The Antigo Daily Journal: 112 Years and Counting

Fred Berner, the owner and publisher of the Antigo Daily Journal picked up our call before the second ring.  We’d met him in the morning at his office but he was busy “getting out the paper” and delivering papers on two routes, so he asked us to call him at his home number after 4:15.  It was 4:20.  We had a conversation for over 30 minutes.  Here are some of the highlights.

Three Generations

Fred’s grandfather and his brother were shopping for papers in 1900 and bought several weeklies, one of which was in Antigo.  In 1905 they converted it to a daily and it has been published continuously since then.  Hung on the wall near the entrance of the large, open press room which included Fred’s desk right in the middle, is a photo of the paper’s staff in 1955.  Fred is a skinny youth in the back of the photo -- part of the family behind the family business. Today he reports that there is only one other independent daily in Wisconsin.  It is owned by the Clifford family in Watertown.  All others have gone under, been rolled up by a large parent or slipped from daily to weekly.

I ask: “How do you do it?”  He concedes that it is a difficult environment for dailies.  But at the Daily Journal, “Everyone is dedicated to the cause.  Everyone works, works hard.” He was at work at 4:15am and will be working tonight, he tells us with a hint of pride. His pressman is also similarly dedicated.  He is short staffed today and had to run the two northern town paper routes this afternoon.  He was impressed with the number of papers sold.  “Papers get a bad rap for not running news.  Well I still run news. There are still people out there who like to read more independent and comprehensive stories.”  Not so “hit and run.”

Readers and Their Feedback

Fred:  A paper gives the reader a chance to read an article two, three times.  Enough time to get madder than hell, get worked up, and come down and see me….  In 1972 we moved to this new building.  In a little town you’re going to have issues.  Well a man wrapped up a note around a brick and threw it through our plate glass window.  I’m not going to say I’m a popular person, I’ll just say that everyone knows me.

We ask about the divisiveness in the US and even in small communities today: “Do you take political positions?”

“No,” he says.  “I don’t take political stands.  We got in all sorts of trouble years back [the Ford/Nixon days] by backing local candidates.  Sometimes those guys don’t all win. And you’ve got to work on a one-on-one basis with a sheriff you didn’t back.  He can give you a schnitzel and not cooperate.”

Politics and Divisions

Fred says, “I’ve never seen something as divisive as this.  I don’t think the people who support Trump are near as wild as those who hate him.  They are far more vocal.  That is what I’ve seen.  It’s tragic but it was already there, just not with such a flamboyant character.”  He reminds us that “Obama health care passed without any Republican participation.”

Dave asks, “Do you see a future for the country?”  

Fred responds, “Oh, I think the country will be just fine.”  “You know that after the Great Depression we all survived -- not that hot, but they did.”

Dave asks, “What is the path forward?”

Fred:  I don’t know.  That is the mystery.  I don’t know how to break the cycle. Society is so polarized.  No spirit of cooperation. Before Walker we had a very liberal Democratic Governor (Doyle).  No “calm” democrats or “calm” republicans.  And things get too far left or too far right.  Things in Wisconsin needed fixing after Doyle got there.  Tommy Thompson came back from Washington, I heard him speak a bunch of times, and he said I just got out of there the bureaucratic situation is so horrid.  We’re making too big a swings -- that pendulum is just rockin’ and a rollin’.  I’m hoping someone with common sense comes rolling along.

Fred Berner, Publisher

Fred: In the last week of the Obama administration we created all these monuments took all that land out west and passed all the new legislation.  Now we’re (Trump) knocking them out but that’s causing problems too.  The pendulum is going back and forth is just spinning around.

