Lawrence Magazine | Summer 2024

Attack of the Honeysuckle

The Doug DuBois Harmony Fund

Darren Canady Stages New Works

Geeville’s Resident Artist Extraordinaire

Dan Wildcat on Lawrence, KU & Haskell

FidPick for Four Decades ... and more!

EDITOR

Nathan Pettengill

DESIGNER / ART DIRECTOR

Shelly Bryant

ADVERTISING

Joanne Morgan 785.832.7264 jmorgan@sunflowerpub.com

AD DESIGNER

Alex Tatro

COPY EDITOR

Leslie Clugston Andres

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Shirley Braunlich Haines Eason

Amber Fraley Lauren Kanan

Michael Pearce Aidan Pezold

Bill Stephens Nick Spacek

Darin M. White

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS

Fally Afani Jason Dailey

Brian Goodman Nick Krug

Michael Pearce Bill Stephens

Doug Stremel

PUBLISHER

Bill Uhler

DIRECTOR

Bob Cucciniello

I remember honeysuckle as one of the first plants I could identify. It grew in the garden of a family friend who allowed my sister and me to enter her property, roam around and eat anything we found. We knew the mulberry tree, whose berries would come early in summer. We knew the gooseberry, whose berries we would gather and bring in to be transformed as pie. We knew the mint, which lived close to the house and would be cut with scissors and brought in for tea. And we knew the honeysuckle, which grew in abundance to cover a tall, chain-link fence that edged the property and whose small flowers could be easily plucked to provide nectar. Of all these sweet-tasting plants, the honeysuckle was my favorite because it had no thorns, it didn’t smear our hands and clothes, it required no cooking, and it was there for us almost the entire summer to sample with ease.

But decades past, I cannot recall the honeysuckle vividly enough to remember what type it was. In some ways, that isn’t important—wonderful memories of a summer well spent will always be wonderful memories—but in other ways it is, because I am curious whether that was one of the native honeysuckle plants or one of the invasive varieties described by Michael Pearce in his feature article in this edition.

As Pearce and the experts he talked with explain, the invasive varieties of honeysuckle, particularly the Amur honeysuckle (Lonicera maackii) around Lawerence and the Japanese honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica) in other areas of the States, have become an acute problem because they strangle out other plants and produce berries that attract birds but provide little nutritional value for the environmental conditions the birds will face in this area.

Like the once-beloved Bradford pear tree that seemed ubiquitously planted in new housing developments of the 1980s and beyond, the honeysuckle was once (and probably still is for the most part) regarded as a pleasant home landscaping addition. But once you know what harm the Bradford or the honeysuckle can do, it’s hard to look at them (at least the invasive varieties) in the same way.

CONTACT SUNFLOWER PUBLISHING

1035 N. Third Street, Suite 101-B Lawrence, KS 66044 | 785.832.7264

EMAIL COMMENTS OR SUBSCRIPTION INFO TO lawrencemagazine@sunflowerpub.com

Lawrence Magazine is a publication of Sunflower Publishing, a division of Ogden Publications, Inc.

On the weekend after Pearce sent in his story, I reluctantly went to my backyard, surveyed the honeysuckle growing along the fence, and plucked it out. I’ve repeated this several times now, each time seeing less and less honeysuckle return. And then, after this routine culling, I often go to the porch and sit down, sometimes with an invasive species next to me (our cat) and often with a puzzled glance into the yard at the beautiful invasive tree (an autumn olive) where the cardinals love to rest.

I realize that the olive should probably eventually go.

The cat—like my childhood memories of the taste of the honeysuckle—never. In one summer’s time, there are only so many concessions we can ask of nostalgia or love.

Nathan Pettengill, editor

Ages 3.5 - 5

Mother Goose Is Loose In The Theatre

June 24 - 28

Tales of Threes: Bears, Pigs, and Trolls, OH MY!

July 8 -12

Where The Wild Things Are: Music and Movement

July 15 - 19

Story Drama: A Trapezoid is NOT A Dinosaur

July 8 - 12 | K - 2nd Grade

Shake, Rattle, & Old Time Rock’N’Roll

July 8 - 12 | Grades 3 - 5

Where The Wild Things Are: Music and Movement

July 15 - 19 | K - 2nd Grade

Seussical, KIDS

July 15 - 27

Grades 1 - 5

Royal Holidays

July 29 - August 2 | Grades 1 - 5

Grades 5 -8

Drama-O-Rama: Games Galore

July 15 - 19

The Eras Camp: Songs of Taylor Swift

July 22 - 26

features smorgasbord

40 The Lasting Ballad of Doug DuBois

The legacy of a Lawrence farmer, luthier and roots musician continues through a charitable fund supporting his causes and other musicians

46 Attack of the Honeysuckle!

A decorative addition to some, a landscape’s worst enemy to others, the bush honeysuckle is coming for your yard, your park, your town …

10 Folk and Roots Showcase

Two musical acts are part of the inaugural class of Doug DuBois Harmony Fund scholars

14 ‘A Homecoming of Sorts’

Award-winning playwright and KU professor

Darren M. Canady stages one of his most personal plays for a hometown hall

18 The Latest from ‘Geeville’

A senior Lawrence artist embarks on his next series of paintings, which he views as simply another learning experience in his eighth decade of life

23 Lawrencium

Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships people

26 Where Hope Is a Koala

A Lawrence artist’s latest creation draws on her illustrative skills and a supportive response to personal tragedies

30 ‘Love, Respect, and Gratitude for the Beauty in the World Around Us’

Author, educator and environmental leader

Daniel R. Wildcat talks about his work, the Haskell community, and Lawrence

34 30 Years of Outdoors-Woman

A popular state program provides all-women instruction for outdoor recreational activities from orienteering to turkey hunting places

38 A Guide to the New Game Day Scene

Lawrence hopes to maintain a hometown game day atmosphere for fall KU football games, both here in the city as well as at the KC host venues

Shirley Braunlich writer

Shirley Braunlich is a readers’ services assistant at Lawrence Public Library. She also frequently writes about environmental and social issues affecting Kansas and Lawrence.

Lauren

Kanan writer

Lauren Kanan is a freelance writer and communications professional. A former reporter with the Lawrence Journal-World, she has also written for Kansas City Magazine and The New York Times

Haines Eason Writer

A former newspaper editor and communications specialist, Haines Eason is the owner of startup media agency Freelance Kansas. His work has appeared in The Guardian, The Pitch, and KANSAS! magazine.

Nick Krug photographer

Known throughout Jayhawk nation for his images of KU basketball’s greatest moments over the past two decades, Nick Krug is an award-winning commercial and editorial photographer.

Fally Afani photographer

Fally Afani has received several Kansas Association of Broadcasters awards as well as an Edward R. Murrow award for her online work in over 20 years of journalism. She is also a recipient of the Rocket Grant Award, which she used to help develop live music events in Lawrence.

Doug Stremel Photographer

Doug Stremel’s first camera was a Mickey Mouse model from the local five-and-dime. After a career in television broadcast and advertising, as well as raising three boys, he returned to photography.

Folk & Roots Showcase

Two musical acts are part of the inaugural class of Doug DuBois

Harmony Fund scholars

Recently, the duo began creating songs with Kimberly Storme on vocals and percussion and Zachary Korte on vocals and bass.

Folk in the Flow Folk in the Flow, the duo of Buck Brandt and Holly Taylor, formed in 2017, shortly after Taylor moved to Lawrence in 2016. In that first year, Taylor began doing open mic nights around town. Brandt introduced himself and offered to accompany her on mandolin, later adding the piano to their songs as well.

“Once we got there, we were like, ‘This works,’” recalls Taylor upstairs one morning at Sunflower Bike Shop’s cafe. After that, the pair began to appear at open mics together throughout 2017, and after Brandt returned from that year’s Walnut Valley Festival, they decided to give the duo a whirl as an official project.

Beginning in 2018, the pair made a conscious effort to book four shows a month for the next year and ended up playing more than 50 shows by the end of the year. As part of that, Brandt and Taylor routed a small but formative tour to Washington state.

“It really laid the foundation for like, ‘Yeah, we both want to make positive music,’” Brandt explains. “We both can understand each other. Even though we write songs differently, I think we’re both mindful of what we’re saying to people. One of the things that we came together on from the start is music is medicine, music is therapy. The songs that we write have that intention and it’s for ourselves, as well as anybody else that can receive it.”

