The Northwest Files

Dinosaurs and Dust (or, No Country for Epicureans)

Laura and I have been promising ourselves an adventure for months. This past week, we took that adventure. We had two goals: We set out to see the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, which is maybe two hours east of our home here in Redmond. And we aimed to see the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center, along with a segment of the old trail itself. That’s about five hours east of here.

We had several other goals, as well – these included being well-fed and well-lodged. We were not wholly successful in achieving those goals. But I’ll get to that. First, this: Please click on the thumbnail photos in order to view them fullsize.

The John Day National Monument is composed of five units. We visited just two. Our first stop was at the Painted Hills unit. And spectacular these hills are. They are composed of layers of volcanic ash, debris and chemicals deposited over about 40 million years.

The unit is small, just about a mile square. But it contains stark, amazing beauty – wide, near-horizontal swaths of color decorate these hills, as if some giant, god-like artist took a swipe at these hills after dipping his/her brush into many colors of paint, rich reds, oranges, yellows and white.

And there’s buried treasure there. These hills also are the home of many types of leaf fossils, though I’m sure you’d be prosecuted, shot, then skinned, for trying to find them. But in the overall story of the John Day Fossil Beds, these are small potatoes.

If it’s fossils you want, you have to go to the fossil center itself, a few miles down the road from the Painted Hills unit. Its real name is the Thomas Condon Paleontology Center and it’s located in what is called the Sheep Rock unit. It is spectacular.

According to what we learned there, a 10,000-square-mile chunk of Eastern Oregon is home to the most spectacular trove of prehistoric animals and plant fossils on the globe. The TCPC contains a vast collection of the fossilized remains of those organisms, documenting about 50 million years. It does it through large displays that explain at least seven paleontological eras evident at the site.

The differences between these eras are extreme, ranging from dry deserts to wet, sticky marshlands, to moderate savannas. Our takeaway from this is that Earth never has stopped changing and is changing still.

The fossils run the gamut from predators to prey, to mammals to reptiles to birds, to insects, to leaves, and to fruit, nuts and seeds. The variety is hard to take in.

Next stop was John Day itself, a former booming gold-rush town that now boasts 1,200 residents.

It was here that we got the first clue vis-à-vis dining. There were not many restaurants here. Hey, why would there be? This place is charming, sure, and it rests in a beautiful environment, but it’s tiny.

The solution? When in doubt in Oregon, repair to the nearest brew pub. It will offer pub grub, which usually is pretty good, and craft-brewed beer, which always is excellent. In this case, it was the 1188 Brew Pub. Not a mistake.

Our next stop was Baker City, about three hours east over mountainous roads. This is Oregon’s gold country. Gold is found in quartz, which is found in granite, which is found in mountainous upthrusts that are very different from the vulcanism that formed so much of the rest of Oregon. And these, the Elkhorn Mountains and the Blue Mountains, are real granite mountains, just like the Sierra Nevadas. So they hold gold.

Baker City, it turns out, was the center of Eastern Oregon’s gold rush, which occurred between the 1850s and the 1950s. This was by no means the equivalent of the California Gold Rush, but still it was significant enough for the merchants and bankers of Baker City to become rich.

That wealth today is reflected by a significant collection of magnificent stone buildings that line the town’s wide streets. Those streets today are very quiet, with a number of empty store fronts, signifying that the good times are past and gone. Still, it’s a very pretty little town. I hope that better times are coming.

Those better times would do well to burnish the Geiser Grand Hotel, on the city’s main street, where we spent three nights. Nice old place but to my mind, wanting a bit of a touch-up here and there, as well as some attention to detail.

Not least in the hotel restaurant. We dined there the first night. We vowed never to return. Second night, we hit a brew pub, with the expected satisfactory results. Third night, we hit a Mexican restaurant. It was bloody awful. So back to brew pubs.

We were in Baker City because of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center, perhaps 10 miles east of town. What a treat that place is. It sits by itself atop a hill adjacent to the old trail, which remains baking in the sun and stretching into the east and west distance, as it has for 175 years.

