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Category Archives: video art
Tim Horton's Beans in Our Ears
Just for fun I'm weighing in on the changes afoot at defining Canadian icon, Tim Horton's. Former defining icon is better now that it's owned by Brazilian mega-corporation 3G Capital. Tim Horton's came as part of the 3G deal to buy Burger King which was blessed by the Ref-Con trained seals in Ottawa.
My fake backstory regarding Tim Horton's revolves mainly around a little brown brick building near Pembina and Grant in Winnipeg. I have habituated this building for centuries. Before it was Tim's, Robin's Donuts operated from it as did Loopins and Standards. In the 1950s it was The Sassafras, a coffee and malt shop that catered to teens and adults and maintained an uneasy detente between them. During The War, it was Stookie's, a smoky diner at an important bus stop that led into new suburbs in south and west Winnipeg. During the Dust Bowl days three sisters, all named Thelma, ran it. Of course it was called Betty's Place so as not to confuse people. Just after the First Big War when it was Mike's you could buy coffee and pie over the counter, booze, hookers and reefer under the counter. Even before the new century began, on this spot Pounder's Stopping Off was a widening of the Pembina Trail where you stocked up on supplies coming and going. Porridge Pounder always had plenty of guns and ammunition to sell. Before anything took root at the meeting of the rivers, Cree and Saulteaux sometimes used this place as a campsite due to its closeness to the Red River. For thousands of years before that, it was just me and the woolly mammoths drinking from the river with the wind whistling through the willows.
Most of the above paragraph is not true; it is fiction, historical riffing, guff. In that spirit I created a short video to commemorate the assimilation of Tim Horton's into its new corporate maw. I scrounged around on archive.org and found some vintage footage of Brazilian coffee growers and refiners, added Soul Coughing's The Coffee Song and uploaded it to YouTube. Fellini would appreciate the final few scenes. Click any picture to watch the 2:30 video.
For clarity I have been a long-time customer of Tim Horton's and witnessed their inevitable decline. Of late, I frequent other coffee shops, local and much more interesting. Comments sections online are filled with people vowing to boycott Tim Horton's for their recent actions. In my case, the Horts just ran its course after lo, these many thousands of years.
Filed under Guff, Humour, video art
Tagged as brazil, coffee song, soul coughing, tim horton's, video art
Just This – New Video In a Contemplative Mode
Click any picture to play my 3:55 video.
Filed under Art Actions, DickToolery, video art
Tagged as found images, found sound, just this
Oasis In Space – Found Sound Poetry and Video
Trinidad!
And the big Mississippi
and the town Honolulu
and the lake Titicaca,
the Popocatepetl is not in Canada,
rather in Mexico, Mexico, Mexico!
Canada, Málaga, Rimini, Brindisi
Yes, Tibet, Tibet, Tibet, Tibet,
Nagasaki! Yokohama!
So begins Ernst Toch's fanciful sound poem Geographical Fugue composed entirely of world place names. Toch was a prolific Austrian composer of classical music and film scores who endeavored to stretch the boundaries of music. He's credited with singlehandedly inventing an idiom called Spoken Chorus which combines the spoken word and music creating a new form of expression. Geographical Fugue, written in 1930, caused a sensation when it was first performed and remains Toch's most performed work even though he dismissed it as unimportant.
The piece strictly follows the form of the fugue with four voices entering one at a time: tenor, alto, soprano, bass. The basic structure is that of the canon or round (Row, row, row your boat) resulting in unexpected rhythms and harmonies. Composers John Cage and Henry Cowell translated the poem from its original German.
I combined Toch's sound poetry with footage taken of the earth from the International Space Station and offered with annotations by NASA.
I found both the sound and vision at www.archive.org. Click any picture to watch my 3 minute video.
Filed under 1930s, Guff, video art
Tagged as ernst toch, geographical fugue, nasa, poetry, sound chorus, sound poetry
Tesla As a Boy – New Video by Reid
"It will soon be possible to transmit wireless messages around the world so simply that any individual can carry and operate his own apparatus." – Nikola Tesla October 1909
Another piece from Free Wild Samples, a series of short videos employing found sound and images I made in early 2014. Tesla As a Boy is 3:11. Click pic to watch.
Tagged as found images, found sound, tesla, video art
Guitar Concerto – New Video by Reid
Created entirely from found images and found sound, click any pic to play 4:27 video
Filed under DickToolery, video art
Tagged as found images, found sound, video art
August 1, 2014 · 12:06 am
Grass of the Apocalypse 1:18
Filed under Art Actions, video art
Tagged as izbister, jean giono, video art
The Lonesomes #16 – When Elevators Dream
Click the pic to watch The Lonesomes #16 – 3:22
When Elevators Dream
Two long-abandoned grain elevators have a wonderful dream.
AUDIO: CLANG OF CROSSING BELL
Huh? Huh? What's that?
It sounds like the crossing bell.
The crossing bell!! You've gone mad! There hasn't been a bell there for decades. There hasn't even been tracks here for 20 years (PAUSE) but you are right. It's…
AUDIO: train whistle
It's a train! (PAUSE) It IS a train!
But…but…It can't be…
AUDIO: He is drowned out by the sound of the train passing,
CREDITS: on a vertical roll, end credits over the invisible train. When the credits end, the train passes.
AUDIO: after train passes, the crossing bell stops, peace and serenity return to the prairie.
That was fun!!
I still don't believe it!! We must be dreaming?
(MORE A MURMUR) ummm…maybe.
AUDIO: Prairie sounds arise
THE LONESOMES
Written, Produced and Directed by Reid Dickie
Shelly Anthis
Michel Germain
Steve Black, Duane Braun, Troy Buschman, Reid Dickie, Mitchell Johnston, Borys Kozak, Carol Anne Miller, Nora Nordin-Fredette, Liz Olson, Allan Palmer, Chris Scholl, Dennis Scullard, Tannis Zimmer
Troy Buschman, Reid Dickie, Garcea Diehl, Liz Olson, Chris Scholl, Tannis Zimmer
Sound Recording at Video Pool, Winnipeg
Special Thanks to Kevin Uddenberg, Kenny Boyce, Terry Lewycky, Vonda Bos, Rick Fisher, Prairie Dog Central
Dedicated to Beautiful Linda
A BE HAPPY PRODUCTION
© REID DICKIE 2012
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Character Backstory
Both characters sound groggy and confused by what they are hearing because they are hearing the impossible. This is established quickly.
It's the clang of the crossing bell that catches their attention then the train whistle adds further disbelief until they are drowned out by the sound of a modern fast freight with lots of low rumbles and screeching steel on steel sounds.
To create a crossing the end credits run on a vertical scroll over the elevators as the invisible train passes horizontally.
Once the train is gone, there is joy and disbelief. The prairie silence returns.
For her fourth appearance in The Lonesomes, Nora Nordin-Fredette plays the female elevator and I play the male.
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This sad pair of elevators is in Isabella, Manitoba, again south of Shoal Lake. Long abandoned by the railroad and most of its residents, little remains of Isabella today.
I captured this bucolic scene one hot afternoon. The story is a conversation between the buildings resulting in an imaginary train passing by. I used it has the background for the end credits creating a crossroads with the invisible train moving horizontally and the scrolling credits moving vertically. I saw it as fitting end to The Lonesomes, reinforcing the dream-like quality of the piece.
Filed under Prairie People, The Lonesomes, video art
Tagged as credits, isabella, nora nordin-fredette, when elevators dream
The Lonesomes #15 – Honesty
A brief conversation with an old friend prevents a lifetime of confusion.
I used to stand in that big showroom window and wonder where all the customers were. People drove by but not many stopped in. Cassie, my wife, took care of the storefront and the books and I did the repair work in the garage in the back. We were a good team, at least that's what I thought.
One Saturday night, when Cassie was visiting her sister in the city, my old buddy Hutch and I were watching the game. Between periods I was telling Hutch about how poorly the garage was doing and how confused I was about why it wasn't doing better. I guessed that people in Marshallville didn't think I was a very good mechanic and maybe I needed to find another line of work.
What do you mean, Hutch?
It's not your work that's causing your business to fail.
Really? What is it then? (PAUSE)
It's your wife. (PAUSE)
Cassie! What do you mean?
Cassie…exactly. To be blunt with you, my friend…people don't like her. She came from the city and though you and she may not think so, she looks down on people here. At least that's the impression she leaves. She's not (PAUSE) small town stuff; she's from (PAUSE) elsewhere, a square peg.
NARRATOR (FLABBERGASTED)
People treat me just fine, treat…us just fine!
They're just being polite. How many times you two been invited over to anybody's house but mine for dinner? I'm guessing, none. How often do you both go out to events in town? Almost never. People don't see you anywhere but at the garage. You need to circulate, participate in the life of the town.
Cassie doesn't like those kind of… (PAUSE)
As I got us both another beer, it was beginning to sink in but Hutch wasn't done yet.
HUTCH (FAKE DISBELIEF)
Do you want me to believe that you moved to the city for a few years and forget how people around here think? What their expectations are? You come from here. It's in your blood but you forgot. (LIGHT, A LITTLE TAUNTING) Love made you blind to what's going on around you and to what's always been going on here. It's the same old story in this town. Nothing has changed, nothing ever will.
So…I…am a good mechanic?