“I don’t think either one of us have any worries about how it’ll come together,” agrees Taylor, “because we each have a style of our own that we’ve already put together, so it doesn’t go too far from that. When it does, it’s kind of fun to try something new.”

“I think that there’s always a desire to have a bigger sound and more instrumentation,” Taylor says of their decision to double the group. “Just having that bigger structure of a rhythm section gives us more tools to work with, and we can create more from that. That’s very rewarding for us—to be able to expand our sound.”

“With folk music, the more layers you can have, the better,” expands Brandt. “A large portion of our career together has been playing as a duo and there’s only so much you can do, and both of us are playing so much, you kind of look for someone to help. It’s like, ‘I’m carrying this heavy load. Hey, Mr. Bass Player! Help me carry this heavy load.’”

The band received additional assistance this past February from the Doug DuBois Harmony Fund [see related story on page 40], which awarded Folk in the Flow a scholarship to attend the Folk Alliance International conference in Kansas City as part of a partnership with the Lawrence Music Alliance and the Heartland Song Network. Both Brandt and Taylor gained a great deal from attending the conference and meeting like-minded folk musicians from around the world.

“It’s always just overwhelmingly inspirational, first of all,” says Taylor of the conference. “And then it’s encouraging to see musicians around the globe in the same beat, in the same step as you.”

For Folk in the Flow, performing before a band from Ireland was an intense energy exchange, says Taylor, along with the opportunity to see some of the most seasoned musicians and absorb what it takes to relate to an audience and to make the impact that the duo is trying to make.

From Brandt’s perspective, it’s the very epitome of Doug DuBois—a progressive farmer, luthier and musician.

OPPOSITE Folk in the Flow founders include Buck Brandt (left) and Holly Taylor

ABOVE Brandt and Taylor began as a mandolin-guitar duo, but have added musicians

Kimberly Storme and Zachary Korte to expand their sound.

“He was sort of a renaissance man with his sustainable land, and then his estate was sold so that he can still support music. It’s that being embodied, ’cause that’s exactly what Folk Alliance is—this support network for artists. And, financially, every little bit helps.”

Bad Alaskan

Alex Kimball Williams, through their ambient electronic project Bad Alaskan, takes Indigenous songs and interprets them through a bank of synthesizers housed in a little red wagon originally belonging to their daughter, Winnie.

The result is a brilliant series of sonic excursions that represents what Folk Alliance International says about the folk label: “Folk is more than just a genre of music ... Folk is the music of the people, reflective of any community they are from.”

Part of what makes a Bad Alaskan performance so wonderfully immersive is that the Lawrence musician of Black and Unangaˆx̂(Aleut) heritage takes

traditional songs through an electronic medium. In some ways, it is similar to the Canadian First Nations EDM act Halluci Nation, which blends Native drumming and chanting with electronic dance music.

But Bad Alaskan’s music aims to be more “meditative and ambient,” Kimball Williams says.

Some parts of the folk community have trouble understanding that difference.

“I definitely realized my work is very different from other performers’ work,” Kimball Williams relates over Zoom one afternoon. Being an Indigenous artist and working in certain spaces is one part of it, as well as basics such as not being able to perform certain material wherever alcohol is sold. “It’s different for me navigating than [for] other performers,” Kimball Williams notes, adding that she would also frequently face the question “Why is your music folk music?”

Kimball Williams sees that question as emblematic of the erasure of Native peoples in all other areas of life, as well as people simply being unfamiliar with the place of electronic music in folk.

“I just love putting things out there that I don’t see yet. I’m going to keep paying attention to what kinds of gaps need to be filled and write songs about that.”

–Alex Kimball Williams

Kimball Williams says they’ve been sitting with those thoughts about their position in folk and traditional music, as well as music in general.

In performing this music, Kimball Williams often prefaces each performance and piece with an explanation of the music’s origins, which provides a learning opportunity. Still, it is another situation where a person from a marginalized group in America must educate a White audience.

“I got to thinking about that, and when it comes to these spaces, I’m kind of checking the box of representation, right?” Kimball Williams says. “For some events, I realize what it is.”

Receiving a scholarship from the Doug DuBois Harmony Fund to attend the Folk Alliance International conference this February allowed Kimball Williams to examine some of these questions within spaces such as the Black American Music Summit (BAMS), where musicians discussed questions such as “When did you learn your worth? What event or project showed you what you were worth?”

Kimball Williams says her work’s worth is considered within the context that 98% of their people did not survive post-settlement colonial contact.

“The Russians came into Alaska, and then, of course, we were bought later by the United States, and when I think about it, if there’s only 500 people left in my tribe, and I am the only one doing this, I’m the only person in the world doing this, and if I don’t do this, it won’t

happen,” Kimball Williams explains of the obligation they feel to play and preserve her people’s music.

Kimball Williams says their exposure in the Midwest to other Native traditions, most of which are Plains tribes cultures, allowed them to better understand the uniqueness of Bad Alaskan’s traditional melodic motifs even in the context of Indigenous cultures.

“That’s when I really learned my worth,” Kimball Williams explains. “It was like, ‘Nobody else can do this.’”

Being a Native musician in this context is a daunting responsibility because Kimball Williams feels they must be more than a musician.

Kimball Williams says their music must be viewed within the context of protest art, a performance that operates in the sphere of predominantly White spaces and seeks to validate the experiences of people of color in the United States.

“Every song I perform is part of this protest. We don’t just get to be artists; we are also historians,” Kimball Williams notes. “We are also always having to bring that to the discussions. People don’t know what is Native or

what is Alaskan about my music because there are so few of us because of colonial contact.”

Recently, Kimball Williams worked on a digital storytelling project with the Hall Center for the Humanities at the University of Kansas as part of “Stories for All: A Digital Storytelling Project for the Twenty-first Century.”

In this project, Kimball Williams interviewed Kansas families affected by police brutality and turning their narratives into lyrics.

In 2024, Kimball Williams wants to do more oral history-involved projects.

“I love creating songs and material about filling gaps,” Kimball Williams says. “There’s this disconnection between victims and families and how they are often presented in the media, in a negative light and not portraying their full lives,” Kimball Williams says. “I just love putting things out there that I don’t see yet. I’m going to keep paying attention to what kinds of gaps need to be filled and write songs about that.”

STORY BY Lauren Kanan PHOTOGRAPHY BY Doug Stremel

‘A Homecoming of Sorts’

Award-winning playwright and KU professor

Darren M. Canady stages one of his most personal plays for a hometown hall

This past February, Lawrence playwright Darren M. Canady’s award-winning play Brothers of the Dust took the stage at Topeka’s Washburn University. The production was part of citywide commemorations marking 70 years since the Brown v. Topeka Board of Education Supreme Court ruling that effectively ended legal segregation in American public schools.

Canady, who was raised in Topeka and has been on the faculty at the University of Kansas since 2010, says this was the first time one of his plays had been performed at such a professional level in Topeka.

“It was a homecoming of sorts,” Canady notes.

Brothers is about a trio of brothers locked in a battle over what to do with their family farm in Arkansas. Their situation raises themes of land, property, love, legacy and “who stays and who goes,” Canady explains.

The play is set during the Great Migration, a period of American history during which millions of Black people left the South to pursue new opportunities and escape racial violence and prejudice. More specifically, Brothers is set in 1958, four years after the Brown v. Board of Education ruling and one year after the Little Rock Nine became the first Black teenagers to enter Little Rock’s Central High School.

Canady’s initial draft of Brothers was his thesis for his MFA program at NYU, and the play was first performed professionally in Chicago in 2011. It won the 2012 M. Elizabeth Osborn New Play Award from the American Theatre Critics Association.

“One of the things that happens in Act II is so many people—particularly these three brothers—saying ‘you never told me.’ … And now we’re locked in this battle because we didn’t say these things. And I think that is something that I have watched a number of the men in my life have to grow through,” Canady says. “There’s little pieces of a lot of the men of my family and myself in those imperfections.”

Canady’s love for playwriting began in college although Canady says if you ask his mom, she’ll say he’s been writing plays since childhood. A creative writing major at Carnegie Mellon University, he first intended to focus on fiction and screenwriting, but his love for theater led him to pick up a drama minor. Canady’s first professional production came out in the 2006–2007 season, following the completion of his MFA.

