Faith Works 11-17-23
Jeff Gill
Thankful for what we do not yet have
___
Thankfulness is an art, and like any art, it must be practiced.
Anyone who has practiced, whether it's shooting free throws or sketching landscapes, turning wood on a lathe or diagnosing patients, knows that you can't just practice when it's easy or convenient. Sometimes the best practice in sailing is during a storm; when you can master a skill even as you're weary or distracted, that's a good sign you are at home in your art.
So it is with the art of thankfulness.
Our government is not in the best of order right now, on many levels; I am thankful that we have the outline and tools of democracy still at hand, and ready to be used more responsibly.
The world is not at peace; I am thankful for my awareness that some of the sense of war everywhere is because we can know things previous generations, even our parents's generation, could not, and there is more peace to work from than we might think from a quick glance at the news.
Members of our armed forces have challenges aplenty before them, whether you know any personally or not; I am thankful for the contrast I see looking at life for the average enlisted soldier in most of the great armies of the world, and for our troops. May they train hard so their sweat replaces the blood that might otherwise be shed, and have leave to remind us at home of their sacrifices as we honor their service.
Harvest time is finishing up; I am thankful that I do not have to spend long days and longer nights out in harvester machinery and transport trucks, bringing today's sheaves and selling them at elevators, balancing costs of fuel and taxes on their land against the high calling of growing useful crops. Blessings on our farmers and their families.
Schools face unprecedented challenges in today's world, and are expected to manage tools and technologies the rest of us still are baffled by, both in their use and how to react to potential abuse; I am thankful for teachers and secretaries and administrators and attendance officers and parents and grandparents and yes, thankful for students who keep reminding us, if you pay attention, that there are many fine young people who will exceed our every hope and expectation.
And churches. God bless all the faith communities and new plants and different belief systems all trying to fathom what the Eternal One is saying to the times and seasons we face today; I am thankful for having a religious tradition that feeds my soul and helps me stay connected, and I pray that more people find seek out such a connection in their lives, for I truly believe that in community there is both hope and strength.
If I were to list all the worries, doubts, and concerns that come to mind without much mental effort at all, I could easily fill this column and many more. What takes time and intention is to be thankful, to use Alex Haley's advice: "find the good, and praise it."
There is much good at work in our community this very day, and those who love and seek goodness continue to serve and witness. For them, and those about to join them, I am thankful both now, and in anticipation of more yet to be thankful for.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he has to work at thankfulness from time to time. Tell him what you're thankful for at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, November 13, 2023
Tuesday, November 07, 2023
Faith Works 11-10-23
Faith Works 11-10-23
Jeff Gill
Asking myself some questions without answers
___
In 1923, Ohio had six ballot measures for voters on that century ago Nov. 6th; as has been our long standing habit electorally, four of the six were voted down.
But approved was an initiative to remove the words "white male" from the State Constitution's description of eligible voters. However, it has to be noted that 44% of Ohioans voted against it. It appears that a majority did not approve it in Licking County.
This is the context in which the Ku Klux Klan found a new footing in its second resurgence in the United States, with particular success in the Midwest. Changes were happening, and voters were uneasy. Some changes were approved, others were not. Some changes, say Prohibition, had passed, but there were rumblings to overturn it. And when the electorate is broadly speaking ill at ease, this opens up pathways for new responses, reactions, resistance.
The earlier Know Nothing movement, which was formally the "Native American" party of the 1850s, was a nativist reaction to a spike in immigration from Europe after the revolutions of 1848 and the better known "Potato Famine" in Ireland. Irish, Polish, German immigrants came in unprecedented numbers, and as the percentage of immigrants in the population increased, there was a reaction, the Know Nothings, who were largely anti-Catholic in Northern and Midwestern states. Issues around slavery and the Civil War collapsed the movement as a political force.
By World War I, a new surge of immigrants, now from southern and central Europe, appears to have helped raise concerns about crime, disease, and education especially in the rapidly growing industrial cities, and sure enough: the 1920s Klan.
In both periods of nativist reaction and socially acceptable hostility to Catholicism and parochial schools, religious bodies including my own particular Protestant tradition were front and center in supporting actions to limit or suppress both immigration, and immigrants already here.
This is where I find myself asking hard questions. My strong suit in many ways is that I've always been someone who tries to do what's expected of me. If there's a duty or responsibility that's on me, my goal has always been to fulfill that, and then some. I don't like letting people down. Yes, this can become "people pleasing," which is an essay on its own. But in general, I do think this can be a strength. However.
In the 1920s Klan organization, each county had a Kludd. This was the title of their chaplain, an Imperial Kludd the state chaplain. They wore a bright scarlet robe and hood with purple trim; they carried a ritual book called a Kloran. I know, it sounds so childish, doesn't it?
I found an online copy of the 1925 Klan robe catalog, which included a picture and description of the robes of a National Lecturer: "Made of satin, trimmed with military braid and embroidered with silk. Silk cord and tassels. Price, each $25."
That's about $440 in today's dollars.
Here's my uneasy question. Almost every one of the National Lecturers I find identified by name were national leaders in my particular church body. And while I don't know for sure, it appears the local Kludd in 1923 Newark was of my tradition as well. The fact that the relevant records are missing, with his predecessor and successor well documented, adds to that inference.
So if the members of my church, uneasy about increasing numbers of people not like them, were Klan supporters, and encouraged me to be their religious leader, their Kludd, would I have said no?
It is easy to say today we'd have nothing to do with such a clownish, ugly, mean-spirited and hateful movement. But in that moment, with those around us robed and ready, what would we do?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he tries not to talk to himself too often. Tell him what questions you ask yourself at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Asking myself some questions without answers
___
In 1923, Ohio had six ballot measures for voters on that century ago Nov. 6th; as has been our long standing habit electorally, four of the six were voted down.
But approved was an initiative to remove the words "white male" from the State Constitution's description of eligible voters. However, it has to be noted that 44% of Ohioans voted against it. It appears that a majority did not approve it in Licking County.
This is the context in which the Ku Klux Klan found a new footing in its second resurgence in the United States, with particular success in the Midwest. Changes were happening, and voters were uneasy. Some changes were approved, others were not. Some changes, say Prohibition, had passed, but there were rumblings to overturn it. And when the electorate is broadly speaking ill at ease, this opens up pathways for new responses, reactions, resistance.
The earlier Know Nothing movement, which was formally the "Native American" party of the 1850s, was a nativist reaction to a spike in immigration from Europe after the revolutions of 1848 and the better known "Potato Famine" in Ireland. Irish, Polish, German immigrants came in unprecedented numbers, and as the percentage of immigrants in the population increased, there was a reaction, the Know Nothings, who were largely anti-Catholic in Northern and Midwestern states. Issues around slavery and the Civil War collapsed the movement as a political force.
By World War I, a new surge of immigrants, now from southern and central Europe, appears to have helped raise concerns about crime, disease, and education especially in the rapidly growing industrial cities, and sure enough: the 1920s Klan.
In both periods of nativist reaction and socially acceptable hostility to Catholicism and parochial schools, religious bodies including my own particular Protestant tradition were front and center in supporting actions to limit or suppress both immigration, and immigrants already here.
This is where I find myself asking hard questions. My strong suit in many ways is that I've always been someone who tries to do what's expected of me. If there's a duty or responsibility that's on me, my goal has always been to fulfill that, and then some. I don't like letting people down. Yes, this can become "people pleasing," which is an essay on its own. But in general, I do think this can be a strength. However.
In the 1920s Klan organization, each county had a Kludd. This was the title of their chaplain, an Imperial Kludd the state chaplain. They wore a bright scarlet robe and hood with purple trim; they carried a ritual book called a Kloran. I know, it sounds so childish, doesn't it?
I found an online copy of the 1925 Klan robe catalog, which included a picture and description of the robes of a National Lecturer: "Made of satin, trimmed with military braid and embroidered with silk. Silk cord and tassels. Price, each $25."
That's about $440 in today's dollars.
Here's my uneasy question. Almost every one of the National Lecturers I find identified by name were national leaders in my particular church body. And while I don't know for sure, it appears the local Kludd in 1923 Newark was of my tradition as well. The fact that the relevant records are missing, with his predecessor and successor well documented, adds to that inference.
So if the members of my church, uneasy about increasing numbers of people not like them, were Klan supporters, and encouraged me to be their religious leader, their Kludd, would I have said no?
It is easy to say today we'd have nothing to do with such a clownish, ugly, mean-spirited and hateful movement. But in that moment, with those around us robed and ready, what would we do?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he tries not to talk to himself too often. Tell him what questions you ask yourself at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, October 30, 2023
Faith Works 11-3-23
Faith Works 11-3-23
Jeff Gill
Changes we can tolerate, others we cannot
___
As this year began, last January I started an intermittent series of columns outlining the events of 1923, one hundred years ago, in Licking County.
My focus was, and is, the effective Klan takeover of the political process in the county and in large part the state, along with other Midwestern and some Southern state governments.
Timothy Egan's "A Fever in the Heartland" came out last spring with this same history in mind, about how the second era of the Ku Klux Klan made a very serious run at taking over the country. The first Klan arose after the Civil War to turn back Reconstruction in the South, and in fact was successful in large part by 1877, so that original Klan went dormant.
During and after World War I, a book and a movie spurred the creation of a dues paying Ku Klux Klan, which only became a public entity by the first weeks of 1923 in Newark, Ohio, but in a level of organization and public display that shows their leaders had been at work for some time, perhaps as far back as 1919. Whatever their plans, they do not burn crosses and hold torchlight parades until the late winter and early spring of 1923.
Further evidence that there was some momentum behind the 1923 rallies and public ceremonies is that in the general election of 1923, on November 7th that year, the mayor and municipal judge candidates running as Klan supporters won office. A majority of city council was Klan endorsed, demonstrated by their actions to remove Klan opponents from the police department and fire department, for being Catholic and thereby, the Klan leaders insisted, opposed to Prohibition. Reporting in regional newspapers indicated that they were successful in "cleaning up" the police ranks, but the fire chief and most of the firefighters apparently were Catholic and stood together to resist legally and pragmatically any Klan intrusion into their staffing or operations.
The Klan responded by buying a horse for the police department, but gave nothing to the fire department.
H.N. Stevens, the mayor of Newark from 1924 to 1928, won re-election, and was not only very openly a Klan backed candidate, he was the Ohio legal counsel for national Grand Dragon D.C. Stephenson. This Klan leader over 23 Northern states owned a house on Buckeye Lake and a boat in Toledo harbor, and was charged with indecent exposure in Columbus: Stevens drove over to deal with Stephenson's multiple run-ins with the police over his treatment of women.
So I can speak freely about Mayor Stevens. Other names are implied or inferred, but the reality is that there was no Klan party. As in Indiana, where both the Republican and Democratic candidates for governor were Klan endorsed, so they couldn't lose. In the 1923 Ohio election for governor, Carmi Thompson as the Republican accepted Klan endorsement where three years earlier Ohio-born presidential candidate Warren G. Harding had refused it; Harding of course won his election, while Thompson lost to Democratic Klan opponent "Honest Vic" Donahey.
What doesn't answer my many questions about "who" but opens up a window perhaps on "why" is what else was on the ballot on that century past Nov. 7. There were six ballot measures for voters across Ohio; four of them were voted down. One of the two approved was to remove from the State Constitution's description of voter eligibility the words "white male."
I'm very glad to see it passed; it worries me that 44% of Ohioans voted against it. In Licking County, a majority did not approve it.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's got questions for which there are no simple answers. Tell him what questions keep you up at night at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Changes we can tolerate, others we cannot
___
As this year began, last January I started an intermittent series of columns outlining the events of 1923, one hundred years ago, in Licking County.
My focus was, and is, the effective Klan takeover of the political process in the county and in large part the state, along with other Midwestern and some Southern state governments.
Timothy Egan's "A Fever in the Heartland" came out last spring with this same history in mind, about how the second era of the Ku Klux Klan made a very serious run at taking over the country. The first Klan arose after the Civil War to turn back Reconstruction in the South, and in fact was successful in large part by 1877, so that original Klan went dormant.
During and after World War I, a book and a movie spurred the creation of a dues paying Ku Klux Klan, which only became a public entity by the first weeks of 1923 in Newark, Ohio, but in a level of organization and public display that shows their leaders had been at work for some time, perhaps as far back as 1919. Whatever their plans, they do not burn crosses and hold torchlight parades until the late winter and early spring of 1923.
Further evidence that there was some momentum behind the 1923 rallies and public ceremonies is that in the general election of 1923, on November 7th that year, the mayor and municipal judge candidates running as Klan supporters won office. A majority of city council was Klan endorsed, demonstrated by their actions to remove Klan opponents from the police department and fire department, for being Catholic and thereby, the Klan leaders insisted, opposed to Prohibition. Reporting in regional newspapers indicated that they were successful in "cleaning up" the police ranks, but the fire chief and most of the firefighters apparently were Catholic and stood together to resist legally and pragmatically any Klan intrusion into their staffing or operations.
The Klan responded by buying a horse for the police department, but gave nothing to the fire department.
H.N. Stevens, the mayor of Newark from 1924 to 1928, won re-election, and was not only very openly a Klan backed candidate, he was the Ohio legal counsel for national Grand Dragon D.C. Stephenson. This Klan leader over 23 Northern states owned a house on Buckeye Lake and a boat in Toledo harbor, and was charged with indecent exposure in Columbus: Stevens drove over to deal with Stephenson's multiple run-ins with the police over his treatment of women.
So I can speak freely about Mayor Stevens. Other names are implied or inferred, but the reality is that there was no Klan party. As in Indiana, where both the Republican and Democratic candidates for governor were Klan endorsed, so they couldn't lose. In the 1923 Ohio election for governor, Carmi Thompson as the Republican accepted Klan endorsement where three years earlier Ohio-born presidential candidate Warren G. Harding had refused it; Harding of course won his election, while Thompson lost to Democratic Klan opponent "Honest Vic" Donahey.
What doesn't answer my many questions about "who" but opens up a window perhaps on "why" is what else was on the ballot on that century past Nov. 7. There were six ballot measures for voters across Ohio; four of them were voted down. One of the two approved was to remove from the State Constitution's description of voter eligibility the words "white male."
I'm very glad to see it passed; it worries me that 44% of Ohioans voted against it. In Licking County, a majority did not approve it.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's got questions for which there are no simple answers. Tell him what questions keep you up at night at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Saturday, October 28, 2023
Notes from my Knapsack 11-9-23 & 11-23-23
Notes from my Knapsack 11-9-23
Jeff Gill
That uneasy feeling you can't quite shake
___
We all know what "herding" is. Even if we don't call it that. You can call it manipulating, or see it as directing, but there's an element of herding that's what I'm thinking about.
At the grocery store, we've all made our rueful peace with the fact that pretty much wherever you go, you walk through produce first, but have to reach the very back of the building to get a quart of milk.
Maybe you're aware of it, perhaps not, but the items on the end caps are pretty carefully selected, those prominent aisle dividers along the main flow of traffic, and what's at eye level versus what's around our ankles? Businesses sometimes pay for placement.
