his wife with a big grin on her face. Confused by her renewed spirit, he asked what was going on. She leaned over and said, “You’re not going to believe this, but we’re pregnant.” The two of them celebrated quietly together in the ICU room. Little did Molly know that just a few days before when she had tried to bargain with God for Trent’s life, she was already pregnant. True, they’d had miscarriages before, but this time something was different, and they both felt it. In a confidence Trent attributes to “God’s grace and faithfulness,” they knew they were about to be parents for the first time. When asked about the timing of the news of the pregnancy, Trent said, “God knew exactly what we needed and when we needed it. He gave us that child at just the right moment.” With the news, God’s plan for those nearly five years of infertility became much clearer to him. As he was pouring his emotions into his Ironman training, God had been preparing his body to survive a head-on collision with a truck.

And in God’s timing, he was given the news of the pregnancy the day he came out of surgery, so that he could have something to fight for (the upcoming baby) in the grueling months of physical therapy. But why couldn’t God just have given them a baby in the first place? Or kept him from getting in a wreck? Because according to Trent, apart from those things, he would not have learned what it was to be totally dependent on God. As he lay on the hospital bed, alive by a miracle of God, hearing the news of his wife, who had conceived by a miracle of God, it couldn’t have been clearer to him how dependent he was on God for all things. The pregnancy came exactly when they needed it most. According to Trent, this was that “ah ha” moment, when he was able to look back on over four years of pain and say, “Now I get it.” And he was able to look back and say, “I know what that ‘something more’ was that God kept me alive to experience. I was going to be a father.” Indeed, on February 26th, 2013, Molly gave birth to a little girl, Mary Caroline. Now, as a counselor who often meets with people in the midst of suffering, I am well aware that there are many stories that do not end the same way. Some couples have a lifetime of infertility. Some people don’t survive the bike wreck. What about God’s plan then? If you would, allow me to answer from the Christian faith that Trent and I share. If we trust God in our pain, like Trent and Molly Wierick, we too will one day have that “ah ha” moment in which all previous sorrow is filled with new meaning and turned to joy, as baffling as that may sound in the midst of that pain. Perhaps, like the Wiericks, we will get a small glimpse of his plan in the here and now. Perhaps not. Either way, what they experienced in part, all who trust God in their pain will one day experience in full.

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It Takes A Village How Caddo Schools & Afterschool Programs Help At-Risk Kids Succeed

or many parents, activities after school for children are intended to enrich their intellectual, leadership, and/or physical skills, knowledge, self-confidence and health. Engaging in extracurricular activities is not only good for the personal development of school age children, but it will also hopefully give them a leg up for getting into college and receiving scholarships to help pay for their tuition. Afterschool programs also provide a supervised, structured and safe place for children to spend their time when their parents are working. For many families, however, afterschool programs serve an additional purpose. Afterschool programs are where children are in a safe place and where they won’t become victims and perpetrators of crime, coerced or lured into sex trafficking or abused at home. In addition to providing a safe place for children, afterschool programs are often where children will eat their next meal. There is also the opportunity to receive help with their homework—a chance and encouragement to DO their homework—so their chances are increased that they will be successful in high school and hopefully graduate and go on to college. Shreveport has a staggeringly high rate of people living in poverty. Lynn Stevens, United Way of Northwest Louisiana’s Chief Operating Officer, reported to the July 11, 2017 Shreveport City Council meeting that 49% of Shreveport either live in poverty or are one paycheck away

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from living in poverty. Children in Shreveport make up the largest age demographic living in poverty, with 37% of children under the age of eighteen and 49% of children under the age of five living below the poverty line, according to 2015 Census data. African American children are especially afflicted by poverty in the region. Step Forward, a regional nonprofit which uses data and input from multiple city and business leaders and groups to improve educational outcomes for children in Northwest Louisiana, found 13% of white children under 18 years of age live in poverty, compared to 48% of African American children. The 35-point difference between white and African American children in Northwest Louisiana is larger than the gap at the state level (33%) and at the national level (25%.) Clay Walker, the director of Caddo Parish Juvenile Services, sees the deleterious impact poverty has on children both from the data he collects and analyzes, as well as what he observes daily at the Juvenile Detention Center and Court. “Poverty negatively impacts children after they are born,” he says, “because the critical time for children’s brain development and learning language is ages zero to three. Kids growing up in poverty are underexposed to singing, talking and reading.” This results in children of lower-income families hearing a staggering 30 million fewer words than children from higher-income families by the time they are three years old. Walker explains that when