“I think I am a playwright because I am a creative writer who draws joy from community,” Canady says. “And theater—there’s the script that I write, absolutely—but then there’s the fun of all of these other artists—the director first, right, the actors, the designers—who then get to take that blueprint and bring their artistry to it so that we all together make this experience for the audience. And I think that that’s part of what drew me to playwriting.”

He has since written more than a dozen plays and won several residencies and awards, such as the Lecomte du Nouy Prize from Juilliard School.

OPPOSITE Lawrence

playwright Darren M. Canady says that being a playwright means being “a creative writer who draws joy from community.”

Brothers was born from an inquiry from Canady’s father: “When are you going to write about my family?” At the time of the question, Canady’s father and his father’s cousins were trying to figure out what to do with their family’s land in Arkansas. The brothers in the play struggle to express love and vulnerability, much like the older generation of men in Canady’s family.

Canady’s writing process is different for every project. For an interactive theater piece Canady is working on, his process is entirely collaborative—meaning he is often in meetings and interviews. Then there is a musical, which Canady describes as being at the stage where he spends much time on Zoom, looking over a shared document with his collaborator and “spitballing ideas until one of us gets sick and tired of the other.”

Canady says that through his various projects, he always considers the changing experience of Blackness,

KANSAS STORIES explore

particularly in the Midwest. He describes his plays as dealing with the “said and unsaid,” and he specifically noted the ways “we both talk right at race and the ways we will run away from talking about race, even though it is the thing staring us in the face—which to me was very much growing up in the Midwest.”

began with an idea for a single scene, with the rest of the play filled out around it. In this production, a Black queer director puts on a production of for colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf, but casts only White women

Kansas City Public Theatre, which staged a pre-premiere reading for…girls in October 2023, described the play’s fictional director as an “enfant terrible” who unleashes “a secretive, explosive production experience that drags the actors, the artistic leadership, and the local theatrical community towards a collision.”

Canaday says he will sometimes write about the “affluent or people who are living extraordinary lives,” but that mostly he tends to create characters who enable him and the audience to “look for the extraordinary in the ordinary.”

By doing so, Canady is able to examine themes that can be near-universal as well as highly personal. For example, a father-son pairing in Brothers is based on Canady’s connection to his dad.

“I always tell people it’s a bizarro version of our relationship,” Canady notes, adding that the play’s script allows him to acknowledge his father’s message—no matter how imperfectly it was communicated in real life: “I love you and I am deeply invested in you.”

Canady says one of his biggest regrets is that his dad was never able to see the play before his passing.

Who are Darren M. Canady’s favorite playwrights?

Though Darren Canady notes his list of favorite playwrights often changes, August Wilson is always on it. “I am a playwright because of August Wilson,” Canady says. In his ever-changing list, he also included Lynn Nottage and Tony Kushner.

What is Canady reading?

Canady is reading Straight Man by Richard Russo and listening to the musical WhiteGirlinDanger by Michael R. Jackson.

For those who saw Brothers or plan to read the script, Canady said he hopes his audience will take away the importance of being brave in daily life and relationships. He hopes families will discuss the ties that bind them together “so that we’re not waiting for death and we’re not waiting for conflict to work through the things that have broken us.”

STORY BY Darin M. White

The Latest from ‘Geeville’

A senior Lawrence artist embarks on his next series

of paintings,

which he views as simply another learning experience in his eighth decade of life

To those in Norman Gee’s close circle of friends, his home in central Lawrence is affectionately known as “Geeville” and serves as an exciting and hospitable venue for University of Kansas basketball watch parties.

Gee’s friend and fellow artist Roger Shimomura clarifies that for more than 30 years now, Geeville has become “the center” of their KU sports social life.

But when it is not hosting game-day celebrations, Gee’s house is where he works, where he creates art.

At the center of Gee’s home is a large working space overlooked by his kitchen, where the artist loves to cook and ponder his next ideas or consider what he has placed on his easel.

A home full of Jayhawk spirit and art is not that unusual in Lawrence, but how this one came to be is—because as a young man, Gee had no plans for any of this.

“Art was not part of my growing up,” Gee explains.

he was a personal chef for a wealthy Caucasian family in San Mateo, California,” Gee recalls.

In 1952, Gee’s parents moved the family to Porterville, in the San Joaquin Valley, where they opened their own restaurant.

“We all worked the restaurant until early 1956, when my parents decided to sell the restaurant and move back to Oakland,” Gee says.

Moving was common for Gee as he grew up and went through high school. He remained in place briefly after graduation, when he enrolled at Oakland Junior College, but then dropped out before the end of the first semester to work at a hardware store for a few years and move again to San Francisco, where he enrolled in general studies at San Francisco State University with an interest in anthropology.

ABOVE Although as a youth he had no intention to become an artist, Norman Gee has spent most of his life teaching and creating art.

OPPOSITE Gee’s home is centered around a large work space where he creates his new paintings.

Gee is the son of working-class, first-generation Chinese immigrants from the Taishan region of China. His father arrived in the United States as a teenager, and though his mother was born in the US in 1916, she returned to China for her education and then returned to the US only when she was 20.

“My father, living independently, worked in Chinatown laundries and restaurants and developed an interest in cooking. Part of this interest was European [cuisine]. When my mother met him through relatives,

Art didn’t become a possibility until Gee visited an art studio by chance, became intrigued, and then accepted an invitation from a friend to tour the California College of Arts and Crafts (CCAC). Realizing this was what he wanted to do, Gee ended up submitting his application.

Looking back, Gee says the submitted portfolio was fairly poor work. But he was accepted—with a scholarship.

The next few years transformed the trajectory of Gee’s life and shaped what he considers the eclectic style of art he continues to explore.

“I think back to my CCAC days, and there

was so much I was exposed to that I could say everything around me could be considered part of my influences, even things I didn’t think much of at the time,” Gee explains.

a backseat to his loved ones, and he did not prioritize showing his work. His work, less numerous because of that hiatus, is highly appreciated by fellow artists and those who have seen and are familiar with it.

ABOVE Gee says a viable artist “must be learning constantly.”

In 1969, his work as an artist would soon take him far away, from the West Coast to Lawrence, where he had accepted a one-year appointment as an art professor while his wife, Helen, remained to live and work in California. One year later, Gee’s temporary position turned permanent, and Helen left her career to join him in Kansas.

He taught at KU for more than three decades, influencing generations of students and—as he notes—continuing to be a student himself.

“To be a viable artist, one must be learning constantly. Even in my 33 years teaching at KU, I was learning as I was teaching. It never ends,” Gee says.

Through his years of painting, Gee has created a body of work unbound by any particular style. His creations incorporate a wide range of influences, from classical Chinese ceramic patterns to landscapes and abstractions.

He often works on more than one painting at a time, and it is not uncommon for him to take a painting from his “finished” wall of paintings to rework or add various thoughts. He does this so often that once his daughter, Mikka Gee Conway—who worked at the National Gallery of Art and serves on the national advisory board for KU’s Spencer Museum of Art— asked him to stop perfecting a certain painting as she liked it the way it was.

Gee’s other child is also involved in the arts. Longtime Lawrence residents will recognize musician Brian Gee as the guitarist and vocalist for the popular Lawrence pop-punk group The Bubble Boys.

Family has been important to Gee throughout his life. He was the primary caretaker for his mother for 15 years and also cared for his wife, who lived with Alzheimer’s for 10 years before she passed away in December 2023. They had been married for 57 years. During those years of caretaking, Gee’s art often took

Gee’s paintings are collected by institutions such as KU’s Spencer Museum of Art and the United States Department of State, for its Art in Embassies program.

Saralyn Reece Hardy, the director of the Spencer Museum of Art at the University of Kansas, says that Gee creates “compelling art” and has “made a life of painting animate forms of beauty and structure, all the while looking beyond the canvas to care deeply about family and friends.”

Gee’s latest creations are a series of green-bluethemed paintings, some finished but possibly still in progress (his daughter has not yet placed any restrictions on this batch).

The central painting in this group suspends abstract flora or fauna elements with patches of coral colors popping out of the green-blue background and floating, cloud-like, over geometric patterns, as if it were a landscape viewed from a high elevation. Some of the patterns in the foreground are tinted or shaded, with blocks or repeating colors such as dark and light pinks, with areas of green and blue, or blue-gray, in which certain parts of the dark purples drip down the painted canvas from above. In the upper area of the painting, darker, hard, angular shapes are absorbed into the color field as each bramble-like form hangs on from being enveloped by the next brush stroke. A dark-eggplantcolored form in the central focal area creates tree-like forms with small clusters of pale yellow. From within this tantalizing tangle grow curved mounds of cyan, upward and outward, which bubble up with organic pink petals as if ready to burst.