What to do with too much bad news

Fred:  What I’m worried about is how much bad luck can you tack into about three weeks? Two or three bad storms and now another.  And then this character in Las Vegas.  You know this morning I put an article on the front page about butterflies.  If all you’re doing is running stories about people caught in tragedies -- or victims of someone you can’t make any sense out of what they do.  This is one of the good things about living being right where we are.  We’re never going to be multi millionaires -- unless you are doing it somewhere else...and we do have some local businesses which outsource -- but nothing happens here.  This is a good place to be.  Not perfect, we have people with problems, but we seem to miss bad things: we don’t live on the ocean, we don’t have millions of people.

Fourth Generation

Fred tells us he doesn’t have a fourth generation.  But “my mother passed away recently. She was 98.  So I have a ways to go.”

After talking about the gathering each morning at the Dixie Lunch we close the conversation.  “Thanks for coming in.” he says.  “You’ve made me smile.”

-- Peter

Dining in Dixie

On Wednesday night, as we crossed Fields Street to enter the Farmer’s House Restaurant, a group of four were crossing with us.  The younger woman of the group noted our California plates: “Are you from California?” she asked.

“Yes, I replied, we’ve come all the way from California to eat at the Farmer’s House.” She laughs. "We met someone from Colorado today up at a waterfall.  All the way to Wisconsin to see a waterfall!"

Farmer’s House

The restaurant was unassuming with maybe 20 tables.  The foursome took a 4-top furthest from the door.  The waitress, a middle aged blond woman motioned for us to sit anywhere.  With “listening” on our mind we sat in a booth next to their table.  When Julie, the waitress brought our menu I asked, “Do you have a local beer?”

Without missing a beat she replied, “Pabst is local.”  The bartender from the attached bar brought me a can of Pabst, no glass.  Perfect.

Our dinner was the Wednesday night special: Broasted ½ chicken (pressure fried marinated and breaded chicken - a technique invented, along with the proprietary equipment in Beloit, Wisconsin!), choice of potato (twice baked for me, with sour cream), chicken dumpling soup, and a mud pie for dessert. $8.25.

Health care

We chatted with the neighboring table.  Dave asked the outgoing woman, “What is the biggest problem in America?”  

Without missing a beat she responded, “Health Care.”  Her solution was to get rid of the insurance companies.  They put up too many requirements and restrictions.  She works in a hospital and lots of people are using the emergency room for their primary care facility. “Because they don’t have insurance?” I ask.

“Yes,” she replies. 

Dave pursues, “But most patients don’t have the money to pay in their other pocket. Who should pay?”  

The man with his back to us speaks up for the first time and with a big smiles says, “Trump!”  We all laugh.

The two men of the group are retired Union Steelworkers.  We learn about the foursome's explorations together: camping, two trips in the last four years to the Smokey Mountains for fall foliage (a helicopter ride to look down on the trees was a highlight four years ago) and today, a trip to see 9 of the 14 waterfalls in Wisconsin which are all local. They live 35 miles south.  Their dog is in the car and several times the conversation comes back to how spoiled it is by the older of the two steelworkers.  He makes special breakfasts for it when they camp and is saving half of his chicken to give it on the drive home.

Dinner at Dixie Lunch

Nearly everyone we met on Thursday (our radio talk show host, museum curator, newspaper publisher) insisted that if we wanted to hear what is going on in Antigo we should go to Dixie Lunch for breakfast.  We’d meet the old, powerful (mayor, Sheriff, newspaper publisher) and opinionated men of the town who make a large table and talk for a couple of hours.  We are busy Friday morning, however, so we go to Dixie for dinner.  To optimize our chance of conversation we sit at the counter. Colleen our waitress is charming and brings in the bartender woman from next door (arranged like Farmer's House!) to list for me the "local" tap beers.  I choose the Leinenkugel Oktoberfest draft.

