December 2012

SOUTHWEST MICHIGAN’S MAGAZINE

ROOTS MUSIC THRIVES IN SW MICHIGAN ASTRONOMY GROUP’S QUEST FOR CLEAR SKIES TEACHING TRICKS OF THE ACTING TRADE WHERE BEER IS A HOT COMMODITY

The man with a (client centric) plan.

Steve Christensen was thinking big and realizing with each passing day that big was not in the interests of his clients. As a private wealth manager for one of the nation’s largest banks, his long-term clients and colleagues were being upended and shuffled aside as a result of decisions made in distant boardrooms. It led him to wonder: Could a smaller, privately held wealth management firm provide the integrity and personal touch that big can’t?

Over lunch with a longtime friend who worked for Greenleaf Trust, Steve was surprised to hear that Greenleaf was one of Michigan’s first trust-only banks, privately held and set up to remain so in perpetuity.

And that Greenleaf Trust’s $2MM minimum account requirement for new clients enables us to maintain one of the industry’s best client-to-advisor team ratios; that we do not accept remuneration from mutual funds, thus avoiding conflicts of interest in our recommendations; that our client satisfaction rate is nearly 100%; that approximately four billion dollars are under our discretionary management; and that our year-to-year asset growth has been in double digits for over a decade.

It was music to Steve’s ears. He joined us as a Wealth Management Advisor, and now utilizes his CTFA credentials to develop comprehensive wealth management plans tailored to the each client’s needs. In other words, helping them to achieve financial security from generation to generation. To learn more about Greenleaf Trust’s client centric approach to wealth management, call us at 269.388.9800. Music to your ears or otherwise, you’ll like what you hear.

g r e e n l e a f t ru s t. c o m

2 1 1 s o u t h ro s e st r e e t k a l a m a z o o , m i 4 9 0 0 7 2 6 9. 3 8 8 .9 8 0 0 8 0 0 . 4 1 6 . 4 5 5 5

A MAJOR LEAGUE DIAGNOSIS

CALLED FOR

MAJOR LEAGUE SURGEONS.

My brain tumor was growing and had to be removed. I started preparing myself for a massive operation — a craniotomy. Then Mom heard an ad on the radio about the neurosurgery team at Bronson. Finding Dr. Fabi, my neurosurgeon, and Dr. Szeles, my ear nose and throat surgeon, changed everything. They’re experts at a new, minimally invasive procedure called the Endoscopic Endonasal Approach (EEA). Incredibly, they were able to remove the tumor through my nose. There was far less risk. And the recovery time was weeks instead of months. If not for Bronson Positivity, I’d have missed this baseball season for sure — and maybe a whole lot more.

bronsonhealth.com/neurosurgery

OC_Encore_Sept-2012.qxd:Encore

8/20/12

3:54 PM

Page 1

southwest michigan’s magazine

Here to help We offer a welcoming environment and enriching activities for your loved one, while giving you the necessary time to care for yourself and meet the demands of family, home, and work.

Professional care and loving companionship for older adults who need assistance or supervision during the day.

roots music thrives in sw michigan astronomy group’s quest for clear skies teaching tricks of the acting trade where beer is a hot commodity

publisher encore publications, inc. editor

marie lee

ADULT DAY SERVICES

copy editor

at

margaret deritter designer

Scan the QR code above and learn how we can help you care for your parent or loved one.

2255 West Centre Avenue at Oakland Drive, Portage (269)373-3200 | www.oaklandcentre.org

maria majeski photographer

erik holladay contributors

margaret deritter, brian lam, jeremy martin, larry massie, theresa coty-o’neil, john and jeanne wiler contributing poet

patricia jabbeh wesley advertising sales/business manager

krieg lee advertising representative

celeste statler office manager

ron dundon

Encore Magazine is published 9 times yearly, September through May. Copyright 2012, Encore Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. Editorial, circulation and advertising correspondence should be sent to: www.encorekalamazoo.com 350 S. Burdick, Suite 214, Kalamazoo, MI 49007 Telephone: (269) 383-4433 Fax number: (269) 383-9767 E-mail: Publisher@encorekalamazoo.com

The Moors Golf Club�

It’s all about golf and the golf experience.� Experience great golf through our Preview Membership Program.� www.MoorsGolf.com� 7877 Moorsbridge Road 4 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

•

Portage, Michigan 49024

•

269-323-8873�

The staff at Encore welcomes written comment from readers, and articles and poems for submission with no obligation to print or return them. To learn more about us or to comment, you may visit www. encorekalamazoo.com. Encore subscription rates: one year $27, two years $53, three years $78. Current single issue and newsstand $4, $10 by mail. Back issues $6, $12 by mail. Advertising rates on request. Closing date for space is 28 days prior to publication date. Final date for print-ready copy is 21 days prior to publication date.

d e c e m b e r 2012

features

Roots Music Takes Hold 24 How did Kalamazoo become a hotbed for bluegrass, Americana and roots music?

To the Stars 20 The stargazers of the Kalamazoo Astronomical Society are closing in on their quest for clear skies.

Acting Lessons The Civic Theatre’s education program makes stagecraft accessible to old and young.

28

Up Front

6 Jolly Times Kalamazoo Santacon is a jolly holiday celebration.

9 Photo Challenge You know you’ve seen it, but where?

Solve our picture puzzler and win a gift certificate for Tudor House Tea and Spice.

10 Update Catch up with poet Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, who is working on a war memoir.

14 Good Works Lending Hands provides free medical equipment to the ill and injured.

AT HOME Holiday decorating inside and out

A Fast Built home

Mike Holmes coming to Home Expo

16 Savor Market crashes are a good thing at

SPECIAL SECTION

41

the Kalamazoo Beer Exchange.

Arts

32 Strictly Ornamental ‘Quirky’ angels, wood ducks,

and glass snowflakes all at Ornament Extravaganza.

33 BeethovenFest! KJSO alums and friends tackle Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.

34 Poetry 35 Events of Note Departments

19 First Glance An inspiring image by a local photographer.

48 Massie’s Michigan A French prince takes a tour of 19th-century Michigan.

On the cover: Banjo musician Rock Bartley plays while the sun goes down. Photo by Erik Holladay.

54 The Last Word Following a man’s dream to run away and join the circus.

UP FRONT ENCORE

Red Suit Celebration Fifth annual SantaCon is a ‘jolly good time’ by

MARIE LEE

There’s a group in Kala-

6 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

A Santa with his suit aglow gathers with other SantaConners in downtown Kalamazoo.

ago after working as a comedian in New York City and brought SantaCon with him. With “a lot of help” from friends Nick Zastrow and Chris Bodnar, he organized the area’s first SantaCon in 2007. It attracted six people. Since then, the event has snowballed; last year’s event drew more than 350 happy holiday revelers.

Don’t be fooled by its seeming irreverence; SantaCon is a well-orchestrated event, complete with a comedy show with seven performers and musical performances by three bands. After the event travels from the giant Santa to Harvey’s on the Mall, it goes on to the lower level of Shakespeare’s Pub and ends up at the Old Dog Tavern. Along the way, SantaConners will have candy canes to give away to those who are nice, particularly children. Children, however, cannot be part of the SantaCon throng; participants must be 18 or older. Although SantaCon is generally a free event, SantaConners must pay for their own beverages and pay a $5 cover charge at the Old Dog Tavern.

Derek Ketchum

mazoo that hopes to bring the Santa out in everyone this holiday season.

Local SantaConners will hold their fifth annual SantaCon celebration Dec. 15, bringing revelry, silliness, costumes and mirth to downtown Kalamazoo.

SantaCon is best described as a moving flash mob of holiday revelers, most who come in costume as Santas, elves, Grinches and even the occasional driedel. The first SantaCon occurred in San Francisco in 1994. Now “Santarchy,” as the celebrations have been dubbed, has spread to several hundred U.S. cities as well as far-flung locations across the globe.

This year’s Kalamazoo SantaCon is expected to draw several hundred participants. “This is not just a pub crawl,” says organizer Brett Jones, of Kalamazoo, “but it is about having a good time. It is about celebrating the holiday without the commercialism of it, and doing it for a good cause.”

SantaCon begins at 6:30 p.m. with a gathering at the giant Santa statue on the downtown Kalamazoo Mall, on the north side of Michigan Avenue (“I love that Kalamazoo has that giant Santa statue,” says Jones). The group will then engage in the traditional “Running of the Santas” down Burdick Street to Harvey’s on the Mall.

Jones, who lived in Portage during his middle school and high school years, returned to Southwest Michigan five years

ENCORE UP FRONT

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 7

UP FRONT ENCORE Jones is excited by this year’s SantaCon venues because “they are close enough to each other that people can walk to them.”

“We don’t want people to drink and drive,” he says. “We’ll have taxis on call, and we encourage people to get a hotel room downtown so they don’t have to worry about driving home.”

So there’s a good time to be had by all, but what’s the good cause? This year SantaCon will benefit two organizations. A por-

SantaCon 2012 schedule Saturday, Dec. 15 For more information, visit santaconkalamazoo.com.

tion of the cover charge at the Old Dog Tavern and drink sales at the other venues will go to Courage for Tom to help local resident Thomas Hardy as he combats testicular cancer. There will also be a food drive for Kalamazoo Loaves & Fishes, a provider of emergency food to the hungry in Kalamazoo County.

This SantaCon is also Jones’ opportunity to put in place a succession plan for future events. He graduates from Western Michi-

6:30 p.m. — Gathering of the Santas at giant Santa statue on the Kalamazoo Mall, along Michigan Avenue just east of the Radisson Plaza Hotel & Suites.

7 p.m. — Running of the Santas to Harvey’s on the Mall, 416 S. Burdick St.

gan University this coming summer with a degree in advertising and isn’t sure he’ll be around to plan next year’s festivities.

“Oh, SantaCon will go on,” he says. “Chris, Nick and I are working with people right now to show them everything they need to know to make it happen. We want to keep it a tradition and something people in Kalamazoo just have to do.”

8 p.m. — Shakespeare’s Pub Lower Level, 241 E. Kalamazoo Ave., comedy show featuring Bob Fredericks, Brett Jones, Jamie Perrin, Sonny Pandit, Casey Stoddard, Adam Degi and Russell Cairns.

10 p.m. — Old Dog Tavern, 402 E. Kalamazoo Ave., music

by Branden Mann and the Reprimand, the Boss Mustangs, and The Real Fantastics, $5 cover charge.

Participants are reminded to bring cash for drink and food purchases and canned food items for the food drive.

Lewis Reed & Allen P. C. attorneys Front Row:

Dean S. Lewis, Richard D. Reed Second Row:

Thomas C. Richardson, James M. Marquardt, Whitney A. Kermerling, Robert C. Engels, Sheralee S. Hurwitz, Stephen M. Denenfeld, Owen D. Ramey, William A. Redmond Third Row:

Gregory G. St. Arnauld, Ronald W. Ryan, Nicholas J. Daly, Michael B. Ortega, David A. Lewis, Michael A. Shields, Michael A. Dombos

| kalamazoo | michigan | 49007-3947 | fax: 269.349.3831 | postmaster@lewisreedallen.com www.lewisreedallen.com

136 east michigan avenue suite 800 phone: 269.388.7600

8 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

UP FRONT PHOTO CHALLENGE

Where is this?

Tell us for a chance to win a $25 gift certificate to Tudor House Tea & Spice!

1) Go to www.encorekalamazoo.com and click on the Photo Challenge tab at the top.

Fill out the form and submit your answer; or 2) E -mail your answer to editor@encorekalamazoo.com. Type “Where is this?” in the subject line. Include your name, address and telephone number; or 3) M ail your answer to Encore, 350 S. Burdick St., Ste. 214, Kalamazoo, MI 49007; include your contact information.

One entry per person. The winner will be chosen in a random drawing of correct entries.

Entries must be received by Dec. 15, 2012. The correct answer will be printed in our January issue and on Encore’s website beginning Jan. 5.

photo challenge winner

Congratulations to Dixie Edwards who correctly identified the location of November’s Photo Challenge as the bike rack behind the Columbia Building on the corner of South Pitcher Street and West Michigan Avenue. She won a $25 gift certificate to Lana’s Boutique.

Erik Holladay

Give the Gift of Distinction 6033 S. Westnedge Ave. | Portage Open M-F 10-5:30 & Sat. 10-3 269.321.6100 | www.alfierijewelers.com www.encorekalamazoo.com | 9

UPDATE UP FRONT In celebration of its 40th year, Encore is taking a second look at some of those who have been featured in past issues of the magazine. This month we catch up with Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, a poet whose story appeared in Encore in 2001.

‘So many people’s stories ... have been waiting so long’ by

MARGARET DERITTER

P

Courtesy / P. Jabbeh Wesley

atricia Jabbeh Wesley has often reflected on Liberia’s civil war in her poetry, but now, more than 20 years after fleeing the conflict in her homeland, she’s putting her war experiences into a memoir.

“My major life project is the most important writing project in my future,” says the former Kalamazoo resident. “I think the memoir has so much to tell, so many people’s stories that have been waiting so long.”

Wesley, 57, has been working on the memoir for about five years and hopes to have it in publishable form by next fall, after she completes a sabbatical from her work as an assistant professor of English at Pennsylvania State’s Altoona campus.