Like much of his recent work, these paintings have no titles. Gee describes the paintings only as evidence that he is still learning.

“It never ends,” he repeats. “What were influences became part of my subconscious, and it all contributes to my particular sensibility.”

Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships

What began as a county-wide 1976 bicentennial event became a statewide contest in 1981 and has since continued as Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships, also affectionately known as “FidPick.”

Approximate number of attendees in 2023

2,000

Approximate number of musicians who competed or performed in 2023

100

Number of stages inaugural year

1

Number of stages planned for 2024

2

Number of contests inaugural year

5

Number of contests planned for 2024

9

Those nine contests include State Banjo Championship, Band Competition, State Fiddle Championship, Youth Fiddle Championship, State Finger-Style Guitar Championship, State Flat-Pick Guitar Championship, State Mandolin Championship, State Miscellaneous Acoustic Instruments Championship and the Youth Award.

Number of strings your banjo must have to compete in the State Banjo Championship

8

Minimum number of musicians required to qualify as a band 3

Maximum number of musicians allowed in a band 4

Maximum number of bands that may register for a competition

Maximum song length, in minutes, for band to perform

JUDGES SCORE BANDS ON THE FOLLOWING CRITERIA

25% PERFORMANCE

25% ORIGINALITY OF SONGS

25% COHESIVENESS OF THE BAND

25% CROWD RESPONSE

The general point system for all other contest participants

Judges look for even, consistent rhythm.

Rhythm and Timing (25 points)

Expression (25 points)

Judges favor performances with feeling.

Creativity (25 points)

Execution (25 points)

Judges look for variations, improvisations, and “good licks.”

Judges listen for tone quality, dynamics, pitch, and general command of the instrument.

2024

KANSAS STATE

Fiddling

& Picking

Championship

Sunday, August 25 from 2-7 p.m. in South

Park

This event is free to attend.

Where Hope Is a Koala

A Lawrence artist’s latest creation draws on her illustrative skills and a supportive response to personal tragedies

When Stacey Lamb releases her picture book this summer, it will be a project rooted in her aptly named art company, a whimsically illustrated animal, and a blend of grief and optimism.

Let’s begin with the art company.

At one level, HAPPYtown is “a place of second chances. A place of empathy. A place of understanding. A place with forgiveness,” Lamb says, “a place full of hope and good cheer. A place where happiness can spread to everyone and a place of constant support that lovingly surrounds all its community and citizens.”

This series of positive-themed artwork and designs began in response to a dear friend’s health crisis.

The friend’s name was Cheryl, and she had been diagnosed with cancer. Cheryl’s treatment included a bone marrow transplant, and these procedures can require a stay in a sterile post-op environment. In Cheryl’s case, she had to remain secluded in a germ-free environment for 100 days.

Lamb felt called to help make her friend’s recovery more manageable.

“So, I drew her 100 drawings,” Lamb says.

She delivered the drawings—some including positive affirmations and strengthening scripture verses—in a large envelope with a clothesline and clips. She suggested that Cheryl take a new card out daily and add it to the line. As the days passed, Cheryl and her team of nurses and doctors strung more and more of the cards in her hospital room.

“It got to the point where the nurses and doctors, they were wanting to pull a card,” Lamb says. “They were like, ‘Have you pulled a card today? Can I do it?’”

Cheryl eventually graduated from her germ-free environment. She remained cancer-free for years but then passed away in October 2021.

Lamb continued the card series, in part, as a tribute to her friend. HAPPYtown’s 100 DAYS Countdown Cards is now one of HAPPYtown’s many art-based emotional support products.

STORY BY Haines Eason

“The little koala in a heartshaped balloon has been around for at least 25 years. When I drew her, I had an instant connection to her. It was like seeing an old friend.”

– Stacey Lamb –

At its core, the company includes Stacey and her husband, Bret. But there is another old friend who has occupied a key place in HAPPYtown: an illustrated koala named Hope.

“The little koala in a heart-shaped balloon has been around for at least 25 years,” Lamb says. “When I drew her, I had an instant connection to her. It was like seeing an old friend.”

Hope was originally a koala-ish gray, but Lamb switched Hope’s hue to yellow “because there is something very hopeful about this color.”

The yellow koala now appears in many designs, particularly those focusing on recovery and mental health.

“I’d already created a few products that dealt with grief with the assistance and collaboration of health care and mental health professionals,” Lamb says. “There was always interest in our bereavement products at the conferences that we attended. We were often

OPPOSITE Stacey Lamb holds up some of her recent sketches.

ABOVE One of the Lawrence artist’s most important character is a koala named Hope.

asked if we had anything that dealt with the topic of suicide in a very open sort of way. We didn’t, but we were open to helping children and families deal with the loss of someone by suicide.”

Those interactions— as well Lamb’s personal experience in losing people near to her—were the beginning of the book Hope and the Winds of Grief.

To turn her whimsical koala into a meaningful character at the heart of an informed and therapeutic story, Lamb says she committed to a “totally collaborative” project.

Scott Emmons, who, among other accomplishments, is an Emmy-award-winning writer for the Netflix series Story Bots: Answer Time, provided the text. Mental health professionals Dana Wyss and Katherine Melton were instrumental in the book’s genesis. The two also created a supplementary workbook that pairs with the story to turn the tale into a resource for grieving families, counselors and educators.

“Hope is probably the most important thing that I have ever done,” Lamb says. “Obviously, the subject matter makes it a very intense project... But I knew deep down in my heart that this was a book that needed to be created. There were days I had to step away from doing my art because it felt so heavy.”

But even at those times, Lamb had a cheerful koala to draw and set free in the imaginary world.

“Hope is HAPPYtown’s most beloved citizen,” Lamb says. “She is the one who drops in just at the right time when things get a little rough for folks. She is an encourager, and her mission is to lift. And to help us remember that Hope is always there.”

ABOVE Daniel R. Wildcat says Haskell Indian Nations University, the University of Kansas, and Lawrence have shaped his life and work.

‘Love, Respect, and Gratitude for the Beauty in the World Around Us’

Author, educator and environmental leader Daniel R. Wildcat talks about his work, the Haskell community, and Lawrence

Daniel R. Wildcat, a Yuchi Member of the Muscogee Nation of Oklahoma and distinguished professor at Haskell Indian Nations University, has dedicated his career to Indigenous scholarship and ecological advocacy. He has assisted in and developed visionary efforts such as the Haskell Environmental Research Studies Center, the American Indian and Alaska Native Climate Change Working Group, the Hiawatha Center for Justice based locally at Hiawatha Hall on the Haskell campus, and the Raising Voices, Changing Coasts (RVCC) research hub funded by the National Science Foundation.

He is currently working on a revision of Power and Place: Indian Education in America, a landmark book on Indigenous education first co-authored 25 years ago with his mentor, Vine Deloria, Jr.

Wildcat’s latest release, On Indigenuity: Learning the Lessons of Mother Earth (November 2023, Fulcrum Publishing), centers the many varieties of Native American wisdom and emphasizes the shared responsibilities all people have to the planet. On Indigenuity connects these philosophical essays with original poetry to awaken hearts and minds to relations in the natural world beyond humankind and to challenge and inspire readers to respond locally and work collaboratively with Mother Nature to adapt

to the impacts of our changing climate. In Wildcat’s words, this is a necessary “cultural climate change.” Lawrence Magazine (LM): Can you tell us more about your choice for the book’s title?

Dan Wildcat (DW): Indigenous ingenuity, or “Indigenuity,” is what the earth can teach us if we can stay in one place long enough to observe what she is doing. It is a non-anthropocentric knowledge that understands the land, air, water, and the different-fromhuman life (persons) as our teachers, the co-creators of knowledges and wisdom that honors the deep relationality of our human existence on our Mother Earth with much to teach us about our human selves.

Indigenuity is the product of a people’s symbiotic relationship to a particular place and natural environment—a homeland—that gave them their identity and culture.

I have been surprised by how open many readers seem to be with giving this way of thinking a try in terms of practical questions they face today. Young folks are starting to pay attention and wanting to tackle the incredibly complex problems humans face today with a different kind of thinking, like Indigenuity. The question is, can they stay the course in a system largely built on very damaging features of modern thinking that have given us the age of the Anthropocene? The next decade may give some indication of lasting impacts.