Soon a man sits one stool over from us.   Upon his arrival the chef comes out of the kitchen to greet him.  It  turns out the chef is his daughter.  He is Andy Boyd, a bus driver for the  school district -- although we clarify that he is employed by an outsourced bus company.  His passion are the Chicago Cubs and Bears  (“No,” he tells us, “Wisconsinites don’t have to be a Brewer/Packer  fans”) and his King Midget restored car which he is towing to a car show this weekend.  His daughter is passionate about High School color guard.  The three are each democratic -- Andy: “I hate Walker.  And Trump.”  His daughter, likely in her mid 20’s and without a college education, informs us she is moving to Madison.  We ask why. She replies, “There is not much to do  here for young people.  There is a bowling alley and movie theater but not much else.  And I’m not an outdoors type.”  She goes on, “And there are no jobs that pay above minimum wage.  That’s all I’ve had since graduating.”  In Madison she is “looking for a job that doesn’t involve cooking.”  Although she admits she might fall back on cooking in a pinch.

A friend of her just married and lives in Madison and has offered for her to live with them until she can move out on her own. “Ideally I’d like a job with a color guard.” she concludes.

Kolache for Breakfast

Prune Kolache

On our way to Burger King for our Radio interview we stop by Dixie Lunch one more time.  It is 6:45 so only a few of the “talkers” have arrived -- a couple of camouflage hats and one with white stars on a American-flag-blue background.  We’ve come for the Kolache.  This is a specialty danish pastry baked only Friday and Sunday.  “They just came out of the oven 30 minutes ago,” we are told by the older gentleman in an apron. It turns out he is one of the three siblings running the Dixie after their parents passed a few years ago.  “I was born in ‘46,” he tells us, “the year after my parents opened Dixie.” I choose the prune, Dave the poppy seed filled Kolache.


-- Peter

Antigo: First Impressions

Drive from Madison...lovely lakes, neat lawns

We arrived in Antigo yesterday afternoon after driving up from Madison.  Much to the trip involved county roads, particularly County Road Y.   We drove past farms and homes that were simply beautiful, well maintained and appeared very comfortable; not the impression we had been led to believe by some of our reading.

Antigo RV City Campground

We spent last night in the Antigo Lake City Campground.   It is level, surrounded by pristine lawns, on a lake, quiet, and very well maintained.  There are bicycles free for use by campers, the key is hanging up in the restroom.  There was even a sign in the Men’s room soliciting input from campers on how they could improve their operations.

The whole city of just 7,864 people seems to be filled with local pride.

 

FM 106 COUNTRY

This morning we decided to listen to some local radio news so I searched and found FM 106 Country Music and News.  We listened to music, heard local advertising, and national and local news.  Much of it was slanted toward employment.  By way of example, when there was a report about this year’s cranberry crop being slightly down from last year the story also included the fact that there are 4000 jobs in the cranberry farming industry.

At 7:20 AM “The Breakfast Club” with Gary Hartl came on the air.  He was broadcasting from the local Burger King.  It was a pleasant and somewhat calm exposition about local events, there are MANY, and local issues.  We learned that it is National Apple Betty Day and National Do Something Nice Day, and listened interviews of local people.  We just had to go and see it in person.  We arrived just as it was finishing at 8:30 AM, so we went in and met Gary.  He does this show every morning, Monday through Friday and then goes to his other job as a car salesman.  He is a charming and articulate guy, obviously skilled in radio broadcasting and justifiably proud of his home community, Antigo.

Gary was willing to give quite a bit of his time to discuss how things are going in Antigo. He mentioned that there is a community spirit that results in significant generosity.  An example is that nearby Wausau, population 39,000, raises half as much money for the Salvation Army each year as Antigo, population 7864.  Wausau uses paid bell ringers. In Antigo they are all volunteers.  Antigo raises money directly to support local residents when they have problems.  People also volunteer to fill backpacks with food on Fridays so that children on the School Lunch Program will be supplied over the weekend.  The sign “Antigo Strong” appears many places in town.

The Antigo High School Football team, the Red Robbins, in first place this year, is able to cinch a Championship tomorrow night at an away game in Mosinee.  We plan to attend.  Country 106 will be there to broadcast it live.  Gary told us that when the State established a Championship in the 1970’s the Red Robbins, “potato fed big boys,” as Gary described them, were the first winners, defeating a team from the “city of Racine” and twice again for a three year run.