We like to think we're not merely creatures of impulse, then we suddenly change our minds and order something in the drive-thru that was colorfully featured on the menu in a large, distinct fashion. The fact that the item doesn't quite look like it did on the menu board when it's unwrapped in the car isn't going to keep it from happening again, either.
Then there's online herding. And yes, news sites can be the worst, but the "one weird trick" sites featuring "news" can be even worser. You scroll past the opening banner ad, flick aside the pop-up, click "no" on the invitation to subscribe or activate notifications, then keep having to shut down or otherwise work around embedded video windows and further pop-ups. At a certain point, you stop to ask yourself "what was I reading that I'm trying to find the rest of?"
I call it micro-herding when the sudden overlay screen you want to move aside has a button that looks in color and typeface and relief as if it's the way to say "nope" when it's actually the "yes" or vice versa. Or when the X that's there somewhere for you to click to make the obscuring addition to your phone screen go away is cleverly hidden, shaded to near invisibility to trick you into actually reading the thing you're trying to maneuver past.
Some herding is well-intended and actually helpful. I was at a medical appointment and they'd rearranged the layout of the spaces from how it had been, and to some degree against how it was originally built. When I was done and ready to go back to the waiting area and lobby to exit, I went the wrong way, which a few months ago was the right way. The nurse said "no, just follow the footprints" and indeed there were big blue footprints on the floor to guide my steps.
Herding is sales, too, and where would we be without advertising in all its glory? [pauses to let you think about that imaginary world for a few moments] It's not going away, and we have to figure out how to live with and around and through it.
But I think herding is starting to bother us, and it's showing. The bother, I mean. I'll come back to this next time.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's been herded, and he's done herding of cats and otherwise. Tell him when you've felt herded at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
=+=+=+=
Notes from my Knapsack 11-23-23
Jeff Gill
Herding cats, herding sheep, herding ones own self
___
When last we spoke here, I was going on about "herding."
Herding is what I call all those social and commercial and online ways we get nudged and encouraged and manipulated into doing something we didn't necessarily start out to do.
Like sheep wanting to pursue the next clump of grass when the shepherd wants us heading for the barn, we can be herded to our own good. My phone since the last update has taken to nudging me about exercise and steps and health. I didn't ask for it, but I'll admit I haven't worked too hard to shut it off. I need the nudges.
What is more irritating is the nudging to buy or spend or subscribe that piles up on us, even when we're trying to do better and manage our finances more consciously. You've noticed, no doubt, that there's nothing so simple as making certain online impulse purchases; have you tried to unsubscribe from a recurring payment lately for anything? It ain't easy, and they don't mean for it to be.
I've been helping an older family member shift their bill paying over to online (and that suggestion isn't herding, it's been club-over-the-head in the monthly envelopes for the last few years). It's started to irritate me that, since we need a couple of safeguards on the process, I want to NOT go online to pay and have it go auto-pay, but that's what each utility and payment recipient is set up to herd you towards. Just go paperless, auto-pay, and forget about it! Well, I don't want to forget about it, even as I see the upside for the vendor. They save all kinds of steps and time and expense on their end (while I'm paying a fee, eh?), plus they get an extra measure of security with me going to auto-pay.
So the herding is vigorous, like a good sheepdog, everything but the bite.
What I am starting to wonder about, though, is the ubiquitousness of the herding experience. In stores, in processes and forms, in our online experience. We get the not at all inaccurate impression that we are being herded constantly, and not for our best interests, but to increase profits, enhance revenue, improve someone else's bottom line.
And I think it makes us cranky. You spend all day being herded, and your first hour at home paying bills online and looking up the news and your latest updates feeling constantly herded, and you realize since the first unsubtle herding nudges during the morning news program to get you to download the station's app or buy something they're recommending for which they get a cut, and you find a certain pain behind your right eye, or maybe in your back, or somewhere further down. You squirm, and snarl a bit at those you love, and there's just an atmosphere of rebellion looking for an outlet.
Or are we being herded towards that mood, too?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's been herded, and he's done herding of cats and otherwise. Tell him when you've felt herded at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
That uneasy feeling you can't quite shake
___
We all know what "herding" is. Even if we don't call it that. You can call it manipulating, or see it as directing, but there's an element of herding that's what I'm thinking about.
At the grocery store, we've all made our rueful peace with the fact that pretty much wherever you go, you walk through produce first, but have to reach the very back of the building to get a quart of milk.
Maybe you're aware of it, perhaps not, but the items on the end caps are pretty carefully selected, those prominent aisle dividers along the main flow of traffic, and what's at eye level versus what's around our ankles? Businesses sometimes pay for placement.
We like to think we're not merely creatures of impulse, then we suddenly change our minds and order something in the drive-thru that was colorfully featured on the menu in a large, distinct fashion. The fact that the item doesn't quite look like it did on the menu board when it's unwrapped in the car isn't going to keep it from happening again, either.
Then there's online herding. And yes, news sites can be the worst, but the "one weird trick" sites featuring "news" can be even worser. You scroll past the opening banner ad, flick aside the pop-up, click "no" on the invitation to subscribe or activate notifications, then keep having to shut down or otherwise work around embedded video windows and further pop-ups. At a certain point, you stop to ask yourself "what was I reading that I'm trying to find the rest of?"
I call it micro-herding when the sudden overlay screen you want to move aside has a button that looks in color and typeface and relief as if it's the way to say "nope" when it's actually the "yes" or vice versa. Or when the X that's there somewhere for you to click to make the obscuring addition to your phone screen go away is cleverly hidden, shaded to near invisibility to trick you into actually reading the thing you're trying to maneuver past.
Some herding is well-intended and actually helpful. I was at a medical appointment and they'd rearranged the layout of the spaces from how it had been, and to some degree against how it was originally built. When I was done and ready to go back to the waiting area and lobby to exit, I went the wrong way, which a few months ago was the right way. The nurse said "no, just follow the footprints" and indeed there were big blue footprints on the floor to guide my steps.
Herding is sales, too, and where would we be without advertising in all its glory? [pauses to let you think about that imaginary world for a few moments] It's not going away, and we have to figure out how to live with and around and through it.
But I think herding is starting to bother us, and it's showing. The bother, I mean. I'll come back to this next time.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's been herded, and he's done herding of cats and otherwise. Tell him when you've felt herded at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
=+=+=+=
Notes from my Knapsack 11-23-23
Jeff Gill
Herding cats, herding sheep, herding ones own self
___
When last we spoke here, I was going on about "herding."
Herding is what I call all those social and commercial and online ways we get nudged and encouraged and manipulated into doing something we didn't necessarily start out to do.
Like sheep wanting to pursue the next clump of grass when the shepherd wants us heading for the barn, we can be herded to our own good. My phone since the last update has taken to nudging me about exercise and steps and health. I didn't ask for it, but I'll admit I haven't worked too hard to shut it off. I need the nudges.
What is more irritating is the nudging to buy or spend or subscribe that piles up on us, even when we're trying to do better and manage our finances more consciously. You've noticed, no doubt, that there's nothing so simple as making certain online impulse purchases; have you tried to unsubscribe from a recurring payment lately for anything? It ain't easy, and they don't mean for it to be.
I've been helping an older family member shift their bill paying over to online (and that suggestion isn't herding, it's been club-over-the-head in the monthly envelopes for the last few years). It's started to irritate me that, since we need a couple of safeguards on the process, I want to NOT go online to pay and have it go auto-pay, but that's what each utility and payment recipient is set up to herd you towards. Just go paperless, auto-pay, and forget about it! Well, I don't want to forget about it, even as I see the upside for the vendor. They save all kinds of steps and time and expense on their end (while I'm paying a fee, eh?), plus they get an extra measure of security with me going to auto-pay.
So the herding is vigorous, like a good sheepdog, everything but the bite.
What I am starting to wonder about, though, is the ubiquitousness of the herding experience. In stores, in processes and forms, in our online experience. We get the not at all inaccurate impression that we are being herded constantly, and not for our best interests, but to increase profits, enhance revenue, improve someone else's bottom line.
And I think it makes us cranky. You spend all day being herded, and your first hour at home paying bills online and looking up the news and your latest updates feeling constantly herded, and you realize since the first unsubtle herding nudges during the morning news program to get you to download the station's app or buy something they're recommending for which they get a cut, and you find a certain pain behind your right eye, or maybe in your back, or somewhere further down. You squirm, and snarl a bit at those you love, and there's just an atmosphere of rebellion looking for an outlet.
Or are we being herded towards that mood, too?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's been herded, and he's done herding of cats and otherwise. Tell him when you've felt herded at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, October 23, 2023
Faith Works 10-27-23
Faith Works 10-27-23
Jeff Gill
Remembering the dead in the land of the living
___
"Coco" is an animated film, not a theology text.
The Disney Pixar production back in 2017 is a story woven around the Mexican traditions of the "Day of the Dead," and cultural practices to honor deceased relatives from marigolds and music to shrines with pictures and even favorite foods, all meant to help keep alive the memory of those who have died.
In the larger Christian tradition, it connects to Nov. 1 being "All Saints Day," and the lesser feast of "All Souls" on the 2nd. In our neck of the woods, more people may be aware of the evening before honoring all the saints, or "All Hallows," which has become Hallowe'en.
All Souls, or "Día de los Muertos" is an expansive celebration however you look at it, including all those who have gone on before. In "Coco," the traditional practices and communal beliefs are given some twists with a visit to a not-quite-Purgatory, a "Land of the Dead" which is explained, at one point, as being itself a stage along the way to a deeper mystery, a more lasting eternity. It's a-theological, while dealing very directly with last things.
Most compelling in the narrative is the idea that you vanish from that stage of afterlife once there is no one left who remembers you in life. Again, it isn't a theology text; some might argue it's not even all that Christian. The movie has trouble with the idea of whether or not it's good to move on, or not; to be forgotten and vanish from this post-death phase is most often presented as a tragedy, while it would seem to make more sense for the tragedy to be staying in that in-between state forever, or at least for too long.
Still, the story if you haven't seen it is a truly moving meditation on memory. The recurring theme is in a song, central to the plot in all the many ways it ends up being sung, by different people, to whom, and why. "Remember Me," written Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, is truly the heart of "Coco."
"Remember me/Though I have to say goodbye/Remember me/Don't let it make you cry."
There are aging family members losing their own memories in life; in death, there are memories the living seek to forget, or even erase. There is time, and distance, and pain, and hope, and the desire to be remembered which itself can take many forms.
"For even if I'm far away I hold you in my heart/I sing a secret song to you each night we are apart."
Being an animated movie, there is final plot twist, a flash of the right memory at the right time, redeeming a past almost forgotten.
"Know that I'm with you the only way that I can be…"
In an imperfect, one might even say broken world, there is hope for healing and restoration, a happy ending even when death is very near. I honor the movie, the intention behind a joyful and sometimes laughing Day of the Dead commemoration. And whether it's a Disney production or a Hallmark Christmas romance, who doesn't love a happy ending?
"Remember me." The tears that come for many watching "Coco," and with that song, is that memories don't always heal. Some memories have to be redeemed, and transformed, and occasionally just given over to a deeper mystery, a more lasting everlastingness where we can trust the Keeper of eternity with finding the solutions we do not have, who can tell us just what it is we can safely forget, and cast aside.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he likes to laugh with the kids in costumes at death and decay. Tell him how you mark this season of memory at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Remembering the dead in the land of the living
___
"Coco" is an animated film, not a theology text.
The Disney Pixar production back in 2017 is a story woven around the Mexican traditions of the "Day of the Dead," and cultural practices to honor deceased relatives from marigolds and music to shrines with pictures and even favorite foods, all meant to help keep alive the memory of those who have died.
In the larger Christian tradition, it connects to Nov. 1 being "All Saints Day," and the lesser feast of "All Souls" on the 2nd. In our neck of the woods, more people may be aware of the evening before honoring all the saints, or "All Hallows," which has become Hallowe'en.
All Souls, or "Día de los Muertos" is an expansive celebration however you look at it, including all those who have gone on before. In "Coco," the traditional practices and communal beliefs are given some twists with a visit to a not-quite-Purgatory, a "Land of the Dead" which is explained, at one point, as being itself a stage along the way to a deeper mystery, a more lasting eternity. It's a-theological, while dealing very directly with last things.
Most compelling in the narrative is the idea that you vanish from that stage of afterlife once there is no one left who remembers you in life. Again, it isn't a theology text; some might argue it's not even all that Christian. The movie has trouble with the idea of whether or not it's good to move on, or not; to be forgotten and vanish from this post-death phase is most often presented as a tragedy, while it would seem to make more sense for the tragedy to be staying in that in-between state forever, or at least for too long.
Still, the story if you haven't seen it is a truly moving meditation on memory. The recurring theme is in a song, central to the plot in all the many ways it ends up being sung, by different people, to whom, and why. "Remember Me," written Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, is truly the heart of "Coco."
"Remember me/Though I have to say goodbye/Remember me/Don't let it make you cry."
There are aging family members losing their own memories in life; in death, there are memories the living seek to forget, or even erase. There is time, and distance, and pain, and hope, and the desire to be remembered which itself can take many forms.
"For even if I'm far away I hold you in my heart/I sing a secret song to you each night we are apart."
Being an animated movie, there is final plot twist, a flash of the right memory at the right time, redeeming a past almost forgotten.
"Know that I'm with you the only way that I can be…"
In an imperfect, one might even say broken world, there is hope for healing and restoration, a happy ending even when death is very near. I honor the movie, the intention behind a joyful and sometimes laughing Day of the Dead commemoration. And whether it's a Disney production or a Hallmark Christmas romance, who doesn't love a happy ending?
"Remember me." The tears that come for many watching "Coco," and with that song, is that memories don't always heal. Some memories have to be redeemed, and transformed, and occasionally just given over to a deeper mystery, a more lasting everlastingness where we can trust the Keeper of eternity with finding the solutions we do not have, who can tell us just what it is we can safely forget, and cast aside.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he likes to laugh with the kids in costumes at death and decay. Tell him how you mark this season of memory at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, October 16, 2023
Faith Works 10-20-23
Faith Works 10-20-23
Jeff Gill
The enduring incoherence of anti-Semitism
___
In 1982 at Purdue University, I took a class from Robert Melson. Hardly a week has gone by since when I don't think about one of the readings, discussions, or insights gained in that lecture room.
The course was officially titled "The History of the State of Israel." Honestly, my interest began because it fit my schedule, but I'd had an Iranian Jewish roommate not long before, and my curiosity was provoked by some of the stories he told. So I signed up for it, three days a week, and a daunting syllabus.
As I recall, we started with about 20 students, but quickly rattled down to 12 and it may have been only 8 who finished. One issue was the volume of readings; there were six books required, a few more recommended, and Bob had a habit of announcing he'd run across a book or article that he'd put on reserve for us at the library which he thought would be illuminating. This was catnip for me, but some of the pre-law students looking for an easier three credits bolted early.
The other reason a number left was by the time of the final drop opportunity, we weren't even up to 1948 yet. As one student said in class, "I didn't sign up for 'The History of Anti-Semitism,' I was expecting to learn more about Israel." Bob was gently apologetic, saying "But you can't understand the history of Israel without understanding the history of anti-Semitism."
