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What Was I Thinking? – Stacye Wilson

That helpless feeling, the one where you swear you’re losing the battle for an idea, frantically looking for inspiration. You’re sitting there with Moon Pie eyes like a lost child in a crowded mall on Saturday morning. I think every artist at one time or another has been there. Putting themselves under pressure to perform, willing themselves to do that next great American masterpiece. At least we would like to think so.  As a younger man I had that competitive nature wanting to exceed beyond my talent and of course my limits. Today, I seem to go with the flow to coin an expression. I am, at times, looking at myself wondering why I’m doing what I’m doing as an artist. If it’s not competitive what is it?

I know I can’t please everyone, I can try to make myself happy. I know that might sound self centered but so be it, I can live with that. I’ve been asked “what drugs are you taking?”, “where did you come up with that idea?”, I can’t pin point the answer because I truly don’t know. I can only say that with the availability of images online you get flash backs subconsciously. Nothing is truly new, just re-purposed when ran through my meat grinder of a brain. I apologize to those artists works I have ground up. I can make amens to those affected by telling you who I admire and flagrantly borrow from. These are not Picasso’s or Rembrandt’s just common hard working people with skilled hands, sharp wits and keen eyes.

 

Day 2  Stacye Wilson – Nashville, TN

If there’s a problem, yo, I’ll solve it. – Stacye Wilson

Admittedly Stacye is my confidante, muse and friend.  I’ve known her for most of my life, but make no mistake she has the chutzpah going on. Her work is brutally honest. Her collage work is frank, colorful and pointed to say the least. The kind of work I wish I would have not only thought of, but done. She takes no prisoners and cuts and quarters her subjects like no other artist I know, but does it in a very congenial manner.

 

I have never, ever heard Stacye refer to herself as an artist. I think she is one of the best, an inspiration to me and I love her for it. Thank you Stacye! I look through her massive amount of work and wonder if she is a visual artist or a writer? Probably both and for crying out loud I laugh until I almost cry over some of her work. Her Common Sense Jesus makes you stop and think. Right or wrong, good or bad it’s classic in a wicked way.

Take my word for it and go see for yourself, her Instagram is a microcosm of her life. Capturing her days, thoughts and friends in a way only she can do it.

Stacye Wilson on Istagram

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Gulp

‘Gulp’ is a short film created by Sumo Science at Aardman, depicting a fisherman going about his daily catch. Shot on location at Pendine Beach in South Wales, every frame of this stop-motion animation was shot using a Nokia N8, with its 12 megapixel camera and Carl Zeiss optics. The film has broken a world record for the ‘largest stop-motion animation set’, with the largest scene stretching over 11,000 square feet.

The animators: http://www.aardman.com
The sand artists: http://sandinyoureye.co.uk
The phone: http://www.nokia.com/n8

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South of Nowhere

The first permanent settlers were William Friend, George Yoachum, James Kimberling, George Wells, and Thomas Patterson in present-day Ozark. Yoachum was locally well known for briefly printing his own currency, which he called the “Yocum Dollar.” The name “Ozark,” which quickly became the population center, is said to refer to the bends in the Finley River—French traders called it “aux arcs.” Ozark eventually became the county seat.

The county was still very young when the Civil War began in 1861. The Union Home Guard formed in 1862, and on August 1 of that year defended Ozark against a minor Confederate ambush. On August 2, 1862, there was a minor skirmish near the town of Clever. During the war, many fled their homes and did not return until after the war was over. Both sides’ army forced many residents out of their homes, destroying their livestock, crops, and property. These malicious actions made many residents destitute and on the verge of starvation.

Bushwhackers also posed a constant threat of theft and violence. Although the population increased by more than 1,000 people from 1860-1870, historical records indicate that during the Civil War the county was almost totally depopulated.