People think so. I know so. It's your situation that keeps you from succeeding here. You're the rose and Cassie is the thorn. You cancel each other out in this town.
When Cassie got back from the city, we discussed our situation. A month later I started a real estate course, something I thought I'd be good at and I was. We moved to the city and had a happy and prosperous life together. I left that little town knowing I was a good mechanic but I never did tell Cassie what Hutch said.
I still feel enormous gratitude to my old friend for giving me the perspective I needed at exactly the right moment.
Sometimes friends save your life and don't even know it.
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The aging Narrator is recounting this story from his younger days. It recalls a milestone in his life, a pivotal moment. He tells his story with wistfulness yet reverence for its magnitude in his life. His gratitude to his friend is sincere and, perhaps, overdue.
Hutch and the Narrator were good friends at some point in the past and may still be. We don't know. We do know that the Narrator is beholden to Hutch and feels that telling his story will help purge his gratitude, to find an outlet of expression that satisfies the depth and truth of his thankfulness.
The set-up in the first two paragraphs (under 130 words) is quick and simple. We get the characters, their relationship and the situation immediately in easy-to-understand terms. But don't rush the audience's understanding. Give the story room to move, to grow. Give the audience a chance to figure out what they are seeing.
As a counterpoint to the lonesome empty building, the tone of the actors is generally happiness, of friendship and sharing with good humour. Some drama occurs on Narrator's part with his disbelief about the cause of poor sales but it, too, is good-natured and familiar. Deep in his heart, the Narrator knows Hutch is right and this is the moment he must end his denial and proceed with life. It's truly a Get Real moment.
This is based on fact, sort of. A friend who grew up with me in Shoal Lake, married a city woman and they lived in the little town, with varying degrees of success. My story has a happier ending.
Wanting to reinforce the value of true friendship I came up with the story as a homage to lifelong relationships. Hutch, the old friend who didn't leave home, says nothing ever changes in small towns but everything, all the changes we've just watched in every episode of The Lonesomes, refutes his words.
Dennis Scullard plays the grateful friend and eloquently brought the wisdom of the long view into sight. Watch Dennis' demo reel. Dear friend Troy Buschman voices the younger Hutch.
This scene has a very structuralist feeling to it, an accidental modernist construct on a vacant building in a dying town.
The old garage is in Decker, Manitoba south of Shoal Lake. Several things appealed to me about the place: the greyness of the walls and boards, the smashed window with the perfect arc visible above the hoarding and the horizontal ladder. My two shots of the place were enough to accommodate the conversation. In the story, Marshallville is its location.
In the first and principal scene, we see the boarded up storefront of a long abandoned garage with a broken window covered by several planks and a horizontal ladder. As well as being an interesting solution to the broken window problem, the horizontal ladder is a large metaphor for lateral movement in small towns as they decline.
The second scene (above) is a medium close-up of the broken window with its perfect arc and the ladder dividing the scene a different way. The neutral dusted-out colours of the wood and the building suggest and reinforce the place's and the town's ongoing deterioration. Though dimmed by being reflected, the trees moving in the breeze are the only vivid colours, again suggesting what once was here.
Tagged as decker, dennis scullard, honesty, troy buschman
The Lonesomes #14 – Telephone Operators
Two retired telephone operators have a chance encounter with life-changing results.
Lil? Can that be you?
I guess it pretty much has to be, don't it? How are you, Dort?
Great Geezers, nobody's called me Dort in years.
Probably 'bout as long since I heard anybody say Great Geezers.
THEY CHUCKLE
I'm doing fine, old gal. George and I are in town to visit his sis Ethel who's not doing so well.
So I hear. How is George?
The same. Still loves to haunt musty old places. He dragged me into the museum downtown which I had never been in before. Lo and behold, there was our old switchboard from the telephone office! You coulda knocked me over with a noodle!
That old clutterbucket's been in there for a few years since somebody discovered it in the loft of old Smoocher's barn. You should drive down Larch. The old telephone building is still there.
We will. Old Smoocher! Great Geezers! His number was on the central party line, 23 ring 3.
Very good Dort! Your memory's held up well considering we haven't worked the board for over 30 years.
When I saw that old switchboard it all just came flooding back to me, Lil – the names, the numbers, the rings, the long distance codes, even the smell of the marigolds Juicy Jim the janitor usta plant around the building. Funny what you remember…
And what you forget.
(SLIGHTLY UNDER HER BREATH) Remember Lil? We usta have the best gossip in town, didn't we?
DORT LAUGHS NERVOUSLY
Always the best. If you wanted to know who was pregnant and shouldn'ta been, ask Lil or Dort. If you wanted to know whose business was about to go tits up, ask the phone gals. If you wanted to find out who gambled or drank too much, which men liked boys better than girls, and vice versa, who really stole the church statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary, ask the busiest bodies in town.
It was quite a burden, bearing all that knowledge, wasn't it Lil?
BOTH CHUCKLE
That's how I found out my Dutch was cheating on me (PAUSE) and with who.
LIL (CON'T)
You look surprised, Dort!
(DISBELIEF, SOME HORROR) You knew?
(STILL HORRIFIED) You knew…all along?
All along. It wasn't long before half the town knew.
(MOUNTING SHOCK AND HORROR) No!! What!? No!
(CHUCKLES A LITTLE) You two weren't very good at having an affair, not very good at all. You lacked…umm…basic discretion. You thought people were stupider than they are which always backfires in a small town.
Did Dutch know that you knew?
Nope and that's just how I wanted it. See what I mean about being lousy at cheating. George and I were much better at having our affair than you two.
What!? You and my George had an affair! (GASPING) I don't believe you.
You don't have to believe me, honey. It happened and we had a hoot because nobody, and I mean NO BODY, knew about us. Making sure of that was the most fun, well, some of the fun.
I don't believe you!
You believe what you need to believe, Dort. Ask George.
I will. (TURNS FROM MIC, FADES IN DISTANCE) George! George!
God, I've waited a long time for that. I…feel…great! (CHUCKLES LOUDLY GENUINELY) And (CHUCKLE) she had Old Smoocher's number wrong. Ha!
This story is about a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that presents itself suddenly and perfectly. It has a lot of detail in it, starting with a historical set-up for the characters followed by a plot with a twist and another twist that are revealed quickly and simply, ending with a curlicue. This is a snappy story; it moves along. The pace needs to be bright but not speedy because we want the women's situations to be fully understood.
Two old friends meet accidentally in a cafe in a small town. Back about 30 years, they both worked as telephone operators in the local telephone office, which is the building you see in the image. They seem friendly enough at the beginning of our story.
Lil is not short for Lillian or Lily, it is short for Lilac but still pronounced as if it was short for Lillian. Dort is short for Dorothy. Dort's husband is George who is with her on this visit to their former home town. Lil's husband is Dutch who isn't referred to but in the past tense because Dutch is dead. Both women are in their 60s but young-sounding and distinctive, like telephone operators in small towns were.
At the outset, the two women are a little surprised to see each other but cordial, genuine. Dort has a favourite expression "Great geezers" she uses like a row of exclamation points. By the seventh line, we know their relationship – they were once switchboard operators in town.
By the time we hear about Old Smoocher, Dort is sounding less positive of what she's saying, more disingenuous, challenged. This is followed with Lil's false praise which becomes increasingly evident in her voice.
Sensing Lil's change, Dort tries to endear herself with the memory of the gossip they heard as operators. Lil spouts some suggestive and lurid situations they both knew about, setting us and Dort up nicely for Lil's next line about Dutch. Their chuckle after Dort talks of bearing the burden is the last cordial moment.
Then Lil goes in for the kill, not maliciously but pointedly, directly confronting Dort. Lil knows this is a shocker for Dort and relishes every moment. After the pregnant pause, Lil lures Dort in.
Dort is totally surprised and shocked; she almost whispers her next two lines, like a stage aside. Once she knows that half the town knew about her affair with Dutch, Dort is louder, flustered. This makes Lil happy.
Lil gets right to the point – Dort and Dutch thought people are stupid and that doesn't work in a small town. Lil gets to drop another one on Dort, her affair with George. Dort is flabbergasted with disbelief. Lil encourages her to check with George and we hear Dort turn away calling George twice – the first time Dort sounds rather forlorn but the second time she says his name, she is irate, demanding, impatient.
Sounding enormously satisfied with herself, Lil states her present feelings and chuckles to herself. Then the kicker – Dort got Smoocher's number wrong. The cherry on the sundae for Lil – a jolly Ha!
Even though Lil is the obvious "winner" let's leave the listener feeling empathetic toward both women as well as for hapless George, whose life is probably about to change forever when Dort springs this on him. Maybe George has a heart attack, maybe not. Lil's satisfaction is total, bliss.
Small town telephone operators always had very distinctive voices which were easily recognizable both on and off the phone. I wanted two such voices and thought of Liz Olson and Tannis Zimmer, neither of whom have done voice work but who both possess the vocal and dramatic qualities I wanted. Both women came completely prepared for their roles and The Muse followed us into the studio. In two takes I had my story.
Because I only had one shot of the building and the story is rather long, Kevin Uddenberg, in post production, suggested the slow reveal of the image strip by strip. I like the effect. It complements the story's revelations nicely.
This piece has the most precious and unusual genesis of all the stories in The Lonesomes.