We didn't learn, or at least most of us didn't know, until half way through the semester that as a child, Dr. Melson and his family had escaped the Holocaust from Poland, but they saw it begin to burn across the landscape as they made their escape with false papers.
In the class we learned about Ottoman rule & British Mandate control, Czarist pogroms & Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews. A number of us went to a Conservative Jewish synagogue for a Sabbath eve service. And we did finally get to 1947 & 1948, where Bob made sure we learned about Deir Yassin as well as the SS Exodus, the bombing of the King David Hotel by the Irgun as well as about Herzl and Haifa.
The history of Jews and Palestinians in the eastern Mediterranean is complicated. To come to grips with it, you might need to read a few books, even ones not on the syllabus; it may require consideration of events decades and centuries in the past but live issues today.
I ended up with the assignment for a final paper on Menahem Begin. When I turned it in, I said to Bob the process of fitting all the pieces of his life together made me feel a little sympathetic towards him. He looked concerned, and replied "that keeps happening, but that's not my intention." We walked from University Hall to the Union talking about terrorists and Israel and peace . . . and I've been thinking about those conversations for over forty years now.
The lunacy of anti-Semitism from the medieval purges of northern Europe, to the Russian murderous hostilities of the Eighteenth & Nineteenth Century, then to a peak of madness under Nazism, is a toxin that still rattles around our neck of the woods. I've encountered it coming from family & fellow worshipers right here in the Midwest. We could step back from Israel, but we'd still have our own hyper-xenophobic impulses to contend with.
There's no solution here, just these thoughts about how deep and wide the questions are, not just about one place on the map, and forces on the move. And thank you, Robert Melson, for trying to teach the complexity to us, those of us who stuck around for the whole semester.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's still thinking about how to find justice in his own life, as well as advancing peace in the world. Tell him how you think we can get there at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
The enduring incoherence of anti-Semitism
___
In 1982 at Purdue University, I took a class from Robert Melson. Hardly a week has gone by since when I don't think about one of the readings, discussions, or insights gained in that lecture room.
The course was officially titled "The History of the State of Israel." Honestly, my interest began because it fit my schedule, but I'd had an Iranian Jewish roommate not long before, and my curiosity was provoked by some of the stories he told. So I signed up for it, three days a week, and a daunting syllabus.
As I recall, we started with about 20 students, but quickly rattled down to 12 and it may have been only 8 who finished. One issue was the volume of readings; there were six books required, a few more recommended, and Bob had a habit of announcing he'd run across a book or article that he'd put on reserve for us at the library which he thought would be illuminating. This was catnip for me, but some of the pre-law students looking for an easier three credits bolted early.
The other reason a number left was by the time of the final drop opportunity, we weren't even up to 1948 yet. As one student said in class, "I didn't sign up for 'The History of Anti-Semitism,' I was expecting to learn more about Israel." Bob was gently apologetic, saying "But you can't understand the history of Israel without understanding the history of anti-Semitism."
We didn't learn, or at least most of us didn't know, until half way through the semester that as a child, Dr. Melson and his family had escaped the Holocaust from Poland, but they saw it begin to burn across the landscape as they made their escape with false papers.
In the class we learned about Ottoman rule & British Mandate control, Czarist pogroms & Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews. A number of us went to a Conservative Jewish synagogue for a Sabbath eve service. And we did finally get to 1947 & 1948, where Bob made sure we learned about Deir Yassin as well as the SS Exodus, the bombing of the King David Hotel by the Irgun as well as about Herzl and Haifa.
The history of Jews and Palestinians in the eastern Mediterranean is complicated. To come to grips with it, you might need to read a few books, even ones not on the syllabus; it may require consideration of events decades and centuries in the past but live issues today.
I ended up with the assignment for a final paper on Menahem Begin. When I turned it in, I said to Bob the process of fitting all the pieces of his life together made me feel a little sympathetic towards him. He looked concerned, and replied "that keeps happening, but that's not my intention." We walked from University Hall to the Union talking about terrorists and Israel and peace . . . and I've been thinking about those conversations for over forty years now.
The lunacy of anti-Semitism from the medieval purges of northern Europe, to the Russian murderous hostilities of the Eighteenth & Nineteenth Century, then to a peak of madness under Nazism, is a toxin that still rattles around our neck of the woods. I've encountered it coming from family & fellow worshipers right here in the Midwest. We could step back from Israel, but we'd still have our own hyper-xenophobic impulses to contend with.
There's no solution here, just these thoughts about how deep and wide the questions are, not just about one place on the map, and forces on the move. And thank you, Robert Melson, for trying to teach the complexity to us, those of us who stuck around for the whole semester.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's still thinking about how to find justice in his own life, as well as advancing peace in the world. Tell him how you think we can get there at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, October 09, 2023
Notes from my Knapsack 10-26-23
Notes from my Knapsack 10-26-23
Jeff Gill
We are in good company
___
With the formal declaration of World Heritage List status for the Newark Earthworks, in company with the Chillicothe and Lebanon, Ohio area earthworks together as the "Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks" nomination, it's a good time to look around at the company we are now numbered with by UNESCO.
In this same session of the World Heritage Committee, other new nominations from around the world included the ancient city of Jericho, on the Jordan River, and World War I memorial sites in another group nomination, which includes the Menin Gate and Vimy Ridge monument.
Listening online in the early hours of September 19th, in that morning session there were six nominations from around the world considered including the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks, and two of them were turned aside. It's not a small or simple matter to become a World Heritage Site. They have the opportunity to revise and resubmit in a future cycle, but there are relatively few nominations allowed every two years to a country.
There are both cultural and natural sites; the Newark Earthworks are part of what became the 25th for the United States, among about a thousand around the world.
U.S. cultural sites in alphabetical order, with the year they were inscribed on the World Heritage List in parentheses, are: Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site (1982), Chaco Culture (1987), Independence Hall (1979), La Fortaleza and San Juan National Historic Site in Puerto Rico (1983), Mesa Verde National Park (1978), Monticello and the University of Virginia in Charlottesville (1987), Monumental Earthworks of Poverty Point (2014), San Antonio Missions (2015), Statue of Liberty (1984), Taos Pueblo (1992), and The 20th-Century Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright (2019). Now, with Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks (2023), six of the twelve mark Native American achievements and architecture, but only Poverty Point is older in construction. Taos Pueblo is a living site, still occupied, and well worth visiting in northern New Mexico, about six hundred years old at the foundation level; the Newark Earthworks are nearly two thousand years old.
We share company with the natural sites on the World Heritage List: Carlsbad Caverns National Park (1995), Everglades National Park (1979), Grand Canyon National Park (1979), Great Smoky Mountains National Park (1983), Hawaii Volcanoes National Park (1987), Kluane / Wrangell-St. Elias / Glacier Bay / Tatshenshini-Alsek (1979, 1992, 1994), Mammoth Cave National Park (1981), Olympic National Park (1981), Redwood National and State Parks (1980), Waterton Glacier International Peace Park (1995), Yellowstone National Park (1978), and Yosemite National Park (1984). Along with those twelve, there is one mixed cultural & natural site, in the Pacific Ocean west of Hawaii: Papahānaumokuākea (2010).
It's been one of the small pleasures of working with the World Heritage effort that if I'm looking at it in print, I now know how to say "Papahānaumokuākea"!
I've also had the pleasure over the years to visit 13 of the 25 United States World Heritage Sites. Like many, I'm now reviewing those I've missed and revising my "bucket list": time to go visit a few more and learn about their "outstanding universal value" to the world!
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's been both to the San Antonio Missions, and the Alamo, which are not quite the same things. Tell him what other WHL sites you'd like to visit at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Faith Works 10-13-23
Faith Works 10-13-23
Jeff Gill
Tragedy and trust in church life
___
My goal was to spend three columns, ending in this one, talking about trust and the work of church leadership, particularly ministers, in a time when trust is in short supply.
Events in the Middle East on top of turmoil in Washington just turn those dials up to eleven. The personal and the political intersect with faith and faith communities in peculiar ways; they always have, and always will.
But we're going through a particularly challenging era in that busy intersection. Between the internet and cable news access to alternative perspectives has never been easier, but the ability to judge between them may not have grown along with the range of choices.
Sure, someone can say and even make a case for "you can't trust the mainstream media" (although the fact I can write that line and know it will get printed should tell you that's not the whole story), but when they say "but I trust the bulletin board at Craig's Crab Shack implicitly!" I think you're allowed to ask "why is that?" There are online media outlets that aren't much more well sourced than the cork board in a restaurant bathroom hallway.
I don't want to paint a rosy picture of the past. In my first congregational position as a minister, people would walk up to me with mimeographed fliers about Madalyn Murray O'Hair and the FCC (I'm dating myself, aren't I?) and get upset when I would explain the case was in 1964, over twenty years ago, and had been dismissed. And yeah, I'd ask myself as they walked off "why do they trust a mimeo sheet in the mail from a stranger more than they trust me?"
So in that sense, this has always been with us. But as I said about things turned up to eleven, the internet and cable TV have intensified this problem. If I were disagreeing with Walter Cronkite in some way, the congregation I preached for might hear him for 22 minutes a night five nights a week, not even two full hours versus the hour or two we had together for preaching and teaching.
Today, it's not unusual to have politically engaged members tuned into an outlet with a set of perspectives for a dozen hours or more a week. To which I preach once, maybe teach in Bible study, and any other material I can put forward (newsletters, posts on social media, even columns in newspapers!).
Which means there's trust, and there's time. I still think most church folk would say they trust their pastor more than any one media source, but we're losing the battle of time which erodes the effective nature of trust.
Not always, though. I've noticed over the years that people I've had the chance, even in tragic situations, to sit with for stretches of time, are most likely to trust me in challenging situations. When you've spent a long morning in a surgery waiting room with someone, your relationship changes.
I'll close these reflections with an observation and a challenge. It has been a concern of mine that many online and televised ministries like to use the line "what your minister won't tell you" as a way to both flatter the listener or reader, and imply a connection… and drive contributions their way. I've been given materials to read which I've taken back to the member who shared them, and pointed out that line, usually with a reminder of when I actually had recently talked about it.
Which is to ask any of us: whom do you trust, and why?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he knows that trust is earned over time. Tell him when you know you can trust someone at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, October 02, 2023
Faith Works 10-6-23
Faith Works 10-6-23
Jeff Gill
Tending the flock, herding cats
___
In John's Gospel, Jesus talks in chapter ten a great deal about sheep and shepherds.
A good shepherd knows the sheep and the sheep know their shepherd. In fact, there are four variations in this short passage about Jesus observing that his sheep "know my voice."
The idea that sheep recognize the voice of their shepherd is probably not too unfamiliar to anyone with pets, where their alertness to our voices versus those of others is pretty obvious.
For the ancient Near Eastern hills of Galilee, you have the added complication of multiple shepherds and many different flocks. Lands held in common or used for grazing by many means you have sheep with ties to one household or another, but all munching together on a hillside.
It works out because the sheep know their shepherd's voice, and when their call comes, even poor ignorant sheep know which sound to follow. Their shepherd has led them to water, away from hazards, been with them through storms and many long nights, and when they hear their shepherd, together they gather.
I started this out last week talking about using shepherding as a model for ministry. If this model for God's people is good enough for Jesus, then shepherding is worth our looking into a little more closely today, even if we don't most of us deal with sheep and flocks as much as once could be assumed.
Chapter ten of John's Gospel gives us the words of Christ himself talking about the many ways we are like sheep, needing to come together, needing protection, and finding our trust in the shepherd. Jesus notes that the good shepherd is willing to give their life for the sheep, and the flock knows that, having been protected and guided thus far by their shepherd.
A big challenge ministers of congregations face these days is that the flock is listening to so many voices, I would argue they, we, you . . . all of us get confused sometimes. In the practical sense of Jesus's teaching, I'm sure while the listening crowd was familiar with the reaction of a flock coming out of a larger herd to the sound of their shepherd's call, they also knew a group of shepherds were smart enough to not all shout for their flock to come their way all at once.
This is where the metaphor of calling our flock together breaks down in the solvents of modern life. The flock is hearing many voices, all at once, and frankly I think people get themselves confused about whom to follow.
Earlier in my ministry service, I dealt with Robert Schuller. There were folks in churches I served who would tell me they wouldn't stay for programs after the service because they wanted to get home in time after our worship and my sermon "to hear Dr. Schuller." Okay. Fine. Honestly, I never heard anyone say he was right and I was wrong, it just seemed odd (and I think the choirs and celebrities he had on his well produced "Hour of Power" were the draw).
Then I got accustomed in home visits to seeing the knick-knacks on the TV of Jim and Tammy Faye, from Jimmy Swaggart, from other ministries whose messages I was quite certain were not quite in line with the leading I was trying to give.
Today, the TV ministries are now also online and have apps, and they've multiplied. Other voices are calling out, giving direction, leading in different directions. Many of them suggest they shouldn't trust their preacher, and point in a different direction. But who are they, and why are . . . sheep, so to speak, following them?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he suspects we're overdrawn on our trust accounts. Tell him what you find trustworthy at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Tending the flock, herding cats
___
In John's Gospel, Jesus talks in chapter ten a great deal about sheep and shepherds.
A good shepherd knows the sheep and the sheep know their shepherd. In fact, there are four variations in this short passage about Jesus observing that his sheep "know my voice."
The idea that sheep recognize the voice of their shepherd is probably not too unfamiliar to anyone with pets, where their alertness to our voices versus those of others is pretty obvious.
For the ancient Near Eastern hills of Galilee, you have the added complication of multiple shepherds and many different flocks. Lands held in common or used for grazing by many means you have sheep with ties to one household or another, but all munching together on a hillside.
It works out because the sheep know their shepherd's voice, and when their call comes, even poor ignorant sheep know which sound to follow. Their shepherd has led them to water, away from hazards, been with them through storms and many long nights, and when they hear their shepherd, together they gather.
I started this out last week talking about using shepherding as a model for ministry. If this model for God's people is good enough for Jesus, then shepherding is worth our looking into a little more closely today, even if we don't most of us deal with sheep and flocks as much as once could be assumed.
Chapter ten of John's Gospel gives us the words of Christ himself talking about the many ways we are like sheep, needing to come together, needing protection, and finding our trust in the shepherd. Jesus notes that the good shepherd is willing to give their life for the sheep, and the flock knows that, having been protected and guided thus far by their shepherd.
A big challenge ministers of congregations face these days is that the flock is listening to so many voices, I would argue they, we, you . . . all of us get confused sometimes. In the practical sense of Jesus's teaching, I'm sure while the listening crowd was familiar with the reaction of a flock coming out of a larger herd to the sound of their shepherd's call, they also knew a group of shepherds were smart enough to not all shout for their flock to come their way all at once.
This is where the metaphor of calling our flock together breaks down in the solvents of modern life. The flock is hearing many voices, all at once, and frankly I think people get themselves confused about whom to follow.
Earlier in my ministry service, I dealt with Robert Schuller. There were folks in churches I served who would tell me they wouldn't stay for programs after the service because they wanted to get home in time after our worship and my sermon "to hear Dr. Schuller." Okay. Fine. Honestly, I never heard anyone say he was right and I was wrong, it just seemed odd (and I think the choirs and celebrities he had on his well produced "Hour of Power" were the draw).