The center contains a series of dioramas featuring beautifully realized life-size displays showing pioneers of all ilk during imagined snapshot moments of their trip from Independence, Missouri, the trail’s beginning, to Oregon City, now a Portland suburb, where it ended. It includes trappers, teamsters, whites, Indians, oxen, horses, men, women, children. There also are displays of artifacts.

I think what we liked the most, however, was the hour-long film about life on the trail. This was not an easy trip. It took six months and basically cost everything the travelers had. And sometimes it cost more than that. It is said that the 2,000-mile-long trail is lined by an average of 80 graves per mile.

Mortality at this level seems a very high price to pay for the privilege of carving a new home, a new life, out of the Oregon wilderness, which was still many weeks away from this place.

Though choking dust no longer marks the passage of emigrants, the trail remains very well-marked. The steel wheels of thousands of wagons pounded, battered and packed the trail’s surface to the point where to this day, nothing grows in the trail’s ruts, so the trail remains easily visible. You can see it on Google Earth. Or you can go there, as Laura and I did, and walk on it for a short distance, kicking up our own dust.

I’m mighty happy that I’m walking the trail now, rather than 150 years ago, when it would have been mighty hard to find a brew pub. Those were hard people. They had to be.

Sumpter, a dozen or so miles west of Baker City, contains two wonderful echoes of the gold rush. They are the Sumpter Railroad and the Sumpter Dredge. We found the railroad yards deserted. Seasonal tourists gone, the operation is mostly closed at this time of year. All the better to wander, allowing ourselves to be led by our curiosities.

Same with the dredge, which still floats in a pond that it dug for itself. This thing was built in 1935 and operated – basically eating wide swaths of the valley surface in which it sits – until 1953. The damage is so immense, and so permanent, that you can find the dredge’s damage easily visible on Google Earth just to the south of Sumpter. It is not a positive testament to the greed of men.

Our final stop was Joseph, a high-mountain arts/ranching community in the Wallowa Mountains, said to be Oregon’s alps, about two hours north and east of Baker City. It’s a cute little town with a couple of high-quality galleries, plus the foundry in which the bronze art contained in those galleries is cast using the lost wax method.

I’m still not sure I understand how that works, but I now have a much better idea, having taken the factory tour, which happens only at 11 am, just as the workers are about to take their lunch break. It’s worth doing.

So is a lunch break. Having learned our lesson, which is basically that the boondocks of Eastern Oregon is no country for epicureans, we again hit the local brew pub, then checked in to the Belle Pepper Bed & Breakfast, which is contained in a nicely restored old home on one of Joseph’s side streets. Nice place. But they sure do keep the place cold. And if you are not ready to have breakfast at 8:30 am, you don’t get breakfast.

Dinner that night was at the Wallowa Lodge, adjacent to Wallowa Lake, prime fishing water and also, at its north end, the burial place of Chief Joseph, chief of the Nez Perce. Who apparently were not treated well by the U.S. Government. But tell me, which tribe was? And thus do we have America’s original sin.

But now, except for a quick stop at the woolen mills in Pendleton, the trip is over. We opt for the easy way home, much of the way on Interstate 84. Man, this is gorgeous country. It makes me very happy to call Oregon our home, and to be so situated that a wonderful adventure is just a few hours away from home base. That said, however, home remains the best place of all. Plus, the food is the best!

-JFT

The Marijuana Train

We’ve had visitors this past week, our final batch of a very busy summer. These folks, very old friends, date all the way back to boarding school. So we were thrilled to see them.

They expressed a desire to visit a pot shop. This is not on our usual itinerary when showing guests around, but OK, cool.

As you most likely know, pot is legal here in Oregon, so there are state-controlled pot shops everywhere. The one we visited yesterday, Oregrown, in downtown Bend, is like others I’ve been in: It is clean, neat, well-organized, well-lighted, professional.

We weren’t looking to get high. Rather, we were interested in pot’s healing properties. When it comes to this, there are unbelievers. But one of us, an RN, possesses an open mind. She wanted information. We went to Oregrown to get some.

We came away with information provided by staffers there who were so young that automatically I, a very cranky and professionally skeptical old man, just did not trust.