In the late 1930s/early 1940s, the Manitoba Telephone System (MTS) built dozens of these little Spanish Colonial style buildings with fake adobe awnings all over the province to house their offices, switchboards and operators. With the advent of dial phones in the 1960s these little buildings either were demolished or put to other uses. Very few of them remain.
I found this building in Hartney, MB and shot a few minutes of it on a warm day. I packed up my camera and by the time I was back on Highway #21 just outside of Hartney the entire story came to me in a flash. Writers love it when highly detailed stories are provided from a sudden, unknown source. I pulled over and made a few notes on the story which had come full blown with names, numbers, catch phrases and denouement – a rather mysterious event. When I sat down to write the story a few days later, it flooded effortlessly out of me, seemingly without conscious thought or the need for my presence other than to type it out.
In addition to the twists in the story, there was a twist in gathering the images. I always make notes along the road on what and where I take pictures or shoot video. I lost my notes for this trip which was in the summer of 2011 and couldn't exactly recall in which town this building was located.
On the day of the cast and crew screening of The Lonesomes at IMAX I decided to track down the location of the building, in case someone asked where it was. I knew it was south of Brandon so I called a few little towns including Hartney. I spoke to the Hartney town administrator who recognized the place by my description. It had been used as the municipal office for a number of years after MTS left but had fallen into disrepair on the interior in recent years. He told me it had been torn down in early 2012, about 6 months after I recorded it!
I was flattered that the little place gave me a final story just before it disappeared. I'm happy to be the conduit for its past. In 2014 you can still find the building in situ on Google Street View.
Tagged as hartney, liz olson, tannis zimmer, telephone operators
The Lonesomes #13 – A Town With Water
A Town with Water
A defeated small-town mayor sheepishly tells his odorous story.
OLDER MAN
I blew it. I truly blew it.
In 1960 Marshallville became "a town with water." As mayor at the time I'm proud to say I was instrumental in getting the waterworks to town. No more outhouses and public taps, no more hauling buckets of water in and toilet pails out, soon everything would be up-to-date: hot and cold running, flushing and showering. That summer, streets and yards were torn up all over town as the infrastructure for water and sewer went in. And then in early October, most of the town showed up at a ceremony to celebrate the arrival of "the waterworks."
New "towns with water" usually hold a subdued ceremony with the symbolic burning of an outhouse to signal the end of the old well-worn path out back and the beginning of a bright sanitary indoor future.
Never a town to do anything in a small way, the council and myself voted on burning all the biffies in town at once. There was one dissenting voice – Mark Robbins. He's now the mayor. Anyway, 171 outhouses were piled on the flats over at the north end of the lake, hauled and stacked by Dreidger's Hough. The bottom openings, which once shielded holes filled with human muck, now gaped obscenely and odorously in plain view – not the most pleasant sight as you drove into town.
The local paper asked me for a comment about the forthcoming celebration and my exact words still echo through my memory: "It will make a fine blaze and leave an indelible impression. People will remember this night."
At the ceremony, I gave a brief speech, Doctor Gault, in his British accent, remarked how a new era in our ability to fight disease and improve personal hygiene was beginning. I turned on a giant red tap, the water flowed in, the waste flowed out. It was a miracle! The 20th century had arrived! Everyone cheered.
Then Fire Chief Burley lit the outhouses, more cheers as our past went up in smoke, cutting a swath of light, heat and stink through the cold October twilight. It was a fine blaze, enjoyed on many levels but the outhouses had their revenge.
That night and for three days and nights afterwards, every nose in Marshallville knew we had the waterworks by a constant reminder – an acrid, burning-manure smell that arose from the smoldering heap of collapsed outhouses. The smell resisted arduous spraying from the town's fire truck and produced a rank odour that permeated the whole town no matter which direction the wind blew. It was awful; some older people even went to the hospital for oxygen and relief.
In the aftermath, I bore the brunt of coffee shop condemnation. I couldn't even go for a java at Jim Jim's without being taunted, often not good-naturedly. But I was the one who said it would be "a night to remember" and it stuck. Unable to claim the waterworks as my victory because of the blowback from the fire, I was soundly defeated the following year. Marshallville had flushed me.
Even to this day, every time I flush the toilet, I can smell the stink from the burning outhouses. Apparently this still happens to other people in Marshallville, too.
When small towns got the waterworks it was truly a life-changing event. I remember the summer of 1960 when Shoal Lake became a town with water as described in the story. Often that phrase was then used on roadside billboards as an attraction to the town. I wanted to overwrite this story as it might have been told by the ex-mayor of Marshallville who recalls the biggest mistake of his political career.
The mayor has carefully written out his side of the story and almost recites it but not without some sheepishness and embarrassment at the whole event. There had to be a consequence to the folly of a mass biffy burning so I made it true for the whole town as well as for the former mayor. I wanted him to sound a little foolish but still humorous and sad at once.
The collective remembrance of the outhouse aroma lives on, not just in the former mayor's sense-memory but in the whole town's memory. It's a legacy the mayor still can't reconcile within himself so he leans toward resignation.
A Town with Water presented visual and audial challenges. This was the most difficult voice to cast. I tried two men without success. It was a stroke of luck to think of Borys (Boyd) Kozak whom I'd listened to on CKRC growing up and have become friends with at the local Tim Horton's. Borys grew up in Wadena, Saskatchewan, a town just a little bigger than my hometown by about 400 people. Borys jumped at the chance and brought the ex-mayor to life in just two takes, giving country authenticity to the piece. It was a delight to work with Borys.
In spite of the enormous number of miles I travel every summer, it is surprisingly hard to find classic outhouses these days. I used three different locations for the ones in this story.
The first is located at what once was Bryd Siding just west of Shoal Lake on Highway #16. The outhouse, overgrown with bushes, along with a crumbling barn and dilapidated house, are all that remains of Bryd.
The row of four biffies is in the churchyard of St. Michael's Ukrainian Orthodox Church between Tolstoi and Gardenton on Highway #209 in southern Manitoba. The progressively dilapidated structures spoke to me about progress and regression. This site provided the lion's share of the scenes.
The final classic biffy with the crescent moon cut out of the door I lucked into in Makinak, Manitoba on the northeastern edge of Riding Mountain.
Tagged as biffy, borys kozak, boyd kozak, outhouses, waterworks
The Lonesomes #12 – Cribben McCue Froze to Death
Cribben McCue Froze to Death
The cranky town gossip shares too much information on how to freeze to death.
Cribben McCue froze to death. He lived in this house in Marshallville his whole life and cared for his aging and ailing mother, Ruthie. It was late fall in the early Fifties when he fell through the thin ice on the river. Cribs, as everybody called him, managed to get to shore. Dripping wet, the temperature well below zero with a stiff wind, he started for home but soon got discombobulated. I guess he staggered around for awhile but the cold overwhelmed him.
When they found Cribs, he was naked as the day he was born. Rumours went around that he'd been beaten, robbed and stripped. But he died alone, in the cold, his body wedged up between two big old cottonwoods trees. (SCORNFULLY) People don't know.
Freezing to death is one of the worst ways to die. Slowly losing your heat, your essential fire gradually dimming then gone. It isn't long before the cold starts to interfere with your ability to think rationally, to understand what is happening to you. Your confusion mounts; your movement is impeded by the cold, the awful, unforgiving cold. You shiver violently, uncontrollably. You stumble around. Your hands are useless.
(MORE SCORN) People don't know. The constant cold induces some odd behaviour like wanting to burrow under something, behind something, between something like big trees. It's similar to hibernation. When the metabolism slows down we begin to burrow, to dig in, like varmints.
Somewhere late in the freezing to death process, a strange thing occurs. You suddenly feel hot, unbearably hot. Unable to reason why this might be happening, you feel confined, your clothing imprisons you in the heat so you tear off your clothes, compulsively stripping every shred off your body to cool down.
Naked, you can only feel the dimly heated core of your body as your vitals collapse under duress, your arms and legs turn blue and numb, your skin turns brittle, your eyes freeze shut, your lips and tongue harden, your blood slows as it becomes ice in your veins, your organs succumb to the cold and there is a constant high pitched buzzing in your ears because your eardrums have frozen and broken apart. When the buzzing stops, so does everything else.
You are extinguished; your body becomes stiff, (PAUSE) solid, (PAUSE) like one stuff, (PAUSE) all ice and frozen bone. (PAUSE)
That's how Cribben McCue died. (SCORN) People don't know.
A bitter and miserable old woman tells this tale of woe about a family in Marshallville. Immediately we learn Cribs lived his whole life in the house we are seeing where he cared for his sick mother. What a nice boy, except to our story teller. She is sour about everything including her story. She doesn't try to hide her scorn for others, ever, sees no reason to. She's old; she doesn't care.
Matter-of-factly but with great scorn, she recounts the dreadful experience of freezing to death referring to the death of Cribben McCue. As the horror of each freezing stage is explained, sourpuss lady takes a keener pleasure in talking about it, highly self-satisfied at her knowing what "People don't know."
Everything she says is true; this is what happens when we freeze to death. It delights her; she wallows in the horror, enjoying herself too much.
I didn't have a story until I read the details of what actually happens when we freeze to death. The final details are largely embellishment but everything leading up to that, including the stripping and burrowing, is factual.
