A Mutt, Not A Mitt

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Dear Mitt,

Thanks so much for the letter and the photo of your family. I notice that everyone in that Mitt-group looks like they're in the top 10% of good-looking people. I must say that you and your family make me feel like a mutt. Get it? "Mutt," Mitt?

I notice all your sons are married and look like good family men. This picture tells us without "telling us" that you didn't raise any "unmanly" men. Wink-wink, nudge-nudge.

I'm a Utah resident, was born a Mormon, baptized, and even hold the Aaronic priesthood office of "priest." I'll bet you'd have a hard time explaining to your Massachusetts Catholic friends (if you have any of them, that is), how Mormons can make a 16-year-old boy a priest. I confess, I stopped at being a priest, because I quit the church before I was old enough to be an elder. That's rich, too. Mormons make "elders" out of 19-year-olds when they send them on church missions! Another peculiarity of a peculiar people.

Or maybe you don't know how peculiar because except for living here when you took over the reins of the 2002 Winter Olympics, you have never been a Utahn. Mormon yes. Utahn no. Still, your support here is strong. Utahns are with you in spirit, Mitt. Some of them, anyway. Some of them think you see Utah Mormons as a cash cow to be milked, and milked often.

Here's something I noticed about your letter to me, Mitt. You tell us you have been a great business leader, Olympics leader, and also a conservative governor of the most liberal state in the Union. I don't know if being governor qualifies you, because George W. Bush was a governor, too. He couldn't do a very good job with his state and he's done a really shitty job with the country.

I'm also not so sure about your qualifications considering your success in business. I've found that lots of politicians like to invoke their business smarts when running for office, but political realities are different. For instance, you can't lay off whole sections of the country that are affecting your financial bottom line. It's my opinion that successful business people make rotten political leaders, and all you have to do is look at George W. Bush and Dick Cheney for proof of that.

So that leaves your qualifications as head of the 2002 Winter Olympics and I have to admit, you put on a really good show. But you got called in because some other people didn't do a good job. I think you should give at least a little bit of credit to the underlings who really pulled things off for you. I don't see their names mentioned.

Mitt, thanks again for the letter, but I can't vote for you, and I can't join Team Mitt. I can't help elect a person whose main qualification is that he's good-looking, and secondarily that he was a one-term governor or a successful businessman. None of those things make someone presidential material in my eyes. So I'm going to have to skip the honor of sending you my money.Ciao for now,

Postino

What About My Kumquats?

Last Friday night Sally and I watched the 1934 W. C. Fields classic, It's A Gift. This is the sort of movie I had to avoid a couple of years ago when my sternum was broken. Laughing as hard as I did last Friday night combined with a broken chest would have put me in a serious amount of pain.

This movie is now 73 years old, and as funny, maybe funnier, than ever. It was the first time I realized that despite all of the humor, there are no real jokes in this movie. The laughs come from situations, and also from the way the actors read their lines. Under normal circumstances you wouldn't find jokes about a blind man as proverbial bull in a china shop as very funny. You do in this movie, from Fields' cries of "Look out for Mr. Muckle the blind man!" to "Sit down, Mr. Muckle," as the mayhem continues unabated.

If you were to read the script you wouldn't find Mrs. Bissonette's nagging and complaining funny at all. All of the laughs come from the deadpan delivery and line readings of a very fine actress, Kathleen Howard. I got a real laugh from the angry lines spoken by a dissatisfied customer, actor Morgan Wallace. Basically his only dialogue was, "What about my kumquats?" done in a variety of angry tones. Fields, as grocer Harold Bissonette (pronounced "Bisson-ay"), had a thing about funny names and funny words. "Kumquats" is a funny word, and despite not having a lot to say but that word, actor Wallace said it extremely well.

T. Roy Barnes is the hilarious annuity salesman with the classic funny bit using the silly name, Carl La Fong. As you can see from the photo sequence I took off my computer monitor, and then added dialogue, it isn't the words that are said, it's the way they are said. If you have seen this movie you'll probably remember this sequence, and if you haven't I suggest you rent it.

This is also a movie that shows that you don't need dirty jokes to make something funny. I don't have anything against dirty jokes, and I'm sure Fields didn't have anything against them either. But he made an extremely funny movie that was also clean. Huh! Go figure.

Ciao for now.