Gary asked us what we were doing and said that he was intrigued by the answer.  He invited us to return tomorrow morning to be interviewed on his show.  We can’t resist. He has an appearance scheduled with a 4-H Club and Assemblywoman Mary Felzkowski on the show to explain the local benefit of the investment the State is making in bringing in the Foxconn factory in Racine County.

 

Antigo Daily Journal

From there we went to look for the Antigo Chamber of Commerce, but on the way we stopped by the office of the Antigo Daily Journal.  The office was humming, with nine people visibly working hard at the time.  The woman at the front counter said that when the press started running it would be a bit loud.  We asked how the paper was doing and she said “really well.”  We asked what the secret was and she told us that they are really good at what they do.  She also mentioned that they published local obituaries and that when people came in by 11:30 in the morning, the obits would be in the next day’s paper and that this is unusually rapid response.  She offered to go and get the owner, Fred Berner, to talk with us.  He came to the counter and explained that he had two press runs to get out so he didn’t have time to talk right now but he gave us his home phone number and a good time to call this late afternoon!  He told us that the paper was one of three in the State that was not part of some sort of chain.
 

--David

Mike in Madison

Mike is making us breakfast in his home outside of Madison.  A pot of coffee, a loaf of his famous chocolate chip banana bread, eggs, homemade tomato corn salsa, fresh sliced mango, and lots of bacon.  It is a feast to celebrate our arrival in Wisconsin.  We arrived last night after a second 15 hour day of driving.

Dave's Road Trek and Wisconsin State Capital, Madison

I’ve known Mike since 1991.  We worked closely together at Cummins over eight years: Mike as a mechanical engineering manager and I as a newly minted business strategy/marketing/project manager.  Our respective roles put us in forced teamwork and occasional conflict.  But from this grew a deep friendship: we married our wives in the same year, moved and lived in Charleston, SC, had two kids within months of each other and have been in touch ever since as our careers have taken separate courses.

Mike is now a Program Director at the University of Wisconsin Madison in the College of Engineering working with graduate students in the engine technology department.

Childhood and Economics in Rural Minnesota

Over breakfast Mike tells us about growing up in rural (200-resident town) Northern Minnesota, the second of five kids, raised by a widowed mother.  He was the first of his generation to get a college degree and ultimately a MS in Engineering.  But since then three of his four siblings also completed college and in the next generation nearly all of his nieces and nephews are college graduates - over half in engineering.  For Mike’s siblings, however, getting through college was circuitous - Naval service and starting businesses, getting married and divorces, transferring from community technical colleges, and mentors and encouragement at the right moments was crucial.

“Today there are only two sources of revenue coming into rural communities: trucking and farming.” Mike explained.  “And the driverless car will eventually take out trucking.” “Most farmers do it because they love it, it is in their heritage.  Small farms are rarely profitable.”  Many truck drivers also farm.  Mike’s boss at UW-M maintains his family’s 200 acre farm.  Mike’s brother in Wyoming has a 1000 acre farm 4 hours drive from his home where he grows alfalfa.  For none of these would the farm support them.

Big farms, on the other hand are big, are sophisticated operations with fewer and fewer employees and more and more mechanization.  Mike remembers summer jobs working on farms.  His mom couldn’t afford pocket money for his siblings and him.  They HAD to work to have money.  And the work on a farm taught him a lot of mechanical, electrical and troubleshooting skills which, along with 7th and 8th grade shop classes, stood him well as he ultimately pursued engineering.  In his department at UW, he has students paying college tuition to take the types of shop classes he took in 7th grade because they didn’t have available these classes in high school.

