Joe Heumann Archives - Mary Maddox

Walldogs come to Arcola

On a rainy afternoon Joe and I took a road trip to check out the Walldog event in the nearby town of Arcola. The Walldogs are a group of sign artists who have painted murals on the sides of buildings in towns and cities all across America. The murals are designed to chronicle people and places of significance to the particular town, so they enhance the town’s character as well as adding artistic beauty.

The painting was underway during our visit although the artists retreated indoors or under tents when the summer shower became a downpour. We braved the rain to take photos of the works in progress. (So okay, I snapped most of them from inside the car, but we did get wet. Well, damp anyway.) We plan to return once the murals are complete and photograph the completed murals. Meanwhile, here are some of the shots we got.

Some murals commemorated historical businesses like the two dedicated to Pfeifer Seed and Arcola Candy Kitchen. One honored Arcola native “Average Joe” Ernst. According to an article from WAND-TV news,

A decorated veteran, Joe is now 88 and watched work on a mural honoring his life. In 1941, Joe was working in a local restaurant when a group of African Americans came in seeking service. “Man’s hungry, I don’t care what color he is, he’s hungry.” It was in the days of segregation and black Americans could not be served in most eateries. Joe served those customers and the next day he was fired. “Oh yeah. Next morning I came to work and the key wouldn’t fit the doors” Joe told WAND News.

The African American customers? It turns out it was the “Queen of Jazz,” singer Ella Fitzgerald and her band. Joe had no idea who his famous customer was.

The average Joe is a decent guy. So much for my dark and cynical view of the world.

Here are some other Walldog murals in various stages of completion.

The final mural celebrates Arcola Lawn Rangers, the world-famous lawnmower precision drill team. These guys have marched in hundreds of parades all over the country, including President Obama’s inaugural parade. If you want to know more about this quintessentially American group, check out this video.

But really, their motto says it all.

June 23, 2012/0 Comments/by Mary Maddox

Joe Heumann

Joe Rampant in Arcola

I’ve been so busy with Occasional Writers: Bringing the Past Forward —an anthology of essays and poems by the Past/Forward memoir group and the latest title from Cantraip Press—that my other creative endeavors have fallen by the wayside. Hopefully I’ll have time for my own writing once Occasional Writers comes out next month.

Douglas County Seat

Meanwhile I offer some photographs taken last year by my husband, Joe Heumann, as he was wandering through Arcola, a small town north of Charleston. Joe was taking photographs when I met him in college, but he hasn’t taken any for a number of years. Now that he’s back, I hope he keeps snapping pictures. I love his way of looking at the world.

Silos in Arcola

Come Closer . . .

. . . hidden wonders reveal themselves.

Terminus

September 25, 2011/0 Comments/by Mary Maddox

Adventures, Joe Heumann

Darkness in Sunlight

In August I spent several days with my friend Carol in Studio City, California. Carol works in the movies as an art department coordinator. She was working then on a film called The Artist, so we partied in the evenings and I entertained myself during the day. I took my mini-cam and explored Ventura Boulevard. I trekked from Laurel Canyon Drive almost to Universal Studio, alongside a relentless stream of traffic. It seemed never to let up. My husband the eco-critic (yes really, he and Robin Murray write books on eco-criticism and the cinema) informed me later that Los Angeles has the most polluted air in America. It certainly seems that way when you breathe it.

Side streets with quaint names like Blue Canyon Road branched off Ventura and twisted up the steep hillsides, but the boulevard was mostly commercial. A sinister atmosphere emanated from the hustle and bustle and mixed with the pollution. Maybe it came from my assumption that so much commerce cannot exist without some corruption or from the bleak depictions of Los Angeles in novels by James Ellroy and Michael Connelly and films like Chinatown and Mulholland Drive. I imagined dark happenings in the seedy motels and massage parlors. I wondered what was cached in the windowless storage facilities. So many businesses exploited parents’ dreams of vicarious stardom: “Comedy Lessons for Kids,” “Children in Film.”

I passed a building of gleaming black glass with a large courtyard behind the tall bars of a fence. The sign on the building said only “Pure Beauty.” A spa, maybe? I must have passed 15 or 20 downscale spas in various strip malls. This could be an upscale spa. But a sign on the gate into the parking lot warned that the place was under “constant video surveillance.” What would happen if I took pictures? Would guys in suits and sunglasses come out and break my camera? Later I searched online and discovered it was just an ordinary spa. Maybe the patrons felt insecure or the facility needed protection from feral gangs of starlets foraging for beauty products.