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You're listening to Mornings with Pat Kratlow powered by Upnorth News.
Now, for my Lake Minnesota studio, here is the founding editor of Upnorth News, Pat Kratlow.
Nice to have you back here up north on a Monday morning, 8.06.
Good morning.
Parker Olson producing things down in Madison Studio A2.
John and Gordy are going to join us from Madison Studio A1 in just a moment here, and then coming up at the bottom of the hour, we will play back our interview with Tom Nelson, the Out of Gamey County executive.
who talked to us in August upon publication of his new book about the Edmund Fitzgerald, which sank 50 years ago tonight, and he talks about the ship itself, and also some of the conditions, economic and political, that somehow paralleled the fate of that freighter that was lost in Lake Superior 50 years ago.
So again, that's coming up at 835.
But first, let's check in with our friends, John and Gordy, from our Civic Media Station down in Madison, 927, WMDX, or through the Civic Media app.
John and Gordy, good morning, guys.
How are you?
Hello.
Good morning, Pat.
It's nice to see you all.
We're either of you part of the crowd that was storming the field when Bucky won a game, a football game, over Washington, 13 to 10.
Wow, no, I wish I was.
We were and we were encouraging here.
The the the fans, the students get out during these games, even
when
they lose and have fun out in the stands like they used to when we always used to lose.
Remember those days?
Yeah, we're getting back to have some fun, right?
And then all of a sudden, when they win the game, everybody just went out the field and it was just a madhouse out there.
I would love that out there.
Yeah.
So it's great to see.
Yeah, you were
you were responsible
for the rabble Rousers.
Yeah, we got everybody to go out.
Yeah.
Although I think if you're going to have rabble Rousers at a football game, you're more likely to see it tonight because you got Philadelphia fans coming to Green Bay.
It's also it's also one of the gold package games, which tends to mean you'll you'll see more.
you know, visitors who were able to get tickets to Lambeau Field.
So
yeah, I'm
not familiar with the gold
package.
Well,
see, once, once upon a time, the Packers played half their games at Lambeau Field
and half their
games at County Stadium.
And so the gold package was for the three or four County Stadium games.
And then when all the games were shifted back to Lambeau, that those gold package holders, they could keep their tickets, but they had to go all the way up to Lambeau to use them.
And so
the folks on the gold package, they think they've gotten this reputation now.
Many of them don't want to make the drive and so they put them up for sale, you know, online.
And you, you, so they say tend to see more, you know, hostile visiting fans because it was easier for them to get tickets on these gold package games.
And yeah, in fact, Kristen Lardley's partner, a police officer in Green Bay was talking about just, oh, just dreading this Philadelphia fans.
It's night.
It's a prime time game.
So they will have been drinking beer all day leading up to this.
Not like Packer fans don't drink beer, but we don't engage in the, you know, the misbehavior that Philadelphia fans are known for.
So here's hoping the Eagles fans behave themselves at Lambeau tonight.
And
I don't
get too much hate mail from the Milwaukee people going, I've never sold my gold
packets, kick it online.
How dare you?
Yeah, I'm sure they have.
Yeah, exactly.
So we've got a lot of football going on here, but we also got some winter prep.
We were working, for example, on our Christmas card and our Christmas letter and talking about lights and decorations and things.
And we'll
get to that in a sec here, but another sign of the season.
is when some of the critters decide that they need some place warm to go as the temperature changes.
And in John's case, that involves a little mouse problem.
And I don't mean your computer.
I mean, the little squeaky kind.
I
have that problem too.
But you know, we have, we have mice always entering our home around our kitchen sink for some reason underneath the kitchen sink.
And so that's a great way to stop them by putting traps down there.
And I ran out of traps.
And I went to the
You know, the hardware store to look at these traps and there are a whole bunch of different kinds of traps.
And one is where you put the batteries in it.
And as soon as that mouse gets in there, it sets the battery off and electrocutes them immediately.
What kills them now?
Yes.
And, and there's a little blue light that lights up on it when it has killed a mouse.
Worst blue light special ever.
Right
mouse.
Yeah.
Mouse used to get that at the Kmart snack bar when they had blue light specials.
That's why they went out of business in part.
But holy cow.
I know it.
This new technology
is called
old Sparky like the electric
chair.
What is this?
It really should be actually.
I have one that isn't battery operated.
It's a it is a lot.
allows them to go in and traps them alive so you don't have to, you know.
