Wednesday, 7/31

I'm glad it wasn't as bad as a previous fire at that location.

In case you haven't heard, there was a fire at Marquette's Pine Ridge apartment complex yesterday--

Construction equipment on the building's roof, nine stories above the ground, caught on fire, and soon the roof of the entire north side of the building was on fire. Firefighters from Marquette city, Marquette Township, and Chocolay Township spent almost an hour putting the fire out, and the hundreds of people who live in the building were temporarily housed in the Superior Dome until it was safe to go back.

Luckily, no one was hurt.

Around 120 years ago that same corner was also the site of a fire, this time a fire that consumed Marquette's first real high school. In 1875 Morgan Hewitt, Peter White's son-in-law, gave Marquette land to build a new high school at what was then an empty part of the city, the corner of Pine & Ridge. Designed by D. Fred Charlton, the school was one of Marquette's original sandstone gems--

picture courtesy Marquette Regional History Center

It served the city well until the turn of the 20^th century, when like many of Marquette's classic buildings it fell victim to fire, totally destroying the structure

picture courtesy Marquette Regional History Center

While at the same time providing a great photo backdrop for many city residents who decided to visit the wreckage, decked out in their Sunday finest.

picture courtesy Marquette Regional History Center

What remained of the building was torn down, replaced by the Howard-Frobel school complex, which stood until the early 60s. Once that building was torn down (it actually didn't catch fire, unlike most lost Marquette architectural gems) the lot was used to construct the Pine Ridge Apartments, the building that caught fire yesterday.

Thankfully, though, building materials and firefighting techniques have improved quite a bit in the past 120 years, which means that yesterday Pine Ridge did not suffer the same fate as another building that sat on that very same spot.

Thankfully.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Tuesday, 7/30

The question is a reasonable one. Unfortunately, I can’t find a reasonable answer.

A couple of weeks ago, I received an e-mail from a listener wondering when Q107 became “Q107”; in other words, when this station became the type of station it is today. While I know generally, I can not get it any closer than a certain part of a certain year. And that’s been irritating me a little.

Here’s the backstory--WMQT signed on the air in 1974, calling itself “Stereo 107” and playing what was then oxymoronically called “beautiful music”. You know. . .elevator music, if you were being truly honest; music for old people, if you were being truly brutal. That lasted until sometime in 1981, when the decision was made to change things.

And oh, what a change it was. It was almost WKRP-like; the switch was made from “beautiful music” to a rock format called “Q107-Hot Stereo Rock”. There was even a Johnny Fever-like character named “Marcus Marquette” who took over the airwaves, taking calls from ecstatic kids and bewildered older people, sometimes pitting them against each other on the air. A vote was set up for several weeks after the change; whichever format received the most votes--rock or elevator music--would determine the format for the station.

Needless to say, you haven’t heard a lick of beautiful music on this station since. And that’s the HOW of how Q107 became “Q107”!

It’s the exact when of it that’s a mystery. The person who sent the e-mail remembers living in Marquette at that time and taking part in the vote, and she recalls it as being either 1981 or 1982. I remember being a very young worker at another radio station in Marquette at the time, so I know the year was 1981. I thought it was summer, but she recalls the vote as falling on a snow day from school, so I’m guessing I was wrong about it being summer (although some years, you can never be quite sure). So as closely as we can determine it, the switch happened probably in either March or April of 1981.

But that’s as close as we can get. I know that seven or eight months after the switch the format was fine-tuned from rock to the poppier music we now play, but as to when the exact switch happened. . .well, that’s up in the air. If you guys have ANY idea and can help us narrow it down, I know at least one listener would appreciate it, and I’m sure I would, too.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 7/29

I hope this isn't an omen. I hope it's just a statistical blip. Because if it isn't, we may be screwed.

I finished my annual dorky habit of counting license plates during Art on the Rocks week yesterday, and in the seven days I did it I counted license plates from 35 states, one Canadian province, and, believe it or not, Guatemala. That's not a bad total: if nothing else, it proves Marquette is a great tourist destination. In fact, according to local officials tourism is up around eight percent this year.  However, my weird little count is down almost 20 percent from the last two years, when I was only missing plates from a handful of states. The only other time it's ever dropped that much between years was during the 2008 count, right before the economy crashed and the Great Recession began.

Yikes.

Now, as I say every year, this is not a scientific survey. It's me writing down whatever plates I happen to see when I'm out doing my stuff for the week. I've been doing it the same way for the almost 20 years I've been counting; I go the same places and walk the same streets, so it does lend itself to a little continuity and a good baseline for side-by-side comparison, but it certainly is NOT a scientific survey and certainly, aside from perhaps a weird statistical coincidence, has nothing to do with the state of the U.S. economy.

So the fact that the license plate count dropped by a big chunk the same weekend the Commerce Department said economic growth dropped by almost 30 percent in the second quarter of 2019 is just another weird statistical coincidence, right?

RIGHT?

I did notice three interesting things about this year's count. The first is that there seem to have been just as many, if not more, cars in Marquette during the week. The place was packed, and there were cars everywhere you looked. So Marquette's tourism economy is obviously thriving, as evidenced by the eight percent increase in hotel bookings this year . But I'm guessing that a lot of those visitors and a lot of those cars were from the big three—Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin. Those are the plates you see in Marquette every single week of the year. This week, I think, you just saw a whole lot more of them.  So maybe they're just crowding out visitors from other states farther away

The second interesting thing? The lower number of plates seemed to come in large measure because of both the East Coast (with one huge exception) and the Rocky Mountain states (with one huge exception).  As far as the East Coast goes I did see plates for New York, New Jersey, and Maryland, but there were a LOT of states I usually see that I didn't this year, ranging down the coast from Maine to Delaware. I have no idea why; if we're subscribing to the economic theory of this count maybe, just maybe, it means people are spending less and saving money by staying a little closer to home this year.