Then I got accustomed in home visits to seeing the knick-knacks on the TV of Jim and Tammy Faye, from Jimmy Swaggart, from other ministries whose messages I was quite certain were not quite in line with the leading I was trying to give.
Today, the TV ministries are now also online and have apps, and they've multiplied. Other voices are calling out, giving direction, leading in different directions. Many of them suggest they shouldn't trust their preacher, and point in a different direction. But who are they, and why are . . . sheep, so to speak, following them?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he suspects we're overdrawn on our trust accounts. Tell him what you find trustworthy at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, September 25, 2023
Faith Works 9-29-23
Faith Works 9-29-23
Jeff Gill
A letter to an applicant of sorts
___
From the search committee, to John D. Baptist:
Thank you for your application & interview with us for the open ministry position on our church's staff. We appreciate your time with us, especially as you seem to have walked some distance to be here!
While we are not filling the position at this time, we will keep your resume on file for future consideration. As discussed when we were together, our ministry team dress code would require some adjustments on your part, though sandals with socks could be discussed should a future offer arise.
It was a bit jarring for you to call the search committee "a brood of vipers," but it was said in such a matter of fact tone we might have missed the intended irony. More problematically, your employment history is weak, or at least unclear. Were you working as a wilderness guide for a tour company, or as an interpretive ranger during your time outdoors? If you were serving as a camp chaplain there it is something we'd take into account, but we are looking for someone with previous (indoor) church experience.
As to your current ministry status, we would need you to pursue standing with current certifications. Your preaching skills are apparent, but you would benefit from interpersonal skill development and some small group leadership training. Repentance is all well and good, but you need to hold some effective meetings along the way!
Again, thank you for the chance to meet, and for the honeycomb you shared with us so generously, and we look forward to possibly working together in the future.
Sincerely,
The Search Committee
P.S.: Hold the locusts next time.
===
So, that's a joke, of sorts.
October is in many traditions clergy appreciation month, probably because it's not in either Advent or Lent, or during the summer, so here we are.
I wrote something back in the spring alluding to this calendar custom, urging churches to, if they really want to appreciate their clergy, to encourage them to take the time off they have coming. That kind of support is needed. I know while some sincerely want support their preacher, there's always a critical mass of people who have a tendency to treat them like an employee, no matter what the compensation or benefits are or aren't.
To treat ministers like employees is dangerous to the spiritual health of the whole community, I would argue. What is tricky is that the other relationship I hear about and see in some ways playing out as a model for the church and minister relationship is that of a marriage. This creates all sorts of expectations that aren't helpful, either, or so I'd say.
For Christian faith communities, the best starting place is scripture, and there I think the leading model is that of shepherd. I'm going to sidestep for now the question of how much a preacher is standing in the place of Christ, which is part of the model in some traditions, much less so officially in Protestant circles, but still thought to be part of the persona.
But there's an aspect of being Christ to one another, and to the world, which relates to Jesus speaking about being the Good Shepherd, and some allusions especially in Acts to how the apostles and elders and leaders are shepherds called to good stewardship of the flock in their care.
One obvious problem with using shepherding as our model for ministry is that we don't most of us deal with sheep as much as once was the case. I'd like to talk about that metaphor in practical terms next week!
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's never tended sheep himself, but he's been around at lambing time before. Tell him what you know about sheep at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
A letter to an applicant of sorts
___
From the search committee, to John D. Baptist:
Thank you for your application & interview with us for the open ministry position on our church's staff. We appreciate your time with us, especially as you seem to have walked some distance to be here!
While we are not filling the position at this time, we will keep your resume on file for future consideration. As discussed when we were together, our ministry team dress code would require some adjustments on your part, though sandals with socks could be discussed should a future offer arise.
It was a bit jarring for you to call the search committee "a brood of vipers," but it was said in such a matter of fact tone we might have missed the intended irony. More problematically, your employment history is weak, or at least unclear. Were you working as a wilderness guide for a tour company, or as an interpretive ranger during your time outdoors? If you were serving as a camp chaplain there it is something we'd take into account, but we are looking for someone with previous (indoor) church experience.
As to your current ministry status, we would need you to pursue standing with current certifications. Your preaching skills are apparent, but you would benefit from interpersonal skill development and some small group leadership training. Repentance is all well and good, but you need to hold some effective meetings along the way!
Again, thank you for the chance to meet, and for the honeycomb you shared with us so generously, and we look forward to possibly working together in the future.
Sincerely,
The Search Committee
P.S.: Hold the locusts next time.
===
So, that's a joke, of sorts.
October is in many traditions clergy appreciation month, probably because it's not in either Advent or Lent, or during the summer, so here we are.
I wrote something back in the spring alluding to this calendar custom, urging churches to, if they really want to appreciate their clergy, to encourage them to take the time off they have coming. That kind of support is needed. I know while some sincerely want support their preacher, there's always a critical mass of people who have a tendency to treat them like an employee, no matter what the compensation or benefits are or aren't.
To treat ministers like employees is dangerous to the spiritual health of the whole community, I would argue. What is tricky is that the other relationship I hear about and see in some ways playing out as a model for the church and minister relationship is that of a marriage. This creates all sorts of expectations that aren't helpful, either, or so I'd say.
For Christian faith communities, the best starting place is scripture, and there I think the leading model is that of shepherd. I'm going to sidestep for now the question of how much a preacher is standing in the place of Christ, which is part of the model in some traditions, much less so officially in Protestant circles, but still thought to be part of the persona.
But there's an aspect of being Christ to one another, and to the world, which relates to Jesus speaking about being the Good Shepherd, and some allusions especially in Acts to how the apostles and elders and leaders are shepherds called to good stewardship of the flock in their care.
One obvious problem with using shepherding as our model for ministry is that we don't most of us deal with sheep as much as once was the case. I'd like to talk about that metaphor in practical terms next week!
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's never tended sheep himself, but he's been around at lambing time before. Tell him what you know about sheep at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Monday, September 18, 2023
Faith Works 9-22-23
Faith Works 9-22-23
Jeff Gill
Donation season is setting in
___
Let me share some news with you all in this developing season of donation requests, as they flood into our mailboxes and email accounts.
Nice people can be terrible managers of large, complex operations.
Good managers of large, complex operations can be horrible people on a personal level.
Good causes can be used to front fairly mundane greedy donation harvesting operations.
Bad fundraisers can be excellent advocates for important causes, just not in terms of raising money.
Excellent fundraisers can use a modest amount of good work done to cover for operations that mostly enrich key staff and accomplish very little.
Alternatively, well paid executives can also do good work; poorly compensated ones can also be ineffective leaders — and I'm always wary of any organization head who says too often "I'm not making a dime." They DO exist, but it's broadly speaking a signal to do due diligence.
Donation season is ramping up: my elderly father-in-law's mailbox is JAMMED with appeals. Lots of people give based on fundraising materials. Friends, a modest amount of checking can complicate simple stories, but give you peace of mind at the end of the day.
Full disclosure — I've had to be on clean-up crews for far too many community or faith-based programs that imploded over bad faith, internal controls collapsing, or simple improvidence or malfeasance. All of them had one thing in common: a refusal of smart people to believe nice people doing good things might be either inept, or somewhat scammy, let alone outright lying. Do everyone a favor, and check out some basic info from third parties before you give.
One modest obscured example from many years ago: I was a board chair (hint - if you want to stay out of these situations, never agree to serve as board chair, of anything) & our executive director came to me. Some mail had been misdirected to our address. "This can't be what it looks like, can it?" I took it off that person's hands, went with the materials to the United Way board chair. "This can't be what it looks like, can it?" Once we agreed it was, we had a meeting with our fiscal officers jointly, who said "This can't be what it looks like, can it?" Then we set up a meeting with the agency director who was doing not right things, and he loudly affirmed "This isn't what it looks like!" We had a follow-up meeting with legal representation on both sides; sadly the relevant agency board chair resigned the moment we reached out to them. At the lawyered-up meeting, admissions were made, to what turned out to be about half of what had to be rectified in the end.
Two points: not counting the board chair who likely knew & didn't want to deal with this, there were about five points at which this all could have stopped, and the problem grown to where it couldn't be resolved without dire outcomes. Each stage required facing unpleasant facts.
The other point is I have multiple stories in this vein, from three states. It will always happen where there's not adequate oversight & multiple controls. Which take time & attention… but are worth it in the end.
I'd name some national organizations but I don't have the time or bandwidth to respond to those whose oxes might be gored. This can include anyone from coaches of professional sports teams, to clergy heads of para church organizations, or about smaller programs claiming larger impact than their press kits can really support.
But almost any of them will hit you with multiple mailings annually if you send them a $5 check & your email.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's asked for money, and he gives money (sometimes). Tell him how you decide where to donate at knapsack77@gmail.com, or @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Donation season is setting in
___
Let me share some news with you all in this developing season of donation requests, as they flood into our mailboxes and email accounts.
Nice people can be terrible managers of large, complex operations.
Good managers of large, complex operations can be horrible people on a personal level.
Good causes can be used to front fairly mundane greedy donation harvesting operations.
Bad fundraisers can be excellent advocates for important causes, just not in terms of raising money.
Excellent fundraisers can use a modest amount of good work done to cover for operations that mostly enrich key staff and accomplish very little.
Alternatively, well paid executives can also do good work; poorly compensated ones can also be ineffective leaders — and I'm always wary of any organization head who says too often "I'm not making a dime." They DO exist, but it's broadly speaking a signal to do due diligence.
Donation season is ramping up: my elderly father-in-law's mailbox is JAMMED with appeals. Lots of people give based on fundraising materials. Friends, a modest amount of checking can complicate simple stories, but give you peace of mind at the end of the day.
Full disclosure — I've had to be on clean-up crews for far too many community or faith-based programs that imploded over bad faith, internal controls collapsing, or simple improvidence or malfeasance. All of them had one thing in common: a refusal of smart people to believe nice people doing good things might be either inept, or somewhat scammy, let alone outright lying. Do everyone a favor, and check out some basic info from third parties before you give.
One modest obscured example from many years ago: I was a board chair (hint - if you want to stay out of these situations, never agree to serve as board chair, of anything) & our executive director came to me. Some mail had been misdirected to our address. "This can't be what it looks like, can it?" I took it off that person's hands, went with the materials to the United Way board chair. "This can't be what it looks like, can it?" Once we agreed it was, we had a meeting with our fiscal officers jointly, who said "This can't be what it looks like, can it?" Then we set up a meeting with the agency director who was doing not right things, and he loudly affirmed "This isn't what it looks like!" We had a follow-up meeting with legal representation on both sides; sadly the relevant agency board chair resigned the moment we reached out to them. At the lawyered-up meeting, admissions were made, to what turned out to be about half of what had to be rectified in the end.
Two points: not counting the board chair who likely knew & didn't want to deal with this, there were about five points at which this all could have stopped, and the problem grown to where it couldn't be resolved without dire outcomes. Each stage required facing unpleasant facts.
The other point is I have multiple stories in this vein, from three states. It will always happen where there's not adequate oversight & multiple controls. Which take time & attention… but are worth it in the end.
I'd name some national organizations but I don't have the time or bandwidth to respond to those whose oxes might be gored. This can include anyone from coaches of professional sports teams, to clergy heads of para church organizations, or about smaller programs claiming larger impact than their press kits can really support.
But almost any of them will hit you with multiple mailings annually if you send them a $5 check & your email.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's asked for money, and he gives money (sometimes). Tell him how you decide where to donate at knapsack77@gmail.com, or @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Notes from my Knapsack 10-5-23
Notes from my Knapsack 10-5-23
[EMBARGO UNTIL CONFIRMED on 9-19-23]
Jeff Gill
Spanning centuries, let alone millennia
___
Back in the 1990s, Dick Shiels, now emeritus history professor at Ohio State's Newark Campus and longtime resident of Granville, wondered why Cahokia, and not the much older Newark Earthworks or Chillicothe's Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, was in the front of all the US history intro textbooks he reviewed for his classes.
Dick visited Cahokia, across the Mississippi from St. Louis, and they told him "World Heritage List status from UNESCO made all the difference."
He came back to Licking County with that realization, and went to work starting the Newark Earthworks Center, which was a pioneering effort in its own right. The center helped put on the Octagon Moonrise events in 2005, when the geometry of the octagonal enclosure last aligned with the Observatory Circle and towering platform mound to point at the northernmost rise of the moon on an 18.6 year astronomical cycle.
Once those programs around the lunar alignment were completed, he picked up on the relationships made with the Ohio History Connection, and began pushing for a World Heritage List inscription in 2006.
Seventeen years later, here we are. The effort was not only across two decades, but encompassed myriad institutions and many individuals, crossing boundaries once thought to divide us, such as between archaeologists and today's Native American tribal nations. Now, the leaders of those sovereign governmental units, with historic roots in Ohio before the period of "Indian Removal" in the 1830s, are often traveling back here, and finding a welcome, even bringing busloads of children to Newark, where they can learn about the accomplishments of their ancestors.
Those ancient builders deserve credit, and in the years since, so many people have dreamed and drafted and written and delivered the work which resulted in the declaration and inscription of September 19, 2023, placing the Newark Earthworks on the World Heritage List of UNESCO, now the 25th US listing, along with Independence Hall and the Grand Canyon, Monticello and Mammoth Cave.
Dick Shiels saw an opportunity, over twenty years ago, to add the Newark Earthworks to a roster that globally includes the Great Pyramid of Egypt, Stonehenge in England, and added just a few days before the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks was inscribed on the World Heritage List, the ancient city of Jericho on the Jordan River. It was a dream to most who first heard it, to see "our local mounds" in such august company.
Brad Lepper had a chance to help add "The Earthworks of Newark, Ohio" to "The Seventy Wonders of the Ancient World" as the century turned, and slowly, steadily, more and more people saw that dream as a simple statement of fact: Ohio's ancient earthen enclosures qualify under the UNESCO phrase as having "outstanding universal value." The world has been coming to see them, in fact, for some time.
More will come. Let's be ready to welcome the world, and invite it to stay a few nights and see the rest of Licking County. And another northernmost moonrise in that generational cycle is just around the corner . . .
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's looking forward to seeing you at one of the Octagon Open House events on Oct. 15th. He's hearing from the world these days at knapsack77@gmail.com, and on Threads @Knapsack77.
[EMBARGO UNTIL CONFIRMED on 9-19-23]
Jeff Gill
Spanning centuries, let alone millennia
___
Back in the 1990s, Dick Shiels, now emeritus history professor at Ohio State's Newark Campus and longtime resident of Granville, wondered why Cahokia, and not the much older Newark Earthworks or Chillicothe's Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, was in the front of all the US history intro textbooks he reviewed for his classes.
Dick visited Cahokia, across the Mississippi from St. Louis, and they told him "World Heritage List status from UNESCO made all the difference."
He came back to Licking County with that realization, and went to work starting the Newark Earthworks Center, which was a pioneering effort in its own right. The center helped put on the Octagon Moonrise events in 2005, when the geometry of the octagonal enclosure last aligned with the Observatory Circle and towering platform mound to point at the northernmost rise of the moon on an 18.6 year astronomical cycle.