Punky Roosters

Click on the pictures for full-size images.

I noticed the Dillard's Department Store ad in the local newspaper today. We're right in the Back To School season, so the ads are full of kids in new clothes. Usually the kids look happy, smiling. So happy to be in new clothes, happy to be going back to school (ha!) and happy that they look so hip and cool.

Well, except for this surly bunch. I was immediately struck by the attitude these young guys project. I see these kids all the time. Not the same kids in the ad, of course, but kids just like them. They're in the halls of the junior high schools, eighth, ninth grade or so. They skateboard down my street.Levis has come up with some edgy ads. With all of the jeans manufacturers out there they still have the advantage of the original Levis brand, but they have to make themselves stand out. So they show a bunch of scowling boys with attitude. You think these kids are happy to be going back to school? Not lately, Mommy. You think they appreciate the $$$ Mom and Dad put out to dress them? Hell no, Daddy-o.

*******
EVERY GIRL CRAZY 'BOUT A SHARP-DRESSED MAN!I found these wonderful catalogue pictures on the Internet. What a difference a century makes, eh? These dudes are all the crème de la crème of society. Fashionable to the nth degree. Their suits even cost a whole $5.00!
In those days there were no Back To School sales. Kids were lucky if they went to school. Those were the days of child labor, when many kids were shipped off to mines or factories and never got to school. For poor people, of whom there were a lot, an average life expectancy was about 40 years, give or take. Clothes for kids--besides to cover their nakedness--just wasn't a big priority. Everybody had to scramble to make a living.

The sharp-dressed chaps in their frock coats and top hats were worlds away from that sad world of the same types of children represented by the blank faces of the boys in the Levis ads more than 100 years later.

Ciao for now.

Baby, You Can't Drive My Car

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This partial ad, "Which Of These People Would You Let Drive Your New Car?" is scanned from a 1946 Life Magazine. The answers are: You don't want Jimmy driving your car because he's feeling up his girlfriend; Lucy is too busy looking at her husband's ear while she talks it off. Frank is distracted while lighting a smoke; not only that, his cigar will stink up your nice leather interior.

Because it's from 1946, in the pre-interstate highways, pre-cellphone, pre-iPod, pre-putting-makeup-on-while-driving era, it doesn't show all of the annoyances we deal with every day on the road.

It doesn't deal with the road ragers either. The other day in my area a teenager was shot and killed because he cut someone off on the road. It's becoming common enough that every city has a problem with armed people having homicidal meltdowns while driving. Even vehicles are weapons. A van ran over a bicyclist because the cyclist tapped the side of the van to let the driver know he was there. It's a hit-and-run, and cops are looking for the driver. Flipping someone the finger might get you a bullet. Keep that middle finger down, fella.

I drive for a living and I've found a way to handle such situations. If you see someone doing something stupid let them go on by and hope they'll get caught somewhere down the road. Give all idiots the road. I mean it. Don't challenge. It's not worth a life because someone forgot to signal for a lane change or is listening to an iPod, smoking a cigarette, talking on the cellphone and reading a newspaper, all at the same time.

Oh yeah, back to the 1946 ad from Life Magazine. You want Ralph to drive your car because he's smart; he parks on the side of the road so he can nod off for a little nap and not drive tired. You also want Linda driving your car because she'll fill it up with Ethyl* gasoline! No lie. Those sneaky ad people had to get their message in somehow, so they made buying gas part of being a safe driver.

Ciao for now.

*Do they still make Ethyl, or is it now known as Super Unleaded? It doesn't quite have the ring to it. It reminds me of a joke when I was a kid: "We went to a party to make merry, but Mary didn't want to be made, so we jumped for joy. Joy complained so we went to the gas station and pumped Ethyl!" Hahahaha.

Chubby Love

I went with my wife to the doctor's office last night. I had a chance to look at the other people in the waiting room. I know that as Americans we're getting heavier than ever. Supersize me has been our motto the past decade or so. Even so, I saw some folks so heavy they look like walking coronaries.

Medical insurers are looking at obesity, and morbid obesity (100 pounds or more overweight) as a rampant health problem, and wondered if part of why those folks were in to see the doc was because of, or in spite of, those weighty issues.

There was one young couple who had three children under five years of age. The dad and mom were so big I wondered how they ever got together in order to produce these three children. Dad was at least 6'4" tall with what I'd guess is about a 60" waist. At least. Mom was a lot shorter, but also matched height to weight. A beach ball of a woman.