Sometimes the snap traps keep those mice alive.
Then you
take them outside and of course they never find their way back to your house.
The thing is, I think they do.
I go across the street into a field over there and I drop them over there.
Oh, that should
make all the difference.
Yes.
Well, I'm hoping that you get killed crossing the street.
That's what I'm hoping for.
Yes, because I see all those.
I see so much mouse kill on the
roads, you know, nothing
like so much more than deer that are out there.
We're talking to John and Gordy from our man.
at the station, WMDX.
And my mom thought she was going the humane way, not getting the trap, but getting the sticky paper thing.
And
they get onto the sticky paper and they get stuck and then they can't infest us.
But it's not until you catch the first one that you realize that the downside of this is now
you got to kill the mouse or find some other way to flush it or dispose of
it
or do something with it.
And it could it could be that maybe she still has maybe the memories of the one time as like a four or five year old.
I was reaching into the lower cupboard like under the sink or something and got my fingers in a mousetrap.
Oh, no.
Oh my goodness.
Yeah.
You know how you have very few memories of your early, early, early childhood unless it was like something traumatic.
My
two earliest memories were one tornado damage at about that same time in life and the mousetrap one.
Like those you remember.
The other days they kind of go away.
I've got another part of this story about the mouse under my sink.
This morning I put that I put I have a different mousetrap now it traps the mice They get into it.
They can't get out and it's alive and I can only I just just flip the door open on the back of it and dump them out in a field alive So I don't have to deal with killing them anymore But this morning there are two mice in this little contraption and now they're both trapped in this thing
They're huddled together and I'm thinking if a third mouse goes in there, I'm doomed.
So when I get home, I've got to go out and dump them.
I wanted to do it this morning, but sometimes they run back at you if you dump them on the field.
They want revenge.
And if it's at night, I can't see if they're running back at me.
I feel like
I'm watching the old money pythons get with a killer
rabbit.
Run away, run
away.
This is like a curfew or enthusiasm moment as I'm having trouble at home.
This is just
great.
All
right, well, talking to you about the problems getting rid of mice if you don't want to kill them because, you know, they're, they're, they're just little God's creatures in the same way that we don't have fly swatters.
We just, we just shoo the fly out the door so that it can live another day.
No, wait, we don't.
We kill them because
they're.
They
still use that sticky paper.
That seems
like the
cruelest
thing.
I know.
I know.
Well, they get caught in webs.
So I guess the sticky paper is just fine.
You know what?
I don't care about flies.
But it's nice, but you want to be human to the mouse.
But the old snap traps, you don't always kill the mice.
Right.
That's why I'm trying to trap them live now without injuring them and just
setting them free.
I think it's a great game.
You know, it's like playing tag or hide and seek and you caught them and now take them out to the field and they're going to come back and try again.
And whatever occupies you, Johnny, get you through the winter.
You know, if it involves playing with a mouse and going on the back and forth, all for it more, more power to
John and Gordy, you can hear him on our Civic Media Station in Madison 927 WMDX or through the app here as well.
Okay, so you've got that sign of the season, which you've also got, like I mentioned, getting ready for the holidays.
Some people are way into it already.
The decorations are up.
They're already wearing Christmas sweaters and things like that.
I've got a niece who just, the day after Thanksgiving, is just head to toe Christmas, wall to wall Christmas.
Either one of you, are you a household that gets extra early into the spirit?
Or are you like as close to Christmas as possible?
No, no.
John doesn't put up anything.
I put up a little bit of stuff around the house, but you know, around the apartment, but nothing outside.
No, we always get a tiny little Christmas tree, put on a table in the room, and then we decorate it with all the ornaments that we still have.
You know, superhero ornaments, Star Trek ornaments.
Stuff like that, but I was I'm fascinated by how many Christmas sweaters there are now.
Oh, yeah stores and they really make them elaborate and really grotesque purposely.
Yeah,
it's ugly.
It's really fun.
It's fun to see.
Yeah, all right And I don't know if you have a coals department store.
Yes, you're right.
Yeah, but if you go into coals, I gotta tell everybody statewide
They have the greatest gag gifts ever.
Every aisle is filled with gag gifts.
You have to go there.
They have some of the most fantastic gag gifts ever.
They do.
All right, consider yourself warned.
Give
a little something back from Coles, do
you?
At some point they're saying, don't say gag so often when you're talking about Coles.
We get it.
But the gag gifts are in fact there.
