bluegrass yacht and country club membership cost

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club Hendersonville TN | Membership Cost, Amenities, History, What To Know When Visiting

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Nestled along the picturesque shores of Old Hickory Lake in Hendersonville, Tennessee, Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club is a haven of luxury and leisure. With its timeless charm and pristine surroundings, this exclusive club has become a beloved destination for those seeking an exquisite blend of southern hospitality, championship golf, and waterfront elegance.

Whether you’re a golf enthusiast, a boating aficionado, or simply someone who appreciates the finer things in life, Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club offers a world-class experience that captures the essence of Tennessee’s beauty and hospitality. Welcome to a place where sophistication meets Southern charm, and where memories are made on the water and on the fairways. Welcome to Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club.

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club History and Founding

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club has a rich history that dates back to its founding in 1951. This prestigious club, located in Hendersonville, Tennessee, was established with the vision of creating a premier destination for golf and leisure on the shores of Old Hickory Lake.

The renowned architect Joe Lee was instrumental in bringing this vision to life. Joe Lee was a highly respected figure in the world of golf course design, and his expertise and creativity played a pivotal role in shaping Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club. With a keen eye for blending the natural beauty of the Tennessee landscape with challenging golf holes, he crafted an 18-hole championship golf course that has become a point of pride for the club.

Over the years, Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club has evolved into a multifaceted recreational oasis, offering not only exceptional golf but also a full array of amenities for its members. From its elegant clubhouse to its marina facilities for boating enthusiasts, Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club continues to thrive as a beacon of Southern hospitality, where the spirit of camaraderie and a love for the outdoors converge.

Today, the legacy of Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club endures as a testament to its founders’ commitment to providing a first-class experience for its members and guests. With its rich history and the timeless design of Joe Lee, this club remains a treasured destination for those seeking a unique blend of leisure and luxury in the heart of Tennessee.

Famous Golf Tournament held at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club

There is no famous golf tournament held at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club in Hendersonville, TN. The club is a private club and does not host any major professional or amateur golf tournaments. However, the club does host a number of member-guest tournaments and other smaller events throughout the year.

In 2019, the club hosted the Elite @ Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club, a two-day junior golf tournament for elite golfers in Tennessee. The tournament was part of the Sneds Tour, a junior golf tour in the state.

The club also hosts a number of other golf events throughout the year, such as the Bluegrass Cup, the Member-Guest Tournament, and the Ladies’ Invitational. These events are all open to members and their guests, and they provide a fun and competitive environment for golfers of all skill levels.

While Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club does not host any famous golf tournaments, it is a beautiful and challenging golf course that has been enjoyed by golfers of all skill levels for many years.

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club Membership Costs and Dues

The estimated monthly membership costs and dues for Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club in Hendersonville, TN are as follows:

Individual: $300 Couple: $450 Family: $600

There are also rumors that the costs may be slightly higher, at $350 for an individual membership, $500 for a couple membership, and $650 for a family membership.

Here are some additional things to keep in mind when considering the costs and dues of a membership at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club:

Membership type: The type of membership you choose will have a significant impact on the overall cost. For example, a family membership is more expensive than an individual membership, but it allows all members of your family to access the club’s facilities.

Initiation fee: The initiation fee is a one-time fee that is charged to all new members. This fee can be significant, so it is important to factor it into your budget when considering a membership.

Monthly dues: Monthly dues are the ongoing cost of membership. This fee covers access to all of the club’s facilities and amenities.

Additional costs: In addition to the initiation fee and monthly dues, there may be other costs associated with your membership, such as food and beverage charges, golf cart rental fees, and tournament entry fees.

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club Amenities

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club in Hendersonville, Tennessee, offered a wide range of amenities to its members.

Here are some of the amenities commonly associated with Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club:

Championship Golf Course: The club boasts an 18-hole championship golf course designed by renowned golf course architect Joe Lee. The course offers a challenging and scenic golfing experience for members.

Clubhouse: The clubhouse serves as the central hub for social gatherings, dining, and events. It typically includes dining facilities, lounges, and event spaces for various occasions.

Dining: Members can enjoy fine dining experiences with a range of culinary options, from casual fare to upscale dining. The clubhouse often features restaurants and bars with beautiful views of the golf course or the lake.

Tennis Facilities: Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club often has tennis courts for members who enjoy the sport. These courts may be well-maintained and available for casual play or organized events.

Swimming Pool: Many country clubs include swimming pools as part of their amenities, providing a refreshing way for members and their families to relax and stay active during the summer months.

Marina Facilities: Given its location on the shores of Old Hickory Lake, the club may offer marina facilities for boating enthusiasts, including boat storage, boat slips, and access to the lake for various water activities.

Fitness Center: Some clubs provide fitness facilities equipped with exercise equipment and spaces for classes and personal training.

Social and Event Spaces: In addition to golf and sports amenities, private clubs often offer event spaces for weddings, parties, meetings, and other special occasions.

Social Events: Country clubs frequently host a variety of social events and activities, such as themed parties, holiday celebrations, and special member events throughout the year.

Junior Programs: Family-oriented clubs may offer junior golf and tennis programs, as well as other activities for children and teens.

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club Event Information and Dining Options

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club, like many private country clubs, offers a variety of events and occasions that members can celebrate. These events often cater to different interests and provide opportunities for socializing and enjoying the club’s amenities. While specific events can vary from year to year, here are some common types of events that you might find at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club:

Holiday Celebrations: The club may host special events and parties for holidays like Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, Easter, and more. These events often feature festive decorations, themed menus, and entertainment.

Themed Dinners: Clubs frequently organize themed dinner nights where members can enjoy unique cuisines or experiences. Themes may range from Italian and Mexican nights to seafood buffets and steak nights.

Wine Tastings: Wine enthusiasts may have the opportunity to attend wine-tasting events, where they can sample a selection of wines and learn about wine pairing with gourmet dishes.

Live Music and Entertainment: The club may host live music performances, bands, or DJs for members to enjoy. Music events can range from jazz and classical performances to dance parties.

Golf Tournaments: Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club often hosts various golf tournaments, including member-guest tournaments, charity events, and club championships. These are great opportunities for golf enthusiasts to compete and socialize.

Tennis Tournaments: If the club has tennis facilities, they may organize tennis tournaments and events for members to showcase their skills and enjoy friendly competition.

Junior Programs: Families with children may find a range of events and activities designed for juniors, such as kids’ camps, junior golf or tennis clinics, and youth-themed parties.

Social Mixers: Clubs often arrange social mixers and happy hours where members can meet and mingle with fellow club members in a relaxed atmosphere.

Charity Galas: Some clubs host charity galas and fundraisers to support local causes. These events typically include dinner, auctions, and entertainment.

Member Birthdays and Anniversaries: Members’ birthdays and wedding anniversaries may be celebrated with special events, cake-cutting ceremonies, or personalized dining experiences.

Club Championships: For golfers and tennis players, club championships offer a chance to compete against fellow members for prestigious titles within the club.

Private Parties: Members can host their own private events, such as weddings, receptions, birthday parties, and family gatherings, in the club’s event spaces.

Dining options at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club can vary, but private country clubs often offer a range of dining experiences to cater to their members’ preferences. While specific menus and offerings may change over time, here are some common dining options you might find at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club:

Formal Dining: Many private clubs have a formal dining room where members can enjoy upscale, fine dining experiences. These dining rooms often offer a diverse menu with a focus on gourmet cuisine and a selection of wines. Members can typically expect an elegant and refined atmosphere in the formal dining area.

Casual Dining: In addition to formal dining, clubs often have more relaxed dining options, such as a grill room or lounge. These areas provide a more laid-back atmosphere and a menu that includes a variety of dishes, including sandwiches, salads, burgers, and more. Casual dining is great for members looking for a less formal meal.

Outdoor Dining: If the club has outdoor spaces, they may offer outdoor dining options. Members can enjoy meals on a patio or terrace with beautiful views of the golf course or lake. Outdoor dining can be particularly popular during the warmer months.

Specialty Nights: Some clubs host themed dining nights or special culinary events. These can include wine and dining evenings, seafood buffets, steak nights, and ethnic cuisine nights. Specialty nights add variety to the dining experience.

Private Dining: Private dining rooms are often available for members who wish to host private parties, business meetings, or special gatherings. These rooms provide an intimate setting for members and their guests.

Catering Services: Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club may provide catering services for both on-site and off-site events. This allows members to enjoy the club’s cuisine at their preferred location, whether it’s a private event, a wedding, or a corporate gathering.

Bar and Lounge: Clubs typically have a bar or lounge area where members can enjoy drinks and socialize. This area often includes a bar menu with a selection of beverages, including cocktails, wine, and beer.

Family Dining: Some clubs offer family-friendly dining options that cater to members of all ages. These menus often include kid-friendly dishes to accommodate families dining together.

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club Dress Code and Guest Policy

private country clubs like Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club typically have specific dress codes and guest policies in place to maintain a certain level of decorum and to ensure a pleasant and respectful environment for members and guests.

Here’s a general overview of what you might expect:

Dress Code:

Country clubs often have a dress code for various areas within the club, including the golf course, dining areas, and common spaces. Here are some common elements of a country club dress code:

Golf Course: Proper golf attire is typically required on the golf course. This typically includes collared shirts, slacks or golf shorts, and golf-appropriate footwear. Denim, cargo shorts, and athletic wear are usually discouraged.

Formal Dining: In formal dining areas, a dress code is often enforced. This typically means business casual or formal attire, such as collared shirts, dresses, and dress shoes. Jackets and ties may be required for certain events.

Casual Dining and Clubhouse: Casual dining areas and the clubhouse may have a more relaxed dress code, allowing casual attire like golf shirts, khaki shorts, and casual shoes. However, swimwear, workout attire, and flip-flops are generally discouraged.

Swimming Pool: Swimwear is typically allowed at the pool area, but cover-ups are often required when moving between the pool and other club facilities.

Tennis and Fitness Facilities: Appropriate athletic wear is generally expected in these areas.

Guest Policy:

Private country clubs often have policies regarding guests. These policies can vary but typically include the following points:

Member Sponsorship: Guests are typically required to be sponsored by a club member. The sponsoring member is responsible for the conduct of their guests.

Limitations on Frequency: There may be limitations on how often a guest can visit the club or participate in certain activities.

Registration: Guests are often required to register upon arrival and may be asked to sign in at the front desk or golf shop.

Guest Fees: Clubs may charge guest fees for the use of facilities or participation in activities. These fees can vary depending on the guest’s activities and the club’s policies.

Guest Behavior: Guests are generally expected to adhere to the club’s rules and dress code. Disruptive behavior or violations of the club’s policies may result in the guest being asked to leave.

Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club in Hendersonville, Tennessee, embodies the essence of Southern elegance, offering a splendid blend of recreational amenities, exquisite dining experiences, and a welcoming community of members. Nestled along the scenic shores of Old Hickory Lake and graced with a championship golf course designed by renowned architect Joe Lee, the club provides a sanctuary for those seeking refined leisure and sporting excellence.

Whether you’re teeing off on the lush fairways, enjoying a gourmet meal in the elegant dining rooms, or partaking in the many social events, Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club stands as a testament to timeless hospitality and a place where cherished memories are created. It’s a destination where tradition meets modern comfort, inviting you to embark on a journey of relaxation, camaraderie, and recreation. Welcome to Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club, where every visit is an opportunity to experience the finest in Southern living.

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How much does it cost to join the Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club?

Answered by Craig Sanders

As a professional golfer, I recently looked into joining the Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club. I was pleasantly surprised by the range of membership options they offer. To become a member, there is a one-time joining fee. The exact amount of the fee is not mentioned on their website, but it is best to inquire directly with the club for this information.

Once you have paid the joining fee, you will be required to pay monthly member dues. The dues vary depending on the category of membership you choose. Bluegrass offers membership categories such as social, young executive, and golf, among others. The monthly dues for these categories range from $165 to $458.

The club’s pricing structure seems to cater to a wide range of individuals, making it more accessible compared to other country clubs. This is particularly interesting considering the average member age at Bluegrass is only 41. It seems like a place where younger professionals can enjoy the benefits of a country club without breaking the bank.

While I cannot provide the exact joining fee, I can say that the monthly member dues at Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club range from $165 to $458, depending on the category of membership you choose. This club seems to be a great option for those looking for a diverse and affordable country club experience.

City Lifestyle

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Featured Article

Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club

A Community Treasure Shines in the City By the Lake

Article by Rick Murray

Photography by Rick Murray and Provided

Originally published in Hendersonville Lifestyle

Since 1951, much of the social life in Hendersonville has revolved around Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club. Founded 18 years before the incorporation of the city of Hendersonville, the club offers a friendly and welcoming environment for members and guests to enjoy a wide range of entertainment, recreation, dining and community activities.

Most of the club’s facilities are situated on over 100 acres of rolling grounds that was once the plantation home of Revolutionary War veteran Hubbard Saunders. Saunders was also a Methodist minister who founded the Saundersville Methodist Church, which still exists today, just a short distance from Bluegrass.

Bluegrass offers its members a number of amenities, including an 18-hole championship golf course and pro shop, a fully equipped tennis center, a junior Olympic size pool with locker rooms and showers and a full-service marina, featuring 68 covered boat slips ranging in size from 24 to 52 feet.

At the core of the Bluegrass experience is the world class dining and afterhours entertainment offered in the Harris restaurant and the adjacent 51 Lounge. Both the restaurant and the lounge offer stunning views of the scenic golf course that create a relaxing atmosphere for dinner and drinks with friends and family. In addition, Bluegrass offers an outdoor patio complete with large screen TVs, comfortable lounges and two fire pits that help to make every visit a memorable occasion.

“Our menu is planned and prepared daily from custom recipes developed by Executive Chef Donald Ferguson,” says Membership Director Samantha Starbuck. “Steaks, seafood, custom dishes – we have it all. From breakfast through dinner, our entrees are unparalleled in Hendersonville.”

While still member-owned, Bluegrass is currently leased to and operated by Dallas-based ClubCorp. This arrangement allows Bluegrass to retain the warm, comfortable feel of a locally owned facility, while enabling it to take advantage of the resources of the nation’s largest operator of private clubs.

ClubCorp operates more than 200 private golf and country clubs spread across the United States. Membership in Bluegrass provides access to the ClubCorp Network that features over 300 private clubs and resort properties across the world.

Recently, the club underwent a multimillion-dollar series of state-of-the-art upgrades. From redesigned dining and meeting rooms to a renovated swim complex to new golf greens and fairways, Bluegrass offers some of the most innovative and attractive facilities of any country club in the nation.

Currently, Bluegrass has 740 members spread across multiple categories including social, young executive and golf. After a one-time joining fee, monthly member dues range from $165 to $458.

Unlike the demographics of many other country clubs, the average member age at Bluegrass is only 41. This younger median age, coupled with the club’s extensive recreational facilities, has helped shape it into a very family-friendly destination.

Throughout its storied history, Bluegrass has played host to a number of celebrities. The list of notable visitors includes entertainers Vince Gill and Glen Campbell, professional athletes Lou Graham and Mickey Mantle and dignitaries Col. Harlan Sanders and Rev. Billy Graham.

The club has also had several famous members, including Reba McEntire, William Lee Golden, Richard Sterban, Roy Orbison and Conway Twitty.

Although Bluegrass is a private club, many of its facilities are available for hosting events for area corporate, nonprofit and school organizations. From meetings to catered luncheons to golf tournaments, Bluegrass is the destination of choice for Hendersonville area event planners.

“Unlike many other country clubs, you don’t have to be a Bluegrass member to host an event here,” says Jennifer Turrill, private event director. “We are happy to open up our facilities to support the needs of our community.”

Many different organizations make regular use of the Bluegrass facilities, including the Hendersonville Area Chamber of Commerce, the Junior Service League and the Hendersonville Rotary Club.

Bluegrass also serves as the home of several HolidayFest events each year, including the Garlands and Glitter Fashion Show, the Holiday Tablescape Fashion Show, the Bows & Ballcaps Breakfast with Santa and the St. Nicholas Ball.

Additionally, the club hosts many additional private events each year, including wedding receptions, reunions and awards celebrations.

“Hosting public and private events is not just good for our community, it is also good for club growth,” adds Samantha. “Many of our members decided to join Bluegrass after having attended an event.”

All in all, the club’s hospitality and community service have established it as a Hendersonville community treasure. If it is happening in the City by the Lake, it is likely happening at Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club.

550 Johnny Cash Pkwy.,

Hendersonville, TN

615.824.6528

ClubCorp.com/Clubs/Bluegrass-Yacht-Country-Club

Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club

Review Highlights

“ This club has really updated itself with golf course renovations and a (soon to be) complete renovation of all the dining rooms and locker room areas. ” in 3 reviews

“ Ample free parking, and beautiful views of the golf course . ” in 3 reviews

“ We are new members as of May so we really do not know what the club looked like before the renovation but it is fabulous now. ” in 2 reviews

Location & Hours

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550 Johnny Cash Pkwy

Hendersonville, TN 37075

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Amenities and More

About the business.

The stately beauty of Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club and its lush, meticulously landscaped surroundings provide an exemplary private club experience within a tasteful, elegant setting. Championship golf, a sparkling marina, tennis and swimming top the list of club amenities. …

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Okay for a "Country Club - the prices are much steeper than they should be. I would note that my experience was several years ago- I have no idea why it is showing up now. Yes I would go again just to see if they have changed- but who knows? Also, I would definitely recommend checking out Harrodsburg and the Inn there. The food has always been phenomenal there- anyone know how COVID has affected them?

Horrible experience. Very bad GM named Ben. Has high turnover, fired some really good people who had been there for years over the phone! Fired one of the best chefs in town and now their food has gone horribly down hill. He's upped the membership costs and dues, he's upped the food costs, done away with discounts, he is everything wrong w country clubs. Trying to turn a nice club into a corporate profit at the memberships expense. I left and went to grasslands. This place is a joke.

I absolutely love this venue! I hadn't been here before I joined the Hendersonville Chamber of Commerce, and this is where they hold our monthly luncheons. The service is absolutely spectacular, and every single time I've been there I have had a different dish. Every single time it blows me away, it's so unique and delicious. It's an absolutely gorgeous building, surrounded by golf courses that are always bustling. The members at this location are wonderful people, it's a pleasure getting to see everyone every time. I can't wait for next month's visit!

See all photos from Taylor Brianne Smith, R. for Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club

I am no longer a member of the club I did stop by approximately six weeks ago to visit with the new manager everything seems to be going well and the club looks great but I cannot give a very accurate detailed opinion on the club any longer.

Julia and I are both members of the Bluegrass yacht and Country Club we very much enjoy being members now for almost 5 years and the cuisine is the most fantastic food offerings anywhere in Tennessee in our opinion never ever have we had such fine dining anywhere in all of Tennessee New York or Los Angeles the club is run professionally and very effectively we are treated personally and called by name buy every server and every person on the management team we are very proud and happy to be members of the Bluegrass yacht and Country Club in Hendersonville Tennessee and we have many friends that we have made over the Last 5 Years Julia and I enjoy everything about the club including the swimming pool which is open from May to late September many of the events have many many special events and a full calendar for everyone from children to full grown adults the golfing is fantastic even the even though we are not Avid golfers we know many people who are and the golfing is fantastic they just redid the entire Club remodeled 100% it's absolutely beautiful and they redid the golf course 100% about a year and two months ago so it's a fantastic Club I highly recommend membership to those who are interested in being a member of a fabulous and wonderful Country Club thank you very much we are very happy with every aspect of the club and the management team could not be better Kevin McCune is the general manager he takes control and everything works like clockwork on his watch and all of his subordinates follow his lead he does a fantastic job! Dr. Jonathan P singer Ph.D CEO and Julia altamar ex corporate executive for Sara Lee Corporation

We just moved to Hendersonville and love that we found the country club. We enjoy tons of family activities including the opening of the pool. I believe we have used the pool almost daily since the season opened. Love that there are life guards on duty always. I also joined the fitness truck trainers that the club hosts. We enjoy the dining as well! The unlimited pasta nights along with prime Night! Our kids have enjoyed the "cooking class" as well. Would recommend this place for all families as well.

Visiting from FL and dined with friends who are members here. We were very impressed. Staff was extremely courteous, and our server very attentive. Enjoyed the wedge salad with filet. Cooked to perfection, and served on the side in an iron skillet to keep warm. Decent wine pours. Ample free parking, and beautiful views of the golf course. Would definitely like to come back when we visit again in the future.

Golf course was good - was a little challenging as the outside of the greens were sod squares and if your ball landed just-right you were forced to get creative! Overall it was a decent round of golf . The pro-shop guys were downright amazing - nice, attentive and above and beyond service. Seriously, wish these guys were at our home course. Now - it's onto the food. We had dinner reservations and were clearly early and ahead of the normal Friday crowd. The food was ok - and I mean it, JUST OK. The bang bang shrimp was good, but VERY greasy. Our little one got chicken tenders that seemed to taste a little bit like DIRT (I have no idea how that could be, but it's true, they tasted like dirt). The waitress was lovely, but she was a bit overwhelmed or maybe that was her norm - she didn't think we'd gotten certain food items when they'd actually come out, been eaten and dishes were cleared by the time she popped back around. It was fine, but wasn't quite the stellar service we'd have expected after our service in other areas of the club. Overall, I was very happy to check the course out and if we're back in Nashville, we'll certainly give it a whirl again.

A great looking course in April!

I've seen a lot of changes in this place over the years. The renovation is absolutely gorgeous. It has become much more family friendly and the food is wonderful. We enjoy the atmosphere, both as a couple and a family. The pool has been great and the staff very attentive. We are happy with our decision to join.

Have eaten 3 times here in the past week to try out the new menu. Highly recommend Steak, Salmon and crab cakes most of all. Salads are fresh and I like the premixed dressing method being used. Hot Chicken was good but very different - would rather have Hattie B's style - just saying. New renovations are great all around. Great work Chef Donald!! Thanks to Janice for her ability to make everyone feel welcome.

Love Bluegrass! We almost joined before the renovations started. Came back once we saw how nice and updated it was going to look. We love going to the pool and being able to have food and drinks by the pool. We also love the family friendly atmosphere. Lots of things to do for both adults and kids.

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Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club

550 Johnny Cash Pkwy Hendersonville, TN 37075 Phone: 615-824-6566

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The stately beauty of Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club and its lush, meticulously landscaped surroundings provide an exemplary private club experience within a tasteful, elegant setting. Championship golf, a sparkling marina, tennis and swimming top the list of club amenities.

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Golf Course Info

• Course: 18 Holes
• Course Type: Private
• Opened: 1957
• Head Pro: Gary Head

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• Back Tees: 6650 Yards
• Back Slope: 129

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Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club is a private course available only to its members and their guests.

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550 Johnny Cash Pkwy, Hendersonville, TN 37075, United States Hendersonville, TN 37075

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Nashville memberships

By kywldcts1225 September 6, 2018 in Southeast

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Kywldcts1225.

My wife was recently offered a job in Nashville and we are considering the move. We drove down and visited and we will be living about 15 minutes (8 miles) from Gaylord Springs which seemed very nice when we drove through.

I'm retired and plan on spending a lot of time (daily) practicing and playing. The range and short game areas are extremely important to me and it would be a huge plus if there were some covered/heated bays for winter practice.

Any other recommendations for clubs in that area that are reasonable to join? Gaylord Springs is under $3k a year with no initiation fee which I find very reasonable, but cost isn't a huge concern if the amenities are worth it. A few thousand initiation wouldn't be a deal breaker, but $10-15k+ isn't something I'm willing to do.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

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Sep 10 2018

Sep 12 2018

Never played these or know the cost but check out Foxland Harbor and Fairvue Plantation.

gr8blueheronbird

Foxland and Fairvue just merged. Now called Tennessee Grasslands. They upped the membership fees now approaching $500.00 per month although you get 2 courses to play now. Not sure what initiation fee is but I'm guessing around $3k- $5k. It is appx 20-30 minutes away if you are located on south side of Old Hickory lake. I would look at Hermitage or Old Hickory Country club if I was the OP.

Would need a bit more information around your location, as an 8 mile radius is quite large with th potential recommendations. That said - Gaylord or what Blueheron mentioned would seem most logical.

