Home safe

We arrived home Monday evening at about 5 PM. We had some weather moments around Utica, New York, where it was indeed blowing snow badly. But the worst was on Route 9 between Bennington and Brattleboro, where we had some white-outs on 2-Lane road with oncoming traffic. But we made it ok!  

Tuesday, we stayed warm in bed and read; I got up and went out to modify my cell phone plan; then we went to River Singers rehearsal - great to see our friends. When we came home, I followed the UNC/Syracuse game on a live play-by-play stream on the phone (no video). UNC won 93-85. 

Today we're listening to the Michael Cohen hearing on NPR. 

A quick update

We drove from Bowling Green, OH to Bath, NY yesterday. We took a route that avoided the Cleveland area completely, but we ran into snow when we got into Pennsylvania. But it wasn't too bad - sort of tense driving for Ellen, but manageable. We stayed at a Super 8 in Bath last night and watched the Oscars.  I wasn't feeling too great last evening but am better this morning. Forecast is for snow showers pretty much all the way home. We heard in the breakfast room just now that Utica has had a lot of snow - someone's sister lives there. We'll see!

A partial day's drive

We left Bartlett at about 1:00pm or so - intentionally - and first went by the knitting store in Elgin because Ellen wanted more yarn of the same color she had bought there earlier. But they had run out. She got the name of the color -  maybe she can get it back home at Webs. Then we headed for I-90 East, got caught in traffic, missed a turn and got dumped in downtown Chicago. Siri - our iPhone GPS - helped us find our way back to I-90 and the Chicago Skyway, which got us out of the heavy traffic because it is a toll road. We worked our way down to US 6 and took it East to Bowling Green, OH. Problem -- heavy rain, poor visibility, and a section of highway where Ellen could hardly see where the road was. I had made a motel reservation in Bowling Green, but we began to wonder if we could get there. But when we crossed into Ohio, US 6 improved with better lines and reflectors and much better visibility.  It was still challenging but doable, and we made it to BG by 9pm (8pm our time because we had passed into the Eastern Time Zone and lost an hour). But in our attempt to find the Days Inn where our room was. our iPhone GPS led us into a maze of apartment houses and when we dead-ended in a parking lot, it announced "Arrived!" No way!  So we were on our own and eventually found the Days Inn  but it wasn't easy. The room is spartan - e.g., no carpet  - but fine, and the price is reasonable - $48 incl. tax and bfst. We hope to sleep well.

Our  room at Days Inn

So, the plan is to get within 2-3 hours of home tomorrow (Sunday), spend the night maybe near Albany, and then arrive home late Monday morning so we can build a fire, turn on the heat, go shopping and get the place warm - especially the bedroom - by the time we have to go to bed. then we'll have Tuesday to get ready for River Singers Tuesday night.

Oh yes - the "Heels played Florida State today. I had hoped to stream a radio broadcast of the game through the iPhone, but never succeeded. But I did get a live stream of a play-by-play,  so I followed the game at least, and UNC again won easily over a very "hot" team and ended FS's  8-game winning streak. Wins over two very good teams in 3 days.

The cloud over all this is the fallout from the Duke game - where Zion Williamson's shoe exploded. That incident put a microscope on the practice Nike has of "buying" college teams to get exclusive use of their equipment, including shoes. We don't know what Nike paid Duke for this exclusive contract, because Duke is private and is not obligated to disclose financial information. But UNC is public and is obligated. Last year Nike paid UNC $10 million, and Coach Roy WIlliams got $300,000 from them. That's on top of a huge salary.  Undoubtedly  the payment to Duke and Coach K is similar if not more. But the student athlete gets nothing, except the shoes. Zion Williamson got an injury because he had to wear a defective Nike, and he gets no compensation for that - which could conceivably end his career - while Duke and Coach K make out like crazy. Doesn't seem fair. Plus, an NBA rule against a high school grad going directly into the NBA - he has to go to college for at least a year - makes it even more unfair. Some commentators are saying Zion Williamson would be well-advised to drop out of Duke, cut the risk of further injury, and prepare for the NBA draft where he is expected to be a #1 pick. It's all sort of obscene. But I still enjoy watching these "boys" play their hearts out. I'm sure there are ways it could be made fairer for the so-called "student athlete."

