“Imagine a country the size of France suddenly sprouting in the middle of the United States. … Think how curious we all would be, how interested to discover who these people are and where they have come from. …
Now imagine something different. There is a new country, just as big and just as rich in culture, but no one sees it. … This country is decidedly American. And unlike the first image, it is emerging not only in the cornfields of Iowa but on the streets of the Bronx, all across the country from Seattle to St. Augustine.”[1]
Doctors Paul Ray and Sherry Ruth Anderson did exhaustive research over 13 years to conclude there are three predominant subcultures in the United States. Their numerous studies, interviews and focus groups are documented in their book, THE CULTURAL CREATIVES. The Moderns, “about 48 percent of the American population”, believes “in a technological economy that is reshaping the face of the globe.” The remainder of the country is almost equally divided into the other two groups. Traditionalists make up “about 24.5 percent of the US population or 48 million adults”. For the last 100 years much has been written about the Traditionalists and the Modernists. Almost nothing has been said about a third subculture until Ray and Anderson introduce us to the Cultural Creatives.
Ray and Anderson have a hard time fitting 50 million Cultural Creatives into a box. Except for the fact that 60% are women; the Cultural Creatives do not display any other demographic pattern. They are best identified by their values and beliefs. Ray and Anderson list 23 values/beliefs where Cultural Creatives have highest agreement. Their highest agreement, 93%, is with the statement “Want to rebuild neighborhood/communities”.
A fork in the road
The Industrial Age for all the good it has done has run out of gas. Continuing to do what we have been doing for the last 200 years and expecting a different result is madness. Our nation has reached a fork in the road and has three choices, take one road, take the other or turn back. Now picture two men and two women approaching a fork in a road. Each represents 50 million adults between the ages of 18 and 65. One is a traditionalist, two are modernists and the fourth is a cultural creative. The traditionalist wants to turn back to a world where father knows best and where he can afford a home and support his family comfortably on his secure 40 hour a week job. He is confused because he is beginning to understand that turning back is no longer an option. He feels betrayed by his government that is doing nothing to protect his job from going overseas and his family from run away housing, education and health care costs.
The two modernists are a young married generation “X” couple with high tech jobs. They are living in a $300,000 house in the suburbs. They are confident modern technology will solve our social and economic problems. There is no hesitation in their decision to go forward on the information age superhighway.
The cultural creative also wants to go forward but throughout her youth and as a young adult she had been taught to adapt and not to question the way things are. Then several years ago she became involved in a neighborhood issue. A developer was planning a project which would bring harm to her community. That was the beginning of an uncharted personal journey into areas she had never been before. With some fear and unease as she began asking questions she had never thought of or dared to ask.
Culturally creative women in the leadership
As we declare 2007 to be the year of the neighborhood and launch The Center for the Study of Neighborhood Economics it should be obvious the woman, the cultural creative at the fork in the road, should be the focus of our attention. Women, in my opinion, are much more likely to be attracted to neighborhood economic development plans. They, most often, manage the household and make the economic decisions. Women are looking for long term change and will be best able to ignore the barrage of advertisements offering short term fixes. Women have been engaged in a 100 year battle for equal rights. Women have taken leadership in demanding our male dominated government end the war in Iraq. They know what it is to set long range worth-while goals and they know the joy of overcoming strong opposition and achieving their goals.
We do not exclude anyone from joining us in our plan “to build a healthy national economy, one wealthy neighborhood at a time.” Everyone is welcome, Traditionalists, Modernists, Cultural Creatives, men and women. But the odds are stacked against anyone who believes long term systematic efforts are needed to solve our current social and economic problems and we need culturally creative women in leadership to overcome these odds.
[1] Paul M. Ray, Ph.D. & Sherry Ruth Anderson, Ph.D., THE CULTURAL CREATIVES, Three Rivers Press, Random House, New York, NY, 2000.
Monday, August 20, 2007
LETS NOT FORGET – WE ARE A NATION OF NEIGHBORHOODS
In his 1835 paper on Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote: "In democratic countries knowledge of how to combine into associations is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all others."
