Come to the Northfield
Public Library on Thursday, August
1, at 7:00 p.m. and meet Kent
Stever who will read from his book Growing Up on the Mississippi: the 1950’s in
Winona, Minnesota. The event is
free and open to the public.
Kent Stever's new book opens the floodgates of memory for
long-time Winonans and all Minnesotans and kick-starts a time machine that
sends all readers back to vivid scenes from the past. Mixing extensive research
with personal narratives, Stever's "Growing Up on the Mississippi: The
1950s in Winona, Minnesota," offers more than dry history, but the vibrant
details of life in another time in the island city.
Stever blows on the coals of warm nostalgia in some
pieces, reflecting on his days at Madison Elementary School, for example.
"Ah—the mood, the remembrances, the smells, the quiet night sounds, and
the goodness of life in West Winona," Stever writes of a walk past the
school after many years.
Other pieces bring more
shadowed details of Winona's past to light. Intrigue, romance, scandal,
violence, and debauchery light up the pages. Stever intermingles his stories of
being a taxi cab driver with a history of taxi cabs in Winona. Astonishing
tales of late night rides, drunken patrons, and the brutal hijackings of the
"taxi bandit" prick the imagination.
Another chapter may be the authoritative history of
professional wrestling in Winona. Again, Stever's boyhood memories of the
raucous stands are fleshed out with gleanings from newspaper archives.
"Flashing capes and sweaty bodies overcame the darkness of winter
nights," Stever writes. "We watched for the 'armpit claw,' someone
'skinning the cat,' the 'cobra clutch,' and the ultimate, 'Tree of Woe.'"
Growing
Up on the Mississippi is Stever's first book, though he
says he has already finished his next one. It began as a Christmas present for
his children. He gave them each a bound collection of stories from his
childhood "with the assumption that they couldn't all throw them all away
at once." These recollections led Stever to scrounge the Winona Newspaper
Project, an online repository of local newspaper archives, to learn about the
happenings that preceded and succeeded his youth. Some of his stories were published in the
Winona Post over the past years. Positive feedback from those pieces, and
pieces for Minnesota Moments Magazine, led him to take the plunge and compile a
full-length book.
Stever calls the book "a love affair with the town
and growing up." He adds, "I don't care whether I make a dime or not,
that's not the point." The point, Stever says, was to have fun and
"be a reflection for all kinds of people in Winona.
"These parts and pieces that I do, I'm sort of
giving back stuff that nobody else has done," he continues. "It's
something that Winona can have as part of their history and it doesn't get
lost." The research was intriguing,
Stever says. "It's sort of like doing an algebra project pulling all these
pieces out and putting them together." Putting his memories out in the
public view was affirming in the sense that people confirmed that Stever was
remembering things right, that they share those memories and moments, he
explains.
When asked if he notices a difference when he returns to
Winona now. Stever says, "I'd ask if there was a cohesiveness to
neighborhoods." He recalls all of the children in his neighborhood eating
Mulligan Stew at Hobo Days every year. That and other traditions have been lost
to time. As a society, Americans have become more separated, Stever says.
Stever, a former principal, now resides in Lakeville and still substitute teaches.
He draws on that experience in his analysis of modern social history. "A
lot of people are searching. When I see those kids before me every single day,
they are really searching. They wish somebody would lay it out there for them a
little bit. They're not having any real communication, they're not having any
real experiences, they're not going out in the woods. I'm trying to reaffirm
that it's okay to do that."
If you have questions about the event, please contact
Joan at the library,
at 645-1802.
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