Iowa Life Episode 202

[Charity Nebbe] Coming up on this episode of Iowa Life, we'll meet Griff II, an English bulldog and live mascot for Drake University.

[Announce] He is kind of the living embodiment of what it means to be a Drake Bulldog.

[Charity Nebbe] We'll learn about Appanoose County history through the creation of a 96ft tapestry.

[Announce] I hope you walk in the door and go, oh my gosh.

[Charity Nebbe] And will be inspired by a new generation of poets.

[Announce] All of us have the poems. We're all feeling them. And that's why we feel poetry when we hear it and we read it.

[Charity Nebbe] It's all coming up next on Iowa Life.

[Funders] Funding for Iowa Life is provided by.

[Funders] The Pella Roll Screen Foundation is a proud supporter of Iowa PBS. Pella Windows and Doors strives to better our communities and build a better tomorrow.

[Funders] And by the Lainie Grimm Fund for Inclusive Programing at the Iowa PBS Foundation.

[Charity Nebbe] Hi, I'm Charity Nebbe, and this is Iowa Life. Centerville is the seat of Appanoose County in southern Iowa. For a town of about 5000 people, it will exceed all of your expectations. The largest town square in the state is alive with activity, charm, and a rich history. On today's show, we will learn more about Centerville. But before we do that, we're going to meet Griff II.

[Charity Nebbe] He is the living mascot of Drake University in Des Moines, a place where school spirit runs deep, rooted in a tradition that's more than a century old.

[Announce] It takes a really special and unique dog to do this job, and I think it's something that's very unique for Drake University to have a live mascot.

[Announce] Keep it up, keep it up. We give this little love that. Oh my God.

[Announce] Because we are the Bulldogs, we can have an actual live animal to represent the university. All right, all right.

[Announce] Ready? Three. Two. One. Here. Thank you. Thank you.

[Announce] Oh, yeah. He is kind of the living embodiment of what it means to be a Drake bulldog.

[Announce] That he is Des Moines hometown dog.

[Announce] Brings back.

[Charity Nebbe] Griff is Drake University's beloved live mascot. His story begins with John Griffith, the athletic director who founded the Drake Relays. He often brought his Bulldogs to the stadium, prompting the Des Moines Register to rename the athletes from the Drakes. Yes, that's right, they used to be male ducks. The changed to the Bulldogs in 1908. Fast forward to 2009, when a dog named Porterhouse won the beautiful Bulldog contest.

[Charity Nebbe] He became the unofficial mascot, bringing his charm to campus events through 2013. In 2015, Drake University launched their official Live Mascot program with the help of Aaron Bell, Porter House's owner. That's when Griff arrived on the scene. Now, Griff II carries on this legacy, connecting the past to the present and bringing the Drake community together in the cutest way possible.

[Announce] I just adore dogs. Every dog. I love big dogs. I've always wanted a bulldog. We've had about 35 different foster dogs through the house, and then we've owned a number of them as well. He is very much a part of our family. He lives with me. He lives with my family. He is 100%. A huge, important piece of this family.

[Announce] Here we go. Yeah. About my kids. Adore him. We all love him very much.

[Announce] We're on the move a lot. He gets bathed about once a week.

[Announce] He always has to be clean and and looking very fresh. We get it all clean. He represents the university and everything he does. We're involved in everything that happens on campus. No two days are the same.

[Announce] Who stay. We do a lot of photo shoots. Video shoots? It's just grown so much that finally I was able to get an intern for the live mascot program, which has been amazing.

[Announce] It's just really special to see how much one dog can do for a university, and how special Drake is, because we're one of the few schools that has a live mascot, both in the country and especially in Iowa.

[Announce] Show off these muscles.

[Announce] Come here. Come here.

[Announce] You look good in that. Come here.

[Announce] Come here. All the way. Put your butt down.

[Announce] Put your butt down.

[Announce] Go! Put your butt down! There you go.

[Announce] You stay. I think a lot of people would be surprised at how much effort and hard work goes into this. Good job. That's so good, bud.

[Announce] Come on.

[Announce] You're all done. You know, there's a lot of pressure to be a good representative of Drake. It's a it's a huge responsibility to be the voice of Drake. He's with me most hours of the day.

[Announce] To have visitors on campus that we have to greet.

[Announce] The night.

[Announce] We have, admissions visits. We do a lot of recruiting for the university.

[Announce] So organizations that put things on on campus, which is nonstop. They often want Griff there to interact with people that come.

[Announce] Hi.

[Announce] Great. Hi.

[Announce] Oh. Every single day that I have him on campus, which is just about every day I hear over and over again. Oh, this made my day so much better. Or. Or I needed this today. Or for coming. I need good luck on my test.

[Announce] We built a website to track Griff around campus.