LM: What inspires your best work?

DW: My love, respect, and gratitude for the beauty in the world around us, the life around us that humans had no hand in creating, and a sense of responsibility to be a good community member in that more-than-human ecological community of which we, humankind, are one small— albeit powerful—part of. As a grandfather, I think a lot about what kind of future I am shaping in some infinitesimal way … especially to ensure my grandchildren see less destruction and violence than I have seen in my lifetime. That is pretty good motivation for the work I currently do.

LM: Tell us how you came to Lawrence and what attracted you to Haskell Indian Nations University.

DW: Lawrence is a beautiful city between two rivers, the Kansas [Kaw] and the Wakarusa. I live a little more than a half-mile from the south bank of the Kaw. I love the Kaw. Of course, Lawrence has so many good folks—too many to name—living in Lawrence who understand the importance of making “good and necessary trouble” in the struggle to realize truly democratic justice. Our connections run deep in Lawrence.

My wife, Mern [Marianne], and I moved here after my military service in 1974. I wanted to use my veteran’s education benefits at KU.

Haskell, of course, has been my academic and activist home for the past four decades. My wife often says she feels like Haskell is the “other woman” in my life because I am so passionate about this national treasure—one still too often overlooked and underappreciated in Lawrence.

“Indigenuity is the product of a people’s symbiotic relationship to a particular place and natural environment—a homeland—that gave them their identity and culture.”

– Daniel R. Wildcat –

I knew I wanted to attend KU even as a high school student in Coffeyville, Kansas.

Haskell and KU have both shaped our lives. First, KU, where we now have, as I like to jokingly say, three Wildcats that are true blue Jayhawks: my wife, son and myself. KU opened up the world of scholarship and creativity to me and gave my wife and myself deep and lasting friendships.

I have two cousins who attended Haskell, so I knew about Haskell. I had gone straight from my undergraduate degree into graduate school at KU. I entered a PhD program [at the University of Missouri— Kansas City] in sociology, and I loved it. However, as I matured as a scholar, my interests changed, and the topic I initially was excited about no longer held my interest. Frankly, I was feeling a little burned out. Right about that time in 1985, Dean Charles Geboe at Haskell came to see me and encouraged me to apply for a social science instructor position at Haskell. I had been thinking about Haskell because I had a friend who had accepted a position there, and the more I thought about teaching at Haskell the more excited I became.

Ironically, as I thought about Haskell, what most intrigued and excited me, beside the beauty of the incredible diversity of the allIndigenous student body, was my interest in philosophy and my experience as a graduate teaching assistant in KU’s storied Western Civilization program. I taught classes in Western civilization for three years as a graduate student, and I loved it. As I began to see the power of the Western tradition, well, I began to contemplate how interesting it would be to develop a comparative course where one followed the chronological development of Western thought but counterpointed each major theme or subject with Indigenous thinking about that topic.

When I joined the Haskell faculty, the first course I developed

was a two-semester Western Civilization course—WCI and WCII built on KU’s model. In fact, in my first five years of teaching, my Indigenized WCI and WCII was an active part of the Haskell–KU course-exchange program. I had many KU students take my Western Civilization courses at Haskell. It was a wonderful experience for both Haskell and KU students. When course evaluation time came, both stated how much they enjoyed being in class together and how that enriched their learning experience.

LM: And now you’ve been teaching for 38 years. That’s a lot of students, and many have probably gone on to do work you admire. Do you follow their careers?

DW: I cannot name them all, but a few stand out. Dr. Paulette Blanchard is now a co-investigator in Haskell’s $20 million National Science Foundation grant Rising Voices, Changing Coasts (RVCC) Hub, and her work on the 7 R’s of Indigenous research is outstanding.

Shereena Baker, the best intern I ever worked with, is now completing her education PhD in language, literacy, and socio-cultural studies at the University of New Mexico. I am particularly proud of her work on the New Mexico Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives Task Force.

Another student, Tyler Kimbrell, is now a colleague at Haskell, teaching in the Speech and Communication Program at Haskell. A critical thinker and always willing to demand more of students than what they think they can do.

Patrick Freeland, former Haskell Student Senate president, has done so much. Patrick worked year one of the RVCC Hub project as a part-time project coordinator, and he is now working as the Senior Northwest Tribal Climate Resilience Liaison for the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians.

Andi Weber graduated from Haskell and went on to complete an MPA (Master of Public Administration) at KU. She then worked for the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of Idaho as a senior planner. In the fall of 2022, Andi returned to Haskell, with my encouragement, to fill the executive director position at the Haskell Foundation, a job that required getting the Haskell Foundation on solid ground and serving as the administrator of the large RVCC Hub award.

LM: Who were some influences on you as a student?

DW: Lately, I have realized how important teachers have been in my life: Mrs. Grundy (second grade), Mrs. Culver (eighth grade), and in undergraduate and graduate studies, Bob Antonio (sociology, KU), Nick Peroff, my dissertation adviser (public administration, UMKC), and, of course, Vine Deloria, Jr. (Indigenous Studies, Arizona University and University of Colorado). Also, I must mention my fiercest and best critic— and best friend, my wife, Mern Wildcat.

30 Years of OutdoorsWoman

A popular state program provides all-women instruction for outdoor recreational activities from orienteering to turkey hunting

Since 1994, the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks has sponsored a program to bridge the gap—both in reality and in popular perception— between men and women who enjoy outdoor recreational activities throughout the state.

Taught by women and for women and based on a long-standing program developed in 1991 at the University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point, the Becoming an Outdoors-Woman (BOW) program is a nonprofit, educational, hands-on outdoor adventure offering six categories of workshops. The sessions are held in the spring and fall in Rock Springs Ranch, near Junction City, on 735 acres of land with cabin-type accommodations. No experience is necessary, and BOW is open for adults of all ages and fitness levels. Kansas is one of more than 30 states offering the program, most of which follow a three-day, multi-course approach with more than 20 classes to choose from, including fly fishing, archery, handgun and rifle shooting and gun safety, foraging, canoeing, kayaking, hiking, camping, nature photography, fishing, and learning to back a truck with a trailer attached.

Course Information

To learn more about upcoming fall or spring programs, search for “Becoming an Outdoors-Woman” at the Kansas Department of Wildlife & Parks website, ksoutdoors. com. The group’s official site on Facebook also posts information about shorter courses available throughout the year.

OPPOSITE Becoming an Outdoors-Woman (BOW) courses are all taught by woman instructors and designed for women.

ABOVE The courses for a BOW weekend can be chosen by themes, such as fishing.

While men are not excluded, the emphasis is on women who want to learn new skills, make friends and enjoy the outdoors. This approach goes back to the original program in Wisconsin that was developed, in part, as a response to studies showing that women preferred to learn hunting, fishing and outdoor skills in a noncompetitive atmosphere along with other like-minded women. Some scholarships are available to help cover the $275 enrollment fee, and interest has been so high that the state has had to give preferential registration to first-time participants.

“Over the last several years, we have noticed a real boom in women’s participation in programs such as BOW,” explains Tanna Wagner, a regional program coordinator and instructor. “Studies show that women’s leisure time tends to be valued less than a man’s leisure time. To counteract this imbalance, BOW focuses on adult women because they have a heavy influence on the familial aspects of their families, such as organizing the family calendar. Women also rely on the social network structure and stay connected with like-minded women.”

One of the participants who traveled the furthest distance for the 2023 event was Kathy Benoit from Lafayette, Louisiana.

“My grandkids were always asking me questions about how to bait a hook and what type of bait to use. I knew that BOW had fishing courses, so that was the main draw for me to attend,” she says. She learned the

answers to her questions, practiced fly fishing and rod fishing, and caught a fair amount of catfish in one of the ponds. Catch and release is the policy, so the fish went back into the water to bite another day.

First-time attendee Sue Nanninga from Lawrence anxiously anticipated many of the class sessions. She was able to enroll in all of her first choices, which included kayaking, paddle boarding and handgun safety.

She also took a class in trailer backing and maintenance, which she planned to put to immediate use.

“I bought a pop-up trailer and feel pretty confident in my backing ability, but I am definitely lacking in the maintenance department. I am truly an outdoors person. At 63, I try to stay young!” Nanninga adds.