Zion Williamson and Coach K

Our day in Bartlett

Yesterday (Friday) I got up a bit on the late side, made the bed and tidied up the bedroom and went down for breakfast. Talking with Maggie and Jerry we talked about the possibility of Ellen and I having lunch with Carol Plagge and so I called Carol and learned that she was available that day for lunch and decided we would pick her up at noon. That gave us about an hour and half to visit with M&J before we would need to leave for Elgin. We did that and as usual went with Carol to Alexander's where we had a long, leisurely lunch. We left the phone in the car, so it wasn't until we dropped Carol back at her place on Fletcher Drive that we got a voicemail from Maggie saying that Peter and Lori were coming by at 3pm to see us - and  it was already after 3! So we hightailed it back to Bartlett and had a good visit with them - getting more details about Lori's dad who is going through a rough patch physically. Then not long after they had to leave, Suzie and Becky came by, joined a bit later by Dennis and Daniel. M&J said they weren't going to try and have a family "party" - people would just "come by" for a visit - but it actually did become sort of a party with eight of us around the table eating a variety of things Maggie had prepared, attended with quite a bit of laughter (again, as usual!). Dennis went home a bit earlier but Suzy, Becky and Daniel stayed and talked until ten or after. So we had another good family time - I am so fortunate to have this family!

We'll have this morning with M&J and then leave for home after lunch - with the idea that we will get home Monday morning so we can have the day to get the house warm - especially the bedroom, so we don't have to sleep in a freezing bed! The weather looks wet going back, possibly with some flurries in the Erie, PA region, but no storms. Hopefully it will be ok driving. It looks like cold weather when we get back though - lows in the single digits. I hope we will find the house all ok - it has been really cold back there while we've been gone. You just never know for sure what will happen when you leave a house un-lived-in for six weeks, especially in cold weather. I hope I did everything I needed to do before we left to keep it safe!

Third leg of our trip home

Today we drove from Sac City, IA to Bartlett, IL, a distance of about 380 miles. Again, we had a beautiful, sunny day and clear sailing. This time we stopped in Dubuque, Iowa. This is a small city of about 58 thousand, but it seems bigger. It is a very attractive city, and one of its attractions for me is that it has three seminaries: Dubuque Theological Seminary which is associated with the University of Dubuque, Wartburg Seminary (Lutheran), and Pius X Seminary of Loras College (Roman Catholic). Because of this mix of religious traditions, there is a potential for a rich mix of resources for biblical study. Today I visited briefly the University Library at Univ. Dubuque which incorporates the seminary library. As usual, I went to the BS 2000s (Library of Congress Catalogue) section to assess the holdings related to Luke-Acts. They were actually pretty impressive - a lot of fairly recent works. Not as complete as Wheaton or Princeton, but better than, e.g., Amherst College. I have a feeling that the three together could equal or even exceed Wheaton. That would be interesting to check out.

We had supper at a Culver's in Galena, IL  and arrived at Maggie and Jerry's at about 7:30. Jerry had just purchased a new computer and printer and the styrofoam packing looked like living-room doll furniture, so they had set up a little doll house scene on the floor. Sweet!

The University of Dubuque Library

Interior shot of Library

A section of the stacks dealing with Luke-Acts

Creative use of styrofoam packing!