[Announce] He really does mean a lot to these students and to everybody in the Drake community. And.

[Announce] I definitely think that a lot of students view Griff as their dog. A lot of them say they miss their dogs at home, just like I do, and so they have the chance to pet Griff and see their dog here on campus. But it's really rewarding to see how happy that Griff is able to make everyone.

[Announce] You're totally by me. I love I hope he's asleep. He's sleeping. This is me in class this morning.

[Announce] We do a lot in the community. Oh, he's going to get himself out, apparently. Griff, give us back. Pet Food Drive is an annual initiative that was started with Griff one the OG.

[Announce] Lots of boxes. Come on.

[Announce] We gotta take care of you. That first year and we got maybe, maybe 100 pounds of food. And since then, we have just gone big and we've had over 130,000 pounds of pet food donated for pets in need in the Des Moines community. All of the food that's collected is donated to the Pet Project Midwest, and they are a local pet food pantry.

[Announce] And their mission is to keep loved pets in their homes where they are loved, rather than surrendered to shelters due to an inability to feed them. It makes a huge difference to pets in this community and keeps dogs out of shelters. Hi, my name. You are so Cute! We love the Grand Blue Mile. It is such a fun community event.

[Announce] That this year wanted to.

[Announce] It's a chance for us to be around the Des Moines community, people that are affiliated with Drake, but also people that have no connection to Drake other than the fact that they showed up for the Grand Blue Mile. It's a great opportunity for us to interact with people from all over the community.

[Announce] Who he is a huge source of pride for Drake University.

[Announce] She does so much work for Drake, so much behind the scenes that a lot of people don't even realize they. Congratulations. I'll see you soon. She's running all his social media pages. She's making sure that he's cared for and making sure that he has breaks and making sure that he's healthy and safe. And that's a big undertaking for one person to do with one dog that serves a university of 3000 people plus the community.

[Announce] Having a unifying figure is more important now than ever. We're living in very divided times politically, and there's just a lot of negativity. But there is nothing negative about Griff with the press. They actually.

[Announce] I do believe deep in my core that this program is making a difference.

[Announce] Do all of you know that story about the Underground Railroad in Cincinnati? The story goes that well, there is an underground tunnel from the creek that separates Missouri and Iowa.

[Charity Nebbe] Every place has a story. Over the past ten years, a group of 67 artists and needle workers have dedicated themselves to telling the story of Centerville, Iowa. Piecing it together line by line, stitch by stitch for the entire community to enjoy.

[Announce] Oh, I think when I came to live in this area, I would go and visit families and I would always see this lovely woman in the background and stitching away, and I'd ask what she was doing, or she's making quilts for her grandchildren. Well, how wonderful. But imagine what all that wonderful female talent can do for the whole community.

[Announce] And they've done it.

[Charity Nebbe] Originally from Wales, Enfys McMurry moved to Iowa with her husband and fell in love with the area. So much so she wrote a book about it. Centerville a Mid-American saga.

[Announce] My love affair with Centerville started out. I would hear stories of events that had happened in Centerville, a lot of which I thought, this can't be right. I go home to Wales every so often, and my two cousins took me to a place called Fishguard on the Welsh coast.

[Charity Nebbe] They went to see the last invasion tapestry. It tells the story of the last time French troops invaded Britain. Enfys was inspired.

[Announce] And I said, why not do a community one? All you are brilliant talents with needles and needlework. One woman, who everyone had told me in town was the best needle woman. She said, if you think we're capable of this, you've lost your marbles. And she walked out. I know this.

[Charity Nebbe] After some deliberation, retired schoolteacher Debbie Robinson raised her hand and started recruiting.

[Announce] We didn't know what we were really getting into. I called several people that I knew that were interested. Sandy Nam said, well, does it involve quilting? And it didn't at the time. And I said, yes. And she said, well, I'll quilt whatever you need. Elaine Spencer. She says, Debbie, you know those tattered medallions I make all the time.

[Announce] She said, do you need some of those for the tapestry? Then, Gene, Zapital. She said, I'll draw all your garlands. Then I said, oh, I was hoping that you'd say that.

[Announce] I was kind of a naysayer at first because I kept thinking, how are we going to render these? How are we going to get from one point to another point? And I have to admit, when I did the first one, I thought, oh, this is going to take us a lifetime.

[Charity Nebbe] They worked alone or gathered in groups. People donated money to pay for supplies. Each panel features a moment in county history from Enfys’ book surrounded by wildflowers of the region, farm and coal mining tools, country of origin flags of immigrants, settlers and brass coal miners. Tags.

[Announce] History just made itself happen for us on the on the panel.

[Charity Nebbe] Women's suffrage fires, the flu epidemic, a presidential visit, a jetliner crash, 52 panels in all.

[Charity Nebbe] Before stitching could begin. An artist had to come up with a drawing.