Full membership to Grasslands will be $475.00/month + cart fee of $100.00 + $25.00 extra fee. So Make it $600.00 per month, not $500.00 as previously stated above.

If we decide to move we will be off of Bell Rd. backing up to the Percy Priest Lake area for at least a year until we learn the city and decide if we want to stay permanently.

Between Gaylord Springs, Hermitage, and Old Hickory which has the best practice facilities/course? Do they all stay pretty busy or would a member be able to jump on and play a few holes during non peak hours without a formal tee time? Are there more low handicap players at one over the others or groups who like to play for some money?

Best Practice facilities= Gaylord Springs. Both Gaylord and Hermitage are public courses but more spendy than most. Old Hickory is Private. Not sure about the amount of low handicappers at each course. Now that we know where you are going to live at, the closest course to you is actually Nashboro Village. That is a public course but not well kept and not in the best area.

I think your best bet is Hermitage as they have 2 courses to choose from and above average practice areas. You should get out and play each and make your own decision though. Good luck on the move!

What's Bluegrass like in Hendersonville? Only know of one person who worked there and he didn't say much about the course.

Best Practice facilities= Gaylord Springs. Both Gaylord and Hermitage are public courses but more spendy than most. Old Hickory is Private. Not sure about the amount of low handicappers at each course. Now that we know where you are going to live at, the closest course to you is actually Nashboro Village. That is a public course but not well kept and not in the best area.   I think your best bet is Hermitage as they have 2 courses to choose from and above average practice areas. You should get out and play each and make your own decision though. Good luck on the move!

Thanks. I saw Nashboro Village on the map, but it didn’t have the best reviews. Driving 15-20 minutes isn’t that big of a deal if it’s a step up. Just looking for a good mix between quality, affordability, and proximity.

I’ll definitely try to get out and play Gaylord Springs and Hermitage. I’d like to meet some people in the area and maybe find a few regulars to play with.

SouthPawVol

Tennessee Grasslands just priced me out. Have been a member at Foxland since May 2017. My dues increase would be >35% if I stayed ($320 --> $435). There were only 11(!) ELEVEN members in my member category (Jr Member, Family under 40 yo). Pretty brilliant of them. They can be greedy now, but with economy at all time high and their membership being as old as it is, I think they will regret this initial pricing structure at least for the younger demographic. Amazing how the golf industry clings to baby boomers with every last thread.....until they are gone....and the ones who have planned for the future reap the benefits of catering to my generation. Bluegrass here I come.

So tell me about Bluegrass. I see it, drive by it and see a hole or two but don't know how it stacks up to the other options in the area.

Gaylord is one of the best deals in the mid state, imo. For $3k to get that level of course and facility is great. That said they have a lot of tournaments out there and it’s open to the public. But the public never fills that place up because it’s like $70+ during the week for rounds. The course is challenging and greens have always been in good shape (haven’t played this year there).

Hermitage is my fav public course tho. Getting 2 courses that are always well kept are fantastic. That said, they get even more tournaments and lots of public play. But no clue what a membership includes or costs there.

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• 7 months later...

I just wanted to follow up with an update and ask for additional information. We did end up moving to Nashville, lived in the city for a few months, and then decided Hendersonville was a better fit. Our house out of state is under contract and about to sell and once it does I plan on joining a club. I’m just minutes from Bluegrass and fees seem pretty reasonable and considerably more affordable than Tennessee Grasslands. Does anyone know anything about the course or the atmosphere at the club?

Apparently not. I asked twice and got nothing. Let me know what you find out. I am about 30 minutes north of you.

I am interested in joining so I did a walk through with the membership director about a month ago. She offered me a free round to test out the course but I have not done that yet. It looks like a nice place(tight though) and some older fellows(in their 60's)with whom I know from church are members and seem to like it. Initiation fee is not much at $500.00. Then its $447.25 per month to walk on a full membership. $200 driving range fee and $35 handicap fee per year which are mandatory. Cart fee per month is $77.00. Food minimum of $150.00 per quarter plus additional surcharge of $25.00 month applies. If anyone has any questions or would like to join me to check it out, please advise.

> @gr8blueheronbird said:

> I am interested in joining so I did a walk through with the membership director about a month ago. She offered me a free round to test out the course but I have not done that yet. It looks like a nice place(tight though) and some older fellows(in their 60's)with whom I know from church are members and seem to like it. Initiation fee is not much at $500.00. Then its $447.25 per month to walk on a full membership. $200 driving range fee and $35 handicap fee per year which are mandatory. Cart fee per month is $77.00. Food minimum of $150.00 per quarter plus additional surcharge of $25.00 month applies. If anyone has any questions or would like to join me to check it out, please advise.

Are you talking about TN Grasslands or Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club with those price quotes?

> Bluegrass

Okay. I had a lower quote and was confused by your numbers, but I realized after I posted that I’m probably younger than you and qualify for one of the other membership categories.

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Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club Bluegrass Yacht & CC About

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Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club is a wedding ceremony and reception venue located in Henderson, Tennessee. This premier choice for a wedding celebration is set atop an 18-hole pristine golf course. The elegant setting and impeccable landscaping offer a sophisticated atmosphere for any wedding celebration. Facilities and Capacity Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club boasts a golf course with brand-new USGA greens, which makes for unmatched verdant green views. Indoor ceremonies or intimate gatherings, such as a rehearsal dinner, can take place in the Sunnyside Room, which occupies 1,584 square feet of event space and is attached to a covered patio. Together, the patio and Sunnyside Room have a maximum capacity of up to 150 guests. This room affords excellent views of the 18th hole through a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows. The patio comes equipped with fire pits. Indoor receptions can take place in the Cherry Hill Ballroom, which occupies 4,721 square feet of event space and has a maximum capacity of up to 300 guests. This handsome room features chic chandeliers, white ceilings, and an overall romantic atmosphere with a built-in bar.

The Jarman Conference Room, which has a maximum capacity of up to 14 guests, is ideal for smaller celebrations.

This venue provides a wealth of excellent photo opportunities, most notably among the rich green fairways. The Sunnyside Room, which is largely glass, likewise makes for arresting pictures. Couples can also pose in the foreground of the reflective lake or in the front of the clubhouse itself, which boasts a white-pillared grand entrance. Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club’s amenities include tennis courts, a swimming pool, and a marina, complete with a harbor and fuel dock. Services Offered Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club hosts engagement parties, wedding showers, rehearsal dinners, wedding ceremonies, receptions, and more. Couples can work with a professional Private Events Director who has over 13 years of experience planning and facilitating picture-perfect weddings. The events director provides vendor referrals and coordination services. A standard wedding package at this venue includes exclusive access to the event spaces; wedding day staples such as tables, chairs, and linens in a variety of colors, a dance floor, and votive candles. Full catering services with menu tastings are also available as well as full bar services with liquor, beer and wine. Other more general services include:

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Do you have a site fee for wedding receptions at your venue, what is the starting site fee for wedding receptions during peak season, what is the starting site fee for wedding receptions during off-peak season, do you have a site fee for wedding ceremonies at your venue, what is the starting site fee for wedding ceremonies during peak season, what is the starting site fee for wedding ceremonies during off-peak season, which of the following are included in starting site fee, which of the following are included in the cost of wedding catering, what is the starting price per person for bar service, which of the following are included in the starting price for bar service, what is the minimum number of guests required to book your venue, how many event spaces or rooms does your venue offer, describe your venue:, what kind of settings are available, which of the following wedding events does your venue service, what event services do you offer, what catering services do you offer, what bar services do you provide, what event items are available, what food and beverage items are available, what transportation and access is available, what months are included in your peak season, what months are included in your off-peak season.

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Reviews of Bluegrass Yacht & Country Club

• Quality of service 4.3 out of 5 rating 4.3
• Average response time 4.3 out of 5 rating 4.3
• Professionalism 4.2 out of 5 rating 4.2
• Value 4.4 out of 5 rating 4.4
• Flexibility 4.5 out of 5 rating 4.5

Amazing to say THE LEAST

Great venue and great staff

Wedding Jennifer Turrill needs a raise she the best

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I have DJ'ed at Bluegrass many times and they have always done a wonderful job! Kat, Jeremy and Paul do excellent work and always make sure the Bride and Groom's requests are priority #1! I recommend Bluegrass Yacht and Country Club to anyone looking to have a reception, ceremony or both. If you are searching for a modern venue which is professionally staffed and attentive to your needs, look no further!

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Windstar Cruises Yacht Club loyalty program: Everything you need to know

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Seattle-based Windstar Cruises is a relatively small line, but it offers a big loyalty program that can bring you all sorts of great perks if you sail regularly with the brand.

Dubbed the Yacht Club, the four-tier program, which was massively upgraded in late 2020 , offers its higher-tier members such valuable perks as a $100-per-person onboard credit for every sailing, free laundry service on ships and free Wi-Fi. Higher-tier members also get significant discounts on cruises, beverage packages, shore excursions and more.

For more cruise guides, news and tips, sign up for TPG’s cruise newsletter .

The program was upgraded at the same time that the six-ship line expanded its capacity with a massive makeover and enlargement of three of its vessels. The $250-million Star Plus Initiative, as it was called, brought new suites, restaurants, pool decks and more to the line’s three yacht-like motor vessels — Star Breeze, Star Legend and Star Pride.

All three of the vessels also were lengthened by around 20%.

Ways to earn points

The Yacht Club point-earning system is relatively straightforward. In most cases, members earn 1 point for every day they sail on a Windstar vessel. The only exception is for passengers staying in top suites. Customers staying in Wind Class suites or Deluxe suites on Star Plus Class ships will get 1.5 points for every day they sail. Those staying in Owner’s suites and Classic suites on Star Plus Class vessels will get 2 points for every day they sail, as will passengers staying in the Bridge Suite on the Wind Surf.

Program tiers and benefits

There are four tiers to the Yacht Club program:

• One Star (1 to 15 points)
• Two Star (16 to 39 points)
• Three Star (40 to 89 points)
• Four Star (90 or more points)

Even at the lowest One Star level, the perks are fairly robust, at least as compared to loyalty programs of many of Windstar’s small-ship cruise line competitors.

Yacht Club members at all four tiers get a 5% discount on fares when booking a cruise. That’s a great perk, as it amounts to real money in your pocket. But it gets even better if you book a cruise while on board a Windstar ship or within 60 days of departing one. In such cases, Yacht Club members will get an additional 5% discount on fares — bringing the total savings to 10%.

Related: A beginner’s guide to cruise line loyalty programs  

In select cases, Yacht Club members will be rewarded for their loyalty with even bigger discounts. As part of the program, members can snag an even heftier 20% discount on select Yacht Club member sailings. One caveat: The 20% discount won’t be combinable with other offers.

In addition, all Yacht Club members get:

• Advance notification of new deployments
• Advance notification of sales events
• Members-only private sales
• A $100 shipboard credit when referring a new customer to Windstar. The customer also will receive a $100 onboard credit.
• Exclusive members-only cocktail party with ship officers
• Exclusive onboard tote
• Additional discounts at sister Xanterra Travel Collection brands (more on that below)

Plus, starting at the One Star level, customers get a 5% discount on laundry service, Wi-Fi and Windstar merchandise whenever they sail with the line. Note that the Wi-Fi discount only applies to Wi-Fi purchased individually and not as part of the line’s All-Inclusive Fares.

At the Two Star level, customers get all the above plus a 5% discount on shore excursions and beverage packages (again, the latter discount does not apply to the line’s All-Inclusive Fares). They also get a $50 per person onboard credit for every cruise they take.

The elite level that makes a difference

We’re impressed with all four levels of the Windstar Yacht Club loyalty program. Even at the lowest tier, it brings real savings for loyal passengers. And the shore excursion and beverage package discounts that come with the Two Star level are enticing in our eyes.

That said, we start to get really excited about the Three Star tier. It bumps the discounts for laundry service, Wi-Fi, shore excursions and Windstar merchandise to 10%. If you’re the kind of cruiser who does a shore excursion in every port and regularly uses onboard services, such as laundry and Wi-Fi, this could save you $100 or more on a typical seven-night cruise.

The Three Star tier also comes with an onboard credit of $75 per person for every cruise you take. That’s more real money in your pocket.

Best elite perk

It’s a tough call on the best elite perk of the Windstar Cruises Yacht Club loyalty program. Unlike some frequent cruiser programs, there isn’t one clear standout perk, such as the free cruise that Royal Caribbean Crown & Anchor Society members get after reaching the top Pinnacle Club level.

At the top Four Star tier level of the Yacht Club program, passengers get free laundry service and free Wi-Fi on every sailing, which are both valuable perks. But the most generous perk may be the 15% discount on shore excursions that comes with Four Star status. That’s assuming you are the type of cruiser who signs up for a lot of cruise line-organized shore excursions. If you spend $1,000 a week on excursions, that perk alone is worth $150 per seven-night cruise.

Related: The ultimate guide to picking a cruise line  

At the Four Star level, members also get a 15% credit on Windstar merchandise and a 10% discount on beverage packages. The onboard credit increases to $100 per person for every cruise you take.

One thing we like about the Yacht Club program is that it doesn’t take all that many cruises to reach the top Four Star level. For someone staying in a standard cabin, it would require the completion of 13 seven-night cruises. That’s not all that hard to do in just four or five years, assuming you cruise two or three times a year. But, if you stay in suites, you could hit the Four Star level far more quickly. It would take just seven seven-night cruises.

You can hit the top Four Star level even more quickly if you sign up for Windstar’s longer “Star Collector” voyages of 14 to 60 days. With the right mix of such sailings, you could reach Four Star status in just two or three sailings.

Related: Windstar will let you book a cabin in a crew area

Indeed, someone staying in a top suite on one of the longer Star Collector sailings, in theory, could hit the Four Star level after just a single cruise.

Note that, as is often the case with cruise line loyalty programs, Windstar customers do not have to re-qualify for status each year. Yacht Club members keep their points at the end of each year and continue to accrue points indefinitely. That means that someone who hits Four Star status will remain at that top tier level forever (or until Windstar makes a change to the program).

Such “forever status” is one of the great allures of cruise line frequent cruiser programs. Many airline frequent flyer programs, by contrast, require loyalty members to re-qualify for status each year.

Benefits at Xanterra Travel Collection brands

In addition to discounts and other perks at Windstar, Yacht Club loyalty program members are entitled to special perks at hotels, lodges and other travel vendors owned by Windstar’s parent company, The Anschutz Corporation.

Based in Denver, The Anschutz Corporation owns such iconic hotels as The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and the Sea Island Resort just off the Georgia coast. It also owns two hotel properties near national parks (The Grand Hotel near the Grand Canyon and Cedar Creek Lodge near Glacier National Park) and is the largest national and state park concessioner in the United States. Among the national parks where it is the concessionaire are Yellowstone National Park, Grand Canyon National Park and Glacier National Park.

Related: How to plan a cruise with points and miles

Other Anschutz travel holdings include the Grand Canyon Railway & Hotel and tour companies VBT Bicycling Vacations, Country Walkers and Holiday Vacations.

Together, all of the hotels, lodges and travel companies are known as the Xanterra Travel Collection. The perks available to Yacht Club members at Xanterra Travel Collection entities vary but often take the form of credit. At the Sea Island Resort, for instance, members are entitled to a $200 resort credit.

Bottom line

It’s unusual for a cruise line as small as Windstar to have such a great loyalty program. Massively upgraded in October 2020, Windstar’s four-tier Yacht Club loyalty program brings a lot of great perks even at the lowest One Star tier level, including across-the-board discounts on cruise fares. At the highest Four Star level, it brings a significant amount of value.

Planning a cruise? Start with these stories:

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SPONSORED:  With states reopening, enjoying a meal from a restaurant no longer just means curbside pickup.

And when you do spend on dining, you should use a credit card that will maximize your rewards and potentially even score special discounts. Thanks to temporary card bonuses and changes due to coronavirus, you may even be able to score a meal at your favorite restaurant for free. 

These are the best credit cards for dining out, taking out, and ordering in to maximize every meal purchase.

Editorial Disclaimer: Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, airlines or hotel chain, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities.

A Bit of History and Some Fun Facts

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Memorial Day and the old folks come And stand in the sun feeling sad and dumb. The boys in the ground—there are so many, They’re eighteen, nineteen, maybe twenty—

They just moved out of a boy’s bedroom And went to war, now they lie in a tomb Old people come on Memorial Day And people speak but what’s there to say? The dead would trade it all for the chance To find a girl and ask her to dance.

Ticonderoga, Hamburger Hill, Young men marching out to kill. Manassas, Shiloh, Chancellorsville, They fell down and they lie there still.

World War I: they picked up their arms And marched to Ypres and the Battle of the Marne Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele, the Somme, Midwestern boys far from home. On ninety acres near Ardennes Five thousand 162 men Who left the U.S.A. to strike Down the wickedness of the Third Reich.

Eight thousand near Henri-Chapelle, Outside London, in northern France, Lie men who served their country well And fought to liberate foreign lands. On land and sea, in the air they fought, Landed in France, advanced to the Rhine, Ferocious battles along the line. In a terrifying moment, died And now they lie in a narrow lot, Head to foot and side by side

Far from Ohio, New York, P.A. And now their families are fading away, And memories fade, And how many visitors come around To visit this or that burial ground?

So on one day at the end of May We pause and think of what we owe To those who lie here row after row Who fought for freedom long ago.

Iwo Jima and Normandy, Anzio and the Coral Sea, The Battle of the Bulge, the Korean War, Pork Chop Hill, the Chosin Reservoir, Loc Ninh, Dak To, the siege of Khe Sanh, The Tet Offensive and the battle of Saigon: Young men running and young men fall, Their names are inscribed on a long stone wall.

Iraq, Afghanistan, again and again, The story repeated of elderly men Wary of appearing weak, Needing heroic lines to speak, Sent the soldiers out to die, Leaving the mothers and sisters to cry.

Tragic mistakes were made, it’s true. Generals sent young men to do What shouldn’t be done, What couldn’t be won. At a terrible cost, The mission failed, young men were lost.

History will not ignore The screw-ups that are a part of war. Presidents, senators, leaders will be Closely examined by history,

And on 9/11 in the terrible hours When the fires burned in the twin towers Men and women of the emergency force Came racing through the downtown streets, Cops and firemen and EMTs Dragged equipment through the doors And headed for the upper floors. Knowing this was no accident. Up the smoky stairs they went With every reason to assume That this building would be their tomb. And those who suffered and fell will be heard, And history will have the last word.

But all we say on Memorial Day As bells are rung, hymns are sung, Flowers are brought and strewed among The stones and crosses in this yard, The graves of those who did their part. All we say is, it breaks your heart: They were so young. They were so young. They were so young. They missed out on so many years

So after you decorate the grave, After the speeches and the tears, Enjoy this land they died to save. Enjoy your life, see your friends,

Put the hamburgers on the grill, Toss a salad, eat your fill, Let the festivity commence, Take a walk, go for a run, Let jokes be told and songs be sung, Do the things they would’ve done, Those who died too young.

Copyright 2024 Garrison Keillor

THEY WERE SO YOUNG

Monday is Memorial Day, a day that got lost when it was turned into a weekend, and someday we’ll turn it back into a day, which it was for a hundred years. Decoration Day. After the bloody Civil War, flowers were placed on the graves of the war dead. One of those times when the country is united. This is our observance of Memorial Day, a poem entitled “They Were So Young.”

TEXT FOR POEM

50th ANNIVERSARY SHOWS AHEAD

July 12, 13, 14th       Fitzgerald Theater, St. Paul, MN

July 19th                   Bayfront Festival, Duluth, MN

July 21st                    Chicago Theatre, Chicago, IL

September 26th      Bluestem Center for the Arts Amph, Moorhead, MN

September 28th     Norsk Høstfest, Minot, ND

“Healthful. Invigorating. Good for reading aloud to friends and associates, neighbors, colleagues bartenders, passersby, even strangers in libraries or on airplanes … to ameliorate dyspepsia and digestive inclinations.”

Enjoy Garrison's newest release, May 2024.

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Don't name a library after me, please, I'm still writing

I had a long talk with my friend George Latimer, the mayor of St. Paul, last Monday, which went on for 54 minutes, which is a long time for a dying man, but Mayor Latimer is quite feisty at 88, has been in and out of hospice a few times so his intentions aren’t clear, and he was very funny, which is how I want to be when I am dying, should this ever occur. Though he left office in 1990, I still think of him as mayor because he is memorable. He won office despite being short and Lebanese, which some voters misread as “lesbian,” and is a native of Schenectady, which is not in Minnesota nor even near it, but he could talk like a bartender, speaking with great conviction while taking both sides of a question so as not to disrespect those who disagree and elaborating on the complexities so thoroughly that you forgot what he had said. And St. Paul was in rough shape at the time and why would you impose the mayorship on a friend? So we elected an out-of-towner. In St. Paul, you’re not a full citizen unless your grandmother was born there. From the mayorship, he descended into a spiral of deanships and professorships, board memberships, various eminent vacancies, and ten years ago St. Paul’s downtown library was named the George Latimer Library, which led many people to assume he was dead. He called me last week to tell me, in his own words, that he was not.

We agreed that the world we knew is slipping away. We were troubled by the Minnesota Republican convention the previous week at which their apparent presidential nominee said he’d won the state “by a landslide” in 2020 and the Republicans applauded even though he’d lost the state by roughly 230,000 votes, a margin that’s hard to ignore. In his speech, he said, “No matter how hateful and corrupt the communists and criminals we are fighting against may be, you must never forget … this is a nation that totally belongs to you. It is your heritage.” They paid $500 apiece to applaud this bilge.

Times have changed and I know it because I have children, one born in the olden days and one in modern times. One was born before seat belts, when a child might ride standing up in the front seat next to Daddy as he drove 75 mph across North Dakota, and one rode in a podlike car seat belted in like a little test pilot. One grew up inhaling secondary smoke and the other in a house in which nobody ever smoked though sometimes a guest lurked in the backyard like a Soviet spy and lit a cigarette to notify his criminal confederates that he had the secret papers in his possession. The younger one’s rearing was guided by a ten-foot shelf of books. The older one was raised by pure chance.

I am a Democrat — I gave up communism back in 1982 when I quit smoking — but I am wary of liberals and the hesitations they imposed upon us, the box of razor blades with the warning, “Sharp: may cut skin if pressure is applied.” The warnings on wine bottles: “May have serious consequences in your choice of romantic partners.” Boxes of butter that say, “You know this isn’t good for you and yet you do it anyway.” There is an obsession with syndromes and disorders among liberals, short people become “vertically challenged” and “overlooked” and programs are created to guard against self-minimalization by requiring schools and restaurants to provide stilts.

I think of it as Creeping Unitarianism, the love of organizations like Anger Anonymous for parents who have yelled at their kids, which lets you form committees and subcommittees and hold meetings and conduct research. And Men Coming to Terms with Their Maleness, in which guys sit in a circle of folding chairs and talk about how happy it made Mom to see her boy grow up big and strong and how this made them insensitive and tyrannical and they must now regain vulnerability and learn to weep in front of other men, which they attempt to do every other Wednesday night in a Unitarian church basement near you. I am all in favor of this so long as I’m not required to participate.

In addition to communists and criminals, the Democratic opposition includes many Christians and crossword puzzle workers, and those Minnesota Republicans know that. I know they know it. I wish they hadn’t clapped. Long life, George. Ten more years and you’ll be almost done.

Losing my mind in New York and then finding it

I went into a Manhattan ER last Saturday out of concern about incidental memory loss (name of primary physician, for one, name of building I live in, a vagueness about the previous two weeks) and if you need an ER, Manhattan is the place to be. My sweetie was in St. Paul playing viola in an orchestra. I took a cab, walked in the door of New York-Presbyterian, and a few minutes later I was peeing in a plastic container and ten minutes later a neurologist was asking me what year it is, what date, date of birth, name of spouse or loved one and had I recently ingested marijuana or cocaine or anything of the sort, and the answers were 2024, May 18, 8/7/1942, Jenny Lind, and no and no. (Had this been Fargo, North Dakota, she might’ve asked for the name of my wife and left off the “anything of the sort” but this is New York and there are all sorts of that sort of thing.