I know there are people who are reading this who could stand to lose some weight. Especially my fellow Americans, and I'm one of you. I'm sitting and typing this knowing I should get off my flabby ass and do some sit-ups. I'm thinking, as I always do, it sure would be nice to shed those ten to twenty pounds. I'd be a lot further ahead than the couple I saw. They looked like between them they needed to lose the weight of a Humvee.

*******

Since I've now offended the weighted Americans reading this, I might as well offend my Mormon neighbors. In the book The Limerick, edited by Gershon Legman, there is this little ditty of a limerick:

The late Brigham Young was no neuter--
No faggot, no fairy, no fruiter.
Where ten thousand virgins
Succumbed to his urgin's
There now stands the great State of Utah.

OK, so the last line doesn't rhyme. Just say "Uter."

I've also offended any gay people reading this. Legman dates this limerick 1941, so it was done in a less enlightened time.

There's a legend that polygamy is all about sex. In one way it is, because the people engaged in it also engage in sex, most of them for procreation. But if you look at pictures of Brother Brigham's wives you can see it was less about sex, and more about taking these poor, homely creatures off the streets so they wouldn't frighten children.Uh-oh…there goes the homely vote. Damn. I wouldn't make a good politician.

Ciao for now.

Cousin Evil

I'm still on the polygamy kick. And why not? I think it's interesting that guys can have more than one wife. I've had the same one for almost 40 years. I asked Sally, "Don't you think I should take on a plural wife? Someone young to take on the housework?" I got her most withering look. Oh well. The way it's described in Big Love, the "sister wives" are not only married to the man, but the other wives as well. Wow, it sounds kinky…until you've seen some of the polygamist women I've seen. The wives in Big Love aren't exactly what the polygamist wives around here look like .

I just figured a new wife could do all the hard work while Sally cracked the whip.

(I could make a joke about me "whipping the crack," but that would be SO WRONG…)

At the end of the July 27 episode of Big Love, leader Roman Grant, played so brilliantly by Harry Dean Stanton, is shot by some women in an assassination attempt. This is based on the history of the Ervil LeBaron polygamous cult when it went after a rival leader, Rulon Allred. In 1977 Allred, at work in his homeopathic office in Utah, was accosted by two women in disguises who shot him dead. This is a photo of Allred.Ervil LeBaron, who was also known by local wags as "Evil" LeBaron (shown in the picture at top), was a murderous sort in the Charles Manson-mold. Except I think he ended up directing the killing of more people by his followers than Manson ever did. If you're interested here's a fine article on the whole rampage.

LeBaron died in prison in 1982 but the murders continued for years after. Two polygamist cults going to the mattresses makes for quite a story. It's also told in this book, a biography by one of the women who pulled the trigger on Rulon Allred.At one time I worked with the daughter of Rulon Allred, who was an amazingly good secretary for the school district where my wife and I work. It was kind of an open secret who she was, but very few people I ever talked to about her held it against her. There were a few, though. Me, as long as polygamists aren't murdering each other--or me--I'm OK with 'em. (Oh yeah, I'm not for old men having 14-year-old brides, either, just for the record.)

I'm related to the LeBarons. Their names are prominent in the genealogy of my father's side of my family. That isn't unusual in Utah, though. If your family has been here for 160 years like mine, then other families with like history will climb into the branches of your family tree.

Big Love continues to amaze me as a series. They have so many details right. Some of the bigger details they gloss over or ignore for the sake of storytelling, but the little things are usually right on. In this episode polygamist leader Hollis Green (a character loosely based on Evil LeBaron) arranges for a meeting with Bill. Green's sister gives Bill directions to "the exit on 5300 South," which is an actual exit off Interstate 15, and would be logical for a meeting between people from Sandy to the south and Salt Lake City to the north. None of this means much to you if you're watching in Florida or New Jersey, but to us locals it shows that the people writing the show have done some homework on the local geography.

Despite the little bits of verisimilitude it's worth noting that except for some exteriors, the series isn't filmed here, but is shot in California. That's kind of ironic, because Touched By An Angel filmed all its episodes here, and stood in for cities and countries all over, including California.

Ciao for now.

Hey, I know these people...