Of course, that doesn't explain the third thing I noticed. I saw more plates from two states—Colorado and Virginia, the two exceptions I mentioned before—than I did from any other state aside from the big three. I have no idea why those two states would be better represented than Minnesota or Ohio or Indiana or other nearby states, but they were. In fact, over the weekend I think I saw more Virginia plates than almost every other state.  Another state that caught my eye a lot?  Tennessee was a bit of a surprise, seeing as how I usually only see one or two vehicles from the state. This week, I saw dozens.  Maybe Marquette was written up in a Nashville or Memphis paper? I don't think any local marketing dollars were spent down there; maybe I'm wrong about that, though.

It wouldn't be the first time.

So that's the report from this year's count. Like I said, the number of states was down quite a bit, but there's probably nothing behind that, especially because in Marquette overall tourism numbers are up. At least we hope there's nothing behind it the weird statistical blip.  We hope that the drop this year is, unlike 2008, just one of those freaky things that comes when you're doing an unscientific survey like this one. Because if there actually is something to it, you may not want to look at your 401K statement for the next year or two.

Keep your fingers crossed.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Friday, 7/26

FRIDAY, 7/26:

It's Art on the Rocks weekend. Woo hoo!

Not only is it one of my favorite summer weekends of the year here in Marquette, but it's also a chance for people who may not be from the area and/or familiar with a unique weather phenomena to experience said phenomena. Now, this may be something about which I’ve probably written before. If I have, forgive me. If I haven’t; well, here’s the story about an interesting summer meteorological phenomena in Marquette, a phenomena about which most people who aren't from Marquette or who are from Marquette but always stay in their cars may not even be aware--

It’s called “The Third Street Rule”.

Oh, some days it may be called “The Front Street Rule”, or “The Fourth Street Rule”, or “The Pine Street Rule”. Some days, it may not even exist. But most of the time, between the months of May and September, “The Third Street Rule”, well, rules.

Allow me to explain.

When you’re walking through certain parts of Marquette, Lake Superior can throw around its muscle whenever it likes. You can be walking down the street in warm comfort and then--

BANG

The temperature drops 20 degrees and you’re freezing in your sandals.

If you’ve ever walked anywhere on the east side of Marquette, you know what I’m talking about. But the lake’s effect DOES start to wane, especially the farther you get from shore. If you walk away from the lake, you can (usually) be pretty sure that it’ll start to warm up and stay warm once you get past Third Street. The extra shirt you needed on Front Street? You can usually take it off once you’re past Third Street.

Hence, “The Third Street Rule”.

It’s funny; most everyone subconsciously knows about it, yet never actually seems to think about it, much less give it a name. Guess I’m just unique in that manner.

8-)

Check it out for yourself this weekend if you're at Art on the Rocks or Outback or just enjoying summer here in Marquette. You’ll see what I mean!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Thursday, 7/25

How much money is too much money?

It's a question I've been pondering recently, perhaps for the silliest of reasons. It's what's known as the transfer season in world professional soccer leagues, when teams can sell players to other teams. One of Loraine's favorite players is a French guy named Antoine Greizmann, who had been playing for the Spanish club Atletico Madrid the past few years. In fact, he's been playing for them since spurning another big Spanish club, Barcelona, in 2017, complete with a nationally televised TV special (ala LeBron James) announcing for which team he would be playing.

Well, that was 2017. This year, he decided that despite having three years left on the contract that he signed in 2017 he wanted to move to Barcelona. So, they bought his deal with Atletico for 120 million Euros, and then signed him to a new contract worth 40 million Euros a season.

Just for a guy to play soccer for three years almost a quarter of a billion Euros (almost 300 million dollars) were involved.

Let's set aside the fact that in Europe players can basically break their contracts at will and force a sale, especially if they're highly paid. There are many things that are different between Europe and the US, and how pro athletes honor contracts is one of them. Instead, I would like to concentrate on the obscene amounts of money involved, something that's common both here and there. Antoine Greizmann stands to make 120 million Euro while playing for Barcelona. I don't begrudge him that; if he can get paid that much, it's his right. But what does he—or anyone—need with that much money? There are only so many homes you can buy, only so many cars you can purchase, and only so much bling in the world. If you're an athlete getting paid 40 million Euro a year or a hedge-fund manager in the US making $100 million a year, do you really need that much money? And yes, I know you have to pay taxes on that money, at least in Europe (in the US, if you're rich, that's another story, but one we won't get into today), but even after taxes Greizmann stands to pocket upward of 20 million Euro a year.

If he were to spend that 20 million or so Euro he has after taxes each year, he'd have to spend almost 55,000 Euro a day. That's like having enough money to buy two cars AND two first class airline tickets around the world each and every day. He makes as much money in one day as most people do in a year. Does anyone really need that much money?

Once again, I'm not faulting him for doing it; after all, he was able to make someone pay it to him. And I'm just using him as an example; there are many people around the planet who make as much (if not more) than he does. I just happen to have spent a lot of time recently reading about his whole transfer saga. That's why he's my example. But you have to wonder if any single person is worth that much money, so matter what their skills or their talents or who their father or mother was. Think of the good around the planet that could be done with even a fraction of that 40 million Euro a year. Think of the people that could be fed, the babies that could be housed, the diseases that could be prevented. Think of what some of that money could do in the fight against climate change or developing clean energy.

Think of the good that could be done anywhere, for any reason, with that money.