Carol Anne Miller did four takes of this story, each radically different. I settled on the grating crazy lady voice as there were at least two women in Shoal Lake with similar vocal tones who were terrible gossips and loved to embellish everything they heard. More than any other voice in The Lonesomes, this one gets an immediate reaction and thus works as intended. Thanks Carol.
This house is in Westbourne, Manitoba along Highway #16. The weather-worn colour of the house along with its long abandoned, paintless condition appealed to me.
I shot it twice, once for the long view and once for the details. In post, Kevin Uddenberg and I worked this into a vague Guy Maddin homage during post production with the colour changes and the negative (black) spaces.
Tagged as carol anne miller, cribben mccue, freezing to death, kevin uddenberg, marshallville
The Lonesomes #11 – I Don't Like Trains
Click pic to watch The Lonesomes #11 – 3:07
I Don't Like Trains
An old man recalls his dire railroad birth.
AUDIO: one blast of a steam train whistle
I don't like trains.
AUDIO: another blast of the whistle
Never have.
I was born on a train but it was a rude and crude way to come into the world. It surely was. (PAUSE) It was 1893 and even though Mama was round and ripe with me, she was travelling up to Russell to see her ailing brother Thomas. The train was a mile and half out of the little town of Marshallville and Mama had a big bathroom urge. To her dismay her water burst and she squirted me out like a bar of wet soap. In those days when you used train toilets, your leavings went right out onto the tracks. Well, I landed under the train with the cord that connected me and Mama still attached. I was dragged along under the train over the cinders until the cord got broken.
I was cut up pretty bad and bear the scars to prove it. This red gash on my forehead and below my right eye, that's my tattoo from being dragged face down til the cord broke.
My whole right side and my back looks like a road map from being cut up by sharp cinders.
The doctor in Marshallville, his name was Doc Wensel, he heard about my desperate birth. The doc got in his horse and buggy and hightailed it to the train. Doc Wensel staunched up my bleeding the best he could, tended to Mama and made the train engineer agree to keep the train stopped for an hour. Thay way, me and Mama could get over the shocks of the day in a warm car before he took us to the little hospital in Marshallville.
(WISTFUL) If I'm very quiet, I can still feel the first warm hands that held me. A conductor named Gus lifted me off the cinders and placed me in a linen tablecloth from the dining car. I was bloodied and bleeding. He dried me off and I can remember feeling the heat from his big warm hands.
(PAUSE) Well, that was what the first minutes of my life were like. Luckily life got better. (PAUSE) Mama told me all this and ever since, I've had a great story to tell that always begins with I don't like trains.
AUDIO: steam train whistle as at start
Another true story from the history of Shoal Lake!
In the 1890s just outside of town a baby was born as presented in the story complete with the doctor hurrying out to the train to tend to mother and child. The child lived a long life thereafter and I wanted to capture him as an old man with still-vivid memories of his birth. The first warm hands thing is pure fiction but the rest sticks to the facts. Marshallville is mentioned again.
The old guy has lived every day of his many years with evidence of his terrifying birth writ in scars on his flesh, on his face! The scarification on his body is severe. A large, red scar on his face looks like the number 3 and goes from above his left eye to a peak below his eye and continues around his mouth onto his chin. The scar is wide and thick; it is the defining characteristic of his face. You can't miss it.
His body is even more severely scarred. As he was being dragged along under the train, the needle-sharp cinders minced his right side and all of his back leaving deep ragged furrows that still redden occasionally eighty-odd years after they were made. They healed in such a way that there are three perfect interconnecting circles that run diagonally across his back from his right shoulder to his left side, a bizarre fragment of order amid a chaos of disfigurement. All his life he has carried much shame about his body and only once appeared shirtless in company. On that occasion, a woman fainted when she saw the grotesque scars on his torso.
What a way to arrive in the world! He's a little nuts and speaks in a strange gnarly voice, but he is thrilled to be able to relate the story of his gruesome birth yet again. He tells it with some humour, great familiarity and odd phrasing and tone.
There is much room to generate sympathy and my old buddy Mitchell Johnston did just that, creating a memorable character.
Every weekend during the spring, summer and fall, the Prairie Dog Central plies the rails between Winnipeg and Grosse-Isle, Manitoba. The train consists of an 1882 steam locomotive with five passenger cars and caboose dating from 1901 to 1913, all fully restored and operational. A ride on the Prairie Dog Central is one of the premiere tourist events in Manitoba! As a fun excursion for the whole family, I highly recommend it.
To capture the footage, I leap-frogged the Prairie Dog Central along Highway #6 one Sunday during its run, shooting crossing to crossing along the way. I shot more footage in Grosse Isle as the train navigated the wye. The old train is a visual treat and just being near it hearkens one back to a comfortable and simple time.
Tagged as i don't like trains, mitch johnston, mitchell johnston, prairie dog central
The Lonesomes #10 – Squatters
A resourceful pioneer scares off an opponent and his dream ensues.
ELDERLY MAN
Greetings. I'm Angus Marshall.
I wanted that whole quarter section of land at the end of that lovely blue lake but Aubrey Briers, a farmhand from Ontario just like me, was squatting on it, just like I was. Off in one corner Briers built a lopsided sod hut that looked about to be tumbling over any minute. I don't know how long he'd been there but I was keen to find a way of getting rid of him so I could build my little dream.
What was my little dream? Well, before me stretches to the south a narrow shallow lake, five miles long. A little stream comes in from the north and feeds the lake. The land around rolls in gentle fashion, rich for farming. I feel in my Scottish bones that a town will grow on this very spot.
(BECOMING WISTFUL) One evening when I was sitting under a cottonwood tree watching the sun reflected off the lake, the shimmer of light and water sent a vision afoot over the landscape. Suddenly around me I saw little houses, churches, hotels and stores built along a railroad track, people scurrying about building and doing, building and doing.
I saw yet-unborn Marshalls: my sons and daughters walking on this land, growing and building here, too. And sharing, always sharing, for if the Good Lord teaches us anything, He teaches us that "there's enough."
Sitting under that old tree, I suddenly heard a sound from the future, the wet lonesome whistle of a steam train in the distance. It would be eleven years before the track was laid through here but I heard that train coming just as plain as day. I knew at that moment a town would arise here.
That was my dream but Briers was in the way. I needed to get rid of him. He didn't know me very well. I liked it that way so I came up with a plan.
I waited until the next starless night, dark as a dungeon. I had an old horse collar with a couple of cracked bells that sounded eerie so I put the horse collar around my neck and went to visit Briers. When I got to his hut the thought occurred to me to just push the precarious pile of mud over and smother him. But I didn't need to resort to murder to get what I wanted.
I started to howl like a wolf which got Brier's attention. When he came out of his hut, I introduced myself as Satan and asked if I could be of any service to him since he was squatting on Satan's land. I transformed into a horse and snorted and neighed and whinnied, pawed the ground, telling him I lost my wagon a few miles back and would he help me fetch it. And so on, mad gibberish. Briers didn't know how to react so he went inside his hut. I could hear him securing his door. As I left, I shouted I'd be back every night to see if he needed anything from Satan. (SMALL CHUCKLE)
It rained hard that night. The next morning, when I stepped out of my little hut, I saw a different landscape. No longer did Briers's hovel stand out against the raw horizon. In its stead lay a pile of mud. I rushed over thinking the hut had finally fallen onto Briers and smothered him but a thorough dig among the muck revealed no Briers…or anything for that matter.
I never saw hide nor hair of him again. He had vanished. Gone as gone can get. I claimed that whole quarter and the rest of the section, too. (PAUSE) That's why this town is called Marshallville and not Briersville.
That's also why the war memorial in town has a monument that looks just like Reginald, my first born, who was gassed at Ypres in 1915. (PAUSE) People call the monument The Unknown Soldier (PAUSE) but I know who it is, (PAUSE) I know who it is.
Now we move off the farm into town and hear stories of town life starting with the genesis of Marshallville as explained by its founder and namesake.
Angus Marshall is in his late 70s and looks back over a long life to recount a turning point.
The first paragraph sets everything up. Take it slowly, evenly. Tho Angus and Briers are equals in their squatting rights, being a wily Scotsman, Angus has the edge and he knows it.
The second, third and fourth paragraphs become increasingly wistful as he recounts his dreams and visions. Paragraph five about the train gets almost spooky.
In paragraph six we return to the Briers problem. Here Marshall has a firmer tone.
Marshall gets great enjoyment recounting his plan in action in paragraphs seven and eight ending with a chuckle. Paragraph nine tells of the morning after and paragraph ten the plan is a success. He gloats a little over the town name, affirming his significance in the town.
The last paragraph explains what we have been watching for the last four minutes. Angus' tone gets a little spooky here. He is still grieving. The implication is that Angus paid for the monument and had it built to his specs. His personal assertion of the statue's identity is very satisfying for the old man. He tells his story with wisdom, kindness and understanding gained by a long hard life on the prairies.
The story and the image are both quite personal for me. The story is, in fact, the true story of the founding of my hometown, and the war memorial stands in the first village I lived in.
The genesis of Shoal Lake, Manitoba rests with Matt Thompson, the original settler who had to scare off another squatter to claim his land. My story, based on reports in the Shoal Lake history books, follows events closely including the horse collar and feigning madness. For the purposes of The Lonesomes, this is how Marshallville came into being.