Robert Putnam, a sociologist at Harvard University lists three kinds of assets in every community, Physical Capital, Human Capital and Social Capital. Social Capital is the "resources embedded in social relations among persons and organizations that facilitate cooperation and collaboration in communities."
Economics is the science of making choices and the choices we make have to do with our values. There are three sectors in our economy, a public, a private and a social sector. There is a social sector because there is a set of values different from public and private sector values, the “priceless values” MasterCard talks about in its advertisements. These are the values which make up Putman’s Social Capital. These are the values embedded within the neighborhood associations de Tocqueville defined as the bedrock of our democracy.
The Industrial Age introduced a new system of organizing and educating society into nuclear families and generations of people who would fit into the home-to-work, work-to-home job routine. Large corporations dominated the private sector. Big government took power away from local government. The shift to big-is-better destroyed so much of the neighborhood associational life de Tocqueville admired. When government tried to address social problems with a war on poverty it made the problems worse. Its decision to partner with the corporate sector only exacerbated the problems. It became obvious neighborhood organizations were the missing link in the development puzzle. Public projects and public/private partnerships do not include neighborhoods.
Our inability to include the neighborhood in the problem solving process was never more apparent than it was in the way our nation addressed the 9/11 crisis. The first scenes on our TV screens were of airplanes crashing into the Twin Towers and then into the Pentagon, the two cathedrals of the corporate and government sectors. Our enemies understood the symbolism. What they misunderstood was what de Tocqueville recognized as the power behind the American Democracy. Before the smoke cleared our TV cameras turned to scene after scene of neighbors rushing to help their neighbors. Remember the expressions on their faces. America’s power is not in its towers it is in our ability to join together and form associations to address issues. The terrorists did not understand this. Unfortunately our government didn’t either. When our neighborhoods asked what they could do we were told to go shopping.
Timing is everything. We don’t learn until we get our backsides caught in a deep crack. In 1977 we were just getting over Watergate, a failed war in Viet Nam and riots in neighborhoods. People were looking when we introduced the Neighborhood Assistance Act. NAA is a tax credit to (1) corporations that invest in projects in (2) endangered neighborhoods which had been reviewed and approved by (3) local government. The law requires all three sectors to be involved in solving problems. We designed a simple two-page application which could be submitted any time. Letters of commitment were attached to the proposal. In the beginning all the investments went into neighborhood projects but as time went on the state bureaucracy turned the application into a multi-page and complicated exercise. Now most of the applications come from agencies with professional grant writers.
It’s been thirty years since we introduced NAA. We are again involved in another series of Watergates, another failed war and public protests. It is time to revisit NAA and enact similar laws. We need to redefine America in the way de Tocqueville saw our country in 1835, as a nation of neighborhood associations.
In his 1835 paper on Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote: "In democratic countries knowledge of how to combine into associations is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all others."
Robert Putnam, a sociologist at Harvard University lists three kinds of assets in every community, Physical Capital, Human Capital and Social Capital. Social Capital is the "resources embedded in social relations among persons and organizations that facilitate cooperation and collaboration in communities."
Economics is the science of making choices and the choices we make have to do with our values. There are three sectors in our economy, a public, a private and a social sector. There is a social sector because there is a set of values different from public and private sector values, the “priceless values” MasterCard talks about in its advertisements. These are the values which make up Putman’s Social Capital. These are the values embedded within the neighborhood associations de Tocqueville defined as the bedrock of our democracy.
The Industrial Age introduced a new system of organizing and educating society into nuclear families and generations of people who would fit into the home-to-work, work-to-home job routine. Large corporations dominated the private sector. Big government took power away from local government. The shift to big-is-better destroyed so much of the neighborhood associational life de Tocqueville admired. When government tried to address social problems with a war on poverty it made the problems worse. Its decision to partner with the corporate sector only exacerbated the problems. It became obvious neighborhood organizations were the missing link in the development puzzle. Public projects and public/private partnerships do not include neighborhoods.