10 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

UP FRONT UPDATE She’s also researching stories of other Liberian women traumatized by the war, which began in 1989 and ended in 2003. On her first trip back to Liberia, in 2008, Wesley visited a refugee camp in Ghana, where she videotaped women’s stories.

“My vision is to put together an anthology of the women telling their own stories,” she says. “The women are talking about rape, cannibalism, torture, watching their husbands killed. That was some of the hardest research I ever did.”

Wesley has her own terrifying stories. She recorded them in a 500-page diary and talked about them in the January 2001 cover story in Encore. When the war came to the Wesleys’ hometown, soldiers called men out of their homes and killed them in the streets. Friends and neighbors vanished. One neighbor, a newspaper photographer, was shot in his bed. At that point Wesley and her husband, Mlen-Too, fled with their three children to a missionary school compound, but this refugee camp wasn’t safe either. Some people were taken out of the camp and shot; others were killed upon leaving. Mlen-Too and others had to slip out each day to find food for their families. “You are terrified until you can no longer be terrified,” Wesley told Encore.

Church friends from Grand Rapids petitioned for the Wesleys to get visas to come to the United States, and they were able to leave

Liberia with their three children in 1991. They settled first in Grand Rapids, then moved to Kalamazoo in 1996, two years after their fourth child was born.

When Wesley was featured in Encore in 2001, she was completing her Ph.D. at Western Michigan University and working on a second book of poetry. She now has four. Her first book, Before the Palm Could Bloom: Poems of Africa, was published by WMU’s New Issues Press in 1998.

Kalamazoo is “where I learned to wipe dry my tears, where I learned to live again for many years while war ravaged Liberia,” she writes in an autobiography on her blog.

When asked about that time in her life, she says, “I think I cried a lot in Grand Rapids.

We had lost so much and were still losing so much as a result of the war and all the trauma and the continuation of the war.

“In Kalamazoo I began to find my footing.

That’s when we began to resurrect our lives in the direction we wanted to go as a family.”

Her husband became a pastor, and she got her first full-time job, teaching at WMU from 2002 to 2003 before moving on to Indiana University of Pennsylvania and then Penn State.

She has visited Liberia twice since 2008 and plans to spend her sabbatical next semester in Monrovia, the capital. Her oldest son, 27-year-old Mlen-Too II, who goes by M.T., works as a software designer and program-

mer there, and he’s repairing the roof of the Wesleys’ former home in nearby Congo Town so he and his mother can live there during her sabbatical. “That should be interesting,” she says. “That’s where we were living when they were doing the secret killings.”

Wesley goes on to tell of a recent tragedy that intensified the heartaches of the war. About four months ago, her family was thrilled to discover through Facebook that a cousin they had lost track of during the war was living in Nigeria. The last time his wife had seen him was in 2001 in a refugee camp in Guinea. In 2004, she immigrated to the U.S. with their children, still not knowing his whereabouts.

In September, however, her cousin had been riding in a car with his best friend when an oil tanker truck ran into them and exploded. “We got to know him again just briefly and he had just discovered he had children in America,” says Wesley. “That week I was so miserable. I was crying, and I couldn’t do anything.”

But eventually, as always, she went back to her writing. In 2001, she had vowed, “One day before I die I will tell those stories” of the war and all the suffering it caused. It’s a vow she’s determined to keep.

A poem by Wesley about Kalamazoo appears on page 34 of this issue.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 11

Downtown

DESTINATION

custom winemaking

personalized wine labels

Framemaker Ltd.

wine tasting • private parties

434 S. Burdick St. Kalamazoo, MI

269.345.6566 Custom Picture Framing & Desisgn

Providing excellence and beauty since 1910

For the best in Michigan gifts…

359 S. Kalamazoo Mall

269.343.2671 www.kalamazooflorist.com

269.567.2873 www.natureconnect.com

The Shops at Mall Plaza

260 e. michigan avenue 269.342.9463

1120 S. Burdick St. | Kalamazoo, MI

Where simple tastes scrumptious.

Your Vera Bradley Headquarters

Closer. Fresher. Better.

Exceptional local foods. Serving breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Eat. Drink. Shop.

401 E. Michigan Ave. 269.382.1888 vashoesfit.com Tied to the cause SHOES THAT FIT YOUR LIFE fooddance.net Arriving September 20, this beautiful Silk Scarf in our new breast cancer awareness color, © 2012 Vera Bradley Designs, Inc.

157 S. Kalamazoo Mall

K A L A M A Z O O • P O R T A G E • G R A N D R A P I D S • S T. J O S E P H

Ribbons (just $58). Stop in and see many of your favorite styles in new Ribbons.

Shown: Silk Scarf and Cassidy in Ribbons

tempovinowinery.com

Ahhh, toasty! new location

Holidays

245 s. kalamazoo mall

269.345.3302 incomparable fashion designer denim • shoes • accessories

Downtown on the Mall 269.342.5996 M-F 10-8 • Sat 10-6 • Sun 12-5 GazelleSports.com

Masonry Heater Design House

are more 221 Farmers Alley Kalamazoo, MI 4 9007 downtown kalamazoo 26 9. 3 4 3. 2727

w w w.farmersalley theatre.com

NOV • Soapstone Fireplaces • Bakeovens and Cooktops

30

thru

DEC

23

The Whipping Man February 8 – 24

The 39 Steps

“Authorized Distributor” MI, IN, IL, OH

April 12 – 28

Next to Normal June 7 – 23

www.MasonryHeaterDesignHouse.com

269.598.5831 mhdh@tds.net

Life Could Be a Dream July 19 – August 11

fun

downtown!

GOOD WORKS UP FRONT

by

J

MARGARET DERITTER

ohn Hilliard’s organization has helped thousands of people by lending them home medical equipment at no charge. Two that stand out in his memory are a race car driver who ran into a concrete wall and needed multiple surgeries and a man who fell from the second story of a house he was building and broke his back and other bones.

In both cases, Lending Hands of Michigan lent the men a variety of medical devices to cope with their extensive injuries. “It’s great to see some of the people, like the man who fell off the roof, come back pretty quickly with the help of the equipment we gave them,” says Hilliard.

Lending Hands, located at 5350 Ivanhoe Court in Portage, lends out bath benches, shower stools, wheelchairs, walkers, crutches and other types of medical equipment for up to nine months, mostly to people in Southwest Michigan who can’t afford to rent or buy the equipment because they don’t have medical insurance or their insurance doesn’t cover what they need.

Hilliard, who is 71, founded Lending Hands in 2005 after working with similar organizations in Phoenix. Since its founding, Lending Hands has served more than 8,400 clients and has saved people more than $2.9 million, says Hilliard. “When we save them that out-of-pocket expense, it means they can then pay the rent or buy food or get prescriptions.”

Hilliard says demand for Lending Hands’ medical equipment has gone up at least 15 percent every year. “In April or May we took a big jump — 40 percent in a month or two.

We had four or five months that were pretty intense.”

Most clients are referred to the organization by hospitals, doctors’ offices and social-service organizations, but anyone is free to borrow the equipment. For some items, such as bath seats, there may be a waiting list. “We also need equipment that will work for people who weigh 300 pounds or more,” such as wheelchairs, says Hilliard.

Other items, like walkers, canes and crutches, are donated in abundance. When Lending Hands has had an

Erik Holladay

Lending Hands Executive Director John Hilliard cleans and repairs a donated wheelchair.

14 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

excess of these items, it has worked with other organizations to have them shipped to hospitals in Iraq and Bangladesh.

For his efforts, Hilliard has won three awards this year: a local STAR (Sharing Time and Resources) Award for Volunteer Manager of the Year, a Governor’s Service Award for Senior Volunteer of the Year, and a Certificate of Merit from Blue Cross Blue Shield for outstanding service on behalf of Michigan seniors.

The accolades are well deserved, according to longtime Lending Hands volunteer Carolyn Tourangeau, 73, a retired nurse. “John is wonderful to work for,” she says. “He’s so appreciative.” In fact, she says, “we all consider ourselves family.”

Tourangeau learned about Lending Hands after her husband had knee surgery. “He had a high-rise toilet seat cluttering up the basement,” she says, “and I saw something about Lending Hands in the paper and thought I’d take it over there. John was there, and we got talking, and it appealed to me as something I could do to continue using my knowledge as a nurse.”

Tourangeau is one of about 50 volunteers who work at Lending Hands, and more are always needed, she says. The volunteer jobs include sanitizing equipment, checking it for safety and repairing it, answering phones, waiting on clients and taking donations.

For most of Lending Hands’ existence, Hilliard was strictly a volunteer. He now draws a small salary as executive director, but he estimates that he puts in 50 to 60 hours a week.

He says is particularly grateful to be able to give terminal cancer patients “some comfort and assistance.”

Hilliard brings a lifetime of management experience to Lending Hands and a history of volunteering. He did his first volunteer work when he was in grade school in Kalamazoo, delivering Christmas baskets with his father to families in need, through what was then the men’s club of the Kalamazoo YMCA. “My parents were always involved in the community here in one way or another,” says Hilliard.

Now their son carries on the family tradition: lending a hand to those in need.

For more information on Lending Hands of Michigan and the types of medical equipment it offers, go to lendinghandsmi.org.

Quiet, Comfortable, Affordable Choice Aged Steaks

Reservations Appreciated 375-3650

Fresh Fish Slow Roasted Prime Rib

Dinner from 5:00pm daily RESTAURANT & TAVERN

Visit our website at www.greatlakesshippingco.com

Conveniently located at 4525 West KL Ave, east of Drake Road

love where you live kalamazoo community Foundation 269.381.4416 kalfound.org

Julie Powell

Steven M. Nitsch, MD

Fraxel re:store® Laser Resurfacing

Cosmetic & Reconstructive Breast Surgeries

Skin Care Specialist www.juliepowellskincare.com

“THERMAGE” Skin Tightening IPL Treatment of Skin Pigment & Hair Removal

Parkway Plastic Surgery

Parkway Surgery Center We strive to provide a superior care experience by creating a pleasant personal setting for the finest surgical procedures.

Microdermabrasion, Chemical Peels, Custom Facials Image Products, Gabriel Correctives Products LATISSE

Comprehensive Plastic Surgical Care

Body Contouring Cosmetic & Reconstructive Facial Improvements Burn Care & Reconstruction Skin Cancer Treatments Scar Revision Botox & Injectable Fillers

575 W. Crosstown Parkway, Kalamazoo

269.343.5750 Toll-Free 877.995.5750 | www.parkwayps.com www.encorekalamazoo.com | 15

SAVOR UP FRONT

Kalamazoo Beer Exchange owner Jim Flora enjoys one of the restaurant’s microbrews while explaining the “beer ticker” behind him.

Erik Holladay

T

by

BRIAN LAM

16 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

he market crashes. Chaos erupts on the floor.

Prices plummet. All eyes turn to the exchange index, hands wave wildly and orders are yelled. There’s a rush on — for Bell’s Oberon.

The New York Mercantile Exchange? No, the Kalamazoo Beer Exchange, a downtown Kalamazoo restaurant and tap house with a unique way of doing business.

The Kalamazoo Beer Exchange, at 211 E. Water St., has 28 beers on tap, and the price of each will rise or fall during a night based on how frequently that beer is ordered. Put simply by owner Jim Flora: “The more people buy of one beer, the more the price goes up. But the price of other beers goes down.”

Bad news for the large party ordering round after round of the same brand, but great news for those who like sampling different beers and getting a deal in the process.

“Where else will you see a pint of Bud Light cost more than an Arcadia IPA?” asks Flora. “We worked with a company in Miami to design software that captures our sales from all five computers in real time and calculates new prices based on demand. What’s cool is that people are incentivized to try a craft beer they might not normally have tried.”

“Trading” begins at 6 p.m. nightly (excluding Sundays) with the ringing of the “opening bell.” The exchange board that lists all 28 beers — complete with trending arrows — updates every 15 minutes. The price changes are not preset or made up, and once a price locks, it is locked.

For a little extra excitement, Flora can push a button that causes the whole market to crash. A crash pushes down the price of every beer on the board and is known

to send bar patrons into a frenzy. Originally, the bar used an audio clip of a newscaster warning of a market crash, but Flora says it was drowned out by cheering so now an air horn is used instead.

Flora began contemplating this stockmarket-style pricing back in 2002 after visiting a restaurant in Germany that changed the price of its beers and wines based on supply. At the time, he thought it was a great idea that kept products moving.

When Flora, who was the food and beverage director for the Marriott hotel in Royal Oak, brainstormed concepts for a restaurant of his own, he kept coming back to that idea.

He tweaked it a bit, adopting an American stock market feel, complete with opening bell and exchange board.

“The difference is that we just do it for the beer, and it’s completely demand driven, not supply,” he says. “We have plenty of kegs ready to be tapped when one tap goes dry. It’s more about encouraging the customer to try new beers than to go through product.”

Despite a frenzy or two, the Kalamazoo Beer Exchange is not as chaotic an environment as it sounds. Located in the former Globe building, the Exchange has two levels to spread out the crowds. Split stairs at the entrance lead up to the dining area or down to the more casual bar.