Never mind. After talking with our disgustingly youthful sales person, I bought a jar of Dragon’s Blend balm, made by a firm called Medicine Farm Botanicals.

Hey, this stuff is not cheap: 2 ounces, 60 bucks. Annie bought some too, different stuff and in a smaller jar. I don’t know precisely what she bought. What I bought is composed of 260 mg of THC and just 15 mg of CBD.

That seemed wrong because THC is the component of marijuana that gets you high, which is not what I wanted; and CBD is the component that has, we are told, healing properties, which is what I wanted. So the percentages, for the result I hoped for, were reversed. I went ahead with the deal, repeating my usual refrain, “I’ll try anything twice.”

We came back home, had dinner, sat around and chatted, then we all retired to our respective lairs, promising to apply our balms and compare notes in the morning.

My area of interest involves my lower back. Several years ago, I had surgery on my lumbar region. The surgery solved the most pressing problem, but left me stiff and sore, unable to stand upright without being very uncomfortable. I’ve been walking around bent over, like the old man that I am, as a result.

So last night before crawling into bed I applied some of my Dragon’s Blend to the skin covering my lower spine. I rubbed in just a small amount and went to sleep, hoping that the listed activation time of 15 minutes was correct.

This morning, to my considerable surprise, I easily walked upright, rather than bent over like the great apes to which I have been so appropriately compared. I had no discomfort from my lower back. None at all.

My co-conspirator also used a bit of the balm she bought. She reported similar salubrious results.

I have lived a very active life, having backpacked hundreds of miles, fallen from motorcycles several times, worked hard bucking hay bales and sacks of poultry feed, so by this point in my life, 75 years having passed, pretty much everything hurts.

But not, for the first time in years, my lower back.

This evening, not quite 24 hours after the first application of my Dragon’s Blend balm, the effect has pretty much dissipated.

But no worries, I have more of the stuff. I plan to use it.

I have little interest in using pot to get high. But if it mitigates the effects of a long, active life that has featured, among other things, broken bones, replaced knees and strained, worn-out joints, I certainly am on board the marijuana train.

–JFT

Music vs. Music

This past weekend marked the beginning of the Central Oregon Mastersingers’ choral season. This beginning was composed of a weekend-long retreat to begin preparations for our first concert, which is maybe six weeks away. 

As much as I love participating in great choral music, something I‘ve done since I was a teenager, I’m sitting this one out.

This weekend also marked the 2018 Sisters Folk Festival. The festival was composed of three days of folk, blues and bluegrass performed on 11 indoor and outdoor stages in Sisters, Oregon, about 15 miles from us. I flat adore folk music. If you know me at all, you know that.

Up close and personal with Claire Lynch, center, and her dynamic band.

I really hated being presented with this choice – folk festival or choral retreat.

I attend the choral retreat, my heart and mind are filled with the precise scholarship of majestically performed classical music. This sort of thing fills my heart and makes me happy not only to be alive, but to be upon stage with my choral colleagues where this beautiful music is being made.

I attend the Sisters Folk Festival, I feast with Laura and our friends Bob and Charlene on the peaceful, raucous acoustic music of Americana, the music of the people, the land, the country. The music of people living, dying, suffering, rejoicing, struggling, prevailing. The music of folks in this glorious, maddening, wonderful country. The music of guitars, banjos, mandolins, fiddles, voices, all in rhythm and harmony.

I love it dearly. I have loved it dearly since I was a child listening to my parents’ old Burl Ives records on a wind-up Victrola.

So yes, the Sisters Folk Festival. It couldn’t be anything else.

Our first year here, 2016, we were too late to buy tickets. They sell out early. Last year, the festival was last-minute cancelled. Tiny Sisters was blanketed with smoke from a near-by forest fire that was so thick that just seeing across one of the town’s streets was almost impossible. Health conditions were horrible.

So this year’s festival? Absolutely!

A small-venue recital by Erin Cole-Baker was peaceful and relaxing.