It’s a fascinating drama, beepers beeping, pagers, men and women in blue quickstepping about their jobs, the occasional wacko screaming, the various souls you and I have no wish to deal with, but what is most dramatic is the kindness, the sheer kindness, the unrelenting gentleness and politeness, the doctor’s gentle pat on the shoulder when the interlocutory is done. Do they teach this in Med School? I guess so. Everyone, even the orderly who pushes your gurney, tells you their name and calls you by name. Nobody is anonymous. A woman is crying in the next alcove: a nurse says, “I’m coming to help you, dear.” The woman says she is in terrible pain.” The doctor is on his way, sweetheart.” Two doctors query two young men about drug usage — marijuana? coke? — and the young men hesitate and the doctors say, “I’m not here to judge. Was it meth? Was it fentanyl? Do you not know?”

I am not in pain, thank you, but memory loss worries me because I am in the business of doing unscripted monologues from memory in front of paying audiences, sometimes for two hours and if I can’t do that anymore I’ll have to go to Shady Pines and play bingo. A woman wheeled me into X-ray (it’s called Imaging now) — “I have a very poor self-image,” I said so she’d know that I’m funny and my life is worth saving. She laughed. She was Black, with a definite French accent. “Haiti,” I said. “Oui, monsieur,” she said. I asked if life will ever get better in Haiti. She said, “I hope so. It is a very beautiful country.” Black/French accent — Haiti: I seize the chance to demonstrate brain function. I tell my orderly, Raphael, “This is an exciting place you work in.” “Every day, something you’ve never seen before,” he says.

But in the midst of my vagueness, I have a clear memory of the novel I’m writing, a novel that thrice in the early morning hours, I’ve awakened with clear ideas about, one for the general structure, then that it’s a novel about a happy marriage, and then a clear vision of the ending. This hospital is going into that novel. People need to hear about kindness happening in New York.

And then around midnight a woman walked in, a civilian, no blue on her except her eyes. She was a Unitarian minister, making rounds, saw my name and remembered a column I wrote back in the Bush era saying what a terrible mistake the Iraq War was. My one good protest column and she remembered it all these years later. I told her I’m Episcopalian and that I’ve read Emerson and decided not to come forward. “We never give up hope,” she said. “This building, the George F. Baker Pavilion — he went to my church, so you’re one of us,” She was very funny. She said, “We think of Episcopalians as people who write thank-you notes after orgies.”

“That’s high church; I’m low church.”

She said, “Just don’t kick the bucket because if you die in the George F. Baker building, you go to a Unitarian paradise and that’s a series of committees planning paradise and designing the gates and deciding who all will speak at the dedication.” I said, “You identify as Unitarian and you took the hormones but underneath you’re Episcopalian.” She reached down to pull up her skirt but she was wearing jeans.

She said, “You’re quick. You ought to go into radio or something.” I said, “God bless you.” She said, “I’ll tell her you said so when I see her.”

And now I’m back home, feeling fine. Not a bad column for a demented man. Don’t send flowers. But be kind to any Unitarians you meet. Google “Unitarian jokes” and keep one on hand. Every thirty or forty years there’s a new one but they love them all equally.

Garrison Keillor's  CHEERFULNESS.

The reviews are in.

"Humorist and author Keillor (Serenity at 70, Gaiety at 80) delves into the different faces of positivity and “the great American virtue” of cheerfulness in this playful and resolutely upbeat offering....Dead-serious themes of aging and death pop up throughout, but Keillor plumbs them for humor and insight in his customary style, an approach that will of course please  A Prairie Home Companion devotees but also buoy the spirits of readers who feast on wordplay, witticism, and squeezing the best out of life." ---BookLife from Publishers Weekly. An Editor Pick.

"Cheerfulness is a charming memoir by a beloved humorist that reflects unabashed happiness in defiance of age, loss, and the weight of life’s unpredictability." ---Ryan Prado, Foreword Clarion Reviews

"This is a humorous, insightful perspective on life that showcases Keillor’s signature cocktail of droll storytelling and wry commentary." ---BlueInk Review

Read the first Chapter >>>

Purchase  Cheerfulness Softcover >>>

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Garrison's weekly columns

For full list, click here, to receive each week's column in your email inbox, click here, don’t name a library after me, please, i’m still writing, how i survived the solar flares and stayed sane, my position on congestion pricing, plainly stated, all of me loves olive oil and this is why.

October 19, 2024

The Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, Scotland

Edinburgh, SCOTLAND

Garrison Keillor brings his solo show to The Queen’s Hall in Edinburgh with Poetry, Limericks, Sing-Along and the News from Lake Wobegon

October 17, 2024

Cadogan Hall, London, England

London, ENGLAND

Garrison Keillor brings his solo show to Cadogan Hall in London with Poetry, Limericks, Sing-Along and the News from Lake Wobegon

September 28, 2024

Norsk Høstfest, Minot, ND

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour will visit to the Norsk Høstfest in Minot, ND with our Special Guests: Christine DiGiallonardo, Rich Dworsky, Howard Levy, Chris Siebold, Larry Kohut, Tim Russell and Fred Newman.

September 26, 2024

Bluestem Center for the Arts Amphitheater, Moorhead, MN, MN

Moorhead, MN

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour will visit to the Bluestem Center for the Arts in Moorhead, MN with our Special Guests: Christine DiGiallonardo, Rich Dworsky, Howard Levy, Chris Siebold, Larry Kohut,Tim Russell and Fred Newman.

September 14, 2024

Paramount Hudson Valley Theater, Peekskill, NY

Peekskill, NY

Garrison Keillor along with Heather Masse and Rich Dworsky bring their show of music, humor and stories to Peekskill, NY.

May 26, 2024

Akron Civic Theatre, Akron, OH

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour comes to Akron, OH with our Special Guests: Heather Masse, Christine DiGiallonardo, and our actors, Sue Scott, Tim Russell & Fred Newman, and Richard Dworsky, Richard Kriehn, Chris Siebold, Larry Kohut.

June 6, 2024

Rialto Theater Center, Loveland, CO

Loveland, CO

Garrison Keillor brings his solo show to Loveland, CO with Poetry, Limericks, Sing-Along and the News from Lake Wobegon

June 29, 2024

The Crystal Falls Theatre, Crystal Falls, MI

Crystal Falls, MI

Keillor & Company with Prudence Johnson and Dan Chouinard bring their show in Crystal Falls, MI for a performance of classic love songs, poetry, The News from Lake Wobegon, and a conversation about Why You Should Go On Getting Older.

July 12, 2024

The Fitzgerald Theater, St. Paul, MN

St. Paul, MN – Sold Out

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour returns home to The Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, MN for TWO SHOWS with our Special Guests: Heather Masse, Christine DiGiallonardo, Rich Dworsky, Sue Scott, Tim Russell and Fred Newman and more.

July 13, 2024

July 14, 2024

St. Paul, MN – 3rd show – Limited Seating

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour returns home to The Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, MN for THREE SHOWS with our Special Guests: Heather Masse, Christine DiGiallonardo, Rich Dworsky, Sue Scott, Tim Russell and Fred Newman and more.

July 19, 2024

Bayfront Festival Park, Duluth, MN

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour will visit to the Bayfront Festival Park in Duluth with our Special Guests: Heather Masse, Rich Dworsky, Howard Levy, Chris Siebold, Larry Kohut, Sue Scott, Tim Russell and Fred Newman.

July 21, 2024

Chicago Theatre, Chicago, IL

Chicago, IL

A Prairie Home Companion’s 50th Anniversary Tour will visit to the Chicago Theater in Chicago, IL with our Special Guests: Heather Masse, Christine DiGiallonardo, Rich Dworsky, Howard Levy, Chris Siebold, Larry Kohut, Sue Scott, Tim Russell and Fred Newman.

August 1, 2024

The Vogel, Count Basie Center for the Arts, Red Bank, NJ

Red Bank, NJ

Garrison Keillor brings his solo show to Red Bank, NJ with Poetry, Limericks, Sing-Along and the News from Lake Wobegon

August 2, 2024

The Cabot Theatre, Beverly, MA

Beverly, MA

Garrison Keillor brings his solo show to Beverly, MA with Poetry, Limericks, Sing-Along and the News from Lake Wobegon

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The Writer’s Almanac for Sunday, May 26, 2024

It’s the birthday of John Wayne, born Marion Morrison in Winterset, Iowa, in 1907. He grew up in Southern California and earned his famous nickname, “Duke,” as a child; he was never seen without his Airedale dog, Duke, and people began calling him “Little Duke.” He liked the name better than Marion, and it stuck. His first on-screen film credit was as “Duke Morrison.”

The Writer’s Almanac for Saturday, May 25, 2024

It’s the birthday of poet Theodore Roethke, born in Saginaw, Michigan, in 1908. He grew up working with his father and uncle in his family’s greenhouses, and later said, “They were to me, I realize now, both heaven and hell, a kind of tropics created in the savage climate of Michigan, where austere German Americans turned their love of order and their terrifying efficiency into something beautiful.”

The Writer’s Almanac for Friday, May 24, 2024

It’s the birthday of Bob Dylan, born Robert Zimmerman in 1941. He was born in Duluth, Minnesota, and grew up in nearby Hibbing, just off the road that ran all the way up from New Orleans and lent its name to his sixth album, 1965’s Highway 61 Revisited.

The Writer’s Almanac for Thursday, May 23, 2024

Today is the birthday of the author of the classic children’s book Goodnight Moon: Margaret Wise Brown, born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1910. Brownie, as she was known to her friends, had a revolutionary idea about children’s stories: Kids would rather read about things from their own world than fairy tales and fables.

The Writer’s Almanac for Wednesday, May 22, 2024

It’s the birthday of writer Peter Matthiessen, born in New York City (1927). He grew up in a wealthy family in Connecticut, where he went to boarding school before joining the Navy during WWII. He went on to Yale and later studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. Matthiessen published his first short stories in The Atlantic Monthly, but he was barely scraping by teaching creative writing courses, when one of his Yale professors, Norman Holmes Pearson, asked if he would work for the newly formed CIA.

The Writer’s Almanac for Tuesday, May 21, 2024

On this day in 1881, Clara Barton founded the American Red Cross. When Clara was only 10, her brother David fell off the roof of the family barn. At first, he seemed fine, but the next day he developed a headache and fever. The doctor diagnosed “too much blood” and prescribed the application of leeches to help draw out the extra blood. Clara took over as her brother’s nurse and spent two years at his bedside applying leeches (though David did not get any better until he tried an innovative “steam therapy” several years later).

The Writer’s Almanac for Monday, May 20, 2024

Shakespeare’s sonnets were first published on this day in 1609, most likely without Shakespeare’s permission. The book contained 154 sonnets, all but two of which had never been published before. Shakespeare (or perhaps the publisher Thomas Thorpe) dedicated the collection to “Mr. W.H.” whose identity has never been known. The poems are about love, sex, politics, youth, and the mysterious “Dark Lady,” and they have given young lovers and the hopelessly romantic words for the ages.

A Prairie Home Companion: May 25, 2013

A howling 2013 broadcast from Wolf Trap with special guests The Milk Carton Kids, Aoife O’Donovan and Heather Masse.

The Writer’s Almanac for Sunday, May 19, 2024

Today is the birthday of Malcolm X, born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska (1925). When he was four years old and living in East Lansing, Michigan, white supremacists set fire to the family’s home. The East Lansing police and firefighters—all white—came to the house when called, but stood by and watched it burn. When he was six, his father was murdered.

The Writer’s Almanac for Saturday, May 18, 2024

It is the birthday of comedy writer-cum-actress Tina Fey, born in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania (1970). She was a high school honor student, a member of the drama club, and she performed in a summer theater group. She enrolled at the University of Virginia where she studied playwriting and acting, and after graduation in 1992 she moved to Chicago, where she took night classes at the improv training center The Second City, while working at a YMCA during the day. In 1994, she began performing with The Second City, traveling around the country and doing eight shows a week for two years. Three years later, she was hired as a sketch writer for Saturday Night Live and she quickly rose to head writer.

The geomagnetic storm caused by solar flares that hit Earth last week and triggered the Northern Lights and threatened to disrupt telecommunications and knock out power grids made me a little paranoid, sitting in a 12th-floor apartment in Manhattan, imagining my laptop computer getting fried, smoke pouring from the keyboard, and my novel-in-progress turned to ashes as well as my entire life’s work, leaving me to spend my remaining years in regret, but perhaps not many years would remain, perhaps the flares (which emanate from a sunspot 17 times the size of Earth) would also trigger thermonuclear war and within three hours Earth would be just another roasted planet like Mercury and Venus.

I worried about nuclear war as a child. In grade school, we practiced ducking under our desks in case of a nuclear attack but it only made us question the intelligence of our principal, Mr. Lewis. A nuclear bomb makes a deep crater, and ducking under a desk doesn’t change that nor is it protection against radioactive dust clouds. I’m sure the danger of nuclear war is very real and the prospect is horrendous but how long can you go on worrying over it? You move on to other things such as the prospect of electing a 78-year-old con man from Queens to high office. Didn’t we do that already? Why would we try it again?

Congestion pricing comes to Manhattan in June, a system of tolls to reduce daytime traffic on streets that have become sluggish so they’ll start moving again and not turn into parking lots, which is a noble idea, just as no-smoking laws were back in the day: you don’t have a right to be a public nuisance. If you drive into Manhattan below 60thStreet, a license plate reader will assess you fifteen bucks, more for trucks and buses; your taxi fare will go up $1.25, twice that for Uber or Lyft, and the $1 billion collected per year will go to improve mass transit. Like most bold reforms, congestion pricing is unpopular, and New York being New York, people love to jump into the fray, lawsuits are filed, bureaucracies are denounced, families are split, lovers break up, conspiracy theories abound, the death of the city is predicted, dread mounts as June 30 approaches, and why shouldn’t I, a Minnesotan in exile in the city, not voice my concerns? I pay taxes here. I vote. Why should I be silent? You got a problem with that, pal?

I like congestion. It’s part of city life. Why try to turn Manhattan into Minneapolis? Downtown Minneapolis is a ghost town. Walk down Hennepin Avenue at noon, you feel like the lone survivor of a catastrophe. But a taxi ride from the Upper West Side down Columbus Avenue to a 1:30 appointment on 23rd Street is very very exciting. You jump in the cab at 96th and you cruise for a few blocks and in the Seventies it becomes a dramatic slalom run. The cabbie keeps switching lanes to avoid stopped vehicles. Delivery trucks are double-parked, reducing three lanes of traffic to a single lane. Sometimes cross-street traffic blocks the intersection so you may sit through a couple of stoplight changes. Bicyclists fly past, ignoring red lights. Motorcycles thread through the jam, helmeted guys with delivery boxes on their backs, zooming inches away from your cab. If you jumped out of the cab at any point, your mangled body would lie there until the cops arrive, further tangling traffic; eventually a hearse would pull up. Other drivers would curse you as they passed. There is extensive cursing in times of congestion: English and other languages are fully employed, horns honk, pedestrians shake their fists. Diners sit in the restaurant sheds built in the parking lanes back during COVID and eat their lobster rolls and Thai chicken while inhaling carbon monoxide and paying exorbitant prices. You sit in your cab as pedestrians pass, the whole carnival of diverse ethnicities and body types. Food aromas waft from the food trucks, hot dogs, burgers, felafel, burritos. It’s the Minnesota State Fair on amphetamines. Your awareness is heightened. You arrive at 23rd an hour late — your appointment is canceled, or you’ve lost the gig, or the lady’s left the restaurant and won’t ever speak to you again — but it’s thrilling.

I am now putting olive oil on my pancakes, in my coffee, sipping it from a wine glass, after reading that it is beneficial in holding dementia at bay. Don’t ask for proof, I believe what I want to believe, like most other people my age. I don’t want to spend my last years babbling in a seniors’ warehouse; I plan to do stand-up comedy until I’m 97 and then be shot cleanly by a jealous husband whose wife told him she wished he were more like me. A Republican husband — these guys can shoot straight — will aim his .44 and send me instantly, no mouth-to-mouth, to whatever paradise God keeps for us Episcopalian liberals. Probably a dorm where we’ll sit around and read the same copy of the New York Times over and over. No bliss, just boredom.

Do I sound demented to you, dear reader? Tell me if I do.

Let’s talk about honesty, grrrr, rrrfff, rrrfff

Whenever I open an egg carton, I think of the chicken at work in the factory, creating this elliptical work of art onto a conveyor belt, to be stolen away, and then the hormones in the chicken feed kick in and the process of creation repeats itself, sort of like me and limericks: I write a good one and it stimulates the next limerick and pretty soon I have a hundred of them, which I could collect in a book but won’t because very few people appreciate limericks — women do not, because so many cruel limericks have been written about women, and when men read a limerick they think, “I could’ve done better than that,” being the compulsive competitors they are, and meanwhile here I am with this work of art in my hand.

Minneapolis is great. Have you seen it?

The streets go from Aldrich to Zenith.

It’s the birthplace of Prince,

Than whom no one since

Has been any hipper, I mean it.

The city is good for the sickly.

The streets are numerical, strictly,

And alphabetical

All so that medical

Teams can get to you quickly.

The critic who lit up my week and more

April was an awfully good month for me, so good that I’ve been walking around St. Paul, looking up into the branches of trees, making sure there isn’t an anvil roosting in one of them that’s waiting to fall and kill me and thereby serve justice. I’m a happy old man in love with my wife and in touch with good friends and I’ve been on the road doing good shows at which, among other things, the audience sings beautifully some songs they and I have known by heart since we were in grade school and now, on top of all this, my book Cheerfulness, in which I attempt to defend the title attitude against our present Age of Dread & Gloom, has gotten a long, intense, brilliant review by Meghan O’Gieblyn in Middle West Review, the spring issue. Only a fellow writer can know what this means. A lot.

I’m still writing books but haven’t been reviewed by anybody in ages, maybe because I’m an Old White Male and our time is up, or maybe I’ve written too many books, and I’m okay with unreviewing — going way back to Veronica Geng’s caramel custard review of Lake Wobegon Days in the New York Times in 1985, the reviews have been warm and sweet, which is nice for the publisher but for me, the hardworking writer, are unremarkable, like a friend’s cat climbing into my lap: not the equivalent of good conversation. But O’Gieblyn’s essay is a brilliant and engaging piece of work and I feel honored that she went to so much trouble. It pleases me that she quotes funny lines from the book and not pretentious ones: she could easily have used my own words to make me look like a hack and a bore. She does use the word “schtick” in connection with my radio monologue, but I don’t mind: in stand-up, schtick is simply useful, like the handheld microphone. She says that my willful optimism seems somewhat strained at times, and she writes, “There is, alas, no shortage of holes in the book’s logic that could be exploited by an attentive critic”and she goes ahead and sticks her finger in some of them, but she also says, “It’s hard not to conclude that Keillor has reached the sunny equanimity of enlightenment.” (I’ve made it as hard as I could, Meghan.) And then she says, “The prose throughout the book is both sharp and buoyant, and often arrives, somewhat unexpectedly, at profundity.” I was aiming for buoyancy. Profundity is well above my pay grade; it’s Ms. Gieblyn’s territory, not mine. To me, this sentence from a writer so sharp as she is worth more than any prize given by a committee. “Sharp and buoyant” is a nice phrase for promotion, but what makes it meaningful to me is the brilliance of Meghan O’Gieblyn.

On the road again, meeting the folks

I went out West to Idaho and Washington to do my show in Boise (soft s) and Spokane, and was surprised by how vibrant, bustling, handsome both cities are, and walked out onstage and sang Van Morrison’s “These are the days of the endless summer, these are the days, the time is now” and they seemed to like it okay, so I hummed a note and they sang “America the Beautiful” with me and then we did “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” for the Republicans in the crowd and they sang it full-out, four parts, and then, for contrast, “John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt” and we were on our way.

It’s an age of dread, the news perpetually discouraging, TV and media merchandising ugliness, and either you join the Greek chorus of gloom or you go with the American choir of cheerful resolve, and I choose cheerfulness. I am capable of dismay: I’m dismayed by the Working From Home syndrome that is leaving our big office buildings half empty. I call up an office to get answers to difficult questions and I hear Death Chute singing “Vanilla Windows” and a guy says, “Yeah?” and a dog barks and a woman yells, “Put it on headphones!” This is what Allied Federated has come to. I’d prefer to get a woman named Mildred who is an authority on health coverage and who is looking at me across her desk. But never mind me, I’m old.

The beauty of falls that you walk away from

This is not a sermon, just a fact: since I cut out alcohol 22 years ago, I’ve often awoken in the middle of the night with beautiful ideas, which is a golden gift for a writer, better than emeralds. Tuesday night, for example, I woke at 3 a.m., next to my sleeping wife, arose, dressed, slipped out of our hotel room in Minneapolis, and sat in the lobby with my laptop and started writing a book with a ten-word title about happiness. I’m a happy man, I am qualified. Last week I did two shows, just outside D.C. and in Vermont, two serious locations, and I made those people laugh so hard, they were glad they’d brought an extra pair of pants. I went to Minnesota hoping to solve a Medicare problem that I’d spent years on the phone about, listening to mind-numbing music on Hold, waiting to talk to a clueless functionary working from home, TV blaring in the background, dogs barking, and in Minnesota I went to an office, sat across the desk from a human being, the way we used to do, and he solved it in a matter of minutes. And he thanked me for my patience. Life is good.

I’ve been waiting a long time to become as old as I am and it was worth the wait. You couldn’t pay me enough to go back to being young again. I did dumber things than you’d think possible for a university graduate. That’s why I excused myself from the jury — paying off a porn star and claiming it as a business expense? Heck, I’ve made accounting mistakes, too. But — this is the beautiful 3 a.m. idea — you’ve got to have some disasters, the kind you walk away from, to notice the bluebird on your shoulder. My disaster was a series of falls I took while walking around Manhattan. I’m 81. I used to have a good jump shot from the free-throw circle, I have hit for extra bases in softball, but that was a long time ago. Now, as I walk through LaGuardia, men driving passenger carts stop and offer me a ride. I decline. They say, “Are you sure?”

Take a walk through our history with songs, photos and some pretty wonderful memories.

In 1974, after writing a fact piece for the magazine [ The New Yorker ] about the Grand Ole Opry, I started up A Prairie Home Companion on Saturday evenings, a live variety show with room for a long monologue by me (“It has been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon …”), and found steady colleagues who did most of the work, starting with my boss, Bill Kling, and the producer, Margaret Moos, the engineer, Lynne Cruise, Tom Keith, Bill Hinkley, and Judy Larson, and down to the present day, Sam Hudson, Kate Gustafson, Richard Dworsky, Tim Russell, Sue Scott, and Fred Newman, not to mention fabulous guests, tech guys, good stagehands, and so we sail the ocean blue in pursuit of truth and beauty, sober men and true, attentive to our duty. ( The Keillor Reader )

• A Bit of History and Some Fun Facts 

In the summer of 1973, thinking this was something a radio guy should do someday, I rode the train to Nashville with my friend Don McNeil from the softball team to see the Saturday night broadcast of The Grand Ole Opry at the Ryman Auditorium, which was completely sold out that night so we stood in the parking lot behind the hall and listened to it on WSM from the radios in nearby pickup trucks. There was a whole crowd of us out there. We got to see Loretta Lynn’s tour bus pull up in the alley and she herself step out and walk by in glittering white gown, long black hair, and the crowd parted for her, nobody asked for an autograph, a few people said quietly “Hey, Loretta,” and she smiled and picked up her skirts and went around back to the stage door. The Ryman wasn’t air-conditioned and the windows were wide open, and when we ducked down behind a low stone wall we could see the lower halves of performers on stage, Dolly Parton and Roy Acuff and Bashful Brother Oswald, and almost all of Stonewall Jackson. My hero Marty Robbins sat mugging at the piano and sang “Love Me,” grinning on the falsetto part in the chorus, and then jumped up and did “El Paso,” strumming a little Spanish guitar up on his shoulder. Listening to the music from car radios in the parking lot surrounded by reverent fans on a hot summer night, I felt happy, excited, even exalted. I thought, “I’d like to do that someday.”

