MONDAY.AUGUST 16.2004
OFF THE HILL
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By Jay Senter
jsenter@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
It seemed fitting when presumed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry invoked the work of a famous Kansas poet last May while in Topeka to recognize the 50th anniversary of the Brown v Board of Education decision.
Addressing a large crowd from the steps of the state capital, Kerry recited a few lines from "Let America be America," a poem by Langston Hughes, who was raised in Topeka and Lawrence before moving to New York where he became part of the Harlem Renaissance.
But to the qualified delight of Hughes scholars, Kerry embraced the poem for use beyond his Kansas audience, and has employed parts of it as the closing
line of his stump speech on roughly a dozen occasions.
"It's a mixed blessing," said Mary e m m a Graham, codirector of the L ang st on H u g h e s
Kerry
National Poetry Project at the University of Kansas. "We're excited that the poem has gotten attention, and that people can recognize Hughes' importance. But you want to make sure that its use is a teachable moment. It's bad if too few people don't get beyond the quote and to the poem's deeper meaning."
In "Let America be America," Hughes wrote of nation with abundant promise, but also cast a disparaging eye on the racial inequalities that made the American dream unobtainable for many of its citizens.
Graham said the poem served as an example of Hughes' ironic style.
"He never was a cynical poet,"
she said. "He's using an ironic voice, talking to the audience and himself at the same time. Clearly he had a political message that he wanted to issue."
University of Kansas English professor Edgar Tidwell said that the poem was an appeal to the most basic elements of American democracy.
"It truly is poetry of the people," Tidwell said. "Hughes is calling for a return to the sense of value that ultimately emanates from those governing documents, the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution."
Kerry's use of the poem has drawn criticism from conservative pundits who claim Hughes was a communist and radical whose views were unpatriotic. William F. Buckley, Jr., editor of the conservative magazine National Review, wrote an editorial characterizing "Let America be America" as a call for the nation to mold itself into a 'land of Marx and Lenin and Stalin."
Graham said the assertion was calumnious. She said she
acknowledged that Hughes held leftist political views, but she encouraged modern audiences to consider the social atmosphere in which the poet did his work.
"Yes, Hughes' was clearly on the left, and this poem feels more left than most of his poetry." Graham said. "But you have to take into account that he was writing during the Great Depression, and that the social environment then was much different."
While Kerry typically recites only a few lines from the poem, Graham believed that his use thus far has captured the poem's spirit, and brought its meaning to a large national audience.
"We love the fact that the poem can transcend its period," she said.
But Tidwell warned that there was a danger for poetry to be exploited when it was included in political speech.
"You want to make sure that the spirit of the poem is captured, and that it isn't just being used for political purposes," Tidwell said.
Saferide delivers students for free
By Marc Ingber
mingber@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
Edited by Julie Jones
In many cities, being stranded without a ride usually results in a walk or a taxi. But University of Kansas students have another option: Saferide.
Saferide is a service run through the KU on Wheels program to help students, drunk or sober, who need a ride home. Students can call 864-SAFE from 11 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. seven days a week for a free ride. Only KU students are allowed to use Saferide and they must present their KUID. Destinations must be within Lawrence city limits and the service will only take students to their residences — so you can't use Saferide for party-hopping.
Julia Coelho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, sophomore, said she used Saferide often because she didn't have a car.
"It's hard to find a way home sometimes." she said. "It's nice to
know I can rely on it."
Most of her friends use Saferide as well, she said, but she thought the service would be more beneficial offered earlier in the night.
Guillermo Goicochea, Lima, Peru, junior, agreed. He said Saferide did well getting students home safely, but since the service started at 11 p.m., those who didn't have cars had trouble getting to parties and bars. Students who live in West Lawrence have to drive to get to the bars on Massachusetts Street.
Unfortunately, many of them drive back after drinking instead of calling Saferide, said Natalie McAllister, Topeka sophomore.
"I don't think enough college students realize the repercussions of drunk driving." McAllister said.
Coelho said Saferide was a great benefit for people without cars, but people who did have cars didn't take advantage of it.
Edited by Jay Senter
Sound of train's horn reminds of forgotten industry
By Jay Senter jsenter@kansan.com Kansan staff writer
When the wind is blowing right, Everett McGaugh can hear the whistle of the trains running through Lawrence on the Union Pacific line. It is a reminder of the industry to which McGaugh dedicated 30 years of his life.
The son of a railway worker, he took a job with the Missouri Pacific line as soon as he got out of college. McGaugh followed railroad jobs around the country before retiring to Lawrence, where he is now active in a model railroad club. From time to time, he goes down to the old Union Pacific depot, north of the
river, to watch the trains roll by.
"I still love to watch the game," he said. "I'm just nostalgic, I guess."
University of Kansas student Craig Parker doesn't have to worry about which direction the wind is blowing if he wants a reminder that the trains are running. The St. Louis senior lives on Tennessee Street, just a few houses away from the tracks of the Burlington Northern Santa Fe line that runs through Lawrence along the south side of the Kansas River.
"It rattles the windows when it goes by," he said. "But I've lived here for two years, so I don't really pay attention to it anymore."
Whether from near or far, the sound of trains is the only connection most Lawrence residents have to an often-forgotten industry. But railroad freight has become increasingly important to American commerce over the past decade, as the industry has evolved into a high-volume, national freight shipment system.
Roughly 100 trains rumble through Lawrence on the Union Pacific and Burlington Northern Santa Fe lines on an average day. Union Pacific public affairs director John Bromley said that his company averaged 65 trains a day through Lawrence, most of which carry coal to power plants throughout the midwest and south.
While public perception holds that the golden era of railroads has
long since passed, in many ways the rail industry has entered the most productive phase of its long history.
"People tend to think of the heyday as the '30s or '40s, back in the days of steam engines and passenger trains," Bromley said. "But in terms of how much we are moving, the heyday is right now. Most people don't realize that because, aside from the horn noise, we are pretty much invisible."
Last year, trains shipped more freight than ever before. That growing demand, coupled with a wave of railroad employee retirement, has left the industry scrambling to find workers. The Association of American Railways estimates that the industry will have to hire 80,000
new employees over the next six years.
But train enthusiasts like McGaugh lament that the changes in the industry that allowed the recent growth have also taken away parts of the railroad that made it attractive.
The recent wave of increased rail traffic was made possible by the consolidation of several small, local rail lines into long, national lines in the 1970s and 1980s. That consolidation allowed the major lines to better coordinate their engines, and thus increase traffic. But it also took away some of the local flavor that appealed to train enthusiasts.
The consolidation of the train
lines led to a loss of the nostalgia." McGaugh said. "When you lost all of those small names, a lot of the local interest in the railroads disappeared."
But while McGaugh and his peers may mourn the loss of an era gone by, railroad traffic continues to grow. And that means Lawrence residents can expect to hear more trains chugging through town in the near future.
"We get complaints about the horns all the time, every day," Bromley said. "They complain that we blow them too loud, too much and at night. We almost never hear from people who like the horns."
—Edited by Miranda Lenning
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