While handcrafted beers are an important part of the Kalamazoo Beer Exchange’s identity, Flora is quick to champion the restaurant’s “made-to-order” menu and its executive chef, Bill Kennedy.

“We’re fortunate to have Bill with us,” says Flora. “He has French and Italian culinary training and was with Disney’s culinary program, Fenton Hotel, Cheers on the Channel, and at the Marriott with me.”

The Kalamazoo Beer Exchange, which serves lunch and dinner, features two full kitchens — an “open” kitchen on the upper level, allowing patrons to see the chefs in action, and a full prep kitchen downstairs, where much of the food is prepared. The menu includes a Tequila Lime Steak Salad, Wisconsin Beer Cheese

Soup, Roasted Wild Mushroom Crepes and Smoked Bacon Apple Pork Chops, to name just a few items.

Flora and Kennedy work closely with their distributors in ordering meat, produce and ingredients, with local vendors getting first crack. “Supporting local businesses is important to us,” says Flora. This is especially true in beverage selection. Half of the 28 tap handles at the Exchange are Michigan beers, while the other 14 include more well-known brews such as Bud Light. Additionally, every one of the bottled beers is a Michigan product, and all wine sold by the bottle is made somewhere in Michigan.

“There are great beers in this state, especially in and around Kalamazoo. It’s one of the reasons I decided to open in Kalamazoo as opposed to the east side of the state,” Flora says.

He’s also impressed by the scene in downtown Kalamazoo, which he says has evolved into a destination location where people park their cars and walk from place to place. “We’re located near Bell’s, but we don’t see them as competition. We see them as a partner. We pour their beer. When combined with Sushiya, Shakespeare’s and Old Dog Tavern, we’re all creating a synergy in this area of downtown. We genuinely subscribe to the downtown culture.”

Since the Kalamazoo Beer Exchange opened in November 2010, its staff has grown to more than 50, and many nights there is a line at the door. The seats have seen so much use that they were refinished after two years — three years earlier than anticipated.

When asked about the possibility of expanding elsewhere, Flora says it’s not out of the question, but right now he and his team want to focus on Kalamazoo.

“Running a restaurant takes a lot of energy, and there are a lot of moving parts. We’ll grow if we can do it without negatively impacting what we’ve worked hard to create here in downtown Kalamazoo.”

1 Vineyard 4 Years

12 Award Winning Wines

Come Visit 8456 Stadium drive - Kalamazoo — 3 miles west of uS 131 — 269.372.9463 www.lawtonridgewinery.com

The label describes it, the taste defines it.

Using all natural ingredients, Bravo’s handcrafted beers are made in small batches by our awardwinning chefs.

No additives or extracts, just amazing taste.

Bravo! Restaurant & Cafe • 269.344.7700 5402 Portage Road • Kalamazoo MI bravokalamazoo.com www.encorekalamazoo.com | 17

Happy Holidays from your friends at Keystone Community Bank.

It pays to bank local. Make the move. keystonebank.com

We’re all about you.

Looking for a new view?

Prime Locations • Flexible Terms • Competitive Rates Will Renovate to Suit • Suites to Accommodate Your Needs

Gilmore Real Estate Contact Chris Shook for more information: 269.381.3490 x102 cshook@jgfdn.org 18 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

ENCORE FIRST GLANCE

See page 37 to learn more about this image and the photographer.

Erik Holladay

20 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

Quest for clear skies Local stargazers bring the heavens to Southwest Michigan by

Richard Bell, photographed in the Kalamazoo Valley Museum Planetarium, has been the Kalamazoo Astronomical Society president for seven nonconsecutive terms.

MARIE LEE

The Kalamazoo Astronomical Society is a determined group.

First of all, it’s located in Southwest Michigan, which averages only about 160 clear nights a year, making observation of the heavens a bit challenging. It also has to keep up with the ever-evolving technology of astronomy, which can be time-consuming and expensive. And attracting younger folks to the joys of seeing stars in the sky rather than on a screen takes some clever thinking.

But the KAS is succeeding on all three fronts.

At 76 years old and with more than 130 members, the organization is one of the oldest and most active astronomy clubs in the state of Michigan. The KAS offers dozens of programs free to the public — from public observation sessions of the night sky to solar viewing. Its annual Astronomy Day events have consistently won awards from Sky & Telescope magazine since 2007. That cloudy sky thing, though, that’s a tough one.

“Weather works against us more than with us,” admits Richard Bell, KAS president and instructor at Kalamazoo Valley Community College. “And while it gives us more time to attend presentations and work on our equipment, we really hate cancelling our public observing sessions. It’s frustrating to get 20 telescopes set up and ready to go and then have the clouds roll in.”

The organization has a solution, however — one that promises consistently clear, dark skies and allows members the chance for stargazing like they’ve never seen in Michigan. That’s because the solution is in Arizona.

KAS members Michael and Kathleen Patton, of Galesburg, recently built a home and observatory in Arizona Sky Village, a dark-sky community in Portal, Ariz., two and a half hours from Tucson and 60 miles from the nearest grocery store. Their observatory has a roll-off roof and room for four telescopes and the Pattons have offered one of those spaces to the KAS for a remotely operated telescope.

“Portal, Ariz., is one of the clearest and darkest skies amateurs can still afford,” says Michael Patton, “because mountaintops just aren’t available.”

Thanks to the wonders of technology and a high-speed Internet connection, KAS members will be able to gaze at the clear, humidity-free Arizona skies from the comfort of Kalamazoo.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 21

Rich Mather

Daniel Flanagan

“The KAS has long wanted to buy its own dark-sky property, but it’s very hard to find in Michigan,” says Bell. “When Mike made his offer, we thought about it for, like, a micro-second.”

The KAS Robotic Telescope Project is an ambitious undertaking.

Bell says the organization is committed to buying the best possible equipment for the observatory, estimating it will cost between $90,000 and $100,000 to make it a reality.

“It’s really important from a maintenance and reliability standpoint to have the best equipment we can get,” says Bell. “It’ll be hard to fix something from Kalamazoo if the equipment in Arizona has a problem.”

The organization has begun raising funds and seeking grants for the project. Longtime KAS member Jean DeMott has what the organization refers to as a “perpetual plant sale” at her Stuart neighborhood home, selling perennials and indoor plants she raises. DeMott’s plant sales have already raised more than $11,000 toward the effort.

Overall, KAS has brought in $33,000 for the project.

“The Robotic Telescope Project will give our members and other entities like local schools and universities the ability to observe the stars 300-plus nights a year,” says Bell. “They can reserve a time and then log on to the Internet to control the telescope. It’ll be equipped with a camera so we will be able to get spectacular images as well.”

This project is just one of many efforts to promote astronomy that the organization has undertaken in its more than seven decades of existence. A few Kalamazoo College students looking to expand on what they learned in an astronomy course founded KAS in 1936. The organization has always had a dedicated core, but major astronomical events — such as solar eclipses, comets and the space-exploration efforts of Viking and the Hubble Telescope — have generated growth spurts for the organization. As a result, its membership has been on the rise for the last two decades.

While many KAS members have their own telescopes, Bell says much of the organization is composed of “armchair astronomers” who join to learn more before taking the technological plunge. In 1998, the society established its Owl Observatory at the Kalamazoo Nature Center to provide members with a telescope to use. The observatory has been upgraded a time or two since then and now includes electricity, a roll-off roof and a 12-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope.

22 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

At left, KAS members set up their telescopes at Warren Dunes State Park in June to allow hundreds of viewers to see the transit of Venus across the sun. Far left, the transit as it appeared in a “sun funnel.”

The society meets monthly at the Kalamazoo Math and Science Center, and its gatherings often include national-caliber speakers.

But it is KAS’ education and outreach events that involve the most members.

“Part of our goal is to educate the general public about astronomy,” says Bell. “People at any level can participate. All you need is your own two eyes.”

From April through October, the organization hosts public observation nights, often at the Owl Observatory site, with members setting up dozens of telescopes to allow the public to view various astral wonders. “We think we’re the best-kept secret in Kalamazoo,” says Bell. “We’ll have a couple dozen telescopes set up and welcome people of all ages, especially kids. Our members just love to share and help others explore the night sky.”

The group also hosts exhibits at public events such as its recent observing activities at October’s CraneFest in Calhoun County or “Spooky Science Saturday” at Battle Creek’s Kingman Museum.

As much as the members like to engage with the public, it’s their relationships with one another that bind the group. They’re a diverse lot. At a recent meeting focused on astrophotography, the audience ranged from college students to retired scientists. Several members are former professors of astronomy, others are just regular Joes and Janes enamored with the stars.

“This group is so fun and accepting,” says Beverly Byle, a KAS member since “sometime in the 1990s.” “They are always willing to take on the role of the teacher and share what they know and have learned with others.”

Patton says that camaraderie is one of the reasons he and his wife offered their observatory space to the KAS. “It’s not as much fun to be out there by myself in the middle of the night,” says Patton. “This way I have other amateurs to share the experience with.”

Al Hanchar, who has been a part of the society for three years, also enjoys the companionship the group provides. He was given a membership by his daughter and calls himself a “free baser,” someone who uses a pair of strong binoculars to observe the heavens.

Hanchar is typical of many KAS members who don’t have the fancy equipment but have the desire. Likewise, Daniel Flanagan, a WMU senior who became a KAS member after taking a college astronomy

course, is proud to say he has a mirror and a computer-controlled mount (“the mount is really the most important thing,” he says) but will probably need to wait until he’s not paying tuition to get the rest of his telescope set up.

Byle, also a binocular-toting KAS member, is perfectly happy with her low-tech apparatus but notes that the group provides rental and loaner telescopes for members to try out before they take the technological plunge.

Hanchar advises: “You really have to get to know the night sky before you invest the money in a telescope. You can see a wider view with binoculars; with a telescope you need to know what you want to look at and where it is before you even aim it.”

Astronomers are night owls willing to travel many miles for an unobstructed view. Many KAS members venture to Star Parties, gatherings of amateur astronomers in far-flung locations, for the sole purpose of observing the night sky. These events, with names like Stellafane, Texas Star Party and Astroblast, can last one night or a week or longer and attract thousands of stargazers.

While attending any star-viewing event, “whatever you do, don’t bring a flashlight with a white bulb,” advises Hanchar. “They have to be red lights. It takes 30 minutes for your eyes to adjust to the dark.

One bright light and your eyes will take another 30 minutes to get readjusted. Even looking at a cell phone screen will mess them up.”

Standing outside the Old Central High School after their October meeting, some KAS members were chatting when an unexpected noise came from the skies above.

In unison, they all bent their heads back and looked up, baby bird style.

“That’s us,” said Richard Bell. “We’re always looking up.”

“Part of our goal is to educate the general public about astronomy.

People at any level can participate.

All you need is your own two eyes.”

The Kalamazoo Astronomical Society is raising funds to install a robotic telescope in the dark-skies community of Portal, Ariz., below, that members will be able to view through and control from Kalamazoo.

Courtery: Mike Patton

To learn more about the Kalamazoo Astronomical Society, go to www.kasonline.org.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 23

Musician Joel Mabus, photographed in the Black Owl Café’s new “Americana Music Room,” is part of an older generation that has fostered the prominence of roots music in Southwest Michigan.

24 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

At the

root of it:

Southwest Michigan is an acoustic music hotbed by

JEREMY MARTIN

F

Erik Holladay

or some, the local love affair with bluegrass and other acoustic music started out simply as a way to bond with friends. Others had known its pleasures for years, having been schooled in its history and traditions since childhood. Yet others, like Paul Hoffman of the Kalamazoo band Greensky Bluegrass, discovered bluegrass simply because they were hungry.

“We used to go to the Bluegrass Breakfast (at Cooper Cafe) on Douglas, just outside of Kalamazoo, and watch the Lonesome Midnight Trio play while we ate pancakes. That was sort of our bluegrass education,” says Hoffman, Greensky’s lead vocalist and mandolin player.

Bluegrass is a form of American roots music, which is recognized for its acoustic blend of guitar, banjo, mandolin, fiddle and other stringed instruments. Other genre names that fall into the roots category are Americana, folk, old-time, traditional or alternative country. Though most individual enthusiasts can point to the time, or in some cases the single instant, when they became infatuated with roots music, it’s a little bit harder to discern when or how an entire region like Southwest Michigan began its own love affair with the art form, becoming a creative incubator for the music.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 25

This area now boasts some of the hottest groups in the genre. Local quintet Greensky Bluegrass won the 2006 Telluride Bluegrass Festival Band Competition and plays more than 170 shows a year from Seattle to Atlanta; Red Tail Ring, a roots music duo, recently completed a tour of the eastern, southern and midwestern U.S.; and The Red Sea Pedestrians have avid fans who call themselves “Pedheads” and wouldn’t miss the band’s annual collaborative concert with another local roots favorite, The Corn Fed Girls. A long list of other up-and-comers include Who Hit John?, Whiskey Pickers and Elizabeth Pixley-Fink.

It’s a pretty safe bet that Kalamazoo, with its 70,000-plus people, three colleges and thriving nightlife, would offer music fans ample opportunities to witness live performances. But what is it about this Southwest Michigan community — two states removed from the acoustic music hotbeds of Virginia and Kentucky — that fosters an atmosphere conducive to traditional forms of American music?