Saturday night Sally and I watched Young Frankenstein on our local PBS station. We've seen this movie several times since it was released in 1974. We always laugh through the whole thing. It's totally inspired silliness.

I took a picture off the screen because the monster, Peter Boyle, looks just like my boss. Stick a pair of glasses on him and he'd be a dead ringer.

Of course, Peter Boyle is much better looking.

*******

I was led to this web picture by a coworker. The girl in the middle, the one wearing cut-offs, is one of our office secretaries. She's a cheerleader for a professional Arena Football League team, and they have an advertising arrangement with Harley-Davidson Motorcycles. Can you understand why the guys hang around her desk?

*******

Congratulations, Dick, on the new battery for your pacemaker. C'mon over for dinner and I'll throw something in the microwave!
Ciao for now.

It's Big Business, Not Big Love, For These Polygamists

Polygamy is in the local Utah news again, if in an off-handed manner. The Kingston polygamous clan is said to have gotten $156,000 in federal farm subsidy payments for farm lands it owns.

Like the group, "the U.E.B." in the fictional Big Love on HBO, the Kingston family, led by the late Charles W. Kingston, formed a cooperative in 1935. The Kingston Family is a very business-savvy group, having amassed a fortune estimated at $150M (lowball) to $170M (also lowball, according to some). The number of their businesses in the local area is in dispute because some of them could be hidden under other names. I know a few of them; I pass them by on my way to work.

For instance, this building, which during the week is Standard Restaurant Supply, doubles on Sunday as a church. The family wouldn't find it necessary to spend money on a chapel when they have a building like this, available on Sundays when the store is closed.This nondescript, run-down building is one of the family business' headquarters. You can see my hand with the camera in the side view mirror of my work vehicle. I took the picture before anyone showed up for work. When taking pictures of people who are so strongly paranoid, it's always best to be on the paranoid side yourself. Notice that both buildings are in bad repair. Overgrown trees, peeling paint, very shabby. To put on a fancy front isn't the Kingston way. Not when it costs money. The building is reputed to be without a telephone, which strikes you as odd until you consider that telephones cost money, and that people spend valuable work time talking on them. I also doubt any family members working there have cell phones, either.

The way the Kingston kingdom works, according to several sources, is that family members are required to work in family businesses, but aren't paid in the usual way. They are paid in credits good for all family businesses, so they can buy food, clothes, etc., with those credits. I don't understand how they pay their utilities, but I can see how the credits system keeps an oppressive measure of control on employees. It's a lot like the old company store concept in the coal mine industry, where miners spent money for groceries at exorbitant prices, paying their employers back most, if not all, of their salaries.

Another couple of stories from a few years ago showed the family's complete contempt for government, except their own. Some Kingston wives and children lived in a coal yard. The women were visited by their husbands, who had other homes. When one of the women would get pregnant she'd go to the welfare office, claiming she didn't know who the father was, and then collect welfare. This is a system the Kingstons call "Bleeding the Beast." I like that term, and I give them credit for being creative crooks when stealing from the public.

Some years ago, when Charles W. Kingston was still alive, the state came down hard and made him pay up about a half-million dollars in fraudulent welfare claims. I don't think he spent any time in jail, though.

Big Love this past week showed Bill and his polygamous cronies nervous over the arrest of a fugitive polygamous leader based on real-life Warren Jeffs. In real life this arrest did indeed bring more attention and heat on the total community, although not all polygamists are the same. They have a core belief in what they call The Principle (of polygamy), but many of them have their own sects, and some of the sects have had active warfare, not unlike Mafia families shooting it out.

There are a lot of polygamists all over the Western United States, Canada and Mexico, but many non-confederated. There are an estimated 50,000 in Utah alone, but I have no idea where that number came from. It would be impossible to count them because like cockroaches, they scurry when the light is turned on them. I don't doubt that there are a lot, though, in every community, some better disguised than others. Big Love is fiction, but like the Mafia stories of The Sopranos, it has its basis in truth.

Ciao for now.

"Big and hung, that's Brigham Young."

Tuesday, July 24, was a holiday in my home state of Utah. It's called Pioneer Day, 24th of July, a couple other names, too, especially among visitors to Utah who find that state liquor stores are closed on that day.