I'm never ever going to make 40 million a year; in fact, the thought of that much money kind of blows the few remaining working neurons in my brain. But I'd like to think that that amount would be too much. If I ever made that money I would take the small amount that I'd actually need to live comfortably and travel comfortably, and give the rest to other, much more worthy causes. For me, at least, there is a limit on how much money one person needs.

There is a line where too much money is just that--too much money. But then, I'm not a pro athlete or a hedge-fund manager. I work in radio. Unlike Antoine Greizmann, that's a problem I'll never have to worry about.

(jim@wmqt.com)

(ps--if you're in the listening area make sure you join us around 3:35 this afternoon...Marquette's newest music star Miss Alyssa joins us live!)

Wednesday, 7/24

Well, that was kinda fun.

My first ever gig at the Lake Superior Theater, with Jack & me reprising “What's Up Dock”, went quite well, at least from my point of view. It's a cool place to give a talk, a few people actually showed up, and Jack managed to increase the number of pictures of hookers in the show almost 200 % (well, from zero to two), so it was a win-win all around.

Really, it was!

Say “hey” to some of the people who showed up last night--

Now, my “Summer of History” ™ takes a slight lull for a whole, oh, four weeks, which is when my South Marquette tour is slated to hit the streets, followed a week or two later by that beer thingee at the History Center. So that means I can spend, what—a whole day or two not thinking about stories to tell or pictures to dig up.

Woo hoo. That means it's time to hit the beach. But seeing as how I was planning on doing that today anyway; well, it'll just be multi-tasking on my part, right?

Right?

Since I'm going to spend part of the day playing outside and need to get a few things done before that, let me leave you with a thought to ponder—how much money is too much money? We'll ponder that thought tomorrow, so mull it over if you have a few extra seconds today.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Tuesday, 7/23

Well...this could be kinda interesting.

My “Summer of History” (which is how I've just this moment branded my 2019 summer) continues tonight when I do yet another history show, this time in a venue in which I've never performed. Tonight, Jack & I do an encore performance of “What's Up, Dock”, the ultra-successful show we did at Kaufman Auditorium back in January, but this time we actually do it in Marquette's Lower Harbor; specifically, at the Lake Superior Theater.

In way, the show's returning home. After all, it started as a walking tour I gave throughout the Lower Harbor area. So it's only fitting, right?

We're doing the show for a couple of reasons. One is that the Theater asked, because some of the people who run the place enjoyed the show when we did it in January. The second might be them more important reason; there are an awful lot of people who aren't in Marquette in January (although I can't imagine why, he says sarcastically), and many of those who fled for a month or three didn't get the chance to see it the first time we put it on.

So tonight, I guess, is for them.

I know I should be slightly ashamed of saying this, but I've actually never even set foot inside the theater. I know; it's bad, isn't it? It's been a summer cultural touchstone of Marquette for almost two decades, and I've never once attended a play, a concert, or even a history program there. So if you wanna revoke my city residency, I totally understand.

Totally.

It's funny, too; I know SO many people who've performed there that you'd think I would've visited it at least once, but nope. And I don't know why. I attend a LOT of things around the city, so why I haven't even visited the Theater is beyond me. The only guess I can make is that all the performances are in the middle of summer, and I'm usually out enjoying the weather or giving tours myself. I mean, I realize that's a lame excuse and it doesn't account for the fact that there are usually sixty performances at the theater each summer and I sure don't give sixty tours.

But that's just the way it is.

Of course, that's neither here nor there. I WILL actually visit the place when we do “Dock” tonight. It gets underway at 730, and I'm sure tickets are still available. So if you don't have anything else to do and/or want to pay a visit to the Theater yourself, check it out.

Details on how it went tomorrow.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 7/22

Is it any wonder I can never relax over the weekend?

Most people (i.e. normal people) use their weekend to relax and recharge from their previous week, and to rest up for their upcoming week. But do you think I can EVER do anything like a normal person? No. . .that would be waaaaaaaaay too easy.

Case in point--instead of spending the few precious unscheduled hours in my life this weekend vegging out, catching up on the Tour de France or doing another run-through of our "What's Up Dock" show (coming up tomorrow night, after all), I spent some of that precious time trying to solve a mystery as unsolvable as any a Ellery Queen or Nancy Drew may have solved in their prime--

I spent some of my precious free time this past weekend trying to figure out why I had a pen that said “Escanaba Senior Center” on it.

It’s a very good pen; it’s bright orange, has a nice “feel” to it, and writes quite well. But because maybe I AM closer to zero on the Jim Stir-Crazy Clock than I thought, I started to wonder where I’d actually picked up the pen, instead of just using it and then ignoring it (you know, like a normal person). I haven’t been to Escanaba recently. While I AM getting older, I’m nowhere near Senior status yet. And as far as I can remember, I didn’t even know Escanaba HAD a center like that.

So just where did I get the pen?

This much I know--it was in my back pack as of last week. I know that because I needed a pen to write down a note while walking to work, and I was lucky enough to find it there. But the questions started to pile up. When did it go into my back pack? I have no idea. How did it get into my back pack? Once again, I’m clueless (in case THAT wasn’t painfully obvious). I’m thinking I must’ve picked it up somewhere, but where? Who do I know (or where did I go) that would have a pen from the Escanaba Senior Center? And, most importantly. . .

Why was I spending so much time thinking about this?

It was about that time that I realized I even the few minutes I’d spent pondering the question were a few minutes too many. I realized I should use the time for more worthwhile pursuits, like the Tour, or working on the three history shows I have coming up, or pestering Loraine. Much like the question of who built Stonehenge or why do people like black licorice, I realized that this was one of those mysteries that can never be answered. The pen was in my back pack; it ended up there somehow, and it’s quite possible that that “somehow” was lost to the mists of time. Maybe I was never meant to know how it got there. After all, it’s only a pen. It’s not one of the mysteries of the universe.