Joel Mabus, of Portage, has been writing and recording folk and acoustic music for more than 30 years and, with 22 albums to his credit, has influenced generations of musicians far and wide. Mabus, who grew up in southern Illinois and settled in Michigan after attending Michigan State University, sees something in Kalamazoo that is often lacking in other places: passion.

“There are a lot of really passionate people, and they tend to kind of champion the music that they love,” Mabus says. “It’s one of the healthier cities for that style of music. There are a lot of players here and not just people that play the music but people who also attend the shows. ... It’s been that way for a long time.”

This passion has fostered a roots-music-friendly community that includes several live-music venues, four genre-specific radio programs, hundreds of musicians, and fans far too numerous to count.

It has inspired the formation of a nonprofit organization, the Great Lakes Acoustic Music Association (GLAMA), which, according to board member Kathy Nichols, aims to widen the circle of acoustic music listeners and players in Southwest Michigan.

To that end, GLAMA presents concerts by local and national recording artists and hosts monthly jam sessions to allow less experienced players to hone their skills alongside accomplished musicians in an informal and fun event. Perhaps the most important event the organization hosts, however, is the Cooper’s Glen Music Festival.

The festival, which began in 2002 as a bluegrass-focused event at the Kalamazoo Nature Center, has evolved over the past 11 years to incorporate all forms of acoustic music. The annual gathering, now held at the Radisson Plaza Hotel and Suites in downtown Kalamazoo, is noted for bringing in such roots-music luminaries as Ralph Stanley, Tim O’Brien, Rhonda Vincent and Chris Hillman.

Despite GLAMA’s efforts and the festival’s growing popularity and stature, Nichols believes a movie released in 2000 did more to spur Kalamazoo’s roots-music scene than anything else.

“The movie O Brother, Where Art Thou? was such a big shot in the arm for bluegrass music because people saw that and got excited about that type of music,” Nichols says.

26 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

O Brother, directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, chronicles the exploits of three escaped convicts as they search for a cache of buried treasure.

Its soundtrack, with music by Stanley, Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris and other roots and bluegrass heavyweights, proved to a be crash course in bluegrass for a new generation of musicians and fans.

“Young people saw that and said ‘Wow! The banjo is cool. I wonder if I could do that,’” Nichols says.

But long before George Clooney lip-synced I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow on the silver screen, acoustic music was alive and well in Southwest Michigan. So who in the area actually planted its roots here?

The answer it turns out is as much about what as who.

In 1902, a luthier named Orville Gibson built a modest shop and factory called the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Mfg. Co. on what is now Kalamazoo’s Northside. As the business grew, so did the need for skilled craftsmen who could work with different acoustic and stringed instruments. Turns out that most people with the skills to build a guitar also have an aptitude for playing one.

“Gibson’s used to be here, and in the old days a lot of the people that worked there used to be musicians,” explains Mabus. “A lot of those folks have stayed behind and became involved in the community.”

Though the Gibson Co. gradually shifted its operations from Kalamazoo to Nashville, Tenn., between 1974 and 1984, what remained was a local reverence for folk and acoustic music that began to attract traveling musicians from across the country, musicians who would eventually find a home in Southwest Michigan.

“I know a lot of people that have moved to this town that are traveling musicians,” says Ian Gorman, a founding member of Kalamazoo’s Red Sea Pedestrians and one of the area’s most in-demand producers for folk and acoustic bands. “They’re hip to what’s going on around here, and they want to be a part of it. It’s kind of had a snowball effect.”

Gorman says Kalamazoo is now a recognized destination for young musicians seeking to play with established acoustic acts. “It’s so multi-generational. You have people in their 60s and 70s that have been doing it their whole lives, and there are also people all the way down to their teens and 20s. It’s great to see a lot of young people that are into it; that’s how it continues to live and be relevant.”

Southwest Michigan bands like Greensky Bluegrass, The Red Sea Pedestrians, The Corn Fed Girls and Red Tail Ring are carrying a torch first lit by an older generation, as are younger performers, including Small Houses, Fiona Dickinson and Pixley-Fink.

“I’m not surprised, but I am very relieved,” admits Mabus. “When I was in my 20s and doing this music, a bunch of other folks my age were also doing it. That generation have all gone on, and we were always waiting for the next wave to follow us.”

Red Tail Ring’s Michael Beauchamp is one of a number of young people involved with Square Dance Kalamazoo, a monthly event that takes place at Bell’s Eccentric Café. Featuring local and nationally known bands and callers, Square Dance Kalamazoo offers traditional music and group dances, regularly attracting crowds numbering in the triple digits.

Erik Holladay

Old time music is nothing new for the 30-year old Beauchamp, who was raised on the music of Mabus and the Kalamazoo bluegrass band Sweetcorn, which featured Mark Sahlgren. It was Sahlgren who founded Grassroots on WMUK 102.1 FM, Kalamazoo’s oldest running roots-music radio program. It airs from 8 to 10 p.m. Saturdays and 10 a.m. to noon Sundays.

“I was brought to acoustic shows as a baby out at Celery Flats (in Portage),” Beauchamp says. “As a result of going to those, my parents had records. I have all of these Joel Mabus records, and I just listened to them a lot. Another huge part of it was Grassroots on WMUK with Mark Sahlgren. That’s been going on for over 30 years.”

Mabus also credits Sahlgren’s show as a cornerstone of Kalamazoo’s acoustic music scene. “It’s appointment listening for a lot of people. You catch the show and catch the calendar when they say what’s going on in town.”

In addition to Grassroots, this area boasts two other roots-based radio programs airing on WIDR 89.1 FM, WMU’s student-run radio station: the traditional and contemporary country show The Outhouse (10 a.m. to noon Sunday) and the old-time and folk program The Heritage Hour (1 to 3 p.m. Saturday).

“There are a number of big- and middle-sized cities that don’t have anything going on like that.

It’s one of the reasons Kalamazoo is so alive,” says Mabus.

But just because a form of music may be prevalent in a community, that doesn’t necessarily explain its attraction.

“There is a certain kind of draw, an attraction to these acoustic forms of music because they’re earthy and simpler. There is something about it that is soothing, and it’s almost like an antidote,” says Mark Duval, a singer-songwriter and member of Kalamazoo’s Who Hit John?

“We live in this age where we are just inundated with so much music and we’ve heard it all, and these acoustic and traditional forms of music are maybe the only types of music that young people are underexposed to. When they hear it, it is the only thing that actually sounds fresh and unique. It’s something outside the box for them, something outside of normal exposure.”

This music has also become something that ties people together.

As the old saying goes, nothing attracts a crowd like a crowd, and the local musicians say that the crowd here is unusually welcoming and friendly.

“I think there is more of a community-based support of songwriting and things like that here,” says Greensky Bluegrass’ Hoffman. “If you live in a city like Chicago, I’m sure there is a great group of folk and roots songwriters that all know each other and support each other, but the community might not be there for them like it is in Kalamazoo.

“Everybody is incredibly supportive of everyone else, there is an openness to other opinions and to other bands. It’s not competitive.

There is so much collaboration and sharing and everybody plays (continued on page 38)

Red Tail Ring’s Michael Beauchamp, center, and Laurel Premo jam with Joel Mabus, juxtaposing the older and newer generations of roots musicians in Kalamazoo. www.encorekalamazoo.com | 27

Erik Holladay

28 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

ENCORE ARTS

Civic’s Academy of Theatre Arts makes stagecraft accessible to all

Acting lessons by

BRIAN LAM

At the heart of the Civic Theatre’s Academy of Theatre Arts is director of education Nicki Poer, center. The Academy is attracting students of all ages, including from left, Nancy Craven of Kalamazoo, John Neveux of Grosse Pointe Woods, Rachel Kube of Gobles, and Peter Herold of Ann Arbor.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 29

30 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

Erik Holladay

“I

don’t want to turn 18, because I don’t want to be done with Nicki,” Marcus Bechek told his mother this summer after being picked up from a workshop at the Kalamazoo Civic Theatre.

While a comment like that might give pause to most mothers of a 15-year-old boy, Bechek’s mom, Lorrie, knows the “Nicki” her son was referring to is Nicki Poer, director of education outreach and youth programs for the Civic.

Bechek is one of many area youth and adults who are taking advantage of the expanded classes now offered through the Civic’s new Academy of Theatre Arts.

The Academy of Theatre Arts, which has been rolling out its new program for the past six months, aims to provide accessible theater for all age groups, through new classes for adults, seniors and toddlers and the expansion of its wellregarded youth programs.

“We’re offering something for people who previously didn’t have opportunities,” Poer says. “We’re introducing classes for people at any age with any level of experience.”

So far, their efforts are succeeding. The first of three phases in the Academy’s rollout was increased youth program offerings this past summer that drew a 22 percent increase in participation.

The next two phases give literal meaning to the Academy’s tagline “A Lifetime of Learning.” Formerly, the majority of classes and workshops were available to youth ages 6 to 15. This fall the Civic launched its second phase, offering an assortment of adult group classes (for ages 16 and older) and its first classes for toddlers (ages 3 to 5). Currently, 100 students, both adults and children, are taking classes at the Civic, including eight in its inaugural toddler program.

This winter will see phase three, which will introduce senior classes for those age 50 and older.

For Bechek, who has been involved with the Civic for five years, been in a number of Civic youth productions and had a featured role in last month’s production of A Wrinkle in Time, the Academy’s expanded programming means he’ll get to participate in adult classes once he turns 16. He says these classes will help him improve his weak spots and give him confidence and experience for his theatrical pursuits after high school.

For those who don’t aspire to be in front of the footlights, however, the Academy offers a number of classes on handling technical matters such as lighting and special effects.

“In a lot of productions, the crew is bigger than the cast,” Poer says. “There may be people in town who would like to get involved in theater but don’t see themselves as actors.

We’ve got programs for them as well.”

Ben Zylman, director of marketing and development at the Civic, knows that not everyone is going to have the same ambitions as Bechek. “Our goal is not to turn out a raft of Broadway performers,” he says. “Our goal is to be an artistic home for our community members.”

Both Poer and Zylman say they have heard all too often the laments of adults who wish they had been involved in theater when they were young, or that they don’t have ways to get involved now.

“It’s never too late to get involved with community theater,” says Poer. “As we get older, we lose our sense of play.

Theater can reinvigorate our self-confidence and creativity.”

She points out that participating in a class does not com-

ENCORE ARTS

Participants in the The Actor’s Toolbox workshop listen as classmates discuss a scene.

mit someone to performing in a production. “For some people, it might just be a fun release, or maybe they just want to see what theater’s all about before attempting to get involved in a production. Everybody will get something different out of it.”

The Academy features classes year-round. Fall classes began in September, and registration for winter classes is still open. In addition to regularly scheduled group sessions, the Academy is offering all-day intensives, private coaching sessions and free audition workshops called Inside the Civic.

“The Inside the Civic workshops are designed to provide an insight into what the director of a particular show may be looking for,” says Poer. “Each workshop is specifically tailored to an upcoming show. Poer says that a lot of people are intimidated because they don’t know what’s involved in an audition.

“Inside the Civic accomplishes two things. First, since no two shows are alike, it lets people know what the cast and crew needs of the production are. Second, it gives people a familiarity with the director and the show so that they

have more confidence when they audition. It’s like getting a practice performance.”.

Jennifer Hudson-Prenkert attended an Inside the Civic workshop for the production of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels last March. A former dancer with Wellspring/Cori Terry & Dancers, the 40-year-old had done a little community theater in her youth and decided she wanted to try a musical production at the Civic.

“I wouldn’t have been in a show if it hadn’t been for Inside the Civic,” says Hudson-Prenkert. “It was a totally new experience, but everyone was so supportive. They showed me how to audition, worked with me on the musical numbers and monologues, and I got to know the musical director before the formal audition.”

She landed the role she wanted and has been involved with the Civic ever since. In fact, for the recent production of Legally Blonde, she served as assistant choreographer and was one of the people instructing hopefuls at that show’s Inside the Civic workshop. “It’s amazing,” she says. “A few months ago, I just went in to check out a workshop, and now I have headshots, a bio and am assisting with the production.”

Hudson-Prenkert is excited about the adult classes the Academy is offering and plans to stay involved at the Civic, honing her skills and having fun.

‘The amount of theater opportunities in Kalamazoo is amazing,” says Zylman. “Kalamazoo is a culturally rich community, and theater is a significant part of that cultural landscape.” Zylman points to Theatre Kalamazoo, a nonprofit collaboration of 12 live theaters in Southwest Michigan, as an example of the size and scope of live theater that the community supports.

“Each has their own niche, and we’re all supportive of each other,” he says. “It’s a real testament to this community that each of these theaters can regularly offer such quality productions.”

Participation is key to these productions, and the Civic’s hope is that the Academy of Theatre Arts will encourage more people to enter this theatrical landscape.

“We’ve got the right people in place,” says Poer. “The majority of our faculty have degrees in theater, and all have considerable experience teaching.”

Poer says one of those “right people” is Civic’s managing director, Kristen Chesak, whose vision was to create an environment of lifelong learning for the community.

“Kristen was integral to the creation of the Academy,” say Poer.

“She’s led in its expansion and has helped guide the entire process.”