The next spring I went back to Nashville and wrote a piece about the Opry for The New Yorker . Roger Angell handed me over to a fact editor, Bill Whitworth, knowing Bill is from Little Rock and knows country music, and Bill at the time was the trusted deputy of William Shawn, the editor, and so the assignment was made, though Mr. Shawn’s interest in country music was slight at best. On this daisy chain of connections my whole career hangs. If Roger had handed me to an editor from Connecticut, or if Whit- worth had fallen out of favor with Shawn, or if Shawn had mentioned the Opry to Lillian Ross and she said, “You’re out of your mind,” I’d be wearing a TSA badge and patting down men with suspicious pants at the airport.

I went to the Friday night show and skipped the Saturday night because Richard M. Nixon would be there, trying to slip the bonds of Watergate, and I didn’t care to write about him. I sat in the balcony of the Ryman and watched the sequined ladies with big hair, men in gaudy suits, commercials for chewing tobacco and pork sausage and self-rising Martha White flour and Goo Goo Clusters, Cousin Minnie Pearl ( I’m just so proud to be here! ), the red-barn backdrop, the haze of cigarette smoke, the fans and their flash cameras, the announcer in his funeral suit, and I resolved to go home and start up a Saturday night show of my own. I wrote the piece, Bill Whitworth shepherded it into print between ads for Chanel No. 5 and Cartier diamonds and Cricketeer yacht wear, and I went up the stairs to Bill Kling’s office at KSJN to talk.

Kling kept meetings short. He had a low tolerance for the prefaces and digressions by which people show they have a liberal arts education. He was a true believer in radio, listened to it religiously, and in public radio, surrounded by malcontents, he got excited by good ideas. I proposed the show and he told me to go right ahead. Saturday at 5 p.m., between the Met Opera and the New York Philharmonic broadcasts. He called in Margaret Moos, who worked upstairs in publicity, and asked her to produce it. “Have fun,” he said. It was a ten-minute conversation. Saturday evening was a dead zone in radio, but I was in a sinking marriage and had nothing to lose.  (That Time of Year: A Minnesota Life)

The Facts (with a grain of salt-we are fiction writers after all)

July 6, 1974 – July 2, 2016

1557 Broadcasts

First National Live Broadcast carried on NPR’s Folk Festival USA – Feb 17, 1979

First Regularly Scheduled National Broadcast – May 3, 1980

Approximately 365 different venues

Approximately 10,000+ performers

Approximately 4 million listeners, 690 public radio stations

Approximately 3,400,000 Theater Audience Members

A Prairie Home Companion: Benefit for the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra (1979)

The Young Lutheran’s Guide to the Orchestra: Benefit for the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra (1994)

TV broadcasts:

World Theater Grand Opening (1986)

A Prairie Home Companion -Disney (18 shows February through June 1987)

A Prairie Home Companion 2 nd Annual Farewell – Disney – Radio City Music Hall (1988)

A Pretty Good Night at Carnegie Hall  – Disney- (1989)

Great Performances – A Prairie Home Companion from Tanglewood (2006)

Great Performances – Garrison Keillor, A New Year’s Eve Special (2006)

Movie Theater Presentations:

2 Cinecasts presented by Fathom Events: Radio show video livestreamed nationally to movie (2010)

A Prairie Home Companion film directed by Robert Altman(May 2006)

Fan weekends:

PHC Hymn Sing at Concordia College, Moorhead, MN (1992)

F.Scott Fitzgerald 100 th Anniversary (1996)

Lake Wobegon Ice Fishing Weekend – St. Paul (2002)

Lake Wobegon Ice Fishing Weekend – Bemidji (2011)

A Prairie Home Companion 40 th Anniversary – Macalester College – St. Paul (2014)

13 Talent shows (1995 – 2012)

13 Joke shows (1996 – 2014)

Over 3000 original lyric estimates (Im going with an average of 3 per show)

Over 8000 Personal Greetings read since 1978

Acclaimed guests:  Bob and Ray, Bobby McFerrin, Taj Mahal, Pete Seeger, Doc Watson, Yo Yo Ma, Minnie Pearl, Chet Atkins, The Everly Brothers, Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, Greg Brown, Jean Redpath, Carl Perkins, Ray Stevens, The Judds, Vince Gill, Allison Janney, Lynn Thigpen, Alison Krauss, Brad Paisley, The Dixie Chicks, James Taylor, Meryl Streep, Lily Tomlin, John C. Reilly, John Lithgow, Martin Sheen, Elvis Costello, Reneé, Fleming, Marilyn Horne, Nathan Gunn, Dixie Carter, James Earl Jones, Roger Miller, Carole King, Debra Monk, Sara Bareilles, Joshua Bell, Tom Brokaw, Harry Smith, Charles Kurault, Brandi Carlile, Roseanne Cash, Rosemary Clooney, Kristin Chenoweth, Victoria Clark, Joel Grey, Harry Connick Jr., Lyle Lovett, Sheryl Crow, Heart, Emmanuel Ax, Jeremy Denk, Dr. John, Linda Ronstadt, Al Franken, James Galway, Nanci Griffith, Arlo Guthrie, Kathy Mattea, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Itzhak Perlman, Sydney Pollack, Bonnie Raitt, Leon Redbone

House Bands: Powdermilk Biscuit Band, New Prairie Ramblers, Butch Thompson Trio, The Coffee Club Orchestra, Rich Dworsky and The Guy’s All-Star Shoe Band, Rich Dworsky and the House Band

Choirs that appeared: Angelica Cantati Choir, Beloit Memorial High School Choir, Bonai Cantores, Cantus, Cedar Lake Seven, Central Moravian Church Choir, Chanticleer, Choral Arts Ensemble, Classen School of Advanced Studies Choir, Cornell University Glee Club, Dale Warland Singers, Durango Children’s Chorale, Essex Children’s Choir, First Presbyterian Church Choir of Atlanta, Goshen College Chamber Choir, Gregg Smith Singers, Hamline University Capella Choir, House of Hope Presbyterian Church Choir School, Kamehameha H.S. Glee Club, The King’s Singers, Macalester Concert Choir, Minnesota Boy Choir, Minnesota Opera Chorus, Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Northfield Youth Choir, St. John’s Boy Choir, St. Juliana Choir, St. Malachi’s Choir, St. Olaf Concert Choir, Surma, The Appalachian Association of Sacred Harp Singers, The Bach Choir of Bethlehem, The Bulgarian State Radio and TV Female Vocal Choir, The College of St. Catherine Women’s Choir, Concordia College Choir, The Fóstbræōur Male Choir,The Russian Chamber Chorus of New York, The Tudor Choir, University of Minnesota Morris Concert Choir, Ukranian Choir, University of Minnesota Minneapolis Concert Choir, Kitka, VocalEssence, Waldorf College Choir, Women’s Vocal Ensemble of St. Olaf, Anchorage Community Chorus, Buffalo Philharmonic Chamber Chorus, Bulgarian National Folk Ensemble, Purdue Glee Club, Ypsilanti Chamber Chorus, Yale Russian Chorus

International Broadcasts: Iceland, Ireland, Germany, Scotland, England, Mexico, Canada

Heard internationally via the Armed Forces Network and America One

Lake Wobegon Trail facts:

Dedicated in 1998

65 miles long

Waite Parke, St. Joseph, Avon, Albany, Holdingford, Bowlus, Freeport, Melrose, Sauk Centre, West Union, Osakis

Unusual acts:

Hypnotized Chicken

Murray the Sea Lion

Harley Refsal, the woodcarver

Avner the Eccentric

Marching Bands

Mouth Sound Participants

Bagpipers, Yodelers, Whistlers

Tap dancers, Flat foot dancers, Polka dancers, Belly dancer, Polka dancers, Arthur Murray dancers

SFX props (Tom Keith’s collection)

Wingtips for footsteps

Box of cornstarch sounds like walking in snow

Styrofoam plates sounds like breaking wood

Old-fashioned telephone

Roller skate across typewriter keys to sound like elevator door opening

Wooden legs to sound like people marching

Wood squeaker

Doorbells – buzz or chime

Coconut shells in small gravel

Glass breaking cage

Crash box (wood box with tin cans)

Tour names:

Junior Woodchuck Tour (1976)

Death March to the Prairie (1977)

Spaghetti Transmission Tour (1978)

Thanks Anyway Tour (1980)

Unlikely Tour (1982)

Definitely Last Motor Home Tour (1982)

Tour de Force Tour (1983)

Second Annual Farewell Tour (1988)

Third Annual Farewell Tour (1989)

Fourth Annual Farewell Tour (1990

Moonshine Tour (1994)

Hopeful Gospel Tour

Rhubarb Tour (2003, 2005, 2008)

Summer Love Tour (2010, 2011)

Radio Romance Tour (2013)

America the Beautiful Tour (2015)

Love and Comedy Tour (2017)

11 Sold out cruises (Alaska, Norway, St. Lawrence Seaway, Caribbean, Spain/Portugal, Spain/France/Italy, Baltic Sea)

Interesting venues:

Ramsey Arts and Science Culture Garden, High Schools, College Auditoriums and Chapels, Churches, State Fairs, Oklahoma City Zoo, Oregon Zoo, Ball field in Lanesboro, MN, Open Field in Avon, MN, Shakespeare Festival, Old Faithful Lodge, Mark Twain Memorial House, Willa Cather’s Home, New York Public Library, Gibbon Ballroom (MN), Glenwood Ballroom (MN), The Surf  Ballroom (MN), Botanical Gardens, Wineries

Awards and proclamations :

Grammy award, ACE, George Foster Peabody, National Humanities Medal, Audie Awards, Election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters

Numerous Keys to the city and Proclamation Days

Letters from Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Barack Obama

BILL KLING, PRESIDENT EMERITUS OF MINNESOTA PUBLIC RADIO AND AMERICAN PUBLIC MEDIA

The beginnings of a “live” Keillor show occurred at 6:30 a.m. one weekday in the early 1970s, broadcast on classical music station KSJN. I remember waking up to somebody singing “Old Shep,” followed by the ear-piercing sound of a “glass harmonica” (someone rubbing wine glasses). Bad morning.

Garrison and I had talked about a time slot when the show might work (6:30 a.m. wasn’t the answer). We settled on Saturdays at 5 p.m., allowing a live audience, already out and about, to come and see it. It was also a time of the week when public radio had a very small listenership so there wouldn’t be an uproar if classical music was interrupted. And we further limited the damage by broadcasting only once a week.

I recall early regular broadcasts of what became A Prairie Home Companion , when the show performed in an abandoned (at least I think it was) skyway between the Mears Park building in Saint Paul and the building next door. That space accommodated about 50 people. And thanks in no small part to producer Margaret Moos’s vision of the possibilities, the show kept going. Amazing.

After a nomadic tour of available, rentable auditoriums, the show made a deal with the Dworsky family to rent the World Theater, a movie house that had long been closed. Volunteers drained water out of the basement and scraped the gum off the seats. The rent was paid by the sale of popcorn and a sub-rental to a group that wanted to show Asian-language films on weeknights.

Once the show had matured and was airing locally every week, I got a call from my friend Don Forsling — who ran WOI radio, a powerhouse FM station in Ames, Iowa — asking if they could get tapes of the show and broadcast them in Iowa. We agreed and mailed them a tape each week. That was the beginning of Prairie Home ’s “network.” By 1980, I had managed the plan to connect public stations by satellite and secured an “uplink” for MPR. APHC was then able to be transmitted live to stations across the country.

The problem with the national broadcasts was, as always, “cost.” I asked Frank Mankiewicz — then president of NPR — to fund APHC for national broadcast. He was very clear: “No.” And so we formed American Public Radio, a competing network, whose marquee program was A Prairie Home Companion , which had become an obvious success.

The 10th anniversary celebration show was held at the Orpheum Theatre in downtown Saint Paul, largely because the World Theater had been closed due to falling plaster and a variety of other infractions that the city felt were safety issues — and they probably were. Forty years later, that show — one of the very first for which we have video — still rings in my head. It was an amazing leap forward. Garrison outdid himself with the dancing salsa bottle and a group of similar characters onstage. The Orpheum was full, holding at least twice what the World Theater held in those days. Greg Brown summed it up: “It’s a fine thing you have done, Garrison Keillor.”

The Disney Channel shows added a whole new level of attention and complexity. They were televised with pretty basic production values. There really was no actual “set” and the World Theater’s stage looked bleak on television. But Disney loved it. Their ratings went way up. They marshaled their marketing department to bring media people to town and asked Garrison to talk with various reporters and writers — which he occasionally did.

The Disney broadcasts ended when Garrison decided to move to Denmark, and the “last show” broke all the rules. The program had never run beyond its two-hour time limit. Many public radio stations had skeleton staffs on Saturday nights and were unable to change their schedule, yet the show went on and on and on. The King Kamehameha Choir from Hawaii swayed onstage with flowered leis for everyone. The entire cast stood on the stage singing with the audience, which stood in a standing tribute and remained standing for the next 45 minutes. Seven p.m. came and went. At 7:10 the tech staff scrambled to get more satellite time and extended it until 7:30. At 7:30, the show continued. By that time Garrison was into “Good Night, Irene” and “Bye Bye, Love” and other farewell songs. The audience continued its standing ovation. Via teletype, the stations were advised that the broadcast would end at 7:30, and we ordered the playing of the American Public Radio audio logo signaling that the show was over. Except that on the Disney Channel it wasn’t over. They continued the broadcast for an additional 10 to 15 minutes. On Sunday morning, angry radio stations all around the country demanded that the Sunday rebroadcast include the extra time. And in some cases, a special feed of the additional segment was sent out to be patched onto the end of the rerun. It was clear that nobody — Garrison included — wanted the show to end.

And as we all now know, it shouldn’t have ended.

Over the summer that followed, I spent a lot of time at a lake house in northern Minnesota where the nights were warm and the loons were calling. I would often email Garrison, setting the scene as nostalgically as possible, making every attempt to make him homesick. I later learned that I didn’t have to try that hard. He wasn’t funny in Danish and was already homesick. Finally he responded, saying, “Maybe we could do it again,”

Garrison returned to the U.S., but to New York, where he worked out of his small office in the New Yorker building. I went to visit him one day and talked about a return, doing a big show, bigger than anything we had tried before, and he liked the idea. We were walking along Sixth Avenue talking about venues for a big, big show. We found ourselves standing under the marquee of Radio City Music Hall, and it hit like bolt of lightning: That was the answer.

We explored Radio City with the theater manager, who explained to us how the stage could rise up from the basement and rotate like a railroad roundhouse. And he described a variety of other incredible special effects.

Garrison scheduled three shows at the storied 6,000-seat venue: Friday, a Saturday matinee, and Saturday night, with Saturday night being a national APR radio broadcast. The Disney Channel was back on board too.

The Everly Brothers came as did Chet Atkins and a host of other great talent. We hired a Hollywood production crew. And true to form, Garrison embraced it all, with the Everly Brothers singing while rising up on the rotating stage in a 1957 Chevrolet convertible. Three sold-out shows. Some 18,000 ticket holders. A smashingly successful “return” for Garrison and a big boost for public radio and the Disney Channel.

Of course it wasn’t always that simple. Back in the early days, Garrison and I argued incessantly, each of us taking a polar opposite position. If I said black, he’d say white. (In fact, it was probably neither.) But we were a good team. What he did I could not do; what I did he could not do. And often in between us was Margret Moos, the diplomat facing two immovable objects.

As the nascent radio show grew in popularity so did its live audience. I loved the ticketing system that Margaret and Marge Ostroushko and others developed at the beginning (long before Ticketmaster existed). The World Theater seated about 900 people at best and in those early days even fewer. People from all across the country wanted to come to the shows. If you mailed in a ticket request, you got a blue card back telling you that you couldn’t get a seat — but the next time you wanted to come, use the blue card and it would give you a higher priority. And people did and then they got a red card, and finally on the third try a green card that gave them a seat. But some didn’t wait for that process to play out: they simply drove, flew, hitchhiked to Saint Paul and stood in line outside the theater hoping to grab a last-minute seat. I felt so bad that people had come from everywhere to stand in line for a show that they could not get into. And in a few cases, where I thought it was absolutely unacceptable not to get them in, I would invite them into the theater and find a place where they could stand or sit on a stairstep. They were so incredibly grateful. I’ll never forget it.

LINDA WILLIAMS, SINGER, SONGWRITER, PERFORMER (ROBIN AND LINDA WILLIAMS)

  We were sitting on the front porch at GK’s house after a show and hanging around for the show a weekend later. He came up with the idea of our doing a record pitch commercial — fast hard-hitting bluegrass snippets of Broadway songs that were not in any way connected with common themes from country or bluegrass. He said to do songs from West Side Story or other musicals but nothing from, say, Oklahoma , shows that leaned country. We’d do them as fast as we could, playing and singing harmony. That led to Marvin and Mavis Smiley and the Manhattan Valley Boys.

Smiley is a big name in Augusta County, Virginia, where we live, so we used that last name, and he most likely added the first names and the Manhattan Valley Boys. We continued to be asked to bring back Marvin and Mavis many times over the years, sometimes with other themes, like Down Home Diva with bluegrass snippets of familiar opera arias.

It was always very hard to get through a Marvin and Mavis segment without us breaking into laughter. We used to get lots of requests to do that in concert, which was impossible to do without the band, especially the drummer.

TOM LIEBERMAN, GUITARIST, SINGER, SONGWRITER

A few of my more lucid memories of my years on APHC, for the record:

My good fortune to meet Garrison Keillor was due to my good fortune of having been a part of the vibrant music scene of the Minneapolis West Bank neighborhood in the mid-’70s. I had started playing my original songs at the Coffeehouse Extempore while still in high school, and there found myself in the orbit of such mentors as Sean Blackburn, Dakota Dave Hull, Bob Douglas, Bill Hinkley, Judy Larson, Mary DuShane, Charlie Maguire, Pop Wagner, Bob Bovee, Stevie Beck, Scott Alarik, Maureen McElderry, Tim Hennessy, Peter Ostroushko, Jerry Rau, and countless others. In the mid 1970s, many or most of these folks had found their way onto Garrison’s nascent radio program as performers, and eventually, he got around to meeting me.

I was invited to meet Garrison in 1976 at the old MPR offices in the Park Square Court Building in Lowertown Saint Paul. His “office” was a converted closet wedged under a stairway. It had no window, of course, but I do remember that it had the smell of disinfectant and a sense of dread. As I entered, I perceived a large figure seated deep in the murky darkness behind a Luxo lamp, which was aimed squarely at me, and I extended my hand toward it. The silhouette extended its hand and shook mine. It then introduced itself as Garrison Keillor.

Coming from a “radio family,” I already had a pretty deep understanding and appreciation for the program and story world that Garrison was building. My father’s mother, Julia, had been a juvenile “sweet” singer in the ’20s. She partnered with a young man named Julian to become “Julie and Julie,” who were singing sweethearts on the early airwaves of KSTP and WCCO. So, although I was a 19-year-old upstart, much of what Garrison and I discussed in that first meeting made a lot of sense to me.

He invited me onto the show to sing some of my original songs, and that turned into several years of semi-regular appearances on APHC as a solo artist, a member of the vocal trio Rio Nido (with Tim Sparks and Prudence Johnson), and as a utility guitarist/vocalist/voice actor wherever needed. I was particularly proud to be the voice of the eponymous “El Muchacho Alegre” of “El Muchacho Alegre (Happy Boy) Hot Sauce.” Over these years, I was also invited to develop special material and segments for the show, and I had the opportunity to work on the production staff, as the show’s cultural footprint expanded.

After leaving Rio Nido in 1979, I spent most of 1980 traveling abroad, looking for a new city and a new scene. However, when I returned to Minnesota in the later part of that year, Garrison had ousted one house band, and brought on another — The Butch Thompson Trio. This was somewhat fortuitous for me as a singer and guitarist, since I was a natural fourth for Butch’s trio. Butch and I had been friends and frequent collaborators, and I was friendly with his bassist, Bill Evans, and drummer, Red Maddock, from the traditional New Orleans music scene at the Hall Brothers Emporium of Jazz. Our styles of music meshed well with one another, and I was happy to receive a call to be on the show most weeks in 1981. Of course, I understood that the show was booked one week at a time, and I knew better than to ever expect that the call would keep coming. But I was always happy to get it when it came.

As impressed as I was by Garrison’s talent, I was equally impressed by the support system that had been built around him and the show. His producer, Margaret Moos, ran the show with a firm hand, and by watching her work, I began to develop an understanding of what a producer actually does. I recall one particular Friday rehearsal when I was behaving particularly squirrely, and Margaret impressed upon me that a rehearsal was every bit as important as a show and should be taken as seriously. Margaret, Garrison, and the rest of the staff and crew taught me a lot about what it means to be a professional.

Even though the show now had a national audience, it was still a pretty low-rent touring operation. I remember one road trip where we were playing shows in the towns of Marshall and Minneota in western Minnesota. Garrison drove the Winnebago full of musicians, and there was an equipment van being driven by the crew. We’d pull up to the high school auditorium and load in the gear for the show. I specifically remember Garrison putting a pot roast into the oven of the motor home prior to one of the shows, and us returning to the motor home to enjoy it afterward. We then played a little bit of poker, before retiring to our shared rooms in the local motel. My roomie was Tom Keith (aka Jim Ed Poole), and he appreciated none of my inebriated hijinks. Go figure.

Tenth Anniversary

When the 10 th  Anniversary show rolled around, I appeared on that show with the vocal trio “Lieberman, Fogel, and Bey” (with Arne Fogel and Turhan Bey), singing the song “100 Years from Today.” I recall that we also performed a commercial for bananas, while wearing flouncy banana sleeves that did nothing to improve my guitar playing. The post-show celebration was held outdoors on the grounds of the State Capitol on a portable stage, and I had the honor of serving as the MC of that show. It was a true celebration and a blast.

Ultimately, my best AND worst moments as a professional guitarist happened at the same time when, while tuning up before a show (and feeling perhaps a bit too secure in my position), I was tapped on the shoulder by associate producer Marge Ostroushko, who “asked” if I could please get up so that “Chet could sit down.” I looked up, slowly, and there he was, the Country Gentleman himself. Chet, understanding the gravity of the moment, seemed apologetic, but I simply offered him my chair, and asked if I could get him a cold drink or something. I understood, of course, that the highest compliment any guitarist could receive was to be replaced by “Mr. Guitar,” Chet Atkins, and that it would never get any better than that for me, so I dedicated myself to cobbling together a livelihood in the creative and production industries.

PHILIP BRUNELLE, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR AND FOUNDER OF VOCALESSENCE, AND INTERNATIONALLY RENOWNED CONDUCTOR

My first show

Garrison called me and said he was going to start a radio program and wanted someone to play piano — someone who could play classical music and hymns. I told him that I could do that; he asked if I knew a lot of hymns. I told him that every hymn he knew … I knew. And the question would be: who knew more verses? (The answer was me.) So I showed up for the first show, playing on an upright piano. I stayed with the show for a while but knew that with my work at Minnesota Opera and VocalEssence, I couldn’t be there every week, and so Butch Thompson took over.

The Thanksgiving Cantatas 

When GK decided to have Vern [Sutton}, Janis [Hardy], and me create these cantatas (improvised from audience suggestions), we knew we could do it because all three of us could wing it. We got all the slips of paper from the audience and went to the basement, which in those days  WAS FREEZING!  We separated all the suggestions into categories and decided on themes for what would become “I am thankful.” I typed up our lists (we were under a BIG time crunch since the cantata was on the final half hour of the show) and we performed. Not sure how many years this happened.

Rudolphus rubrinasus

On one December show, I was standing backstage and GK came off and said we were two minutes shy and did anyone have a short holiday song. I told him I could sing “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” in Latin, and he said GO! I went out and sang it, accompanying myself, and dedicated it to my high school Latin teacher, Evangeline Peterson. (She was not listening that day but heard about it later and was THRILLED that her name was mentioned on public radio!)