Our inability to include the neighborhood in the problem solving process was never more apparent than it was in the way our nation addressed the 9/11 crisis. The first scenes on our TV screens were of airplanes crashing into the Twin Towers and then into the Pentagon, the two cathedrals of the corporate and government sectors. Our enemies understood the symbolism. What they misunderstood was what de Tocqueville recognized as the power behind the American Democracy. Before the smoke cleared our TV cameras turned to scene after scene of neighbors rushing to help their neighbors. Remember the expressions on their faces. America’s power is not in its towers it is in our ability to join together and form associations to address issues. The terrorists did not understand this. Unfortunately our government didn’t either. When our neighborhoods asked what they could do we were told to go shopping.
Timing is everything. We don’t learn until we get our backsides caught in a deep crack. In 1977 we were just getting over Watergate, a failed war in Viet Nam and riots in neighborhoods. People were looking when we introduced the Neighborhood Assistance Act. NAA is a tax credit to (1) corporations that invest in projects in (2) endangered neighborhoods which had been reviewed and approved by (3) local government. The law requires all three sectors to be involved in solving problems. We designed a simple two-page application which could be submitted any time. Letters of commitment were attached to the proposal. In the beginning all the investments went into neighborhood projects but as time went on the state bureaucracy turned the application into a multi-page and complicated exercise. Now most of the applications come from agencies with professional grant writers.
It’s been thirty years since we introduced NAA. We are again involved in another series of Watergates, another failed war and public protests. It is time to revisit NAA and enact similar laws. We need to redefine America in the way de Tocqueville saw our country in 1835, as a nation of neighborhood associations.
A JEFERSON CITY NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCIL
In April 1994 a drug war broke out in the neighborhood adjoining "The Walls". Bullets landed in several of my constituent's yards. At our first neighborhood meeting each person in the room vented their frustrations about City Hall, the Police, the drug houses and do-nothing politicians. That remark hurt. I was their city councilman. I reminded the meeting we had a similar problem with drug houses in the 80s when I was on the council. We drove drug houses out of our ward. We know how to drive drug houses out. The question is how can we keep them out?
I answered the question by telling the Independence Plan for Neighborhood Councils (IPNC) story. In the early 70s Mayor Weeks of Independence and members of his city council were frustrated by the lack of citizen participation. Far too often, developers would present plans, staff would comment but nobody from “the public” would come to the hearing. Only after the contract was signed and the ground broken did a neighborhood association appear in opposition to the project. The mayor appointed a committee of citizens to study the problem. They recommended the IPNC which was adopted by the city. The plan established a Council of Neighborhoods which would work with the city in reviewing and approving all future development projects.
I shared IPNC materials with the neighborhood group, the Mayor, and City Council. I attempted to get the City of Jefferson to pass an ordinance similar to the one passed by the Independence City Council. The City Manager and several department heads visited Independence and were impressed with the IPNC but in the end it did not get city council support and the idea was dropped.
The IPNC materials encouraged the neighbors to organize the Central East Side Neighborhood Association. CESNA organized a "Neighborhood Watch" and a Block Party in an empty lot that had been the place where the shooting occurred. Four hundred turned out to take back their neighborhood. By the end of the year CESNA had closed the drug houses and cleaned up the neighborhood. CESNA published "Neighbor News" and organized a series of events including beautification days, a grandparent day and a recognition party to honor the police who helped CESNA drive drug traffickers from the neighborhood. The Police Chief remarked that he had never in his lifetime seen this kind of appreciation given to a police officer.
Most neighborhood organizations start because of a crisis. Unfortunately they die as soon as the crisis passes. Without a pressing issue and without a Council of Neighborhoods support and recognition CESNA faded away. Almost.
In 2002 several CESNA survivors met with forty neighborhood residents and stakeholders to form the Eastside Neighborhood Development Association in order to have an effective voice in planning for the area. The state built a Health Laboratory in the 900 block of East Capitol and wanted to purchase adjoining homes for parking and landscaping. The city and state adopted a plan for the Missouri State Prison (MSP) site. ENDA wanted to make sure the Eastside neighborhoods will benefit and not be hurt by these plans. The Mayor and City council welcomed ENDA’s participation and appointed ENDA members the City’s Neighborhood Improvement Task Force.