So, yeah, we were working on the Christmas card and the Christmas letter with the updates and the card.
Really, you sent a
Christmas letter about the whole family and what
everybody stopped doing.
Well, see, now, that's the point I'm getting to.
People do that.
We used to send all the time when our girls were young.
Here's all the things we know.
We went to Disney World or whatever the case may be.
And we have to be careful now, or at least I do.
Maybe I'm being cynical here.
I mean, I love my girls, but they're adults.
They got families.
They do their thing.
And so, I see people, like my age, and so much of the letter is about
kids and grandkids.
Other kids haven't lived with them for a decade or more.
And my other pet peeve, if you will, is when the Christmas card only shows the kids or the grandkids.
It's like, I don't know your kids.
I don't know.
I know you.
What's new with you?
How was your year?
I want to see you.
You're
my
kid.
Yeah.
And we kind of went through that with the photos here.
It's like, well, let's put this one in this one.
They can send those this
is
our how about our vacation where we went to and at some point I'm starting to wonder if Sherry's just trying to nudge me out of the picture quite literally
on this
Christmas card thing Wow, but we you know you put that together and I look back at the the younger ones or when I was younger though the Christmas letters and Boy, I was I was just
It's just so, what's the word I'm looking for?
You think I'm sarcastic now?
Yeah.
I look at that and I'm like.
I am.
I'm amazed anybody was friends with me looking at this back then, you know, which of course at the time I thought
was,
you
know,
that was funny stuff.
That's some real, that's some real writing talent.
But you
look, you know, you look back at these things and you just kind of cringe going, oh, how did that get green lit?
You know, but we did.
And they and people say, oh, we, we miss when your letters were really funny.
I'm like, you do.
Okay.
Well, again, you know, you have the Midwest sense of humor, the sarcastic, passive aggressive.
Yeah.
Yeah.
the dry sense of humor.
Yeah, so everybody appreciates that.
See,
they do.
And I like when when people do it.
I've just found I just don't
have that
same.
No, I did like it at the time.
I'm just much more sedate now and I save it for the morning for the radio.
I've got I've got friends like you to bounce all this stuff off of.
Yeah,
we're
talking to John and Gordy from ninety two seven WMDX in Madison.
You can catch the show on the Civic Media app if you're not in the Madison area weekday mornings from six until eight o'clock.
quick check on sports.
We've got the Packers, of course, playing the Philadelphia Eagles.
Coverage begins at five o'clock at the pregame on stations in Richland Center.
Park Falls, Racine, and Wautoma.
There's also some Badger Women's Basketball on some of the other stations across the Civic Media radio network.
Coming up later on this Monday evening as well.
I'm Pat Critewell.
You're up north.
You're listening to Civic Media.
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Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get started.
Nice to have you back.
We'll continue chatting with John and Gordy here in just a moment.
First, a reminder, you can sign up for the Up North News Daily newsletter.
Head to UpNorthNewsWI.com.
Click subscribe in the top banner.
If you missed it a week before last, I believe it was, we talked to Carmen Solis.
She's originally from Mexico.
She's lived in Altoona for the past 15 years or so and started a successful small business and recently spoke to the Wisconsin Latino Chamber of Commerce about
you know, achieving her dream of being an immigrant and starting a small business here in America.
And now is, you know, employing people.
And so you can, if you missed the show, you can read about it in today's edition of the newsletter, sign up at UpNorthNewsWI.com.
And of course, if you follow the show as a podcast, you can go back and hear that particular segment, head over to Spotify, Apple, wherever you get your podcasts and follow mornings with Pat Krightlow, powered by UpNorth News here on the Civic Media Radio Network.
John and Gordy again from 92.7 WMDX.
We were talking about Christmas prep and cards and letters and decorations and things.
And guys, the other thing that's starting for us is catalogs.
I don't know how we got on so many catalog lists or maybe it's everybody.
I don't know about you guys, but officially the first two have arrived.
This one's from Jay Jill, but the very first one, new skis.
Who needs bacon?
Oh.
Newskies from up in Wittenberg.
I like to get that.
I will probably get three more Newskies catalogs before Christmas.
We'll get the ones from, is it O&H Kringle in Racine?
And then we'll get so many clothing catalogs and we don't get, we don't order a lot.
I don't know that we order much of anything from catalogs, but that is not stopping the companies.
That stack of catalogs is going to be
probably four inches high by the time all of a sudden done.