Pioneer Day commemorates the arrival of Mormon pioneers to Salt Lake Valley in 1847. Mormon leader Brigham Young, reportedly sick and lying down in his wagon, sat up and said, "This is the right place. Drive on." He was so sick I think he meant, "This is not the right place. Drive on to San Diego," but the faithful took it to mean "stop here." And they did.

The modern day LDS (Mormon) Church likes to distance itself from its past. They love stories like the arrival of pioneers, less so the stories of polygamy. They'd like all of us to forget that little part of their past, but of course no one can. They'd like us not to think of Brother Brigham as being husband to 27 wives, but we do. The HBO show, Big Love, embarrasses them because it reminds them of their past.

When the 1940 movie, Brigham Young, was made with Dean Jagger and Tyrone Power--and Vincent Price as Joseph Smith!--the LDS Church gave its approval, as long as the polygamy stuff was left out. Revisionist history is not new for any group, so the Mormons aren't the only ones who have a past they'd like to edit.

Brigham Young himself was a powerful guy, who took over for another powerful guy. The early Mormons had the charismatic Joseph Smith as prophet. Usually in this sort of religious organization, when the leader dies so goes the church, but the Mormons were lucky when Smith was killed. They had Brigham Young, equally charismatic, to take over. He and the organization thrived to the point where the Latter-day Saints are one of the fastest growing religious groups in the world.

Brigham affected different looks during his lifetime, according to fashion. You had the young, Beatles-bobbed Brigham (immediately below), the Bad-Hair Day Brigham (above), and the Bushy-Beard Brigham (below). I think those 27 wives had something to do with making sure he met the fashion standards of the day.
He looks pretty rakish in this picture, doesn't he? Strong jaw, handsome face, strong-looking body. The hair just sort of adds to the whole picture of a young guy with mucho sex mojo.

Here are some stories I bet you haven't heard:

The LDS Church-owned Brigham Young University has a prohibition against beards on men. As the old local saying goes, "Brigham Young couldn't attend the school named after him."

Some years ago there was a local telethon with imported talent, Gary "Radar" Burghof, who was in the TV series M*A*S*H. Gary must've had a couple of belts while off-camera because when he accepted a donation check on air from Brigham Young University he said, "Oh, that reminds me of the old joke: Brigham Young said, 'I don't care how you bring 'em, just bring 'em young.'" The man handing over the check reared back. The expression on his face was of someone who just smelled a fart. The words out of his mouth were, "Yessssssss, well…" and then his voice trailed off into embarrassed silence. Radar apparently wasn't using his political correctness radar that day.

Here's a Brigham Young story that is as old as Brigham Young. My dad told me this joke when I was a kid and I didn't forget it, because at the time I didn't get it! Brigham Young is walking down the street in Salt Lake City and encounters a young African-American boy. Brother Brigham says, "My, you're a handsome young man! A fine-looking boy! Whose boy are you?"

The young black boy looks at him and says, "I'm Brigham Young's boy!"

Ciao for now.

Cokesuckers

Yesterday I went to the new Lowe's story by my house. It's right next to the new Wal-Mart, which is next to the new condo housing development going up. It's been a busy summer for construction near my house. I spotted one of my neighbors, who now works at Wal-Mart, outside the store, taking a break.

I've never know this young man's name, even though I've lived up the street from him and his family for a couple of decades. What I know is that he and his twin brother are what would be called mentally-challenged, special education students when they were in school. They are in their thirties now; one of the twins works, but the other one doesn't. I assume the working twin is higher level than the other.

What I know about the family is that they all seem somewhat challenged, and they have an addiction to Coca-Cola products. I saw the Wal-Mart employee twin drinking a 20-oz bottle of Diet Coke. His stomach protrudes with what I'd call a Cokebelly. When I drive by their house and their recycling can is out for pickup, I notice it is bulging out of the top with plastic Coke bottles of all sizes. Sometimes I see the more low-level twin walking home from the dollar store in the other direction, laden with a plastic grocery sack full of Coke products. These folks just really love Coke.Occasionally I buy a soft drink, but no one at Coke, Pepsi, or any other soft drink company is getting rich off me. What I see around me are a lot of people who are overweight, with big mugs of soft drinks in their hands. A couple of coworkers of mine might toss down the equivalent of a six-pack of Coke a day. They not only have Cokebellies, but a lot of other body fat to go along with it. I believe these drinks are helping make people in America into the most grotesquely fat people in the world. You don't have to be mentally challenged to drink Coke, but people are mentally challenged if they drink it all day and wonder why they can't lose weight.