For Lorrie Bechek, Marcus’ mother, this is what it all comes down to: “Theater has made him more confident and has given him leadership roles. It’s an important part of his life. The Civic is truly his home away from home.”

Marcus’ experience illustrates what the Academy is all about, agrees Zylman. “Regardless of age, ability or motivation, we want people to know that the Academy of Theatre Arts offers something meaningful for anyone looking to explore the arts.”

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 31

ARTS ENCORE

Elizabeth King’s “quirky” angel ornaments can be found at Midtown Gallery, 356 South Kalamazoo Mall.

St rict ly O r n a m e n ta l

Gallery offers an extravaganza of local creations by

MARGARET DERITTER

C

eramic snowmen, glass snowflakes, oddball angels and other ornaments made by local artists could be hanging on your tree or in your window this year. You can find them at Midtown Gallery in an annual holiday exhibit that owner Terry Nihart calls the Ornament Extravaganza.

He says it with great expression in his voice and a stretched-out emphasis on “Ex-tra-va-GAAAAN-za,” as if he were imitating a carnival barker or an infomercial voice.

Nihart’s a funny guy who knows how to hawk his wares, but he’s also serious about art, which is evident when he talks about the artists featured in the Extravaganza.

“Elizabeth King just consistently amazes me,” he says. “I tell people she picks up things from around the world that I would just pass by and not even think about. And all these little bits she picks up she makes into fabulous pieces of art. A lot of times they’re very tranquil pieces, very Zen-like.

When you look at them, you just get drawn into them.”

For Halloween, King made some wonderfully creepy and creative little figures on small wooden pedestals as well as polymer-clay heads on sticks named for the seven deadly sins.

For the Christmas season, she’s made ornaments that she describes as “quirky angels.” “They’re kind of like the heads of the (Halloween) figures but with wings coming out and halos,” King explains.

The Ornament Extravanganza opened the day after Thanksgiving and continues this month, with an Art Hop reception from 5 to 8 p.m. Dec. 7.

Nihart has been selling locally made ornaments since he owned a store in Saugatuck called No Dibs, from 1992 to 2000.

He continued the holiday tradition when he was the gallery curator for the now-defunct Smart Shop in Kalamazoo.

This is the third ornament show he’s hosted at Midtown Gallery, which he opened three and half years ago. He has invited (continued on page 38)

the team to pick

F O R A W I N N I N G C O M M U N I C AT I O N P L A N

Picking the right team for your business communication needs should be based on facts, not just chance. From a pool of choices, CTS continues to stand out as the favorite for state-of-the-art telephone, internet, fiber optics and hosted IP service. By customizing a gameplan for each and every one of our clients, CTS continues to come out on top...and so does your business.

Get connected, stay connected with CTS.

CTSTELECOM.COM 32 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

13800 E. MICHIGAN AVE., GALESBURG, MI 49053-9658

269.746.4411 • 800.627.5287

Kendra Eberts

by

THERESA COTY-O’NEIL

KJSO fundraiser to tackle Ninth Symphony

B

arry Ross never balks at a big idea.

Neither did Ludwig van Beethoven.

Ross is the assistant conductor of the Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra, and in his 40 years here has watched many gifted musicians grow up, study music and then move on for educational and career opportunities elsewhere, leaving him to wonder how he could bring back the graduates and introduce them to current students while celebrating the great musical institutions in the community.

The answer came to him in two parts: Beethoven and KJSO. The Kalamazoo Junior Symphony Orchestra is America’s third-oldest continuously

Barry Ross, poses with violinist Dylana Jenson at the 2011 BeethovenFest! as Charlie Tomlinson, KJSO alum and current board president, looks on.

(continued on page 47)

Our Industry AwArd-wInnIng servIces mAke It hAppen:

PRoDuCTiviTy

Print Services Technology Support Data Management

CoSTS & RiSk Kalamazoo • Battle Creek • Grand Rapids (269) 321-9442 • cornerstoneos.com www.encorekalamazoo.com | 33

POETRY ENCORE

In This Town in beads, chalked beauty and virginity?

Buttocks swaying to drumming as old suitors watch with envious eyes?

Does anything here make sense with no coconut or palm fronds waving in midair, children running barefoot, while birds perch on tree branches, singing songs only villagers know?

Where are the chief, the elders, and their drums?

Will there be kola nuts inside the door for me?

In this town the Presbyterian church spreads its wings like a jumbo jet.

Sprawled upon the street corner, larger than the town.

Houses sporadically dropped here and there, in between overgrown brushes.

Gravestones beckon us motorists.

A gas station calls and we stop to inquire.

A Main Street here and a Burdick there.

Is there a Main Street in every town and a Burdick close to each Main?

— Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

Nothing makes sense to me except these cattle grazing in fields in the surrounding plains.

I love these cornfields and dilapidated barns, this emptiness and the silence.

Will there be festivals where villagers come out, where mothers dance the end of the year goodbye, fathers carrying kinjas of the river catch?

In my hometown, Iyeeh’s eyes water at the passing of years, grinning at children running wild.

Will there be new brides, adorned

Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, a former Kalamazoo resident who grew up in Liberia, is an assistant professor of English at Pennsylvania State University’s Altoona campus and the author of four poetry collections. This poem is from her second book, Becoming Ebony (Crab Orchard Award Series in Poetry, Southern Illinois University Press, 2003).

A story about Wesley appears on page 10.

Encore invites area poets to share their work with Southwest Michigan readers.

For consideration, submit your poetry and a short personal profile by e-mail to editor@encorekalamazoo.com or by mail addressed to Poetry Editor, Encore Magazine, 350 S. Burdick St, Suite 214, Kalamazoo, MI, 49007.

Legal Experience

Jeff Smith Experienced Litigator

■

Nationally & World Ranked Water Skier

■

In Your Corner®

■

Jeffrey D. Smith jdsmith@varnumlaw.com 34 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

■

Kalamazoo

■

Grand Rapids

■

Metro Detroit

■

Grand Haven

■

Lansing

ENCORE EVENTS

PERFORMING ARTS Plays The Hungarian Trilogy — An offbeat comedy about the Hungarian-born proprietress of a tavern in Chicago and the surprises that await her, 8 p.m. Dec. 1, 7 & 8; 2 p.m. Dec. 2; 7:30 p.m.

Dec. 6. Fancy Pants Theater, 246 N. Kalamazoo Mall. For reservations, e-mail theater246@gmail.com.

The Night Before Christmas — The family-friendly premiere of a new adaptation by local playwrights Arnold Johnston and Deborah Ann Percy, 2 p.m., Dec. 15 & 16; 7 p.m., Dec. 16-19, Civic Auditorium, 329 S. Park St. 343-1313.

Musicals & Opera A Christmas Carol — The annual holiday favorite, 8:30 p.m. Fridays & Saturdays; 2 p.m. selected Saturdays & Sundays; 7:30 p.m. selected weekdays, through Dec. 29, New Vic Theatre, 134 E. Vine St. 381-3328.

Nuncrackers — The lovable sisters from Nunsense return with a holiday “broadcast” full of new and old Christmas songs, 8 p.m. Dec. 1, 7, 8; 2 p.m. Dec. 2 & 9, Civic Auditorium, 329 S. Park St. 343-1313.

Kenny G — The KSO Pops Series presents saxophonist Kenny G with the Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra, 8 p.m. Dec. 22, Miller Auditorium, WMU. 349-7759.

BeethovenFest! — A volunteer orchestra and choir perform Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with guest vocalists Alice Pierce, Meredith Arwady, John Pierce and Carl Ratner in a benefit for the Kalamazoo Junior Symphony Society, 7:30 p.m. Dec. 28, Calvary Bible Church, 855 S. Drake Road. 372-1130.

Chamber, Jazz, Orchestra & Bands A Brass Celebration of Christmas — WMU’s Western Brass Quintet & Friends present their annual Christmas concert, 3 p.m.

Dec. 9, Miller Auditorium, WMU. 387-2300.

Inner Worlds — Fontana Chamber Arts presents pianist Sarah Rothenberg and her exploration of the inner worlds of Brahms and Schoenberg, 7:30 p.m. Dec. 14, Wellspring Theater, Epic Center.

382-7774.

Vocal & Radio An American Christmas — Early Music Michigan presents early American Christmas music, with local Celtic band Embarr, 8 p.m. Dec. 1, Holy Family Chapel, Nazareth Center, 3427 Gull Road.

387-2300.

BachFest Christmas — This Bach Festival Chorus and Orchestra concert includes an audience sing-along, 4 p.m. Dec. 2, Stetson Chapel, K-College. 337-7407.

At This Special Time — The New Vic Theatre presents its annual Christmas concert, 8 p.m.

Dec. 3-5, 134 E. Vine St. 381-3328.

VISUAL ARTS Richmond Center for Visual Arts WMU, 387-2436 Faculty Exhibition — The annual Gwen Frostic School of Art faculty exhibition, through Dec. 14, Albertine Monroe-Brown Gallery.

Prints from the University Art Colletion — Through Dec. 14, Rose Netzorg & James Wilfrid Kerr Permanent Collection Gallery.

My Way — Farmers Alley Theatre presents this musical tribute to Frank Sinatra, 8 p.m. Dec. 1, 6-8, 13-15, 20-22; 2 p.m. Dec. 2, 9, 16, 23, Farmers Alley Theatre, 221 Farmers Alley.

343-2727.

Dance Western Dance Project — The WMU Western Dance Project and guests perform during Art Hop, 6-7 p.m. Dec. 7, Wellspring Theater, Epic Center, 359 S. Kalamazoo Mall.

The Nutcracker — The Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra and Grand Rapids Ballet Company combine talents for this traditional holiday ballet, 8 p.m. Dec. 8 and 3 p.m. Dec. 9, Miller Auditorium, WMU. 387-2300.

Symphony Handel’s Messiah — The WMU Grand Chorus, University Symphony Orchestra and distinguished faculty soloists present selected pieces from this classic choral work, 3 p.m. Dec. 2, Miller Auditorium, WMU. 387-2300.

…providing wealth accumulation and wealth preservation for over 24 years to entrepreneurs, professionals, retirees and those facing life transitions.

Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker — The Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra performs (see listing under Dance.)

7840 Moorsbridge Road | Portage, Michigan 49024 269.321.8120 | 800.488.2036 | lvmcapital.com www.encorekalamazoo.com | 35

HOS_Encore_Jan-2012.qxd:Encore

12/7/11

10:44 AM

Page 1

F

Facing a serious illness is never easy.

We understand.

Talk to us.

(269)345-0273

Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, 349-7775 Great Lakes Pastel Society National Show — A juried exhibition, through Jan. 8.

A Legacy for Kalamazoo: Works Acquired through the Elisabeth Claire Lahti Fund, 1998-2012 — Includes works by Mary Cassatt, Jim Dine, Helen Frankenthaler and Jasper Johns, through Jan. 20.

ARTbreak — Informal free presentations on artrelated topics: Jim Dine: Self-Portrait on the Walls, Dec. 4; Mary Cassatt, A Brush with Independence (Part 1), Dec. 11; Mary Cassatt, A Brush with Independence (Part 2), Dec. 18. Guests may bring a lunch to these noon sessions.

Art League Lecture — Carla Atwood Hartman, the granddaughter of Charles and Ray Eames, will discuss Furniture Design as Art: Eames Furniture History at the KIA and then lead a tour of the Good Designs: Stories from Herman Miller exhibit at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum, 10 a.m. Dec. 12.

Miscellaneous Park Trades Center — Open studio tours, including glassblowing and other demonstrations, 5-9 p.m.

Dec. 7, 326 W. Kalamazoo Ave. 345-3311.

Serving our community since 1981 www.hospiceswmi.org

Local Decision-Making.

Experienced Bankers.

Familiar names... Familiar faces... A whole new approach to banking.

John M. Schreuder Chairman & CEO

269.349.0100 Free ATM at 2,000 locations Learn more at fnbmichigan.com

36 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

We are a locally-owned community bank. We know and value each of our customers. Decisions are made locally, by experienced bankers you can meet with, face to face. When you bank with us, your deposits stay here, helping our community prosper.

Midtown Gallery — The Holiday Show features the best of local art and special ornaments for the season, 356 S. Kalamazoo Mall. 372-0134.

Saniwax Gallery — Multi-media works created by the Christian Artists’ Cooperative, Dec. 7–21, 326 W. Kalamazoo Ave. Opening reception, 5-9 p.m.

Dec. 7. 345-3311.

ArtFNBM Hop — View the works Encore ad of local artists at various venues and galleries in downtown Kalamazoo,DECEMBER 5-9 p.m. Dec. 7.2012 342-5059.

LITERARY EVENTS Kalamazoo Public Library, 553-7879 or 342-9837 Music at the Library — The Ken Morgan Jazz Unit, 6:30 p.m. Dec. 11, Oshtemo Branch; Jamie Sue Seal & John Latini, 7 p.m. Dec. 19, Central Library.

Classics Revisited — A discussion about Oscar Wilde’s play The Importance of Being Earnest, 7 p.m. Dec. 20, Central Library.

Portage District Library, 329-4544 Reading, Reflection and Book Signing — Author Hedy Habra will read from Flying Carpets, a collection of stories about her childhood in Egypt and Lebanon, 6:30-8 p.m. Dec. 6.