Once those programs around the lunar alignment were completed, he picked up on the relationships made with the Ohio History Connection, and began pushing for a World Heritage List inscription in 2006.
Seventeen years later, here we are. The effort was not only across two decades, but encompassed myriad institutions and many individuals, crossing boundaries once thought to divide us, such as between archaeologists and today's Native American tribal nations. Now, the leaders of those sovereign governmental units, with historic roots in Ohio before the period of "Indian Removal" in the 1830s, are often traveling back here, and finding a welcome, even bringing busloads of children to Newark, where they can learn about the accomplishments of their ancestors.
Those ancient builders deserve credit, and in the years since, so many people have dreamed and drafted and written and delivered the work which resulted in the declaration and inscription of September 19, 2023, placing the Newark Earthworks on the World Heritage List of UNESCO, now the 25th US listing, along with Independence Hall and the Grand Canyon, Monticello and Mammoth Cave.
Dick Shiels saw an opportunity, over twenty years ago, to add the Newark Earthworks to a roster that globally includes the Great Pyramid of Egypt, Stonehenge in England, and added just a few days before the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks was inscribed on the World Heritage List, the ancient city of Jericho on the Jordan River. It was a dream to most who first heard it, to see "our local mounds" in such august company.
Brad Lepper had a chance to help add "The Earthworks of Newark, Ohio" to "The Seventy Wonders of the Ancient World" as the century turned, and slowly, steadily, more and more people saw that dream as a simple statement of fact: Ohio's ancient earthen enclosures qualify under the UNESCO phrase as having "outstanding universal value." The world has been coming to see them, in fact, for some time.
More will come. Let's be ready to welcome the world, and invite it to stay a few nights and see the rest of Licking County. And another northernmost moonrise in that generational cycle is just around the corner . . .
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's looking forward to seeing you at one of the Octagon Open House events on Oct. 15th. He's hearing from the world these days at knapsack77@gmail.com, and on Threads @Knapsack77.
Sunday, September 10, 2023
Faith Works 9-15-23
Faith Works 9-15-23
Jeff Gill
Who is included among "us"?
___
Through this year I've been asking us to think about the modern implications of events taking place 100 years ago in Licking County, and the Midwest all around us in 1923.
With the rise of what historians call "the second era of the Ku Klux Klan," there is an assumption that the causes and motivations of the post-Civil War Klan's origins, and the "third era" Klan of the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s & 60s down to today, are all of a piece.
But it's complicated by how the larger and more politically influential 1920s Klan was agitating against migrants and minority groups of its day, and claiming special status and exclusive rights for "white supremacy." Especially in the Midwest where the 1920s Klan was even more influential than in the South, and the hostility of the organization was primarily aimed at Catholics and Jews newly arrived from Europe (newly as in within the last century, since many of these migrants had come in the wake of social strife in 1848 across Eastern Europe). Some were revolutionaries, others simply displaced common folk caught up in an age of revolution from the Atlantic to the Urals.
Somewhat confusingly to modern eyes and ears, these peasant immigrants were called "black people." A nationally famous muckraking journalist, Ray Stannard Baker, after spending a few weeks in Newark following the infamous 1910 lynching on Courthouse Square, wrote in 1912 a picaresque novel where his narrator records a union organizer saying:
"And then the "black people" began to come in, little by little at first, and then by the carload. By the "black people" he meant the people from Southern Europe, he called them "hordes" — "hordes and hordes of 'em" — Italians mostly, and they began getting into the mills and underbidding for the jobs, so that wages slowly went down and at the same time the machines were speeded up. It seems that many of these "black people" were single men or vigorous young married people with only themselves to support, while the old American workers were men with families and little homes to pay for, and plenty of old grandfathers and grandmothers, to say nothing of babies, depending upon them.
"There wasn't a living for a decent family left," he said."
Baker's protagonist goes on to describe a strike for better working conditions that led to dire circumstances in a place very like what we know of Newark in that era, until:
"And presently the strike collapsed, and the workers rushed helter skelter back to the mills to get their old jobs "Begging like whipped dogs," he said bitterly.
Many of them found their places taken by the eager "black people," and many had to go to work at lower wages in poorer places — punished for the fight they had made."
After his effort at leading a strike for better pay and working conditions failed, the narrator had a realization:
"It was then that he began to see clearly what it all meant. He said he made a great discovery: that the "black people" against whom they had struck in 1894 were not to blame.
"I tell you," said he, "we found when we got started that them black people — we used to call 'em dagoes — were just workin' people like us — and in hell with us. They were good soldiers, them Eyetalians and Poles and Syrians, they fought with us to the end.""
This by a journalist who is not a Klan apologist at all, but is helping us understand what's going on in 1912 or so around the racial definition of "white."
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's trying to make sense of how we understand who is included in what we call community. Tell him how you would draw that circle at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Who is included among "us"?
___
Through this year I've been asking us to think about the modern implications of events taking place 100 years ago in Licking County, and the Midwest all around us in 1923.
With the rise of what historians call "the second era of the Ku Klux Klan," there is an assumption that the causes and motivations of the post-Civil War Klan's origins, and the "third era" Klan of the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s & 60s down to today, are all of a piece.
But it's complicated by how the larger and more politically influential 1920s Klan was agitating against migrants and minority groups of its day, and claiming special status and exclusive rights for "white supremacy." Especially in the Midwest where the 1920s Klan was even more influential than in the South, and the hostility of the organization was primarily aimed at Catholics and Jews newly arrived from Europe (newly as in within the last century, since many of these migrants had come in the wake of social strife in 1848 across Eastern Europe). Some were revolutionaries, others simply displaced common folk caught up in an age of revolution from the Atlantic to the Urals.
Somewhat confusingly to modern eyes and ears, these peasant immigrants were called "black people." A nationally famous muckraking journalist, Ray Stannard Baker, after spending a few weeks in Newark following the infamous 1910 lynching on Courthouse Square, wrote in 1912 a picaresque novel where his narrator records a union organizer saying:
"And then the "black people" began to come in, little by little at first, and then by the carload. By the "black people" he meant the people from Southern Europe, he called them "hordes" — "hordes and hordes of 'em" — Italians mostly, and they began getting into the mills and underbidding for the jobs, so that wages slowly went down and at the same time the machines were speeded up. It seems that many of these "black people" were single men or vigorous young married people with only themselves to support, while the old American workers were men with families and little homes to pay for, and plenty of old grandfathers and grandmothers, to say nothing of babies, depending upon them.
"There wasn't a living for a decent family left," he said."
Baker's protagonist goes on to describe a strike for better working conditions that led to dire circumstances in a place very like what we know of Newark in that era, until:
"And presently the strike collapsed, and the workers rushed helter skelter back to the mills to get their old jobs "Begging like whipped dogs," he said bitterly.
Many of them found their places taken by the eager "black people," and many had to go to work at lower wages in poorer places — punished for the fight they had made."
After his effort at leading a strike for better pay and working conditions failed, the narrator had a realization:
"It was then that he began to see clearly what it all meant. He said he made a great discovery: that the "black people" against whom they had struck in 1894 were not to blame.
"I tell you," said he, "we found when we got started that them black people — we used to call 'em dagoes — were just workin' people like us — and in hell with us. They were good soldiers, them Eyetalians and Poles and Syrians, they fought with us to the end.""
This by a journalist who is not a Klan apologist at all, but is helping us understand what's going on in 1912 or so around the racial definition of "white."
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's trying to make sense of how we understand who is included in what we call community. Tell him how you would draw that circle at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @knapsack77 on Threads.
Sunday, August 27, 2023
Faith Works 9-8-23
Since Labor Day weekend is ahead, thought I'd get ahead before I was asked to:
Faith Works 9-8-23
Jeff Gill
Just imagining losses in the light of gains
___
Living in Licking County in 2023, I find myself thinking about ministry in 1923.
The interurbans, electric railways, had seen their national premiere between Newark and Granville in 1890; both the tracks and the transportation along them grew, spurring an industry to build interurban and subway and elevated railway cars.
Preachers through this period had seen the demise of once common hitching posts and watering troughs along the street in front of their churches. In fact, architecture up to this point had always made a point of putting a high set of stairs between the street level and the main entry, to keep the door above the dust of passing carriages and buggies, much of that dust pulverized from what the horses left behind.
Older members might find that climb a barrier to church attendance, but if you kept the grit and grime and flies out of the auditorium by doing so, since you had to keep the doors propped open in the warmer months, it was a tradeoff.
And you might even remember the livery stable operators and hansom cab drivers in a state of shock as first interurbans and then Mr. Ford's horseless carriages steadily eroded their businesses, let alone the craftsman in leather and fine woods who made buggy whips. Some moved further out in the country and found work where they could still be close to the horses they understood, others sold their stock at a loss and went to work in the growing factories and foundries.
Those pastoral conversations were still vivid in your memory, even as now you were hearing from parishioners that the Jewett Car Company was laying off even more workers. Automobiles were taking away passengers and fares, so interurbans were reducing replacement rates and it was said some municipal rail systems were closing down. Strangely, north in Sandusky the interurban company was closing down much of its business and putting their investments and energy into the former weekend sideline of an amusement park they had at Cedar Point.
The local interurban was still riding high, especially in the summers when so many rode all the way to Buckeye Lake Park, but after Labor Day, the passenger cars certainly looked emptier. At least there was talk about some plants might make automotive parts for the Detroit behemoths. And Heisey Glass kept adding capacity, so they'd be in business for another century for sure.
If people still came to church by automobile rather than by buggy or interurban trolley, that was fine. There was talk among ministers, though, about the silent films that were becoming so popular. Downtown Newark had theaters on all sides of the courthouse square, and there was talk of those "movie palaces" coming to town, giant spaces with pipe organs finer than any church had, with trumpets and bells and sound effects to accent the story. If they figured out how to put the sound of actors talking with the film, how would a Sunday service compete?
And even in the home, it seemed like every other house, at least of the better off church members, had a radio set; people after church talked to each other about music and news they were hearing from Pittsburgh and Akron, and that President Harding had a radio in the White House.
With private automobiles for almost every home, radios becoming common, and movie houses getting more popular, businesses like Scheidler and Jewett cutting back, a preacher could be forgiven for wondering: how would this influence church members? Would people become even more mobile, and disconnected from family and each other, distracted more easily by increasingly intensely interesting entertainment options? Or did that even occur to them, as our modern age was being born?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's pretty sure the worries of clergy in 1923 weren't what we'd think, looking back. Tell him what you wonder looking ahead at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Faith Works 9-8-23
Jeff Gill
Just imagining losses in the light of gains
___
Living in Licking County in 2023, I find myself thinking about ministry in 1923.
The interurbans, electric railways, had seen their national premiere between Newark and Granville in 1890; both the tracks and the transportation along them grew, spurring an industry to build interurban and subway and elevated railway cars.
Preachers through this period had seen the demise of once common hitching posts and watering troughs along the street in front of their churches. In fact, architecture up to this point had always made a point of putting a high set of stairs between the street level and the main entry, to keep the door above the dust of passing carriages and buggies, much of that dust pulverized from what the horses left behind.
Older members might find that climb a barrier to church attendance, but if you kept the grit and grime and flies out of the auditorium by doing so, since you had to keep the doors propped open in the warmer months, it was a tradeoff.
And you might even remember the livery stable operators and hansom cab drivers in a state of shock as first interurbans and then Mr. Ford's horseless carriages steadily eroded their businesses, let alone the craftsman in leather and fine woods who made buggy whips. Some moved further out in the country and found work where they could still be close to the horses they understood, others sold their stock at a loss and went to work in the growing factories and foundries.
Those pastoral conversations were still vivid in your memory, even as now you were hearing from parishioners that the Jewett Car Company was laying off even more workers. Automobiles were taking away passengers and fares, so interurbans were reducing replacement rates and it was said some municipal rail systems were closing down. Strangely, north in Sandusky the interurban company was closing down much of its business and putting their investments and energy into the former weekend sideline of an amusement park they had at Cedar Point.
The local interurban was still riding high, especially in the summers when so many rode all the way to Buckeye Lake Park, but after Labor Day, the passenger cars certainly looked emptier. At least there was talk about some plants might make automotive parts for the Detroit behemoths. And Heisey Glass kept adding capacity, so they'd be in business for another century for sure.
If people still came to church by automobile rather than by buggy or interurban trolley, that was fine. There was talk among ministers, though, about the silent films that were becoming so popular. Downtown Newark had theaters on all sides of the courthouse square, and there was talk of those "movie palaces" coming to town, giant spaces with pipe organs finer than any church had, with trumpets and bells and sound effects to accent the story. If they figured out how to put the sound of actors talking with the film, how would a Sunday service compete?
And even in the home, it seemed like every other house, at least of the better off church members, had a radio set; people after church talked to each other about music and news they were hearing from Pittsburgh and Akron, and that President Harding had a radio in the White House.
With private automobiles for almost every home, radios becoming common, and movie houses getting more popular, businesses like Scheidler and Jewett cutting back, a preacher could be forgiven for wondering: how would this influence church members? Would people become even more mobile, and disconnected from family and each other, distracted more easily by increasingly intensely interesting entertainment options? Or did that even occur to them, as our modern age was being born?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's pretty sure the worries of clergy in 1923 weren't what we'd think, looking back. Tell him what you wonder looking ahead at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Faith Works 9-1-23
Faith Works 9-1-23
Jeff Gill
A history worth remembering, faith that redeems
___
2022 will long be a significant date in Ohio and Licking County history.
The truly historic decision to put what now seems to be starting out as a $30 billion dollar investment in our backyard will put Intel in a narrative that goes back through names like Heisey, Scheidler, Rugg, Pharis, and Wehrle.
[ https://www.dispatch.com/story/business/manufacturing/2023/08/23/intel-is-seeking-federal-chips-act-money-for-new-albany-ohio-project/70594547007/ ]
Some years ago I had the opportunity to share a platform with other local historians talking about the industrial development of Licking County. In a ballroom that was filled to capacity (hat tip Freedom Years and Park National Bank!) we talked through a fascinating narrative of how sand and natural gas led to glassworks and lighting, and why the B&O Railroad and the Pennsylvania Station set the table for machine shops and foundries to start and grow here.
We also tried to point out the multiple waves of industrial and technological development that rose and fell across this narrative; I tossed in light heartedly, but with a sincere intention, the fact that our first known industry was flint based technology, distributed across the continent, spurring the local Hopewell economy two thousand years ago. But, I noted, we don't engage in large scale flint business anymore.
Nor do we make cast iron stoves, or rope, or beer bottles. Fiberglass comes along, and that has had a day not yet done; aluminum replaced the dominance of cast iron, with a smaller workforce to make more tonnage. Things change.
This was November 2019. COVID wasn't even a rumor yet, and Intel? That's an overseas manufacturer, right? Turns out they had US fabs, and now half of Licking County knows where they are and it seems half of those have been to Arizona or New Mexico or Oregon for a visit.
Dayton isn't going to make the world's cash registers again, and Akron has blimps but no longer a near monopoly on tire manufacturing. They're looking for their next step forward. In Licking County, we're already marching on ahead.