The only time that I saw GK lose it was when Janis Hardy came onstage with her dog Freckles and sang “Indian Love Call.” Janis walked out with Freckles, the audience exploded in laughter, of course. Janis knelt down next to the dog and started singing “When I’m calling you.” Freckles liked to howl when he heard Janis singing, and the combination of hearing Janis sing and Freckles howl caused GK to start laughing. He had to leave the stage.

VocalEssence

Among the many, many appearances of the VocalEssence Ensemble Singers on PHC, one of the most memorable was when the Ensemble Singers sang “El Hambo,” a song by the Finnish composer Jaakko Mäntyjärvi that is in nonsense syllables. GK decided that, rather than singing it straight through, we would sing a few measures and then he (or Jim Ed Poole) would give a made-up translation, which brought the audience into hysterics.

JANIS HARDY, SOPRANO

  Like Garrison, I can’t remember a lot of specifics about those early days — more impressions than complete scenes. For instance, it seemed to me that every time I performed on a show in the tiny theater of the Arts and Science Center in Saint Paul, there was always a baby crying or child yelling! I also remember, with Philip and Vern, frantically trying to put together the Thanksgiving Oratorio based upon suggestions from the audience — downstairs at the Fitz with pieces of paper flying everywhere — doing it all in under half an hour, as I recall. It was also not unusual for Garrison to throw an improv scenario at us (Vern, Philip, and me) and we’d take it from there — singing an opera scene at the drop of a hat! Scary but fun!

There was a period in my life where I inherited a bakery and spent most of my waking hours there. So I often came to the show dressed in flour-covered overalls. And I’m not exaggerating! Garrison would take that opportunity to describe to the radio audience the beautiful gown I was wearing, much to the amusement of the theater audience. And yes, I’m sure Philip can regale you with the story of Vern and me singing a duet with my dog Freckles. Pretty hysterical.

We loved standing in the wings watching Garrison and Tom and Sue and Tim do their magic — priceless! It was a magical time and I’ll be forever grateful.

CHARLIE MAGUIRE, SINGER-SONGWRITER

Spaghetti in Saint Paul, 1974

Returning to Minneapolis from 14 months doing national service (VISTA/Western Nebraska) in the fall of 1974, I got a call from fellow performers Bill Hinkley and Judy Larson that a writer and radio DJ named Garrison Keillor had just started a variety radio show, based in part on the Grand Ole Opry. They both knew my music — like “Getting in the Cows” and “Winter on the Farm.” The songs had a rural theme that Garrison was after at the time, and Bill and Judy pitched me to Garrison thinking I might be a good fit. He invited me and my wife to dinner at his house for spaghetti, and afterward, hearing a few of my songs clinched the deal. I was a featured guest on the second or third broadcast, and a fairly regular performer for years after.

Sweeping up and eating up … together

When performers remember APHC, it’s the early years they seem to recall with the most warmth. It was community in the truest sense. We’d all — Garrison included — sweep up the theaters after a show, then adjourn to La Cucaracha, the local Mexican restaurant, for a late dinner together.

Born-in-a-trunk daughter makes APHC appearance at 11 months

During the early shows, the “green room” was simply backstage behind a curtain. Local performers brought their children (who could afford a babysitter?) who mingled like an extended family. On one show, Garrison invited the Persuasions who happened to be on tour through town. The quartet — too long on the road — were missing their own families. One of the members scooped up my 11-month-old daughter, Elsie, into his arms and took her out in front of the audience for the finale. Elsie put her little arm around the singer’s neck as if he was a long-lost uncle, and quietly sucked her thumb as the Persuasions smiled and laughed at her and went into their final song.

The Morning Show — APHC incubator

People may not know that Garrison was on the air not only on Saturdays but also worked Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. on Minnesota Public Radio in Saint Paul. I loved being on the show in the mornings, since it was just Garrison, engineer Tom Keith, Bob Potter, who read the news, and me. I often used that time to work up new material for my tours and used APHC and The Morning Show to test things out. If Garrison heard a new song he really liked, he’d ask me to come on the show the following Saturday and sing it. That’s how a lot of my songs came into being. “DM&IR” is about a railroad on the Iron Range of Minnesota; “Talking Home Improvement,” about the perils of making your own home repairs; “Oh Cold & Misery,” about starting your car on a cold Minnesota winter morning; and lots and lots of others.

Spontaneous, no rehearsal necessary

One time on The Morning Show , a retired guy who loved to write poetry about his childhood, sent in a piece to Garrison titled “The Evening Train.” In it he painted a picture of his days as a kid going down to the railroad station to see who was getting on and off in his little town of Cokato, Minnesota. So Garrison, Tom, and I, were sitting there at the mics in the MPR Studio, and during one of Bob’s newscasts (when we could talk without being heard on air), Garrison turned to me and said, “Tell you what, I think this poem would make a good song this week on the show. Why don’t you go into the hallway and set it to music, and then try it out in the 8:30 segment?” I have always been fast with the music to a song having studied Woody Guthrie, and Carlton Lee’s poem was so songlike, I had it ready in 15 minutes flat.

On a book tour with guitar, spoons, and new friends

Sometimes there was “APHC” work to be had without actually being on the air. Out of APHC’s “Department of Folk Song” came a book by Jon and Marcia Pankake titled A Prairie Home Companion Folk Song Book . It was a full-sized hardcover published by Viking Press with a foreword by Garrison — released in the fall of 1988. Viking hired me to go out on the road with the authors and we sang songs from the book at store signings. We had a ton of stops all over the place. There were a lot more independent bookstores in those days, and as we wore into tour, I taught Marcia how to play wooden spoons in rhythmic accompaniment to the songs we sang. It was the beginning of a friendship that lasts to this day.

On experiencing Vietnam via Omaha

I credit Garrison and APHC for my start in Minnesota as a songwriter/performer. Getting on the show on a regular basis often led to other well-paying gigs around the region for anyone who wanted to travel to an audience that wanted a bit of the show in their own backyard. A request for me came in from a law firm in Nebraska. The day before Thanksgiving that year, I flew down to Omaha with my little Martin Terz guitar that fit easily in the overhead compartment of the airplane, and upon landing was promptly chauffeured to a holiday party. I had a great time with that little guitar in the law library, surrounded by people who loved the songs they had heard me sing on the show. Between sets, one of the lawyers came up to me with a request I thought unusual for his line of work: it was for traditional folksongs Joan Baez had recorded. I sang as many of the old ballads as I could remember, and this guy filled in beautifully with a soft voice right on key. He introduced himself as William Holland and then proceeded to tell me that he would listen to Baez while piloting a Huey helicopter in Vietnam. Holland told me story after story about the war, and later put many of them into a novel titled, Let A Soldier Die (Delacorte Press). The longer I was on the show, I realized that APHC was not only entertainment for many, but also a way for some to find peace in their lives. Music, as they say, is medicine. And as the show endeared itself to more and more listeners, I think that many were eased by Garrison’s stories — and the way a good song can go straight to the heart.

“It Seems We Met Somewhere Before …”

Looking back, I like to think that we took our work and our music seriously, but not ourselves. That was partly the secret to the early success of the show. The beginnings of A Prairie Home Companion grew out of the West Bank folk scene that passed for Greenwich Village around Minneapolis in the 1970s. We had a lot of good times, comradery, and encouragement, and got to share our songs and the music we loved with the world.

ANDRA SUCHY, SINGER

One of my favorite recollections is the time I was in the car with GK, goinh from the hotel in Nashville to the Ryman. GK asked if I had ever been to the Country Music Hall of Fame Museum. I had not, so he looked at his watch, gave me a twenty dollar bill and had the car drop me off. He said, “You can be an hour and a half late to rehearsal. I know the boss. Come over after you get through.” I’ll never forget that!

Another memory is being on the tour bus and making cheese curds in the middle of the night in the microwave, which I had no idea was the proper way to eat them (not cold right out of the bag).

Or when we did a show in Bismarck and I suggested rewriting the words to an old cowboy song (come a ti-yi-yippee, etc.). He said, “OK! Be back with it in 20 minutes!” Keep in mind, my idea was for HIM to write it. The muses were good to me that day because I came back with “The Old Suchy Trail” and it made it on the show.

TIM RUSSELL, ACTOR

Garrison invited me to be on the show in May of 1994. My first show was in Portland, Oregon. I remember passing him at the door of the hotel on the day before the show, he said, “I’m going to buy some reds socks; I need to write something for you.” He wrote a script about “The Plaid Pants Warehouse” that featured my President Reagan impression, and we were off and running. Needless to say, I enjoyed doing the recurring characters: Dusty in “Lives of the Cowboys,” a chance to dig up a voice from the TV Western serials of my youth; Jim for The Catchup Advisory Board, which started out as a parody of the TV spots of ad guru Hal Riney, the voice of President Reagan’s “Morning in America” spots.

I had great fun doing the panoply of “Famous Celebrities” ruminating on the importance of various holiday’s or topical events, the voices of current and past politicians and presidents (the Washington Post noted that my “John McCain” was dead on; I told them his voice was a strange combination of Carol Channing and Liberace). There were also the many “Bob and Ray” nods as Garrison interviewed characters like my version of Paul Bunyan or F. Scott Fitzgerald. He challenged me with various dialects: the script might say (Italian) and I would have to create Italian gibberish and so on.

None of this would have been as fun without Garrison’s great script; his scripts made it easy to envision the voices needed and most of the time he didn’t tinker with whatever choice the actors would make. And if we were off the mark, he would guide us to a better choice. Garrison is a writing machine, it’s all about the rewrites, right up to showtime and sometimes during the show itself. There’s a picture of Garrison reaching around my shoulders — as I was reading a script on the air — and editing the script midstream. Most importantly, I enjoyed working with a great cast: Sue Scott, Fred Newman, and the late, great Tom Keith. Plus, the one-of-a-kind staff and technical crew that made every weekend a joy. The musicians were always world class, led by Rich Dworsky who was a valuable part of every script with his amazing, inventive, underscoring. The scripts would jump to life, thanks to Rich.

Then there was the opportunity to travel.

New York City: Taking the walk though Times Square to the legendary Town Hall on W. 43 rd St. in NYC. Sharing a stage once trod by the greats in jazz, opera, folk, and spoken word. Downstairs — bathroom challenged, but full of camaraderie, Klezmer musicians and Broadway stars sharing curtained cubbyholes.

The energy of the great outdoor spring and summer venues.

Miami , where a bunch of deceased “Famous Celebrities,” like Jimmy Stewart and John Wayne, welcomed the recently passed Mr. Rogers to heaven. GK: “I’m sorry I wasn’t kinder to you Mr. Rogers.” Mr. Rogers: “That’s okay. I’ve talked to the Man upstairs and guess what.” GK: “What?” Mr. Rogers: “You’re not going to be my neighbor.”

Tanglewood , in the unparalleled beauty of the Berkshires. Quick jaunts to the Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, where his Four Freedoms paintings can bring a grown man to tears. Joined onstage with the likes of James Tylor, Meryl Streep, Sara Bareilles, and great classical musicians like Emanuel Ax. Major thunderstorms driving the lawn attendees under the great roof for epic marathon post-show sing-alongs, with everything from hymns and the great patriotic anthems, to the Beatles and Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline.”

Wolf Trap National Park in Virginia, where the lawn crowds howl with enthusiasm at the mere mention of wolves. My imitation of Al Gore saying President George Bush’s policies creating a “giant sucking sound” sounded like something entirely different, drawing a light gasp from the crowd and some serious pearl clutching from the NPR listeners. “Did I hear word Sucking or something else?” Majority Leader Harry Reid was sitting on stage, and he evidently heard the “something else” and he loved it!

Ravinia , in the Northern Chicago suburbs, where one can visit a great botanic garden and drive up and down Sheridan Avenue wondering how so many people could make so much money. One year, we shared the stage with the howl of the 17-year cicada infestation. It’s where our beloved stage manager, the late Albert Webster, tracked impending storms on his computer.

The Hollywood Bowl , where guest Martin Sheen, The West Wing ’s President Jed Bartlet got presidential advice from my Reagan, George W., Clinton, etc.

The Greek Theatre in Los Angeles, where the cool June nights were highlighted by the dramatic lighting of the amphitheater’s crown of vegetation, bringing out the best in a performer.

The Starlight Theatre in Kansas City, where one can sense that 105 degrees is not optimal for performing — but nonetheless Calvin Trillin and Kelley Hunt persisted.

Nashville , the home of the Ryman Auditorium, where we enjoyed the likes of Emmylou Harris, Mark Knopfler, and Brad Paisley, sitting in with the band and, one time, bringing us a moment with Little Jimmy Dickens.

The Odd Spaces :

Canceled flights, a 13-hour rental car drive, nighttime in a snowstorm, to Bismarck, ND .

Sue Scott, Tom Keith, and Stevie Beck taking an 8-hour rental car drive from Denver, over the mountains at night, to Durango, CO .

Staying in the dorm at Interlochen Music Academy in Michigan — camp for grown-ups.

Lanesboro, Minnesota : a stormy Rhubarb Festival on-air show on a baseball diamond, where the weather knocked the satellite off the air, but Garrison soldiered on walking the muddy fields, microphone in hand joining the drenched crowd in song. Memorialized on film for the PBS American Masters documentary by Peter Rosen, The Man on the Radio in the Red Shoes .

The Minnesota D ance Hall Shows , where attendees are comfortable enough to chat you up while the show is on. So, where’s the men’s room then?

Yellowstone’s Old Faithful Lodge , wondering if this is the day that Old Faithful gives up the ghost. The Lodge Recreation center, good for basketball and bison, where a bull, rolling in the dust, threatened the broadcast satellite dish.

Flagstaff. A chance for a pre-show bucket list visit to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, seeing a California Condor, with numbered tag, on a ledge below

New Orleans, LA. The rickety but famous St. Charles Streetcar takes you to within a few blocks of the WW2 museum, discovering the importance of a man named Higgins, the creator of the Higgins Boat, the heroic landing vehicle responsible for making D-Day a success. Trying to master the Cajun parlance for a script the morning of the show by listening to local talk radio.

Reykjavik. Learning to pronounce Eyjafjallajökull, the active volcano, almost as hard as Piscawaddaquadymogon (a word Garrison would throw in a script for some big shot visiting actor to be tortured trying to pronounce). The first screening of Robert Altman’s film A Prairie Home Companion , with Icelandic subtitles where “you can’t put the horse before Descartes” was subtitled “you can’t put a horse before Plato.” John C. Reilly was on the show from Iceland and loved jamming with the musicians in the wee hours.

The Cruises. Garrison chartered Holland American Ships some 11 times for a cruise experience that brought talent and fans together for a chance to see the world. We did many APHC-like shows in the big showroom, and our guest musicians, singers, and poets would take over the smaller venues. Sue Scott and I would spend a couple of months putting together our own shows for the Showroom. Fine-tuning one of those shows would remind us of the skill Garrison had in putting together a 2-hour show each week for a national audience, an incredible feat.

The Summer Rhubarb Tour. The first of many non-radio APHC tours, one-nighters, covering the country. Sue Scott, Fred Newman, and I were on some of the first of these tours and it was deluxe: jetting to a city in a private plane (Pearl Jam’s touring plane), doing a show then flying to the next city, a stay in a hotel for the day, then doing the next show, then rinse and repeat. Later Garrison took just Fred, the musicians, and a guest singer like Suzy Bogguss or Sara Watkins for a couple of weeks on a magical mystery bus tour with a different theme each summer — two buses, lots of adventures.

JENNIFER HOWE, APHC OFFICE MANAGER AND PERSONAL ASSISTANT TO GARRISON

I joined A Prairie Home Companion in 1984 and immediately began to tour with the show. The entire experience was new to me, and I fell in love with the vast array of theaters, their history, “phantoms,” and construction. One theater had numerous balconies, the top few rows at an almost vertical angle, narrow stairs and only a knee-high guard rail. The pitch was such that you were sure you were going to fall over the railing. It was so high from the main floor that a person could hardly see the actors on the stage. Some venues were gothic, others Pepto Bismol pink, ultra-modern or quaint — each one more interesting than the one before. My favorite was a theater that resembled a Sultan’s tent.

Today the technicians use a computer; however, the original backstage control panel resembled the wall of a battleship. Large hand cranks, knobs, buttons, dials, and steering wheels to move the screens, curtains, and lights. During rehearsal, I asked one of the techs to explain the controls and he informed me that the ceiling could be illuminated to produce a sunset, stars, and sunrise. I showed Garrison and he talked the procedure through on the radio. The ceiling had not been lit for some time and everyone was thrilled to see it. There were ooohs and aaahs from the audience just like you hear during the Fourth of July fireworks.

George Lunn, Chet Atkin’s Road Manager, was on the my few road shows and took me under his wing — a great mentor and friend. Chet and my husband, Bob, became friends over the years. One day Chet called and invited us down to Nashville, all expenses paid, for his famous Celebrity Golf Tournament and party. Bob golfed in Chet’s foursome — an experience that neither of us would ever forget.

My first trip with Garrison was about three weeks after my start date. The cast and crew had already departed, and Garrison and I were taking a later flight. Departing the airport, I saw a long white stretch limo waiting at the end of the sidewalk. The driver was holding the door. I climbed in, followed by Garrison and to my amazement, across from us were Chet Atkins and Johnny Gimble. All I could do was think to myself — Jennifer Mathwig Howe, Cumberland, WI, population 1897, sitting in a stretch limo with Garrison Keillor, Chet Atkins, and Johnny Gimble. Needless to say, I pinched myself a dozen times!! And the adventure of a lifetime began.

Fan letters were abundant — everything from advice, thank-you notes, pictures of family gatherings, gifts. A few that stand out were from a chaplain, an inmate, and a college English class. The chaplain wrote from a military base in Europe. He had taken one of Garrison’s tapes with him and had played it so many times with the troops that it was worn out. I boxed up one of each of Garrison’s tapes and books and forwarded the package to the chaplain. We were happy to hear that it arrived in time for Christmas. The chaplain’s thank-you read that a number of the boys never received mail from home, so this was a very special gift. Students dissecting one of Garrison’s stories in an English class found a grammatical error. As a class project, they composed a letter spelling out the error to Garrison, each one signing the letter. Garrison asked me to send another gift box of his books and tapes and off it went with a letter of acknowledgement and thank you from Garrison. An inmate, in for life, found solace in Garrison’s work and asked if we could send tapes and enlist our services to get the show on the local airwaves. We were unable to accomplish the latter, but we boxed up a season’s worth of tapes, in addition to some of Garrison’s products and sent them off. Because the show tapes were not shrink wrapped, the concern of the prison staff was that they could contain secret messages to the inmates, escape routes and such, so it was a strict prison policy to return this type of material to the sender.

One memorable package came to our office after Garrison had mentioned in a monologue how he missed the sweet aroma of cow manure. Sure enough, along came a two-pound coffee can filled to the brim!

One book autograph request was from a man in Australia. Garrison turned the book upside down and inscribed, “To _____, in the land down under,” Classic and brilliant as always.

One of the many benefits of working with Garrison and APHC was the opportunity to meet his vast array of guests and to hear such a wonderful variety of music. And as exciting and humbling as it was to meet some of the all-time legends, I have to admit one of my favorite guests was “Murray,” the 800-pound sea lion from California’s SeaWorld. There is an incredible photograph of Garrison leaning over addressing Murray. When Garrison put his microphone in front of Murray, hoping for an audience laugh, Murray surprised us by talking back. Much to Garrison’s (and our) amusement, he barked back an answer to every one of Garrison’s questions. Garrison’s facial expressions were priceless. They went back and forth for several minutes, and it brought the house down! When Murray had to depart for his next “performance” he took a bow, waved his flipper at the audience and waddled off to his travel cart down a special plank we had built for him. He was doused with water to keep his skin from drying out, and off he went, barking at us all the way out. What a variety show! It was the only time I saw Garrison upstaged.

Garrison’s willingness to accept outside speaking engagements — in addition to writing, producing, and hosting a weekly show — was remarkable. In most cases, a request for Garrison to “stop by and greet volunteers of a hospital or church during their lunch break” would turn into a full-blown two-hour benefit performance, in a theater that held 2,000 people. Garrison would insist that all proceeds go to the charity the volunteers were working for. It is amazing how Garrison gives of his time and talents.

The final Saint Paul APHC broadcast in 1987 was a day none of us looked forward to. The performance was flawless, filled with emotion for all who performed, worked, or listened. My husband was waiting in our Jeep in the alley behind the stage door to whisk Garrison away to a private farewell function with family and friends. Garrison’s loon calls, as lonely and heartbreaking as they sounded, were also a ray of hope to all of us that Garrison and A Prairie Home Companion would someday return. None of us could begin to imagine Garrison’s feelings. We each experienced our own mourning and sense of great loss. But for the creator and host — who had spent so many years onstage — it must have been a very sad day indeed. It was then wonderful to know our feelings about the loon calls were correct: Garrison returned, and the show continued for another thirty years. Congratulations on your 50 th  Anniversary!

POP WAGNER, SINGER, SONGWRITER, PERFORMER

Early years

The first time I played on the show was in 1974 or 1975. It was at the small theater space in the Park Square Court Building (where the radio station was also located at that time). I remember the feeling of excitement over its being a LIVE broadcast although the in-house audience was relatively small. In the early years, I was a frequent guest and played on shows at the Science Museum, the Sculpture Garden, and the World Theater. I remember volunteering with many others as we cleaned up the old World Theater, getting it ready for the public. In those early years, the entire cast and crew would often go out to dinner together after the show — a great feeling of camaraderie! Once when the show was being broadcast from the Sculpture Garden, it started to rain. The broadcast was briefly switched back to the station and everyone (cast, crew, and audience) picked up a mic stand or other piece of equipment and carried it across the street to the World Theater. We were back on the air within 5 or 10 minutes as I recall!

The show goes national

I had the honor (along with the Butch Thompson Trio, the Powdermilk Biscuit Band, and others) of being on the first national broadcast at the NPR convention in Kansas City. I believe this was being considered as a “trial run” of sorts. Later, when the kickoff show for the regularly scheduled national broadcasts was held at Northrop Auditorium, I was the first solo to perform after the introduction — the excitement, almost electric, was palpable in the air! And a full house sang along with me as I played Libba Cotten’s “Shake Sugaree.”

During my first day on the movie [Robert Altman’s A Prairie Home Companion ] set (as a musician extra), I was in a scene with Lily Tomlin, Meryl Streep, and Lindsey Lohan. I was instructed to pass by them as they entered the green room area. The cameras rolled and I walked. Then as I was passing by, Meryl said, “Good morning, Pop!” and I responded with “Howdy, ma’am!” — at which point someone hollered, “CUT!” Well, then I was taken aside and told NOT to say a word since it would have put me in a much higher pay grade. I like to think that somewhere on a cutting room floor there is footage of me trading lines with Meryl Streep!

PAT DONOHUE, GUITARIST

One segment on the show I will always remember was in 1994 when we did a Prairie Home show for the grand reopening of the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. It was a star-studded show. One bit was the “Everly Brothers Singing Contest,” in which there were three “teams” of duo singers. We (the Guy’s All-Star Shoe Band) played “Dream” (by the Everlys) and Kate MacKenzie and G.K. sang the first verse and did great. Vince Gill and Mary Chapin Carpenter sang the second verse and the crowd went wild. Then, the actual Everly Bros. (who were also on the show) came in on the middle part — “I can make you mine, taste your lips of wine, anytime night or day” — with their iconic sound fully on display and at that point the crowd went totally insane with happiness, me included.

Another thing I will always remember happened after a Dec. 21 APHC show at The Town Hall in NYC. It had started snowing … hard! We were supposed to fly back home the next day as usual, but I chose to get in the truck with our beloved driver Russ Ringsak and ride back to Minnesota with him, since I didn’t want to get snowed in. It was coming down like crazy and I had my doubts as to whether or not Russ could drive us out of Manhattan in such a storm in that big red APHC semi. Well, sir, I saw a masterful exhibition of truck driving that not only got us out of New York but also safely home in about a day and a half. Those who stayed were snowed in for several days. I hope they all made it home for Christmas. I know I did, thanks to Russ. I had a great time on the ride too, listening to blues and playing my guitar in the passenger seat. God bless Russ.