Second leg of our trip home

Yesterday (Wednesday), we drove from Chadron, NE to Sac City, IA, a distance of about 450 miles, all on US Route 20. It was smooth sailing all the way. We stopped in Bassett, NE, a town we had never visited before, to eat lunch at the Range Cafe, which is connected to a hotel which is on the National Register of Historic Sites. I read aloud for much of the trip from Chesapeake Requiem, a book John gave me for Christmas, about the gradual disappearance into the sea of Tangier Island, due to a combination of factors: the rising of the sea level due to global warming, the sinking of the island due to ancient geological forces going back to the ice age, and erosion of the beaches and marshes of the island due to the action of waves, especially during heavy storms. It is a fascinating, detailed study of the island and its people, the bulk of whom are "watermen," i.e., fisherman who are harvesting the blue crab which is abundant in Chesapeake Bay. There are still about 450 people on the island (about a tenth of whom are Crocketts, one of the founding families of the island), but the population is declining as the island grows smaller. It will probably be no longer viable as a community in the next 10-20 years. The author lived on the island for a year and deeply researched it. We are enjoying the book very much.

Last evening , #8 UNC played #1 Duke. I got to watch the game at our motel, the Sac City Motel. The game was hyped as "the greatest rivalry in college basketball," and it exceeded expectations. A key Duke player, Zion Williamson, slipped 33 seconds into the game, his foot burst through one of his sneakers (literally - the shoe exploded!), and he injured his knee. He left the game and never returned. His loss disheartened the Duke team, which was expected to win handily. UNC fully exploited the situation, and despite the fact that it made only 1 three-point basket out of over a dozen attempts,  it totally ran over Duke "in the paint," and in rebounding and won 88-72. Duke never led the entire game. They will play again in two weeks, on UNC's home court, and maybe we'll find out then if UNC can win with Zion Willamson on the court (if his knee is ok by then). It was quite a game.

The Range Cafe in Bassett,  NE

A mural in the cafe.  The town of Bassett was made wealthy by cattle shipping

The lobby of the hotel

The hotel in the 1950s

UNC/Duke game

First leg of our trip home

We left Alpine this morning, saying our goodbyes but knowing it won't be that long before we'll be back - four months or so. By then, PJ&M will actually be in the new house! Awesome!

No weather problems today! A cold but mostly bright and sunny day with some spectacular scenery with bright white snow and blue, blue sky. But we also witnessed a remarkable transition - west of the mountains there was deep snow, but after Dubois, there was virtually no snow on the ground. The old "shadow effect."  Thus:

"Often times, mountains stand as barriers to clouds so as to prevent precipitation from falling on certain sides of them. This phenomenon is the result of the warm moist air that rises accompanied by prevailing winds at the tops of mountains. The warm air mass is pushed upwards to higher altitudes to produce rain or showers, and when it passes over a mountain it cools down. As it hurdles the top of a mountain, it quickly dries up and goes down the other side of a mountain, gaining back its warm mass which sucks up moisture as it travels downwards. As a result of the removal of moisture, the area becomes a dry region devoid of further precipitation by the action of the warm, moist air."

We are at the Motel Grand in Chadron, NE tonight, with a rate of $35 tax incl. What a deal. It's an old-fashioned motel, but it is a "nice"  old-fashioned. No breakfast included though -we're hoping to eat in a real restaurant for breakfast for a change.

Scene going up the Snake River Canyon near Hoback Jct.

Fog and snow up on the Togwotee Pass west of Dubois, WY

East of Dubois - no snow!

More no snow

Revisiting Robert Flaherty

When we were in Salem, visiting Roger and Bonnie Hull, we learned some interesting news: The Claremont School of Theology, which  since 1957 has been located in Claremont, CA, is pretty seriously considering relocating in Salem and merging with Willamette University there. Roger wasn't sure just how definite this proposal is, or what the timing of it would be if it does happen, but it is definitely under consideration. He even pointed out  to us the building which will house CST if it happens, which is just across the street from the Hallie Ford Museum. Checking the CST website, I discovered that this idea is no secret, and that evidently the prospect has led to litigation between CST and the Claremont Graduate Union (of which CST has been a part), presumably over the rightful ownership of some of CST's resources. Since both CST and WU have an historic United Methodist affiliation, the prospect of a merger makes some sense. Roger did indicate that WU has been experiencing declining enrollments; presumably CST has been too. There are a lot of things happening in higher education today that are putting both smaller liberal arts colleges and seminaries at risk. Perhaps it is felt that a merger would be to the advantage of both institutions.