Do you guys, sounds like you don't get nearly the male volume we do from catalogs.
No, I might get a farm and fleet catalog, maybe a couple others like that, but not like the old days.
Like out of Costco.
Yeah, you get a Costco.
Well, because I live there.
He does live in Moscow.
He's they do help me out.
Everyone's so out by giving me guidance and what aisles I need to live in each each and every month.
Here's it.
But here's the thing, you know, wasn't it Spencer gifts?
Or you know, one of those catalogs with all these really inexpensive gifts and items that you never thought were possible.
Oh, yes, I
mean, hammock or Schlemmer is is
one of them or my
wife keeps calling it the hammock or Schlemmer catalog.
And and it's got so many gadgets.
And yeah, for the
For years and years, I'd look and go, oh, that's cool.
That's cool.
And that's cool.
And now we'll get, like I said, two or three of those during this season.
And I'll look through the whole thing and go, there is nothing there.
You look at it and go, who needs that?
But it'll happen.
It'll happen.
All you got to do is buy one,
you know, the Sears catalog and the
old days, you know,
they used to be two inches thick.
I
mean,
it's just they were enormous.
Yeah.
For Christmas, you could buy a house.
You could.
You literally could.
Yes.
A prefab home.
And oh, we loved that.
The only
Um, and we loved it because from, uh, like JC penny, you'd get some half decent or Sears.
My mom would always get us the tough skin jeans, which I swear were actually just like, you know, metal plates.
I mean, they had no bend in them whatsoever.
They were so rigid.
I think the name kind of warned you initially.
Yep.
And I remember the, the NFL pajamas that, that they would sell.
We'd get those every year.
And I mean, yeah, we've traded it in for the internet.
the internet's all perfectly fine, but it's not the same.
You take some of these catalogs, like you said, Farm and Fleet, for example, for Toyland, and you give that to one of the grandkids with a marker and say, you know, circle the things that you
want.
I'd like to see that marker.
I
mean, the whole thing ends up circled by the end of it, but you at least see what kind of caught their eye, whereas like last year, the grandson who was five at the time, I think
said something like, um, I want the, the pizza Play-Doh bike thing.
We're like, the what?
Yeah.
And we had to look it up online.
I don't know where he saw it.
Probably one of the commercials on the Disney channel or something, but yeah, it was a little trike with a pizza oven thing.
It was a, you know, the delivery
vehicles that like
DoorDash uses, like the little box in the back.
Wow.
But with, with pizza ingredients, it was a, and you make the pizzas out of Play-Doh.
But they didn't tell you.
But again, the phrase, some assembly required, not some, not some, a full day of these little itty bitty screws into the plastic all around it.
I've never felt more like I was working in a sweatshop than during that day.
But the kid loved it, you know.
So
that's part of your work at a department store, Arlins way back when, and I was in the toy department and I had to put those wagons and bikes and everything together.
I actually had to assemble them for display.
I'm traumatized to this day, by the way, get some assembly required.
You guys were mentioning as well that you're helping Pete Schwabba, our friend at Civic Media, bring back a movie that he did 20 years ago.
That's right.
Pete's got a movie called The Godfather of Green Bay, and yes, it did come out in 2005.
It's a
rom-com.
It is.
And Pete Schwabba is the star.
He's the romantic interest.
He also directed it.
He wrote
the plot
as well.
He's a
screenwriter.
It's a gorgeous film, actually.
It's really nice.
It captures Wisconsin all the craziness.
There's a guy in the movie that does the Macarena or the Pacarena, as we all know it here in the state.
So it's a really wonderful film and we're going to show it again.
Yeah, it's gonna be at the Atwood Music Hall here in Madison on December 4th.
That's a Thursday night at 7 p.m.
And We're hoping for a good crowd there.
Some of the proceeds will go to the Dane County Humane Society and It should be a lot of fun Pete's gonna be there and talk a little bit about the movie and take some questions.
I think afterwards and It's just gonna be a great time, you know Pete
did a lot of work out in Los Angeles.
Therefore, I don't know, I think he lived there for a dozen years or maybe a little bit more.
But this was his attempt to get out into the
movie world.
The movie was about a comedian trying to be seen by Carson so they could be on the Carson show and become very successful.
That's what it's about.
And Pete did a
lot of stand-up.
in his life.
Things I learn about my coworkers.
So happens when you when you live 200 miles away from your coworkers.