Steve Black did a wonderful job bringing Angus Marshall to life.
The first town my parents and I lived in after I was born was Margaret, Manitoba, south of Brandon. I have vague memories of it since we moved when I was about four years old. I have returned to Margaret since and noted the lovely white statue of the soldier that sat in the small park. I wanted to use the statue for The Lonesomes but when I returned to shot it, it was no longer in the village park.
Fewer than a dozen people still live in Margaret. I chatted up the postmistress who said they had moved the statue to the cemetery just outside of town which is where I shot the scene. The water effect I created in my backyard and applied to the image.
Tagged as margaret, marshallville, shoal lake, squatters, statue, steve black, unknown soldier
The Lonesomes #9 – God Moves in a Windstorm
Click the pic to watch The Lonesomes #9 – 1:13
God Moves in a Windstorm
A disharmonious choir churns away graveside.
RAGGED CHOIR
God moves in a windstorm,
And heaven ain't far behind.
(repeat twice)
A ragged choir sings off-key and unsteadily at a graveside funeral on a windy day. It could be Tillie Sweet's funeral. The wind howls throughout, weaving in and out of the choir.
I wanted to capture the notion of praise but with uncertainty about the melody and the words like a real church congregation would sound without hymnals. The song is my variation on an old Kentucky coal-mining tune by Sara Ogan Gunning.
I recorded the choir in three different places with different people at three different times. Sound engineer Mike Germain did an excellent job combining the disparate pieces into the lop-sided round you hear.
The choir voices are Garcea Diehl, Tannis Zimmer, Liz Olson, Chris Scholl, Troy Buschman and Reid Dickie.
Just east of Komarno, Manitoba, right next to Provincial Road #229, I found this tiny cemetery with a single row of headstones. It felt very lonesome to me. The slow zoom, the drained colour, off-kilter choir and the howling wind combine to enhance a dream-like feeling of loneliness.
This is the last segment in the Farm Life section of The Lonesomes. Next we move into Town Life.
Tagged as choir, god moves in a windstorm, komarno, mike germain
The Lonesomes #8 – Running
The vast blueness of the sky frightens a woman to death.
ELDERLY WOMAN
Out here most of the world is sky with just a little strip of land running around the bottom. Sometimes that little bit of land isn't enough, especially when the sky… (PAUSE…UNCERTAINTY…SIGH)
Tillie Sweet lived in this house. (SIGHS) Aw, me. Tillie came from the big city of London England where there is more land than sky. Just off the boat, she married Willaker Sweet. People round here called them Tillie and Willie. Anyways, Willie moved her out here to the middle of the big sky, the biggest sky she ever saw. Tillie Sweet had never experienced anything so big, so blue, so unforgiving, so overpowering as the prairie sky. It became her prison but one that she eventually escaped.
It was during her second summer out here when the isolation, the homesickness and the desperation of her daily life overtook Tillie. It sent her running, running and running and running and running across the open prairie. She was running from the sky, trying to escape it. She ran and ran until her lungs burst and she fell face down in a clover pasture, never to arise.
When they found her, she was smiling. (SIGHS) Aw, me. (WHISPERS) It's happened before. I know for truth, it has happened before.
(NORMAL VOICE) The night Tillie died, a thunderstorm came through here and lightning struck the big old cottonwood tree that grew by the Sweet house. (WHISPER) Some say lightning struck it three times that night. (NORMAL VOICE) In the morning all that was left was a jagged stump with a sharp tip, like a finger pointing toward heaven. (SIGHS) Aw, me.
An elderly woman, with great resignation, recounts this tale of prairie desperation. She speaks slowly, deliberately, with a world weariness that indicates her age and experience. She wants, needs to tell the story but there are taboos about it, its horror too vast to bear alone. She whispers two lines that are especially chilling but she gets the story told. The story involves conflict with the elements, resolution and the narrator's familiarity with the feeling, suggesting perhaps she had similar urges.
Sadly, this is based on true events that occurred on the Canadian prairies as pioneers filled up the west. Perhaps an extreme form of agoraphobia or something inexplicable and individual, running yourself to death was an option for a few pioneer women. Although not widespread and rarely affecting men, running became a fact of some pioneer family's lives.
The possible reasons or explanations for this behavior are laid out by the storyteller. Her burden of knowing what happened to Tillie Sweet expresses itself as fear in her voice. The script is explicit with directions.
The dramatic moment of Tillie's death combines several small audio effects including time lapse clouds that speed up, her heart beating faster and faster, her frantic gasping and her feet running through the clover.
The end of the story explains the image of the tree stump, a satisfactory yet chilling end to the tale. The woman's whispers must be convincing and she must know why she is whispering. Her world weariness is unabated by telling the story and her heartfelt sighs persist.
As ever, Nora Nordin-Fredette did a great job of capturing the sadness and world weariness of the narrator and the peculiarity of story.
This house is located near what remains of Mountain Road, Manitoba in the rolling uplands of Riding Mountain just off Highway #357. This highway offers some of Manitoba's most stunning vistas. If you are eastbound, the road ends at Hwy #5 with a wonderful descent off the Manitoba Escarpment onto the old lake bed.
I was struck by the exposed bones of the house but it was the pointy stump and its location next to the house that drove my imagination.
Tagged as mountain road, nora nordin-fredette, running, tillie sweet
The Lonesomes #7 – Old Friends
Rusty old farm equipment suddenly spouts poetry.
Well, old friend, looks like we got through another summer without having to do a speck of work. How about that!
THRESHER
How many summers is it that we haven't worked?
I lost track but I'm still tired. It sure is good not to have to pull a plough anymore.
You like just rusting away up here with this great view of the prairie and the highway, don't you, old tugger?
I do, I love it. My tuggin' days are long over. I pulled everybody and everything back and forth across hot dusty fields and down skinny little roads through the bush. I pushed snow away so everyone could move again. I pulled ploughs, harrows, wagons, stoneboats, binders, horses and wagons out of mires, big blocks of ice from the slough for the icebox, ha, I even pulled you a time or two, old thresher pal.
You did and you were strong and eager. Then they bought The Big Horse, as they called it, and you tugged other stuff after that. The Big Horse did most of my pulling. I mostly just sat there and let my gears tickle me once I was in action. But you were a strong tugger, my friend.
I had some fine metal days, didn't I?
That you did.
You had your share of heroic days in the field, too.
Those times in late summer
when the heat was still on the land and the crop came in early,
those days, driven by more horsepower than I needed,
surrounded, serviced and fed by dozens of broad sweating men,
each trying to precisely match my abilities to reap,
to separate the seed from the stalk,
the gold from the grip
and deliver it
en masse
into a hopper,
the rich harvest bestowed.
I yearned all year for those weeks of thrilling work,
the rhythmic whine of the belt from the power takeoff of The Big Horse
playing counterpoint to the chugging beat of my cogs, gears and pulleys,
the dry shouts of the men feeding me the harvest,
the erotic embrace of virgin grain against polished metal,
that was my moment,
my bliss.
So that's what you've been ruminatin' about! You are a poet!
I am! I am the cutting edge of rusty and irrelevant farm machinery poetry which is rapidly taking over from cowboy poetry as the true voice of the prairie wind. Would you like to hear more?
I very much would and, hopefully, shall.
Indeed, you shall.
That small sound we both know so well,
it is the creep and peel of The Rust.
The Rust, The Rust, it rules us now.
Day and night, through every season,
subtle but unstoppable against the breeze and the dawn,
The Rust is omnipresent,
like God,
etching away at us.
We flake into the grey fall grass,
shatterings of us glint on cold snow and are buried,
only to glint again in spring turnings.
We are the hilltop beasts of burden,
brazen against the whip of the northerlies in January,
snapping in the August heat like brittle controlled insects
and always,
always the shedding,
the shedding Rust
speaking in its wee, timorous voice.
I can hear The Rust right now. (PAUSE) And I'm still tired."
As the scene indicates this is a modern conversation between an old threshing machine and an old tractor, both from the early part of the 1900s. The tone here is light and jovial, familiar, sincere and endearing.
The two male voices sound old and tired but the thresher, having a poetry mission, is more cheerful and slightly more energetic than the tractor who is just plain tired. They've literally been put out to pasture, relegated to a rise with a view of the asphalt highway below in one direction and miles of monoculture spreading away to the horizon in the other. The two old machines have witnessed vast changes in farming, suggested by mention of The Big Horse which describes a new and large tractor, an increase in the scale and speed of farming.
Both machines are sincere in their comments and accolades about each other; their individual triumphs in the field are noted with understanding and kindness.
Thresher delivers the poetry professionally with perfect inflection and phrasing. He wraps you in his voice and holds you there. After the last poem, Tractor becomes rather wistful which is soon overwhelmed by his ongoing tiredness.
My dear friend Chris Scholl masters the voice of Tractor and I'm Thresher.
I found this location along Manitoba Highway #3 just west of Cartwright. I was struck by the positioning of the old thresher and tractor in relation to each other, the sky and the rolling land around. The highway runs by at the bottom of the rise.
This is a site I shot twice. Just as post production began, at Kevin Uddenberg's urging, I re-shot the machinery one afternoon using the classic film language angles we know as cinematic conversation. It worked very well. The high contrast in the wide two-shot is intentional to make the close-up pans more intriguing. I lucked out with the abundant swallows sailing about on my second shoot.