Stacked here downstairs are two guitars, four banjos, a mandolin and a bass. I play them all and have done so since I was a high-schooler.  Those days, folk music was where I lived. Girls, cars? sure, interesting but confounding. School? Hah! But oh, that dusty, gritty, poetic old music of the people!

I really regret missing out on this first of three concerts of the Mastersingers season - missing this retreat automatically means I am ineligible. But I will pick things up in time for our Christmas concert, and be ready, and in top voice, I hope, for our spring concert – ill-fitting tux, which I hate, and all.

Meanwhile, I will have memories of the acts we enjoyed this weekend. A couple of great dinners. Time with Laura and our pals. And yeah, I’ll also have the event T-shirt. Much better than any damned concert-dress tux. It’s a net gain.

Now, bring on that choral music. I’m ready!

-JFT

Notes from the Culture Wars

Went to a wedding over the weekend. Why? I have no idea whatsoever, since we barely know the father of the bride.

But he is a dairy farmer and milks Jersey cows, so I guess he’s part of our extended Jersey family.

Brother-in-law Bob Tailor and I got there fashionably late, just as planned. Hey, this place was so far out in the woods I expected Ned Beatty to jump out of the trees in full “Deliverance” costume.

Laura and her sister went on ahead to help out, which I think was the real reason they were invited. Those two know how to work. In any case, once there, we were surrounded by people in cowboy hats and ball caps, women in skirts and cowboy (girl?) boots. Country music from the P.A. system. Oh, swell!

I was told that prior to our arrival, someone on the dais with a mic asked if there were any Democrats in the audience. One woman stood up and raised her hand to be counted. The guy with the mic said something like, “Well, you won’t be for long.”

Who knows what that meant?

But OK, now I’m pissed. I missed a chance to stand up and be counted, and that annoys me. Furthermore, I missed a chance to now only declare my allegiance, but to inform those fine Trumpy mouth-breathers that I also am a retired newspaper editor and reporter. And no, those magazine years don’t count. An elitist, I suppose, in their eyes.

Probably I would not have gotten out of the place without being beaten up. But the lawsuit that would have resulted would have been worth it and the results would have been glorious.

Sometimes timing is everything.

–JFT

Bugatti of the Lake

Probably we’ve all heard of the Lady of the Lake, but how many of us have heard of the Bugatti of the Lake?

A few of us have, I would think, particularly if we are gearheads with a special interest in the classics. (Be sure to click on the photographs to see them full-size.)

The story is true, of course. The Bugatti Brescia – a very early Bugatti model – you see in these photographs was dumped into Lago di Maggiore, in the Italian Lakes District, something like 80 years ago because its caretakers wanted to avoid fines associated with nonpayment of import duties by the car’s owner. One gathers that its location was always more-or-less known, and finally someone decided to retrieve it. Full story here:

https://newatlas.com/the-legendary-lake-maggiore-1925-bugatti-type-22-brescia/14045/

I caught up with the car at the Mullen Museum in Oxnard, California, a couple of years ago. Collector and kazillionaire Peter Mullen bought the thing – if memory serves, the purchase price, in the millions, went to charity – and decided that conserving what was left of it, rather than attempting a restoration, was the right thing to do.

A pretty cool and forward-thinking decision, sez I.

The car is very carefully and sympathetically displayed in exactly the condition it was in when it was resurrected from Maggiore’s depths. Check it out next time you’re anywhere near Oxnard.

–JFT

Let There Be Music, They Commanded!

I don’t play my banjo much anymore. I just don’t. Not sure why. But I find myself in a position which requires a concert. Which is strange, because usually, people are all to happy to not hear me play my banjo.

Well, actually, it will be a mini-concert. The items you see here, an ancient Martin guitar and an even older Vega longneck banjo, will be my co-conspirators.

This is all about co-conspirators. The foremost of those will be my pal of untold decades, Mike Kicenski, best musician I’ve ever seen. The others will be maybe a half-dozen boarding-school classmates who are gathering here for – well, just to hang out, chat, visit, hike, watch me grill volcano burgers, enjoy Central Oregon, and remember when we were young.

