Wretched excess and college football myths

By Jeff Orvis

The Ford Motor Company seems to like the letter “E.” Its line of SUVs include the Escape, the Explorer and the Expedition. All seem like fine vehicles. I sometimes wondered if they could make something even bigger. Maybe they could call it the Wretched Excess. It would take premium gas, get about a dozen miles to the gallon and have a base price of over $50,000.

The Excess came to mind in recent weeks as I watched the thousands of folks all across this country (and some other places as well) occupying downtown locations. The Occupy Wall Street group, which was recently washed out of its campground, was protesting what they claimed to be the excessive salaries paid to some bankers and other Wall Street folks. In an era where many of us have been forced out of our profession, they are wondering why the corporate leaders keep on cashing those seven-figure annual paychecks.

I've written before on how corporate America is giving us less for our money, especially in the grocery store. Even more evident are the companies that continue to move manufacturing jobs to other countries and other practices in an effort to increase the almighty bottom line and look good for the stockholders.

Many folks questioned why banks tried to increase various fees while the CEOs of the national banks made obscene salaries and bonuses. But I've had a more basic question when it comes to banks: Why is the bank building the most prominent, massive and architecturally significant building in virtually every town in America?

Think about it. Travel to any town across the country, whether it is a major city or a small town with a two-block Main Street. If the city has a bank, it won't be hard to pick out of the other businesses in town. Soaring two or three story entries, heavy front doors coated in bronze or brass and hundreds of square feet of marble are often the norm, rather than the exception. When was the last time a plush bank lobby helped you get better interest on your savings account or helped you get a home or business loan?

I realize that this building design trend is nothing new. I suspect that many banks in the Old West were the only buildings in town with brass accents on the teller cages and inlaid tile floors. I suppose the idea of fancy buildings for banks came from the notion that customers would trust their money to someone who could afford a fancy place to house it. It probably was supposed to promote customer confidence.

But in an era where banks are trying to hit us with higher ATM fees or service charges for accounts that fall below a certain level, do they really need to continue to choose splendor over function? Just wondering...

It was just about this time of the year. Our second grade class was eating lunch one day at Riverdale School. We were starting to get excited about Christmas and the accompanying school vacation. Our teacher, Miss Good, sensed our excitement and realized that many of us had younger siblings. In a matter-of-fact tone, she told us that while she realized that we knew that Santa would not be coming down our chimneys, we should keep the “truth” to ourselves so we wouldn't ruin it for our younger brothers and sisters.

I remember chills ran down my spine that day. I knew this day was coming, when I would have to admit to myself that the legend of the Jolly Old Soul was probably impossible. But my fear was if I admitted it out loud, I wouldn't get any presents! I did a good job of keeping this quiet in my family until the sixth grade, when my sister and I admitted to our parents we realized who was responsible for nice Christmas presents.

Fast forward about 50 years and I had that same chill when news came out of State College, PA, about the scandal involving the Penn State football coaching staff members. I was never a real fan of Penn State football, especially when the Nittany Lions joined the Big Ten. But I certainly admired what they stood for – a tough-as-nails team that gave everything they had on every play. They played tough, but by the rules. Their coach, Joe Paterno, virtually owned the program, having been associated with it for over 60 years. He and his wife recognized that while football was vital to his career, Penn State was more than its football program. To that end, they have returned over $4 million in personal donations to the university over the years.

All that was instantly forgotten with the news of a 40-count indictment of a former longtime assistant coach on the staff. Sixty-one years of devotion to a program was destroyed with one document.

In my mind's eye, I see a sorry parade of Santa, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy marching down the road, fading into the distance, suddenly joined by the most veteran of college football coaches. Myths one and all.

Remembering a special small town cop

By Jeff Orvis

One of the best parts of my job in small town community journalism over the years was the opportunity to develop a good relationship with local law enforcement. When I first landed in Independence, I'll admit that I may not have had a high opinion of local law enforcement. Growing up in a larger metropolitan area, I had little actual contact with small town cops.