Like like John and Gordy who are in person in Madison catch their saw on 927 WMDX or on the Civic Media app guys.
Thank you so much.
Have a great week.
All right.
Thank
you.
All right.
When we come back, we're going to replay our conversation with Tom Nelson, author of a book about the Edmund Fitzgerald on the 50th anniversary of its loss.
That's coming up.
I'm Pat Krightlow.
This is the Civic Media Radio Network.
As you know today November 10th marks the 50th anniversary that 29 souls were lost in a Lake Superior shipwreck the likes of which few thought we'd see in a modern era given the size and the power of freighters like the SS Edmund Fitzgerald
but there's more to the story than a really big bad November storm.
So here's our interview from August 11th with Tom Nelson about his book.
The interview starts, by the way, with me referencing another more personal example of Mother Nature always being willing to show us who's in charge.
I lost some technology for a while over the weekend when Lightning Strike took out the cable and took out the internet.
And it seemed like the perfect time to finish a book that I had started.
And that book is written by Tom Nelson, the out of gaming county executive, former legislator.
It's titled, uh, wrecked the Edmund Fitzgerald and the sinking of the American economy.
And you can get more at MSU press.org.
We'll talk about that now with Tom Nelson, who joins us.
Tom, how are you?
It's great to be on.
This is wonderful.
It's good to see
you, man.
How you been?
It's good.
I can't believe it's just like old times, you know, we're going, you know, it was like about 20 years ago.
I met Pac right low.
I was a fan back at W. E. A. U. Running for the state Senate, pulling off a big upset.
And we've been best buds ever since.
And now look at you.
Look at this.
You have a great radio program.
Wonderful.
Look at you writing a book.
And I did promise when I had Kristen Lyrely on earlier that I would do two things.
First, I would make sure to tell people to go look up the Dr. Kristen Lyrely show because she spent her entire show with Tom talking about the book.
But then I also wanted to, I told her, I would ask you, the book is co-written with Gerald, is it Podair?
How do you say this?
Podair.
Podair.
How much of this did he write?
Because it's really good.
Yeah, thank you.
I wrote the book and he helped with the editing, a little bit of editing, and then also consulting.
He had another book project, so he was limited in what he could do for this project, but he was absolutely indispensable.
He was the one who encouraged me to do this in the first place because I came to him with three ideas.
And the Fitzgerald book was actually number two or number three.
I wanted to do something different.
And he looked at this and he said, you know, Thomas,
This is history.
He's a professor emeritus of history at Lawrence University in Appleton.
He's very well published, knows this area very well.
And he explained, look, this is history.
History is taking a popular, maybe cultural event that occurred in the past and then helping it.
to explain a broader phenomenon, which is the heart of what this book's about.
And if you've read it all, which thank you, congratulations.
You're the first interviewer yet who says, I actually read the whole book, so kudos to you.
Thank you.
And makes the connection between those two.
Plus, as you find out, there's brand new material, exclusive interviews, people related to the Fitzgerald sinking that have come forward for the first time, shedding light on some mysteries of what really happened that night,
for and after.
Yeah, you knocked on doors and called on family members and other people who were tied to it, either attorneys and others to get these stories.
Before we get to the metaphor, let's get to the ship itself, which for the behemoth that it was, and it was this workhorse for years and years, but it was clear that with other things, corporations sometimes took shortcuts without thinking about the safety of the workers.
Exactly.
You got it right there.
You nailed it in one sentence.
And even though, and I think the reason why we haven't talked about these things is, you know, exactly for what you said, it was this behemoth.
It was this war course.
It was one of the largest warships on the lakes, but that also explains why it was not seaworthy, why it should not have set sail from Superior that night.
The hull was
a wreck.
They had been tacked welding it for for several seasons.
It was known as a wet ship, which meant that it took on a lot of ballast and it kept it in there.
And after seasons when they would dug
when they would dig out the ballast hold, that sometimes there was up to six feet of dirt and sludge.
So this ship was in no condition.
The Coast Guard regulatory outfit, the American Shipbuilding Bureau, they knew it was in no shape.
to run despite the fact that they continue to certify it.
And as the attorneys found out and they brought to light through this deposition, they found one of the crew members, the only crew member who did not a part of the Fitzgerald in 1975 season, but was not on the ship the night that.
it sank, and he spilled the beans.
He put forward, he did so in a federal deposition in St.
Paul in December of 1978.
And so it has all been accounted for.