After the end of the war, Bushwhackers still posed a threat. A group of local men formed a vigilante band called the “Bald Knobbers,” who tracked down Bushwhackers or others taking part in illegal activities. In most cases, the “Bald Knobbers” either killed the criminal or brought them in for arrest. The “Bald Knobbers” continued to fight what they saw as injustice long after the Bushwhackers were no longer a problem. In the 1880s, their activity began to get out of hand, and the sheriff arrested the men who refused to stop their vigilante activity.

The railroad aided recovery, coming to the area in the 1870s-1880s. Several towns were named after railroad officials. These include: Chadwick, named after John F. Chadwick and Billings, named after John Billings. Several other towns sprung up after the war, including Sparta in 1885. Sparta was supposedly named after settler J.J. Burton’s home town of Sparta, Tennessee. Nixa was officially formed in 1878, supposedly after settlers Nicholas Alexander Inman. For postal service to come to the area, the town needed an official name, and got it from “Nick” A. Inman’s mailbox, becoming “Nixa.” The railroad continued to flourish in the area well into the 20th century.

A local barber named Finis Gold started Nixa Sucker Day in 1957, and it has since been a longstanding tradition with the people of Nixa, Missouri. Locals would often close up shop and skip school for the day to go grabbin’ for Suckers. The fish were then frozen until there was enough for a big fish fry. Nixa Sucker Day was the result of this annual tradition.

 

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The Ozarks: Abandoned

Living in The Ozarks has been key to my development as an artist. The color, seasons, textures and characters of The Ozark Mountains makes it all come together.

It’s history and it’s people are what inspire me. Photo journalism is my focus, if you are looking for senior, wedding or baby pictures you might as well continue searching for another photographer.

Simple pleasures and the mysterious power that lures people to the land. Nothing is more satisfying than a newly turned field in early spring, fresh cut hay on a summer day or the smell of apple butter cooking in the fall.

In this post I’ll introduce you to “My Ozarks” they are small, out-of-the-way places, back road villages or one horse towns . The people who live here have opted to live differently. Small town residents worry about everything from school closings and their children’s futures to the slipping of the local economy.

The fragility of our communities in small towns is evident as you can see in these images. Some are blighted, while in other areas nearby the economy is booming. Making us question “what happened here”?

There are factory workers, barbers, small business owners, retirees, teachers, farmers, clergy, and mayors all who depend on the smallest things to hold these communities together all the while dealing with things such as the opioid epidemic.

Down at The Corner Cafe they are having their coffee about now, discussing the daily special or who fed the cats.

The End to the Means.

I first found myself staring at the ruins of an old home in an uninhabited town, I thought post-apocalyptic! It’s a vision of a horror story. However in certain cases they make me curious as to the backstory. But that’s not what keeps me searching for modern ruins, and it’s not the sole reason I devote so much time to finding and documenting these vanishing forgotten buildings.

Heck, they are so compelling! Of course, there’s an aesthetic to decaying buildings, an opportunity to enjoy these buildings when I stumble upon them. After all those who came before me enjoyed them in their day, why not me, why not now.

These ruins still contain promises of the unexpected. They have served their original purpose but now, for me, it’s the possibility of some weird encounter. The seemingly impossible find of a forgotten treasure or a captured moment.

It all allows for my imagination to go wild and the images allow for your own interpretation. In some strange way it’s all unencumbered repurposing.

Just a note to my fellow photographers who like to shoot cemeteries…Avoiding stepping on a grave. Ozarks Legend has it if a hillman happens to tread upon a grave, he is supposed to jump backward across it immediately, as otherwise a member of his family will die, according to the old-timers.

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Ghost of Bloody 13

Highway 13 or Bloody 13 as it’s known stretched from Clinton, MO south to Springfield, MO. It went through the center of small town America, through towns like Bolivar, Humansville, Brighton and Osceola. Weaving it’s way around sharp blind corners over rock covered hills and through densely wooded land. It was treacherous when wet, deadly when misjudged.

I Spent an afternoon on a lonely stretch of old Highway 13, this particular section was the original alignment of Highway 13, before 2005. Some of it still exists today as a reminder of those death defying days.