It didn't take long to realize that local law officers were our neighbors. If you called a sheriff's deputy for help in Scott County, chances are all you saw was the gun and uniform. You would probably never see the officer again. That was different in Independence. The police chief and his assistant both had children who grew up in the local schools. One of the officers was married to a woman who worked in our news room. A few years after I began working in town, we joined a church where the police chief, Buchanan County sheriff, his chief deputy and nearly half of the ambulance crew all were members. It was sort of like attending church with the president!

These memories came flooding back earlier this week when I learned of the death of the former assistant chief of the Independence department, Jim Hayward. By the time I arrived in town, he and his boss, Chief Dan Schremser, had many years of experience keeping the peace in town between them. As a part of my beat, I would collect the police news each week and sometimes, when there were ongoing investigations, I stopped by Jim's office to try to get more details not included on the news release. Usually when I stopped by, I knew he wouldn't be able to elaborate on what I already had learned, but it was worth a try. He always dressed in a tie and had a pipe handy – sort of like a modern day Sherlock Holmes. He also usually had a twinkle in his eye and you never quite knew if he was being truthful or handing you a line.

My experience with Jim actually included the only time I have been questioned in connection with a crime. I lived in a four-plex in town and a woman in another unit had reported a sexual assault. Jim stopped by my place and quickly told me that I wasn't a suspect, but he was just wondering if I had heard anything during the time of the alleged assault. I don't recall being able to offer any help, but he conducted the interview with his professional style, with just a hint of good humor.

Knowing all the officers on the local department was a luxury reporters in larger cities seldom share. Another time I heard a call on the police scanner of shots fired at a home in Independence. By the time I arrived, another veteran officer of the department had roped off the front of the home and was guarding it until state investigators arrived. He and I were the only ones there. Apparently a troubled young man had come home from school, gone to the basement and ended his life with a shotgun. I had known the officer for several years by this point and while he wouldn't have allowed me to go into the basement, he described in general terms what had apparently happened. His description left little doubt in my mind that I was glad he wouldn't allow me to enter.

Another time, I arrived at the scene of a murder in town. TV crews were already set up and were getting little or no information from the officer guarding the scene. I left the scene and drove to the law center where I found the county's chief deputy (one of my fellow church members). He confirmed that a murder had taken place, who had been killed and other details the TV folks were scrambling to find.

Because of the mutual trust I developed with many officers I met over the years, I heard about the time our sheriff spent two days laying in the weeds at a rural site on a stakeout. I was able to joke with a state trooper who lived in our town because it seemed that each time there was a traffic accident out in the country on the coldest, windiest day, he would be the one dispatched to the scene.

On my weekly visits to the law centers in Independence and later in Belle Plaine, most of my reports were about ambulance assists, traffic accidents, domestic disputes, etc. I once told a police chief that they could have simplified the code by making most infractions degrees of stupidity. Someone who was suspected of first offense drunk driving would be charged with “stupidity in the third degree.” I once told the Belle Plaine chief that his officers should change their uniforms to referee's shirts, since so many of their calls involved settling disputes between husbands and wives, neighbors, etc.

While there were lighter moments in my visits to the police stations, I realized that there could have come a time when I would have to report on an officer involved shooting or other dangerous, tragic incident. Small towns are not immune to bad people doing bad things or good people having bad things happening to them.

It takes a special individual, like Jim Hayward, to go to work each day for more than 25 years, knowing that the next time the phone rings, it could be news of something bad happening to someone he might have grown up with. He had to be prepared to quickly shed his personal feelings and assume the role of law enforcement professional.

You gain respect for small town cops when you get to know them, especially the men and women I've met over more than 30 years in this crazy business.

Rest in peace, Jim and thanks for your service and all you taught me about police work.