And based on my research, which I believe I did extensive research, that this has only appeared in one other publication.
And that was a Star Tribune story back in 1997.
And I think it goes a long way in explaining the truth of what really happened, why it sunk.
And so
part of the purpose of th metaphor but also to bring
No.
And again, the amount of settlement they got varied, again, depending on their representation.
You talked with, I would say, legal legend, Toby Markovich.
Exactly, Arthur and Saveri.
He had a big
part.
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
I mean, he's just larger than life and the role that he played.
And then you even get into later the decision to retrieve the bell as a symbol, but also as a way to say, that's it, no more poking around the wreck, leave this grave.
site undisturbed but let's take it to again that that that metaphor for the post war economy although I shouldn't say post war economy because there was just so much growth post war but I guess the right way to say it is
I think a lot of it was taken for granted.
And
that that's when you started to see shortcuts.
That's when you started to see you really get into the notion of, you know, we used to build ships.
And then the thought was, well, we can just, you know, we can just pay to have ships made elsewhere.
And that was one of many indications of how our custodianship of the American economy started to turn.
Exactly.
That's exactly right.
And we see that all over the place.
I think every small town, large town, not just here in Wisconsin, the Midwest, but across the country can relate with a bad boss and a bad company that did not invest.
properly in the company, allowed it to wither on the vine, succumbed at trade deals.
And here we are today, where we have a manufacturing base that is hollowed out compared to what it was in 1957, the year that the Fitzgerald made its maiden voyage.
And I would like to say how far we've come and how much we've accomplished, but we have not.
And the key decades were the 1960s and the 1970s.
That's all precipitous decline in American manufacturing.
And the Fitzgerald, as you put it in metaphor, helps explain what happened to the Fitzgerald, why it's sunk.
But I also think, and this is one of the reasons why the Fitzgerald is top of mind 50 years later is because a lot of us can relate to the crew members and the families.
Of course, the big difference is that they didn't come back from work though, but they had a bad boss, okay?
They had a company that was not making proper investments and they paid the ultimate price.
We're talking to Thomas Nelson, out of Game of County Executive, former legislator, now author of WRECT, the Edmund Fitzgerald and the Sinking of the American Economy.
You can get it through the Michigan State University Press, MSUPress.org.
And part of the reason I could not put this book down was that it isn't, again, you draw the metaphor, but you do it with what I would consider...
How can I put it?
It's both exhaustive and concise, a political history of how we got to these points.
For example, you know, people think of Jimmy Carter, for example, as, you know, a typical Democratic president.
Well, not exactly.
And you get into the notion of, like Bill Clinton, the conservative Democratic presidents who were perhaps a little too eager to go along with, you know, what
what the corporate side of the economic equation wanted, the supply side, rather than the worker side.
That's exactly right.
And so when you're talking about Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, of course, that's post Fitzgerald, the other Fitzgerald thing in 1975.
And so by bringing that up, the legacy.
other Fitzgerald goes well beyond 1975.
And not just because in terms of the mystery and the controversy that it generated, how did it sink that night?
But it also goes a long way that the third act of this went into the Carter administration, where despite being a Democrat, there were the so-called neoliberal policies where you were focusing on the corporate side, tax cuts for the rich, bad trade deals and so forth.
And then going into the Reagan administration would put that on steroids.
into Bill Clinton and then after three administrations, Democrats and Republicans, we were by the turn of the century in 2000 left with a hollowed out manufacturing economy.
And then you get into the false choice of job growth versus environmental protection.
And part of it, part of the center of this for anybody who is either from Northern Wisconsin, from the Iron Range area, but all the way down to the Twin Cities where the reserve mining trial was, I mean, that was daily coverage of this huge taconite plant that was dumping.
I mean in how I forget how big you said the the eventual spread of taconite tailings were polluting Lake Superior and that that you know for the longest time was well that's just the cost of business.
Exactly and Judge Miles Lord who's a federal judge and I read through this again yesterday because I did a book talk up in Superior and what he talked about is exactly that
you know, we should not have this false choice, that this company should not use, the word used was hostage, hold workers and this economy hostage, that you can have it both ways, that you can have a good environment, that you can have good jobs.
Just as the late great Gaylord Nelson said that the economy is a wholly owned subsidiary
of the environment.
That's the relationship between the two.
Judge Myles lore understood that during that court case and that's a big reason which chapter three which is called the lake they call Kichigumi and that's important because that is where the ship sank and it is the second largest lake in the world.
