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Read “Local”

The Source

When I bought my house in Arenzville I was faced with a choice. I could get a loan from a bank in Jacksonville, no questions asked, or I could borrow money from the local bank. Our town’s banker required a title search…an added expense. My father told me, “If you’re going to live in town you need to do your business there, buy your gas, your groceries, your house.” I took his advice and the Arenzville bank searched my deed back to the dinosaurs to find that I indeed owned the house. “Shop locally” is good advice that keeps our community vital. If we drive to Springfield to buy a pair of pants then someday we’ll have no other choice than to drive to Springfield for a pair of pants. So why not read locally as well? I try to buy the books of local authors simply because…well…they’re local. I probably know them. I have one entire shelf filled with books of varying quality and interest. I mean after all, if they were truly great would they still be termed “local?” But recently I’ve come across two local authors whose work would stand up to any publishing standards. In fact, I hesitate to term them “local,” and thus imply that the quality and subject matter of their work is not how limited to the nearby area. Roy French hangs out in what’s just about the neatest little store on the Virginia Square, a 112 year old building originally designed as a hardware store now houses The Caraway Seed Antique Store, a delightful amalgamation of collectables, and somewhere in the back of the store, Roy French himself. A long-time author, carpenter, storyteller, historian, and civic booster, Roy’s newest project is a book, “Hickory Road,” now available at his store, Our Town Books on the square in Jacksonville, the Passavant Gift Shop, and McAusland IGA in Virginia. I made my first visit to Jacksonville’s delightful little book nook, Our Town Books, and picked up my copy. Actually, I wanted to get a copy for my father since the book’s time period so closely mirrors that of the stories dad told me. I began thumbing through it. I was hooked. If I might be a bit blunt, amateur writers tend to “over write.” They are obvious and obviously embarrassing in their effort to sound “literary.” Roy’s been writing long enough and well enough that he has no need for strained flashiness. He writes from the heart and with a style honed by years of reading widely and writing well. “Hickory Road, Stories from Hickory Hollow,” is a collection of essays about growing up in the Cass County woodlands….hunting, trapping, eking out a living during the Depression, one-room schools, falling down snowy hillsides, square dancing, learning to make potato soup when mom was gone, suffering illness without doctors, falling in love, gathering eggs, chivarees, second-hand clothing, finding favorite hunting dogs hung up on barbed-wire fences, raising children with little money, praying together, and a hundred others adventures that today’s high tech world has taken from us. But the best parts…the very best parts of Roy’s wonderful little book is when he talks about simply sitting on a Hickory Hollow hillside and watching the trees two-step in the breeze….walking on an icy creek with the help of his cane and a 12-year-old friend skating circles around him…..finding that a Saturday night square dance is the best cure for loneliness….listening to the sound of a bird as he walked through the snow to school. Roy writes from the soul and both his age and experience have given him the courage to be honest in his appraisal. And yes, he writes very, very well. Hickory Road may be on my shelf of “local authors” but his appeal is universal and his skill ranks with the best. And now to “the kid.” Sorry, but Scott Maruna will always look like a kid to me. He’s that guy who’s taught just about every subject at Routt at one time or another, willingly jumping in to add to his math and science load to keep the drama and music departments going in Jacksonville’s Catholic High School. And…he writes. He writes well. Published under the somewhat eerily titled Swamp Gas Book Company, his most recent book, “Unexplained Mysteries of Jacksonville and the Surrounding Area,” follows his earlier books, “The Mad Gasser of Mattoon” and “The History and Mystery of the Piasa Bird.” I read the book a year or so ago but recently picked up two more copies for a couple of my friends who serve as entertainers and tour guides with me on The Spirit of Peoria Riverboat. Our downstream trips to St. Louis feature a first-night landing on the banks of the Meredosia landing and then we bus our hundred-or-so guests to a Jacksonville motel (unless there’s a ball tournament in town in which case we sadly bypass the town and head to Springfield.) My two buddies are wonderful tour guides and they literally know the tales and histories of every Illinois River mile, but I’ve noticed that they say little about this historic town of J’ville when we approach. Since hyperbole and tale-telling are a part of the riverboat experience, Scott’s book is just they need and next week they shall have their own copies. Maruna’s book is carnival of legends, strange sightings, maybe myths, unexplained thing-a-ma-bobs, paranormal peculiarities, and just plain outrageous things that have happened, may have happened, and surely could not have happened in the extended Jacksonville area. Some are documented and factual…the fact that Beardstown is built on the bones of dead Native Americans, the story of Robert Earl Hughes..the world’s heaviest man, the day in 2002 when Jacksonville was hit with mass hysteria….but most are of the “I don’t know if it’s true, but my grandpa once told me” variety. And the cool thing…they’re all local. Scott is a scientist by nature and he’s not the type of writer who’d be hired by The National Inquirer. In story after weird story, he lays out what he’s heard, what he’s been able to research, and then lets the reader decide upon the tales veracity. He says in the books introduction, “I have always been inexplicably dawn to the unknown, the anomalous and the downright mysterious. “ And that’s just what this book is. One thing you can believe…the book will hold you. One more added benefit: the only place you can purchase Scott’s book is at Our Town Books, a place that’s more fun than Bass Pro Shop…at least in my book. And like Roy French, Scott Maruna knows how to carve out a narrative. I’ve long wondered whether there was something in the local water that helped produce such an unusually high number of artists in our area. If that’s the case, Roy and Scott have drunk deeply. You’re free to buy your pants wherever you wish, but this summer I hope we all make a pledge to read locally. Roy will be having three book signings in the next two months: August 10, Annabelle Lee Tea Room on East State, 11:30-1:30 August 27, Barnes and Noble in Springfield, 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. September 2, Our Town Books in Jacksonville, 5-7:30 p.m. Scott Maruna will be signing books at Our Town Books on Friday, August 5th, from 5 until 7 p.m.