Homecrest, an outdoor furniture manufacturer in Wadina, Mike’s High School town of 5000, was put out of business by imports.  And when large companies proposed opening plants in the town, the anti-union attitude of the town kept them out.  The owner of the hardware store, lumber yard and construction company also influenced the city to keep out competition.  Today the town has shrunk to 2500 and many buildings on main street are boarded up.  In contrast Perham, a town 25 miles west has grown from 2000 to 5000 in the same time period.  It has a an entrepreneurial civic leader and pro-business outlook who has started a number of small businesses and the town now has welcomed larger outside firms, union or not.  Land-O-Lakes, Tuff (dog food), and others have locations there.

Environment and Climate Change

Mike is an engineer, scientist, and a thinker with nuanced opinions about most things. We asked him about climate change.  He knows that temperatures are rising.  He knows that humans are having an effect on the world and environment.  However, he works closely with the team at UW who perform simulations on the combustion of engines -- complex systems.  He knows that together they are always being surprised by how their models are wrong and must be revised.  When he looks at predictions of both the causes and effects of climate change he is skeptical that the simulations of climate -- which are exponentially more complex than engine systems -- are correct.  So he is left not convinced that it is CO2 which is the root cause.  “Could it be water vapor?” he wonders, as it has a higher greenhouse gas effect than CO2.  “What about the vapor trails of airplanes?” he asks.

Furthermore, he is not so sure that warming will be all bad.  “Sure there will be problems.  But some things like growing seasons will get better.  I’m thinking that it may be 50:50 downside and upside with climate change.”

Steve, Mike’s brother, has just finished a career at Minnesota Power.  His last role was overseeing alternative power production.  Steve was part of Minnesota Power implementing a strategy of producing 100% renewable energy, a strategy which is well underway.  They have installed many windmills in North Dakota and using high capacity DC power transmission lines they bring all the way to Wisconsin to sell.  To fill production dips due to low wind, they buy hydro-power from Canada.  When they have too much wind, they sell the excess to Canada which closes a valve on their hydro dam. We ask if Steve is proud of this accomplishment.  “Yes.  He is proud of the economic impact -- it is less expensive to produce power from wind and you can sell it for more as “clean power.”  We ask if he is an environmentalist.  “No.  Steve tells me that environmentalists are against anything that makes economic sense.”  They are protesting the bird deaths by the wind mills.

Politics, President Trump and Government “telling us what to do”

Mike tells us he did not vote for Trump, but his siblings probably did.  But at the UW (Madison is a very liberal town), he heard colleagues saying that they did not know any “Smart Trump Voters.”  This made Mike think, “Really?  You don’t think there are any smart Trump voters?”  I tell him about a description of classes in America that I read in a book.  He thinks his explanation is too simple.  But he counters that he believes the split in perceptions/ politics is between “those people who receive more from the government or from work.”  He uses as an example from his Wyoming brother’s experience.  When he used to work for a coal mining company, he was very conservative.  But once he retired he signed up for Obama Care and became a farmer. He then became very methodical about getting the various farming incentives.  Mike teases him that he used to say climate change was a big hoax, but now he has become very liberal.

We bring up the “resentment” described in Kathy Cramer’s book (see Dave’s blog on background reading) by rural Wisconsinites toward Madison.  He agrees.  “Most of the research projects are just to tell us what we already know.”  “People don’t like being told what to do.”  Mike gives this as a key resentment towards Obama Care.  People HAVE to have insurance or they’ll be fined.  “They resent that.”  We bring up the analogy of auto insurance.  Mike doesn’t take the bait.  “They drive anyway.”  “Nearly half of my auto insurance is to cover uninsured motorists!”

“Wolves,” Mike told us, “is a good example of government making rules that may make sense in Madison but don’t in the north.”  Mike’s brother and four other people bought a piece of marshy land in Minnesota for hunting.  They even plant some corn on it to attract and feed the deer. Mike says it is almost like “farming deer.”  But then wolves arrived.  And for two years his brother has not seen a fawn on the property.  Finally they called DNR (Wisconsin’s vilified (at least among sportsmen) Department of Natural Resources) who came out and trapped and removed 13 wolves.  “They don’t have natural predators” Mike explains “they will multiply as long as there is prey.”  DNR moved the wolves to another location.  The government treats “shooting a wolf as worse than shooting a person!” Mike summarizes.  “How about moving a pack of wolves into the park here in Madison?” he wonders out loud.