If I’ve heard it once I’ve heard it a thousand times, “If this house could talk it surely would have a tale.” This house has seen the deaths of many, I personally have seen the destruction, the aftermath of careless drivers. My father owned and operated a wrecker service out of Bolivar and I went on more than one trip out to this area to pick up an overturned car. It usually was after the ambulance had came to retrieve the victims but that didn’t hide the fact the wreck had taken it’s toll. All the while in the distance this house overlooked everything coming and going.


Highway 13 between Springfield and Bolivar was so dangerous for so long that area residents nicknamed it “Bloody 13”.

The northbound half of the divided highway consists of a section of road built in the 1920s. The accident rate along the northbound side is 3 1/2 times higher than on the southbound side, says Bob Edwards, a spokesman for the Missouri Department of Transportation. It was also higher than the statewide rate for similar highways, at the time. he says.

The most dangerous stretch begins just north of Ebenezer, where the north and southbound lanes divide, and ends just north of Slagle, where the lanes merge. That is just south of Bolivar.




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Ike’s Shoe Repair – Times They are A Changin’!

Springfield News-Leader –

The story of Refuel Coffee and Soda Bar, a 1920s-to-1940s themed cafe planned to open in 2016, begins almost a century ago.

In the ’20s, the tiny building at Central Street and National Avenue was a gas station.

As early cars grew larger and car ownership more common, small, first-generation gas stations like the one at 900 N. National Ave. fell out of fashion, replaced by bigger ones along wider streets. That’s according to Drury University’s dean of architecture, Robert Weddle.


Ike’s as of December 2017
The building that is to become Refuel, its footprint only a few hundred square feet, was repurposed over the decades.

For the 27 years ending in 2012, it was a shoe-repair shop, owned by Rev. Isaac J. “Ike” Jenkins.


Ike’s past photo by Dale Brueggemann

My family lived in the house just north of Ike’s when my brothers were children. I grew up on the north side and remember passing Ike’s mostly my whole life. Always loved the old neon sign out front. This post is my way of remembering Ike’s as it was. Thanks Dale Brueggemann for capturing Ike’s before the restoration began!

Dale has some very interesting photos, go visit his Flickr Page and see for yourself.

News-Leader full story

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Galena, James River and Charlie Barnes

Galena was platted in 1852, and named for deposits of the ore galena near the original town site. A post office has been in operation at Galena since 1853 and the last public execution in Missouri took place in Galena in 1937.

The James River flows past the east side of the town and enters the northernmost arm of Table Rock Lake to the south.The historic Y-Bridge over the James River is located just east of the town. Float trips, for which the Ozarks are famous, reputedly originated at Galena on the James. John boats 18-24 feet long and 4 feet wide were used long before canoes and kayaks became popular and are amazingly maneuverable craft for their size.

Some anglers still prefer the stability they provide for casting while standing and the comfort of folding arm chairs which they can carry. Before the days of Table Rock Dam a five-day float of about 125 miles was available from Galena to Branson. However one of the fine fishing floats always has been the 22-mile section from “Hootentown” to Galena and this may still be floated even with john boats.

From Ralph Foster Museum at College of the Ozarks –   It is rumored that the skilled boatman, Charlie Barnes of Galena may have invented the jonboat; whether that is true or not, Barnes definitely defined the role of the jonboat in the White River. He built over five hundred boats in his lifetime, and he guided many people through the James River and the White River on float trips. Many of his clients, in fact, were industrialists and movie stars. Unfortunately, with the creation of Table Rock and Bull Shoals dams, his business died and the wooden jonboats simply lost their significance on the rivers.

Galena Chamber of Commerce

 

Roscoe “Red” Jackson was hanged at dawn on May 21, 1937, for murdering a traveling salesman for his car and $18. Several hundred witnesses were jammed inside the temporary stockade, built around the gallows, and many more people milled about the courthouse square. It was the last public hanging in Missouri.

