The early December issue of The North Woods Call will hit the presses later next week.
It's another block-buster edition, with stories about the ongoing fight over oil & gas leases in Barry County and the people waging the battle; a proposed strip mine in Michigan's eastern Upper Peninsula; "anti-fracking" legal strategies for community activists; and an interesting study of toxic chemicals at natural gas production sites.
Also, you'll get the usual news and information from the north woods; a review of Plastic Ocean, a troubling book by Capt. Charles Moore; and all our great columns, editorials and letters to get you thinking.
How about signing up for your subscription today, or at least ordering your North Woods Call t-shirts and caps! See www.mynorthwoodscall.com.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
A lifetime of campfires
Mike VanBuren column from the mid-November issue:
A man’s life can be measured in the glow of campfires. At least that’s the way it has been for me.
I first gathered around the soothing flames while still a boy—during family campouts at Interlochen State Park—where we fellowshipped regularly with friends and relatives who made the trek north each July.
Back home, the neighbor kids and I could often be found on summer nights building campfires in the hills behind our home, a rite-of passage that included sipping root beer from gallon jugs, exploring dark woodlots in the moonlight and sleeping soundly in canvas pup tents, or in bags rolled out under the stars.
“The fire is the main comfort of the camp—whether in summer or winter—and is about as ample at one season as at another,” wrote Henry David Thoreau. “It is as well for cheerfulness as for warmth and dryness.”
That’s probably one reason our Native American brethren have traditionally gathered around fire circles to talk and listen to the wisdom of others.
For much of my childhood and into my adult life, I have collected wisdom from campfire conversations. For many years, it was an Independence Day ritual for family and friends to gather around a blazing social fire built in the gravel driveway—and later in the patio fire pit—of our rural home.
We children would listen to the conversations of our parents and their friends, learning important life lessons passed down through stories and good-natured laughter.
“Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people,” observed Garrison Keillor of Minnesota Public Radio’s A Prairie Home Companion.
Gentleness and quiet wisdom seem to have always been hallmarks of the campfires that I sat around. As I grew older, I carried those benefits with me.
Among my best memories are the roaring campfires shared with friends and family in various locations throughout northern and southern Michigan.
Elsewhere, I have basked in their warmth and light in the national forests of Arizona, with young Dutch tourists on a cold September evening in Wyoming’s Yellowstone National Park and in front of a crackling fireplace at a small log cabin in the ghost town of Tincup, Colorado.
During my early college years, there were large group gatherings in Allegan Forest and on the beaches of Lake Michigan. And my good friend and ex-roommate from Central Michigan University still joins me for regular spring and fall excursions—including twice on the south shore of Beaver Island—that would be incomplete without campfire philosophy.
Firelight was even an integral part of my courtship years and a delight at the wedding reception. And my own kids were raised on campfires and smores during 20-plus years of August camping trips to the state park near our house.
Many gatherings with my acoustic musician friends over the years have included singing to the accompaniment of guitars, banjos and mandolins in the flickering shadows of a friendly campfire.
I treasure these memories and hope to make even more of them before my days are done.
George Bernard Shaw said that “life is a flame that is always burning itself out, but it catches fire again every time a child is born.”
It’s somehow comforting to know that—when the embers of my life are finally extinguished with a dash of cold water and a whiff of white smoke—another boy will come along and seek wisdom in the stories and laughter of a thousand campfires.
A man’s life can be measured in the glow of campfires. At least that’s the way it has been for me.
I first gathered around the soothing flames while still a boy—during family campouts at Interlochen State Park—where we fellowshipped regularly with friends and relatives who made the trek north each July.
Back home, the neighbor kids and I could often be found on summer nights building campfires in the hills behind our home, a rite-of passage that included sipping root beer from gallon jugs, exploring dark woodlots in the moonlight and sleeping soundly in canvas pup tents, or in bags rolled out under the stars.
“The fire is the main comfort of the camp—whether in summer or winter—and is about as ample at one season as at another,” wrote Henry David Thoreau. “It is as well for cheerfulness as for warmth and dryness.”
That’s probably one reason our Native American brethren have traditionally gathered around fire circles to talk and listen to the wisdom of others.
For much of my childhood and into my adult life, I have collected wisdom from campfire conversations. For many years, it was an Independence Day ritual for family and friends to gather around a blazing social fire built in the gravel driveway—and later in the patio fire pit—of our rural home.
We children would listen to the conversations of our parents and their friends, learning important life lessons passed down through stories and good-natured laughter.
“Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people,” observed Garrison Keillor of Minnesota Public Radio’s A Prairie Home Companion.
Gentleness and quiet wisdom seem to have always been hallmarks of the campfires that I sat around. As I grew older, I carried those benefits with me.
Among my best memories are the roaring campfires shared with friends and family in various locations throughout northern and southern Michigan.