Free entertainment on the other side of the porch screen

By Jeff Orvis

It's been a year since I packed up the van, said my good-byes to my friends in Belle Plaine and began the next chapter in this interesting life. While the past year has been less than a success from the standpoint of finding employment, it's been very rewarding in the fact that I've been able to reconnect with family and some of the friends I grew up with.

I wondered how I would adapt to giving up a three-bedroom, two-story house for a bedroom and a storage unit. What kind of adjustment would I have to make going from a quiet, friendly town of just under 3,000 to a metropolitan area of more than 350,000, where everybody seems to be in a hurry?

In the first place, Mom's condo is incredibly well insulated. We live within two miles of perhaps 40 restaurants, four supermarkets, more than a half-dozen big box stores and one of the busiest streets in the area. But with the windows closed, every night is as quiet as a snowy winter night in Belle Plaine when the wind is blowing from the north. The last time I heard a train was this summer when I went down to the Davenport levee to hear a concert during the Bix Beiderbecke Fest.

The condo complex adjoins the Crow Valley Country Club. While we don't have a big course view, the golf course provides a small slice of solitude.

As I've grown older, I am discovering that I inherited some of my dad's traits. He could be quite eloquent on the rare occasions he sat down to write a letter in longhand. I've spent the better part of 35 years trying to put words together in a coherent way. His best expression came in his photography, where he could capture Minnesota nature at its finest. While working in the news business, I would take pictures when necessary, but not nearly as well as he did.

He grew up in small towns in south central Illinois, moving to the Quad-City area for work. I spent more than 30 years living in towns of similar size to his hometown and discovered an easy-going lifestyle where rush hour usually lasted about 10 minutes and involved a couple dozen cars.

So what does this have to do with my current living arrangement? Many summer nights when I was growing up, Dad would take a cup of coffee after supper and go out and sit on our front porch, which was across the road from a park. My sister and I might scramble to finish eating so we could go out and play or watch a favorite TV show. Dad would be content to spent an hour or two just sitting on the porch, enjoying the quiet.

Well, it too more than 40 years, but I finally found some of that contentment. Make no mistake, I admit I am a TV addict. Nobody is as well-versed in the operation of the remote than I am. But some of the best time I have spent since coming to live here has been spent on Mom's screened porch. The view is not really impressive – the next condo building is only about 40 yards away. But there's enough room for a few mature trees and a small patio where Mom has put up a couple of bird feeders.

I never saw a hummingbird before this spring. We had a couple who would regularly battle for the best spot to suck up the sugar water put in the feeder for them. I remember only seeing one or two gold finches over the years. We had a small flock who would constantly remind me that I should keep that feeder filled. Sometimes we see a hawk soaring overhead. One of his favorite perches this summer was on the roof of the adjoining building.

We also had a few non-winged visitors. Several squirrels seemed to find new and innovative ways to climb up on that hanging bird feeder. It really amazed me how far they could fly when I scared them off the feeder. Make a sudden noise and watch them fly off the five-foot high feeder and land on their feet.

A couple of chipmunks also were local residents. Mom had some potted plants on the patio and the chipmunks liked to forage in the dirt, trying to eat the flower bulbs. Mom heard somewhere that if you sprinkled chili powder on the base of the plants, the chipmunks would leave them alone. A couple of days later, I told Mom that I saw a few chipmunks wearing tiny sombreros, playing mariachi music and having a fiesta. She didn't see the humor in that one.

The point is, we spend about 40 years of our lives raising families, looking after our investments, perhaps trying to own the best car or biggest home. How many of us spend the afternoon or evening simply sitting on a porch, away from the TV or computer, enjoying the best entertainment in the world?

Would I like to find the perfect job to finish my work career? Of course. But even more important is waking up to many more days when I can take at least a few minutes to the kind of free entertainment on the other side of that porch screen. I hope that would show a potential employer that I pay attention to detail and know how to prioritize my life.

And even more importantly, know how to occasionally stop and smell the roses – and maybe feed a chipmunk or two.