In his 1835 paper on Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote: "In democratic countries knowledge of how to combine into associations is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all others." The Industrial Age destroyed much of the neighborhood associational life de Tocqueville admired. Too often in the shift to big-is-better the neighborhood’s agenda is pushed aside by the private sector’s rush to a short term fix or the public sector’s need to control. The City of Jefferson should be congratulated for its willingness to work with ENDA and other neighborhoods. Neighborhoods have demonstrated their ability to work with the city and developers.
In April 1994 a drug war broke out in the neighborhood adjoining "The Walls". Bullets landed in several of my constituent's yards. At our first neighborhood meeting each person in the room vented their frustrations about City Hall, the Police, the drug houses and do-nothing politicians. That remark hurt. I was their city councilman. I reminded the meeting we had a similar problem with drug houses in the 80s when I was on the council. We drove drug houses out of our ward. We know how to drive drug houses out. The question is how can we keep them out?
I answered the question by telling the Independence Plan for Neighborhood Councils (IPNC) story. In the early 70s Mayor Weeks of Independence and members of his city council were frustrated by the lack of citizen participation. Far too often, developers would present plans, staff would comment but nobody from “the public” would come to the hearing. Only after the contract was signed and the ground broken did a neighborhood association appear in opposition to the project. The mayor appointed a committee of citizens to study the problem. They recommended the IPNC which was adopted by the city. The plan established a Council of Neighborhoods which would work with the city in reviewing and approving all future development projects.
I shared IPNC materials with the neighborhood group, the Mayor, and City Council. I attempted to get the City of Jefferson to pass an ordinance similar to the one passed by the Independence City Council. The City Manager and several department heads visited Independence and were impressed with the IPNC but in the end it did not get city council support and the idea was dropped.
The IPNC materials encouraged the neighbors to organize the Central East Side Neighborhood Association. CESNA organized a "Neighborhood Watch" and a Block Party in an empty lot that had been the place where the shooting occurred. Four hundred turned out to take back their neighborhood. By the end of the year CESNA had closed the drug houses and cleaned up the neighborhood. CESNA published "Neighbor News" and organized a series of events including beautification days, a grandparent day and a recognition party to honor the police who helped CESNA drive drug traffickers from the neighborhood. The Police Chief remarked that he had never in his lifetime seen this kind of appreciation given to a police officer.
Most neighborhood organizations start because of a crisis. Unfortunately they die as soon as the crisis passes. Without a pressing issue and without a Council of Neighborhoods support and recognition CESNA faded away. Almost.
In 2002 several CESNA survivors met with forty neighborhood residents and stakeholders to form the Eastside Neighborhood Development Association in order to have an effective voice in planning for the area. The state built a Health Laboratory in the 900 block of East Capitol and wanted to purchase adjoining homes for parking and landscaping. The city and state adopted a plan for the Missouri State Prison (MSP) site. ENDA wanted to make sure the Eastside neighborhoods will benefit and not be hurt by these plans. The Mayor and City council welcomed ENDA’s participation and appointed ENDA members the City’s Neighborhood Improvement Task Force.
In his 1835 paper on Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote: "In democratic countries knowledge of how to combine into associations is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all others." The Industrial Age destroyed much of the neighborhood associational life de Tocqueville admired. Too often in the shift to big-is-better the neighborhood’s agenda is pushed aside by the private sector’s rush to a short term fix or the public sector’s need to control. The City of Jefferson should be congratulated for its willingness to work with ENDA and other neighborhoods. Neighborhoods have demonstrated their ability to work with the city and developers.
Neighborhood institutions are the missing link
If we understand and accept the premise there are three sectors in our economy, a public, a private and a social sector it becomes obvious neighborhood institutions are the missing link in the development puzzle. The question then becomes how do we identify and recognize and engage these associations in the process? This critical first step involves a new vision. It requires a redefinition and a new understanding of the importance of neighboring and the neighborhood institutions supporting neighborhood values. It recognizes the need to reach out and support the neighborhood associations that build the community and foster neighboring.