kids start kindergarten with that huge gap in language acquisition, it is as if “we are asking them to run a three-mile race but they are starting two miles behind everyone else.” Children with large gaps in learning early in their lives will often struggle academically throughout their years in school. They face long odds of completing high school, which means they and their families are likely to live in poverty. Men who dropped out of high school are at a higher risk of being incarcerated. A 2009 study by Northeastern University found that one in every ten young male high school dropouts ends up in jail or juvenile detention, compared with one in thirty-five young male high school graduates. For African American men, it is much worse, with one in four going to jail or juvenile detention. A major reason toddlers from a lower socio-economic background do not acquire the vital language knowledge and skills is an overwhelming majority of these children are in households headed by single mothers. Walker explains, “Single moms are usually undereducated and working two, even three jobs. The stereotype of a single mom sitting on a couch drawing a welfare check is inaccurate. They are not able to be around their kids in their first few years to talk or sing to them enough.” When children of single, working moms from these lower socio-economic backgrounds go to K-12 school, they fall further behind their wealthier peers and struggle academically. Walker says that “the moms often don’t have the education to help them with their homework and sometimes, they’re not home until 8 or 10 p.m. The fathers are often in prison, so they’re not around. So, after school, their children aren’t supervised, they are often looking after their little brothers and sisters, and they’re not getting help with homework. We have a lot of kids during that time that are being abused and molested during that afterschool time period. That is why in-school services and afterschool programs are a vital part of the village it takes to help poor children. Because if these kids get to me, it means they have committed a crime somewhere and someone is a victim of it. That is what we need to prevent.” The Caddo Parish school system, like many schools throughout the country, has implemented programs that train teachers to support and assist students’ social and emotional learning in school. Dr. Barzanna White, Caddo Parish School’s District Psychologist, oversees the training and service programs, which are for all students, regardless of their backgrounds. They address character education, bullying prevention, suicide prevention, leadership, and positive reinforcement of behavior. The Positive Behavior Intervention and Support (PBIS) approach is structured with three tiers of response and support for students, depending on the types of behavior they exhibit. For instance, the first tier offers basic support to all students, such as praising students who are especially kind to others. The second tier is for more complex situations. “Maybe a kid missed breakfast that morning,” Dr. White explains. “Missing that meal means the child will likely have a negative experience all day long in school. So that she doesn’t have that, her teacher might give her an energy bar or let her go to the cafeteria to get a snack. Tier three is when a child is struggling academically, emotionally or socially or all of the above, and teachers and counselors respond with multiple levels of support to help him.” A recent outside-of-school program is the Team Leadership institute which Dr. White has focused on for the past few years. This program is for high school students who attend schools in high poverty areas, such as Huntington and Woodlawn. One Saturday morning a

month, Team Leadership students go to a workshop from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. “We get them transportation, so those who don’t have it can get to the workshop,” Dr. White says. “We feed them breakfast and lunch, and we have guest speakers, most of whom are African American men because students usually have African American and white female teachers. This gives the students some balance.” Dr. White and the program’s school sponsors also took about 65 Team Leadership students to Baton Rouge for Mental Awareness Day and a tour of the state capitol. Many of these students had never been out of Shreveport before and the Baton Rouge trip exposed the students to a new place, allowing them to see that they are not limited to one neighborhood or one community. Next spring, Dr. White will take eight students to Washington, DC. There is a plethora of afterschool programs within and outside of Caddo Parish schools for low-income children. They vary in size, notoriety, offered activities, and stated missions, but all focus on giving at-risk children skills, knowledge, opportunities, and most of all, nurturing adults and role models that can improve their chances of having a financially and socially stable future. Below are just a few of these programs and what they offer.