Guns

Mike and his brothers are hunters.  Mike joined the NRA.  But when it stopped focusing on gun safety many years ago he revoked his membership.  “I own lots of guns.  But I don’t own handguns.  There is only one purpose for a handgun, to shoot a person.”  AR (automatic rifles) are fun to shoot, no question about it.  But there is no purpose for them.  Mike believes the only way forward is to agree guns are okay but we need to minimize deaths.

Health Care

“This is the biggest problem,” Mike said matter of factly about health care.  It represents 20% of our GNP.  He explains that when the law changed to force all hospitals to take uninsured patients, they began to go broke.  Then a law was passed that allowed them to write off the losses from these patients.  And pretty soon they were writing off investments in new wings, new equipment, etc.  “Drive by a hospital in a rural town in northern Wisconsin.” Mike suggests, “you’ll see an incredible facility.”  They have all sorts of equipment they don’t need.

The three biggest problems are: drug company profits, lawyers (apologies to Dave) and the resulting cost of malpractice insurance, and perverse incentives at hospitals (see rural hospital comment above) and doctors to perform more tests.  “How do we solve it?” we ask.  

“The problem is thinking one size fits all.”  An example is HIPPA. This is a $1 problem which received a $100 solution.  “I’m paying my children’s insurance and now that they are over 18 can’t see their records without filling out paperwork and getting their permission.”  Maybe the best is if “each state figures it out.” California can do a single payer system.  And then the states can pick the best solution.

We ask Mike if healthcare is a right.  He responds “No.  It is like roads.  Roads are not a right.”  The government should make rules and set up guidelines for efficiency.  But how it is paid for is another question.” 

Kids Today and the “Boy Problem”

We’ve been talking for two hours straight.  Mike takes a shower and we get ready to go with him for a short driving tour of Madison.  But before we go he says: “I’ve got three more points I want to make.”  So we turn back on the recording app.  One of these Mike introduces as the “Boy Problem.”  The only group that can be vilified or stereotyped without consequence is the white male.  All other groups are protected.  “The only accolades boys get are for sports.” “I saw a report which showed that for people under 30 men make less than women.”  In Madison Mike sees a number of men who stay at home while their wives work because women can make more.  In the engineering department Mike sees a big push to attract more women and minorities even though men are generally have more affinity.

Engineering buildings - UW-Madison

Mike also blames the education: the lack of shop class, for example.  And the fact that kids today don’t have to work so don’t get practical experiences (like he did baling hay on a farm as a kid). Today "immigrants are better farm workers," he concludes.

Madison Impressions:

Our Listening over, we followed Mike into Madison and were wowed by the beauty.  The city is an isthmus between two large, clear lakes surrounded by trees in the midst of fall foliage.  The state capital stands prominent standing on a rise looking out over the lakes.  A weekly summer farmer’s market surrounds it each Saturday and Mike reports it is so popular it is hard to move among the stalls.  The University buildings are impressive and varied in style -- blocks of engineering, a large medical center, frat row looking out over the larger of the two lakes.  The city makes a very favorable impression on us.  We say thank you and goodbye to Mike and begin our drive north.


-- Peter

AM Radio Across Western Nebraska

As we drove I-80 across western Nebraska we listened to AM radio.  Part of our curiosity is “How do you receive news and information?”  Radio seems like one way to find out.