If we understand and accept the premise there are three sectors in our economy, a public, a private and a social sector it becomes obvious neighborhood institutions are the missing link in the development puzzle. The question then becomes how do we identify and recognize and engage these associations in the process? This critical first step involves a new vision. It requires a redefinition and a new understanding of the importance of neighboring and the neighborhood institutions supporting neighborhood values. It recognizes the need to reach out and support the neighborhood associations that build the community and foster neighboring.
My wife is Lorraine so why am I living in Mary’s Home?
Lorraine and I didn’t grow up in Mary’s Home, Missouri but we were lucky enough to have found it. Mary’s Home is one of the rare finds in Rural America that has survived the destruction the Industrial Age brought to our neighborhoods and their economies. Mary’s Home is an unincorporated village on a bend in the Osage River 30 miles south of Jefferson City. No one can say how many live in Mary’s Home. The number is not important. It only measures the human capital. It is the social capital which is most important and best predictor of the quality of a neighborhood and its organizations.
If you want to taste and experience what it feels like to live in a wealthy neighborhood community come to the Corner Market for breakfast some morning between 6:30 and 8:00. If you aren’t invited into the conversation listen in. If you can get a word in edgewise ask a question. Any one of the breakfast club members or Sandra, the owner, or one of her staff will be more than happy to answer your questions but be warned, you may be invited to join in and stay longer than you planned. Whatever happens, I know you will feel welcome. After breakfast walk around the 100 year old store. Be sure to go upstairs onto the balcony. Be warned again you might be tempted to spend more money than you had planned to spend for breakfast.
Before you jump in your car take a quick walk through downtown Mary’s Home. Judy, the manager of our credit union, will be happy to tell you about its 40 year history serving the community. Are you impressed there is a $2M credit union in a tiny place like this? Wait till you see our full service bank at the end of the block. On the way, pay a visit to our 100 year old church. The door is open. Before you reach the Bank of Mary’s Home at the end of the block you pass by our K to 8 school and the old community hall with a gymnasium and bowling alley. The new community center just opened to take care of the expanding number of students and just in time to accommodate you and many others at our parish picnic on September 2nd.
If you end your visit to Mary’s Home with a ten mile drive around Old Ten Mile Road, which begins at the Corner Market and ends at the Corner Market, you will pass more than 40 home based businesses. Some are visible like the farms and Benny Bax Auto Repair. Most hidden in and behind the homes along the road. All are the engines of our healthy economy.
Now you know why I am living in Mary’s Home and why I raised such a stink with the Jefferson City Council for inviting another destructive Wal*Mart into our local economy.
I wrote this on purpose
Of course you are invited to our parish picnic on September 2nd. It is a great event. Not only is it the mother of all parish picnics, it is a demonstration of the power a community has when its members work together. Of course you are invited. Come early and buy your dinner tickets before the hall opens at 11:00. But the purpose of this article is not to promote our picnic nor is it to sell real estate in Mary’s Home. My purpose is to show how important healthy neighborhood institutions are as the building blocks for a healthy neighborhood economy and community. If I have another purpose it is to encourage you to go back to building and rebuilding your own neighborhood community. You don’t have to move to live in a better neighborhood.
Lorraine and I didn’t grow up in Mary’s Home, Missouri but we were lucky enough to have found it. Mary’s Home is one of the rare finds in Rural America that has survived the destruction the Industrial Age brought to our neighborhoods and their economies. Mary’s Home is an unincorporated village on a bend in the Osage River 30 miles south of Jefferson City. No one can say how many live in Mary’s Home. The number is not important. It only measures the human capital. It is the social capital which is most important and best predictor of the quality of a neighborhood and its organizations.
If you want to taste and experience what it feels like to live in a wealthy neighborhood community come to the Corner Market for breakfast some morning between 6:30 and 8:00. If you aren’t invited into the conversation listen in. If you can get a word in edgewise ask a question. Any one of the breakfast club members or Sandra, the owner, or one of her staff will be more than happy to answer your questions but be warned, you may be invited to join in and stay longer than you planned. Whatever happens, I know you will feel welcome. After breakfast walk around the 100 year old store. Be sure to go upstairs onto the balcony. Be warned again you might be tempted to spend more money than you had planned to spend for breakfast.