I’d be happy to leave it at that but two of the most persuasive of these – by name, Marilyn and Charlene, who demanded and received a mini-concert three years ago at a similar gathering – have instructed me that a concert is not just expected, but required. Listen, I was terrified of these two when we were kids. I still am.

Like my sweetie Laura, of whom I’m even more terrified, these are people one does not disappoint. So I’ve assembled a set list and even, like, rehearsed. A little. So yes, the music will ring out in spite of arthritic fingers and quavering voice. And yes, my pal Mike, who as a musician is light years better than me, will chime in. The wine will flow, feet will tap, we will have a ball. And we will miss those who because of distance or early passing, are unable to join us.

-JFT

It's Time for a Reset

I’ve been thinking that we are long overdue for a reset. This current hateful GOP administration, powered by selfishness, greed, and loathing for anyone who isn’t wealthy and white, provides more than enough proof of that. By “reset,” I’m thinking of a change in our national attitudes about the way we treat people, about the way our actions continue to express our national character.

This is simplified, and not strictly chronological, but it gets to the core, I think, of what is so deeply wrong with us as a people.

• We, as immigrants, murdered millions of Native Americans and stole their land – basically, all of North America.
• For more than 500 years, we embraced slavery (from1526, when the first slaves were brought here from Africa by the Spanish to 1865, when Congress and the states ratified the 13^th Amendment, which abolished slavery).
• In spite of that 13th Amendment, racism continued rampant, with lynchings, bombing of black churches, the murders of white civil-rights activists, and more, right down to today’s very public expressions of hatred for African Americans, expressions seemingly endorsed by the GOP administration.
• Even today, white cops who shoot and kill unarmed black men rarely are punished.
• After Pearl Harbor, for no practical reason, we imprisoned perfectly innocent Japanese Americans who after their release, rarely were able to resume their prewar lives. And their property? Forget about it. That was taken by white people.
• During the period between the California Gold Rush and the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad, thousands of Chinese people were brought here, were worked hard and paid poorly. Then, thanks to the Chinese Exclusion Act, the inflow of Chinese to the U.S. was stopped. And vote? The Naturalization Act of 1790 prevented anyone who wasn’t white from voting.
• We consigned Mexican Americans to second- or third-class status.

In short, if your skin was not white, you got screwed.

Sure, we did some good things, as well:

• We undid the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Naturalization Act and passed the Voting Rights Act.
• With the help of our allies, we defeated Fascism.
• We supported and enjoyed the benefits of the greatest social benefits ever seen here, thanks to Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson. These include Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.
• We put men on the moon, leading to a blossom of technology that continues to flower.
• We made positive steps to preserve treasured natural resources and parks from exploitation and misuse, and we made enormous strides toward cleaning up unhealthy air and water.

Now, with tacit but very real permission from the GOP administration, racial hatred once again is rampant and out in the open. But that’s not all:

• Voting rights increasingly are under attack, especially in the South and Midwest.
• We celebrate ignorance, regularly ignoring the inexorable rules of science.
• Latino children are being stolen from their parents.
• Fascism is on the rise right here in the U.S., with some voters saying they think democracy isn’t such a good thing.
• People whose religion does not conform to Christian dogma are under attack. Not that this is anything new.
• Social benefits and programs are under attack. So are environmental rules.

And on the economic side, in spite of a growing economy and a booming GDP:

• Wages are static.
• Housing prices are rising.
• The middle class is shrinking.
• The three wealthiest people in the U.S. own more wealth than the bottom half of the nation’s population. (Yes, this is true. If you think this is defensible, you are part of the problem.)

The rug has been jerked out from under – well, almost everyone who isn’t white, wealthy, or both.

All of us are on our way toward becoming serfs, right here in our own country and the votes of some of us even help that happen.

Here are a few of the reasons why, I think:

• They are terrified of losing their gun rights.
• They fear and hate abortion and a woman’s right to choose.
• And maybe most important, no matter their economic status, they see this hateful GOP administration as the last bulwark between them and people whose skin is not white. They fear those people, hate the fact that their numbers are growing, and are appalled that they actually have all the same rights as white people.