Music

“We got both kinds of music here, Country and Western.”  Dave remembers this line from the Blues Brothers and it applies to the music we hear.  John Anderson’s “Black Sheep” is a wonderful tribute to the “I’m poor and proud” theme of some Country music. Our protagonist is one of four children of a brakeman on a highball express train.  His parents wish the best for the children.  Three are material successful, a doctor, Mercedes and Japanese cars, a sister who marries a banker.  But John, the black sheep is clearly disdainful of their success and revels in his black sheep status, driving a long haul truck and making payments on his two room shack.

The Dave Ramsey Show

Dave Ramsey is a national institution with radio shows, books, training and speaking tours and a following of millions.  Everyday his talk show airs.  On this morning a Christian, stay at home mother of four in New Hampshire has called in. She has purchased Dave’s book and is working hard with her husband to follow Dave’s advice to lower their debt; and in the past six months they have dropped from $216,000 to $200,000.  But they have just learned that her husband will lose his job before the end of the year.  Dave congratulates her on their progress, asks the details of the types of debt, and instructs her to hoard cash now to help them ride out the hard times until her husband lands a new job.  “Beans and rice, rice and beans,” is his catch phrase to cut expenses.  And he seamlessly intersperses biblical phrases.  But at bottom this is the gospel of living within your means and resisting the temptation of debt.

Not your father’s combine

An advertisement comes on for the latest John Deere Integrated Series S Combine.  It is fully automated with computer controls monitoring thousands of sensors checking the moisture level in the corn, a video display showing the operator the grain and debris as they pass up the conveyor belt.  It will increase yield, save time, and make your work easier.

Huskers Hosting the Badgers

The big football game this Saturday is between the Nebraska Corn-huskers and the Wisconsin Badgers.  Both are undefeated in the Big 10 West (not including the Michigans and Ohio State).  The Badgers are ranked #9.  So the Huskers would LOVE to take them down.  That said, the coach says that the game will go to the team that “finishes it.”  He is referring to the last two years when Nebraska let up at the end of the game giving up leads and losing.

Signing Bonus Job...in the Pen

The local pen is hiring full time correctional officers.  $2500 signing bonus, 2.5% raise after the first year and 10% over ten years.  These positions will allow a reduction in the overtime that is paid to the current officers.

Rush on Las Vegas Shooting:

Rush Limbaugh comes on after Dave Ramsey.  He is hot on the topic of how the “Left, Democrats” are harping on the fact that the gunman used an automatic machine gun. He reminds us that it is stupid to blame the gun, its the gunman.  Rush talks us through a chart he is viewing which shows the trend in gun ownership since ‘94 - a 54% increase - against the number of gun murders over the same period - a 48% decrease.  He concludes that this shows us guns are not the problem.  He warns us that the Left will call him a bigot, an idiot...etc., “they’ll attack me” but they will ignore the facts.

We turn off the radio and admire the beautiful bluffs and a freight train with four engines pulling a ½ mile of cars west toward the Rockies.

--Peter

Resource Books for the Listening Tour

Naturally a project such as this deserves some background reading and information.  I read six books, three of general interest and three about Wisconsin that we had not heard about before we chose to go:

The three general interest books:

Strangers in Their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild.  This book of interviews in an area far different than Hochschild’s background, with its suggestion that people visit in places where “other” people live was one of the original motivators for the trip.

American Nations by Colin Woodard.  Peter referenced this in his post about the “International drive along Interstate 80.”  Woodard posits that there are eleven rival regional cultures in the “United” States.

The Big Sort by Bill Bishop.  This intensely researched and detailed book argues that people really like to be with people with whom they agree; even to the extent that this dictates a career and place to live.  We are all in our own bubbles by choice!

The three books about Wisconsin:

Janesville by Amy Goldstein.  General Motors closed down a huge and old assembly plant in Janesville Wisconsin in 2008, at the start of the “Great Recession.”  This threw about 8000 well paid, union, auto workers out of their jobs.  It bankrupted the supply and ancillary industries locally.  It had the potential to devastate the city, but this is Janesville! The city had gone through good and bad times before.  It could pull itself up by its bootstraps once again.