The first thing that came to my mind on hearing this news was: the Robert Flaherty film archive. Robert Flaherty is, of course, the famous "Father of the Documentary Film," best known for his Nanook of the North. The Flaherty place in Dummerston is sort of next door to our home. We used to regularly walk a loop starting at our house that took us through what we called the Flaherty field (and up until a few years ago, by the graves of both Robert and Frances - since relocated) in view of the Flaherty house and barn where back in the 1950s and 60s we on occasion were invited to see a Flaherty film by Robert's wife and collaborator, Frances Flaherty. The projectionist was always my friend, Arnold Kirchheimer. Before she died (in 1972), Frances Flaherty  arranged to have the Flaherty film archive, including not only Robert Flaherty's films but 1000s of her own still photographs, located at the Claremont School of Theology, where it became the Robert J. and Frances H. Flaherty Study Center. I wondered: if CST merged with WU, would the Flaherty Study Center come to Salem? That would open up some interesting possibilities. It may take a long time to happen and I might not live long enough to see it, but I can't help but think about it!

I have been a fan of Flaherty films since those early screenings in the 1950's, and I feel a bit of a connection with the family.  I arrived in Dummerston 5 years after Robert Flaherty died, but I knew Frances very well; one of her daughters, Frances Rohr, was a teacher in the Dummerston Church Vacation Bible School that I organized in 1958, and just a few years ago, Hallowell went to the Flaherty place to sing for another daughter, Monica. I have long had fantasies about doing something with Flaherty films and that fantasy resurfaced in 2010 during the summer of the terrible Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which ravaged the Louisiana coast and brought into sharp relevance Flaherty's film Louisiana Story, and the more recent documentary, Revisiting Louisiana Story produced in 2006 at Louisiana State University (see my blog for August 25, 2010).

Going online today, I am amazed at what is there. YouTube has the entire films Nanook of the North, Men of Aran, and Louisiana Story free for the watching (and also a short film titled Twenty-four Dollar Island, about Manhattan).  I found the rarely seen The Land on a US Dept of Agriculture website. A DVD of the very controversial Moana of the South Seas seems to be for sale for $17. I learned that every year in June, a Flaherty Documentary Film Festival is held at Colgate U in New York, where new documentary films from all over the world are screened and discussed in honor and memory of Robert Flaherty - an event founded by Frances Flaherty after Robert's death and still going strong. It attracts hundreds of filmmakers and students of film (and costs a lot).

And there are scores of articles about Flaherty and his place in film history - a very controversial place it is - absolutely chock-a-block with irony, paradox, rants and raves. A recent article by Patricia Zimmerman, Prof. of  Film Studies at Ithaca College, puts it succinctly:

"The name Robert Flaherty conjures up a maelstrom of complex debates in documentary: representation of others, ethics, the role of the director, ideology, argument, the imperialist gaze, racialized bodies, gendered imagery, the blurring between fiction and non-fiction, manipulation of the pro-filmic world, collaboration, politics, deep immersion in the field, ethnography, amateurism, non-preconception, realistic or idealized cinematography, modes, community, voice, authenticity, filmmaker/subject relations, fantasy."

That just whets my appetite! What could be more interesting than to plunge into that maelstrom!  So I hope from time to time to do just that on this blog.

Left to right, Frances Flaherty, Richard  Leacock, and Robert Flaherty on location filming Louisiana Story

Frances Flaherty addressing a group of students at NYU

Prof.Jack Coogan, Claremont School of Theology

"Working with Frances Flaherty, (Prof. Coogan)  developed a Center to provide resources for the study of non-fiction film, which has since preserved and made accessible to the scholarly community thousands of still photographs, audio recordings, and films related to the production of NANOOK OF THE NORTH and the other Flaherty films. These pioneered a new use of the film medium, focused on cross-cultural communication, care of the earth through right relationship to it, and the moving image as a tool for the human spirit, to inspire and shape a better future for the earth and its peoples." (from the CST website)

A P. S.: One of Prof. Coogan's colleagues at CST was James A. Sanders, the New Testament scholar who championed my dissertation back in the 1970s.