Topekan Delainey Williams, a past BOW attendee, returned to the camp as an assistant instructor in archery.

“BOW felt like the adult version of Girl Scout camp. The idea of all-female instructors sounded like the exact place that I wanted to be. And it was everything that I expected.

Attending BOW at Rock Springs was the perfect environment for women to learn new skills here in Kansas,” she says.

Course Pathways

The Kansas Becoming an Outdoors-Woman threeday session offers 20 different courses. Organizers have grouped these courses, with some overlap, into “pathway” options based on core themes. Students can register their preference for one pathway with all its classes or sign up for individual courses across all the different pathways.

Paddling Pathway: Kayaking, Trailer Backing and Maintenance, Stream Ecology, and Paddleboarding.

Fishing Pathway: Stream Ecology, Intro to Fishing, Intro to Flyfishing, and Flat Water Kayaking.

Hunting Pathway: Turkey Talk, Turkey Hunt, Cooking with Wild Game, and Nose-to-Tail Cooking.

Shooting Sports Pathway: Intro to Archery, Intro to Shotguns, Intro to Handguns, and Intro to Rifles.

Camping Pathway: Camping, Dutch Oven Cooking, Wilderness First Aid, Backpacking and Orienteering Basics.

Foodie Pathway: Foraging, Dutch Oven Cooking, Cooking with Wild Game, and Nose-to-Tail Cooking.

A Guide to the New Game Day Scene

Lawrence hopes to maintain a hometown game day atmosphere for fall KU football games, both here in the city as well as at the KC host venues

As the University of Kansas football team prepares to leave Lawrence for the 2024–2025 season home games, local fans and venues look to create events and special offers to keep the game-day spirit alive in Lawrence. These plans range from creating fan zones to offering the ultimate tailgate experience downtown—and organizers say more details are still to come.

By now, the Jayhawks’ absence this fall should be no surprise—it results from huge successes on the field and a tremendous rise in interest from fans, alumni, students, and donors. After achieving a 9-4 record in the 2023–2024 season, a feat that hasn’t been matched since the 2007–2008 football season, and taking the Guaranteed Rate Bowl win over the UNLC Rebels, the Jayhawks are beginning a massive, $250-million upgrade to Kansas Memorial Stadium and its immediate surroundings. Dubbed the Gateway District project, the renovation is set for completion by the beginning of the 2025 season. In the meantime, the Jayhawks will relocate to Kansas City for a single season, holding home games at the Kansas City NFL team stadium and Children’s Mercy Park.

But KU officials and others in Lawrence are seeking ways to keep football fandom alive in Lawrence this fall.

Andrew Holt, executive director of Downtown Lawrence, says that his group has begun planning to do “everything we can” to turn the city’s downtown district into an extended game-weekend celebration watch party.

Downtown Lawrence is also part of a wider KULawrence committee planning a series of rallies the day before each game. The events will include pep bands,

cheerleading squads and tailgating games held in different “zones.” Presently, two of these zones are confirmed: one Downtown and the other in the parking lot between HyVee and 23rd Street Brewery.

Businesses around both zones are also making plans for game day.

Louise’s Downtown, at 1009 Mass. Street, wants to allow Jayhawk fans to keep game-day excitement going in Lawrence. Bar manager Sean Donnelly says the venue intends to create a “full-on tailgate atmosphere” at the front and across the three patios on the back. The spread will include a grill, cooling fans, loads of televisions tuned to the game, $3 hotdogs, $4 burgers, and half-off select beers.

“We want people to feel like they are at the game,” Donnelly adds.

On the southwest side of town and at the second designated pre-game zone, 23rd Street Brewery owner Matt Llewellyn says his restaurant will also offer specials on food and drink as they add watch parties to their traditional pregame and post-game parties.

“Normally, on home football game days, we are crazy busy before and after the game,” Llewellyn says. “Now we know we are going to encourage watch parties during the game. We are hoping this year that we will be packed for the games.”

As the football season grows closer, more events are expected to fill the Lawrence game-day and game-weekend calendars. Look for listings at downtownlawrence.com and at explorelawrence.com

the places

Lawrence Goes to the Game

As Lawrence continues to find ways to make game days fun at home, campus and community members are also looking at ways to bring Lawrence to the games.

At the University of Kansas, KU student body leader Zakariya Ahmed says students and community fans have a guaranteed ride to Kansas City for the game or just the atmosphere outside the stadium.

“We will have multiple buses leaving at varying times with various pick-up spots,” says Ahmed.

The plan is to have 15–20 buses departing in a revolvingdoor–style schedule to drop off and pick up fans before, during and after the games. In working with KU Athletics, Ahmed reached a deal with third-party bus service Shofur to offer this service. Each bus will leave once it is full; then, another will begin loading up. More details will be released closer to the fall season games.

Lawrence Chamber of Commerce’s vice president of economic development, Steve Kelly, describes the hype for the fall season as “the highest interest in KU football there’s been in 20 years.”

He has been in talks with some of the city’s biggest local restaurants to set up food trucks and food tents outside the game venues, so that both Lawrence and KC fans will find some signature Lawrence establishments to greet them.

He describes it as “bringing Lawrence to the game even though the game isn’t in Lawrence.”

ABOVE The KU Marching Band, Big Jay, and other KU groups are expected to participate in Lawrence “zone” celebrations on the day before KU home football games being held in Kansas City this year.

Bad Alaskan Moonshroom

Sweet Lil and the Nothings

The Lasting Ballad of

Doug DuBois Doug DuBois

The legacy of a Lawrence farmer, luthier and roots musician continues through a charitable fund supporting his causes and other musicians

Story by Nick Spacek

Photography by Fally Afani

In March of 2021,

when he was 61, musician and luthier Doug DuBois in a tractor accident on his homestead of Brushy Run outside of Lawrence.

A musician, permaculture farming advocate, and longtime Lawrence resident, DuBois affected many lives in the community. Some knew him from his time as a member of the Alferd Packer Memorial String Band, some knew him as a luthier behind the counter of Beautiful Music, and others knew him from his annual “Homestead Hoedown” he hosted at Brushy Run.

After DuBois’ funeral, his family cleared out his barn and gave his collection of instruments and tools to friends. And then, they took one more step to celebrate DuBois’ legacy. DuBois’ sister Marjean Brooks writes in her elegy, The Day the Music Died, “After Doug’s affairs were settled, our family set up the Doug DuBois Harmony Fund to benefit causes close to his heart.”

That fund has sponsored a multitude of causes DuBois would have appreciated, such as a scholarship program for disadvantaged students at the Kansas Permaculture Institute, the Doug DuBois Harmony Stage at the annual Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships in South Park, and just this past February, eight scholarships for musicians to attend the annual Folk Alliance International conference at the Westin Crown Center in Kansas City, Missouri.

These Doug DuBois Harmony Fund scholarships were presented in collaboration with the Lawrence Music Alliance (LMA) and the Heartland Song Network (HSN). As Nick Carswell, executive director of the Lawrence Music Alliance, explains, all three groups support, develop and celebrate independent music creators in our region.

“The legacy of Lawrence musician Doug DuBois was being celebrated in the best possible way: by supporting the music scene that Doug belonged to and cherished,” Carswell says. “Several of the selected artists had a direct connection to Doug, and performing on such a major platform under his name is a privilege and a fitting way to honor Doug’s memory.”

As Danny Powell and Diana Linn Ennis of the Heartland Song Network explain, HSN board members and members of the LMA developed the criteria for selection: musicians must reside in Lawrence/Douglas County, Kansas, and they must have a catalog of original songs, performance and

ABOVE Doug DuBois’ influence as a musician continues after his death through the Doug DuBois Harmony Fund. Photograph courtesy Marjean Brooks. OPPOSITE Several Lawrence musical groups received funds from the Doug DuBois Harmony Fund to attend the annual Folk Alliance International conference.

audience engagement experience and a desire to take advantage of the connections, showcases, and education available through attendance at the conference.

The committee received and reviewed applications, awarding scholarships and additional assistance to Miki P, Spencer & Rains, Bad Alaskan, MoonShroom, Christena Graves, Sky Smeed, Folk in the Flow, and Sweet Lil and the Nothings. (Bad Alaskan and Folk in the Flow are also featured as artists in this magazine’s Sounds section.)

“He’d be astounded that his estate could do something like this. He would just be amazed. But it seemed to me that as we had these funds to spend, that it would be great to help Lawrence artists in some way.”