Before you jump in your car take a quick walk through downtown Mary’s Home. Judy, the manager of our credit union, will be happy to tell you about its 40 year history serving the community. Are you impressed there is a $2M credit union in a tiny place like this? Wait till you see our full service bank at the end of the block. On the way, pay a visit to our 100 year old church. The door is open. Before you reach the Bank of Mary’s Home at the end of the block you pass by our K to 8 school and the old community hall with a gymnasium and bowling alley. The new community center just opened to take care of the expanding number of students and just in time to accommodate you and many others at our parish picnic on September 2nd.
If you end your visit to Mary’s Home with a ten mile drive around Old Ten Mile Road, which begins at the Corner Market and ends at the Corner Market, you will pass more than 40 home based businesses. Some are visible like the farms and Benny Bax Auto Repair. Most hidden in and behind the homes along the road. All are the engines of our healthy economy.
Now you know why I am living in Mary’s Home and why I raised such a stink with the Jefferson City Council for inviting another destructive Wal*Mart into our local economy.
I wrote this on purpose
Of course you are invited to our parish picnic on September 2nd. It is a great event. Not only is it the mother of all parish picnics, it is a demonstration of the power a community has when its members work together. Of course you are invited. Come early and buy your dinner tickets before the hall opens at 11:00. But the purpose of this article is not to promote our picnic nor is it to sell real estate in Mary’s Home. My purpose is to show how important healthy neighborhood institutions are as the building blocks for a healthy neighborhood economy and community. If I have another purpose it is to encourage you to go back to building and rebuilding your own neighborhood community. You don’t have to move to live in a better neighborhood.
Friday, August 10, 2007
AUGUST DROPPINGS
This is a monthly newsletter we send from Barnicle Farms to people all over the world. It has a neighborhood agenda. I plan to post the DROPPINGS here every month. I hope you enjoy it.
DROPPINGS FROM THE BARNICLES
Volume VI, Number 8 August, 2007
Volume VI, Number 8 August, 2007
GOOD NEWS OUT OF AFRICA – “KAISER WAS MURDERED”
The headline in the East African Standard marks the ending of a six year fight to clear John’s name from a false charge that he committed suicide. The decision of the Nairobi court Magistrate reads:
“The suicide theory is replete with loopholes and missing links. The theory raises more questions than answers. On the whole this court finds the FBI report to be seriously flawed, superficial and lopsided.”
For information on Fr. John Kaiser, go to his blog at http://JohnKaiser.blogspot.com/.
We met at the Mill Hill Missionaries House of Studies in St. Louis in 1958. We were together for the next six years studying Philosophy and Theology. We were ordained together in St. Louis in July 1964 and concelebrated our First Masses in University City and Underwood Minnesota. I am two weeks older than John. Our middle names and our patron Saint is Anthony. We both had University Degrees prior to serving in the military, John as a paratrooper and I as a pilot. Next to his family, I do not think anyone was closer to John or knew him better than I. After the FBI report, I wrote a deposition to the court and a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft asking him to look into the case. There is more about John throughout my book on http://www.barniclefarms.com/. Chapter IV, Pages 85 to 90 might be difficult reading for those who have kept faith in our country and in our church.
LEARNING TO BLOG
Only after our government officially and categorically denies something I believe it’s true. Ashcroft's response confirms my theory. John Kaiser’s blog and so many other voices of “small” people talking to one another in blogs throughout Africa and America forced the court to reopen the Kaiser case and expose the lies the FBI and the Kenyan government told. Small talk can overcome the big talk.
It took me four years to understand why blogs are so powerful. I viewed our DROPPINGS and our web sites as blogs. They are if you are like me, a man of a few thousand words. But most people don’t write books and don’t like to give speeches. They enjoy conversations with friends and neighbors. They like talking and being listened to. Blogs are so important. They are the extension of the conversations which go on every morning at the Corner Market in Mary’s Home and coffee shops all over the world. They are the fuel for our relationships and associations. Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in his 1835 paper on Democracy in America: "In democratic countries knowledge of how to combine into associations is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all others."