Big (and medium-sized) Love

Big Love, which my favorite show this summer--well, it's the only serial I watch this summer, so I guess it's my favorite by default--is in some doldrums with this transitional episode, shown July 9. There are things that just wouldn't happen. No Fundamentalist Mormon couple would ever put their child in a Catholic school. Bill's desire is to buy a gambling machine company, when gambling is strictly taboo. Even the coffee cups the actors heft in a couple of scenes would be taboo. The interesting and realistic part is the beginning of Bill's courtship of yet another woman.

Bill's courtship isn't that surprising. Thirty years ago I worked with a young secretary who was in love with her dream man, only to find out after she'd gotten engaged if she married him she'd be sister-wife number three. No guy who wants to make a woman interested comes on to her with, "Hi, I'm Bill…I'm a polygamist. How'd you like to be my number four?" They've got to be careful. They hunt like tigers, sneaking up on their prey, then pouncing when the time is right.

In real life polygamy comes in all forms, from the most religious to a more casual relationship between the extended family. Big Love is interesting because it mixes the two. Bill's relationships with his wives would be definitely considered casual, because he's not a stern, religious figure whose word is absolute law. In some communities in Utah and wherever Mormon fundamentalist sects live, like the Juniper Creek community shown in Big Love, Bill would be considered weak. His wives and children would be supposed to do what he wanted them to do, 24/7. If they didn't a spiritual leader might take his wives from him and assign them to another husband. In the Fundamentalist Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-day Saints, whose leader, Warren Jeffs, is now awaiting trial, he'd definitely lose his family. His son would have been banished from the home, left to fend for himself. His sexual activities would come out and he'd be sent packing. That would also remove him as a rival for young women with the older brethren of the sect.

Bill's oldest daughter, Sarah, who appears to be about 18, would have been married to a "worthy" man when she was about 16. She might have even been married to Bill's brother. That happened with the Kingston polygamous family. The teenage daughter of the leader of the sect ran away when she was supposed to marry her uncle. Her father caught up to her and beat her within an inch of her life. She went to the authorities and her father went to jail. Needless to say, she didn’t marry her uncle.

It's all sad and sordid, but I'm sure for every child beater and unbearable iron-fisted patriarch there are husbands more like Bill Henrickson, but there are still things about the show that just don't ring true, like I mentioned above. Of all the things that bugged me about this episode the coffee cups are among the worst. Mormons, fundamentalist or mainstream, just don't drink coffee. If they do, it's not in public. Of course, as one funny guy I know asked once, "How come there are so many Starbucks stores in Utah? No one here is allowed to drink coffee!" Haha. Funny man. But, he'd be right about 50% or so of the population who are supposed to be Mormons of one degree or another.

I found these pictures online. The two Jenny Craig dropouts are what I would define as Big Love!

Remembering Clay Geerdes

Ten years ago today Clay Geerdes died as a result of liver cancer. He was 63-years-old.

Clay was someone I met because of his work with young cartoonists. He published a series of mini-comix and a newsletter called Comix World (later Comix Wave), which covered the vibrant scene of underground comic books.Geerdes' newsletter was a hodge podge of styles, type and illustrations. Different cartoonists did his logos, and sometimes used him as the subject. Click on the pictures for full-size images.

Clay was right there from the beginning of that movement in the late 1960s, as a freelance journalist, writing about the hippie culture from his home in the San Francisco Bay Area. He wasn't from California, but was a transplanted Midwesterner. He left his home in Nebraska when he was of age and went into the Navy for four years. When he came out he stayed in California where he completed his education, becoming for a time in the 1960s a college English professor. The worlds of academe and Clay Geerdes just didn't get along. He left education, became a freelance journalist, writing whole underground newspapers, including the satirical San Francisco Ball. If there was a mover-and-shaker in the world of the underground press at the time Clay probably knew him. He took pictures of many of the counterculture celebrities of the day, and many of those photos* are still around, being used in movies and books about the era.