Dalene Bradford

“He’d be astounded that his estate could do something like this,” says DuBois’ sister, Dalene Bradford, who administers the Doug DuBois Harmony Fund along with Brooks and their brother Dwight DuBois. “He would just be amazed. But it seemed to me that as we had these funds to spend, that it would be great to help Lawrence artists in some way.”

After meeting members of the Heartland Song Network, Bradford was impressed with how an organization can assist regional artists by helping them grow their business and visibility in the music community.

“We have a lot of great artists, but they don’t always find their way to a larger stage in the metaphorical sense,” Bradford says. “I saw that instead of giving Folk Alliance money for scholarships, [we] could make it bigger than that. You could make it an experience for them to go to Folk Alliance and get in front of these larger audiences, but then also this group could help them learn more about the business of music and get introduced to a group of people from all over the world who could influence their trajectory.”

In addition to providing those eight scholarships and training, the fund allowed the musicians to present the Lawrence Free State Room, a dedicated showcase room at the conference.

As Powell and Ennis explain, “Our presence at Folk Alliance through a private showcase room is an opportunity to spread that message to audiences across the US and internationally.”

LMA’s Carswell echoes that idea, saying that the showcase presents the “range of diverse sounds and perspectives that each artist brings” and the “vibrant music scene in Lawrence.”

Jesse Carr, the owner of Beautiful Music and board member for the Kansas State Picking and Fiddling Championships, says that DuBois’ foundation supports exactly what DuBois would want supported.

“He was a community guy,” says Carr. “He always wanted more people to be exposed to this thing, to this kind of music—especially old-time music.”

Carr adds that DuBois was a proponent of the music and an advocate for people coming together to play and perform old-time fiddle and Appalachian string band tunes.

“We have an old-time jam weekly here at the shop,” Carr says, “and we have it at Fidpick. It really feels like this is what he would want us to do, you know? The fact that there are people walking by—kids and parents and kids that go to school with my kid who had no idea this even existed—and they’re like, ‘Wow, this is really interesting!’ I think he would be happy.”

Brooks agrees.

“It’s made in heaven,” she says.

of the Honeysuckle! Attack

Michael Pearce

Story and photography by

Bill Skepnek

has been fighting a war in his Lawrence backyard for over a decade. The first dozen or so years he fought alone. The last three years he’s paid professionals to help from getting overrun.

“I can’t let up. It’s attack, attack, attack,” says Skepnek from his home near the University of Kansas campus. “If I let up for even a year or two, my backyard will be nothing but those bushes. It’s a fight I never see ending, sadly. They’re horrible.”

This berated bush is the honeysuckle. In its many varieties, it grows thick along the edges of many woodlands and tree lines, quickly spreading into nearby forests or fields. The imported, decorative honeysuckle has become one of the most common and problematic plants in Lawrence.

Each of the many thousands of honeysuckles bring possible disaster to our native vegetation, from the tiniest wildflower to the tallest trees. Because of the sweet-smelling, lovely blooming honeysuckle, many species of wildlife face serious habitat threats.

Can dominate the Kansas landscape

“Bush honeysuckle could be a total landscape changer. It can totally take over and smother out plants near the forest floor and create basically a monoculture,” says Tim Urban, a Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks wildlife biologist. “It may be quite a few years, but when those big mature, native trees finally die, there could be none growing up to take their place.”

It’s a problem getting steadily worse.

Tyler Fike, Lawrence’s horticulture and forestry manager, says bush honeysuckle is widespread throughout Lawrence’s 4,000 acres of public lands.

Even with no forestry training, Skepnek can easily spot bush honeysuckle growing in many yards and woodlands, including many areas where it wasn’t growing even a few years ago. The problem stretches far into the countryside.

When asked about the honeysuckle’s presence along the Kansas River, Kansas Riverkeeper Dawn Buehler says, “It’s everywhere, it really is.”

Alarming as the threats of bush honeysuckle are to professionals, the plant seems to be especially appreciated— and often encouraged—by most of the public.

“It’s always one of the first plants to green up in the spring, often large areas at a time, and people tired of winter like to see that,” says Ryan Rastok, a past forester with the Kansas Forest Service and current owner of Lawrence Arborists. “Then it gets a lot of those white fragrant blossoms and eventually vibrant red berries. They hold their green leaves and those berries, long after most trees and plants have become barren. It’s easy to see why so many people like bush honeysuckle.”

There are several varieties of bush honeysuckle, all considered invasive species in Kansas, with the Amur honeysuckle (Lonicera maackii) being particularly problematic in the region around Lawrence.

Even so, there are nurseries in Kansas that continue selling bush honeysuckle as ornamental plants.

No time to wait

Based on how quickly bush honeysuckle has spread to create current problems, arborists and biologists urge immediate and sustained action to avoid a complete take over.

When Urban started his job in northeast Kansas in 2005, bush honeysuckle was far from a problem. He doesn’t recall seeing much of it.

He’s since seen it take over some broad areas. One example he gave was Lake Olathe in Johnson County.

“It happened fast. It may have started off as six or eight decorative bushes, but now it’s overrun the area. The damage is done there,” says Urban. “A lot of places, it’s so thick I can’t move through it. If I can’t, a deer probably can’t. It’s a shame.”

On a March trip to Lawrence’s Dad Perry Park, even Rastok was impressed (and depressed) by how quickly bush honeysuckle had invaded the woodlands.

“It’s already spread well into the woodlands here,” he said, standing on the edge and pointing to green bushes 50 yards into the trees. “It’s easy to see how fast it can spread and take over. This is going to just get worse and worse.”

According to an Illinois study, bush honeysuckle can shade out low-growing and sprouting native vegetation and rob enough nutrients and water from the soil to reduce the growth rate of mature trees by up to 40%.

Skepnek said bush honeysuckle had already overtaken much of his 1.5-acre lot when he arrived in 2008. Even with his intense eradication efforts, the problematic plants have just kept coming.

ABOVE Rastok says that once you learn to identify honeysuckle, you can easily see how big of a problem the invasive plant has become. Photograph of Asian bush honeysuckle berries courtesy Kansas Forest Service.

summer 2024

“Basically, I’ve won the fight. ... I am the bane of honeysuckle.” –Bill Skepnek

Some of the spread across the eastern half of the U.S. can be credited to intentional landscape plantings. The bushes spread well on their own, with a shallow root system constantly forming new crowns, which sprout more bushes.

Several bird species help the spread by feeding on bush honeysuckle berries, then excreting the viable seeds as they move about.

Urban notes that even in its relationship to birds, the bush honeysuckle is doing no favors. The plant’s berries lack most of the nutrients found in the native foods Kansas birds require to thrive.

How to take the woodlands back

A major step towards dealing with the building threats of bush honeysuckle lies in public education. First, of course, is simple plant identification.

“Once you learn identification, it’s easy to see how big a problem they’ve become,” says Rastok.

Identification is easiest in the early spring or late fall, when they’re one of the first bushes to consistently hold green leaves. Rastok notes that the leaves of the bush honeysuckle set directly opposite each other on the stems. When broken, sizable stems and branches have a brown, hollow core. There are usually several trunks rising from the base of each bush. By late April, the bushes will be loaded with dainty, fragrant white blossoms. The red berries come in midsummer and usually sit in pairs that form clusters.

It’s hoped people will use that ability to identify bush honeysuckle to help stop its spread. Though it takes vigilance, and some labor, most homeowners already have what it takes to reduce the spread of bush honeysuckle.

Small, newly sprouted bushes can be pulled and uprooted like common weeds. Small root crowns from young bushes can be dug up.

Rastok cautions that simply cutting bush honeysuckle at the surface triggers rigorous growth in the root crown. It makes the problem much worse down the road.

Treating cut stubs with a bit of herbicide within a few minutes kills the root system any time after the first green-up.

Accidental damage to desirable plants can easily be avoided by dabbing the needed chemical only on the stub with a small foam-tipped brush or specialized herbicide contact applicator. Actually, getting others involved in the fight frustrates those who dedicate much of their time and money to eradicating bush honeysuckle.

Some who are dedicated to fighting the invading species have organized groups and furnished equipment on workdays to clear sizable areas. An Audubon Society chapter in Wichita has honeysuckle removal field trips every year; their efforts

focus on a local park, where birding habitat is seriously threatened by bush honeysuckle. Buehler said Friends of the Kaw has included bush honeysuckle removal as an important part of its Riverbank Restoration Projects since 2018.