None of what's coming is going to erase our past history. We have some remarkable episodes in American history, some epic and marvelous, others tragic and painful, that happened here in our previous eras of boom and bust. We're entering a boom time; many of us have only known a busted era as adults, watching plants close and factory ship south, with our elders comparing any development today to better days in the past. A boom time is good times, right?
Pastorally speaking, I find it interesting that the crowd on the evening in 2019 did not respond well to our attempts to talk about positive developments in our local economy that were taking place, with the Port Authority in Heath and The Limited and other distribution centers to our west. There was some strong and immediate grumbling at any talk of better days ahead. The focus was on what we'd lost. And I understood, even if I regretted that attitude in the room.
In a parallel way, I find myself sifting some of the earlier history for what we lost when the now vanished manufacturers and businesses got started. What we as a community recall as boom times came with costs to persons and ways of life that were displaced by steam engines and assembly lines. Growth wasn't, and won't be, all good.
The challenge for faith communities: how do we celebrate new opportunities, while ministering to the losses that will come with change?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's imagining a pastor talking to a livery stable owner as the interurbans went in. Tell him what your community is doing with change at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
A history worth remembering, faith that redeems
___
2022 will long be a significant date in Ohio and Licking County history.
The truly historic decision to put what now seems to be starting out as a $30 billion dollar investment in our backyard will put Intel in a narrative that goes back through names like Heisey, Scheidler, Rugg, Pharis, and Wehrle.
[ https://www.dispatch.com/story/business/manufacturing/2023/08/23/intel-is-seeking-federal-chips-act-money-for-new-albany-ohio-project/70594547007/ ]
Some years ago I had the opportunity to share a platform with other local historians talking about the industrial development of Licking County. In a ballroom that was filled to capacity (hat tip Freedom Years and Park National Bank!) we talked through a fascinating narrative of how sand and natural gas led to glassworks and lighting, and why the B&O Railroad and the Pennsylvania Station set the table for machine shops and foundries to start and grow here.
We also tried to point out the multiple waves of industrial and technological development that rose and fell across this narrative; I tossed in light heartedly, but with a sincere intention, the fact that our first known industry was flint based technology, distributed across the continent, spurring the local Hopewell economy two thousand years ago. But, I noted, we don't engage in large scale flint business anymore.
Nor do we make cast iron stoves, or rope, or beer bottles. Fiberglass comes along, and that has had a day not yet done; aluminum replaced the dominance of cast iron, with a smaller workforce to make more tonnage. Things change.
This was November 2019. COVID wasn't even a rumor yet, and Intel? That's an overseas manufacturer, right? Turns out they had US fabs, and now half of Licking County knows where they are and it seems half of those have been to Arizona or New Mexico or Oregon for a visit.
Dayton isn't going to make the world's cash registers again, and Akron has blimps but no longer a near monopoly on tire manufacturing. They're looking for their next step forward. In Licking County, we're already marching on ahead.
None of what's coming is going to erase our past history. We have some remarkable episodes in American history, some epic and marvelous, others tragic and painful, that happened here in our previous eras of boom and bust. We're entering a boom time; many of us have only known a busted era as adults, watching plants close and factory ship south, with our elders comparing any development today to better days in the past. A boom time is good times, right?
Pastorally speaking, I find it interesting that the crowd on the evening in 2019 did not respond well to our attempts to talk about positive developments in our local economy that were taking place, with the Port Authority in Heath and The Limited and other distribution centers to our west. There was some strong and immediate grumbling at any talk of better days ahead. The focus was on what we'd lost. And I understood, even if I regretted that attitude in the room.
In a parallel way, I find myself sifting some of the earlier history for what we lost when the now vanished manufacturers and businesses got started. What we as a community recall as boom times came with costs to persons and ways of life that were displaced by steam engines and assembly lines. Growth wasn't, and won't be, all good.
The challenge for faith communities: how do we celebrate new opportunities, while ministering to the losses that will come with change?
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's imagining a pastor talking to a livery stable owner as the interurbans went in. Tell him what your community is doing with change at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Notes from my Knapsack 8-31-23
Notes from my Knapsack 8-31-23
Jeff Gill
Service and civic opportunities
___
When it comes to serving your country, that phrase most quickly brings to mind enlistment in the armed forces. We salute all veterans and the family members who supported them in that kind of service to our nation, but I'm thinking of some different sorts of opportunity more broadly available to citizens wanting to show their patriotism.
The most basic form of public service is voting. Not everyone can vote, children and foreign nationals for starters. The big issue is that not everyone who can does: only about 60 to 70% of those who could vote do so, and that's in high turnout elections.
Failure to register in the first place keeps that number down, some register but don't vote or move and their voter registration lapses, and others just don't show up, which is why political parties are interested in what they call GOTV or "getting out the vote." If in more mundane election cycles you have about half of the eligible population going to the polls, smaller and smaller fractions of the whole can change the outcome.
Along with voting, paying taxes is something many of us do, but not all: in 2022 it was about 60% of all households that paid income tax. Of the 40% that didn't, they are still in many cases paying FICA (Social Security and Medicare, "Federal Insurance Contributions Act" at 6.2% & 1.45% of gross wages, respectively), and we all end up paying sales taxes or gas tax somewhere somehow. I find disputed sources on how many pay property tax, but I think the average renter would share my suspicion that much property tax cost is passed along to them. In one form or another, we all pay taxes, probably more than how many of us vote.
So as citizens, we can and should vote, we kind of have to pay taxes, and there's military service. But when it comes to citizenship, I think on the list of basics there's one we don't talk about enough.
There is jury duty. I would argue on behalf of our judicial system that in line with voting and taxpaying and honoring the flag, responding to a call for serving on a jury is a basic element of citizenship. Without jurors, we can't deliver on those constitutional promises of a trial by a jury of your peers, and the harder it is to find jurors, the slower the course of justice can be, and a speedy trial is one of those basics we want to honor as well.
I'm writing this because I continue to be amazed at the good, upstanding people who consider a request for jury duty nothing but a burden and inconvenience. And I know full well: being on a jury can be burdensome, but it's not a 55 pound pack or a forward deployment. Jury duty is inconvenient, but it's not a tour in a combat zone. Serving as a juror, though, is an element of our national polity as much as registering to vote, paying taxes, or having a certain number of us willing to serve in uniform.
I started writing this thinking about the further opportunity to serve as an elected or appointed official in the small quiet corners of our civc life, but hearing my umpteenth protest that it's ridiculous to ask a busy person to do jury duty caused me to change course. I hope putting it in this context changes yours.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's served on multiple juries. Tell him about what you learned responding to a jury summons at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Jeff Gill
Service and civic opportunities
___
When it comes to serving your country, that phrase most quickly brings to mind enlistment in the armed forces. We salute all veterans and the family members who supported them in that kind of service to our nation, but I'm thinking of some different sorts of opportunity more broadly available to citizens wanting to show their patriotism.
The most basic form of public service is voting. Not everyone can vote, children and foreign nationals for starters. The big issue is that not everyone who can does: only about 60 to 70% of those who could vote do so, and that's in high turnout elections.
Failure to register in the first place keeps that number down, some register but don't vote or move and their voter registration lapses, and others just don't show up, which is why political parties are interested in what they call GOTV or "getting out the vote." If in more mundane election cycles you have about half of the eligible population going to the polls, smaller and smaller fractions of the whole can change the outcome.
Along with voting, paying taxes is something many of us do, but not all: in 2022 it was about 60% of all households that paid income tax. Of the 40% that didn't, they are still in many cases paying FICA (Social Security and Medicare, "Federal Insurance Contributions Act" at 6.2% & 1.45% of gross wages, respectively), and we all end up paying sales taxes or gas tax somewhere somehow. I find disputed sources on how many pay property tax, but I think the average renter would share my suspicion that much property tax cost is passed along to them. In one form or another, we all pay taxes, probably more than how many of us vote.
So as citizens, we can and should vote, we kind of have to pay taxes, and there's military service. But when it comes to citizenship, I think on the list of basics there's one we don't talk about enough.
There is jury duty. I would argue on behalf of our judicial system that in line with voting and taxpaying and honoring the flag, responding to a call for serving on a jury is a basic element of citizenship. Without jurors, we can't deliver on those constitutional promises of a trial by a jury of your peers, and the harder it is to find jurors, the slower the course of justice can be, and a speedy trial is one of those basics we want to honor as well.
I'm writing this because I continue to be amazed at the good, upstanding people who consider a request for jury duty nothing but a burden and inconvenience. And I know full well: being on a jury can be burdensome, but it's not a 55 pound pack or a forward deployment. Jury duty is inconvenient, but it's not a tour in a combat zone. Serving as a juror, though, is an element of our national polity as much as registering to vote, paying taxes, or having a certain number of us willing to serve in uniform.
I started writing this thinking about the further opportunity to serve as an elected or appointed official in the small quiet corners of our civc life, but hearing my umpteenth protest that it's ridiculous to ask a busy person to do jury duty caused me to change course. I hope putting it in this context changes yours.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's served on multiple juries. Tell him about what you learned responding to a jury summons at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack77 on Threads.
Sunday, August 20, 2023
Faith Works 8-25-23
Faith Works 8-25-23
Jeff Gill
For what it's worth
___
While I'm in the middle of a series about events of our past in Licking County, news out of southern Georgia, where a one term President of the United States and his wife of 77 years both on hospice care, sounds as if his term of life is coming to a close.
Jimmy Carter is nearing 99 years on this earth; Rosalynn just turned 96. I got to stand and talk to her about Habitat and homelessness and building homes at Denison University some years ago, and she was as gracious and delightful as you might have heard. She liked painting more than carpentry, but her husband lived to frame in new builds, hammer at the ready. I never met her husband, but he has been a presence in my life at a number of interesting junctures, such as the summer of 1980. During that already steamy June, I heard a fellow Marine Corps officer candidate say:
"He's not my president."
What followed is what happened in an armory building at Quantico Marine Base in Virginia; some poor fool said that as we stood around waiting for our range time, in reference to a framed picture of Jimmy Carter, on the wall with Edward Hidalgo, Secretary of the Navy, and Gen. Robert Barrow, Commandant of the United States Marine Corps.
The gunnery sergeant in charge had temporary custody of half of Kilo Company, and the gunny had been making a number of what could reasonably called conservative statements, about the Rapture theologically and the foolishness of welfare politically, while we waited at ease in the shade. All of which took hold of one person in our number to say, nodding at Carter's toothy grin, "he's sure not my President."
Gunny stood up from his stool behind the counter, an audible creak as his considerable bulk came off of it. He had arms like thighs, heavily inked with eagles, flags, anchors, and an old rugged cross.
"Not your president, candidate?" he said with a smile that would chill the blood of a person much denser than any of his listeners. "You would set yourself up to define and decide on your own chain of command? You think it's up to you to choose who you report to, whose authority issues your commission? Why, that's dangerously close to mutiny, and the Department of the Navy (nods at Hidalgo) and our own Commandant (nods to Gen. Barrow) categorize mutiny as a hanging offense… hypothetically, of course" he said with a further frosty smile.
"We've had fools and drunkards in the White House, but while they hold office, they are in the chain of command second only to God the Father." He paused, looked through us beyond the walls of the armory, and smiled one last time. "When you receive your commission, you'll be in the chain of command over me. Isn't THAT a wonder?"
The gunny shook his head, turned back to his bench, and we filed out onto the range shortly after, Jimmy Carter our president. For every last one of us, even those who didn't know that afternoon who the current president was. They knew now.
Leadership, whether political or theological, requires a certain measure, judicious I'll admit but it need to be there, of followership. Leadership, and followership. If everyone believes that to be truly faithful or true they have to be in charge, at all times, how does that even work? Sometimes we are called to follow.
In retrospect, Jimmy Carter was a commander in chief I'm proud to have followed. A leader is not always someone you agree with at all times, but at the right time, to follow faithfully can be a real blessing.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's known a number of commanders-in-chief. Tell him how you've dealt with being a follower at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
For what it's worth
___
While I'm in the middle of a series about events of our past in Licking County, news out of southern Georgia, where a one term President of the United States and his wife of 77 years both on hospice care, sounds as if his term of life is coming to a close.
Jimmy Carter is nearing 99 years on this earth; Rosalynn just turned 96. I got to stand and talk to her about Habitat and homelessness and building homes at Denison University some years ago, and she was as gracious and delightful as you might have heard. She liked painting more than carpentry, but her husband lived to frame in new builds, hammer at the ready. I never met her husband, but he has been a presence in my life at a number of interesting junctures, such as the summer of 1980. During that already steamy June, I heard a fellow Marine Corps officer candidate say:
"He's not my president."
What followed is what happened in an armory building at Quantico Marine Base in Virginia; some poor fool said that as we stood around waiting for our range time, in reference to a framed picture of Jimmy Carter, on the wall with Edward Hidalgo, Secretary of the Navy, and Gen. Robert Barrow, Commandant of the United States Marine Corps.
The gunnery sergeant in charge had temporary custody of half of Kilo Company, and the gunny had been making a number of what could reasonably called conservative statements, about the Rapture theologically and the foolishness of welfare politically, while we waited at ease in the shade. All of which took hold of one person in our number to say, nodding at Carter's toothy grin, "he's sure not my President."
Gunny stood up from his stool behind the counter, an audible creak as his considerable bulk came off of it. He had arms like thighs, heavily inked with eagles, flags, anchors, and an old rugged cross.
"Not your president, candidate?" he said with a smile that would chill the blood of a person much denser than any of his listeners. "You would set yourself up to define and decide on your own chain of command? You think it's up to you to choose who you report to, whose authority issues your commission? Why, that's dangerously close to mutiny, and the Department of the Navy (nods at Hidalgo) and our own Commandant (nods to Gen. Barrow) categorize mutiny as a hanging offense… hypothetically, of course" he said with a further frosty smile.
"We've had fools and drunkards in the White House, but while they hold office, they are in the chain of command second only to God the Father." He paused, looked through us beyond the walls of the armory, and smiled one last time. "When you receive your commission, you'll be in the chain of command over me. Isn't THAT a wonder?"
The gunny shook his head, turned back to his bench, and we filed out onto the range shortly after, Jimmy Carter our president. For every last one of us, even those who didn't know that afternoon who the current president was. They knew now.
Leadership, whether political or theological, requires a certain measure, judicious I'll admit but it need to be there, of followership. Leadership, and followership. If everyone believes that to be truly faithful or true they have to be in charge, at all times, how does that even work? Sometimes we are called to follow.
In retrospect, Jimmy Carter was a commander in chief I'm proud to have followed. A leader is not always someone you agree with at all times, but at the right time, to follow faithfully can be a real blessing.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's known a number of commanders-in-chief. Tell him how you've dealt with being a follower at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Monday, August 14, 2023
Faith Works 8-18-23
Faith Works 8-18-23
Jeff Gill
Enduring biases and transforming our views
___
Last week my offering to you was from 250 years ago, when Rev. David Jones makes the first written record of people residing in Licking County.
His account effectively begins what we traditionally know as "history," with events and activity before that "prehistory" simply because we have only artifacts and remains to work from, not a written record.