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Local Afterschool Programs BOYS II YOUNG MEN MENTORING PROGRAM Boys II Young Men (BIIYM) is a free mentoring program for boys ages 8-12 from low- to moderate income backgrounds, who live in Caddo and Bossier Parishes. Chris Henry, a firefighter, and his wife Jennifer, a teacher, founded BIIYM in 2015. BIIYM’s mentors and mentees are required to meet a minimum of four hours per month, attending group meetings for two hours and performing community service for two hours. There is also a weekly afterschool communications class the boys attend. Currently, twenty boys are enrolled in the program and almost all come from households headed by a single parent and without a strong male presence. Henry targets younger boys because they won’t hold back who they are and what they need. “When boys become teenagers,” he said, “they are harder to reach and not as open to changing themselves in a positive way.” The need these boys have for men who pay positive attention to them and care for them is palpable. Henry describes an eight-year-old boy who, when he first met Henry, latched onto his leg and wouldn’t let go for the three hours they were together. BIIYM is careful, though, not to have the male mentors displace the boys’ mothers as the primary caregivers. Henry explains, “The mothers pick up their sons at the end of the mentoring sessions so the boys aren’t confused of who they’re supposed to be with or that they need to choose between their moms and mentors. It’s critical to keep those relationships intact and balanced.” Henry says the weekly communications class his wife Jennifer teaches is for the boys to learn the first step in conflict resolution—communicating a non-confrontational response to a potential or real conflict. Every Thursday afternoon, the boys meet in a school classroom with a comfortable environment and write down their thoughts, pencil to paper. “A lot of guys are visual learners and hands-on,” Henry explains. “All I know to do [as a boy] is what I have in my head. If I can see what my thoughts are and review them, I can see that I do not want to carry my thoughts out and I can think of a different way to respond.” The more the boys write, the better they become at assessing their thoughts and responding to conflicts. They also become better at writing, which means they will perform better academically and know how to write strong college and scholarship applications. CADDO PARISH 4-H Most people have heard of 4-H, an organization that historically has been known for teaching youth how to raise farm

animals in rural parts of the United States and has been around for over 100 years. Today, 4-H has chapters throughout the world. Caddo Parish 4-H, a chapter organization of Louisiana 4-H, focuses on teaching young people leadership, citizenship and life skills. It offers a wide range of community service programs and activities, such as shooting sports, fashion, yoga, and weekend camping trips. Most of Caddo’s 4-H clubs are organized in Caddo schools. A teacher volunteers as a guide and initial student recruiter to the club, but the students nominate leaders and run it themselves. Many of the clubs meet during school hours, but most of the programs and activities happen after school and on weekends. Last year, 806 youth were enrolled in 35 4-H clubs across Caddo Parish Betsy Willis, an eighth-grade science teacher at Ridgewood Middle School, who has led the school’s 4-H club since 2013, focuses on teaching the 4-H students the importance of respecting themselves and respecting others. Her one guideline for the 4-H students is “do unto others.” “I tell them, if they act and treat themselves a certain way, they have to know that is how their parents, siblings, their own children and their friends are going to act and treat them,” Willis says. She tells her students that this philosophy applies to their communities as well. “It’s important for the students to realize they have to build their communities and take care of them. So we do community service, help the elderly, plant trees, clean up litter, and other things.” Willis observed her “do unto others” and the 4-H community service projects change many of her students who started out struggling academically and emotionally. She recalls a boy a few years ago who wore an ankle monitor when he first joined 4-H. “He lived with his grandmother and did pretty much what he wanted to do. And then he came to the understanding, ‘I have to take care of my grandmother because one day, I am going to be old and however I’m treating her, it’s going to be done to me.’” While completing the community service projects, the boy discovered he enjoyed planting trees. “I think planting the trees helped his thought process slow down and he was able to get in and enjoy the moment,” Willis says. “And then it helped him slow down and enjoy his grandmother.” Why does Betsy Willis love leading the 4-H club? “To watch these children change is amazing,” she exults. “To be a part of that change is awesome.” RENZI EDUCATION AND ART CENTER The Renzi Education and Art Center, founded in 1997 by