 To be continued....

Progress report

The exterior of Paul's house looks pretty much as it did when we arrived a month ago, but the interior has changed dramatically because it has been insulated,  there is heat, and all the sheet rock has been installed. It is beginning to take shape as a real home, and one can imagine living in it. It's going to be really nice.

Here are some views:

Looking into the kitchen from the dining area

The upstairs guest bedroom will have a Murphy bed and double as a yoga room

Paul's new chop saw, with a window seat area behind

The view off the front porch

The view from the kitchen door, which will open onto a deck

The house from the next road over, looking at the garage entrance

Today was a quiet Presidents Day at home. I went out to go to the house and do a couple of errands, and Max was home all day -no school.

Yesterday, Sunday, I did not go to church, but Ellen and I watched last week's service at the Guilford Church on YouTube. What an amazing thing to be able to do! In the afternoon we made one last walk up the hill behind Paul's old house. It was such a bright, sunny day, we. just had to get out. As usual, the view from the top was great and the cloud formations were especially beautiful:

One last view before we leave for home

A quiet day and supper out

Today was a quiet day indeed! I did listen to the Tarheels/Wake Forest game on the computer "radio," this morning and they won handily, 95-57. Wake Forest is having a bad year. But the game that will determine a lot of things down the line comes up next Wednesday against arch-rival Duke. Duke is a powerhouse this year: #1 in the ACC and #2 in the nation. Not unbeatable, but close to it.If UNC brings their best game, that could be interesting.

I made one trip out today to get kefir and protein powder. My jar of kefir and bag of protein powder was accidently tossed as trash on our return trip yesterday. So I'm starting from scratch.

Paul and Jenny took us out for supper at the local brew pub, Melvins, tonight. Everyone had chicken curry except me - I was afraid it would be too spicy and not sit well. I had chicken satay instead, which was good.

We will stay here through Monday - Presidents' Day - and leave Tuesday  a.m. I talked with Jerry today and they are expecting us Thursday evening. Fingers crossed the weather will be ok across the country next week.

Melvins' dining room -  it's rustic, but the food and beer are good

immense vats - they make a lot of beer!

Travel adventures

These past three days we have encountered more winter travel adventures in one stretch than probably at any time in all our travel. The trip from Salem to Boise proved to be something of an adventure on Wednesday, and likewise the trip from Boise to Alpine yesterday. Fortunately our day in Boise on Thursday was a "rest" day as far as travel was concerned, and proved to be a productive day. And now we are safe in Alpine, none too much the worse for wear.

Wednesday, we got off to a reasonably early start out of Salem, and had decided to take the northern route up I-5 to Portland and then up the Columbia River gorge on I-84 to Hood River, on over the Blue Mountains to Pendleton and LaGrange on I-84 and down to Ontario and Boise - Interstate highway all the way. We knew that snow was forecast for part of the day in Oregon and figured Interstate was better than going over the mountains of central Oregon. Normally that would be an 8-hour drive, we would lose an hour crossing over into Mountain Time at Ontario, and arrive in Boise at about 6:30 - 7pm MT.