SUZANNE WEIL, ARTS ADMINISTRATOR AND PRODUCER

I ran a one-person Performing Arts program at Walker Art Center in Minneapolis beginning in the late ’60s. We were a discerning, I might say a bit hard to please, small staff — a relentlessly sophisticated young bunch. If there had been a water cooler, we would’ve all be around it each morning talking about the Prairie Home Companion .

That guy in the tiny booth in a tiny town? I have no idea how we got there; I’m certain that there was no such thing as a publicist, given the time and the resources, laughable. The juxtaposition of that little town somehow brilliantly funny and always respected, perhaps that is the crux of it all. There was music you wanted to hear but didn’t know it. If “Help Me, Rhonda” didn’t set you up for the day, forget it …

I’ve complained about the loss of Jack’s Auto Repair and Raoul’s Warm Car Service (a particular favorite). I don’t remember who survived those early programs — was Pastor Liz there? I don’t think so.

He made them funny but never talked down to them. The listener didn’t have to feel guilty laughing at them — ever.

I had gotten to know Garrison when I presented a poetry reading of Garrison and the late Peter Schjeldahl (Art Critic at The New Yorker for many years, a Minnesotan) at the Planetarium at the Public Library. GK’s Richard Nixon poems stand out. I suggested a live program at the Walker Art Center Auditorium (“listeners would like to see what you look like”). We presented A PRAIRE HOME ENTERTAINMENT with others at the Auditorium at Walker Art Center. That seemed to be the beginning of something, I’m not sure what exactly.

I think those of us who found him then have a right to be a bit smug — I am.

MARCIA PANKAKE, PERFORMER (WITH HUSBAND JON PANKAKE), EDITOR OF A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION COMMONPLACE BOOK AND A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION FOLK SONG BOOK

The Masked Folk Singer

It was Garrison’s idea that traditional music scholar and musician Jon Pankake appear on A Prairie Home Companion as “The Masked Folk Singer.” Wearing a red mask, Jon would take the stage and sing a song. For one such appearance, Jon had been instructed to enter the theater during the broadcast through the loading dock door — behind the curtain at the back of the stage. Finding that door locked, Jon and I went through the theater’s main door, where we were met by some resistance from a staff and crew unaware of the plan. Bill Kling, president and CEO of Minnesota Public Radio, thought the Masked Folksinger bit was awful, especially on shows with the likes of Chet Atkins or The Modern Jazz Quartet.

“Just say goodnight …”

Like many listeners, we can remember where we were when we heard a certain show. We were picking raspberries in the backyard, and at 5 o’clock set things aside, got our lawn chairs and sat down in the yard to listen. It was the show from Alaska in which the News from Lake Wobegon ran long. I was thinking. “Oh, maybe the show is going to be more than two hours today.” Later on, I heard that Garrison had dug himself into a convoluted monologue and it was stalwart stage manager Steve Koeln who — as the clock ticked down — kept going out on the stage to show GK signs: 5 MINUTES. Then, 2 MINUTES. And finally, JUST SAY GOODNIGHT!

The Prairie Home Attic Show

I think this was the first time Garrison ever took time off from the Saturday show, and he may have still been doing KSJN’s The Morning Show as well. But he asked us to put together a broadcast of recorded music (from “the attic”), and so we listened to a lot of things and played a few things for him and came up with a show. I sat with engineer (and sound-effects man) Tom Keith and we assembled the recorded pieces. We had Garrison on tape speaking something and we were going to connect that to something else, but he had breathed out rather than in — or in rather than out — just where the join was going to be. Tom worked on that one recorded breath for an inordinate amount of time before we got it cut just right.

The project was great fun because “the attic” included lots of recordings from the 1930s. GK had told us that we should contact the still-living people we could find to get permission to use their recordings — typical of his thoughtfulness. I wrote to the DeZurik Sisters, for example. Carolyn and Mary Jane DeZurik — who grew up in the tiny town of Royalton, Minnesota, and went on to appear regularly on Chicago’s National Barn Dance — were very excited that we wanted to use one of their records. Later on, one of the sisters wrote back, telling me that they had gathered the family together and listened to the show. They were tremendously thrilled to hear their old recording.

STEVIE BECK, PERFORMER, ASSOCIATE PRODUCER

At the Ryman

I remember when Garrison went down to Nashville in the spring of 1974 to see the final Grand Ole Opry show held in the Ryman Auditorium. For several months, he had been taking music lessons from me, and at our next session, he brought me a picture of the Carter Family, which I still have. He also returned with an idea for a live radio show: A Prairie Home Companion .

The Ryman had been home to the Grand Ole Opry since 1943, and thirty-one years’ worth of performers added up to a big chapter in the history of country music. For some of us who listened to WSM on Saturday nights, when Roy Acuff, Minnie Pearl, Ernest Tubb, and Loretta Lynn performed on that stage, the 1974 move to Opryland USA didn’t sit too well.

During the next couple of decades, only the occasional recording session or special event brought music back to the Ryman. The building, falling into disrepair, was open daily — 8:30 to 4:00 — to busloads of tourists who paid $2.50 for a chance to see a collection of memorabilia from the glory days.

Then in 1993, an $8.5 million renovation began, which would bring the “Mother Church of Country Music” back to life. Greg Pope at WPLN Nashville Public Radio and the Ryman Auditorium staff invited A Prairie Home Companion to kick off the grand opening celebration, And with APHC’s broadcast on June 4, 1994, live radio returned to the Ryman.

During that afternoon, PHC’s guest performers — including Chet Atkins, Vince Gill, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Kate MacKenzie, Robin and Linda Williams, Don and Phil Everly, and Mark O’Connor — wandered through the Ryman’s oak pews and recalled their own connections with the venue. Don Everly told me that back in the 1950s, he and Phil spent two solid years standing in the alley between the Ryman and Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, hoping they’d be invited onto the Opry stage. And, he added, every time Chet Atkins came out the stage door, he’d introduce the Everlys to whomever he was with and comment on the boys’ talent. Chet himself remembered being a boy of ten when someone told him, “Keep on playing that fiddle, Chester, and someday you’ll be on the Grand Ole Opry.”

What stays lodged in my memory of that day is the thrill of standing on the stage where Maybelle Carter once sang with her daughters; where Roy Acuff did “The Wabash Cannonball” and balanced his bow on his nose; where Minnie Pearl’s piercing “Howdy! I’m just so proud to be here” carried all the way to the parking lot; and the likes of Red Foley, Kitty Wells, Uncle Dave Macon, Hank Williams, and Patsy Cline stepped up to the mic on Saturday nights.

First appearance on A Prairie Home Companion

After Garrison received an Autoharp for Christmas in 1973, he began taking lessons from me early the following January. The lessons lasted only a few months, but that summer he called and invited me and my music partner, Bob Bovee, to play on his new radio program. Our first APHC appearance was October 19, 1974, the first time he dubbed me the Queen of the Autoharp. It was Prairie Home’s sixth show — and audience attendance was holding steady at about 12.

For the first few years, the music performers played the parts of characters in the scripts. I was once cast as Jessie James in an all-female version of the James Gang. On another show, I played a trucker named Little Queenie, hauling a load of bat guano in my eighteen-wheeler. Later, APHC stepped up its game and booked real actors — a marked improvement. All the while, Tom Keith provided the sound effects. He was a genius at his craft and made poetry of every footstep, faucet drip, helicopter flyover, car tire spinning on ice, even (wince) a cornea removal. After Tom’s death, sound-effects duties went to Fred Newman (the envy of any 14-year-old who ever put palm to armpit).

Associate Producer

I performed on A Prairie Home Companion five or six times a year until the show folded its tent (the first time) in 1987. And a couple of years after the program was resurrected (as American Radio Company of the Air before returning to the original title), I was offered the position of associate producer, in charge of booking talent.

During rehearsal on show days, the most frequent question I got from the guest performers — out of their element in our production style — was, “How do I know when to start?” I’d always tell them, “Just listen to Garrison when he introduces you and chats with you. He’ll say or do something that’ll seem as though he’s handed you a downbeat on a silver platter.” True.

In New York

Working on a Prairie Home Saturday broadcast in St. Paul could be challenging, but doing the show in New York flummoxed me. Everything felt like a struggle. Our ad hoc office at The Town Hall was on an upper floor, a space you got to by elevator — that is, if you could find the elevator operator. One December Saturday, shortly before airtime, I had completed some last-minute task in the office and then rang for the elevator.

The minutes — five, ten, twenty — ticked by. More ringing. No luck. I considered taking the stairs but thought the better of that idea when I peeked into the stairwell and found it so dark that I could barely make out the pigeon corpses that littered the steps. Rescue finally came after I made a (then) long-distance call to the tech director’s cell phone, and he got someone to track down the elevator guy.

In the words of our wonderful stage manager Steve Koeln, “If you need a piece of plywood in St. Paul, you zip over to Knox Lumber and get one; in New York, it takes three hours, two unions, and a trip to New Jersey.”

KEN LAZEBNIK, WRITER

My wife, Kate, and I moved to New York City in 1985, driving out from Minnesota in an old Chevy Nova my parents had bequeathed us. When I lived in St. Paul, I had listened to Garrison’s morning show, and then Prairie Home Companion , with star-struck admiration. (I graduated from Macalester College in 1976, unaware that one summer when I was preoccupied with doing summer theater productions there, PHC was broadcasting from the music hall at Macalester.) The brilliance of the writing — the uncanny combination of inspired absurdity of the sketches, balanced with the profoundly human storytelling of the monologues — created a magic I’d never heard before. But I had never met Garrison or connected with PHC in any way when I lived in Minnesota.

When Garrison returned from his Denmark hiatus, he wanted to launch a different show, one based in New York. It would be a two-hour variety show, like PHC, but without the Midwest as its touchstone. He hired Minnesota composer Randall Davidson as his initial producer of The American Radio Company of the Air , and he set up the office of The American Humor Institute in an old building on 14 th Street. In one of life’s serendipitous turns, Randall and I were childhood friends; we’d both grown up as sons of professors who taught at Stephens College, in Columbia, Missouri. Randall contacted me and said Garrison was looking for a writer. He invited me to send a couple of short script samples.

As a playwright, I had some short plays — ten- or twelve-page one-acts — and I mailed those to Randall. On Halloween night of 1989, the phone rang in our one-room apartment, which was a four-floor walk-up on Christopher Street. Kate answered and was astonished to hear the radio come out of her phone. It was Garrison’s voice, and he asked to speak with me. She handed the phone to me, and I heard that familiar voice say hello, and explain he was launching a show and looking for a writer. He asked if I had any short pieces. I stammered that I had sent him a couple of short plays, and Garrison said he was looking for very short pieces — one or two pages. I replied that I had one of those, and he said, “Good. Come by the office tomorrow.”

I hung up, dazed. Of course I didn’t have anything of the kind, and of course I was determined to write one that night. I decided to walk through Greenwich Village and see what I could come up with. Halloween night in the Village in 1989 was both more anarchic and friendlier than the current corporate version of Halloween. I walked through the streets, noting the drag costumes, which would today be categorized as legendary, writing down bits of overheard dialogue, and then I came back to the apartment and wrote something that I hoped to be simple and honest and a little funny. It was in the form of a letter from New York, written by a young man to his girlfriend back in Missouri.

I typed it up on the best quality paper I had (yes, this was before word processing, so it was actually put through a typewriter), and the next day I reported to the American Humor Institute. It was a simple office, with a couple of rooms, one of which was occupied by Jennifer Howe, the endlessly cheerful and efficient manager of a million things GK. She greeted me and then Garrison came out, we shook hands, he was taller than I had anticipated, and we sat down in his office.

He asked the polite questions about where I had come from and I remember stammering. Even though I was 34 at the time and had worked in theaters for a dozen years, this was an opportunity like none I’d ever had. Then Garrison said, “Let’s see what you have.”

I handed him my two-page piece. He took it, and started reading. I hadn’t expected that. Silence. Extended silence. Fortunately, I had lived in Minnesota long enough to be comfortable with silence. My two pages on his desk, Garrison scowling down at them. Then he pulled out a pen and started editing. I could see him crossing lines out, writing in the margins. His lips pursed, serious, unsmiling. Finally, he looked up.

“Good. Is there a second act?”

As far as I knew, I was being interviewed for a staff writer position. I figured he was testing me — could I come up with a continuation of the story? I said, “Yes. Maybe she writes him back.”

Garrison stared in the distance for a moment, then said, “No.”

Then he pitched a wonderful idea for a second act. I wish I could remember what he said. I just remember it was great, a funny twist to the story, which opened it up. Then he handed me back my pages and said, “Can you come back in a day or two?” I said yes, correctly interpreting this as “Please rewrite this and return.”

I set a time to return with Jennifer and walked out in the hall. I looked at the pages Garrison handed back to me. During those minutes of scowling and editing, he had added hilarious jokes. It was my first experience of seeing him hard at work as a humorist — which was skillful, serious work.

I did the rewrites, typed up the new version, and returned in two days. As before, I walked in, was greeted by upbeat Jennifer, and went into Garrison’s office.

“What’chu got?”

I handed him the pages. Once again, silence as he read. He looked as serious as ever, but this time when he put the pages down, he said, “This is good. How much do you want for it?”

I was floored. I thought I was applying for some version of a staff job. I had no idea how much public radio paid — specifically how much public radio (or Garrison) paid for a two-page script.

I stammered around and finally said, “Well, I generally hope to make about $500 a week.”

A pause. I thought to myself, “Damnit, I asked for too much.”

Then he said, “I’ll give you $750.” And he had Jennifer write me a check on the spot. Somehow, he knew I needed the money. Among the many extraordinary qualities of Garrison is his visceral unbroken connection with people struggling to pay the bills. He has never forgotten what that was like.

I became a contributing writer, and it defined for me what getting your big break meant. The theater I was part of was a wonderful off-off-Broadway company, which meant our work was exciting and there was no money and we performed at the Home for Contemporary Theater and Art on Walker Street, a theater carved out of a storefront, with seating for something like 80 people, and a backstage with one tiny dressing room and a bathroom we shared with the audience. I went from the sense of performing for an audience in the palm of your hand to ARCA’s first show at BAM, on an immense stage with a Broadway orchestra populated by world-class musicians and led by Rob Fisher. It was like being shot out of a cannon and finding yourself flying in a dream.

During that time, I found myself riding back to Manhattan in a limo with Bob Elliott and his son Chris. I was introduced to Renée Fleming and Pete Seeger and Victor Borge. I traveled to the Grand Ole Opry and London and Seattle and Memphis. I was friends with Rob Fisher and Broadway musicians and Rich Dworsky and Tom Keith. (The sweetest man in the world; much missed.) Years later, I met Robert Altman and sat next to Kurt Vonnegut at the premiere of the PHC movie. It was the ride of a lifetime.

I learned many things from Garrison over the years. (I wrote for the radio show steadily for four or five years, until my TV writing took up too much time. I then shared a story credit with Garrison for the PHC movie, and I wrote again for the radio show the fall he was getting back to full steam following his stroke.)

Thing One: GK is a singular genius, a writing machine that I have never seen duplicated. I wrote five minutes of a two-hour show; Garrison wrote the rest. My usual writing consisted of short sketches, and then narrative pieces about the city we were touring to. The rest was Garrison. The idea that for 39 weeks each year, Garrison would create a two-hour show, writing 95% of the material — and somehow weaving a vision of music through it all — remains a high-wire feat unlike any in American popular culture.

Thing Two: It’s all just material. Our process was for me to turn in four or five short pieces on Thursday. There was a Friday afternoon read through of all the material for that week’s show. Garrison would show up with reams of sketches. In the first year of ARCA, there was always a 10- to 14-page continuing drama of Gloria, played by Ivy Austin, about the life of an aspiring singer in New York, as well as the other sketches that repeated every week (Duct Tape, Dusty and Lefty, Guy Noir, etc.), as well as a couple of mine. After the read through, Garrison and I would repair to his office and he would select the pieces that he thought worked, and which ones needed revision. The first week, I remember he took one of his ten-page scripts, and methodically crossed out page after page, until he finally circled one paragraph. “I’ll come back with something.” The next morning he appeared with a new eight-page script, with that one paragraph forming its core. Not many people could do this (and produce any quality, let alone sustained brilliance) — but the underlying lesson was that it’s all just material. Don’t be precious. Let it go, the good things will come back to you. Pick and choose good things and put the blocks back together in a new arrangement. It’s just material.

Thing Three: Come at a story from the side. One horrible misconception of Garrison is that he spins homespun stories from the heartland. Nothing is further from the truth. Garrison started out writing for The New Yorker , and that means a lineage from James Thurber and S. J. Perelman and E. B. White. One writing technique he guided me toward was coming at things from the side. If you want to land at point K, don’t start at point J. Start way off to the side and come to things indirectly. There’s a tremendous delight an audience feels when they suddenly see how things have tied together in a completely unexpected but understandable way. He employs this technique in the monologues most famously. (Note: He always writes the News From Lake Wobegon in a mysterious cone of silence. He’d simply show up on Saturdays and deliver them — never went over them in rehearsal. If I had to guess, he’d write it out Saturday morning, and because he has what seems to be a photographic memory, he’d be able to deliver it that afternoon.)

Thing Four: It’s a live show; keep it live. From doing hours of live early morning radio he realized that part of the excitement of a live show is to not overprepare. Or, rather, to bake the cake right in front of the audience. The audience delighted in seeing the flow of the show — in seeing Garrison do the high-wire act of creating a two-hour entertainment that held together, but was created right before their eyes. This was both true and not true. The musical acts were obviously booked long before the show; the scripts were rehearsed —well, read through on Friday, and then read through again on Saturday — but the feeling was that we were putting the whole thing together right in front of the audience’s eyes. Garrison always pushed the deadlines for preparing for the show to the final moments — I remember one week in New York when, at about half hour before air, he nonchalantly said he was going back home to get a belt (not such an easy trip in the city, to go from midtown to the Upper West Side and back!) — and he actually ducked out. There was tightly controlled panic, and prayers that he’d come back in time, and sure enough, with only moments to spare, he walked in, now fully dressed with a belt, and walked out on stage and did his pre-show. I think that was all part of a conscious and subconscious effort to keep the show in the moment: This is happening right now, we’re all in this together, let’s hope it turns out for the best.

RICHARD DWORSKY, MUSIC DIRECTOR AND KEYBOARD PLAYER

After a more than 40 year association with Garrison Keillor and his radio show  A Prairie Home Companion , people often ask me how that relationship began. The answer is short and simple. My parents…Bob and Shirley. Dad had owned the World Theater and the attached Schubert Apartments since 1970 . A Prairie Home Companion  was looking for a permanent home and, in 1978, found it at the World Theater (later renamed the Fitzgerald Theater). Sadly, Dad passed away that same year, and Mom became the owner/landlord. She knew nothing about business (that was handled by others), but she did become friends with the show’s producer, Margaret Moos. Mom had been impressed by a talented Russian and Yiddish singer, Sima Shumilovsky, who had recently arrived in St. Paul from the Soviet Union. Mom thought that Sima would make wonderful guest on  A Prairie Home Companion and  dragged Margaret to a little a cappella performance Sima gave in a basement room at the St. Paul Jewish Community Center. Margaret was very impressed but a little cautious, saying, “Sima is great, but she needs an accompanist”. Mom immediately replied “My son, Richard, can play piano in any style and can learn a song immediately by ear” etc. Margaret was sold on the idea. Mom then came to me with the plan for my approval. Not considering myself a Russian/Yiddish folkie, my response was less than enthusiastic.

But Mom was persistent and begged me, saying “Come on. It’ll be a mitzvah” (Hebrew for a good deed). Sima and I performed on the radio show in February of 1980, and it went so well that we were invited back several more times. After a few shows, I was given an opportunity to do a solo tune. Garrison took notice and invited me back as a solo performer and to accompany him and various other guests. This all led to me eventually becoming  A Prairie Home Companion’s  pianist/music director for decades.

The moral of the story?  Listen to your mother! Every once in a while, she just might be right…and in a way that can change your life.

A short story about my dad, Bob Dworsky and the World Theater

After his service, Bob graduated from the University of Minnesota Law School in 1949 and began his law practice in St. Paul. He was admired and respected as a brilliant attorney, and in 1962 formed the “Dworsky & Rosen” law firm in partnership with attorney William S. Rosen. Beginning in 1956, he performed legal services for his old college friend, Billy Weitzman. Bob eventually became a development partner in Billy’s company, William H. Weitzman and Associates, a firm which designed and built apartments in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and St. Paul).

Upon Weitzman’s death, Bob retained his ownership share in many of the buildings, and formed his own company,  Multifam Corporation , to manage them. But he was granted sole ownership of the Shubert Building apartments and the adjacent World Theater (later renamed  The Fitzgerald ) in St. Paul, which became the permanent home of Garrison Keillor’s  A Prairie Home Companion  on Minnesota Public Radio. In 1978, MPR had approached Bob about renting the theater during broadcast weekends. Bob was a lover of the arts and generously gave MPR use of the theater for a flat fee of $90 per week. The show’s producer at the time recalled that “this fee was supposed to cover heating and lighting. I can’t imagine it came close.”

Bob passed away that same year, but Shirley never raised the rent. MPR eventually purchased the theater from Shirley.

CHRISTINE TSCHIDA, PRODUCER

I have lots of memories about the show in the early days of its reincarnation as The American Radio Company of the Air , then, The American Radio Company , and eventually A Prairie Home Companion once again.

Though I am from Minnesota/Mac grad/and had attended a couple of broadcasts of the original APHC in the Twin Cities, I was actually working at The Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York when Garrison returned from Denmark and started ARCA. My college friend Ken LaZebnik was living in New York at the time, and I’d occasionally get him comps for BAM shows. So, when he told me he was doing some writing for Garrison’s new radio show — which was actually renting one of the theaters at BAM in that first season, I asked him for tickets to that in return. A couple of months after seeing it, Ken told me that the show needed to find a new producer, and that’s how I came to be hired by Minnesota Public Radio while living in New York. I had produced plenty of theater and dance tours, but I had never really worked in radio, so it was good that there were smart people who knew the technical/broadcast side of the business, because I certainly did not.

The show was a bit of a nomad those first couple of seasons. BAM wasn’t really the right place for it, or for Garrison’s audience, which would happily find its way to midtown Manhattan from Connecticut and New Jersey and beyond. Somewhere with less expensive rent and production costs was better, and not in a sketchy (at that time) neighborhood in an “outer borough” would be better. So the “second season” (the first one that I worked on) found us renting The Lamb’s Theatre on 44th Street in Manhattan. At 350 seats, it was a much better fit for a show that was just getting started at building an audience than the cavernous BAM Opera House was.

Garrison had connected with Rob Fisher to put together a wonderful 16-piece band they called The Coffee Club Orchestra (with a smaller group called the Demitasse orch).  There was also a terrific musical arranger, Russell Warner, who would compose theme music for the sketches and commercials. I recall “The Water March” for a campaign to promote drinking eight glasses of water a day (which didn’t last) and others, like Café Boeuf, Rhubarb, and Coffee that did. There was a running soap opera about a young woman in New York called “The Story of Gloria” and Ivy Austin and Richard Muenz were regulars (more or less) augmented by Tom Keith (who didn’t want to travel) and other terrific New York based actors like Alice Playten and Lynne Thigpen.

So, the first show I ever worked on was at The Lamb’s Theatre, and I don’t remember all of the details exactly. I think the guest list may have included The Gregg Smith singers (they made a few appearances on shows in that period) and perhaps Victor Borge was on? I do distinctly remember leading him up a circular staircase offstage right to a dressing room area that we had designated for him, brushing cobwebs out of the way as we went. He was a very good sport about it.

Prior to that show, I got my first stopwatch. We had a meeting or two earlier in the week in the show’s offices in the big Republic Bank Building on the corner of 14th Street and 8th Avenue. (Surely this must have been the inspiration for Guy Noir’s Acme Building, right?)

We read through first drafts of a couple of scripts, talked about possible music selections from the orchestra and the guests, and called the final tech/dress rehearsal for noon on Saturday at The Lamb’s.