the Sisters of Our Lady of Sorrow and local artist Donna Service, offers free afterschool academic and art classes to students in grades K through 10. These classes take place in two renovated Highland mansions, whose walls are adorned with art created by Renzi students. Not all, but most of the up to 60 students attending Renzi are from low-income/at-risk backgrounds. Students take one 50-minute art class and two 25-minute academic classes, Monday through Thursday, during four seven-week sessions during the school year. The kids can choose from a plethora of art classes, taught by professional artists, such as cartooning, painting, and wire sculpture. Renzi offers a variety of academic classes as well, taught by professional teachers who offer individualized instruction and homework assistance to the students. Hillary Frazier, Renzi’s Program Director, runs the afterschool program, which means she gets to know the students and their families well. She says the homework and core academic classes such as English and math help students academically, but the art classes are often what boost the kids’ self-confidence, which helps them in their studies. “We have kids who struggle in school, but they sew a beautiful quilt, make a cool wire sculpture or find they are good at sign language,” Frazier says. “They see they’ve accomplished something, maybe that their friends at school haven’t and then they have more confidence when doing something that’s hard for them, like science.” TWIRLERS IN MOTION LaKimbria Washington, who goes by Kim, started Twirlers In Motion (TIM) for Northwest Louisiana, a baton twirling group that “encourages youths’ physical, mental, and social success one move at a time.” Washington founded TIM because she was in a baton twirling group when she was a kid and could have “easily become another statistic of a young black kid never going outside of the low-income communities and mentalities.” Washington grew up in Shreveport and her mother was an onagain, off-again single mother of five. As a child, Washington’s family moved frequently, which made her childhood chaotic. When her aunt enrolled her in the twirling group, the Dixie Diamond Baton Corporation, Washington found a group and place that helped ground her, give her new skills, and open her to opportunities she would not have had otherwise. “Baton twirling helped me become confident, to express myself, and accept constructive criticism,” she recalls. “I got to travel inside and outside the United States for tournaments and performances and meet other kids who had different family structures than me. I saw I could have a different family structure than the one I had.” Washington founded TIM so she could offer the same opportunities she gained from being in Dixie Diamond to a new generation of children. While TIM classes are not free, she has made them affordable for single parents and parents

with multiple children. “Extracurricular activities are very expensive and can really be taxing on families, especially those with more than one child,” she says. “Our program is about bridging the gap.” The afterschool programs described here and the many other programs in our community all need volunteers to serve the children who take part in these programs—to help children with their homework, teach them new skills and topics, and crucially—nurture and mentor them. They also need donations, both monetary and in-kind. It is important that we all participate in the village that it will take to ensure that every child in Shreveport has the opportunity to thrive in school and beyond. A federal government poverty guideline is a family of four earning a household income of $24,600 is considered living in poverty. However, the National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) reports “families typically need an income of at least twice the official poverty level…to meet basic needs” or about $48,000 for a family of four in 2017. 1

Shreveport in Caddo Parish, Bossier City in Bossier Parish, Minden and Springhill in Webster Parish, and Mansfield in DeSoto Parish. 2

https://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/periodicals/TheEarlyCatastrophe.pdf

Afterschool Program Contact Info

BOYS II YOUNG MEN MENTORING PROGRAM Contact:

Chris Henry, Executive Director, (318) 550-6162

Email:

boys2youngmenmentoring@gmail.com

Website:

boys2youngmen.com

Facebook:

facebook.com/b2ymm

CADDO PARISH 4-H Contact:

Katherine Pace, (318) 226-6805

Email:

kpace@agcenter.lsu.edu

Website:

lsuagcenter.com/portals/our_offices/parishes/caddo

Facebook:

facebook.com/Caddo-Parish-4-H-103319039726317/

RENZI CENTER Contact:

Hillary Frazier at (318) 222-1414

Website:

renzicenter.org

Facebook:

facebook.com/RenziCenter/

TWIRLERS IN MOTION Contact:

Kim Washington at (318) 207-8356

Email:

twirlersinmotion@gmail.com

Facebook:

facebook.com/TwirlersInMotion/

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Fall Into Awesome Local Things To Do

Sept. 5Nov. 22

Portraits of ‘The Others’

Sept. 7-28 on Thurs

Generations of Struggle

Sept. 16

Chimpanzee Discovery Day

Sept. 20

//Meadows Museum

Brewoga

//Red River Brewing Co.

//Bossier Parish Library

//Chimp Haven

Highland Jazz & Blues Festival //September 16th in Columbia Park

The best local and national musicians converge on the Highland Jazz and Blues Festival Presented by Twisted Root for Shreveport’s own “party in the park”

Sept. 23Oct. 31

Dixie Maze Farms & Corn Maze

Sept. 29

Cirque du Lake Block Party

//Dixie Maze Farms

//Lake Street Sept. 16

Shreveport Symphony: Beethoven & Schumann //Riverview Theater

Marlene Yu’s 80th Birthday Gala //September 30th at Marlene Yu Museum

Experience the culinary artistry of Chef Anthony Felan’s multi-course feast for the eyes and palate with Marlene Yu’s new 20-by-40-foot masterpiece and large works: “Step outside of our regular restaurant settings, and bring it all to life on a plate to showcase the art, the food, and the whole background of Marlene Yu for one night: her 80th birthday.”