The curtain comes up in 1773, not all the way nor to a fully lit stage, but we get a clear glimpse of part of the setting. As a local historian, I've gone back many times to Gist's earlier but unpopulated journal of 1751, Jones's account, and the later reports of Indian Billy Dragoo who passed through in the 1780s but gave his account decades later, or Isaac & Katherine Stadden's impressions in 1800, also recorded later around 1870.
All of this makes the detailed Jones account of 1753 incredibly important, and again, I've looked it up and read many times through the Licking County section, along with the narrative of the weeks before and after for clues to the landscape and peoples and customs of the day.
But it has only been on my more recent reading that something incredibly obvious finally became clear to me. Rev. Jones's party is entertained by the village chief, a woman who is clearly in charge, and she clears out what is called the "negro quarter" which is a substantial structure with a smoke vent in the ceiling and room for at least half a dozen adults. That observation is footnoted that the chief "has several negroes who were taken from Virginia in time of last war, and now esteemed as her property."
There are long discussions to be had about the role and place of slavery among Native Americans in the colonial era, but the language here is unclear about "esteemed as," which could mean the people were considered her property, or that this status is how others saw it, but she was sheltering them from enslavement here north of the Ohio.
In either case, it does mean without doubt that African Americans were here as local residents before any European Americans came as settlers, a period which comes almost thirty years later, in 1800. Most "historical" later accounts call people like Ratliff and Hughes, the Staddens, folks named Beard and Van Buskirk and a family of Joneses, in some sequence, as the pioneers or settlers of Licking County.
To be fair, we have no names. History likes names; we make connections and follow families through them. But those "several negroes" with a home somewhere near Elliott's Run north of Raccoon Creek as part of the Shawnee woman's village, whose name is also essentially hidden from us: they were here first.
And for too many years, they were invisible to me. I read this passage over many times, but their personhood and pre-eminence had been invisible to me, because I could not or did not see them.
Friends, that is racism. My racism. My own inability to see something right in front of me because of inherent racial assumptions about who is first, who is in charge, who has status. Fortunately the record endures, and blessedly my awareness has changed. But the fact remains. Because of racism, I missed this for far too long. I lift them up now so we all can see, and wonder, and envision them. What was their life like here in a place we call home? How did they live and worship and love and die?
We're just beginning to see many things about our history more clearly.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's still amazed how long he missed these folk in plain view. Tell him how you've seen what you'd previously missed at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
Enduring biases and transforming our views
___
Last week my offering to you was from 250 years ago, when Rev. David Jones makes the first written record of people residing in Licking County.
His account effectively begins what we traditionally know as "history," with events and activity before that "prehistory" simply because we have only artifacts and remains to work from, not a written record.
The curtain comes up in 1773, not all the way nor to a fully lit stage, but we get a clear glimpse of part of the setting. As a local historian, I've gone back many times to Gist's earlier but unpopulated journal of 1751, Jones's account, and the later reports of Indian Billy Dragoo who passed through in the 1780s but gave his account decades later, or Isaac & Katherine Stadden's impressions in 1800, also recorded later around 1870.
All of this makes the detailed Jones account of 1753 incredibly important, and again, I've looked it up and read many times through the Licking County section, along with the narrative of the weeks before and after for clues to the landscape and peoples and customs of the day.
But it has only been on my more recent reading that something incredibly obvious finally became clear to me. Rev. Jones's party is entertained by the village chief, a woman who is clearly in charge, and she clears out what is called the "negro quarter" which is a substantial structure with a smoke vent in the ceiling and room for at least half a dozen adults. That observation is footnoted that the chief "has several negroes who were taken from Virginia in time of last war, and now esteemed as her property."
There are long discussions to be had about the role and place of slavery among Native Americans in the colonial era, but the language here is unclear about "esteemed as," which could mean the people were considered her property, or that this status is how others saw it, but she was sheltering them from enslavement here north of the Ohio.
In either case, it does mean without doubt that African Americans were here as local residents before any European Americans came as settlers, a period which comes almost thirty years later, in 1800. Most "historical" later accounts call people like Ratliff and Hughes, the Staddens, folks named Beard and Van Buskirk and a family of Joneses, in some sequence, as the pioneers or settlers of Licking County.
To be fair, we have no names. History likes names; we make connections and follow families through them. But those "several negroes" with a home somewhere near Elliott's Run north of Raccoon Creek as part of the Shawnee woman's village, whose name is also essentially hidden from us: they were here first.
And for too many years, they were invisible to me. I read this passage over many times, but their personhood and pre-eminence had been invisible to me, because I could not or did not see them.
Friends, that is racism. My racism. My own inability to see something right in front of me because of inherent racial assumptions about who is first, who is in charge, who has status. Fortunately the record endures, and blessedly my awareness has changed. But the fact remains. Because of racism, I missed this for far too long. I lift them up now so we all can see, and wonder, and envision them. What was their life like here in a place we call home? How did they live and worship and love and die?
We're just beginning to see many things about our history more clearly.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's still amazed how long he missed these folk in plain view. Tell him how you've seen what you'd previously missed at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Monday, August 07, 2023
Notes from my Knapsack 8-17-23
Notes from my Knapsack 8-17-23
Jeff Gill
Things to think about now, not later
___
Back in May I invited readers to think about the ways we used to care for elderly and ailing family members, before hospitals and nursing homes and assisted living became common solutions to what used to be less common dilemmas.
You've probably picked up over time on the fact that I've spent the last three years spending increasing amounts of time on doing home care. The details don't matter, just that I've ended up making some pretty major life changes (occupationally, personally) to adjust to the needs of aging relatives, and I know from many, many conversations this is a quietly common situation.
To all the many "have you considered" suggestions, I can only say you can only imagine. Which is why I wanted to put this "out there" in the platform this paper allows me:
If you are any age past about 25, it is not too soon to start thinking strategically about 3 categories:
a) Your own retirement living plans & financing,
b) How to deal with same for elderly relatives you can talk to about this, &
c) What to do with those who can't/won't discuss it.
Let's start with b) because it's the easy one. Mostly. If you have a parent or grandparent or other relation to whom you're close, and they are willing to talk about aging and care, they probably already have. God bless those who have sat down adult children and told them "here's my plan, here's what I have put where to do that, and here's how I see this working - what do you think?" May their tribe increase. And their numbers are, alas, too few.
I'll admit a) isn't exactly easy. Especially if you're younger. Save for retirement? Think about long term care coverage? Start sorting your accumulated accumulations now? What kind of a grumpy old man are you?
I'm that kind. Especially now. All sorts of things that are difficult or inconvenient at 35 are dang near impossible at 55. Trust me, financial advisors dread those conversations, when a person is pushing 60 and says "I have no savings other than Social Security, so what do I need to do now to retire?" At 62 or 65 or 67 for most of us moving forward, if you have zippity doo dah set aside, it's gonna be hard. Not impossible, but very hard. If you're 35, it's still possible; 45, doable; 55, feel the pain but see the goal.
Okay, finally c). These are hardest of all. The only thing I can offer is this: if you have an older family member whose situation you know you'll get called about if there's a medical emergency, and they aren't ready for needing care or support, and resist any conversation at all about it, you need to build a team. For YOU. You will need a team to make this work, whatever the end game is. Other family, friends, even co-workers, but if the relation won't talk, it's okay to talk about them, especially when you see mobility lessen and needs increasing.
Brainstorm, scenario out options, figure out what is doable. It may not be fun now, but it's so much harder when it's a tomorrow deadline, coming while you're standing in a hospital waiting room or funeral home lobby, asking each other "how will we take care of them?"
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; his sister has her hands full with our mom, too. Tell him about solutions to tricky problems you've found at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
Things to think about now, not later
___
Back in May I invited readers to think about the ways we used to care for elderly and ailing family members, before hospitals and nursing homes and assisted living became common solutions to what used to be less common dilemmas.
You've probably picked up over time on the fact that I've spent the last three years spending increasing amounts of time on doing home care. The details don't matter, just that I've ended up making some pretty major life changes (occupationally, personally) to adjust to the needs of aging relatives, and I know from many, many conversations this is a quietly common situation.
To all the many "have you considered" suggestions, I can only say you can only imagine. Which is why I wanted to put this "out there" in the platform this paper allows me:
If you are any age past about 25, it is not too soon to start thinking strategically about 3 categories:
a) Your own retirement living plans & financing,
b) How to deal with same for elderly relatives you can talk to about this, &
c) What to do with those who can't/won't discuss it.
Let's start with b) because it's the easy one. Mostly. If you have a parent or grandparent or other relation to whom you're close, and they are willing to talk about aging and care, they probably already have. God bless those who have sat down adult children and told them "here's my plan, here's what I have put where to do that, and here's how I see this working - what do you think?" May their tribe increase. And their numbers are, alas, too few.
I'll admit a) isn't exactly easy. Especially if you're younger. Save for retirement? Think about long term care coverage? Start sorting your accumulated accumulations now? What kind of a grumpy old man are you?
I'm that kind. Especially now. All sorts of things that are difficult or inconvenient at 35 are dang near impossible at 55. Trust me, financial advisors dread those conversations, when a person is pushing 60 and says "I have no savings other than Social Security, so what do I need to do now to retire?" At 62 or 65 or 67 for most of us moving forward, if you have zippity doo dah set aside, it's gonna be hard. Not impossible, but very hard. If you're 35, it's still possible; 45, doable; 55, feel the pain but see the goal.
Okay, finally c). These are hardest of all. The only thing I can offer is this: if you have an older family member whose situation you know you'll get called about if there's a medical emergency, and they aren't ready for needing care or support, and resist any conversation at all about it, you need to build a team. For YOU. You will need a team to make this work, whatever the end game is. Other family, friends, even co-workers, but if the relation won't talk, it's okay to talk about them, especially when you see mobility lessen and needs increasing.
Brainstorm, scenario out options, figure out what is doable. It may not be fun now, but it's so much harder when it's a tomorrow deadline, coming while you're standing in a hospital waiting room or funeral home lobby, asking each other "how will we take care of them?"
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; his sister has her hands full with our mom, too. Tell him about solutions to tricky problems you've found at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Faith Works 8-11-23
Faith Works 8-11-23
Jeff Gill
Nothing so invisible as what we don't see
___
In talking about lessons we might learn about race and racism from history, I've been spending a great deal of time one hundred years ago, in 1923, with the Ku Klux Klan as that organization steadily took over Licking County, and much of the Midwest.
To answer in part why this context is still important in 2023, I need to jump back even farther, 250 years ago in fact, to 1773.
History is in large part the study of the records of a period, and so for Licking County, our pre-history is deep and complex with artifacts and earthworks, but our written history begins in 1751.
Christopher Gist, friend and associate of George Washington, passed through the Ohio Country in 1750 and 1751: crucially, he left a journal. His party spends Christmas and New Year's Eve of 1750 in Coshocton, and he gives us our earliest written account of the legendary "White Woman" from which the main street of Roscoe Village and other sites along Walhonding Creek get their name.
Mary Harris was a child captive born in Deerfield, Massachusetts in 1696, seized in a 1704 French raid, and by 1750 a matriarch married to a Lenape, or Delaware man, and leader of a village along the Muskingum. She remembers dimly so-called civilization in New England, but says to Gist "she still remembers they used to be very religious in New England, and wonders how the White Men can be so wicked as she has seen them in these woods."
That was recorded on January 15, 1751; on the 16th and 17th Gist's party passes through today's Licking County, but he records salt licks and streams, nothing about people, on his way to the "great swamp" which they pass around on their way to Hockhocking, what we call Rock Mill today near Lancaster.
In essence, history as a written account begins for Licking County in 1751. A generation later, in 1773, we get history with characters to populate the scene. On Feb. 10, 1773, Rev. David Jones passes through going the opposite direction, from Standing Stone on his way to Newcomerstown. From the Hockhocking area up to what he calls "Salt Lick Creek," or the Raccoon Fork of the Licking River drainage, he notes "there were no inhabitants…" until they reach their destination. Jones goes on to tell us "Before night, came to the designed town, called Dan. Elleot's wife's; a man of that name was said to have here a squaa for his pretended wife. This is a small town consisting of Delawares and Shawannees. The chief is a Shawannee woman, who is esteemed very rich — she entertains travellers — there were four of us in company, and for our use, her negro quarter was evacuated this night, which had a fire in the middle without any chimney.* [Remember that asterisk.] This woman has a large flock, and supplied us with milk. Here also we got corn for our horses at a very expensive price."
Jones closes his "Licking County" sojourn by saying "The country here appeared calculated for health, fertile and beautiful." And in fact, there's good reason to believe it's Chaplain Jones who routes the earliest settlers of Licking County to this area, from Bowling Green to the Welsh Hills. He and those settlers are the dawn of most historical accounts of our area, after a passing nod to thousands of years of Native American residence and activity.
But note the dual historical significance of the asterisked note on the page: "* This woman has several negroes who were taken from Virginia in time of last war, and now esteemed as her property."
Do you see them now? I hope to sharpen the focus for us next week.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he knows it's a struggle sometimes to see what's in front of your face. Tell him what you've come to see at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
Nothing so invisible as what we don't see
___
In talking about lessons we might learn about race and racism from history, I've been spending a great deal of time one hundred years ago, in 1923, with the Ku Klux Klan as that organization steadily took over Licking County, and much of the Midwest.
To answer in part why this context is still important in 2023, I need to jump back even farther, 250 years ago in fact, to 1773.
History is in large part the study of the records of a period, and so for Licking County, our pre-history is deep and complex with artifacts and earthworks, but our written history begins in 1751.
Christopher Gist, friend and associate of George Washington, passed through the Ohio Country in 1750 and 1751: crucially, he left a journal. His party spends Christmas and New Year's Eve of 1750 in Coshocton, and he gives us our earliest written account of the legendary "White Woman" from which the main street of Roscoe Village and other sites along Walhonding Creek get their name.
Mary Harris was a child captive born in Deerfield, Massachusetts in 1696, seized in a 1704 French raid, and by 1750 a matriarch married to a Lenape, or Delaware man, and leader of a village along the Muskingum. She remembers dimly so-called civilization in New England, but says to Gist "she still remembers they used to be very religious in New England, and wonders how the White Men can be so wicked as she has seen them in these woods."
That was recorded on January 15, 1751; on the 16th and 17th Gist's party passes through today's Licking County, but he records salt licks and streams, nothing about people, on his way to the "great swamp" which they pass around on their way to Hockhocking, what we call Rock Mill today near Lancaster.
In essence, history as a written account begins for Licking County in 1751. A generation later, in 1773, we get history with characters to populate the scene. On Feb. 10, 1773, Rev. David Jones passes through going the opposite direction, from Standing Stone on his way to Newcomerstown. From the Hockhocking area up to what he calls "Salt Lick Creek," or the Raccoon Fork of the Licking River drainage, he notes "there were no inhabitants…" until they reach their destination. Jones goes on to tell us "Before night, came to the designed town, called Dan. Elleot's wife's; a man of that name was said to have here a squaa for his pretended wife. This is a small town consisting of Delawares and Shawannees. The chief is a Shawannee woman, who is esteemed very rich — she entertains travellers — there were four of us in company, and for our use, her negro quarter was evacuated this night, which had a fire in the middle without any chimney.* [Remember that asterisk.] This woman has a large flock, and supplied us with milk. Here also we got corn for our horses at a very expensive price."