Great Books Reading & Discussion Group — The group will discuss selections from the anthology Great Conversations I, 2-4:30 p.m. Dec. 2 & 16.

Combat Veterans Writing Group — A biweekly writing workshop on poetry, essays or fiction for veterans who have seen combat, 6:30-8 p.m.

Dec. 11.

Your Local Bank, Putting You First.

Holiday Family Fun — Holiday games, crafts and creative activities for the whole family, 10:30 a.m.-noon and 6:30-8 p.m. Dec. 18.

MUSEUMS Kalamazoo Valley Museum373-7990 Good Design: Stories from Herman Miller — Explore the problem-solving design process used at the West Michigan-based furniture company, through Jan. 27.

Brain Teasers 2 — A collection of 21 hands-on puzzles, through Jan. 6.

Music at the Museum — Kalamazoo Mandolin and Guitar Orchestra, free concert during Art Hop, 6-8 p.m. Dec. 7; skacore band The Mushmen, 7 p.m. Dec. 14.

Sunday Series — Tom Dietz presents The Holiday Season in 19th-Century Kalamazoo, 1:30 p.m. Dec. 9.

Character Counts!

With 60 years of combined experience.

Small Business Accounting & Taxes Personal Income Tax Services Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) QuickBooks Pro Advisors New Business Set-up 4341 S. Westnedge Ave., Suite 1205 Kalamazoo MI 49008

(269) 343-9700

Left to right - Jill Flipse, CPA, CFE Ralph Meyer, CPA - Mindy Allwardt, CPA

NATURE Kalamazoo Nature Center, 381-1574 Holidays at the Homestead — DeLano Homestead decorated for the holidays with crafts, live music, wagon rides and more, 1-4 p.m. Dec. 2 & 9.

Buy Local Art & Gift Fair — Arts and crafts from local artists, free admission to the trails and Interpretive Center, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Dec. 8.

Small Wonders: Snow Stories — Interactive nature stations set up to encourage children’s learning, 10-11:30 a.m. Dec. 15 & 18.

Winter Wonders Walk — Learn about winter animal activities and survival while walking in the woods, 2-3 p.m. Dec. 16.

Kellogg Biological Station, 671-2510 Holiday Walks — Guided and self-guided tours of the Kellogg Manor House, decorated in holiday splendor, with local artisan-produced gifts for sale and tea and cookies after the walk, noon-5 p.m. Dec. 1, 7, 8, 14, 15, 19, 20. 671-2160.

Birds & Coffee — An experienced guide chooses the best trails to see a variety of birds, followed by coffee and a discussion, 8:30-10 a.m. Dec. 12, 12685 East C Ave., near Gull Lake. 671-2510.

First Glance Artist ERIK HOLLADAY began his photography career at 15, taking shots for a Grand Rapids-based weekly newspaper. He subsequently graduated from Grand Valley State University and worked for the Grand Rapids Press and the Flint Journal.

Holladay is now a freelance photographer and visual artist whose work often graces the pages of Encore.

PHOTOS WANTED!

Do you have an image that captures the essence of living in Southwest Michigan? We invite photographers of all ages and abilities to submit their photos to Encore for consideration to be the photo featured on our First Glance photo page. Send photos to editor@encorekalamazoo.com. www.encorekalamazoo.com | 37

Root of It (continued from page 27) with everybody else. My understanding is there are a lot of areas of the country where it is a lot more competitive; it’s not a friendly thing. Here it is more like one big family.”

Because Southwest Michigan offers a community of musicians and fans who are not only passionate but also supportive of the art form, the music is allowed to breathe, to find itself in an organic and often wholly unique way, musicians say.

Take the evolution of Greensky Bluegrass, for example. The group cut its teeth playing open-mic nights at the now-defunct Kraftbrau Brewery and at intimate shows at Papa Pete’s, a 150-person barroom adjacent to the Blue Dolphin restaurant. The group played a mix of American standards and traditional bluegrass numbers in its early years before gaining confidence, honing its skills and morphing into a powerhouse band that tours the nation with a set list of genre-defying original numbers and covers.

“We were really ‘bluegrass-y’ in the beginning because we were all really new to our instruments,” Hoffman says. “I sort of equate it to learning the rules before you break them.

But once we got really good at bluegrass we needed more and wanted to play bluegrass different. We started to incorporate our own ideas.”

Beauchamp thinks similarly. “The worst thing that you can do with music is think that we’re done, that we’re done changing it.”

HRMInnovationsllc.com

...Share the Gift of Art this Season...

Ornamental (continued from page 32)

Great flavor comes from deep roots.

bellsbeer.com 38 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

© Bell's Brewery, Inc., Comstock, MI

since 1985

the 26 artists on his gallery roster to participate, plus about a half dozen guest artists.

“I’ve got some cool Peggy Frisbie stuff,” he says. “She’s the one who does those little origami baskets that are extremely ornate, and she does the handpainted snakes as well.”

Julie Taborn has made glass snowflakes for the show, and Chris Syndergaard is offering wooden duck ornaments.

Most artists have been very receptive to the idea of making ornaments, Nihart says, because “it kind of gets them out of their regular niche.”

King agrees. “It’s a new challenge and it’s a fun way to get handmade art into other people’s lives,” since ornaments are often more affordable than other pieces of art.

A Special Advertising Section www.encorekalamazoo.com | 39

Preceding page and this page: Christmas DĂŠcor, a division of Naylor Landscape Management, installs outdoor holiday lighting for residential and commercial clients across Southwest Michigan.

Local pros provide holiday decorating inside and out

40 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

A

nyone who has wrangled a tangled line of Christmas lights knows: Christmas decorating can be frustrating and time-consuming.

But two Home Builders Association members, Naylor Landscape Management and Design Solutions, take the pain out of holiday decorating and put the beauty in.

Exteriors aglow

When it comes to decorating home and business exteriors, Naylor Landscape Management’s Christmas Décor division begins way before the snow flies — even before the leaves fall.

James Whittaker, a landscape designer and supervisor for Naylor, handles most of the design work for Christmas Décor clients. He says he’ll meet with clients as early as September, find out what they have in mind, visit their properties and develop sketches of where lights and greenery such as wreaths and garland will go.

The best part? Once the client approves, Christmas Décor installs all the lights and decorations.

“We use non-mechanical means to attach the lights and decorations,” says Whittaker. “We don’t use nails or screws to attach the lights unless absolutely necessary. We usually find a way to attach the lights without them.“ Christmas Décor provides decorations from lights to artificial greenery and the electrical cords needed to make them glow. The company has “several semi-truck trailers” where it stores the LED lights in the off-season, and it hangs the greens up in a warehouse so they don’t become misshapen.

Those LED lights are often a source of surprise for clients — not only because they come in soft, warm colors that mimic incandescent lighting, but also because of the minimal electricity they use.

“LED lights have really changed things. Incandescent lighting is really inefficient and hard to install,” says Whittaker. “A large home could spend $50 to $75 a month on incandescent lights during the Christmas season, but with our LED lights, they hardly notice any difference in their electrical bill.”

LED lights also make it easier to light up older homes with dated electrical wiring and nonexistent external electrical outlets. “With LEDs, we don’t worry about drawing too much power, so we can make it work with older homes,” Whittaker says.

Whittaker admits he never thought he’d become a Christmas lights guru, but as a landscape designer he found he had a knack for it. With some training and classes, he says, he now enjoys the challenge of it.

“When I look at a property now, it’s easier to see the rooftops that will light well and the items that people don’t think about decorating. I try to do something that people will drive by and talk about.

“Some houses have great architecture, which makes it easy.

Others are more traditional and need creativity,“ he says. “But simple is better.”

Christmas Décor isn’t done, however, when the lights and greenery are installed. The company technicians visit each home or businesses they’ve decorated twice during the holiday season — before Thanksgiving and before Christmas — to check the installations to make sure all is working right.

After the holidays are over, Christmas Décor returns and removes the decorations. In the spring, once the snow has melted, the technicians visit clients one more time to make sure that every clip, tape and any other evidence of the installation is cleaned up.

“That’s all part of the price,” Whittaker explains. “It’s all-inclusive.

We provide everything. All the client has to do is turn the lights on.

We have timers so they don’t even have to do that.”

Christmas Décor currently has about 130 regular clients, but this season expects that number to increase to about 160. The company has installations throughout Southwest Michigan, from Kalamazoo to St. Joe and South Haven.

To find out more about Naylor Landscape Management’s Christmas Décor, visit its website at www.naylorlandscape.com or call (269) 375-0084.

On the Inside

She has decorated many Parade of Homes houses and specializes in providing builders with selections from flooring to lighting and fixtures to paint colors to bring a house together.

Berkey found a niche when clients began calling her to provide designs for special events such as engagement and graduation parties and, yes, holidays. She will provide design for a whole house, as well as just a few rooms.

“I work with them to use what they have, because we all know money gets tight at holidays,” says Berkey. “People collect holiday decorations – they have heirloom ornaments and decorations that mean a lot to them. I will find new ways to use those heirloom ornaments, like in a wreath that hangs in a entry way or a powder room.

It doesn’t’ take a lot of money. You can do a lot with ribbons and florals that people wouldn’t think about.

“I love the idea of helping people to express themselves in their design.”

Lynn Berkey can be reached at Design Solutions, (269) 324-3665.

Linda Foster

Boxes of ornaments, heirloom decorations, Christmas trees – where people see their Christmas knick-knacks, Lynn Berkey of Design Solutions sees magic.

The interior designer is called on by clients to provide interior holiday decorating for the season. Sometimes it’s for a special event such as a holiday party; other times they just want a fresh new holiday look.

“People get into a rut — the tree goes here, the Santa there and the Christmas village is on the kitchen cabinets,” Berkey says. “Often my clients want fresh new ideas and to update their look while working with what they have.”

Berkey says she’ll meet with clients to determine their ideas for holiday décor, including colors and accessories. She’ll also learn about their holiday traditions, religious preferences and if there are children and pets to consider.

Holiday decorating became a natural extension of Berkey’s design business, which began six years ago.

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION DECEMBER 2012

Rhino Media Erik Holladay

200 volunteers + 24 hours =

New home for family Rhino Media

W

Above, the house on Fairbanks Avenue is ready for renovation. The completed house, center photo, is now energy-efficient and updated. At top, Ebony Laurencin, pictured with her daughter, will be the home’s proud new owner.

hat can 200 volunteers with building and construction know-how accomplish in 24 hours?

Just ask Ebony Laurencin, who moves into her new home at 923 Fairbanks Ave. this month.

The single mother of a 2-year-old daughter is the proud new owner of the 20th Fast Built home of the Home Builders Association and Kalamazoo Valley Habitat for Humanity. The house was completed in September.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 43

This project was different from past Fast Built collaborations because it involved rebuilding a 61-year-old home instead of building a new home from the ground up. HBA members started with the brick exterior walls in place, but everything else inside and out — heating, ventilation, air conditioning, electrical, plumbing, windows, doors, insulation, drywall, trim, paint, roofing and landscaping — was brand new. Like all Habitat homes, the Fast Built house is energy-efficient and utilizes the latest building innovations.

“The biggest challenge of a rebuild over an entirely new construction was really getting everybody organized,” says Fast Built co-chair Scott DeLoof, of DeLoof Builders. “Because we hadn’t done Fast Built this way before, we weren’t entirely sure about the timeline and what unexpected things we might run into.”

For example, says DeLoof, the house’s old windows were replaced, but the standard sizes for windows now are different than they were six decades ago, when the house was built.

“We had to put new windows in the old windows’ holes, and there was some real adjusting that had to be made,” he explains.

What HBA volunteers make look fast and easy actually took many months of preparation by a large committee, beginning last March.

Each area of expertise, from framing, drywall and trim work to gutters, flooring and roofing, had its own committee headed by a local professional in that field.

DeLoof, who has been involved in many Fast Built projects, says having a co-chair — in this case Dan Martz, of Martz Home Builders — made the preparations a little less cumbersome.

“It’s nice to have a partner to bounce things off of,” he says. “We make a lot of phone calls trying to get people to work for free and donations, and it was great to have Dan to work with.”

In addition to labor, much of the material used was donated by HBA members. Other donations included an Energy Star refrigerator and range provided by Whirlpool Corp.

From the moment it began at 6:45 a.m. on a Thursday, the project was a well-orchestrated undertaking. During the first day, framing, plumbing, roofing and electrical were installed and inspected, insulation and drywall went up, and the painters began their work, toiling away through the evening.

The next day, cabinets and trim were installed inside, while the finishing touches of gutters and landscaping were done outside. By Friday afternoon, exhausted but exuberant, the volunteers celebrated with a picnic. The final phase of the project — refinishing the house’s original wood floors — happened after all the other work was done.

“It’s really gratifying to help people with the American dream of owning a home,” says DeLoof. “As building contractors who work within this community every day, it is really nice to know we are giving something back.

“At the end of the day, that’s what makes me smile.”

“It’s really gratifying to help people with the American dream of owning a home. As building contractors who work within this community every day, it is really nice to know we are giving something back.”