[Announce] I would go to the book first, read whatever it was that she had in it, and I would go through everything I could find from there. I would try to put this together in my head and say, how am I going to illustrate something like this? When you think of the Normandy invasion, you've got boats, soldiers, marines coming out into the water.

[Announce] You have guns. Do you have. And I couldn't. I couldn't feature drawing, that kind of thing. But I thought of what was happening at home during the Normandy invasion. Jan van der Linden is a watercolorist, and she. She did this. Like, right now I'm blending these. And so I've got the purple that I want on top. And now I have a lighter lavender.

[Announce] And I'm going to put another light lighter color lavender under that. And then I will evolve into yellow. And it's supposed to look like the sky lying on the artist's rendering of plane oil.

[Announce] It was intimidating to me, though, to see someone like Sue Keller, Sue Sacco, that, their talent is so unbelievable. And then I would look at mine and say, oh, dear, I don't know, but but you just keep going. This is just kind of something that's bigger than yourself to be able to do the needlework. That's just the small part.

[Announce] You know, the artistry, the artwork that's involved, the whole vision of what it's supposed to look like is overwhelming. I just keep plugging away at it one stitch at a time.

[Announce] So now we're trying to sort out our mess, ripping panels apart that are were used to be in the right spot but aren't in the right spot now. Bonnie's ripping. These guys are hunting, and the rest of us are kind of arguing where we think they go.

[Charity Nebbe] The finished tapestry is 96ft long. It will be displayed in the packed office on the southwest corner of the Centerville Square.

[Announce] I hope you walk in the door and go, oh my gosh, can you believe this? The people in this town made this beautiful stitching.

[Announce] What is all this?

[Announce] And start reading about it and learn the history and grow. To appreciate artwork and needlework and their community and get involved.

[Announce] When we started this, I did not have grandchildren and now the oldest one is 11. I just hope someday she comes and looks at the tapestry and says, my grandma did that. Exactly. I agree perfect.  

[Charity Nebbe] Today is Pancake day. It's a celebration of Centerville pride and camaraderie. It started as a small gathering back in 1949, but it has grown into a major annual event that brings together thousands of locals and visitors. There is a whole lot going on, but the best part is still the free pancakes.

[Announce]  How many would you like?

[Charity Nebbe] Pancake day began 75 years ago as a way for local manufacturers to thank their employees. That spirit of giving back to the community laid the foundation for a full on festival with a pageant, a parade, and endless stacks of pancakes.

[Announce] Pancake day is about friends and family just as much as it is about the pancakes and the sirup. It's about getting together with people you haven't seen for years. You're your schoolmates, your friends, your family. The the cousin that went overseas. That's finally back. As my dad said, it's a tradition. Tyler, you have to flip pancakes at least once.

[Announce] And I can proudly say I've done it about 4 or 5 times.

[Announce] We have quite the assembly line of griddles. There are 21 griddles going at any given time. About 100 volunteers under the pancake tent, and they are, returning volunteers that have it down pat, and they can get thousands of people through that tent every hour. It's really cool to see who's volunteering, because there are kids as young as nine years old that are helping run batter.

[Announce] There are people that come back just for Pancake Day each year because their family loved it, and they help out Pancake Day.

[Announce] As a kid, you're thinking about pancakes and even pancakes as a dog. When you're volunteering, you're watching the flying all the way around the square and you're like, well, it's going to be a while. Well, the family's been coming for all 75 years, and I've been 69 of them. This is our homecoming every year, our annual celebration. Like every town.

[Announce] I've already seen, like, eight people this morning from 50 years ago.

[Announce] The pancakes are free. But beyond that, a lot of our activities are free. So the goal is if a family wants to come up here for a whole day and spend some time downtown together, they don't have to spend money if they don't want to. So I think it's just such a positive atmosphere and a celebration of a small community, that it really makes people.

[Announce] Want to come back year after year. Who doesn't like pancakes? It's like everybody loves pancakes.

[Charity Nebbe] Thanks in large part to the world famous Iowa Writers Workshop, our state is known as a home for great literature and incredible writers. Some legends, others aspiring. Our capacity for cultivating talent and fostering creativity is on display in Des Moines, where poets travel from around the country to connect and hone their craft at an event called Poetry Palooza.

[Announce] It's hard to imagine tomorrow when today it looks like a mountain and you're sitting on the foots and bare feet and being told to climb. One of the biggest things is people like to think poetry has to be a certain way, but it really doesn't. And it's very, very free. We all write poems.

[Announce] To explain to you that sometimes people hurt people just to hurt people.

[Announce] The people who sit down and pick up a pen and decide to write a poem are the people who have poems knocking at their door, saying they need to be on a page. It's difficult to tell between.

[Announce] Flesh from fabric.