Jones closes his "Licking County" sojourn by saying "The country here appeared calculated for health, fertile and beautiful." And in fact, there's good reason to believe it's Chaplain Jones who routes the earliest settlers of Licking County to this area, from Bowling Green to the Welsh Hills. He and those settlers are the dawn of most historical accounts of our area, after a passing nod to thousands of years of Native American residence and activity.
But note the dual historical significance of the asterisked note on the page: "* This woman has several negroes who were taken from Virginia in time of last war, and now esteemed as her property."
Do you see them now? I hope to sharpen the focus for us next week.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he knows it's a struggle sometimes to see what's in front of your face. Tell him what you've come to see at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Monday, July 31, 2023
Faith Works 8-4-23
Faith Works 8-4-23
Jeff Gill
Historical memory in community life
___
When Steven Spielberg made his magisterial movie "Lincoln" in 2012, he and scriptwriter Tony Kushner made some changes to the strict history of the period they were depicting, in the first months of 1865.
There is much to praise, historically, in the narrative and the acting; politically, the story as we get it squishes together (as films always do) multiple conflicts with more complex issues behind them than you would get just from the story around log-rolling and patronage and moral suasion, even if Tommy Lee Jones's Thaddeus Stevens is the spirit of the man to a T. Dickinson College has some wonderful resources online in their "House Divided" webpage that helps to unpack what's historical and what's literary license.
A particular and peculiar set of changes the filmmakers employed was to obscure the names of most of the opponents to the Thirteenth Amendment, the formal and legal abolition of slavery in the United States.
With 183 House seats at the time, 122 would have to vote "yea" to secure passage of the resolution; with 8 Democrats abstaining, passage required 117. The amendment received 119.
Opposing the measure were Fernando Wood of New York City, and Ohio's George Pendleton, while the floor leader for the Republican majority was James Ashby. Ohio was strongly on both sides of the debate, in fact. The two Democratic leaders are given their own names and accurately their own words and demeanor. But for the dramatic final roll call, almost every "nay" vote was given to a fictional name.
Why? The filmmakers never said; there was controversy after it came out, but it was around descendants, politically as well as by actual lineage, who wanted their ancestor's "yea" votes more prominently featured.
Which would support the idea that they knew giving a "nay" to someone whose descendants were still around to object would raise some issues they could just as easily sidestep.
I know how they felt. If you've been reading my columns the last few weeks, let alone the series I put forth early in the spring, you know I'm trying to tell a painful story and seek modern day lessons from an often obscured part of our local history: how the Ku Klux Klan a century ago gathered thousands in Newark, a hundred thousand at Buckeye Lake from around the state, and in November of 1923 literally took control of county government, as well as the county seat's governance. It didn't last, but not because anyone thought better of their decisions or renounced hate and division. It would take the revelation of corruption by the movement's top leaders, and misuse of state and national funds, to cause the Klan to fold its hoods and tents and recede back into the darkness where their rallies by torchlight were held. The beliefs? Those didn't just vanish.
As someone said when I was showing earlier drafts of my writings on this subject: "you better be careful about calling someone's grandfather a Klansman." I've not done so, but after the first columns ran, I've gotten many messages from people whose grandfathers, in fact, were. And they've asked that I not use their names even when they invited me to retell parts of their stories, which I understand.
But you see the dilemma? There are organizations and institutions and churches, let alone persons, who gave themselves over to the Klan ideology and agenda, openly and avidly. In 2023, they would I think all disavow the Klan's perspective. Does that mean I should, like Spielberg in "Lincoln," keep their names out of historical consideration?
People yes; institutions, perhaps not.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's still wrestling with the ethics of past practice and present discrimination. Tell him how you would tell the story at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
Historical memory in community life
___
When Steven Spielberg made his magisterial movie "Lincoln" in 2012, he and scriptwriter Tony Kushner made some changes to the strict history of the period they were depicting, in the first months of 1865.
There is much to praise, historically, in the narrative and the acting; politically, the story as we get it squishes together (as films always do) multiple conflicts with more complex issues behind them than you would get just from the story around log-rolling and patronage and moral suasion, even if Tommy Lee Jones's Thaddeus Stevens is the spirit of the man to a T. Dickinson College has some wonderful resources online in their "House Divided" webpage that helps to unpack what's historical and what's literary license.
A particular and peculiar set of changes the filmmakers employed was to obscure the names of most of the opponents to the Thirteenth Amendment, the formal and legal abolition of slavery in the United States.
With 183 House seats at the time, 122 would have to vote "yea" to secure passage of the resolution; with 8 Democrats abstaining, passage required 117. The amendment received 119.
Opposing the measure were Fernando Wood of New York City, and Ohio's George Pendleton, while the floor leader for the Republican majority was James Ashby. Ohio was strongly on both sides of the debate, in fact. The two Democratic leaders are given their own names and accurately their own words and demeanor. But for the dramatic final roll call, almost every "nay" vote was given to a fictional name.
Why? The filmmakers never said; there was controversy after it came out, but it was around descendants, politically as well as by actual lineage, who wanted their ancestor's "yea" votes more prominently featured.
Which would support the idea that they knew giving a "nay" to someone whose descendants were still around to object would raise some issues they could just as easily sidestep.
I know how they felt. If you've been reading my columns the last few weeks, let alone the series I put forth early in the spring, you know I'm trying to tell a painful story and seek modern day lessons from an often obscured part of our local history: how the Ku Klux Klan a century ago gathered thousands in Newark, a hundred thousand at Buckeye Lake from around the state, and in November of 1923 literally took control of county government, as well as the county seat's governance. It didn't last, but not because anyone thought better of their decisions or renounced hate and division. It would take the revelation of corruption by the movement's top leaders, and misuse of state and national funds, to cause the Klan to fold its hoods and tents and recede back into the darkness where their rallies by torchlight were held. The beliefs? Those didn't just vanish.
As someone said when I was showing earlier drafts of my writings on this subject: "you better be careful about calling someone's grandfather a Klansman." I've not done so, but after the first columns ran, I've gotten many messages from people whose grandfathers, in fact, were. And they've asked that I not use their names even when they invited me to retell parts of their stories, which I understand.
But you see the dilemma? There are organizations and institutions and churches, let alone persons, who gave themselves over to the Klan ideology and agenda, openly and avidly. In 2023, they would I think all disavow the Klan's perspective. Does that mean I should, like Spielberg in "Lincoln," keep their names out of historical consideration?
People yes; institutions, perhaps not.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's still wrestling with the ethics of past practice and present discrimination. Tell him how you would tell the story at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Sunday, July 23, 2023
Notes from my Knapsack 8-3-23
Notes from my Knapsack 8-3-23
Jeff Gill
250 years ago, across our landscape
___
There's work going on towards the year 2026.
I don't know about you, but that still looks odd to me. 2026 has a science fictiony sound to it, right up there with the year 2525, but here we are.
2026 is not just three years from now, it's 250 years after the Declaration of Independence. The words drafted by Thomas Jefferson, edited by John Adams and Benjamin Franklin, further amended and then adopted by the Second Continental Congress, brought our nation into being 250 years before 2026, in 1776.
Some of us recall vividly the many and various celebrations we had in 1976, the Bicentennial. In Newark, Ohio, we have a strong reminder of the Centennial of American Independence, any time we drive around Courthouse Square, and see the huge 1876 on each face of the building.
By way of preparation, though, for our America 250-Ohio events, or the "semiquincentennial" if you like the technical terminology, I thought it worth lifting up that our 250th anniversary commemorations begin in 2023, at least for Licking County.
While we have good solid data to show Native Americans have lived here in these valleys and hills for some 12,000 years (Burning Tree mastodon, Munson Springs, etc.), recorded history as in written records begins about 250 years ago for Licking County. We were peeled off of Fairfield County in 1808, true, but the earliest written accounts of these creeks and rivers and trails come to us indirectly by way of Christopher Gist in 1751, some 272 years ago. Gist passes quickly through here, and in his journal it's unclear where he's camped for a night, and which path he took from Coshocton to Lancaster, broadly speaking.
But in 1773, which is 250 years ago, Rev. David Jones rode through, on Feb. 10th & 11th, spending the night near to the heart of today's Licking County, possibly in the vicinity of the Ohio State Newark campus.
Of great interest in his publication, which was famous enough once published to be in Thomas Jefferson's library at Monticello, is the small detail that when Rev. Jones and his party came to a "middle ground" village along "Salt Lick Creek" where both European Americans and Native people lived in a trading post village, the female chief of a Shawnee band arranged that "her negro quarter was evacuated this night, which had a fire in the middle without any chimney." An asterisk at this point notes "This woman has several negroes who were taken from Virginia in time of last war, and now esteemed as her property," the "last war" being the French & Indian War of the 1750s.
After praising the chief and her hospitality, Jones goes on to note "The country here appeared calculated for health, fertile and beautiful." Then he leaves Licking County as we know it, on the way to Coshocton.
250 years ago, women were in leadership, and people of color lived here; in fact, the language of 1773 suggests they were "esteemed" as slaves, but not necessarily treated as such. It was a complicated place, Licking County was.
Which is why we turn to history, 250 years later. We learn things about our present in that light.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he is constantly surprised by history. Tell him where you've seen today differently because of yesterday at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Jeff Gill
250 years ago, across our landscape
___
There's work going on towards the year 2026.
I don't know about you, but that still looks odd to me. 2026 has a science fictiony sound to it, right up there with the year 2525, but here we are.
2026 is not just three years from now, it's 250 years after the Declaration of Independence. The words drafted by Thomas Jefferson, edited by John Adams and Benjamin Franklin, further amended and then adopted by the Second Continental Congress, brought our nation into being 250 years before 2026, in 1776.
Some of us recall vividly the many and various celebrations we had in 1976, the Bicentennial. In Newark, Ohio, we have a strong reminder of the Centennial of American Independence, any time we drive around Courthouse Square, and see the huge 1876 on each face of the building.
By way of preparation, though, for our America 250-Ohio events, or the "semiquincentennial" if you like the technical terminology, I thought it worth lifting up that our 250th anniversary commemorations begin in 2023, at least for Licking County.
While we have good solid data to show Native Americans have lived here in these valleys and hills for some 12,000 years (Burning Tree mastodon, Munson Springs, etc.), recorded history as in written records begins about 250 years ago for Licking County. We were peeled off of Fairfield County in 1808, true, but the earliest written accounts of these creeks and rivers and trails come to us indirectly by way of Christopher Gist in 1751, some 272 years ago. Gist passes quickly through here, and in his journal it's unclear where he's camped for a night, and which path he took from Coshocton to Lancaster, broadly speaking.
But in 1773, which is 250 years ago, Rev. David Jones rode through, on Feb. 10th & 11th, spending the night near to the heart of today's Licking County, possibly in the vicinity of the Ohio State Newark campus.
Of great interest in his publication, which was famous enough once published to be in Thomas Jefferson's library at Monticello, is the small detail that when Rev. Jones and his party came to a "middle ground" village along "Salt Lick Creek" where both European Americans and Native people lived in a trading post village, the female chief of a Shawnee band arranged that "her negro quarter was evacuated this night, which had a fire in the middle without any chimney." An asterisk at this point notes "This woman has several negroes who were taken from Virginia in time of last war, and now esteemed as her property," the "last war" being the French & Indian War of the 1750s.
After praising the chief and her hospitality, Jones goes on to note "The country here appeared calculated for health, fertile and beautiful." Then he leaves Licking County as we know it, on the way to Coshocton.
250 years ago, women were in leadership, and people of color lived here; in fact, the language of 1773 suggests they were "esteemed" as slaves, but not necessarily treated as such. It was a complicated place, Licking County was.
Which is why we turn to history, 250 years later. We learn things about our present in that light.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he is constantly surprised by history. Tell him where you've seen today differently because of yesterday at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Faith Works 7-28-23
Faith Works 7-28-23
Jeff Gill
New arrivals, old hostilities, same problems
___
Who belongs in the United States of America? That's a question that continues to come up, from the colonies before 1776 to the present day, and one that rattles church life as well as civic discourse.
Who belongs in the United States of America? That's a question that continues to come up, from the colonies before 1776 to the present day, and one that rattles church life as well as civic discourse.
According to Pew Research, immigrants in 2020 accounted for 13.7% of the U.S. population, nearly triple the share (4.8%) it was in 1970; that figure actually decreased to 13.6% in 2021. It's short of the record high of 14.8% in 1890.
In fact, between 1900 and 1915, over 15 million immigrants arrived in the United States. That was about equal to the number of immigrants who had arrived in the previous 40 years combined. This meant that by the time of World War I, 75% of New York City's population was either immigrant or first generation (sons and daughters of immigrants).
Today, 77% of immigrants are here legally, with 45% naturalized citizens, in other words citizens like you and me, except they've answered a long list of questions many of us born here couldn't come up with. And yes, 23% are undocumented, here illegally. It is very hard to come up with a good comparison figure because of differences in the naturalization process between 1915 and today, but there were plenty here evading the rules back then, as there are today.
It was in the wake of this unprecedented surge in immigration, and a second peak just short of 14.8% in 1910, that the second era of the Ku Klux Klan took off. I mentioned Timothy Egan's new book "A Fever in the Heartland" last week as an excellent source for this troubling period in our nation's and local history.
The Klan of the 1920s hated just about anyone who wasn't Protestant, Anglo-Saxon (Aryan wasn't in vogue just yet), and middle class. In some areas, the Klan lived up to the image you likely have, certainly in the South terrorizing and killing African Americans, brandishing fiery crosses, but also in places like Tulsa, Oklahoma or North Platte, Nebraska, where they did the same, ordering a growing black community to leave town, as property was burnt, leaders beaten, and many killed.
Yet their numbers for recruitment were biggest in the Midwest, Ohio & Indiana at the forefront, and their hatred was aimed primarily at: the Irish, Italian, southern and central Europeans, and Catholics in general. The Klan arguments, boiled down to their essence, was that there were too many of them, they needed to stop coming, many should be sent back, and only those allowed to stay who would go to "our" churches, attend public schools, and live and act like "normal" Americans.
The Klonklave at Buckeye Lake one hundred years ago this month, some 75,000 Klan members from all over Ohio, had as a major theme the goal of both building up the public school system, and shutting down by law all parochial schools. That "Fighting Irish" mascot for Notre Dame, adopted by many other Catholic schools you may know of? It comes from the students in South Bend, Indiana literally having to fight off a Klan mob which came to burn the campus down (spoiler alert: they did).
In 1923, some folks looked around, saw too many people who looked different than what they were used to, and said "enough." They wanted no more immigrants, and those who were here to change and be more like them.
And both churches & elected officials chose to adopt that position as their own. Come November, 1923 it would prove to be a majority of Licking Countians, at least those voting in the general election.
Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; how to bring newcomers into existing communities is a question he's wrestled with. Tell him how you see that done at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.
Ohio State Klonklave at Buckeye Lake, July 12, 1923
Ohio Memory Klan photo archive, mostly 1923
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