So yeah, time for a reset. A reset that renews our faith in education and science, in the value of working people, and in the necessity of paying working a decent living wage, of treating everyone – everyone – with dignity and respect.

As things are, we are on a frightening downward trajectory. Our institutions, our ways of life, are under attack.

There are a few things we can do about that. Most important is to arm ourselves with facts. I mean real, objective facts. Read some newspapers, god damnit, instead of getting your “news” from the TV, or, worse, the Internet. And then think about what you read. Use your head.

Then decide. Which side are you on? Are you on the side of hate and divisiveness, of poverty for all but politicians and corporate presidents? Of disaster for everyone who isn’t white and privileged? Or are you on the side of a decent chance at a decent life for every person?

Seems like an easy decision, no?

After you decide, get out and vote. In every election. Vote for schoolboards, city council members, county commissioners, and more; vote for people who reflect your values, who will work for the common good. Educate yourselves on the issues and vote. But for god’s sake, do it from an informed perspective that it is backed by facts, rather than bullshit generated in political echo chambers.

Most important, vote in the 2018 mid-term elections. They are just a few months away. And then, whatever happens, avoid complacency. Get ready to vote again in 2020.

Make no mistake, we are on the verge of losing our country. Whether we do or not is down to all of us rejecting the hate and divisiveness that has enflamed our country. We – you and I – are the firefighters who can put out those flames.

-JFT

Doomed, I tell you!

Fires in the Swedish Arctic and across the rest of Europe, rising sea levels, melting ice packs, a complete refusal by the GOP administration not just to recognize climate change, but to do something about it – in short, scanning the big picture suggests that we are toast. I believe that sooner, rather than later, we as a species will become extinct.

Earth will be the better for that. Look at how badly we’ve fucked the place up.

It has happened before. We were down to as few as 40 breeding pairs, one study suggests, worldwide. Or maybe as many as a few thousand. Those who survived were the lucky ones who just happened to live in microclimates in which subsistence farming was possible.

Don’t believe it? Here, read this:

Almost Extinct!

For this new disaster, subsistence farming may not be possible. Gonna be way too hot for farming.

A lot has been said about “saving the Earth.” Here’s a news flash for you – Earth does not need to be saved. It will do just fine. Over time, temperatures will return to normal and animal and plant life eventually will thrive.

Will humans be here to witness that? I do not think so. I just hope that our national patrimony, now on the verge of being destroyed by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, a dickhead who puts exploitational profit from our public lands ahead of historic preservation, can survive until extinction. The way things are going, that patrimony – preserved public lands, cliff dwellings, rock carvings – doesn’t deserve us.

This pretty much started for us in the U.S. with our refusal to sign onto the Kyoto Protocol in 1992, one of the first international agreements to try to tackle climate change through the reduction of greenhouse gasses.

“Too expensive,” business interests moaned. Republican business interests, naturally, tied to the politics of selfishness and greed.

So we’re about to go extinct. Don’t doubt it. It is in the cards. It will happen. Your progeny are doomed.

Thanks ever so much, you Republican asshats. If you vote Republican, you own this.

-JFT

A Survivor

I love California, even though I no longer reside there. The mountains, the ocean, the deserts, the sunrises and sunsets – but most of all, the history.

As it happens, when I was teenager, I happened to stumble upon a tiny, inconsequential piece of that history, which I still have.

It is an S.S. Stewart 5-string banjo, a fancy model known as the Universal Favorite #3, built in about 1888. It is exactly like the instrument shown on the cover of the Kingston Trio’s first record album. I was a big fan, so I was thrilled to find this thing. I paid 50 bucks for it. It was 1959, I was 16 years old; $50 was big money.

But old Sam Stewart built his instruments in Philadelphia. So why is this particular instrument a piece of the history of the Golden State?

Somehow, this banjo made its way westward to San Francisco. It’s owner, one E.E. Curtsworth, apparently lived at 2420 Fillmore Street. At least he engraved that name and address on the banjo’s tension hoop, the steel ring that keeps the banjo’s velum head taut. Here’s a look at that.