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Turner’s Vision: The Gay Parita Gas Station

Gary Turner’s station was a re-creation of a circa-1930 gas station owned by Fred and Gay Mason that stood in the small township of Paris Springs, Missouri, until it burned down in 1955.

During his retirement, Turner rebuilt the station, and it quickly became a must-stop for Route 66 travelers because of his hospitality and his ability to connect with just about anyone. A short 15-minute visit would often turn into a complete afternoon — and the visitors didn’t mind. Gary was full of stories and wasn’t afraid to share them.

 

Thanks for the memories:
Gary Gene Turner February 3, 1944 – January 22, 2015

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Bralley Civil War Cemetery

Just outside Seymour, MO sits the Bralley Civil War Cemetery. According to a small plaque at the entrance, The Jonothan Smythe Bralley family moved from Virginia to The James River near Galloway, MO in Greene County around 1835. In about 1845 they again moved to the Finley River Falls area near Seymour. At the site there are supposedly 22 grave sites. The only gravestones are provided to the Civil War soldiers buried there by the government. Therefore it is officially a Civil War Cemetery. Some 12-15 graves are marked by nothing more than field stones.

 

The site is only about 50′ square. There is at least one child buried there named Alberta Cornelison. There are four steel posts around the grave. One of the Civil War stones has a misspelling with a “W”. As the story goes the family received word of the boys deaths in the Battle Of Rolla, MO and sent a wagon to pick them up. Unbeknown to them the soldiers had already loaded the boys bodies up in a wagon were in route to bring the boys home, passing the family wagon along the route.

 

For more information visit:

Webster County Historical Society

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Amish of Webster County

From the Greater Seymour Chamber Of Commerce:
The Amish of Webster County

The Amish in Webster County, Missouri, are resisting the progress of the 21st century. They are “Old Order Amish,” which means plain ways—buggies with no tops, no enclosed cabs, no rubber tires and plain black paint. Most of the Amish here are of Swiss-German descent. They settled in Webster County in 1968, acquiring many old rundown farms and restoring them to successful, diversified farming operations. Friendly people, they are interesting and make good friends and neighbors.

While a young man’s ambition is to own his own farm and raise his large family without having to leave the farm to work, prices for necessities have forced him to seek work away from home, usually as a carpenter. From father to son, the skills of all phases of the construction trade are handed down.

The Amish women, not unlike their husbands, hand down their skills to their daughters. They are highly skilled in maintaining a comfortable well-ordered home. They grow huge gardens and preserve what they grow. They sew all clothing for their large families, do all the laundry without the convenience of electricity, quilt beautifully, help with the outside chores and do all of the things a housewife is required to do in any household. They are busy from before sunup to after sundown.


The Amish are very frugal people and are highly respected for their honesty. A few things they do not allow themselves to possess are television sets, radios, automobiles or any motor-driven vehicles, telephones, electricity, indoor plumbing (except for pitcher pumps at the kitchen sink), insurance, government pensions or Social Security income.

However, it is not all work and no play for the Amish. They enjoy “frolics” (where they all get together and build a house or barn for a neighbor or relative), quilting bees and singing (they sing without the accompaniment of musical instruments and they yodel just like they do in the Swiss Alps). They travel a lot from community to community and out of state for weddings and visits to family and friends. They hire drivers with vans or buses to carry them, and there is always a van full of eager travelers. Weddings are large—often with as many as 400 people in attendance, traveling from other Amish communities in other sates. This is a time of fellowship and is certainly an exciting time for the whole community.

Church is observed every other Sunday, being held in individual homes. Lunch is served to as many as 200 people by the host family. Young people play softball, basketball and other active games, and the young men are strong wrestlers.

The Webster County Amish once sent their children to public schools through the eighth grade. However, with the public schools adding computers and modern technology, they felt they must establish their own schools. They didn’t want their children contaminated by outside influences.

City Of Seymour

Please note: I tried to link to the Chamber and found nothing to link to. The Chamber may have disbanded, not known.