Saturday we ran through musical numbers, which I timed, waited for Garrison to arrive with revised, and new and different scripts, and went through all of that material. Sometime mid afternoon, I sidled over to my friend Ken, with my list of timings in hand, and said, “So, we have all of this … stuff  now. Who figures out how it all comes together to be a show?” I could see a look of fear on Ken’s face. The fear that he had recommended a complete idiot to be the producer. Still, he smiled, chuckled, and said, “Well, YOU do.” And so, the learning curve began.

The first “tour show” I worked on was shortly thereafter — a broadcast from the Mark Twain home in Hartford, CT, but the show traveled to many exciting places — London’s West End, Edinburgh, Dublin, Berlin, and the Reading Room of the New York Public Library.

My favorite tour story, though, was the Birmingham, Alabama, Blizzard story, where the city shut down, and the company was stranded for an entire extra day because nothing was moving. Of course, the show went on — despite being told repeatedly on Friday afternoon and evening that we should cancel it. Tom Keith would tell everyone that I “made him” rent a car when his connecting flight from Atlanta was canceled (I did), but admitted later on that it was great that we had it available so he could run a reconnaissance mission out to the Birmingham airport. By now, everyone has likely heard the stories about how 500 people managed to get themselves to the theater for the broadcast (the guy with the keys to open it up for us used skis); how Emmylou Harris’s tour bus was 50 miles outside of town an hour before broadcast time; how our truck driver Russ Ringsak had to go pick up the last member of the Dixie Hummingbirds AND his pregnant wife from the other side of town in the cab of the semi, and they made it onstage for the closing number of the show. It was nerve-racking as we went through it, but so much fun to think about now.

Recognizing that this is a 50-year anniversary, I want to mention some things that I think about, occasionally, related to the show and the world that it was/is a part of.

One thing is TECHNOLOGY. We used to have scripts come in paper form that we would feed into a xerox copier that we carried with us to every theater we performed in (or rented on-site.) Revisions were done by hand sometimes, sometimes even mid broadcast, as the script was being performed. Research wasn’t done via the internet or Wikipedia. We used books, the library, and Russ Ringsak’s on-site observations from the road.

The first “mobile phones” that we had were enormous. I remember that technical director Scott Rivard had one that was roughly the size of a shoebox. We had to have phone cables installed in each theater in order to be able to transmit the show for uplink for broadcast. There was one night in New York (the show by then hand moved from The Lamb’s Theatre to Symphony Space and then to The Town Hall) when something went wrong with that uplink connection, and we had to dash from Town Hall to WNYC studios down by City Hall in lower Manhattan carrying two reels of tape so that the show could get on the air for those who tape-delayed it on Saturday, and for the Sunday rebroadcast.

Travel was different, of course, because my time with the show was mostly pre-9/11, and things were easier. There was a season when we had two back-to-back weekend broadcasts in Ohio (Cincinnati and then Columbus, I think), and we had sent out plane tickets to the musicians and guests in advance. One of the musicians (Joe Wilder) headed to LaGuardia on Friday for his flight, shrugged when he didn’t see any other musicians in the waiting area, but figured they must have been on different flights. So Joe boarded a flight to Columbus ONE WEEK EARLIER than he was actually ticketed to go there, having mixed up the order of his Cincinnati and Columbus tickets. Meanwhile the rest of the band was somewhere down another concourse boarding their correct flight, wondering if Joe was late, or just not booked on the show that weekend.

My husband used to drive me to the airport and pick me up, and could come right to the gate with us. One week when I had left my stopwatch in my desk at MPR, he dropped me off, drove back to MPR to pick it up, and delivered it to the door of the aircraft for the stewardess to bring to me.

And then there are certain historical events that I recall in the context of the show: Justice David Souter joined the Supreme Court in October of 1990, and there was a song that Ivy Austin sang about him (“The man is a liberal …) It would have been one of the first broadcasts I worked on.

In spring of 1992, the show was still based in New York, but Ivy had moved to Los Angeles and was flying back and forth each weekend to perform with us. Los Angeles was burning from the Rodney King riots, and there was a question about Ivy’s flight being able to take off because the smoke was so thick at LAX …

In 1994, I remember sitting in a hotel room in Houston, Texas, where we were attempting to do script read-throughs on Friday evening, but sat transfixed in front of a TV watching OJ Simpson’s white Bronco sailing down the LA Freeways with the police in cautious pursuit. Later that fall, we did a broadcast from Madison, Wisconsin, and Tim Russell was in a script where he played a genial, but befuddled Ronald Reagan. Little did we know that Reagan’s revelation of his Alzheimer’s diagnosis was a news item in the break right before the start of the show, because having a constant news feed of things that were going on in the world the moment they happened was not a “thing” yet. Those who heard the show live were appalled by our insensitivity, thinking it was deliberate. But the audience in the theater (who laughed) and the staff and crew knew nothing of this announcement. It was only when I ran into a somber-faced Tim Russell in the lobby of the hotel who gave me the news and saw the blinking red light on my hotel phone indicating an urgent message from Bill Kling that I realized we were going to catch some hell. I think we were able to do a quick edit for the tape delayed broadcasts, and certainly for the Sunday repeats, but, nonetheless, it was uncomfortable.

And then there was the Y2K scare that ended up being a big “nothing burger.”

KATE GUSTAFSON SANDERSON, MANAGING DIRECTOR

I began working for Prairie Home in 1986 just after the big success of  Lake Wobegon Days . I worked two years as an elementary music teacher when the state of Minnesota suffered a budget crisis, which meant the laying off of art and music teachers. Typing only 46 words a minute, I got the Minnesota Public Radio job, which entailed answering the phone and responding to the mail. After his hiatus from A Prairie Home Companion , Garrison started broadcasting American Radio Company from New York. I remained in Minnesota but became the business manager, responsible for payrolls, unions, and contracts. In 2002, I became Managing Director of our own company, Prairie Home Productions. Over the next 23 years, we produced 34 broadcasts per year, chartered cruise ships, did crazy summer tours (30 shows in 40 days), opened a bookstore, produced TV shows, theater events, and of course, the A Prairie Home Companion movie.

Garrison would call often, starting the conversation with, “I have an idea.” It was up to our small staff of 15 to bring these ideas to life.

One example happened the season of our 35th Anniversary. For months, we asked Garrison if he wanted to do anything special for the 35th (July 2009). Nine weeks from the anniversary, he called and said that he would like to do a show with these guidelines: a live broadcast from an open field in Avon, Minnesota, including a brass band, Senator Klobuchar, local mayor, priest, restaurant owners, WW II veterans, as well as our regular guests. The event needed to be free with food and beverage vendors. Against all odds, we pulled off a very memorable event. On July 4, 2009, at 5 p.m. CT, it was a perfect 80 degrees. An estimated 10,000 attended the show sitting on picnic blankets and lawn chairs. There were only two ways in to Avon and the traffic was backed up for miles. Senator Klobuchar was stuck in traffic on the freeway well past the start of the show.

This story is a great example of how Garrison put the fan’s experience first — above everything else. It was all about giving the listener and the venue attendee something worthwhile. They were always the first priority. It was up to the staff to get it done, and we always gave it our best shot.

SONG SELECTIONS (Click Mp3 links below list)

• HELLO LOVE : Garrison Keillor, Steven Gammell, Buzz Kemper, Craig Ruble
• MINNEAPOLIS BLUES : Red Maddock, Butch Thompson, Bill Evans. (m. Red Maddock (w/m: George Maddock)
• VINCENT : Chet Atkins
• QUEEN BEE : Taj Mahal, Carlos Andrade Band
• TURN THE RADIO ON
• TIGER RAG : Chet Atkins, Jethro Burns
• BROWNIE AND PETE : Garrison Keillor, Chet Atkins, Leo Kottke, Kate MacKenzie
• IN THE GARDEN : Meryl Streep, Garrison Keillor, Richard Dworsky, Andy Stein, Pat Donohue, Gary Raynor, Arnie Kinsella, Jr.
• IOWA WALTZ : Greg Brown, Kate MacKenzie, Peter Ostroushko, Andy Stein, Dave Moore, Paul Yandell, Johnny Johnson
• BARNYARD DANCE : Bill Hinkley, Judy Larson, John Angus Foster, Marya Hart
• DREADFUL WIND AND RAIN : Mike Seeger
• TUNA, THE FOOD OF MY SOUL : Jean Redpath, Garrison Keillor, Prudence Johnson, Philip Brunelle
• WHERE WILL YOU BE : Sara Watkins, Garrison Keillor, Richard Dworsky, Pat Donohue, Richard Kriehn, Gary Raynor, Peter Johnson
• COLD COLD HEART : Robin and Linda Williams
• SAN ANTONIO STROLL : Chet Atkins, Johnny Gimble, Peter Ostroushko, Bruce Calin, Red Maddock
• RIDING DOWN THE CANYON : Johnny Gimble, Willie Nelson, Garrison Keillor, Chet Atkins
• AIRMAIL SPECIAL : Peter Ostroushko
• VISIONS OF MOTHER AND DAD : Robin and Linda Williams, Richard Dworsky, John Niemann, Gary Raynor
• BRIGHT MORNING STARS : The Wailin’ Jennys
• BLUE TRAIN : Pat Donohue
• CRAZY PEOPLE : The DiGiallonardo Sisters, Richard Dworsky, Pat Donohue, Richard Kriehn, Gary Raynor, Peter Johnson
• SITTING ON TOP OF THE WORLD : Sam Bush, Richard Dworsky, Stuart Duncan, Pat Donohue, Howard Levy, Gary Raynor, Joe Savage, Peter Johnson
• STRIDE BY STRIDE : Richard Dworsky
• ON RAGLAN ROAD : Cathal McConnell
• STOP THAT THING : Pop Wagner, Bob Douglas
• IT’S A LONESOME ROAD IN THIS WORLD OF SIN : Hopeful Gospel Quartet, Albert Lee
• BANKS OF MARBLE : Leo Kottke, Iris DeMent
• RIDING DOWN THE CANYON : Johnny Gimble, Willie Nelson, Garrison Keillor, Chet Atkins, Peter Ostroushko, Butch Thompson, Henry Strezlecki, Randy Hauser
• PLEASE MISTER CONDUCTOR : Helen Schneyer with Lisa Neustadt, Lisa Null, Claudia Schmidt
• TOO GONE : Pat Donohue, Heather Masse, Richard Dworsky, Richard Kriehn, Gary Raynor, Peter Johnson
• LET’S HAVE A PARTY : The Powdermilk Biscuit Band

PARADE OF JINGLES

TELL ME WHY

• NIGHT O’REST HOTEL

I’LL BE HOME

PICTURE IN A FRAME

• LIEBERMAN FOGEL AND BEY INTRODUCTION
• ONE HUNDRED YEARS FROM TODAY PART 1 AND 2

SONG OF THE EXILES

OH! SUSANNAH

STORMS ACROSS THE OCEAN

STARS AND STRIPES FOREVER

HELLO LOVE : Garrison Keillor, Steven Gammell, Buzz Kemper, Craig Ruble (w/m: Aileen Mnich and Betty Jean Robinson © Sony/ATV Acuff-Rose BMI)

MINNEAPOLIS BLUES : Red Maddock, Butch Thompson, Bill Evans. (m. Red Maddock (w/m: George “Red” Maddock)

VINCENT : Chet Atkins (w/m: Don McLean © Songs of Universal, Inc.)

QUEEN BEE : Taj Mahal, Carlos Andrade Band (w/m: Taj Mahal © Sony/ATV Tunes LLC/Prankee Music)

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Whether solo or accompanied by Richard Dworsky, Heather Masse, Prudence Johnson, Dan Chouinard, Dean Magraw, or others, Garrison Keillor delivers an extraordinary, crowd-pleasing performance.

Garrison Keillor ’s celebrated radio broadcast A Prairie Home Companion ran for forty years. He wrote the comedy sketches and more, and he invented a “little town that time forgot and the decades could not improve.” These days, his shows are packed with humor and song, plus the audience-favorite News from Lake Wobegon. He has written dozens of books — recently, Boom Town (a Lake Wobegon novel), That Time of Year (a memoir), a book of limericks, and Serenity at 70, Gaiety at 80 (reflections on why you should keep on getting older). Garrison and his wife, Jenny Lind Nilsson, live in New York City.

Trained as a jazz singer at the New England Conservatory of Music, Heather Masse is equally versed in a variety of traditions — folk, pop, bluegrass, and more. As member of Billboard-charting group The Wailin’ Jennys, she has performed at hundreds of venues across the world. She was a frequent guest on A Prairie Home Companion , both solo and with The Jennys. One reviewer rightly lauded her “lush velvety vocals, capable of melting butter in a Siberian winter.”

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Virgin Voyages Sailing Club loyalty program: Everything you need to know

Does Virgin Voyages have a loyalty program? The short answer is yes, and it recently got a major overhaul.

That said, the Virgin Voyages Sailing Club, as it's called, is a relatively simple program, as was the case when it was first unveiled in August 2022 .

The program has just three tiers of benefits as compared to five or more at many cruise lines, and it doesn't offer nearly the array of perks that you'll find at bigger cruise lines such as Royal Caribbean .

Still, some of the perks you can get through the program can be quite valuable. They include free laundry service and free premium Wi-Fi at the program's higher tiers, two things that normally can cost quite a bit extra on cruise ships.

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There is also a daily specialty coffee credit for members at the second and third tiers of the program that is like money in the bank if you're a regular latte or cappuccino drinker. And the perks don't end there.

Note that the Virgin Voyages Sailing Club is a loyalty program exclusive to Virgin Voyages, separate from the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club and Virgin Red programs that are connected to other Virgin brands.

Members of those programs in the U.S. can already redeem their Virgin points on sailings on all of the line's current ships: Scarlet Lady, Valiant Lady and Resilient Lady. Capital One cardholders can also access cruises for points through a partnership between Capital One and Virgin Red .

Ways to earn points

The Virgin Voyages Sailing Club point-earning system is about as simple as can be: You earn one credit for every cruise you take with the line.

Unlike at some cruise brands, there are no complicated formulas for earning points that take into account the type of cabin you book or the length of your cruise. It's one cruise, one credit. End of story.

Note that certain low-priced sailings and nonrevenue fares do not get you any credits. To be eligible for a credit, a voyage must be a full-fare sailing that hasn't used a discounted access key or other low-fare pricing methods, such as gifted cruises, comped casino cruises or voyages bought with airline points.

Reduced rate voyages and certain other booking types also are not eligible to earn or receive perks.

Additionally, the credit for voyages doesn't accrue toward perks until 30 days following the completion of the voyage.

Virgin Voyages Sailing Club loyalty levels

There are three tiers to the Virgin Voyages Sailing Club program:

• Sailing Club membership (after one sailing)
• Blue Extras (after two sailings)
• Deep Blue Extras (after four sailings)

The first tier of the program, the basic Sailing Club membership, brings just three relatively minor perks. The most notable is that you become eligible for special offers on cruises.

Additionally, you will be among the first to be alerted to promotions that the line announces. You'll also receive a quarterly members newsletter.

It's not until you reach the second tier of the program, Blue Extras, that you start to get some perks that you can use when on board ships. These include a free specialty coffee every day of your cruise and free laundry service for one bag of laundry per voyage.

Blue Extras members also get:

• An invitation to an exclusive cocktail event
• A dedicated phone support line (known as Sailor Services)

The elite level that makes a difference

The Deep Blue Extras level is where your Virgin Voyages Sailing Club membership really starts paying off.

At this level, you can order two specialty coffees per day at no charge, and your complimentary laundry allowance goes up. You'll get two pressed items for free, as well as one specialty cleaning item and a bag of regular laundry.

But that's just the appetizer for the main course of perks at this level: a $100 per cruise credit for alcoholic drinks (or, as Virgin likes to call it, a $100 bar tab credit). This is a significant perk, as it amounts to real money saved when cruising, assuming you like to order drinks while at sea.

Deep Blue Extras members also get all the other perks of the two previous tier levels, plus:

• An unlimited premium Wi-Fi package
• Access to expedited boarding

The access to expedited boarding is not just for you but your cabin mates, assuming they arrive with you at the terminal. Your cabin mates will also be able to attend the exclusive cocktail event, which is a perk for Blue Extras and Deep Blue Extras members.

Note that many of these perks appear as credits on your final bill. You will still be charged for the premium Wi-Fi when you sign up for it and the specialty coffees when you order them, and the charges will appear on your onboard account, but they will be waived before the end of the voyage when Virgin Voyages runs your credit card.

In addition to being available to cruisers who complete four sailings under the revamped program, the Deep Blue Extras perks are also available to two broad categories of cruisers established under the old program:

• Sea-Blazers : These are the "pioneers" of Virgin Voyages sailings who cruised with the line in 2021, its first year of operation. In addition to the temporary perks available to all eligible Sailing Club members, this group will get a $125 bar tab bonus for every $300 bar tab purchased every time they sail with the line for the rest of their lives; this was something Virgin Voyages promised them back in 2021.
• Sea-Rovers : These are customers who sailed with Virgin Voyages at least twice between Jan. 1, 2022, and Dec. 31, 2023. They are receiving all the Deep Blue Extras perks, plus a $100 bar tab bonus for every $300 bar tab purchased through 2024.

Under the new program, Sea-Blazers and Sea-Rovers will continue to receive all the Deep Blue Extras perks through the end of 2025.

Get perks faster with a Sailing Club status match

As of April 3, Virgin Voyages is offering a status match to cruisers who hold loyalty status with other select cruise and travel brands.

The Sailing Club Status Match program, as it's called, offers immediate Sailing Club membership and Blue Extras perks to cruisers who provide confirmation of loyalty status in other programs and have a confirmed eligible booking with Virgin Voyages.

As part of this program, you can receive Blue Extras perks on your very first voyage with Virgin Voyages instead of having to wait until your third cruise with the line.

Virgin Voyages offers this status match with the following loyalty programs:

• Azamara Circle (for Explorer, Discoverer, Discover Plus and Discover Platinum members)
• Carnival Cruise Line's VIFP Club (for Platinum and Diamond members)
• Celebrity Cruises' Captain's Club (for Captain's Club, Elite, Elite Plus and Zenith members)
• Disney Cruise Line's Castaway Club (for Silver, Gold, Platinum and Pearl members)
• Holland America's Mariner Society (for 3-Star, 4-Star and 5-Star Mariner members)
• Norwegian Cruise Line's Latitudes Rewards (for Platinum, Sapphire, Diamond and Ambassador members)
• Oceania Club (for Gold, Platinum, Diamond and President's Circle members)
• P&O Peninsular Club (for Mediterranean Tier, Caribbean Tier, Baltic Tier and Ligurian Tier members)
• Princess Cruises' Captain's Circle (for Platinum and Elite members)
• Royal Caribbean's Crown & Anchor Society (for Diamond, Diamond Plus and Pinnacle Club members)
• Virgin Atlantic Flying Club (for Gold members)
• Virgin Australia Velocity Frequent Flyer (for Gold, Platinum and Beyond members)
• Windstar Cruises' Yacht Club (for One Star, Two Star, Three Star and Four Star members)

Bottom line

Virgin Voyages has a relatively modest loyalty program with just three tiers and not all that many perks at each of the tiers, but it does offer several valuable perks at its higher tiers, including free laundry service, free premium Wi-Fi and a significant credit toward drinks.

One thing to keep in mind when evaluating the benefits available through the Virgin Voyages Sailing Club loyalty program is that many of the perks that other lines offer cruisers as part of their loyalty programs are already included in the base fares for Virgin Voyages cruises. Virgin Voyages includes gratuities, specialty dining and a basic Wi-Fi package in the fares for every cabin on its ships, for instance. As a result, there are fewer valuable extras to give away to its customers with status in the loyalty program.

Planning a cruise? Start with these stories:

• The 5 most desirable cabin locations on any cruise ship
• The 8 worst cabin locations on any cruise ship
• A quick guide to the most popular cruise lines
• 21 tips and tricks that will make your cruise go smoothly
• 15 ways cruisers waste money
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What it's really like to live in Antarctica

A five-month-long slumber party. A college dorm. An introvert’s hell.

Those are just some of the words residents of Antarctica use to describe life in the world’s coldest, most mysterious continent.

In 1959, 12 countries - including Chile, Japan, Australia and the United States – signed the Antarctic Treaty , pledging that the seventh continent would only be used “for peaceful purposes only.” As a result, there are no military bases there, although military planes and ships can bring people and supplies.

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That means that only a few thousand humans can say that they have lived in Antarctica.

And yet, despite bunking with strangers, taking 90-second showers and having zero privacy, there are intrepid travelers who believe all the challenges are worth it.

Keri Nelson is one of them.

The Minnesota native first went to the White Continent in 2007 to work as a janitor at McMurdo Base, one of the three U.S. outposts there. Now a veteran of 16 Antarctica seasons, she has done stints at all three stations – in addition to McMurdo, the largest and most active, there are Amundsen-Scott Station at the geographic south pole, and Palmer Station, north of the Antarctic peninsula.

“If I was going to describe it in musical form,” Nelson says, “I would say McMurdo was like gritty, dirty bluegrass and South Pole was like symphony music and Palmer is like really corny, fun pop music.”

Summer camp for grownups

In the summer months from October to March there can be as many as 1,000 people at McMurdo Base, from scientists to carpenters to dishwashers. Many support staffers have multiple jobs.

For example, Evan Townsend, creator of the Antarctica Flag , worked in the kitchen, tended bar and managed the craft room during his stint there.

“It is an entire town,” Keri Nelson says of McMurdo. “You could go whole seasons and never meet a lot of people there, and it’s just very busy at those stations. It’s just bustle, bustle, bustle all the time.” That’s due to McMurdo’s size as the biggest base, but also due to the rotation of staff, since people will move between other stations or go out on expeditions and research trips throughout the season.

While there are some modern amenities – a room for watching DVDs, a craft room, a gym – the clubhouse feel of the base offers lots of opportunities for socializing. Nelson has organized fashion shows complete with a runway and played music in the “ice bands” that often form during a season.

Just three kilometers (two miles) from McMurdo is New Zealand’s Scott Base, and sometimes staffers will make the trip across Ross Island to visit their US counterparts – joining in on their jam sessions, book club meetings and movie marathons. Some staffers even volunteer to teach classes in yoga, languages or other interests.

“That was my thing that I learned in Antarctica, hip hop dancing and Thai massage,” says Chris Long.

Long, who claims to be from “the most remote living family in New Zealand,” has spent more of his life living off the grid than on it. As a 19-year-old, he took a last-minute gig working in the galley (kitchen) of a Russian ice breaker ship going to Antarctica.

He “absolutely hated” the job, but found his calling along the way.

After those disastrous few months, during which the unforgiving waters of the Southern Ocean regularly sent the ship bobbing at 45-degree angles, Long redirected into a job managing logistics for the scientists at Scott Base and now works as support staff for travelers who visit Antarctica by ship.

It’s an unconventional life, spending half the year going back and forth across the notoriously chaotic waters of the Drake Passage to South America, but Long says he can’t imagine any other way to be.

The other side of the ice

Laura Bullesbach doesn’t see anything of her own experience in the stories of fashion shows and book clubs. Her own Antarctic season, which concluded in March 2024, was more serene. She was one of half-a-dozen people staffing the world’s southernmost post office , UK Antarctic Heritage Trust -administered Port Lockroy.

“The island is the size of a football field, so it’s tiny. And you live in a hut together where there are basically two rooms,” she says.

“We don’t have any running water and therefore no showers, no proper flushing toilets, and you’re always on top of each other.

“When I said goodbye at the airport to one of my colleagues, we hadn’t been without each other since the end of October for longer than maybe what it takes to take a shower on a ship. You’re close friends and you’re roommates and you’re colleagues and it’s everything at once.”

One common misconception, Bullesbach says, is that life on the remote continent is boring. At Port Lockroy there were daily tasks that kept everybody busy, from basic life admin like taking turns cooking meals to more serious tasks like surveying the water for any plastic that may have washed up and keeping track of the island’s penguin colony.