Sept. 30

Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure //CenturyLink Center

Sept. 30Oct. 7

Red River Revel

Oct. 6

Joan Jett & The Blackhearts

//Festival Plaza

//Horseshoe Riverdome

Oct. 3Nov. 30

Human Beings & Being Human Beings: A Self-Portraiture Show //East Bank Gallery

Oct. 4-8

LA Film Prize & Prize Fest //700 Block of Texas Street

Oct. 26Nov. 12

LSUS AgCenter: AgMagic //State Fair of Louisiana

Brookshireâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s & Super 1 Foods Heroes Run

//October 28th at the Shreveport Convention Center Join us and help support first responders & military heroes at this half marathon, 5K and Kids 1K. www.bgcracing.com

Oct. 28

ASEANA Autumn Festival //Asian Gardens of Shreveport

Oct. 28

7th Annual Bugs, Bats, & Bones

//Walter B. Jacobs Park

Oct. 12th

RENT 20th Anniversary Tour //The Strand Theatre

Nov. 1

7th Annual Red River Cleanup

Nov. 2

36th Annual Taste of Shreveport Benefiting Holy Angels

Nov. 3

Shreveport Sounds: A Music History Symposium //Robinson Film Center

Oct. 13Nov. 14

Halloween //artspace

Nov. 11-12

Paw Patrol Live

//Centurylink Center Oct. 14

BREW

//Festival Plaza

Oct. 20

International Lincoln Center Lecture //LSU University Center

Oct. 21

Great Raft Ramble //Great Raft Brewing

Oct. 23

Up With Downs Golf Tournamanet

//Stonebridge Country Club

Nov. 18th

Catahoula Wine Mixer //Provenance

Revelry BY PAYTON HANEY DENNEY

he word “revelry” is defined as noisy or unrestrained merrymaking; boisterous festivity, but in Shreveport, revelry means more. The Revel, to me, is more than face painting, bounce houses and bottles filled with colorful sand. It’s a feeling of home—a warm, welcoming celebration. It’s all things good, beautiful and local, our best foot forward and an overwhelming act of hospitality. Sure there is a middle-aged clown chasing children around their mothers and overpriced food, but in order to really understand Revel you need to look deeper. The Revel is a meeting of old friends pushing strollers and doting on growing babies. It’s a come as you are, scrubs, boots or tank top kind of gathering. It’s awareness of and appreciation for cultures different from your own as you meander through the rows of winding artist booths. Also, I’m pretty sure it’s one of the only places you can see a debutante gnaw a turkey leg while tapping her toe to the music overhead. Even the air is jovial at the Revel. Melodies bellow but begin to diminish and are then overlapped by new instruments as you wander around the festival. Zydeco, Rock, Country, Bluegrass, Reggae—it’s all there. Your limbs will begin to move and tap as if they have a life of their own. It happens to everyone and there’s no avoiding it. As easily as you can get lost in the music, you can get lost wandering from booth to booth in fried food heaven. The smell is hypnotizing. My

58 FALL 2017

eyes and my stomach can never agree as I peer up at “The Board” of food choices. What to do? What to do? So many choices, so little time, so few dollars. So you settle for a meat pie and a roasted ear of corn, but it was no settlement at all. You hit the jackpot and to reward your excellent decision-making you’ll have a funnel cake for dessert. Or maybe cheesecake on a stick. Or maybe both! Why do we Revel? Mainly because not going is like missing Homecoming or Thanksgiving dinner. You can’t. You shouldn’t. Who would want to? But also because it supports local artists as they share beauty as they see it. Remember that overpriced corndog? Well, that’s helping to fund many worthy not-for-profit causes. It’s a donation and dinner and no dishes afterward. And beer. Don’t forget the beer. Yes, that makes sense. Revel is a stamp of Shreveport. It’s a feeling than runs straight down into our core and rests in our happy memory storage bank. Oh and it’s a party too. I mean, where else can a freight train drive straight past a crowd of hundreds of people and no one notices. We’ll come back year after year. Why? I think one of this year’s artists said it best, “The idea is to keep shooting because I know that I’ve yet to take my best shot.” While working together, things can only get better. Constantly striving for our best, hoping for better, and celebrating our success is what it’s all about. Revel is Shreveportant. Well done.