Unlike, say, why people like black licorice.

8-)

(jim@wmqt.com)

Friday, 7/19

I get to be a dork all next week.

Okay; right now, I know a bunch of you are yelling out “is there a week when you're NOT a dork”? And you'd probably be right. But next week I carry my dork-dom to the ultimate extreme with my annual Art on the Rocks week habit of looking at license plates.

Yes, I need help. What's your point?

For those of you who haven't been reading these forever, let me explain about the ultimate in dork-dom. For over 20 years now, during the week preceding Art on the Rocks, I carry a notepad and pen around with me, and I write down every single state for which I see a license plate. I don't know how this started or why I keep doing it, but I do. It's not like the world would stop revolving on its axis if I didn't count the plates, but you wouldn't want me to risk it, would you?

That's okay. And you're welcome.

I have been able to notice a few trends after all these years. Each year you can usually tell in which states Marquette has gotten favorable publicity or a nice newspaper write-up, because you suddenly see multiple plates from a state that in the past has only shown up once or twice. And you can also tell the relative state of the US economy by how many different plates you see. Back in 2008, when the Great Recession was hitting, I only saw plates from 17 different states last week. Last year, with the US economy doing very well, I saw 42 different states (plus a few Canadian provinces). I'm assuming there's a correlation there, and although the economy is starting to show signs of slowing down I'm guessing I'll see 40 or so again this year.

If not; well, let's hope it was just coincidence and not correlation, right?

So if you see me about next week with my head swiveling around every time a car passes by, don't worry. I haven't come down with anything aside from a severe case of dork-dom. I'll just be looking at every single license plate I see, and checking to make sure it's on the list I'll be carrying with me every single place I go.

Well...SOMEONE has to do it, right?

8-)

Have yourself a great weekend. Enjoy Hiawatha if you're headed there!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Thursday, 7/18

So now we know. It's actually the second time that's the charm.

The sun kept shining and rains held off long enough last night for us to get in the “...And Put Up A Parking Lot” tour for the Marquette Regional History Center. And despite the fact that it was postponed a week, there were other activities going on, and the forecast did call for rain later in the evening, a couple of people showed up. And by a couple I mean this many--

I don't have an exact count; if I had to guess I'd say that 80 or so people showed up. Considering it was a rescheduled event on a night when there were a TON of things going on in Marquette, I'm happy with that number.  And it's funny, too. As with most tours we picked up a few stragglers along the way. But that's okay. It's happened on almost every downtown tour I've given, and on almost every downtown tour the people who do join ask at the end if they can make a donation to the History Center.

So it's a win-win.

Now that this one's in the books I get to move on to the next two. A this upcoming Tuesday (the 23^rd) Jack & I are doing a reprise of “What's Up, Dock” at the Lake Superior Theater. That one requires little if no extra work on my part. Then August 21^st I'm doing a South Marquette tour for the History Center for the first time in almost a decade. That one will actually require some work, staring with me finding my notes from 2010 (wherever they may be) and moving on from there. Then finally, I also get to make a presentation during a Brewing History fundraiser at the History Center September 4^th. They 're having serious speakers talk about beer and Prohibition and then a dork telling stories about bars and drunk people.

You can imagine which part I'll be doing.

But that's over the next month and a half. For now, I'm just going to bask in the knowledge that I can relax for a day or so and not obsessively check the weather forecast. Well, I'll actually keep obsessively checking the weather forecast, but that'll be more for beach days and less for wondering if a thunderstorm will rain out a tour.

And it'll be a nice change, too.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Wednesday, 6/17

I’m not sure about this one, but I just read a statistic that blew my mind—

Only one out of every three Americans would want to travel into space, even if the trip were free.

ONLY ONE OUT OF THREE????

Excuse my shouting there, but consider that I grew up wanting to be an astronaut, and that I've been re-reading some of my favorite space books this summer, including “How To Build Your Own Spaceship” and “Riding Rockets: The Outrageous Story of a Space Shuttle Astronaut” (a very hilarious book by former shuttle astronaut Mike Mullane, by the way). I’ve dreamed of going into space my entire life, and I would jump at the chance to spend even just a few minutes on the edge of that blackness. Yet only third of the people in this country would do the same.

Once again, I guess, I’m an oddball among my own people.

I don’t know why two thirds of all Americans would pass up a chance to do what less than 300 people in the entire history of humankind have done. I don’t know if it’s fear of the unknown or a lack of adventure or what, but a majority of people say they’d be content never to try something that, according to every book I’ve ever read by people who’ve been there, has called a life-changing experience

One of the great stories in that “Riding Rockets” book concerns what Mullane did his first night up in orbit—he was so excited by the fact that he was up in space that he couldn’t sleep, so while his crewmates rested, he floated to the shuttle’s flight deck and spend the night just watching the planet pass before his eyes every 90 minutes, thunderstruck by what he was doing and what he was experiencing. That’s exactly the kind of thing I would do if I were ever lucky enough spend a night in space, and that’s why, I guess, it blows my mind that most people would never want to even consider trying it.

It’s funny; Loraine and I have heard from a lot of people about how they could never travel to Europe like we do, and we always have the same answer—why not? It’s not hard; in fact, after you’ve done it once, it seems to keep drawing you back again and again (we’re the perfect examples). Sure, traveling to Europe—or to space—gets you out of your comfort zone, but isn’t worth it to see how other people live? Isn’t it worth it to see how you react and adapt to differing situations? Isn’t it worth it to see a different part of the world—or to see the whole world unroll before you in a mere 90 minutes?