On the second shoot I ran into the land owner whose permission I had not sought. He and his wife, Randy and Donna Pawich, were just curious about what I was doing. I talked to them about my heritage interests, leaving the story of The Lonesomes untold. They were friendly people and I'm sure they will enjoy the story I attached to their old equipment.
Creating the rust sound was a problem during the recording of The Lonesomes. I had a mental sound of the rust but didn't know how to produce it. Finally I recorded the dragging of a metal rod over a concrete floor and slowed it down. Voila! The sound of rust!
Tagged as chris scholl, mccormick deering tractor, poetry, rust, thresher
The Lonesomes #6 – Luke's Truck
Luke's Truck
A father commemorates his son's birthday in a vehicular way.
I bought that Chevy half ton from Steve Twerdun. Me and Mary had just got hitched and we needed solid farm transportation. That Chev was a fine piece of truck. People noticed me when I drove it into Marshallville back when it was shiny and new (PAUSE) and I was shiny and new.
Luke, our first born, was conceived in that truck. It was a hot day in late August and me and Mary were drivin' home from seeing her parents about an hour away. We stopped for a pee by the road when a prairie storm come up with thunder and lightning. It rained hammers and nails. We couldn't see to drive so we had wild sex in the steamed up truck by the side of the road.
The next May when Mary went into labour, she woke me at three in the morning. We got two-thirds of the way to the hospital in town and she gave birth, right into the tote bag she had her clothes in. Luke just slid right out of her and into the bag. So he was born in that truck, too.
Seventeen years later on an August night Luke drove the truck into a soft embankment, uprooting a tree which came through the side window impaling his head. He died in the truck, quivering at the end of a broken branch. (PAUSE)
(STARTS TO SOB) I leave Luke's truck up there to remind me and the sky what happened. (TRYING TO GAIN CONTROL) He'd a bin fifty years old…today. (SOBS)
This deep memory piece aspires to be a great country song loaded with irony and poignancy. An elderly man, 33 years after his son's death, still grieves every day for his lost child. The old truck, slowly sinking into the prairie atop a rise, harbours his most significant memories starting when he was first married.
The first three paragraphs are delivered almost happily as he recalls the events of the story. In the first paragraph he sets the scene and remembers the shiny, new truck with delight but a bit of sadness creeps in when he says "And I was shiny and new" indicating his advanced age.
The second paragraph he delivers a little sheepishly but with enjoyment of the memory of the day Luke was conceived. The third paragraph again is a pleasant memory if somewhat surprising for the birth in the truck and the ease of it all.
The fourth paragraph is matter-of-fact, deadpan as if he is trying to hold back the emotion of the event. He is still stunned by it. The stark image of his impaled son is followed by a pause so the audience can realize Luke was conceived, born and died in the truck they are seeing. How horrible!
The final paragraph is the kicker. The truck is his personal memorial to his lost son, the object that still connects him every day with Luke. His voice is clogged with emotion as he speaks the second last line. After a pause, the last line is charged with cruel memory as he reports the special nature of the day. The pause between "fifty years old" and "today" and the way "today" is delivered are the keys to the story's success. He has a hard time getting out the last line before he breaks down and sobs after the story is over. It's an emotionally charged ending that shouldn't feel manipulative but honest and sincere.
Since the background sound will only be the sound of the prairie wind whispering through the grass, this has much potential to be maudlin. I want to avoid that. I want the audience to see that although it's a sad story and he is still heartsick over his loss, there is an underpinning of acceptance of how life is.
Dennis Scullard gave a superior performance as the still-grieving father expressing his deep and incurable sorrow, just emotional enough. Dennis is evolving into a very good actor and his roles are getting larger. Watch his demo reel.
Luke's Truck contains the first mention of Marshallville which looms large later in The Lonesomes once we get to town life.
This old half ton was a familiar site to me from my sacred site tours as it sits at the bottom of the rise below the buffalo effigy in extreme southern Saskatchewan, again about a mile from Montana.
I love how the truck dominated the landscape while deteriorating comfortably into the prairie soil. I shot it twice on two separate trips, once with the hood open and once with the hood closed.
The truck belonged to Ralph Rasmussen who grew up on the family homestead just below the buffalo effigy. I met Ralph several times on my trips and have written about him on my blog. He told me his interesting history of the sacred site as well as his family background in the area. Ralph has since passed away but his truck still sits atop the same rise where he parked it years ago. Other than my use of his old truck, the fictional story of Luke has nothing to do with Ralph Rasmussen.
Tagged as buffalo effigy, chevy half ton, dennis scullard, luke's truck, ralph rasmussen, saskatchewan
The Lonesomes #5 – Prairie Fire
Click pic to watch The Lonesomes #5 – 2:28
Prairie Fire
Wildfire races across the open prairie toward a homestead.
I 'member Papa and I standin' after sundown and watchin' the red glow far off in the distance. I was skeerd and I think Papa was a little skeerd too. The next night the glow was even closer. In the mornin' we all could smell the smoke.
Papa got the team out and ploughed a wide circle round the house, the barn and haystacks. We filled everything we had with water: barrels, troughs, pots, pans, kettles, pails, basins, jars, even the chamber pots. We soaked brooms, grain sacks, sheets and anything we could find that sopped up water and could be used to beat back the fire. My big brother Ivan pumped water so long that day his arms was swole and sore by the evening.
After dark we all stood and watched the fire comin' straight toward our farm. The prairie grass was so high the fire ate it like it was breakfast. I can still hear the loud roar of the fire. We was lucky. Just when we started to beat at the flames, the wind changed direction and sent the fire across the ravine, away from us. Burned out half our wheat crop though.
The other thing the fire took was the outhouse. It was tinder-dry and it took but one spark to set it on fire. It was gone in no time. Mama and us kids talked Papa into digging the new outhouse closer to the house. Mama had to tickle him to get him to agree.
When we was lookin' for things to fill with water, we even used the pretty teacups Mama brought over with her on the boat. There was only two of them and one got broke. (PAUSE) Mama cried.
Raging prairie fires were a frequent danger for pioneers after the buffalo were extirpated and the prairie grasses grew tall and dry in the summer heat. Often fires could be seen approaching for several days across the flat land. It was an all-out battle to prepare for an oncoming fire: from ploughing a wide fireguard around the property to collecting water and gathering materials to beat back the flames.
This story is told from the perspective of a bright eight-year-old girl who lives with her family on their prairie homestead in 1899. The girl's English is colloquial giving the piece an atmosphere of the era when children's education was often secondary to farm work. She recounts the story with increasing wide-eyed fear but comfort from having her family around her. There is palpable relief in her voice when the wind changes and their farm is saved. Things lighten up considerably with the outhouse story and we think everything is going to be okay.
Reality rears its head again in last paragraph when one of the two teacups gets broken and Mama cries. The irony and the happy/sad balance is maintained. The broken tea cup was a dramatic and poignant afterthought.
Once again, Nora Nordin-Fredette did an excellent job bringing the fearful little girl to life.
This lone abandoned farmhouse atop a rise in southern Saskatchewan was the inspiration for The Lonesomes. I had driven past it dozens of times over the years and everything about it was mysterious to me. It seemed to cry out for an imagination to commemorate its hardships, its joys and fears, its life and death.
It is located in extreme southern Saskatchewan along Highway #18 in the Missouri Coteau near the Big Muddy area. The symmetrical little house with its four dormers was familiar to me from my trips visiting sacred sites in Saskatchewan. One year turkey vultures nested in the house and when I drove by a vulture was perched on each of its dormers like elegant gargoyles.
I took a guided tour of the area in 2011 from Tillie Duncan, an elderly lady who'd lived her whole life in the region. She explained the house was built in the late 1890s and the family had to bring wood across the border from Plentywood, Montana, about a mile away, because there were no trees in this part of the country.
Combining live action with my still photos of the house the place looks vulnerable enough to suit the prairie fire story I had in mind. The close-up moving pan across the facade details the intricate decay of the old house.
Tagged as missouri coteau, nora nordin-fredette, prairie fire, saskatchewan, tillie duncan


text:
Eco Flow Port Drivers Vote To Join Teamsters Teamsters.org ...Late on July 8, 2015, port truck drivers from Eco Flow Transportation, LLC, voted unanimously and selected Teamsters Local 848 as their exclusive bargaining agent in an election conducted by Region 21 of the National Labor Relations Board. Pursuant to an agreement with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Eco Flow agreed to remain neutral with respect to the drivers' efforts to form a union...
Teamsters Local 340 Members Protest At City Council Teamster.org ...Local 340 members were out in force last night at the Biddeford, Maine, city council meeting to demand action on new contracts. The city leaders have stalled negotiating on new contracts which cover 60 police officers and 50 public works employees which the local union has tried to negotiate for the past six months.
"The city is not negotiating in good faith…we have tried to meet them half way," said Ray Cote, business agent with Local 340...
Danafilms workers vote to join Teamsters Telegram ...Production employees of RKW Danafilms Inc. have voted to organize under Teamsters Local 170, the union reported this week. Workers at the plastic film manufacturer voted in April, but their ballots were impounded while the Teamsters pursued unfair labor practice charges against the company. The Teamsters reported that when ballots were finally counted June 29, the final vote was 23-13 to unionize...