Plus, there’s an educational component. When private, scientific or commercial ships visited Port Lockroy, which is the first scientific base established by the UK in Antarctica, Bullesbach and other team members would go on board to give educational talks, sell souvenirs and pick up mail. But there were perks – they could often use the onboard showers and sometimes, there were fresh fruits and vegetables they could take back to the island to supplement their supply of tinned and dried foods.

Competing for the opportunity to clean up puke

Unless you’re a scientist in a very specialized field, your best bet for living in Antarctica is by applying for a support role at one of the stations.

Nelson was so gung-ho about going to the White Continent that she went to Denver to attend a McMurdo job fair. After initially being rejected for a job as a dishwasher, she emphasized her training as a registered nurse when applying to be a janitor.

One of the interview questions, she says, was “what’s the grossest thing you’ve ever cleaned up?”

It worked. Since that first stint as a cleaner, Nelson has held a variety of Antarctic jobs, eventually working her way up to a station administrator.

The pay was low, but Nelson didn’t care. She wanted the experience of living in Antarctica, and she notes that despite the small paychecks, all meals, room and board, and transport to and from the continent are covered.

But landing an Antarctica job isn’t just about having the right CV. Living in close quarters for long periods requires a certain kind of personality.

“You can be an amazing engineer or scientist, but if you can’t live in a small hut or a small station with three other people or maybe on a station with 40 other people for the summer, then you’re no good for the job,” says Long.

“Doesn’t matter how good you are at the job. Being able to fit in with the team is the most important. You don’t want to make enemies in that kind of environment.”

When Bullesbach reached the final round of interviews for the Port Lockroy jobs, she and other candidates went out to a rural area for what she calls a “selection camp.” There, applicants were put into different teams and given assignments like building a tent while blindfolded. The purpose was two-fold: to measure everyone’s practical skills and abilities while also judging how well they could problem-solve and work with others.

Another consideration for working “on the ice” is what country you’re from and if your country has a base in the Antarctic. Bullesbach is German, but she has the right to work in the UK, which made her eligible for the Port Lockroy job.

However, if you’re not a citizen of a country with an Antarctic program there are still some options to spend time in Antarctica, mostly by working in tourism.

Once you get the Antarctica bug, Long and Nelson say, it’s pretty hard to get rid of. Getting in the first time is difficult, but since so few people have Antarctica work experience it’s easier to keep returning after multiple seasons. One member of Bullesbach’s team, Clare Ballantyne, had a previous season at Port Lockroy under her belt and served as a mentor to some of the first-timers.

“My expertise is living and working in the most uninhabitable places on Earth,” Long says. “[A resident] might be a scientist, very smart person, knows a whole lot about whatever their area of expertise is, but if you send them down to Antarctica, they’re gonna die tomorrow. So you need someone who is good at looking after and training people to live in that environment.”

Planning for every eventuality

It’s one of the most common questions for someone about to move to Antarctica: what to pack?

For Bullesbach, the answer was “not much.” She and her colleagues were limited to two bags each.

“You have three jumpers, two pairs of trousers, lots of socks, and then that’s kind of enough,” she says. “Then we got to send a box down with some other personal stuff. Any kind of hygiene products we might need, we got to send down beforehand and then everyone brought one or two board games or stuff to keep us all entertained in the evenings.”

Those living at larger and more established camps have the benefit of using what previous residents have left behind. At McMurdo, Nelson says, there was a lending library of books and DVDs, plus gear, clothing and other odds and ends that one might find useful. There were also medical supplies, from basic bandages and gauze to more serious equipment like a defibrillator.

Electronics have also been helpful when it comes to packing for the edge of the world. Bullesbach could just bring her fully stocked Kindle instead of physical books to save space and, thanks to solar panels, there was always enough power to keep it charged. There was internet access at Port Lockroy thanks to Starlink, but the team voted as a group not to use their phones during mealtimes.

Long says he’s also a minimalist. After some trial and error during his earlier seasons, he now has his packing routine down to a science.

“Now I have the gear that I like, so I don’t need to take so many things. I have exactly the pair of salopettes that I like and the warm jacket that I like and the hat that I like. That way, the more you know your gear, the less that you have to think about yourself, the more you can do your job.”

Still, there are risks in choosing to live and work in, as Long puts it, the most uninhabitable place on earth.

At larger camps like McMurdo, there are trained medical professionals on base who can do a wide variety of procedures. But if someone needs a more serious operation or an urgent treatment, the patient will need to wait for a ship or boat to take them to the closest city – which could take anywhere from two to 10 days.

Long gives several examples of serious injuries that happened in Antarctica. In one case, he says a cruise ship vacationer fell on the ice and broke her arm. Luckily, the on-board doctor was able to put her arm in a cast, and the traveler continued the next two weeks of the trip as planned. In a more serious case, a Russian scientist – who was also a medical doctor – realized that his appendix had burst and performed emergency surgery on himself.

“He knew what he was doing and so he knew he was going to die if he didn’t. So he tried and he did it and lived,” says Long. “That’s what you do when there’s no other option.”

Leaving the ice behind

Antarctica can have a powerful spell on the people who visit. Both Nelson and Long say they can’t imagine not spending time there, and Bullesbach was already applying for a second expedition the week after returning from her first. Meanwhile, Nelson has launched a podcast, Antarctica Did That For Me , to share her experiences.

In a fast-paced globalized world where everyone is on their phones all the time, Antarctica offers a rare opportunity to live a different kind of life.

However, climate change is already affecting the seventh continent, and not only by shrinking glaciers. More and more countries who weren’t part of the initial Antarctic Treaty, namely China, are trying to lay claim to part of it as the planet warms.

“[Antarctica] is set aside by treaty right now for science and peace and projects that benefit humanity. It’s one of the things I love personally about working in the program. It’s why I’m an Antarctica devotee,” says Nelson.

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“Stuff just keeps being taken from Antarctica. Information, ice, resources like seals and whales and fish,” Klaus Dodds, professor of Geopolitics at the University of London, told CNN in 2021 . “Antarctica’s fragility, I think, represents the fragility of the wider world. I think the Antarctic represents, in essence, not just the idealism that the treaty represents, but it also represents the supreme contradictory nature of humanity more generally.”

Nelson says that Antarctica gives her a sense of peace that she can’t replicate anywhere else.

“When I’m there, I can feel exactly as tiny as I am in this universe, no smaller than I am in this universe, but no bigger.”

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Appeal denied for Edmonton soldier accused of trying to kill her 3 children

An Edmonton woman found guilty of trying to kill her three children has been denied an appeal.

Man on suspended licence drives himself to Ottawa OPP detachment, faces additional charges

An eastern Ontario man arrested for impaired driving on Friday night is facing additional charges for driving himself to an Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) detachment in Ottawa after he thought he forgot his cellphone.

Bodies recovered in search off Sandpoint Beach

Windsor police report the bodies of two young men swept underwater by the current near Sandpoint Beach on Thursday have been recovered.

1 dead, 3 in hospital after flying wheel crashes into bus windshield on QEW

A man is dead, and three others are in hospital after a flying wheel crashed into a coach bus on the QEW in St. Catharines.

Chile firefighter, forest official accused of setting wildfires that killed 130

A volunteer firefighter and a Chilean forestry official have been formally accused to have involvement in setting wildfires that engulfed central Chile this past February, killing over 130 people.

Hundreds in Peru mark Clown Day in hopes of getting the holiday official recognition

Hundreds of clowns gathered in the streets of Peru’s capital to mark Clown Day. They have sought for years to gain official recognition of the day.

Nicki Minaj's England concert postponed after rapper was detained by Dutch authorities over pot

Nicki Minaj's concert in Manchester scheduled for Saturday night was postponed after police in the Netherlands discovered marijuana in her bags as she was preparing to leave the country.

Pro-independence leader calls on protesters in New Caledonia to 'maintain resistance' against France

The leader of a pro-independence party in New Caledonia on Saturday called on supporters to "remain mobilized" across the French Pacific archipelago and "maintain resistance" against the Paris government's efforts to impose electoral reforms that the Indigenous Kanak people fear would further marginalize them.

G7 officials make progress but no final deal on money for Ukraine from frozen Russian assets

Finance officials from the Group of Seven rich democracies said they had moved toward agreement on a U.S. proposal to squeeze more money for Ukraine from Russian assets frozen in their countries. But the ministers left a final deal to be worked out ahead of a June summit of national leaders.

Public safety minister pledges to 'massively' reduce auto theft

Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc insists the federal government is 'doing everything (it) can' to eliminate auto thefts in Canada, and he hopes to see 'a significant reduction quickly' following this week's announcement of new measures to counter the problem.

House of Commons committee recommends feds tackle 'excessive' profits in food sector

The federal government should consider policies to tackle "excessive net profits" in the food industry, the House of Commons committee studying food prices said in its latest report.

Border intelligence program needs improved training, analytical tools: evaluation

Better training and information-processing tools are needed to help the intelligence program at Canada's border agency fight everything from firearms smuggling to human trafficking, says an internal evaluation.

Governments must disaster-proof Canada's hospitals against climate change: experts

Last month, the Canadian Medical Association warned that Canada's health-care facilities are among the oldest public infrastructure in use. Half were built more than 50 years ago, making them especially vulnerable to extreme climate events.

Avian flu: Catch up on spread, risks, and guidance from health experts

After another case of H5N1 avian flu linked to dairy cows was confirmed in a second dairy farmer in the United States, some Canadian experts say the federal government needs to expand surveillance of the virus north of the border.

'A really bad car crash': Why health experts are raising concerns over surging syphilis cases

A sexually transmitted infection (STI) that was once thought to be a thing of the past is now a public health priority for North American doctors.

NASA launches tiny CubeSat to set its sights on Earth

NASA has launched the first of two research satellites to measure how much heat is lost to space from the Arctic and Antarctica.

Crows can count up to four, a new study finds

Perhaps 'birdbrained' isn’t such an insult after all –– crows, the ubiquitous urban bird, can vocally count up to four, the latest research has found.

Boeing's 1st astronaut flight now set for June after a review of small leak on new capsule

Boeing is now aiming for its first astronaut launch at the beginning of June, after spending the past few weeks struggling with more problems on the space capsule.

Entertainment

Richard M. Sherman, who wrote songs for 'Mary Poppins' and 'It's a Small World,' dies at 95

Richard M. Sherman, who helped write the songs for 'Mary Poppins,' 'The Jungle Book' and 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang' — as well as the most-played tune on Earth, 'It's a Small World (After All)' — died at 95.

Musical adaptation of Beaches explores the healing power of female friendship

Beaches the Musical is a good cry, and that’s not nothing.

Lawsuit filed in the death of dancer with a peanut allergy who died after eating mislabelled cookie

The estate of a young dancer who died after eating a mislabelled cookie containing peanuts has filed a wrongful death lawsuit, claiming the failure to properly label the package was grossly negligent.

Luciano Benetton says he's stepping down as chairman of family-run brand as losses top US$100 million

Luciano Benetton, a co-founder of the apparel brand, announced he was stepping down as chairman in an interview published on Saturday with Milan daily Corriere della Sera. He blamed current management for losses of 100 million euros (US$108.5 million) that he discovered last year.

GameStop surges after fetching US$933M from stock sale

GameStop made nearly US$933.4 million by selling 45 million shares, the struggling videogame retailer said on Friday, sending its shares up more than 12 per cent after the bell.

How to keep insects out of your house, according to an entomologist and other experts

Now that temperatures have warmed up even more this spring, you may be anxious at the thought of bugs invading your home or you may already be battling the pests. Here are expert tips on how to keep them away.

Whitecaps offering free tickets to fans attending Saturday's Messi-less match

In the wake of major disappointment among soccer fans who were hoping to see Lionel Messi play at BC Place on Saturday, the Vancouver Whitecaps are offering what seems to be a consolation prize.

Chiefs' Harrison Butker has no regrets about expressing his beliefs in speech

Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker has no regrets about expressing his beliefs in a recent commencement speech and he said he has received support as well as “a shocking level of hate” from others.

Their Nissan SUV was parked in the driveway. Then it caught fire and exploded

In the early morning of May 14, Vicki Hill was startled awake by the sound of explosions outside her home in Bethesda, Md. The loud bangs, she learned later, had come from the airbags of the family’s SUV, a 2015 Nissan Murano that was parked in the driveway. It was on fire.

How to make your car ready for summer

If you’re planning a road trip this summer, it won’t hurt to make sure your car is reliable and would take you there and back.

BMW unveils its latest 'Art Car,' courtesy of abstract artist Julie Mehretu

BMW and Ethiopian-American artist Julie Mehretu unveiled her newest 'Art Car' at the Pompidou Centre in Paris, France.

Local Spotlight

Pomp, circumstance, and Crocs: Barrie, Ont. couple's unforgettable day at Buckingham Palace

When one is extended an invitation to the Royal Garden Party in London, England, there's undoubtedly no shortage of pomp and circumstance. Barrie, Ont. natives Megan Kirk Chang and her husband Brandon experienced just that as they entered the prestigious event hosted at Buckingham Palace on Tuesday.

Tim Meadows pledges not to shave until the Oilers win the cup, who are the team's other famous fans?

An unlikely celebrity emerged from social media to cheer on the Edmonton Oilers as they face the Dallas Stars tonight in Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals.

'Near and dear to all filmmakers': Return of Regina's discount theatre bodes well for fans, movie makers alike

The proprietors of Regina's sole discount theatre are aware they're carrying on a significant legacy.

'Best experience ever': B.C. baker on making it to the finals of Netflix's 'Is it Cake?'

When Jujhar Mann said he wanted to be a pastry chef on a grade school career project, he didn't imagine that pursuing his dream would land him on a popular Netflix baking competition.

Winnipeg flair on the menu at neighbourhood Houston restaurant

A city known for its history, ties to outer space and southern barbecue, is also home to a Winnipeg chef dishing out dozens of perogies.

Montreal photographer captures dramatic Canada goose vs. fox fight on video

A Montreal photographer captured the moment a Canada goose defended itself from a fox at the Botanical Garden.

Beyond books: Halifax libraries lends instruments, sports equipment, memory kits and more

Public libraries in Atlantic Canada are now lending a broader range of items.

'A special bird': The unbreakable bond between purple martins and humans

Flashes of purple darting across the sky mixed with the serenading sound of songs will be noticed more with spring in full force in Manitoba.

7-year-old Pokémon prodigy heading to Hawaii for world championship tournament

Catching 'em all with impressive speed, a 7-year-old boy from Windsor, Ont. who only started his competitive Pokémon journey seven months ago has already levelled up to compete at a world championship level.

'Making his legacy come alive': Ball hockey tournament honours fallen B.C. RCMP Const. Rick O’Brien

Dozens gathered at a rink in Maple Ridge, B.C., on Saturday to play in a ball hockey tournament in honour of fallen B.C. RCMP Const. Rick O’Brien.

Toronto police to boost presence after firearm discharged outside of Jewish elementary school

Toronto police say they will increase their presence in certain neighbourhoods after a firearm was discharged outside a Jewish elementary school in North York on Saturday morning.

Kerry Carpenter's 2-run homer sends the Tigers to a 2-1 victory over the Blue Jays

Kerry Carpenter hit a two-run homer for a second straight game and the Detroit Tigers edged the Toronto Blue Jays 2-1 on Saturday.

Protesters say “Enough is Enough” to UCP government Saturday

Rallies took place in towns and cities across the province on Saturday afternoon to send a message to the provincial government.

Former Stampeder memorialized at Stamps game

Friends and family of Bruce Covernton held a barbeque in the parking lot of McMahon Stadium on Saturday to honour his legacy.

Babies line up for annual diaper dash

As adult runners prepare for the Servus Calgary Marathon on Sunday,some pint-sized competitors took part in another race on Saturday. The Wee Wild Ones Diaper Dash saw 64 babies and toddlers race down a 42.2 foot long raceway at GMC Stadium at Stampede Park.

Here's what you need to know about Ottawa Race Weekend

Thousands of runners will lace up their sneakers this weekend for the Tamarack Ottawa Race Weekend. Here is everything you need to know about Tamarack Ottawa Race Weekend, including road closures.

City looks to purchase former Nortel building with a $70 million discount

The City of Ottawa is set to get a $72.2 million discount on the purchase price of a Nepean business complex if council moves to buy it in its entirety before the lease comes to an end.

Legault calls social media platforms 'virtual pushers' as party mulls age restrictions

Social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat are nothing less than 'virtual pushers,' according to Premier François Legault.

Driver, 18, gets $3,000 ticket, 32 demerit points after speeding on Laval boulevard

A young driver received a hefty fine from Laval police after they say he was driving nearly 100 km/h over the posted speed limit.

Emilise Lessard-Therrien's shadow looms large over Quebec solidaire general convention

Despite her absence, the shadow of Émilise Lessard-Therrien hangs over the opening of the Québec solidaire (QS) general convention.

Marchment scores winner, Stars beat Oilers 3-1 to even Western Conference final 1-1

Mason Marchment scored the winner early in the third period as the Dallas Stars beat the Edmonton Oilers 3-1 on Saturday to even the NHL's Western Conference final 1-1.

Protesters raise multitude of issues at 'Enough is Enough UCP' protest Saturday

Hundreds of protesters gathered at the Alberta legislature Saturday to express their discontent with Premier Danielle Smith and the UCP government.

Fifth Arctic and Offshore Patrol ship officially named HMCS Frédérick Rolette

The name of the Royal Canadian Navy’s fifth Arctic and Offshore Patrol Ship is now official.

'Our homes shake': N.B. Residents protest over noise concerns

For the second straight day, a group of people from a Moncton neighbourhood gathered to protest the operation of a scrap metal recycling facility located in their backyard.

‘It’s pretty alarming’: Urban wildlife encounters in Winnipeg this week

When you consider what kind of animals you might encounter in your Winnipeg neighborhood, a bear probably isn’t on your list.

Part of Pembina Highway closed after pedestrian hit by vehicle

Police have shut down part of Pembina Highway after a pedestrian was hit by a vehicle in Winnipeg’s Fort Garry neighbourhood Saturday afternoon.

Heavy rain, snow drenches southern Manitoba

Parts of southern Manitoba were walloped with rain and snow Friday, with some regions seeing more than 85 millimetres of precipitation.

'Inspires a sense of adventure': Sask. man conquers Mount Everest

A Saskatchewan man made it to the summit of Mount Everest earlier this month.

Regina city councillor Andrew Stevens not running in next municipal election

After eight years of serving on Regina’s City Council, Ward 3 Coun. Andrew Stevens will not be running again in the next municipal election.

Purolator truck drivers from Guelph, Ont. save man walking in Hwy. 407 lanes

A pair of Purolator transport truck drivers from Guelph, Ont. are being hailed as heroes for their efforts in helping a person in crisis.

Drugs and weapons seized, two arrested in downtown Kitchener

Waterloo regional police have arrested two men and seized a large quantity of drugs in downtown Kitchener.

Waterloo unveils fully accessible, self-cleaning washroom

A new public washroom has opened in Uptown Waterloo and not only can it self-clean, but it's all fully accessible.

Hundreds walk in Saskatoon to raise awareness for Alzheimer's

A walking party of 200 people gathered at River Landing Amphitheatre on Saturday to prepare for either a one or four-kilometer walk to advocate awareness for Alzheimer's, dementia, and other neuro-degenerative diseases.

Sask. swimmer qualifies for 2024 Olympic Games, sets Canadian record

A swimmer from Saskatoon has qualified for the 2024 Olympic Summer Games in Paris.

Northern Ontario

Suspect sought in suspicious death in northern Ont.

Ontario Provincial Police in Cochrane are asking for the public’s help in locating a man they want to speak with in connection with a suspicious death.

Police clear scene near Highways 11 & 654

Provincial police say they have concluded their investigation in Callander, Ont., south of North Bay, after asking residents to avoid the area of Highway 11 and Highway 654 on Saturday morning.

Out-of-control fire rages southeast of Cobalt, Ont.

A now 134-hectare fire is burning three kilometres southeast of Cobalt near the east shore of Kerr Lake, the province’s Aviation, Forest Fire and Emergency Services says.

PLAYOFF TRACKER | London Knights open Memorial Cup with a shutout victory

London shutout Drummondville 4-0 Saturday afternoon to get their first victory, and guarantee at least a playoff spot in the Canadian Hockey League championship tournament.

City councillor withdraws proposed curfew for gas powered lawn equipment after negative feedback

Several days after a motion was first put forward that would have limited the time of day when Londoners could use gas powered lawn equipment, the city councillor who proposed it is speaking out.

Pandemic pets still being surrendered, animal care officials say

It’s been nearly two years since London and area residents returned to nearly normal life after the COVID-19 pandemic turned many of us into temporary shut-ins. However, pets that were adopted during the pandemic continue to be surrendered to local agencies.

Community unites for 12th annual 'Walk for Suicide Awareness' in Barrie

Dozens participated in the 12th annual Walk for Suicide Awareness event on Saturday.

Toddler dies after being struck by recycling truck in Barrie, Ont. neighbourhood

A toddler has died after being struck by a recycling truck in a Barrie, Ont. neighbourhood on Thursday afternoon.

Annual memorial golf tournament honours Chase McEachern's legacy

The legacy of a young boy's passionate campaign to install defibrillators in schools and arenas to save lives continues to inspire people across the province.

New pro wrestling promotion holding its first show in Leamington next weekend

On June 1, Noble Champions Group will present its inaugural event called In Your Town at the Nature Fresh Farms Recreation Centre in Leamington.

Man breaks into residence, is discovered by homeowner asleep in chair: CKPS

A 45-year-old man has been charged after breaking into a Chatham home and falling asleep inside the residence.

Vancouver Island

No merger: bc conservatives rejected non-competition deal, bc united says.

BC Conservatives have rejected a non-competition deal proposed by BC United, the party formerly known as the BC Liberals says, putting an end to talks about a possible merge between the two parties.

'Altercation' in Penticton leaves 1 dead: RCMP

One person is dead after a fight in Penticton early Sunday morning, according to authorities.

Suspect fled in 2-door Fiat after convenience store robbery, Merritt RCMP say

A suspect is at large after robbing a convenience store at gunpoint in Merritt, B.C., Friday, according to local police.

Kamloops RCMP issue public warning about 2 men allegedly at centre of 'organized crime conflict'

After four targeted shootings in four days, Mounties in Kamloops are taking the unusual step of warning the public about two men they believe are likely to be targeted in future violent incidents.

Organizers have high hopes as Lethbridge launches collector and entertainment expo

The entertainment and collector expo in Lethbridge got underway Friday afternoon.

Lethbridge police, fire responders set to square off on the diamond in Battle of the Badges

A friendly competition between Lethbridge police officers and fire responders will take place Saturday, all for a good cause.

Maintenance work shuts down Lethbridge online services this weekend

People trying to access a variety of online services offered by The City of Lethbridge may run into a digital roadblock this weekend.

Sault Ste. Marie

Sault marks 70 years of Community Living Algoma

Dozens gathered at the steps of Sault Ste. Marie’s city hall Friday for a moment 70 years in the making.

Federal loan supports Sault apartment development

The federal government is providing a low-interest loan of $25 million for new rental units in downtown Sault Ste. Marie.

Lack of services means at-risk youth in the north sleeping in hotels, Airbnbs

Dozens of young people in the care of the Children’s Aid Society will be going to sleep tonight in motels, hotels, and short-term rentals because there aren’t enough foster beds or treatment facilities.

Unknown Newfoundland soldier from the First World War heads back home from France after 100 years

Canadian soldiers and government officials arrived in northeastern France this week for a historic mission: returning an unknown Newfoundland soldier back home.

Newfoundland grandmothers can wail on the accordion. A historian wants them on stage

79-year-old Madonna Wilkinson has been playing the accordion since she was 15, when she picked one up that had been left behind at one of her parents' rollicking parties in the oceanside town about 25 kilometres north of St. John's, N.L. She has played Sunday masses and St. Patrick's Day parties, and community events of all kinds.

The latest advice for expecting parents? Sign up for child care as soon as you're pregnant

Canada's new $10-a-day child care program is expanding, but there's growing evidence that demand for the program is rising even faster, leaving many parents on the outside looking in.

Shopping Trends

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