Man, I was curious about that. So, we went looking for my banjo’s home address. We found that address attached to the shop of a custom jeweler, part of a much larger building. Here’s a look at the building. The shop is at the lower right.

Remember what happened in 1906, just after 5:00 the morning of April 18? An enormous earthquake shook hell out of the city. Much of what wasn’t damaged by the seismic event was burned in a succession of fires.

I think this building may have survived the earthquake and fire; a Fillmore Street history says Fillmore Street itself was largely undamaged. In fact, a period photo showing the corner of Fillmore and O’Farrell, about eight blocks north of the 2420 address, shows buildings still standing, though reinforced by framing.

But here’s the thing: A close look at the two buildings immediately to the north of 2420 shows that they are much smaller, three stories tall, and are of wooden construction. I think this one may be concrete. And 2420, along with the two to the south of it, is six stories tall and looks newer than the two to the north. Were all three of them destroyed in 1906 and rebuilt? Who knows?

Was my old banjo present in this building the morning that San Francisco went crazy? I don’t know. But its residency at that address makes it a tiny piece of California history.

When I was younger and even dumber than I now am, I sought to “improve” this wonderful old piece. I installed modern geared tuners and I had the neck refinished. It needed none of that work. I eventually replaced the modern tuners with period friction items, but there’s nothing I can do to undo the refinishing foolishness.

I own several other banjos – or, rather, I am their caretakers, for they are of such quality that eventually they will be passed on to younger players who will treasure them as much as I have and, I hope, play them much more skillfully.

They all are of vastly superior tone, playability and quality to this old Stewart. But they do not have the history that this Stewart has. For me, that makes it very special indeed.

I should mention that my old violin is of similar vintage and has a name and date engraved into its wood. But I don’t play it. If I did, the noise, the sheer racket, would be cringeworthy.

Not so with this banjo. It still sounds great and I still get great pleasure from playing it. It makes great music, music that is anchored in history. I scarcely can tell you how much that means to me.

-JFT

The Music of Lady Liberty

This killer image, Lady Liberty with her right fist raised and a fine old guitar in her left hand, hits me right where I live. But you knew that.

This is a detail from the poster for the 2017 Sisters Folk Festival, a festival that didn't happen. Of course we had tickets! It was called off, literally at the last second, because smoke from nearby forest fires made the air all around these parts unhealthy to breath. I drove over to Sisters, which is quite close to us, to purchase event T-shirts just because I could, and because I wanted to extend what support I could. The front of those shirts displays a version of this image.

I find myself surprisingly emotional every time I see this. In part, I think, that's because of the profound meaning of the Statue of Liberty, a meaning that is being insulted by the fools in the present administration. But also because the guitar shown in this painting echoes the shape and lines of Martin's famous 00 family of guitars, small jewels that are far more powerful than their size might indicate.

They were one of the mainstays of the 1960s folk movement and to this day are incredibly desirable. I'm very lucky. I have one. I bought it in the summer of 1962 and it has been with me ever since. I never will part with it. (Find the story of that guitar here:  https://jfthompson.typepad.com/californiafiles/2017/06/thumb-drive.html )

The folk movement, of course, was sounded on these guitars and existed in the music of Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, the Weavers, Leadbelly, the Kingston Trio, Joan Baez, Harry Belafonte, Peter, Paul and Mary, Josh White, and many more. It was the music of inclusion, of progressive politics. That such a guitar should show up in the clutches of Lady Liberty in this poster - it just has tremendous meaning for me. 

What has equal and ominous meaning is that I have no idea where we all will end up when this ugly episode finally is done. Neither, I'm sure, do the idiots and fools who pretend to "lead" us. 

About all I can hope is that Lady Liberty and the ideals for which she stands remain intact. And I hope that the wonderful music, the folk, bluegrass, and Americana that is played on the sort of instrument you see her handling, continues to make its positive, progressive, and non-violent contribution.

As for this year, why, yes, of course we have tickets to the 2018 Sisters Folk Festival! We're keeping our fingers crossed that we don't get smoked out, or burned out, again. And also that this horrid political nightmare soon comes to its conclusion. Please hurry, Mr, Mueller.

-JFT