In the early 1970s Geerdes began to focus solely on the underground comix, because of the talent level coming out of those books. R. Crumb. Spain. Clay Wilson. The list goes on and on. A blog devoted to his photos of cartoonists is available here. Clay found out early that underground publishing, like mainstream publishing, was closed to outsiders. Anyone, even someone with talent who wasn't part of the inner circle, could expect their submitted artwork to become a coaster for coffee cups, mislaid or lost. Geerdes felt that encouraging and publishing young cartoonists was a way for them to grow and develop.

I contacted him in 1979 and sent him some of my drawings. By return mail I got a clipped funny news article and a demand to "do a cartoon of this." I went ahead and did it, and looking back on it now I can see it wasn't very good. But I got better. He made cartoonists get better over time because he was demanding and wanted them to draw constantly. He wasn't a harsh taskmaster, but he knew potential and asked something of his contributors.
The mini-comix were a mixed bag of good and sometimes very bad cartoons. The best of the artists did their job to make them hilarious.

Besides a love of cartooning, Clay and I had something else in common: heads made of solid granite. When we made up our minds it was difficult to get us to see the other person's point of view. I hope I've mellowed, but Clay never did. One time we had a screaming fight that chilled our friendship for a few years, and even when our relationship was renewed there was a remote side, an iciness to Geerdes I hadn't seen before. I had betrayed him, and could never be wholly trusted again. OK, I accepted that. But when he was close to death, he wrote and requested a present. He wanted a copy of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing "Shenandoah." I was floored. The great counterculture chronicler wanted the Mormon Tabernacle Choir? What it showed was Geerdes' soft side. He had one. Like a lot of guys of his generation he just didn't like to show it.

The picture at the head of this article, taken in 1982 when Clay was 47, was by his friend Clara Felix. Clara is now also deceased. She was also a presence, one of the few people who really understood that under Clay's irascibility and curmudgeonly exterior there beat a soft heart.

For some reason Clay Geerdes is being forgotten for the work he did in his chosen field. Others who have written about the artists and early years of the underground comix have written Geerdes out, all the while using his information and sometimes his photos (illegally). Geerdes longed for recognition and for his contributions to be recognized. He was deeply hurt when it wasn't forthcoming or when he felt dismissed. Underground comix history isn't a big field, and the names of the experts can be ticked off on the fingers of one hand. Unfortunately, Clay's might be the middle finger that got cut off because it was sticking up at his enemies.
A page of one of Geerdes' newsletters that shows him in happier days, circa 1976. He's the one with the mariner's beard, sitting next to animator Bob Clampett. The bearded man on the bottom, George DiCaprio, was an underground cartoonist and father of movie star, Leonardo.

Of all of the people I've known, Clay was really the only one who did things his way, Frank Sinatra notwithstanding. Geerdes was not cut out for a 9-to-5 job, so contented himself in later years with a doorman job in a folk music nightclub near his home in Berkeley, California. It was enough to keep body and soul together. He never cared about the American dream of having a driveway full of cars and a boat, or a house full of expensive things he didn't really need. As long as his needs were met he seemed to be all right. I believe Clay knew he could not answer to anyone, no matter what it cost him. It was because of that independence that he had no medical insurance. It killed him. He ignored symptoms and by the time he saw a doctor it was too late.

Clay Geerdes was a lot of things, but the main thing he was to me is unforgettable. That is why I remember him on this day, 10 years to the day since he died.

*Geerdes' photos are still under copyright, administered by his former neighbor and best friend, David Miller. Use of Clay's photos can be arranged by contacting Dave at DMiller611@aol.com.

On Another Independence Day...

On July 4, 1967, I got dressed for a guard mount. One of my roommates, Brewster, hollered, "I'm taking a picture for your folks." Brewster was an amateur (as you can see by the photo, very amateur) photographer, who wanted to use up a roll of film so he could develop it in the darkroom at the enlisted man's club. I stuck my cigarette behind my back--no use Mom and Dad seeing that I'd taken up the filthy habit--and forced a grin.

A few days ago I remembered I had this picture and searched it out from amongst my old photos. It freezes a moment in time for me: I had been in Germany for two months; I was four days short of 20-years-old; I had a year-and-a-half left in the Army, and Dad had exactly six months left to live.

Photos can be like that, which is obviously why we want to keep them. They take time and put it onto a small piece of paper. A moment of how someone was, maybe a long, long time ago.

The picture may be grainy and Brewster's photo developing may be poor, but in this picture I see a lot of history. Not just a PFC standing by his bunk, dressed in his starched fatigues, but the guy I was exactly 40 years ago today.