I guess that’s why the statistic blew my mind a little. I would jump at the chance for a life-altering experience like heading into space. I was just shocked that more people wouldn’t feel the same, especially this week, as we're celebrating the 50^th anniversary of the greatest technological achievement in the history of our species. You know...the 50^th anniversary of Apollo 11 landing on the moon.

*****

Before I go I just wanted to mention that the rescheduled “..And Put Up A Parking Lot” tour I'm doing for the Marquette Regional History Center is coming up tonight at 630. And unlike last week, tonight we've been promised no rain. We'll see how that turns out, but if it actually turns out to be true I hope we see you there!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Tuesday, 7/16

I have never, ever been accused of being a pessimist. I always look at the good side of things, and I’m always marveling at the potential of what’s to come. Yet I was struck with a thought this morning—

If you consider summer to be the months of June, July, and August, then today marks the halfway point of the season.

SUMMER’S HALF OVER!!!!

So, for the moment, at least, feel free to call me “Mr. Pessimist”.

The sad thing about that observation is that it really doesn’t SEEM like summer’s been with us long enough to be half over. Most of June was so cold and so wet, and so many of us spent the month complaining about it, that it really doesn’t seem like we’ve used up half of our allotment of summer. It just seems like May lasted so long that, well, summer just started. Not that it’s halfway over.

That's just not right.

But numbers don't lie. There are three months (June, July, and August) to “summer”. Today is the mid-point of the mid month. It's like we're at that moment when you're on a teeter-totter and it's perfectly balanced between you and the person on the other side. That's where we are today. Tomorrow, you start heading toward the ground, or up in the air, depending upon your point of view.

And if that's a mangled metaphor, I don't know what is.

But since I don’t seem to have the capability to be a pessimist for long, let me share a neat local weather forecast that I picked up a couple of years ago. According to records from this century—the past 18 years--Marquette has gotten an average of four 90+ degree days a year. That means that, since we’ve only had one so far, the second half of summer promises at least three more (quite possibly, even, later this week).

So while summer may really BE half over, it seems like the best of it may yet be coming. And if that’s not cause for a return to optimism, I don’t know WHAT is!

Enjoy your “mid-point of summer” day, and get ready to enjoy the rest of the season.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 7/15

MONDAY, 7/15:

It's such a no-brainer that I can't believe anyone hasn't thought of it yet.

Miss me? We had a great three-day weekend with Loraine's nephews Nathan and Jeremy. The weather was great, we were able to show them in what a cool place we live, and we did everything you're supposed to do when visiting the city, everything from eating pastys to Jeremy jumping off of Black Rocks.

And that's what made me wonder why no one else (at least that I know of) has come up with an idea that seems so obvious that it should be as plain as the nose on your face. When Jeremy decided that he wanted to jump off of Black Rocks, his brother Nathan wasn't quite sure. He said that he would do it if he could get a t-shirt that said something along the lines of “I survived Black Rocks”. So we looked through a ton of stores in Marquette for a shirt along those lines, but you know what?

We could not find one anywhere.

In fact, we couldn't find a lot to do with Black Rocks at all. There were a few stickers, a few paintings, and that's about it. No T-shirts; nothing at all that would allow someone to show off the fact that they jumped off the Rocks into the 45 degree water.

Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada.

Because of that (or at least playing a part in his decision) Nathan didn't jump, while Jeremy made the leap twice. However, aside from the video I took of him he has nothing to show that he did it. I mean, just think of the money that someone could make if there was a little stand or something in the Black Rocks parking lot selling shirts bragging about the jump. Even someone who didn't jump, but watched, would be likely to buy a shirt or three, of for no other reason than to document what they were just watching.

See? No-brainer business idea, right? That's why I can't believe that no one has come up with the idea yet. Unless, of course, I'm blatantly missing something. But I don't think I am. So if you have a few extra bucks sitting around and are looking for a can't fail business idea, there you go.

You're welcome. And you can send my royalty check to the station.

8-)

One other thing I want to mention about the weekend—we were in the Marquette Food Co-op Saturday buying some amazing brats (made with blueberries and the Vierling's Blueberry Wheat beer) for dinner. Jeremy and Nathan had noticed people saying “hey” to me all weekend, which is something I don't even pay attention to any more. Anyway, we were in the checkout line at the Co-op when the guy checking us out said something to me that even I had never heard before.

What did he say? Well, it wasn't “You're that guy on the radio”, or “I see you on TV”, or any of the other things I hear when people figure out who I am. So what just did the checkout guy at the Co-op say?

“Hey, you're the dude with the 'Star Wars” bag”, after he saw that I handed him the bag with Luke, Han, Leia, Darth, and the rest of the gang that Loraine gave me for Christmas a few years ago. Apparently the shopping bag I use at the Co-op has become quite the object of conversation among the people who work there.

Who knew?

So now I can be referred to any number of ways—Radio Jim, TV Jim, History Jim, and now, apparently, “The Dude with the 'Star Wars' bag” Jim.

(jim@wmqt.com), dude with the “Star Wars” bag

Thursday, 7/11

Maybe the second time will be the charm.

About 20 minutes before the start of our "...And Put Up A Parking Lot" tour last night the skies opened up and gave anyone who wanted it a free (and rather heavy) shower, complete with thunder, lightning, and (I think) a plague of locusts.  We had so been hoping we'd be able to do it; the day was nice and sunny and hot, and the rain that was supposed to presage the real storm never showed up.  Not only that, but the percentage of a chance of precipitation kept going down, as well.

Unfortunately, our luck started to run out about 4, when the system moved through.  You could tell because the wind shifted and the temperature dropped 20 degrees; however, there wasn't any rain.  It wasn't until I left work and went down to the History Center that the first drop appeared, and by the time I completed the three block journey rain was everywhere.