This is not just your typical lake and it's a big part of Legend of Fitzgerald because it's also in the first stanza of Gordon Lightfoot's song, the lake they call Kichigumi.
And in fact, Gordon Fitzgerald, you're right, even went so far as to change one of the lyrics later in life to make clear that, you know, when he has that lyric, the main hatchway caved in.
Well, that may not have been the full story afterwards or after all.
And so I, you know, I really want to tip my cap to the late Gordon Fitzgerald or the late
Gordon
Lightfoot for telling that story.
And just a couple of minutes we have left here.
Where do you want to take this looking forward?
If there was a message to go to
public officials and to voters.
If there is a lesson to glean from this moving forward in the American economy, what would you tell folks?
I
would say
how many more times we have to go through this, how many more Fitzgeralds do we have to start?
This was 50 years ago.
And you still see this example where you have bad bosses and you have bad companies that are not doing the right thing.
They're either polluting our natural resources.
They're not making proper investments so that they have continued to have good pain, family supporting jobs in these.
in these communities.
And I think if you were to do two things, if you would recognize how we need to take care of our environment, take care of our workers, and then to know that we can have greatness again, that we can have a strong.
that can be the lifeblood in manufacturing while d environment and doing right be the central lesson and t that justice has yet to be s families that we need
And so that never again, we have to call a church bell 29 times.
Thomas Nelson, I know that this was a labor of love.
You talk about the personal stake, your connection to all of this.
And I hope that once all of this is all done, you find something else to write about because it was wonderful work.
And I look forward to talking to you again real soon.
Thomas.
Wonderful.
Thanks for having me on.
Appreciate it.
One quick note, there is now in this day and age plenty of data that's fed by 130 boys and stations floating throughout the Great Lakes to help with forecasts.
That network of boys needs to be maintained.
President Trump funded it for zero dollars.
He's zeroed it out in his latest budget proposal if he were to have his way.
We'll wrap things up here with Jane Mattenair next.
You're up north.
You're listening to Civic Media.
Find the latest news, information, and archives of all your favorite shows on the Civic Media website, civicmedia.us.
Let us wrap things up as we always do on a Monday, checking in with Jane Mattenair from Mattenair on Air.
Jane and Greg Bach can be heard at 9 o'clock, 9 to 11 weekdays here across the Civic Media Radio Network.
Jane McNair, good morning.
How are
you?
Good morning, Pat and...
Parker Happy Monday.
Did you have a good weekend?
I did have a good weekend.
I accomplished some, you know, you get you in your head that I want to get this one thing done.
So I got my clippers back, which is fair.
This is how exciting I am.
I dropped my clippers off to get sharpened on them, but waiting for them for two and a half weeks and they were finally done.
So Friday before the weather started to turn, I actually got clipping and I clipped the stuff that needed to get done.
And so I felt a great sense of accomplishment.
That's great.
Yes.
Got to do those little things.
Yes.
I was doing the
hoses in.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
But that was, yeah, last weekend we did clipping, we did hoses.
This weekend for us it was a Christmas card, you know, get all the photos the best of the year.
Wow.
And a Christmas letter to go along with a little annual update.
how you do with the Christmas letter.
We used to do it every year.
And of course, we were raising the girls and there was always stuff to talk about.
And then when we became empty nesters, it by and large, it was done on like the back of one of those photo cards, just kind of the highlights.
And this year we're like, well, there's enough to talk about, you know, there was the trip to Portugal, which was really nice.
And, you know, grandson graduating high school and things like that.
So, so yeah, the letters back some years, it's a little, it's got a little bit more snark or a little more humor, or maybe you
do a parody of, you know, the lyrics to Christmas Carols.
We've done
those in the past.
Oh, I like
that.
Yeah.
But this year is just kind of a straight update, you know.
It's not a knee slapper, but there's just often times where you get a card and they've literally just scribbled, you know, their name at the bottom.
and that's it and it's like well I haven't heard from you all year I have no idea what you're up to or if they do send something like I was saying earlier it's a photo of like just their kids or just their grandkids I'm like right I don't I want you you're my friend what's new with you so yeah we we definitely shared an update this year what what's your tradition if you will I'm a terrible person I'm
just a bad person because I I am one of the
It's a week before Christmas.
Oh, my God.
As Christmas cards come in, I send mine out.
Oh, OK.