Elsewhere, I have basked in their warmth and light in the national forests of Arizona, with young Dutch tourists on a cold September evening in Wyoming’s Yellowstone National Park and in front of a crackling fireplace at a small log cabin in the ghost town of Tincup, Colorado.
During my early college years, there were large group gatherings in Allegan Forest and on the beaches of Lake Michigan. And my good friend and ex-roommate from Central Michigan University still joins me for regular spring and fall excursions—including twice on the south shore of Beaver Island—that would be incomplete without campfire philosophy.
Firelight was even an integral part of my courtship years and a delight at the wedding reception. And my own kids were raised on campfires and smores during 20-plus years of August camping trips to the state park near our house.
Many gatherings with my acoustic musician friends over the years have included singing to the accompaniment of guitars, banjos and mandolins in the flickering shadows of a friendly campfire.
I treasure these memories and hope to make even more of them before my days are done.
George Bernard Shaw said that “life is a flame that is always burning itself out, but it catches fire again every time a child is born.”
It’s somehow comforting to know that—when the embers of my life are finally extinguished with a dash of cold water and a whiff of white smoke—another boy will come along and seek wisdom in the stories and laughter of a thousand campfires.
Monday, November 12, 2012
Newspaper management 101: Lessons from Shep
Mike VanBuren column from the late October 2012 issue:
The first time I encountered Glen Sheppard, I was an upstart reporter at a small weekly newspaper in the northern Michigan community of Mancelona.
That’s when the phone rang.
“This is Shep at The North Woods Call,” said the gruff, no-nonsense voice on the other end of the line. “They’re screwing up the Cedar River.”
It seems the Michigan Environmental Protection Foundation had filed a civil action suit against the Antrim County Road Commission in hopes of halting two culvert replacement projects on the pristine trout stream. The plaintiffs wanted bridges installed over the river, while the top brass at the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) had approved the large steel culverts to be placed in the water.
Shep wasn’t about to accept this sitting down. He believed that extensive excavation in the stream bottom would introduce many tons of silt into the Cedar and harm the fishery resource. He urged me to visit the site, take photographs and do a story—which I gladly did.
After 35 years, I don’t recall today just how the conflict was resolved, but I still remember the passion in Shep’s voice and his steely determination to protect the river. It was that way whenever he called with story ideas.
Later, during the mid-1980s, I attended two gatherings for North Woods Call subscribers that Shep hosted at the DNR conference center at Higgins Lake—ostensibly to get-acquainted with incoming DNR directors Ron Skoog and Gordon Guyer. When one subscriber questioned the Call’s editorial stance on some conservation issue, the response was classic Shep.
“If you don’t like it,” he said, “buy your own damned newspaper.”
Given this legendary combative personality, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I visited Shep’s home several years later. The first thing I noticed was a sign next to his door that said something like this:
“If you knock and we don’t answer, it’s because we are either busy, or don’t want any visitors. So just go away!”
Fortunately, Shep was expecting me and answered the door in good cheer. I found both he and wife Mary Lou quite hospitable and easy to talk to, although perhaps somewhat suspicious of my motives. After all, I was there because he had hinted in a column that he might be ready to retire and turn The North Woods Call over to someone else.
That, of course, was easier said than done.
I’m not sure he really wanted to step aside. He certainly didn’t want to surrender The Call to just anyone and I was asking way too many technical questions to suit his style.
“Someone who is going to continue The Call’s tradition will have to be an aggressive risk-taker,” he said. “Sure, you need to set goals, but to hell with analyzing the odds before deciding to take the risks.”
He conceded that this is not the way in today’s high-tech corporate world, but declared, “The Call ain’t about high-tech.”
Besides, he said, he didn’t know the answers to most of my questions and couldn’t rightly say why the newspaper had survived for so many years without more attention to textbook business practices.
“I would know these things if I were more prudent,” he admitted, “in which case The Call would have died years ago.”
Instead, Shep lived by a lesson learned from his military rifle company commander more than 50 years earlier when as a young soldier he questioned the wisdom of charging a hill without proper reconnaissance.
“You’re telling me that discretion is the better part of valor,” the commander reportedly said. “Discreet cowards cower. Get those rifles up that hill!”
I’m still not sure what to make of all that—I’ve never been one for blind foolishness—but I probably ignored a fair number of traditional business principles when I took on the uncertain task of resurrecting this newspaper.
“We have had a lot of people look at and crave The Call,” Shep told me during one of our discussions, “but none that I judged would carry on its mission. I think you could.”
That’s as close to an endorsement as I ever got from him.
In the end, my business instincts were probably too cautious and his personal identity with The North Woods Call too strong for us to reach a satisfactory agreement while he was at the helm.