We had set ourselves a time limit of 6 pm to call it off, and the rain started at 5:59.  Talk about cutting it close...sigh.  It's funny; there were people already gathering to take the walk, and a reporter from TV-6 (hi, Alyssa!) had her equipment all set up for an interview.  Everything was set to go, except for Mother Nature, continuing her streak of letting us down in 2019.

Oh well...what are you gonna do, right?  We'll try it again next Wednesday...same history time, same history channel.  After all, it can't rain two Wednesday evenings in a row, can it?

Can it????

****

There won't be one of these tomorrow, as I'm taking the day off. Loraine's nephews Nathan and Jeremy are coming up to visit, and we'll spend Friday and Saturday spending time with them and showing off this amazing place where we live. So have yourself a great weekend. See you again Monday!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Wednesday, 7/10

Should we stay or should we go?

As I write this I have no idea what the weather will be like tonight at 630, the scheduled start time for my “...And Put Up A Parking Lot” tour for the Marquette Regional History Center. The forecast had been trending for the better, the chances of rain falling slightly, and the timing pushing later and later into the evening.  But this morning's update erased some of those gains, so as of right now, I have no idea what'll happen, even though as i type this we have clear blue skies outside (for the first time in five days, I might add).

Maybe, just maybe, we'll get lucky tonight. Keep your fingers crossed.

Now, as I joked yesterday, I get to re-purpose the article I wrote for the Mining Journal about a parking lot we won't be visiting tonight. Enjoy your history lesson (including a picture that didn't make the print edition) and come back tomorrow to see if we were actually able to do it, or if we're now targeting next Wednesday, or sometime in September, or next year (all options we're considering).

Wish us luck.

(jim@wmqt.com)

*****

Schools, churches, bars, stores, hospitals, and even an entire city street. When you're looking at parking lots in downtown Marquette, you're looking at more than a place to store your car while you work or shop.

You're also looking at a piece of the city's history.

To quote a great Canadian philosopher, “They paved paradise, and put up a parking lot”. Because Marquette grew up in an era before cars, room had to be made to park them once they came on the scene. Many times that room came from demolishing old or unwanted buildings. And while not all of the buildings torn down in the past 100 years to make room for parking lots could be called “paradise” by any stretch of the imagination, a surprising number of downtown's current parking lots were once home to pieces of iconic Marquette sandstone architecture and fondly remembered city business.

One such example would be the parking lot that sits on the west side of the 300 block of south Front Street in Marquette, the lot next to the VAST Insurance building.

Once a hub of downtown Marquette, the 300 south block of Front Street had been anchored by Peter White's First National Bank of Marquette on one end, and what was at the time Marquette's “main” street, Superior Street (now known as Baraga Avenue) on the other. Close proximity to both the railroad lines and the harbor led to it becoming a vital area of downtown commerce and public gathering areas. In fact, the block was home to a veritable “Murderer's Row” of legendary Marquette bars and restaurants from the first sixty years of the 20^th century. While The Central, The Jet Grille, The Dinner Bell, and The Deluxe were just a few of the eating and drinking establishments that called the west side of the block home, there was one that outlasted them all.

That was the Bon Ton.

Interior of the Bon Ton, 1949.  Picture courtesy of the Marquette Regional History center

The Bon Ton originally opened in 1901 as The Candy Kitchen; Greek immigrant James Lafkas sold house-made confections from the shop. He renamed it in 1916, and in 1920 it was purchased by Peter Bouth, who added homemade ice cream to the menu. Five years later he started serving lunch, and by the 1930s the restaurant added a full kitchen, serving meals all day long and at its peak employing 21 people.

In 1953 George Papadakis, who had worked at the Bon Ton since 1938, bought the restaurant, which had just been remodeled with new booths, a shiny chrome interior, and a new bar. However, ice cream was still one of the best sellers of the establishment. A popular choice of customers from that era was the Tin Roof Sundae. One woman who worked there remembers the combination of vanilla ice cream, peanuts, hot fudge, and whipping cream, calling it “everyone's favorite”. The malted milks are also fondly recalled; even almost six decades later, another fan says they were “So thick! They filled that glass to the brim and gave you the extra in that ice cold metal container they had made it in with their green Hamilton Beach mixer”.

The Bon Ton closed in 1967; a year later, the building (along with others on that side of the street) was torn down and paved over into the current parking lot. However, one part of the Bon Ton still exists in Marquette. Before the building was demolished Papadakis's sons James and Peter salvaged some of the equipment and furniture, along with the restaurant's liquor license, for a new pub they were opening on Third Street. While the ownership of that establishment has changed hands several times, the original bar from the Bon Bon Restaurant is still in use today at Stucko's Pub.

The “...And Put Up A Parking Lot” walking tour, which will have stories on over 20 downtown parking lots, will be led by historical storyteller Jim Koski. The tour will cover a twelve-square block region of downtown Marquette and will require participants to walk up and down some hills. It begins Wednesday, July 10^th at 6:30 at the Marquette Regional History Center. There's a suggested $5 donation. For more information call the History Center at 226-3571, or visit their website at www.marquettehistory.org.

Tuesday, 7/9

Wanna see two places we've visited multiple times in France? Then make sure you watch the Tour de France today and tomorrow.

Slowly but surely I'm getting into my July routine of watching the world's most famous bike race as it heads around France (and Belgium, this year) for the next three weeks. It always seems as if every year the race goes through or finishes in a town where Loraine and I have visited, and it's no different this year.

Especially tomorrow.