Ciao for now.

Bompaw Brags

What the hell...I can brag if I want to. It's the 4th of July and we're celebrating our independence, which means our freedom of speech, which means my freedom to brag.

This is Sally's and my posterity. David, his wife, Loan, who became a U.S. citizen in May, and their two girls, Isabella and Gabriela.Bella, which means "beautiful" in Italian, is already matching up to her name, even at the tender age of 2 1/2 years. To Bella I am "Bompaw." Gabby is a smiling, happy baby who will also be a beauty.

Ah, their poor dad...I didn't have his impending problems because I only had him to worry about. In about 15 years he will have to keep the wolves from circling around his two young beauties.

See? I have every right to brag.

Ciao for now.

4th of July

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!

Revealed At Last! The True Origin Of The Flying Saucers!

No sooner had I posted my blog this morning than I got an e-mail marked URGENT.

"Dear Postino, I have followed your postings of the past week with a great deal of interest. You say that all who see UFOs and so-called 'flying saucers' are suffering from a need for attention or a psychosis. [Not true. I said people who claim to have been abducted by aliens to be suffering from a need for attention or a psychosis.]

'So-called 'flying saucers' are real, and they are produced right here in the United States, in a secret laboratory. I should know. My grandfather has made them since 1947. Here's his picture. I hope this will set the record straight and that you won't be condemning all those who have made legitimate sightings of 'flying saucers.'" Sincerely, One Who Knows

OK, One Who Knows…here's the picture you sent me, so now we all know the secret origin of the flying saucers.

Ciao for now.

Watch The Skies, Hang Onto Your Wallet

Alien Agenda by Jim Marrs, published in 1997, says in the first two sentences of its introduction: "The controversy over the existence of UFOs is over. UFOs are real." He then goes on for the next 600 (!!!) pages or so to regurgitate just about every story, myth, lie, misinterpretation, half-truth and canard of the Alien/UFO True Believer. I noted early in the book a statement that claims Otto Binder was an "ex-NASA space program member." Whatever that is. Otto, who I met and talked to before his death, was a prolific writer of science fiction and before that of comic books. Here's a book, under his original pen-name, he gave me during my visit to him in Chestertown, NY. Otto did believe in flying saucers, and also spirit mediums. He was very open to those sorts of ideas. Did he work for NASA in some capacity? I don't know.

In my time doing research on the UFO phenomenon I have found that most authors of these books don't really try to reach the non-believers, because they know those folks can't be convinced by their brand of evidence. They go after the folks who already believe, or who can be persuaded by accepting the author's word for it. Jim Marrs established his bona fides in those two sentences in the introduction to his book. He's a believer. It helps to know he also wrote the book Crossfire, which was the basis for Oliver Stone's movie fantasy, JFK.

Ah, conspiracy theorists and paranoids. My life would be so empty without them.

This will be my last column on flying saucers/UFOs, at least for a while. (What? Am I hearing a big sigh of relief from you?) Anyway, I have dug out some more book covers.

Jenny Randles is a prolific writer on the subject of UFOs. I especially enjoy these two covers. The first, UFOs and How To See Them has a saucer shaped object on the dust jacket which is really a lenticular cloud. I suppose if you don't know it's a cloud you could technically call it an unidentified flying object.

The second book, World's Best "True" UFO Stories is made interesting by the quotes around the word "true." Are they actually true true stories, or are they quote-true-unquote stories? Apparently the latter.

All of these books claim to tell you the truth, but in actuality are guilty of the same things I blame on the author of Alien Agenda.

And there is some sleight-of-hand in the title of this exploitation video: UFO Phenomenon: The Mystery Revealed. OK, so there's a mystery. So that needs to be revealed? Do you think the unwary might approach this video thinking it will give out any real answers to said mystery?Finally, and God bless American ingenuity. Someone had a far-out idea based on the designs of flying saucers he'd seen splattered all over the newspaper and magazine racks for a couple of years. The cover of Science and Mechanics from December, 1950 uses a technique of promising something that in real life will never be delivered. How many of these flying saucer buses have you seen buzzing over the streets of your city? And if streets were congested in 1950 how about now that we have over twice the population? We need these flying saucer buses now!Ciao for now. Watch the skies, but don't believe everything you see in them.