Shep insisted that discretion could not sustain The Call’s contribution to conservation for another half-century and left me with three words of advice:
“Just do it!”
Well, I finally did, though not in the way Shep envisioned. Turns out, that was the easy part.
Now I’m learning to harness my natural discretion and live with the risk.
The first time I encountered Glen Sheppard, I was an upstart reporter at a small weekly newspaper in the northern Michigan community of Mancelona.
That’s when the phone rang.
“This is Shep at The North Woods Call,” said the gruff, no-nonsense voice on the other end of the line. “They’re screwing up the Cedar River.”
It seems the Michigan Environmental Protection Foundation had filed a civil action suit against the Antrim County Road Commission in hopes of halting two culvert replacement projects on the pristine trout stream. The plaintiffs wanted bridges installed over the river, while the top brass at the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) had approved the large steel culverts to be placed in the water.
Shep wasn’t about to accept this sitting down. He believed that extensive excavation in the stream bottom would introduce many tons of silt into the Cedar and harm the fishery resource. He urged me to visit the site, take photographs and do a story—which I gladly did.
After 35 years, I don’t recall today just how the conflict was resolved, but I still remember the passion in Shep’s voice and his steely determination to protect the river. It was that way whenever he called with story ideas.
Later, during the mid-1980s, I attended two gatherings for North Woods Call subscribers that Shep hosted at the DNR conference center at Higgins Lake—ostensibly to get-acquainted with incoming DNR directors Ron Skoog and Gordon Guyer. When one subscriber questioned the Call’s editorial stance on some conservation issue, the response was classic Shep.
“If you don’t like it,” he said, “buy your own damned newspaper.”
Given this legendary combative personality, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I visited Shep’s home several years later. The first thing I noticed was a sign next to his door that said something like this:
“If you knock and we don’t answer, it’s because we are either busy, or don’t want any visitors. So just go away!”
Fortunately, Shep was expecting me and answered the door in good cheer. I found both he and wife Mary Lou quite hospitable and easy to talk to, although perhaps somewhat suspicious of my motives. After all, I was there because he had hinted in a column that he might be ready to retire and turn The North Woods Call over to someone else.
That, of course, was easier said than done.
I’m not sure he really wanted to step aside. He certainly didn’t want to surrender The Call to just anyone and I was asking way too many technical questions to suit his style.
“Someone who is going to continue The Call’s tradition will have to be an aggressive risk-taker,” he said. “Sure, you need to set goals, but to hell with analyzing the odds before deciding to take the risks.”
He conceded that this is not the way in today’s high-tech corporate world, but declared, “The Call ain’t about high-tech.”
Besides, he said, he didn’t know the answers to most of my questions and couldn’t rightly say why the newspaper had survived for so many years without more attention to textbook business practices.
“I would know these things if I were more prudent,” he admitted, “in which case The Call would have died years ago.”
Instead, Shep lived by a lesson learned from his military rifle company commander more than 50 years earlier when as a young soldier he questioned the wisdom of charging a hill without proper reconnaissance.
“You’re telling me that discretion is the better part of valor,” the commander reportedly said. “Discreet cowards cower. Get those rifles up that hill!”
I’m still not sure what to make of all that—I’ve never been one for blind foolishness—but I probably ignored a fair number of traditional business principles when I took on the uncertain task of resurrecting this newspaper.
“We have had a lot of people look at and crave The Call,” Shep told me during one of our discussions, “but none that I judged would carry on its mission. I think you could.”
That’s as close to an endorsement as I ever got from him.
In the end, my business instincts were probably too cautious and his personal identity with The North Woods Call too strong for us to reach a satisfactory agreement while he was at the helm.
Shep insisted that discretion could not sustain The Call’s contribution to conservation for another half-century and left me with three words of advice:
“Just do it!”
Well, I finally did, though not in the way Shep envisioned. Turns out, that was the easy part.
Now I’m learning to harness my natural discretion and live with the risk.
Mid-November issue
Greetings to all you North Woods Call groupies out there. We're entering our 60th year this month and the latest edition will be coming off the press this week, so get ready.
Stories include pieces on state Sen. Tom Casperson discussing the Department of Natural Resources (DNR), a lawsuit over oil and gas leases in Barry/Allegan counties, the arrest of seven lease protesters, the work of Michigan photographer Rick Baetsen and the impact of EHD on this year's deer licenses.
Of course, there's also a cornucopia of other important information, as well as the usual columns and editorials.
Stories include pieces on state Sen. Tom Casperson discussing the Department of Natural Resources (DNR), a lawsuit over oil and gas leases in Barry/Allegan counties, the arrest of seven lease protesters, the work of Michigan photographer Rick Baetsen and the impact of EHD on this year's deer licenses.
Of course, there's also a cornucopia of other important information, as well as the usual columns and editorials.
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