Marker honoring fallen Minneapolis Teamsters to be dedicated July 18 Union Advocate ...After a lengthy fundraising campaign, the Remember 1934 Committee will unveil a permanent plaque July 18 in the Warehouse District of downtown Minneapolis commemorating the historic Teamsters strikes that echoed across the U.S. – and made Minneapolis a union town...
Teamsters go on strike at Cranesville Block Company Daily Gazette ...Cement truck drivers at the Cranesville Block Co. plant in Glenville and Albany went on strike Wednesday. Among their demands are a reduction in what they pay toward company-provided health care and changes to the company's pension program...
Global Labor & Trade
European Parliament backs key TTIP compromise Politico ...After months of fighting, the European Parliament voted to back a compromise on the most controversial piece in Europe's evolving free trade pact with the U.S., while also giving its blessing to the future of the talks. The Parliament on Wednesday voted, 447-229, to green-light a proposal to revamp a disputed investor court...
Trans-Pacific Partnership's Potential Impact Weighed in Asia and U.S. New York Times ...Banks from rich countries like the United States and Japan would have the right to be treated more like local banks in less affluent countries, including Peru, Malaysia and Vietnam. Japan would be required to let in more American farm goods. Makers of pharmaceuticals would have an extra tool to protect their patents abroad, limiting competition from less expensive generic drugs. Auto parts would move more smoothly around the Pacific, with fewer taxes...
Japan, U.S. resume talks ahead of TPP ministerial session in late July The Mainici ...Japan and the United States resumed bilateral talks for a Pacific free trade agreement Thursday ahead of a crucial ministerial meeting of all 12 negotiating countries in late July at which they will seek to reach a broad agreement. The working-level talks "will be the last negotiations before the ministerial meeting"...
Menendez worried Obama will upgrade Malaysia in trafficking report The Hill ...Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) expressed concern Wednesday night that Malaysia may get an upgrade from the Obama administration in its human-trafficking status in order to remove a potential hurdle to completing negotiations on a vast Pacific Rim trade agreement. The State Department is expected to bump up Malaysia to tier 2 from the lowest level in its Trafficking in Persons report that is expected to be released next week...
U.S. upgrades Malaysia in annual human trafficking report Daily Mail ...The United States is upgrading Malaysia from the lowest tier on its list of worst human trafficking centers, U.S. sources said on Wednesday, a move that could smooth the way for an ambitious U.S.-led free-trade deal with the Southeast Asian nation and 11 other countries. The upgrade to so-called "Tier 2 Watch List" status removes a potential barrier to President Barack Obama's signature global trade deal...
Greece PM Tsipras tells EU parliament: Greece has been failed austerity lab experiment Reuters ...Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras pleaded in the European Parliament on Wednesday for a fair deal to keep his country in the euro zone, acknowledging Greece's own responsibility for its plight, after EU leaders gave him five days to come up with reforms. With its banks closed, cash withdrawals rationed and the economy in freefall, Greece has never been closer to a total state bankruptcy...
London commuters battle to get home as tube strike begins The Guardian ...London commuters were starting to battle major transport problems as the most widespread tube strike in decades started on Wednesday evening. The strike action by four unions representing almost 20,000 staff, including train drivers, is the result of a continuing dispute over pay and rosters for the all-night tube services planned to start at weekends in September...
Labour Ministry intervenes to stop maritime workers strike News24 Nigeria ...The Federal Ministry of Labour and Productivity, has formally intervened in the strike threat by Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria (MWUN) against the Nigeria Ports Authority over the demand for non-payment of wage arrears to tally clerks and on-board security gangway men. Samuel Olowookere, Deputy Director of Press in the ministry, the intervention is in line with section 4 and 5 of Trade Dispute Act...
State & Living Wage Battles
Labor Battles Heat Up In State Legislatures Huffington Post ...The battles this year over the legislation — perceived as free-market initiatives by proponents and anti-union by foes — reflect the tremendous power that Republicans have gained in state capitols following November's elections and the declining political clout of organized labor in many states...
What Is Scott Walker Trying to Hide? The Nation ...The governor—who former White House counsel John Dean refers to as "more Nixonian than Nixon"—has never been much for transparency. But a botched attempt by his legislative allies to gut the state's open-records law has blown up on Walker in a big way...
Prevailing Wage Law fight heats up WLNS ...It is a law that has been around for 50 years and the fight to change it is picking up steam. Opponents have raised $1 million to their petition drive; the Prevailing Wage Law. Currently the law reads state funded construction projects must pay workers wage scales that are similar to local union groups...
Wisconsin lawmakers pass state budget, partial repeal of prevailing wage law Business Insider ...Wisconsin lawmakers approved early on Thursday a $73 billion state budget that partly repeals the state's prevailing wage law, one of several contentious measures that delayed the two-year spending plan for five weeks. The state Assembly voted 52-46 on the measure, a day after the state Senate approved the spending package...
MO Sec. of State approves voter ID amendment KHQA ...The Missouri Secretary of State approved for circulation the photo voter ID constitutional amendment on Tuesday. The amendment was filed by Jay Ashcroft on May 21, 2015. Ashcroft issued the following statement following the announcement: "Requiring a photo ID to vote is a common sense way to protect our elections from fraud"...
About 2,000 expected for voter ID protest on Monday Winston-Salem Journal ...Winston-Salem police officers have been assigned to protect the nearly 2,000 participants expected for the N.C. NAACP's downtown march and rally Monday, authorities said Wednesday. Monday is scheduled to be the first day of a trial in U.S. District Court in Winston-Salem on the constitutionality of the state's voter ID law...
The Roots of Puerto Rico's Debt Crisis—and Why Austerity Will Not Solve It The Nation ...What Puerto Rico has in common with Greece is that it is a peripheral economy that has been invaded by hedge funds and pushed, by speculation and ballooning debt-service payments, to its limits. But since Puerto Rico's banks are tied to the US Federal Reserve and not its own government, there is no bank panic. What it has in common with Detroit is a history of inefficient administrations...
U.S. Labor
Applications for U.S. unemployment benefits climb to 297,000 Dallas Morning News ...he number of people seeking unemployment benefits rose last week to the highest level since late February. But the increase likely reflected temporary auto plant shutdowns rather than any underlying labor market weakness. The number of people filing applications for unemployment benefits rose by 15,000 to 297,000...
Verizon preps for a strike as labor talks continue RCR Wireless News ...Amid labor negotiations with some 45,000 union employees, Verizon is prepping for a potential work stoppage by training more than 15,000 non-union employees to take over in the event of a strike. Verizon is working on a three-year contract with representatives from the Communication Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers...
The UAW gears up for a labor talks showdown CBS ...The day before hundreds of United Auto Workers delegates gathered to set strategy for contract talks with the Detroit Three, General Motors (GM) sent them a not-so-subtle message. GM announced a $350 million investment in a Mexican factory to build the Chevrolet Cruze compact car, currently built for all of North America at a sprawling plant in Lordstown, Ohio, east of Cleveland...
State reaches tentative deal with AFSCME East Oregonian ...The state has reached a tentative two-year agreement with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the union that represents the second-largest group of state workers. The agreement was reached late Tuesday after a 14-hour bargaining session...
"It's not a good record": When it comes to worker safety, Obama is a lot like Bush Salon ...Not only are many of the laws already on the books to protect workers desperately in need of updating, but the government resources devoted to protecting workers are woefully insufficient. The result? Some tens of thousands of human beings, every year, suffer due to health hazards that could be addressed with relative ease...
If You Could Decrease a Workplace's Injury Rate by 65 Percent, Would You? The Nation ...Registered nurses face more than 50 percent the rate of musculoskeletal injury of the general workforce; nursing assistants more than six times the rate. Registered nurses face more than 50 percent the rate of musculoskeletal injury of the general workforce; nursing assistants more than six times the rate...
Report: Immigrants commit fewer crimes than native born Monterey Herald ...t a time when the century-long American debate on whether immigrants commit more crimes than native-born residents is raging again, a new report concludes exactly the opposite. The debate, which has always been present when immigration increases, is being renewed by the killing of a young woman in San Francisco by a Mexican national who entered the country illegally several times...
The NYSE Shutdown Isn't Just A Glitch, It's A Glimpse Into Our Chaotic Future Think Progress ...The digital sky is officially falling as the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) suddenly shut down all trading activity Wednesday, raising speculation of a major technical glitch or a malicious cyberattack. The exchange is experiencing an unexplained "critical issue," according to alerts on the NYSE website, and stocks are tumbling fast. The NYSE hasn't provided any additional information regarding the cause of the unexpected trading suspension...
The Confederate Flag Will Be Removed The Atlantic ...After more than six decades flying at the statehouse—first atop it, then nearby—the Confederate battle flag will soon come down for the final time in Columbia. The state House of Representatives voted 94-20 on Thursday to remove the flag, following a 36-3 vote in the Senate on Tuesday. Many people deserve credit for the flag coming down, from the thousands who marched in Charleston to Bree Newsome, who took matters into her own hands...
Obama Administration Takes On Segregation And Racist Housing Schemes Think Progress ...Cities and counties that want federal grants for development projects will have to start taking segregation much more seriously under a set of rules to be announced Wednesday by Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Julian Castro. The new system will require cities to report regularly and in far greater detail on segregation in their communities, making it harder for towns to quietly maintain existing racial inequities in development...
