January 17, 2008
Fluffy snow, anyone?
Will this winter be a lion or a lamb?
Old Man Winter suffered a New Year's Eve hangover, and a thaw in early January prompted us to ask that question. But by mid-January the ground was white again (certainly to the delight of little ones skiing at The Homestead resort north of Glen Arbor). Last year featured a brown and green holiday season, a frigid February, and golfing weather by late March. What the heck's going on?
The Glen Arbor Sun will hibernate until Memorial Day weekend, and then we'll give you a postmordem analysis of the winter of '08. Until then, stay warm!
Posted by editor at 02:36 AM | Comments (0)
August 23, 2007
Firefighters practice their skills
Glen Arbor firefighters demonstrate methods used to extinguish a car fire during the annual Open House.
Photo by Joanne Rettke
The Glen Arbor Sun has concluded publishing for the summer, but we'll print three "off-season" issues, on September 13, November 7 and January 17. Look for coverage of the Tour de Leelanau bike race, recently discovered log cabins in the National Park, holiday shopping and natural essays on the changing seasons in our fall and winter issues.
Posted by editor at 02:19 PM | Comments (0)
July 12, 2007
Music in the Dunes
The most popular event of the Manitou Music Festival is the free concert at the Dune Climb, which takes placec on Sunday, July 15 and this summer features the Traverse Symphony Orchestra Brass Ensemble.
Photo courtesy of the Glen Arbor Art Association
Stay tuned in future editions of the Glen Arbor Sun for previews of the upcoming Empire Dunegrass Festival and the circus coming to town in August, as well as essays by Native American activist Lois Beardslee.
Posted by editor at 06:17 PM | Comments (0)
June 28, 2007
Life Springs Eternal
A few days after a wildland fire scorched several acres of Port Onedia prairie, a quenching rain fell. And from that springs new grass, and the field is once again alive!
Photo by Mike Buhler
Stay tuned in future issues of the Glen Arbor Sun for stories on Dr. Chuck Olson's quest to save historic structures in the Crystal River, how northern Michigan locals are stepping up to help the Guatemalan non-profit Safe Passage in the wake of founder Hanley Denning's passing, and the fallout from the Empire beach controversy.
Posted by editor at 11:08 AM | Comments (0)
T.R.A.M.P.S. aloft in Empire
By Mike Buhler
The Traverse Area Model Pilots Society took to flight at the Empire Airport last Saturday, with hundreds of model airplanes, and several hundred participants and spectators from across the Great Lakes region. Doug Sattler (below) is typical of the members, a ten-year enthusiast from Traverse City with 19 airplanes. Asked about when #20 would join the collection, he was cagy. Yet he made one telling remark: "It's an addiction!."
Posted by editor at 10:41 AM | Comments (0)
June 14, 2007
"Something there is that doesn't love a wall" — Robert Frost
The new beachscape at the Empire waterfront. Will the wall block the lake view from the parking lot?
Photo by Norm Wheeler
Stay tuned for coverage in future issues of the Glen Arbor Sun.
Also to come, later this summer, we'll chronicle the fight to protect historic objects in the Crystal River; we'll learn about more locals doing innovative things to reduce their environmental footprint; we'll stroll through the history of the annual Picnic at Old Settler's Park, and keep you updated on all concerts, art openings and events related to Fourth of July weekend in southern Leelanau County.
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May 24, 2007
Asparagus Festival ... Hers and His
Last year Empire's Heidi Skinner (l) donned the asparagus stalk and lovely lipstick for the village's annual festival the weekend before Memorial Day. This year it was her husband Paul (r). Who wins the beauty contest?
Posted by editor at 10:00 AM | Comments (0)
November 09, 2006
Sun sets over Little Glen Lake
... and with it the Glen Arbor Sun goes into hibernation for the winter. Thanks again for your readership this year, and look for us again on Memorial Day weekend, 2007.
Photo by Ryan Romeike
Look for more of Romeike's fine photography on our website or in our print edition. This past year he's captured everything from Fourth of July fireworks on the beach to spring cherry orchards in bloom to those silly mascots at the new minor league baseball field in Traverse City. Ryan Romeike is a manager at Gemma's cafe in Empire.
Posted by editor at 10:48 PM | Comments (0)
September 15, 2006
A Local Barn in all its Autumn Splendor
photo by Cookie Thatcher
The Glen Arbor Sun will take a break for the next few weeks as we enjoy northern Michigan's fall colors and catch up on sleep. We publish our final issue of 2006 on November 9. Thanks for your readership!
Posted by editor at 10:46 PM | Comments (0)
Labor Day bridge walks
Peace activisits cross the Mackinaw Bridge on Labor Day in a call of solidarity to bring home the troops (left, photo by Marilyn Bagdonas). Glen Arborites cross the Narrows Bridge on Labor Day — an annual tradition (right, photo by Joanne Rettke).
Posted by editor at 04:40 PM | Comments (0)
Bringing in the harvest
Will Hendricks (left) marvels at last year's apple harvest. After washing the freshly picked apples, they are pressed in a hand-cranked machine. Finally, his mother Sharon Hendricks (right), filters the fresh apple juice through cheesecloth to remove pulp, readying fresh apple juice ready for the glass!
Posted by editor at 11:05 AM | Comments (0)
July 13, 2006
Scenes from the Fourth of July
Photos by Ryan Romeike (l) and Joanne Rettke (r)
Glen Arbor held its first Independence Day Boat Parade on July Fourth, sponsored by the Glen Lake Chamber of Commerce.