Well, things got interesting going up to Hood River. They had had a lot of wet, heavy snow overnight and into the morning, and it was still snowing some. The roads had not been cleared adequately, so every truck was required to pull over and put on chains. There wasn't a lot of cleared shoulder, so they had to stop partly in the drivers lane to got their chains on. Hundreds and hundreds of trucks had pulled over. The passing lane was open for cars the likes of us, but the surface was covered with rough, frozen snow, with innumerable pot holes - it felt like the car  was going to shake to pieces. We had to go very slowly around all those trucks, and there was nothing to be done for it except keep moving as best we could. Meanwhile, west-bound traffic on the other side of the barrier was at a stand-still. I guess their side was closed, and thousands of vehicles, 90% trucks, were chock-a-block in both lanes for at least ten miles or more. Drivers were standing around outside their rigs, grousing, I imagine, and looking at us with some envy because at least we were moving, albeit slowly. We finally got to the top, a bit beyond Hood River, and the road surface cleared. Then all the trucks had to pull over and take off their chains. What a sight! But we got through it ok, and had clear sailing for a while until we got up into the Blue Mountains, and there it was snowing again and foggy. So we had blowing snow and poor visibility. Poor Ellen! But it never got slick and we never felt in danger of losing control. It was just slow and stressful. We finally got down into the plains and it was clear sailing, but by then it was raining and had gotten dark. Ellen hates driving at night in the rain, because everything looks the same, and it is hard to see exactly where the road is and oncoming traffic sort of blinds you. So a normal eight hour trip took more like eleven hours and we didn't get to our destination in Boise until close to 9p.m. A long day!'

Trucks putting on chains

Stalled west-bound traffic

Trucks taking off chains

We talked with Susan and Christian a bit, regaling them with our story, and then retired to our AirBnB which was just next door and was very nice. S&C are living in the garage loft - normally where guests would stay - because their house is being totally  redone: new wiring, walls, insulation, windows, radon mitigation, you name it. So they arranged the AirBnB for us. It was a little house all to ourselves - very like the sort of thing we would like to build back in Vermont!

The sitting area of the AirBnB

The bedroom

The kitchen

Thursday was Valentines Day. I got up and was actually able to bring tea and toast to Ellen in bed - we had brought bread and there was tea in the cupboard and a nice electric teapot. I think it was our first morning tea and toast in bed since we had left home, where it is our usual morning ritual. Then we went next door to S&C's for breakfast. C had made oatmeal in their new smart pot, or whatever you call it - you can put in the ingredients the night before and set a timer. Then we went to the Boise Coop with Susan, where we stocked up on food for our food box for the rest of the trip, and I got DGL (deglycerhizenated licorice) (sp?) for my stomach. Then we met Christian at a Thai Restaurant for the lunch buffet - very nice. We have eaten there several times now.

The Boise Coop

The bar at the Thai Restaurant

Then I did two errands. The charge cord for my MacAir laptop  had stopped working and since that is sort of an essential item, we went to the Mac store in Boise. When I pulled out the cord and said it wasn't working, sales guy said, "No wonder - that is a counterfeit! We would never plug that cord into one of our computers!" That seemed a bit extreme, but I forked over $81 for a genuine Apple charge cord! Ouch! but necessary. Then I remembered that I have long been having trouble with the battery in my iPhone 4S. Could they replace that? "Nope, Apple doesn't replace batteries for phones that old!" I was beginning to feel like a criminal! "But," he said, "a place down the road called FixitPro can do it."   So we went there and by golly they did! For $41! An hour later I had a new battery, and it's great. The old one would discharge in a matter of minutes.You would be writing an email, the phone would go dead and you would lose it. Then you would plug in the cord, and the battery would be at 63% or something like that. Erratic. No more! So that proved to be an expensive but productive tech day.

After that, we visited Margie, who was in Boise Hospice Singers and is still in a little chamber group Susan plays in for fun. We visited, she and I shared our Iowa connection - we both spent part of our youth in Iowa - and  Ellen, Susan and Margie played recorders while I played the bass recorder  line on her harpsicord for a couple of quartets. Fun!  Then we picked up prepared food from the Coop and went back to the garage for supper. One added little feature of supper was that Susan showed me how to make a screen shot on my iPhone. I had never known how to do that before. If you have some important info on your screen you can easily save it to your photo file. Nice to know.