Posted by Teamster Power at 11:41 AM
Labels: AFSCME, austerity, cwa, Greece, IBEW, Local 170, Local 340, minneapolis 1934, misclassification, Nigeria, organizing victory, port drivers, prevailing wage, scott walker, strike, TPP, TTIP, UK, unemployment, voter ID
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South Carolina is the 23rd most populous state in the country, with major industries based in agriculture, industrial output and one of the largest sectors of the economy is health services. Health care managers are the professionals who plan, direct and coordinate the medical and health services taking place in hospitals, clinics, managed care, agencies; providing public health and other health care. South Carolina has a diverse range of colleges and universities, ranging from large state-funded research universities to small private colleges that cultivate liberal arts, religious or military tradition. Throughout these various academic institutions a growing number are now offering a master's programs in health care management. With a continuing trend for growth in this area of the economy, those with graduate degrees in health care management will be well prepared to enter lucrative and rewarding careers in health care.
Founded in 1911 as a four-year college for women, Anderson University is a private coed Christian University. Anderson provides bachelor's and graduate programs through eight colleges and schools in business, the arts, education, sciences, ministry and criminal justice. Current enrollment for the university is over 2,900 students, with programs of study in 53 different areas. In 2016, US News and World Reports ranked Anderson University as the 35th best Midwestern Regional University. The Online Education Department at Anderson provides the convenience and flexibility needed for working students to pursue their education. The mission of the program (as stated by the university) is "a commitment to academic excellence in programs in a diverse and Christ centered environment".
The curriculum for the Master of Business Administration (MBA) program with Health Care Leadership concentration prepares students with core business disciplines within a Christian framework. Students learn the core areas of business including: economics, human resources, accounting, financing, management and marketing, through traditional course work, seminars, case studies and simulations. The MBA program requires 36 credits for completion and the program can be completed as little as 20 months (less as a full time program). The Healthcare Leadership concentration includes courses that are offered entirely online. Graduates of the MBA in Healthcare Leadership are prepared for leadership careers in the health care sectors including the following settings: hospitals or health care delivery system, health insurance companies, medical device companies, pharmaceuticals, consulting, health information technologies and medical clinics.
Anderson University is a private coed Christian University founded in 1911. The School of Nursing supports a Bachelor of Science in Nursing, an Accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing, an RN to BSN program, a Master of Science in Nursing and a Doctor of Nurse Practitioner program. The School of Nursing includes a 26,500 square foot facility with a cadaver lab (the only one in the state) that is specifically designed for training nurses. All incoming freshman receive an I Pad for use on projects and participation in dissections. The faculty for the School of Nursing has expertise in areas including: anesthesia (Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist/CRNA), urgent care/ER, Family Nurse Practitioner, and Pediatrics. Nursing sites include: AnMed Health Medical Center, Patrick B. Harris Psychiatric Hospital, South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control, Greenville Hospital System, Oconee Memorial Hospital, Baptist Easley Hospital, Self Regional Healthcare and Bon Secours Saint Frances Health System.
The Master of Science in Nursing with Executive Leadership Concentration provides students with curriculum using a holistic approach to patient care in order to meet a patient's physical needs within a Christian worldview. The MSN Executive Leadership program provides a study of nursing combined with business to prepare students to manage and lead within health care systems. Instructors in this program help students to understand the juncture of service, faith and knowledge. The program allows students to participate in a Faith and Learning Seminar with topics that include Servant Leadership, Emotional Intelligence, Christian Worldview, and Intelligent Design. For nurses currently employed in the field, the program is flexible with online courses offered anytime – to meet their current needs. RN's with associate degrees can apply directly to the MSN program without earning a bachelor's degree (requirements include two bridge courses to begin work on the MSN). BSN's are not required any additional preparation courses. Students are required to meet with their professors in person during a three-day session that is held once per semester for four consecutive semesters. The concentration in Executive Leadership offers MBA classes preparing students for leadership positions in corporate healthcare setting with classes including: Management Thought & Application, Healthcare Finance & Economics, Public Health in Disaster Management, and Healthcare Policy & Structure. The program requires 41 credits for completion and graduates are prepare to enter position as Chief Nurse Officers, Chief Executive Nurse, Chief Executive Officer or in other roles in executive leadership.
Located in Charleston, South Carolina – The Military College of South Carolina (most commonly known as the Citadel) is a state supported college founded in 1842. The Citadel is one of six Senior Military Colleges in the United States, and is well known for its educational excellence and its military history. The college has a current enrollment of 3,300 students in five schools and 17 academic departments. The school has an undergraduate student body of about 2,300 students who make up the South Carolina Corps of Cadets. Another 1,000 students attend The Citadel Graduate College, a civilian evening program that offers graduate and professional degrees as well as undergraduate programs. Students can choose from 19 majors and 36 minors and military cadets are required to live on campus for four years. The Citadel additionally offers evening graduate program as well as online programs. In 2016, US News and World Reports ranked The Citadel as 3rd for Best South Regional Universities. The mission of the Citadel School of Business (as stated by the College) is "educating and developing leaders of principle to serve a global community".
The School of Business, in conjunction with other departments on campus, and the Medical University of South Carolina offers the Master of Business Administration and Doctor of Pharmacy dual degree program. The curriculum for the Master of Business Administration prepares students for careers as working professionals in careers as leaders of principle serving a global community. Coursework for the MBA program provides core business principles based on the Citadel's core values of Honor, Duty and Respect. The MBA program provides students with the core knowledge, skills, and analytical abilities for careers of management in a global world. Students in the dual program earn their MBA and Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) degrees simultaneously through the joint collaboration. Graduates are prepared as pharmacists who will understand general business principles and the ability to direct patient care activities. The dual degree is applicable for those students who are pursuing careers in institutional practice settings, the pharmaceutical industry, pharmacy benefit management organizations, and academia.
The Citadel partners with the Medical University of South Carolina in order to offer students the ability to pursue a dual degree program concurrently completing the Doctor of Medicine (MD) and a Master of Business Administration. Students are required to apply and be accepted into both programs to pursue the dual degree option. Students in the MD program begin MBA coursework during summer school sessions prior to the first year of medical education. Study continues during summer sessions between the first and second years of medical education and during the academic year following the third year of medical education. Those students without undergraduate degrees in business may need to take foundation courses.
Claflin University is a private coed Liberal Arts college located on 43 acres in Orangeburg South Carolina, 40 miles southeast of Columbia. Northern missionaries founded the university in 1869, after the American Civil War for the purpose of educating freedmen and their children. Claflin is affiliated with the United Methodist Church and offers bachelors and master's degree programs. A historically black University, Claflin maintains a mission to "provide students with access to exemplary educational opportunities through undergraduate, graduate and continuing education programs." Current student undergraduate enrollment is 1,803. In 2016, US News and World Reports ranked Claflin University as the 174th best National Liberal Arts College. The School of Business prepares students to enter successful careers in business professions and offers Master of Business Administration and Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, Management, Marketing and Organizational Management.
Technological skills in careers after graduation and in the future.
Global Issues in Business, and Business Ethics. The program is offered in the traditional evening and classroom (weekend) format or as an online MBA program or a combination blending online and on-campus learning.
Founded in 1889, Clemson University is a private coeducational university located on 14,000 acres in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Clemson, South Carolina. Clemson provides academics in 80 majors and 75 minors, with 110 graduate degree programs within 6 colleges including: Agriculture, Forestry and Life Sciences, Architecture, Arts and Humanities, Business and Behavioral Sciences, Engineering and Sciences, Health and Human Development and Education. As of 2015, Clemson had an enrollment of over 18,000 undergrads and 4,600 graduate students. In 2016, US News and world Reports ranked Clemson University as the 61st Best National University. The College of Business opens in July 1, 2016 becoming the newest college at Clemson College. The Clemson MBA Program currently enrolls almost 400 students in full and part time programs.
The curriculum for the Master of Business Administration (MBA) with Health Services Concentration provides students with a core understanding of the healthcare system. Coursework studies legal and ethical issues in healthcare as a manager, healthcare finance, the relationship between healthcare economics and public policy, and the development of managed care approaches. The MBA in Health Services allows students to better understand current trends and issues that impact health insurance and managed care. The MBA curriculum requires 49 credits for completion and includes: 13 credits of Foundation Courses, 27 credits of Core Courses, and 3 Elective Courses (9 credit hours), for a total of 49 course credit hours. Students with less than 2 years of post graduate career relevant experience must complete a supervised, 6 credit internship. Clemson offers the MBA program in a full-time and part-time format. All full-time students with less than two years of post-graduate career-relevant work experience are required to complete an approved business-related internship.
It is an exciting time to pursue careers in healthcare management and administration. With an aging population, expanded access to health care and a renewed focus on preventative care continuing to make this one of the fastest growing industries and the largest provider of jobs in the United States. According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, the need for Healthcare managers / administrators will continue to grow exponentially well into the year 2022. South Carolina has many options for graduate programs in public health, health administration, health informatics, or many other areas of health care management. Current salaries for the top 10 percent of health care managers in the US are well over $161,000 annually. Those pursuing graduate degrees in health care management can expect to find success in careers in the health care industry.