So it's like just
in
time inventory.
OK.
Just one in.
That one goes out.
They sent me one.
OK.
I got to send one.
And as far as the Christmas letter goes, maybe it's because I'm so cynical.
But to me, Christmas letters are like continual Facebook posts
where everything is
great.
Yes.
Here is how great my life is.
We did this great trick.
I would respect Christmas.
letters more if they were like, Uncle Fritz is still in prison.
He's probably never going to get out.
If you want to send him a card, you know, you can do that.
I don't know.
I guess I would just like a Christmas letter with a little more reality.
That
was actually one of my Christmas letters, the one that had like the most.
prep into it was when Facebook was relatively new.
And so I did literally set it up to look like a series of Facebook posts.
Oh,
that's cute status update should put the date on there.
You know, oh, we went up north to such and such.
And no, you know, we went to visit grandma and grandpa, whatever the case may be.
And that's a lot of work.
It was fun to do.
But yeah,
my Christmas letter would be more like when when I die, I have my funeral plans all written out already.
I do, because my father was a mortician.
Come on, there's
nothing like
preparation.
So I've built in time for eulogy rebuttals.
eulogy rebuttals.
Oh my gosh.
I think that's an important piece.
So because as soon as you die, you become a saint.
Yeah.
We all know we're not saints.
So you want
people to be able to step up to a podium and go, here's what Jane didn't tell you.
Exactly.
Here's the thing she did that drove me crazy.
It will help along with the grieving process, everyone.
If you're just reminded of these little foibles.
Guys,
you're turning your funeral into the Chuckles the Clown episode
from Mary Tyler Moore.
Yes.
If there are no jokes.
My funeral, I'm not going.
Oh, that's so good.
That's it.
You got it.
You got this nailed
down.
Good for you.
I can't imagine what all you're going to be talking about today, given the potential deal for getting rid of or ending the government shutdown and whether that's a, whether that's a cave in or what it is.
And then, of course, we've got the newer update now that Donald Trump has now pardoned.
Everybody who tried the first it was all the January 6th, you know domestic terrorists and now it's the people who tried worked with him to plot a coup And I don't know why we don't use that word more because that's what it was people
and
so it includes Kenneth Chesbro and Jim Trupas the lawyers from Wisconsin all the fake electors and all that none of it applies because they're charged with state Crimes by the Wisconsin Department of Justice none of them are charged with federal crimes, but they've been given a pardon by Trump
in case of any federal crime.
So, you know, just in case people are wondering how that effort to crack down on people who plotted a coup is going, it's going nowhere.
Well, I think it's a pretty easy going forward now.
If you crime on behalf of Donald Trump, you'll get a pardon.
If you crime for the rule of law, they're going to go after you.
Right.
Right.
It's simple.
It's it's it's it's pretty easy.
It's a pretty easy equation there.
Yeah.
And yes.
So we're going to talk about pardon Palooza and and snap that.
Where are we with snap benefits?
They're on their off.
They're on their off.
Governor.
I love Governor Evers response was essentially no.
No.
No.
I mean
because what do you want to do?
He loaded up the cards.
People bought groceries over the weekend and you could all down trouble saying is hey if you're a poor family.
We need you to take the groceries you bought and take them back to the grocery store because yeah because I say so
Unmake that
meatloaf
that you made for dinner last night
and take the ingredients I have a feeling the reaction would be a lot like the reaction Donald Trump got when he went to the Washington Commanders football game yesterday and if you haven't seen the video of that or heard heard the booze and watched all the birds Treat yourself because he did not
He was not given the the welcome he maybe expected like what he gets at a NASCAR event or something like that.
Or at his own ballroom.
Or at his ballroom, yes.
Where he enters the room.
Yeah, that's that's the guy taking food off the tables here.
Jane has all that and more along with Greg Bach, Matt Nair on air just after the news here at nine o'clock.
Thank you, Jane.
See you guys next week.
All right, thanks.
Have a wonderful start to the week.
Parker, thank you for everything as always.
Thanks to today's guests.
Dr. Kristen Lirely, Selina Heller, Jenny Muller from Head Start Wisconsin, sports director Jimmy Koska, John and Gordy, Jane Mattenair there, and Tom Nelson.
And all of you for being here this morning.
I'm Pat Critello from Up North News, part of Courier Newsroom, a pro democracy news network.
Enjoy your Monday.
See you back here bright and early tomorrow morning, 6am here up north.
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