— Scott DeLoof

ns Ser ving Ka l am eratio n e az eG e r oo Th

372-3400

www.devisserlandscape.com

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION DECEMBER 2012

At Home is a special advertising section published

by Encore Publications Inc. in partnership with the Home Builders Association. Information contained within this section is from sources believed by the publisher to be authoritative. The publisher assumes no responsibility for damages, losses or injuries resulting from the use of any of these products or services.

Encore Publications 350 S. Burdick St., Suite 214, Kalamazoo MI, 49007

Rhino Media

ENCORE UP FRONT

Early morning Fast Built volunteers, from left, Terry Vroekindewey, Evan Hoffman, Scott DeLoof, Mason Goostrey, Robert Zimmer, Hank Laws, Larry Goostrey, Harold Garnaat, Dan Hoeksema, Raul Ortiz, Tom Tishler, Jamie Wolfe, an unidentified volunteer, Robert Parson, Meliton Rodriguez, Nick Reed, Dan Martz and Scott Hoeksema.

Fast Built Committee Members Co-Chairs: S cott DeLoof, DeLoof Builders Dan Martz, Martz Home Builders, LLC Linda Drenth Cerutti, Clute & Associates, P.C. Linda Marklin, Consumers Energy Larry Goostrey, Country Lane Electric, Inc. Dawn Bradley, Devon Title Bob Dewaelsche, Gypsum Supply Company Kevin Maher, Gypsum Supply Company Troy Cuvelier, Integrated Smart Technologies

Ann Kilkuskie, Kalamazoo Valley Habitat for Humanity Tom Tishler, Kalamazoo Valley Habitat for Humanity Ken Klok, Kenneth J. Klok Builders Willie Starks, Lowe’s Home Improvement Barney Naylor, Naylor Landscape Management, Inc. James Whittaker, Naylor Landscape Management, Inc. Luke Vanderhill, Nieboer Heating & Cooling, Inc. Cindy Scheuer, Scholten Kitchen & Bath Timothy Bunch, Secure Start Inspections, Inc. Terry Vroegindewey, Waterways, LLC

The Way to Invest, Manage Wealth & Retire

Securities and Investment Advisory Services offered through Transamerica Financial Advisors, Inc. (TFA) member FINRA, SIPC, and a Registered Investment Advisor. Non-Securities products and services are not offered through TFA. The Wiser Group is independent of TFA. LD43065-03/12

thewisergroup.com DECEMBER 2012 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

UP FRONT ENCORE

Mike Holmes, America’s most trusted contractor and host of Holmes on Homes® on HGTV, will appear at the Home Builders Association’s Kalamazoo Home Expo on Saturday, March 9.

Holmes made two sold-out appearances at the 2010 Kalamazoo Home Expo and will appear twice again at the 2013 Home Expo.

“We’re excited to be able to bring someone of Mike Holmes’ stature back to the area,” says Scott McGraw, Home Expo director. “Mike was a huge hit two years ago, and I think his popularity has just grown since then.”

Holmes is both the host and creator of Holmes on Homes®, which airs in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Germany. He is known for

his tough criticism of shoddy workmanship and advises viewers of his television show to “make it right” by making sure contractors are licensed and insured.

Thanks to strong supporters in both the broadcast and building industries, the award-winning Holmes on Homes® has run for seven successful seasons and broken ratings records.

Holmes recently finished production on Holmes Inspection®, another television series airing on HGTV, which shines the flashlight on homeowners who face unexpected, expensive repair bills and even potentially dangerous living conditions because they received incomplete, vague or inaccurate information from a home inspector. After a Holmes Inspection®, where he identifies problems with a house, Holmes and his crew “make it right.”

Holmes’ next show, Holmes Makes It Right®, is scheduled to premiere in early 2013.

Jorden and Branden DeHaan with their father, DRS founder, Robert DeHaan

TRUSTED SPECIALISTS

SINCE 1978 We Listen.

We Deliver.

Let us put our 34 years of professional

•Kitchens & Baths •Room Additions •Lower levels •CUSTOM BUILT-INS •Patios & decks •Exteriors & more!

remodeling expertise to work for you.

(269) 343-3757

View our Portfolio at DeHaanRemodeling.com SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION DECEMBER 2012

•

quartz, granite and solid-surface countertops

•

free estimates

•

installation avaliable

Complete Kitchen & Bath Cabinetry

60% OFF 6313 Stadium dr • Kalamazoo mi • 269.375.2212

www.kbunlimited.com

Beethoven Fest! (continued from page 33) performing youth orchestra. “So many Kalamazoo musicians have come through the Junior Symphony or had friends or students in it,” says Ross, currently the organization’s board vice president.

Putting the two together seemed a perfect fit, and thus the KJSO fundraiser BeethovenFest! was born.

That was five years ago. Each year since, the festival has gained momentum, raising more than $13,000 and featuring such wellrespected soloists as pianist Lori Sims and violinist Dylana Jenson as well as a multi-generational orchestra composed of KSO members, KJSO alums and current members and other musicians who have community ties.

This year’s BeethovenFest! will present Beethoven’s biggest idea of all: his Ninth Symphony. “The Ninth is arguably the greatest symphony ever written,” Ross says. “It is the first symphony ever to include a chorus and vocal soloists.”

The event will take place 7:30 p.m. Dec. 28 at Calvary Bible Church, 855 S. Drake Road, with a gala reception to follow.

Organizing and directing the chorus will be Cynthia Hunter, choral director at Portage Northern High School. The 120-voice chorus will include high school, college and community singers. “We’re extending the philosophy of BeethovenFest! to vocalists in a big way, as was Beethoven’s intent,” Ross says. “They will be singing in German. It’s a big deal. It’s the biggest thing I’ve done in a while.”

A gift by an anonymous donor allowed Ross to secure an all-star vocal cast for the four solo parts: soprano Alice Pierce, contralto Meredith Arwady, tenor John Pierce and baritone Carl Ratner.

This year’s BeethovenFest! also marks the official beginning of the 75th Anniversary Celebration of the Kalamazoo Junior Symphony, which Barry calls “a fabulous institution.”

“The Junior Symphony has really had an effect on the musical environment of Southwest Michigan, serving 21 communities and 41 schools.” More than 90 percent of KJSO’s graduates attend college, and more than a third major in music. Many KJSO alums occupy positions in professional orchestras across the nation.

Financial Advice for You on Your Road Through Life

a part of

SM

Anything but Common®

Jeff K. Ross

157 S. Kalamazoo Mall, Suite 300, Kalamazoo, MI 49007 • 269.385.0001 • www.jeffkrossfinancial.com Securities and Advisory Services Offered Through Commonwealth Financial Network • Member FINRA/SIPC, A Registered Investment Adviser

what’s next?

• THE NEW WMUK PUBLIC RADIO APP •

i TUNES STORE

GOOGLE PLAY

WMUK 102.1FM WMUK.ORG

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 47

MASSIE’S MICHIGAN ENCORE

Larry Massie to take a break …

Beginning in January, Larry Massie will take a sabbatical from writing “Massie’s Michigan” to work on a book project. We know that the many loyal readers of “Massie’s Michigan” will miss his monthly feature but wish him well in his writing endeavors. We all look forward to his return.

A French Prince

by

LARRY MASSIE

in Michigan

Below, Prince Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte was known to friends as Plom Plom. Facing page, Allegan artist Judy Miller painted Anna Jameson shooting the Sault Rapids in 1836.

W

ith a fearsome roar, the St. Marys River hurdled from Lake Superior over the boulder-strewn rapids at Sault Ste. Marie. Only the native Chippewa dared venture into that fierce current in their fragile birchbark canoes to hand-dip nets that came up brimming with whitefish. Col. Ferri Pisani, aide-de-camp to Prince Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte (not the betterknown Bonaparte who died in 1821), thought the thundering rapids “one of American’s grand sights.”

The prince, with several other French noblemen, had traveled to war-torn America in the summer of 1861 to experience the strife firsthand. In one of the letters describing their adventures that Pisani sent back to France, he wrote: “In certain places there are a few terrifying vortexes; in others, the tops of the rocks extend above the pounding water. At times it looks as if this prodigious life force belongs to some animated being trying desperately to carry away these small motionless, immovable rocky bridges.”

On a spit of rocky land lying between the river and the American lock, which was completed six years earlier and allowed ships to bypass the rapids, stood a birch-bark-covered Indian lodge. A crowd of tourists stood gaping at the Chippewa family intent on their domestic chores as if they were inmates of a zoo. Spying a pair of canoes near 48 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

the hut, the portly prince, whom friends called Plom Plom, bellied through the crowd and calmly asked, “Could this good man take us over the rapids?” The head of the family, named Little Hare, raised his head and answered in French, “Naturally, sir.”

Upon hearing the request, two of the prince’s party quickly disappeared into the crowd. Pisani attempted to follow suit, but the prince grabbed his arm, and he was unable to avoid the “party.” Pisani, a distinguished soldier who had unflinchingly faced the mouths of cannons in Algeria, Crimea and Italy, wanted no part of an encounter with that raging maelstrom of a river. Nevertheless, he, the prince and a fellow traveler named Baron Mercier dutifully took seats at the rear of the canoe as Little Hare stood in the prow and slowly poled the craft upstream. The pole looked entirely too spindly to Pisani, who worried it would break and he would die by drowning or being dashed against a rock.

Little Hare poled for about 500 meters as the crowd on shore followed along. And then they were off on a thrill ride that had become

de rigueur for many another visitor to the Sault. As early as 1836, the literary Canadian tourist Anna Jameson had been the first white woman to shoot the rapids. The Chippewa named the beautiful redhead “Bright Woman of the Foam” in honor of her feat.

Pisani, however, clearly was not thrilled, as one can tell from his description of the gut-wrenching ride: “The current carries the boat at a terrifying speed amid and above the rocks which scrape the bottom and sides almost continuously. The canoe slides and skates as much as it floats. Though the rocks are quite smooth from the erosive action of the water, it is quite inadvisable to hit them head on. ... The canoe is made of a very thin layer of bark through which it is possible to see daylight.

“One cannot expect continuously to shake a balloon made of sewn-together pieces of bark without splitting it some and finally breaking it completely.”

By the time the canoe was pulled back upstream to the point of departure, it had taken on so much water that it was barely floating. The Frenchmen hurried from the scene to change into dry clothes and enjoy a warm fire and dinner of planked whitefish with all the trimmings.

The prince, a cousin of French King Napoleon III, and his party had sailed from Europe on the Jerome Napoleon, a naval steamship fitted up as a yacht, and anchored in New York Harbor on July 27, 1861. After spending four days seeing the sights in New York,

they visited Philadelphia and proceeded to Washington, where they intended to visit President Abraham Lincoln. Despite the Civil War, in which the Union forces had suffered a recent rout at Bull Run, the times were much more relaxed than the present day. Presidential security was practically nonexistent.

When the prince arrived at the White House, he found, to his dismay, no doorman to announce his arrival and let him in. After he waited several minutes, a servant who happened to be passing by led him inside. Then the prince waited another 15 minutes in the drawing room before Secretary of State William H. Seward arrived and entertained him while they awaited the arrival of the president. When Lincoln finally appeared, the towering president reached down and shook hands with the Napoleon-size prince and attempted to make small talk about the weather and other matters. The prince, miffed at the wait, which he took as offensive to his Gallic dignity, sat silently. After several minutes of the prince’s taciturn coldness, Lincoln arose from his chair, shook hands again and left.

At a state dinner in the White House that evening, however, the prince had a better time. He met Sen. Charles Sumner; 75-yearold General Winfield Scott, then titular Commander in Chief of the Federal Army; and General George McClelland, who had taken over reorganization of the Union forces after the embarrassing defeat at

DeMENT AND MARQUARDT, PLC A law firm focusing on estate planning, estate settlement, and the transfer of wealth.

the Globe Building Charles S. Ofstein • Michael D. Holmes • Michele C. Marquardt Daniel L. DeMent • William B. Millard

211 East Water Street, Suite 401 Kalamazoo, MI 49007 269.343.2106 www.encorekalamazoo.com | 49

MASSIE’S MICHIGAN ENCORE Bull Run. Later the prince visited the Confederate troops middle of the forest which they cleared just enough to make room for at Manassas, where he had an interview with Col. J.E.B. houses.” Instead of largely French-Indian inhabitants as in the Sault, he Stuart and General Pierre Beauregard and received quite found Marquette peopled by “a very active, noisy, and shifting population of Americans and emigrants – merchants, speculators, and miners a different perspective on the Battle of Bull Run. On Aug. 19, the prince and his party boarded the – who are here not to settle down but to make a quick fortune” from steamer North Star at Cleveland en route to Bayfield, the iron mines located a few miles inland. During their four-hour stay in Wis. The following morning the boat reached Detroit, Marquette, the proprietor of the Jackson Mine took them on a railroad which Pisani compared favorably with Marseille. On both tour of what was then the most productive of the local mines. Pisani desides of Merchant Street, the major commercial center at scribed the mountain of red iron ore he faced as a “huge block of metal that time, “the city spreads in the distance like a beautiful reflecting, in spots, the warm sun rays like a mirror.” garden, cut through by long and wide avenues bordered From Marquette, the North Star steamed across Portage Lake, which with trees shading thousands of buildings of all sizes and divided the Keweenaw Peninsula. The ship was assisted by a tugboat shapes,” he wrote. In Detroit he met 79-year-old Lewis that pulled the vessel through the narrows. The prince encountered a Cass, former territorial governor of Michigan, Secretary number of “mineral experts” aboard the boat only too eager to explain of War under Andrew Jackson, American ambassador to the mysteries of the Copper Country and the get-rich schemes that France from 1836 to 1842, unsuccessful candidate for lured thousands to the rocky Keweenaw in search of red metal in the the U.S. presidency in 1844, 1848 and 1852, U.S. senator 1840s. from Michigan and U.S. Secretary of State under James One of the more knowledgeable was none other than George Buchanan, a post he resigned in 1860 when Buchanan Gordon Meade, then a captain in the Army Corps of Engineers. For the failed to make sufficient efforts to avert the Civil War. Pisani found Cass deeply discouraged. He had lost faith in the course of the republic to which he had devoted his life.