So in conclusion to this meditation we have decided to dump two of our three web sites, TonyBarnicle.com and NeighborhoodEconomics.net. In their place we are adding this blog. I welcome your comments.
BANSETTAS
I had a series of virtual reunions in July and August with many good friends from past lives. Dan Callinan was a classmate with John and me in Mill Hill. Dan was also with me in Cameroon. He and I had the distinctions of being arrested by the Nigerian Army during the Biafran war. I got out of jail in a day. His arrest and several months in a Nigerian Jail created an international incident. Dan had news about many other of our classmates from Mill Hill. I found Norm Brown on the Internet. Norm and I learned to fly T6s at Malden Missouri and B25s in San Angelo Texas. We had a great conversation on the phone about the class of 1956Q in those scarf and goggles days. Dopgima Fofung found me and telephoned from Cameroon. He was among our first graduates from St. Augustine’s College. He is a surgeon at a Hospital in Douala now. When we last saw him he was a medical student in New York. We Augustinians share a secret code, NVNVNSNC. I didn’t know we had a secret code at St. Bede’s College until Joseph Fomunung left a note in our Barnicle Farms Guest Book. Joseph is another ex-student. He was in the only class I recruited into St. Bede’s. I couldn’t remember Joseph or any of the other students I brought into the college that year. Joseph tells me it was a big class. All I remember was a big rush; finishing buildings in time for the Fall Semester, rushing back to Nso to prepare for Fr. Tumi’s (now Cardinal) First Mass and the convent for the Nun’s arrival, and then rushing back to recruit students. Bob O’Neil came to help out before school opened and things went fine after that. Bob is now the Mill Hill superior for the US. He was also with John, Dan and me at St. Joseph’s College, Mill Hill. The story is in the book, Chapter II, page 47 and following.
In Joseph’s note and from our telephone conversation I learned about the BANSETTAS, a secret code which stands for the “Barnicle Selected Students”. The class was the only class in the history of St. Bede’s selected by Father Barnicle and then before they could learn to spell “Barnicle”, he was gone. Joseph told me his class felt a special kinship to this masked man and named themselves after him. After graduation they kept this special bond and for the last 40 years the BANSETTAS have gathered, sung songs and told stories. WOW! If you don’t believe me, look at Joseph’s message in our Guest Book.
I told Joseph the next reunion of the BANSETTAS will be at Barnicle Farms.
The headline in the East African Standard marks the ending of a six year fight to clear John’s name from a false charge that he committed suicide. The decision of the Nairobi court Magistrate reads:
“The suicide theory is replete with loopholes and missing links. The theory raises more questions than answers. On the whole this court finds the FBI report to be seriously flawed, superficial and lopsided.”
For information on Fr. John Kaiser, go to his blog at http://JohnKaiser.blogspot.com/.
We met at the Mill Hill Missionaries House of Studies in St. Louis in 1958. We were together for the next six years studying Philosophy and Theology. We were ordained together in St. Louis in July 1964 and concelebrated our First Masses in University City and Underwood Minnesota. I am two weeks older than John. Our middle names and our patron Saint is Anthony. We both had University Degrees prior to serving in the military, John as a paratrooper and I as a pilot. Next to his family, I do not think anyone was closer to John or knew him better than I. After the FBI report, I wrote a deposition to the court and a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft asking him to look into the case. There is more about John throughout my book on http://www.barniclefarms.com/. Chapter IV, Pages 85 to 90 might be difficult reading for those who have kept faith in our country and in our church.
LEARNING TO BLOG
Only after our government officially and categorically denies something I believe it’s true. Ashcroft's response confirms my theory. John Kaiser’s blog and so many other voices of “small” people talking to one another in blogs throughout Africa and America forced the court to reopen the Kaiser case and expose the lies the FBI and the Kenyan government told. Small talk can overcome the big talk.