With this sense of boundless optimism the City set out to fix things.  But the things were not to be fixed.  Retraining would employ only a few.  No major corporation would come in.  The city survives, but things are not “back to normal.”  Fascinating and well documented, the Goldstein interviewed many of the participants in this American drama.

The Politics of Resentment by Katherine J. Cramer. The author set out in 2007 to try to figure out why rural Wisconsinites voted differently than urban people, why rural people resented “Madison,” and why conservative politicians like Scott Walker and Paul Ryan rose to power in what was formerly a reliably liberal state.

Cramer visited and interviewed groups of people in rural areas, each several times over the years to see what changed.  She learned that people who struggle to keep a roof over their heads and have jobs that do not include paid vacations, healthcare and retirement plans resent paying taxes to the State (hence “Madison,” the state capital) so that it can pay public employees who do have those benefits, and often higher salaries as well.  Her interviews are well documented and establish that this resentment that is in the title of the book often seems quite reasonable.  She covers many other areas of group thinking as well.  Many of the issues she had in getting the information were similar to those we anticipate in our Listening Tour.  This book was recommended to us by several people from Wisconsin.


Evicted by Matthew Desmond is based on the problems of landlords and tenants in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  He particularly traces the issues that arise when renting to people of the lowest classes and the people who might become homeless when evicted.  
Communities arise everywhere.  When there are disruptions and problems there is always somebody in the local community who knows who to call and what to do.  The police are usually a second or third line of defense.  When one of these people is evicted it negatively impacts two communities; the first is the community a person is forced to vacate and the second is the new community where this person knows nobody and can no longer be of help.

Race plays a big part here.  A majority of defendants in eviction court are Black women. So while Black men are often being locked up, Black women are often being locked out.

Desmond spent several years living in these communities while doing his research and when he puts quotes around many of the statements that he presents it means that he has heard and recorded the person making the statement personally.  Frankly the book is pretty depressing.  Only one of the characters gets out of the cycle; the rest either fail or die trying.  It is a brutally honest look at the problem and it is often hard to take.  He does have some suggestions for improvements, but the real value of the book is the impact it has on the reader.

Each of these helped us frame our Tour and helped us understand the people we would meet.

--David

An International Drive Along I-80

Tonight we are staying in a Flying J fuel stop in Rawlins, Wyoming where it is snowing. We’ve been on the road for 14 hours and traveled a little over 1000 miles.  For the first hour we were traversing the Bay Area.  In American Nations, Colin Woodard describes the skinny strip of the United States from the San Francisco Bay Area up through Vancouver, BC as the “The Left Coast.” It is a home of progressive liberalism; creative energy and innovation; and questioning of the status quo social, economic and religious norms and institutions.

For the next 13 hours we traveled across California, the Sierra Nevada mountains, Nevada, Utah and half of Wyoming.  This region he calls “The Far West.”  It is sparsely populated by rugged-individual, self-sufficient Americans.  Many Far Westerners originally emigrated from the Appalachian region.   These states have and are dependent on extractive industries -- mining and oil and gas in particular -- and ranching.  As a consequence, their individualism runs up against BIG federal government and large industry.  It makes for a particular identity and a complex relationship and view of government.

This journey across the spectacular western basin and range of Nevada, salt flats of Utah, Rocky mountains east of Salt Lake City, and Wyoming helped bring alive in us the idea of the stark differences among the parts of our beautiful land.  It is the natural landscape, the people who settled it, the role and our relationships with industry and the government.  It rings true that thinking about the “nations” within North America is a useful way of considering the United States.  Not a monolith.  But stark, regional differences worth trying to understand.
 

Tomorrow we leave the Far West and spend the day in Woodard’s “Midlands” which stretch out from the original Pennsylvanian colonies and their westward settlements.  At the end of the day we will turn north into Wisconsin and an extension of “Yankeedom.”  Four “nations” in two days.


-- Peter