The old patriot foresaw only misfortune, ruin and humiliation ahead.

Sadly, by the time of his death in 1866, he had seen much of what he had prophesied become reality, but the republic would survive.

From Detroit the North Star steamed across Lake Huron to the Sault. En route, the French tourists enjoyed the easy atmosphere of the classless American society, jovial Marquette about the time of Prince Napoleon’s visit. meals and dancing parties, with an African-American band strumming mandolins and singing tunes “which breathe passion and love, a vague reminiscence, a vague translation into English of some previous five years he had been in command of a topographic and hysavage poetry brought long ago to the Mississippi from drographic survey of the western Upper Peninsula. Meade explained the shores of the Niger or Senegambia.” He had never that he recently had been granted his request to return to active duty in all of his travels heard anything more “danceable.” and would soon leave for Washington.

After several days’ sojourn in Sault Ste. Marie, the Little did the French tourists know as they returned from the Upper North Star entered the lock, was raised to the 16-foot- Peninsula, stopping at Chicago, St. Louis, Niagara Falls and Boston behigher level of Lake Superior and steamed directly to fore re-embarking for Europe in late September, that Michigan’s mineral Marquette, reaching that city in 14 hours. Pisani found wealth would ultimately prove of vital importance to the Union cause Marquette to be similar to Sault Ste. Marie, with the same during the Civil War or that former surveyor Meade’s role as commander wooden houses and boardwalks. But while the Sault was of the Army of the Potomac during the Union victory at Gettysburg (July an ancient city, Marquette was newly “built right in the 1-3, 1863) would spell the beginning of the end of the Confederacy.

50 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

Idea i·de·a noun

[ahy-dee-uh, ahy-deeuh]

1. any conception existing in the mind as a result of mental understanding, awareness, or activity.

We are your full-service union printing partner. We feature: • Commercial (Offset) Printing • Cold-Set Web Printing • Digital Printing • In-House Mailing • Specialty Coatings • Full Bindery

No quantity is too large or too small, and no order is too unique.

So, go on...

Let your ideas flow.

Email us at service@keystonemillbrook.com or call us at 800.992.9653. We’re waiting to hear from you!

3540 JEFFERSON HWY. • GRAND LEDGE, MI 48837 • 517.627.4078 CHECK OUT OUR NEW WEBSITE WWW.KEYSTONEMILLBROOK.COM

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 51

Warm nights, Gentle breezes...

Soft fabric with whimsical color.

Yolanda Lorente at

Fine Fashions for women size 12W-24W

29 WEST 8Th STREET DOWNTOWN hOLLAND

616.393.5950

Let’s Build Tomorrow What makes tomorrow happen? Sounds like a silly question, but it’s not.

Tomorrow happens because of what we do today. If you decide to take action, you are building tomorrow. If you create something new, you are building tomorrow. If you let something go, you are building tomorrow.

Tomorrow is created by the actions we take today; as printers we get to see it happen all the time. Our customers bring in their ideas, hopes, and dreams, and we make them real. But it’s more than that. We’re not just putting ideas on paper. What we’re really doing is creating a new reality; we’re building tomorrow.

Kind of heady stuff, isn’t it? Kind of exciting, too!

What shall we build for your tomorrow?

Alfieri Jewelers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Bell’s Brewery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 Borgess Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Bravo! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17 Bronson Healthcare Group . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Cornerstone Office Systems . . . . . . . . . .33 CTS Telecom, Inc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32 Dan Wood Company . . . . . . . . . . . . . .42 Dave’s Glass Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 DeHaan Remodeling . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46 DeMent & Marquardt, PLC . . . . . . . . . . .49 DeVisser Landscape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Farmers Alley Theatre . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 First National Bank of Michigan . . . . . . . . 36 Flipse, Meyer, Allwardt . . . . . . . . . . . . .37 Food Dance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Forensic Fluids . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37 Framemaker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 Gazelle Sports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13 Gilmore Real Estate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Great Lakes Shipping Co. . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Greenleaf Trust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Hospice Care of SW Michigan . . . . . . . . .36 HRM Innovations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .38 Kalamazoo/BC International Airport . . . . . .55 Kalamazoo Community Foundation . . . . . .15 KNI/Southwest Michigan Imaging . . . . . . .56 Keystone Community Bank . . . . . . . . . . 18 Keystone Millbrook Printing . . . . . . . . . . 51 Kitchen & Bath Unlimited . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Lana’s Boutique . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Lawton Ridge Winery . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Lewis Reed & Allen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 LVM Capital Management . . . . . . . . . . .35 Mall Plaza Shops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 Masonry Heater Design House . . . . . . . . .13 Midtown Gallery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .38 Millennium Restaurant Group . . . . . . . . .13 The Moors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Nature Connection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 New Year’s Fest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Oakland Centre . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Parkway Plastic Surgery . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Portage Printing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .52 Jeff K. Ross Financial . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 Sharp Smile Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .53 Tempo Vino . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 V & A Bootery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 VanderSalm’s Flowershop . . . . . . . . . . .12 Varnum Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34 West Michigan Glass Art Center . . . . . . . .12 The Wiser Group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .45 WMUK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 Yeta’s Fine Fashion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .52 YMCA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47

Don’t miss an issue of Encore, Southwest Michigan’s Magazine!

Have Encore delivered to your home or office.

Subscribe today at www.encorekalamazoo.com or call Encore at 269.383.4433

1116 W Centre Avenue 323-9333 PortagePrinting.com

☎

52 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

ENCORE THE LAST WORD (continued from page 54)

This pride in a job well done and constantly improving is the heart and soul of the traveling circus.

At 5:30 a.m., armed with coffee and doughnuts from the cookhouse, or “pie car” in circus lingo, we rolled out caravan-style for Washington, Pa., 140 miles down the road, where we would spend two days over Memorial Day weekend. Each day presented new neighbors and new friendships. We parked next to Becky (Rebecca Ostroff), who was the featured trapeze artist in the movie Water for Elephants. She also gives tours in the morning to locals who come to watch the circus set up. Her husband, Marshall, plays trumpet in the circus band.

After the one performance we had that day, we all attended a minor-league baseball game, where we got to eat baseball-park food rather than circus food.

Masontown, Pa., was our next destination.

It had rained all night. As we approached the park where the circus was scheduled to appear, all the vehicles were parked along the road’s edge. It was too wet and muddy for the semis to make it up a hill to the lot.

Rumors were going around that we would have to wait for tractors to come and pull us up the hill. It was the responsibility of Oscar Perez, the circus manager, and his brother Gustavos, circus superintendent, to get us onto the lot. No matter what the obstacle, management must make sure a performance

occurs in each city the circus visits. The Perez brothers solved the problem by removing a small section of a fence, allowing the semis to get better traction on the hill.

Despite the weather and the fact that the town had been hit hard by the recession, we had two full houses that day. People exiting the Big Top were personally thanked for coming by the ringmaster and members of the door crew. Many patrons stopped with questions and comments about the circus, including thanking us for bringing the circus to their community.

Our final day was in Grantville, Md., a town tucked in the mountains near West Virginia.

The lot was a short walk from town, so many of us did laundry, shopped for supplies and ate at a restaurant located in a historic stagecoach inn. Then it was time for us to say goodbye.

In the circus world, however, there are no goodbyes, only “I’ll see you down the road.”

As the circus rolled on without us, we were left with memories of our new friends who travel more than 10,000 miles over 36 weeks every summer, endure the stresses of day-today moving, present two shows daily, raise families with the same concerns all parents share, and keep a positive attitude through it all.

The ringmaster’s final words at each performance still echo in our ears: “The circus will leave your town tonight, but it will remain with you, if you hold it in your heart.”

John Wiler is a retired dentist from Centre Dental Associates in Portage, and Jeanne Wiler is retired from her business, Smokefree Services. Both are members of CFA (Circus Fans of America). John was co-chairman of the CFA’s 2010 national convention, held in Grand Rapids.

They enjoy gardening, travel, cultural events, grandchildren and summers at their lake cottage.

Have The Last Word Have a story to tell? Non-fiction, personal narratives about life in Southwest Michigan are sought for The Last Word. Stories should be no more than 1,000 words. Submit your story and contact information to editor@encorekalamazoo.com.

www.encorekalamazoo.com | 53

THE LAST WORD ENCORE

by

JOHN WILER

Adventures on the Sawdust Trail

Yes, you really can run away and join the circus

From

man, who is responsible for the routing of the circus and arrangement the time I was a little of the lot, including where circus employees and vehicles are to park. boy, I always wanted to run away We hooked up our RV to electricity and then wandered around watching and join the circus. My grandparents the array of preparation activities. All the trucks and RVs were parked would take me in the early morning to in their assigned places, the beautiful red and blue Big Top watch the tents go up; in the afternoon, we tent was beginning to rise, camels were unloaded and fed, would attend the performance under the and elephants were getting their morning baths. The Big Top. The music, animals, costumes and tigers were released into an area that is constructed performers took my breath away. I wanted each day by the trainer and includes two pools, logs to be a part of it, and when the cirand balls for playing. The smell of breakfast was cus magically moved in the night, coming from the cookhouse.

I wanted to follow.

These activities create a rhythm and timing On Jan. 17 of this year, a birthday card that, we would discover, you can set a watch from my wife, Jeanne, lay on my breakfast to. My assignment was to work the front plate. It read “Happy Birthday, darling! Time to live entrance taking tickets, answering questyour dream!” Enclosed was a contract from the ions from patrons and making sure general manager of the Kelly Miller Circus offering everyone entered and exited the Big me a job as a “generally useful” employee for Top safely. My co-workers were Sister one week (two meals daily and zero salary).

Bernard, a Franciscan nun also known as I signed it immediately. In May, decades one of the “circus sisters,” and Julio after my boyhood dreams, Jeanne and Rosales, a member of a large circus I left Kalamazoo to join the circus. family.

Kelly Miller is a traditional AmeriJulio also drives the cookhouse semi can circus presenting its magic under from town to town, performs as a juggler the Big Top in a new city each day. It and knife thrower and assists his is owned by John Ringling North II, wife, Deyanina, with her aerial great-nephew of the famous Ringling act. Having multiple jobs is Brothers. John grew up on the circus common in the circus world. lot learning the day-to-day operations

There were two shows in Mount Hope. For those from his father, Henry Ringling North, and his showwho might think the circus is dead, there was no man uncle, John Ringling North. Young John’s dream evidence of that at the packed 2:30 p.m. show; was not to own the largest circus in America as his the 5:30 p.m. show required extra seating uncles did, but to have the best. The opportunity to be erected to accommodate the crowd. became available in 2007 with his purchase of the People were turned away with the promKelly Miller Circus, based in Hugo, Okla. North has ise that the circus would be back next year. maintained excellent standards for the circus and After the last show, we joined other attends every performance. circus personnel for an Amish dinner at the local diner, returning in Jeanne and I caught up with the circus in Mount Hope, Ohio, a town of 800 located in the heart of Amish country. As we ap- time to watch the lowering of the Big Top. When the crew members proached the lot at 7 a.m., the circus was just beginning to come had finished, one of them asked, “How did we do?” to life. I felt like I was walking into a dream come true but was a “It all looked amazing to us,” we answered. little apprehensive. The ringmaster welcomed me, reassured me that “Come back tomorrow,” he said. “We can do better. Our timing was I would have a great time and directed me to the 24-hour advance a little off tonight.” (continued on page 53)

54 | ENCORE DECEMBER 2012

FLY HOME. BE HOME.

Hey. We just landed.

Be home in 10 minutes.

Safe. Simple. Convenient.

SEPTEMBER 2012 ENCORE | 55

Keep your options open.

Your physician has powerful tools to provide you with medical images.

Even an Olympic swimmer with a 7-foot arm span can stretch out in KNI’s high-field open magnet.

MRI patients who need more room, who feel uneasy in tight spaces, or who need specialty exams for orthopedic procedures often find comfort in high-field open magnets.

KNI will continue to introduce area physicians to new developments in breast imaging, cardiac imaging, neuroimaging, orthopedic imaging and functional imaging.

So, when medical imaging is important to you or your family, learn more about your options at www.kniimaging. com.

KNI partners with Borgess to provide the most powerful and versatile medical imaging equipment available in Southwest Michigan. Working with Premier Radiology, KNI has the medical expertise to provide your physician with the test results you need.

KNI • 1700 Gull Road • Kalamazoo, MI 49048 • 269.342.1099 • www.kniimaging.com