Supper in the garage, using Christian's workbench as a dining table

The trip from Boise to Alpine is normally an easy six-hour drive. Not this time. It started out fine, but it started to snow lightly after Twin Falls, I was reading aloud from a book John gave me for Christmas titled Chesapeake Requiem - about how the island of Tangier (famed for its blue crab fishing industry) is disappearing into the bay - and we missed the exit for I-86 and found ourselves heading for Utah. Almost immediately it began to snow hard and within minutes it was total whiteout with virtually 0 visibility!  We were behind a truck we could barely see, and wanted to get off to turn back but missed two exits because we couldn't see them in time. We finally got off and headed back on the opposite lane and suddenly visibility improved.  But that was scary for a while. Then after Idaho Falls, we suddenly hit a stalled line of traffic. Turned out the road was closed ahead due to several truck accidents. The trooper said we could wait in the car for an hour, or turn back. We were low on gas, so we turned back, got gas and supper at a Subway shop, and by the time we came back it was cleared. We passed where we think the accident had taken place but the trucks were all cleared out. So the six-hour trip turned into more like eight and a half hours. We were glad to be safe with P, J & M in Alpine!

Saturday a.m. I'll listen to the Heels play Wake Forest. No worries about snow and ice!

Artifacts from ancient Cyprus

This evening, after a lovely supper with Roger, Bonnie, and J. E., consisting  of "finnan haddie"  chowder, coleslaw and bread, prepared by Ellen, we went to a lecture at Willamette U on Cypriotic pottery. Here is a description of the exhibit, which provides a summary of the lecture:

"Organized by professor and faculty curator Ann M. Nicgorski, the exhibition features 26 ceramic vessels and figurines that date from the Early Bronze Age to Early Iron Age (ca. 2500 to 475 BCE) and have many tales to tell. As carefully crafted artifacts of daily life in Cyprus, an ancient crossroads of civilizations, they tell of local traditions and aesthetics in dialogue with cultural imports from the East and West.

Equally fascinating, however, are the stories of their travels to museums in Washington, Oregon, and California, which were facilitated by many colorful characters including Luigi Palma di Cesnola, the first director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Jane and Leland Stanford, founders of Stanford University; railroad tycoon Samuel Hill; San Francisco philanthropists Phoebe Apperson Hearst and Alma de Bretteville Spreckels; Queen Marie of Romania and her eldest daughter, Elisabeth, Queen Consort of the Hellenes; and Harvey Seeley Mudd.

The pieces in this exhibition are drawn from museums in Washington, Oregon, and California, which are remarkably rich in artifacts from ancient Cyprus. In addition to the Hallie Ford Museum of Art, these institutions include the Maryhill Museum of Art in Goldendale, Washington; the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture at the University of Washington in Seattle; the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley; the Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco; the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University in Palo Alto; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; and the J. Paul Getty Museum in Malibu."

The most fascinating story to come out in the lecture has to do with Luigi Palma di Cesnola (1832-1904), the first Director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, who was U. S. consul in Cyprus from 1865-1877. During his time there he essentially robbed Cyprus of thousands of artifacts, many of them taken from graves. He did this without respect for the people of Cyprus or for the principles of archeology re: site orientation, dating, etc. Most of these artifacts ended up at the Metropolitan Museum; many were later sold and ended up at Stanford, the Getty Museum, Maryhill Museum, etc.  He was honored in his day, but today, as came up in the question period, there are real issues of where these artifacts really belong. There are arguments to be made on both sides of the issue, but
one cannot help but be troubled by this history. Such is the resonance in today's world of an exhibit of old ceramics!

Base-Ring Ware Askos in the Shape of a Bull, Late Bronze Age, ca. 1400-1230 BCE

White-Painted Ware Amphora, Late Bronze Age to Cypro-Geometric, ca.1200-950 BCE,

Bichrome Ware (Free-field Style) Jug, Cypro-Archaic, ca. 700-600 BCE

A Bichrome Ware Horse and Rider, Cypro-Archaic, ca. 700-600 BCE,

Base-Ring Ware Female Figurine with Birdlike Face, Late Bronze Age, ca. 1450-1200 BCE,