Obstacles and possibilities

But as of now, on Lawrence public lands, bush honeysuckle isn’t getting near the removal efforts most experts would like to see. Fike said his department is held back by three key elements: budget, manpower and public support.

“We are very aware of bush honeysuckle’s aggressive nature, and we understand the possible long-term consequences,” Fike says. “But right now, we just can’t afford to focus a lot of staff and funding towards that problem. To put more money and time towards [bush honeysuckle], we’d have to cut back on other important things. Hopefully things will change.”

He says the state mandates that his department first eradicate plants on the Kansas noxious plants list. That includes invasives like sericea lespedeza, Johnson grass and musk thistle.

If bush honeysuckle was on that list, Fike says, it would make eradication more of a priority and possibly open avenues to more funding opportunities.

Even if his department got a huge boost in funding to address bush honeysuckle, Fike thinks there would be a spirited discussion about how to eradicate it.

One of the common, most effective ways to counter bush honeysuckle is a method called “mist blowing.”

It’s done primarily in the fall, after native vegetation has dropped its foliage and largely gone dormant and immune to herbicides. Fike said large areas of bush honeysuckle could be eradicated safely by having staff carefully spray a fine mist of herbicide over the green and absorbent honeysuckle leaves.

“It’s an effective and safe method, well backed by research, but it’s a sensitive topic,” says Fike. “Here in Lawrence, people can be especially sensitive to the use of any sprays. It would be a hard sell, even though it could make a heck of difference.”

But bush honeysuckle can be pushed back.

Skepnek wants others to know there is hope.

He says he has recovered his yard by removing the honeysuckle and planting brome, a strong and dense-rooted grass that makes it harder for bush honeysuckle to gain purchase in the lawn.

The war isn’t entirely over for Skepnek. He has found a small amount of bush honeysuckle trying to take hold.

But he’s ready for it.

“Basically, I’ve won the fight,” he says. “It’s next. It will be taken care of. I am the bane of honeysuckle.”

ABOVE The bush honeysuckle crowds out native plants in places such as Dad Perry Park.

events

Lawrence Farmers’ Market

Ongoing–November 23

lawrencefarmersmarket.org

The state’s oldest continually operating farmers market welcomes visitors on Saturdays from 7:30-11:30 a.m. until November 23.

Cottin’s Hardware Farmers Market

Ongoing–September 26

cottinshardware.com

Gathering of local food vendors in the parking lot of Cottin’s Hardware on Thursdays from 4-6:30 p.m.

Lawrence 1970s Project

ongoing–December 31 watkinsmuseum.org

The Watkins Museum of History hosts an exhibit focusing on the political protests, cultural changes, and economic changes that transformed Lawrence during the 1970s.

City

Band Concerts

May 29–July 10 (TBD)

lawrencecitybandonFacebook

A beloved bit of Americana in the heart of Lawrence is repeated each Wednesday night at 8 p.m. as the city band provides a free concert from the South Park gazebo (or in Murphy Hall on the University of Kansas campus in the event of bad weather).

Storydwelling

May 31–July 27

lawrenceartscenter.org

Artist Rosa Leff presents her papercut art depicting city landscapes. INSIGHT gallery presentation by artist on June 1.

Lawrence

PRIDE Street Party

June 1

lawrencekspride.com

A downtown parade and evening street party to celebrate and honor the contributions and presence of the community’s LGBTQ+ communities.

Fiddler on the Roof

June 7–23 (various dates)

theatrelawrence.com

A staging of the classic musical chronicling a Jewish milkman’s struggle to keep his family together and his traditions alive during a period of racial and religious oppression.

Grover Barn Talk and Tour

with Kerry Altenbernd

Jun 13

lplks.org

Historian Kerry Altenbernd talks about the history and significance of Lawrence’s Grover Barn with a focus on its role in the Underground Railroad.

summer 2024

Jacob Lawrence and John Brown

June 13

spencerart.ku.edu

Curator Kate Meyer leads a tour and talk of Jacob Lawrence’s paintings of the life and legacy of John Brown. The presentation is part of the senior lecture series, but free and open to all members of the public.

Juneteenth

June 15

lawrenceksjuneteenth.org

Community gathering to honor the history and contributions of Lawrence’s Black residents featuring vendors, presentations and musical celebrations.

Rags and Riches: The Raiment of our Journey

June 15

lied.ku.edu

Lawrence playwright Rita Rials presents an interactive staging highlighting African American history through the lens of culture and fashion.

Summer Solstice Celebration

June 20

klt.org

The Kansas Land Trust celebrates Summer Solstice at Cider Gallery with a bonfire, food, drink, music and more.

Midsummer

Night on Mass

June 21

downtownlawrence.com

Downtown businesses hold special sidewalk sales and discounts for an evening of shopping and strolling.

St. John’s Mexican Fiesta

June 22

stjohnsfiesta.com

Annual celebration of music, food, and dancing to honor Lawrence’s Mexican American community and raise scholarships for Lawrence students.

events

summer 2024

Free State Festival

June 25–30

freestatefestival.org

The Lawrence Arts Center presents a week of films, lectures, concerts and more with headliners Makaya McCraven, Jana Schmieding, and Joe Rainey.

Final Fridays

June 28

explorelawrence.com

This Friday (and the last Friday of every month), Lawrence galleries, studios and businesses open their doors for an evening of new art showings and artist-hosted events throughout the city’s Downtown and central Arts District.

The Wallflowers

July 12

Libertyhall.net

Grammy Award winners The Wallflowers performs at Liberty Hall.

Douglas County Fair

July 29–August 3

dgcountyfair.com

Come during the day for animal showings, pie contests and more or come during the evening for concerts, carnival rides and demolition derby. A county tradition for all ages.

Amyl and the Sniffers

July 30

thegranada.com

Australia’s hard-core indie punk-rock group performs for one night in Lawrence following the release of two new singles “U Should Not Be Doing That” and “Facts.”

Llama and Alpaca Show

August 1

Wake up early and come to the 9:00 am Douglas County Fair ringside competition or follow live Instagram updates from Lawrence Magazine as we cheer on the 4-H students and their charming companions.

Lawrence Opera Theatre

August 3–18 (various dates)

lawrenceopera.org

The Lawrence Opera Theatre presents its summer concert season with performances at various venues highlighting the music of Gilbert & Sullivan, Mozart, Adam Gorb and more.

Civil War on the Border

August 23–25

watkinsmuseum.org

The Watkins Museum of History hosts its annual series of lectures, tours and other events to commemorate the 1863 attack on Lawrence by Confederate guerrilla forces and the legacy of the Civil War conflict on the city’s history and character.

Kansas Picking and Fiddling

Championships

August 27

fidpick.com

South Parks hosts a celebration of folk and roots music.

Carnegie Building Celebration

August 29 lplks.org

The Lawrence Public Library honors the Carnegie Building—the city’s public library from 1904 to 1972—with a history presentation by Shana Woodyard Stuart. A free event in partnership with Watkins Community Museum and Lawrence Parks & Recreation Department.

Kaw River Roots Festival

June 21–23

kawriverroots.com

A celebration of Americana music with two days of indoor concerts and events. This year’s fourthannual festival features Splitlip Rayfield, Opal Agafia, and more.

KU Football Season Opener

August 28-29

kuathletics.com

The University of Kansas Jayhawks football team opens its 2024 season with a home game against Lindenwood at Children’s Mercy Park in Kansas City. Celebrations in designated party zones will take place across Lawrence on the day before the game.

Best of Lawrence Winners Bash

August 28

bestoflawrence.com

Drinks, shout-outs and recognition of all those who won the community-wide online voting in over 200 categories to celebrate the businesses, people, groups and events that define Lawrence.

On Indigenuity

September 4

lplks.org

Daniel Wildcat (Yuchi member of the Muscogee Nation) and Tyler Kimbrell (Muscogee Creek Nation) present a talk on Indigenous knowledge and responsibilities in caring for the natural world.

The Hawk

September 7

trailhawks.com

The Trailhawks running club hosts its annual showcase race at Clinton Lake with a 50-mile, 75mile, and a 100-mile race routes.

Haskell Indian Art Market

September 7–8

HaskellIndianArtMarketonFB

One of the nation’s premier open-air markets for authentic Native-made art. Dances, musical celebrations, and food vendors accompany the market.