One Book, One Denver

A couple of months ago I was getting to know my library's redone web page, and I stumbled across something called One Book, One Denver.

According to the DPL website,

One Book, One Denver is Mayor Hickenlooper's citywide book club created to build community and stimulate people to read.

(Yes, our mayor's name is Hickenlooper. Watch out, he's running for gub'ner!)

So what happens is, the mayor sets out three books, and then there's a popular vote done on the library website. The choice is chosen but kept secret for a couple of months, while people add their names to the Holds list. I think something like 1100 people put the OBOD on hold this year, sheesh!

The choices this year were:

• The Help by Kathryn Stockett
• Fine Just the Way It Is by Annie Proulx
• The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski

It's probably a surprise to no one that The Help was chosen. It's the book with all the buzz, at least from what I can tell. I read it about a month ago (it was great!) and Brian started it, but he wasn't able to finish before it was due back. So now he has at least 3 more weeks to get through it. 

In the next few days I'm going to look at the schedule of events and see what discussion groups and activities I might want to check out. I'm from the south (though not as deep as Mississippi, where the book takes place) and now living in a place where race, at least the black/white perspective, doesn't seem to be much of an 'issue' on the list of top issues. 

Aside: did I ever tell you about the time Chapel Hill was considering changing the name of the main street from Airport Blvd. (which had local historical significance that was meaningful to longtime residents) to MLKJ Blvd.? The opponents gave their arguments, which had a lot to do with the financial hit to business, which needed HELP, and suggested more appropriate, more meaningful, less costly ways ($50k to get the street signs changed, for starters) to celebrate/honor Dr. King. The local NAACP leader then got up and said, pointing fingers, that they were all racist. "You a racist, and you a racist, and you a racist." I'll never forget that moment Even in supposedly-enlightened, progressive Chapel Hill, North Carolina, community leaders will point their fingers and call each other racist. 

To contrast, the apparent lack (at least from my very limited perspective - my circles right now are still very small) of 'blacks vs. whites' mentality out here is startling to someone who grew up surrounded by that mentality. I'm really curious about the Wild West's take on racial reconciliation, the theme of the book. It really is a different world in the South. Could everyman Coloradans have anything meaningful to contribute to the discussion? I'll find out soon enough, I guess. (I wonder how many times I'll hear someone refer to 'those people' and what kinds of Southerner stereotypes I might hear about.)

Does your city do something like this? Have you ever gone to 'discussion groups' for a massive reading effort? What's the most troubling thing you can remember happening in your community?

Lou Gehrig on night baseball

The job I have right now - for the next couple of weeks, at least - sometimes inspires me to delve into information about Lou Gehrig.  (It's Gehrig, not Gherig, by the way.)

Many months ago, I came across a fun interview that Lou did with a guy named Dwight Merriam, of KROC.  They talked about all kinds of basebally subjects, but this one comment on night baseball games struck me as odd in a funny kind of way. There was a shift in the days of the Great Depression from baseball games being played in the daytime to being played at night, made possible by electricity and made necessary by dwindling spectatorship.  Playing at night meant that folks who worked during the day could come to the evening games, and ticket sales were (as always) important.  The first night baseball game was played in 1935, but it didn't really take off until after the war.  The Chicaco Cubs were the lone daytime holdout for decades, and they didn't install lights at Wrigley until 1988.

While fans seemed to take to night baseball pretty quickly, a lot of the people IN baseball didn't like the change.  As a self-professed analog person in a digital world, I totally 'get' an innate resistance to change brought on by technology, and some of the major arguments from 80 years ago are tinged with quaint antique notions.  For example, one major worry was that players would have a hard time shifting betweein lighting conditions and that there would be more injuries during night games (per this site).

Want to know what Lou Gehrig thought?  Read this excerpt from that 1939 interview, and keep in mind that Gehrig and the Yankees lost their first night game, in Philadelphia, prior to this interview.  (Note: I've put my favorite comment in bold.)


Dwight Merriam, KROC: Lou, what's your opinion of night baseball?

Lou Gehrig: Well, night baseball is strictly a show and is strictly advantageous to the owners' pocketbook. But as far as being a true exhibition of baseball, well, I don't think I can say it is, and it's very difficult on the ballplayers themselves. Of course, we realize that the men who work in the daytime like to get out at night and really see a spectacle, and we do all in our power to give them their money's worth. But after all, it's not really baseball. Real baseball should be played in the daytime, in the sunshine.



 I love baseball.  I don't really 'follow' it, I don't know many players and I can only tell you the Phillies won the world series last year because one of my best friends is a hardcore fan.  It was a long time before I'd return to a stadium or even watch a game after the big players strick in the 90s.  But I sure do love going to stadiums, especially major league stadiums, and it doesn't take much for me to get caught up in the traditions of our national pastime.

the video of Anne Frank

I saw on CBS.com (and a number of other blogs) that footage of Anne Frank, the Jewish teenager who died at the hands of the Nazis and whose diary has been published and read by many, has recently been discovered.  In the video, a neighbor of Anne's is leaving to go to a wedding.  Anne is looking out her window.  It's easy to recognize her shadowed eyes and dark hair.

You can see the video here.

Of course, I got lost in a timesuck of watching Anne Frank videos and reading about her life, her family, and her legacy.  I read the Diary of Anne Frank when I was around her age, and I remember feeling so sad.  I could relate to her in many ways, but there were other things in her life that I had no way of comprehending.  Heady, heady stuff for a young teenager.  I probably would have had a breakdown in her situation.  As I often remind Brian, I have little, if any, survival instinct and I might not fare well in a do-or-die situation.

Heady, heady stuff for a Tuesday.