Hemispherical Bowl, Early to Middle Bronze Age, ca. 2000-1750 BCE,

Library and Lunch

Monday, I went to the Willamette U Library, which in all these years of coming to Salem I had never set foot in. We have been reading aloud in the car a book by Elaine Pagels, Why Religion?  - a very compelling and also sometimes emotionally wrenching account of Pagel's personal life and the way it has been integrated with her scholarship, which has been focused on the Gnostic Library of documents uncovered in Nag Hammadi, Egpyt, in  the middle of the 20th century, in particular the Gospel of Thomas. Pagels has endured the loss of her infant son, Mark, who died at age three as the result of a cardio birth defect, and then the sudden death of her husband just a year later, the result of a fall while hiking in the Rockies. She has found unexpected and strange comfort in the "secret gospels" and other Gnostic works, relegated to the category of "heretical" and destroyed by the orthodox Christians of the fourth century and known only in fragments until recently. So my trip to the library was to follow up a bit on that reading - to look at other works by Pagels and also to look at English translations of the Nag Hammadi texts. I was able to do both. I looked at several works by Pagels, in particular The Origin of Satan, and I found two comprehensive English  translations of the Nag Hammadi texts, one made in 1988 and the other in 2007. One of Pagels' favorite texts from that collection is one titled Thunder: Perfect Mind, which is written by a (divine?) woman speaking in the first-person in a series of highly paradoxical pronouncements. Here is the first page:

Thunder, from the Nag Hammadi Gnostic Library

The text goes on in this vein for several pages. Male scholars are bewildered by it, but Pagels found it speaking to her in profound ways.

Today, Ellen and I met her god-daughter, Ruth Thatcher, at a Salem restaurant, The Acme Cafe, for lunch. Ruth is now living in Portland, OR. I had met her earlier both  in Ann Arbor, MI and in Chicago. She also had lived in Philadelphia for a while. But she was born in Salem  - which is how she became Ellen's god-daughter - and her mother now lives in Portland, so she has "come home" in a way. She is currently working part-time and attending Portland Community College. The Acme Cafe is a restaurant run by Cecilia Ritter James and her husband, a couple I met at the gathering Sunday evening, because Cecilia and her sister, Jessica, worked at the Arbor Cafe as teenagers and were inspired to go into the restaurant business themselves. Cecilia and her husband (who is a chef) manage three Salem restaurants, Acme Cafe, The Wild Pear, and Ritter's. They are a very interesting and out-going couple, and I enjoyed talking with Cecilia at some length Sunday evening. The Acme Cafe is housed in a former filling station, and we enjoyed, e.g., the split pea/ham soup and the ruby grapefruit sorbet immensely, plus having a nice visit with Ruth, who had graciously driven down from Portland to see us.

The Acme Cafe interior

Ruth and Ellen

Ellen and me, taken by Ruth

This evening, the Hulls are coming over to J. E.'s place for supper, prepared by Ellen. Tomorrow, we head for Boise.

Lucinda Parker, artist

The Hallie Ford Museum, one of our favorite art museums in the world, is currently hosting a retrospective exhibit of the work of Oregon artist, Lucinda Parker, now in her mid-seventies (just a month older than Ellen). Our friend, Roger Hull, has written a magnificent book to accompany the exhibit, something he has done for ten artists so far, but this may be the best one yet. 

A recent photograph of Lucinda Parker

Although Parker has had a life-long association with Portland, OR, starting with her attendance at Reed College, she also has a connection with my part of the world, having attended Putney School in the late fifties (when I was the minister in Dummerston), and also having been an "Experimenter" with the Experiment in International Living in the 60s (where I worked in the 70s).

She manifested a prodigious talent from the start. A painting done at Putney School when she was sixteen makes that clear. But she soon eschewed representational art based on nature and explored the potential of abstract art, but with a unique gift for color, movement and composition. Only in more recent years has she returned to nature, mountains in particular, which offer large forms which fascinate her. It is a stunning exhibit.

Waterfall at Garland Pond (1959), done when she was 16 at Putney School

Roger's book, with Parker's Saraband (1993) on the cover

Lisa's Brooch, from the 1980s

Avid Diva (1991)

Catchment (2013)