Today it finishes in the city of Nancy, where Loraine and I have twice visited. The race won't go anywhere near where we usually hang out (it's finishing on the outskirts of town), but we're looking forward to the helicopter beauty shots of the Place Stanislaus and the adjoining Parc de Pepiniere, the place long-time readers may remember as the park where Loraine was mugged by a peacock on our last visit in 2017.

Tomorrow, though, is the big day, as the race winds through the Vosges Mountains and makes its way into Colmar, a place we've visited three times, a place that, obviously, we like a lot. On its way into Colmar the races winds up & down hills and through many towns & villages along what translates into “the Wine Road”, an area on the east side of the Vosges where you see nothing vineyards and picturesque villages.

I'm sure it'll be a very pretty day on your TV.

Our friends Oliver and Marie-Rose live in that area; in fact, Loraine received an e-mail from Oliver Sunday in which he included a timetable of when the race paces through his town (Wittelsheim). In fact, the race will run down a street the next block over from where he lives, and he's planning on camping out early to get the best spot.

So if you happen to be watching the race around late this morning Eastern time and you see it going through Wittelsheim, look for Oliver. I'm sure he'll appreciate it.

                                 *******

Also tomorrow, and having nothing to do at all with the Tour de France? A couple of questions need to be answered. Those questions? Will the rain hold out? Will we get the tour in? Will Jim repurpose the newspaper article he wrote?

We'll have to see, won't we?

8-)

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 7/8

You'd think by now I'd know enough not to be disappointed every time it happens.

You'd think.

I'm referring to the weather the past few days, and how it hasn't turned out any way near how it was supposed to. I don't know why—I'm sure it's a character flaw on my part—but I get bummed when what was supposed to be a nice sunny day turns out to be anything but a nice sunny day. I especially felt that way yesterday when what was supposed to be a perfectly nice summer day was gloomy and kind of chilly, thanks to haze in the sky blocking out the sun, courtesy of a forest fire in Canada. There have been other weekend days this summer when I felt the exact same way, and I''m sure there are still more of them on the horizon.

Good times.

Like I said, I know enough and have lived through enough to know that U.P. weather forecasts are not always the most reliable in the world. Heck, there's a reason meteorologists say this is one of the hardest places on the planet to forecast. And as anyone who's lived up here long enough knows, you should take any forecast with a grain of salt. But when a wind pattern shifts and all of a sudden blows fire smoke in from hundreds of miles away, and completely blots the sun out of the sky...

Well, that's not something that happens ever day.

Too many times to count yesterday I just stood looking out the window, wondering if the sun would ever make an appearance. It never did, despite the fact that the National Weather Service forecast didn't change for most of the day. It called for sun and warm. And while I'm sure some places in the UP may have escaped the smoke and got a little sun, we didn't. All we had was the gloom.

It was the waste of a summer day. And since we have so few of those to begin with; well, maybe you can see why I was a little disappointed. And really bummed.

Like I said, I should know better. I should know that even if we have a forecast for a perfect day, it may not be perfect, due to any number of circumstances. After all, that's why it's called a forecast, and not a certainty. And other times of the year, it really wouldn't bother me. But like I said, summer up here is fleeting; in a way, it's kind of ephemeral the way it darts in and out of our lives. And when a day that hold promise fails to live up to that promise...

Well, that's one fewer day when it can be perfect outside.

(jim@wmqt.com), who, sadly, has noticed that while the weather the next few (work) days should be nice, Wednesday calls for rain. You know Wednesday, right? The day I'm supposed to give my “...And Put Up A Parking Lot” tour for the History Center? We'll have to see...

Friday, 7/5

Wow. That was some impressive fireworks display to wrap up the Fourth last night, wasn't it? Too bad it wasn't the kind 15,000 people had gathered at Lower Harbor Park to see.

I know I had intimated that I wasn't gonna write anything today, but after last night's doozy of a thunderstorm I felt I should at least jot a few things down. I went for a bike ride this morning and all along the city's bike path system there were dirt washouts, branches were strewn across the pavement, and signs of the hour of mayhem could be seen everywhere. It postponed Marquette's fireworks, canceled Ishpeming's all together (their fireworks crew has to be somewhere else tonight), and just generally laid havoc into what has been a nice holiday for most of us.

Well, nice except for the house, somewhere on Arch and Michigan between Third & Fourth, that started playing loud and drone-like techno music around 10 am, and was still playing it when we went to bed just before midnight. Or the doofusses around the corner from us who were lighting off monster firecrackers—during the storm no less—and setting off car alarms all over the block.

So yeah, it was mostly a nice holiday. Except for the idiots. And they seem to be growing in number each and every Fourth. But other than that...

My favorite thing during Marquette's parade yesterday?

The theme this year was “Hometown heroes”, and I really don't think the UP Children's Museum could have picked out a better hero. I really don't!

Okay; that's your holiday report. I hope you have a great rest of your weekend, and that whatever fireworks you get to enjoy tonight are of the man-made variety!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Wednesday, 7/3

Our long national nightmare is finally over--

As I write this the sod is being put down on the street outside our house.  The final layer of pavement was deposited yesterday, along with the patches on everyone's driveway where they were dug up for water & sewer lines. Later today, after a month or so, we finally have our street back.

Yay.

I don't know what shocks me more; the fact that it was a relatively painless process, or the fact they started this over a month ago. I mean, it seems to me like it's been at most a week, but as we've been discussing recently I've now lost all track of any sense of time, so maybe it's not that surprising,

But still. It doesn't seem like it's been more than a month that we haven't had a car in the driveway.

And on that note I REALLY have to thank daily blog readers Chicky-Poo and Darlene in Marquette. For the past month, they've let us keep Loraine's car at their place. We would've been happy just keeping it in their building's lot, but they had us keep Loraine's baby in their garage, where it was safe the 6 days and 20 hours a week we don't use it.