It took me four years to understand why blogs are so powerful. I viewed our DROPPINGS and our web sites as blogs. They are if you are like me, a man of a few thousand words. But most people don’t write books and don’t like to give speeches. They enjoy conversations with friends and neighbors. They like talking and being listened to. Blogs are so important. They are the extension of the conversations which go on every morning at the Corner Market in Mary’s Home and coffee shops all over the world. They are the fuel for our relationships and associations. Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in his 1835 paper on Democracy in America: "In democratic countries knowledge of how to combine into associations is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all others."
So in conclusion to this meditation we have decided to dump two of our three web sites, TonyBarnicle.com and NeighborhoodEconomics.net. In their place we are adding this blog. I welcome your comments.
BANSETTAS
I had a series of virtual reunions in July and August with many good friends from past lives. Dan Callinan was a classmate with John and me in Mill Hill. Dan was also with me in Cameroon. He and I had the distinctions of being arrested by the Nigerian Army during the Biafran war. I got out of jail in a day. His arrest and several months in a Nigerian Jail created an international incident. Dan had news about many other of our classmates from Mill Hill. I found Norm Brown on the Internet. Norm and I learned to fly T6s at Malden Missouri and B25s in San Angelo Texas. We had a great conversation on the phone about the class of 1956Q in those scarf and goggles days. Dopgima Fofung found me and telephoned from Cameroon. He was among our first graduates from St. Augustine’s College. He is a surgeon at a Hospital in Douala now. When we last saw him he was a medical student in New York. We Augustinians share a secret code, NVNVNSNC. I didn’t know we had a secret code at St. Bede’s College until Joseph Fomunung left a note in our Barnicle Farms Guest Book. Joseph is another ex-student. He was in the only class I recruited into St. Bede’s. I couldn’t remember Joseph or any of the other students I brought into the college that year. Joseph tells me it was a big class. All I remember was a big rush; finishing buildings in time for the Fall Semester, rushing back to Nso to prepare for Fr. Tumi’s (now Cardinal) First Mass and the convent for the Nun’s arrival, and then rushing back to recruit students. Bob O’Neil came to help out before school opened and things went fine after that. Bob is now the Mill Hill superior for the US. He was also with John, Dan and me at St. Joseph’s College, Mill Hill. The story is in the book, Chapter II, page 47 and following.
In Joseph’s note and from our telephone conversation I learned about the BANSETTAS, a secret code which stands for the “Barnicle Selected Students”. The class was the only class in the history of St. Bede’s selected by Father Barnicle and then before they could learn to spell “Barnicle”, he was gone. Joseph told me his class felt a special kinship to this masked man and named themselves after him. After graduation they kept this special bond and for the last 40 years the BANSETTAS have gathered, sung songs and told stories. WOW! If you don’t believe me, look at Joseph’s message in our Guest Book.
I told Joseph the next reunion of the BANSETTAS will be at Barnicle Farms.
We are a nation of neighborhoods in a world of neighborhoods
Over the last 42 years I have helped build healthy neighborhoods with strong neighborhood economies. My life's story is told in my book, WHAT A LIFE, WITH MY WIFE AND MY NEIGHBORS TOO. It is free for anyone who wishes read it or to download in into print copy. You can find it on our web site, http://www.barniclefarms.com/ > Tony's book. The book is about my life and my purpose in life, liberating people. I find this purpose fulfilled in my teaching as an Adjunct Professor at two universities and through my consulting business, OIKOS whose purpose is building neighborhood economies.
I am opening this blog to encourage others who are interested in talking about how we can build a neighborhood based nation and a neighborhood based world to join in the conversation.
I am convinced that if enough people begin talking about neighborhood issues and become interested in the neighborhood agenda our small talk can drown out the big talk.
Toghther we can.
I am opening this blog to encourage others who are interested in talking about how we can build a neighborhood based nation and a neighborhood based world to join in the conversation.
I am convinced that if enough people begin talking about neighborhood issues and become interested in the neighborhood agenda our small talk can drown out the big talk.
Toghther we can.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)