[Announce] And they're the people who answer the door and go, all right, this is your home now. Do you know how it feels to snitch on your own father, to break up a bond that you thought would last forever? But all of us have the poems. We're all feeling them. And that's why we feel poetry when we hear it and when.

[Announce] We read it.

[Announce] We are.

[Announce] Poetry across Iowa is thriving, and a lot of the work I've gotten to do since moving here is bridging the gap between page poets and spoken word poets. And when I say page poet, I mean it's written for the page for a book. And then there's spoken word poets who are performers and spoken word. It is meant to be heard and listened to and engaged with.

[Announce] A poem for the end of the world. 

[Announce] Poetry palooza truly is just a celebration of poetry in not just Iowa, but across the country. We bring in poets who have national recognition. It's an education experience, too. We're we're providing workshops for the community, but also we're going into the schools. We're sending our featured poets into schools, not just here in Des Moines, but across the state.

[Announce] It's just a really great way to uplift our Iowa and national poets, as well as just amplify the community and show people that we're here. We have space for you. We want you to join us.

[Announce] I can't remember a time that I didn't have poetry as part of my life. So we are thinking about a place I went to high school and Iowa City. And like, you can't walk four states without bumping into a writer. So I was really lucky to be raised in a way where I understood the writers were people, and some of them were super famous and became poet laureate of the United States, and some of them just did this thing, in a way that might be comparable to just playing pickup basketball every other Sunday, you know?

[Announce] And that lowered the stakes for me. It was something that I like to do, and I just did it, and I kept doing it. And I've had some success with it. Writers thrive on communities, and we read each other our poems and we comment on each other's poems. We support each other, usually a very kind of private endeavor.

[Announce] You just don't really make any money ever, as a poet. And so the real rewards are the beneficial effects of reading poetry and then writing it. I want you to think about your least dominant of the five major senses. I think there are a lot of reasons that you might want to come to the session. One of the key reasons would be to broaden your skills.

[Announce] Another one is to just practice differently than you might. We all get stuck in ruts, and it's just useful sometimes to get different points of view.

[Announce] We get a good mix of, I would say like 30 and 40 year olds, and then we also get a good mix of 50, 60 or 70 year old. But we also with the education piece, we get so many awesome like high school students involved.

[Announce] So we are out at Jester Park and we're doing a program for high school students on, on on poetry and mostly texture in creative writing. So thinking about how how you create language in order to make people feel something and have kind of a mood. So they're out right now. Looking around, getting ideas and they're going to be writing an original poem here and in short order.

[Announce] Now, trees and frogs. Crickets.

[Announce] Great kind of scarecrow.

[Announce] I ate before for dignity to decay, to preschool. Kids are incredibly, like, spontaneous and imaginative. It's almost like we have it. We're born with it. Then there just comes this kind of unlearning that happens where we get tamped down and told, no, don't you know, don't say that or that's not the right way. Or and people get more and more self-conscious about language.

[Announce] Honestly, I think there's a kind of connection, especially when you're in your teen years. There's a kind of way of expressing yourself that allows you to just like free flow. They can, like, wield that emotion and show you what they're feeling or they can just do it for themselves and release it, which is good because that's healthy. I think we're so busy with our lives.

[Announce] We were so caught up in the city life that it's just busyness and and we're we're kind of like, distracted. This is a way to kind of find centeredness and to find a place of calm. And that, I think, leads to better revelations in poetry.

[Announce] I think there's a common misconception that poetry is complicated. So I always try to put contemporary poetry in front of people first because it's it's shocking to see, you know, your own experience reflected in a poem. He couldn't live that way. And that's why we need poets from all walks of life, because everyone is narrating a kind of different experience.

[Announce] Events like this, where we get to come together as both poets and then as people who are like, just interested, like, oh, what is this? And so these events are the moments where you get to meet seasoned poets who who have books out, and they and they do this as a living. And then you also get to meet someone like, I've never been in front of a mic and I've never shared my poems before.

[Announce] Right. You get to have the whole range. And what it does is it creates this community where I think you want to, like, put your hands in the air a little bit, like, just like stretch. Those who might be more experience are kind of reaching back and pulling us forward. And that is essential, especially if we want this art form to to continue to exist and to be seen and heard and appreciated.

[Announce] After which nothing was ever the same to.

[Charity Nebbe] That's all for this week. Thank you for joining me. As we explore Iowa's capacity for generosity, creativity and connection. I'm Charity Nebbe. See you next time for more Iowa Life.

[Funders] Funding for Iowa Life is provided by.

[Funders] The Pella Roll Screen Foundation is a proud supporter of Iowa PBS. Pella Windows and Doors strives to better our communities and build a better tomorrow.

[Funders] And by the Lainie Grimm Fund for Inclusive Programing at the Iowa PBS Foundation.]