So thanks, Mom & Dad. You're literally the greatest parents who ever existed. And don't let anyone else tell you THEIR parents are the greatest. Because they'd be wrong.

8-)

Well, since the sun's out and it's supposed to be another nice day I'm gonna skip out and take a half-day. Sure, it's a holiday tomorrow, but I have three or four months of bone-numbing cold to get out of my system, and a walk on an 80-degree sunny beach seems to be the perfect way to leach some of that residual cold out of my system.

I hope you agree, and I hope you understand.

Speaking of the holiday, I'm still trying to decide if I'll be writing one of these on Friday. Past experience shows that few, if any, people will actually be paying attention or be around to read it, but we'll see. If nothing else, maybe I'll take a few pictures and stick them up. At this moment, I have no idea.

I guess come back on Friday and find out, right?

Have a great Fourth!!!!

(jim@wmqt.com)

(ps—don't forget to check out the Mining Journal tomorrow for the article I wrote on the tour I'm giving one week from today. That is, do so if you're bored and need something to do. Otherwise, enjoy the Fourth. The article will wait!!)

Tuesday, 7/2

We agree on an awful lot in life, but there is one thing on which Loraine and I will, apparently, never compromise.

The whole issue probably goes back to our childhoods, and the ways in which we grew up. She grew up downstate, in a farming community. I grew up in Marquette, a college town. She had older siblings; I was the first-born. She was a relatively normal child, while I was (and still am) a dork. And I think that once you know those differences in our upbringings you’ll fully understand why we have this chasm separating us.

You see, she likes “The Munsters”, and I like “The Addams Family”.

This has been a point of contention for the 30-ish years we've been together, and it came up against this weekend when we were out to lunch with my friend Deanna. I don't know how the topic came up, but she (Deanna) professed a fair amount of shock when she found out I'm a huge fan of “The Gilmore Girls”. I then had to explain how I like certain kinds of TV shows, and that led to the revelation that Loraine and I have this fundamental disagreement in our relationship.

I like “The Addams Family” for the same reason I like two other shows Loraine’s not really that fond of, “Rocky & Bullwinkle” and the aforementioned “The Gilmore Girls”. I like the shows because they’re hyper-verbal. They feature offbeat characters doing offbeat things, and what they say is often much more important than what they do. That’s the kind of kid I was growing up, and that’s pretty much the way I am now. So I guess it’s no surprise that I would gravitate toward shows that feature characters like that, especially a show like “The Addams Family”.

It’s also not a surprise that Loraine would favor “The Munsters”. Like I said, she wasn’t a dork, so she probably wouldn’t find appeal in a show full of dorks. Not only that, but she had an older brother who gravitated toward movie monsters, and seeing as how “The Munsters” was a show put together so Universal could feature their famous movie monsters of the 1930s, I can see entirely why she likes the show. And it’s not like it’s a really bad TV show.

It’s just not “The Addams Family”.

As I said before, it’s just one of those things about which Loraine & I will have to agree to disagree. She feels, from the depths of her heart, that “The Munsters” is the superior show, while I feel, from the depths of my dorky heart, that “The Addams Family” will never be topped. To quote a great American philosopher, “We’re obviously separated by denominational differences”. And I guess we’ll just have to live with it.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 7/1

I suppose one way to look at it is that I'm getting more protein in my diet. That's one way to look at it.

We've had a really rainy year here in Marquette. We've had so much rain in the past year, in fact, that we've set a record for the wettest 12 months in recorded history. And with all that rain and assorted other moisture brings a problem that we don't usually face, at least here in the city. Because everything is so saturated, and there are often yards of wet grass or puddles of standing water here and there, there seem to be a lot of bugs everywhere.

Now, I know those of you who live outside of Marquette may scoff, seeing as how bugs are an everyday part of your life, but unless it's extremely wet here in the city we don't get a lot of bugs. In a densely packed area, you just don't. But like I said, that's not the case these days. There seem to be more insects in the air in the past week than I've ever noticed in my life.

Just how to I know that? Well, I'm basing that solely on the number of bugs I've swallowed while out running.

When you run hard your body needs lots of oxygen. And sometimes, to get enough oxygen, you have to breathe through your mouth. And sometimes, when you're breathing through your mouth while running, you inhale things you don't mean to inhale. For me, in the past few weeks when the excess moisture has led to an excess of things flying around, that means bugs.

A whole lot of bugs.

Now, I don't mean to swallow bugs while running. In fact, I'm pretty sure no runner means to swallow bugs while running. But as anyone who runs will tell you, it happens. And it usually happens at the most inconvenient time, like when you're trying to make it up the Fifth Street hill in Marquette, gasping for air, only to have something enter your mouth along with the oxygen you're gasping, causing you to exhale all the oxygen (along with everything else in your mouth and lungs) in a vain attempt to get rid of the little creature that decided to make you its new home.

It's fun. Trust me on that.

I've been running a long time, which means that I've probably swallowed more than my fair share of the little critters. But I can't for the life of me remember a time when I've swallowed more bugs in a shorter span of time than the amount of insects I've swallowed in the past few weeks. I guess my only consolation is that I haven't yet picked up a bug from the bugs, and that, like I mentioned at the beginning of this, I'm getting a little more protein than usual by inhaling the insects along with my oxygen.

Because that makes up for it, right?

Hopefully, if our weather pattern gets back closer to normal (and that's a BIG if), I won't have to worry about this sudden (and unwelcome) change in my diet. But if it stays as wet and as buggy as it has been, don't be surprised if you see me running down the streets of Marquette wearing a surgical mask.

I won't be trying to make a fashion statement. I'll just be trying to cut down on my insect intake.

(jim@wmqt.com)