Don't miss Empire's Anchor Day festival coming up on July 15 and Glen Arbor's third annual Village Art Fair on July 19, and also check out the full lineup of live music around the area in our Community Calendar.
Posted by editor at 11:09 PM | Comments (0)
May 25, 2006
Spring in Bloom!
photo by Ryan Romeike
Notable Quotable:
"I often wonder if our forefathers who worked in the Empire Lumber Company mill along Lake Michigan ever took the time to pause, look about, and realize what a beautiful spot it was here in Empire."
— Dave Taghon, Empire wiseman
Posted by editor at 10:17 PM | Comments (0)
November 10, 2005
Serene Autumn
A bird's eye view of the D.H. Day farm and Lake Michigan displays the full splendor of fall.
Photo by Don Miller
Posted by editor at 10:39 PM | Comments (1)
November 11, 2004
Old Man Winter
... is just around the corner the corner. Do you have enough firewood to last until spring?
Photo by Jacob Wheeler
A Thanksgiving Feast!
The fourth-annual Pig Roast at Art’s Bar on Saturday, November 6 proved what many of us never doubted in the first place — Glen Arbor-ites sure can throw down food! Tim Barr and staff roasted two delicious swine that totaled a whopping 336 pounds and complimented that with 40 chickens and plenty of other Thanksgiving-type fixings to feed 510 happy locals for no charge. The giving season will continue at Art’s on Monday nights throughout the winter, with a 2-for-1 burger deal and free pool.
Posted by editor at 10:33 PM | Comments (0)
June 05, 2003
Absent all answers, poetry necessary
By James Coleman
Sun contributor
This piece was originally published in the Norwich Bulletin and submitted to the Glen Arbor Sun by Mr. Coleman, a close friend of Norman Wheeler, a local poet who runs the Beach Bards Bonfire, which meets every Friday at dusk from June 20 until Labor Day weekend on the Leelanau School beach just north of Glen Arbor.
We don’t need poetry if we have all the answers. Every poem is an investigation of a human problem, where the poet invites us to look over his or her own shoulder as he or she tries to express an important truth, an important insight that can’t be said in any other way.
Dr. Phil can’t get at it; Pat Buchanan is at a loss for words. A poet, in short, is needed.
Robert Frost was often asked what he meant by his poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” He always claimed, “If I could have said it any other way, I would have.” We return to poems as part of our cultural heritage because they way what cannot be otherwise expressed.
William Carlos Williams tries to capture this quality of poems in “Asphodel, That Greeny Flower,” when he tells us “It is difficult/ to get the news from poems/ yet men die miserably every day/ for lack/ of what is found there.”
Here Williams argues that some of life’s essentials can be found only in “despised poems,” as he calls them. “Hear me out!” he says to the reader.
Williams raises an interesting problem when he asks us to hear him out: the problem of access. If we don’t know where to find poetry, we can’t hear him or any poet; we can’t “hear him out.”
Unfortunately, I have to tell you that the chance of poetry reaching your ears is diminishing. Community poetry readings are being painted as irrelevant, and funding is being withdrawn.
The Connecticut Humanities Council Cultural Heritage program has had its entire budget cut for next year. The National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities and National Public Radio are slated for elimination by prominent members of Congress, according to recent e-mail petitions. Library funding, both state and local, has been cut.
TV dotes on retired generals
I have not heard of any plans to cut the number of retired generals appearing on television. I enjoy listening to the retired generals, but their dominance in the media was highlighted by a claim made by Robert Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer, that the media did not cover the environmental issues raised by Bush administration initiatives. He said that his organization, the Natural Resources Defense Council, had asked him to step forward as its spokesperson because his celebrity might gain him access to the media.
Other environmental experts had no hope of gaining access. That seemed to be the case on the show I was watching, “Buchanan & Press.”
Access is an important issue. If critics of administration environmental policy cannot get a hearing, vital issues may not be debated. Kennedy’s strongest example was the catastrophic rise in childhood asthma, and its relation to air quality and the policies affecting it.
How does the analogy extend then to poetry? Do poets get time or access to policy makers? Should they? What do they have to offer?
Laura Bush had scheduled a “Celebration of Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson and Langston Hughes” for Feb. 12 at the White House. When informed that some poets felt disquiet about the upcoming war, she cancelled the event, with the comment: “American Literature is not political.”
Was the White House action political? Did the White House action influence network coverage of poets’ views on the war by signaling the White House position? Does it matter?
Here we return to Dr. Williams. “It is difficult/ to get the news from poems/ yet men die miserably ever day/ for lack/ of what is found there.”
I defer to the West Pointers on military issues, but I think the poets may have empowering ideas about love, justice and other deep human issues that we need to hear.
Poetry may live, as W.H. Auden put it, “in the valley of its saying.” Yet after the tragedy of September 11, his poem “September 1, 1940” circulated widely on the Internet. Its language expressed something for people about the otherwise sad, turbulent and confused emotions with which they had to contend.
Will we be the richer for deciding now that poetry does not matter?
Mr. Coleman of Norwich, professor emeritus of Three Rivers Community College, is a scholar, writer and editor. This column comprises his introductory remarks, “Does Poetry Matter?”, delivered April 27 at the Community Poetry Reading.
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