SAS Girls' Wrestling Team Places Second at State

St. Andrew’s-Sewanee School student Abby Mainzer earned the title as the first girls’ heavyweight wrestling champion in the state of Tennessee at the state meet on Feb. 13–14. The SAS girls’ team placed second overall. From left: coach McLain Still, Kia Whitman, Mainzer and Zaferah Fortune. For the full story, go to the full edition and see page 12.

39th Friday School Seeks Volunteers

The Sewanee Elementary School Parent Organization is set to host the 39th annual Friday School series. 

The organization is seeking volunteers to run a program of their choice for four Fridays: March 27, April 10, April 17 and April 24. The children are divided into two groups by grade (K–2 and 3–5), and the course could be offered to one or both of the age groups. 

To learn more contact Abby Colbert at <abbycolbert@gmail.com> or Veronica Meola at <vlmeola@yahoo.com> or call (931) 636-1152.

The deadline to sign up is Saturday, Feb. 28.

“All’s Well That Ends Well” Opens Wednesday

Theatre Sewanee will present William Shakespeare’s comedy “All’s Well That Ends Well” at 7:30 p.m., Wednesday–Saturday, Feb. 25–28, with a 2 p.m. matinee on Sunday, March 1, in the Tennessee Williams Center on the Sewanee campus. Admission is free but reservations are suggested; please email <mcook@sewanee.edu>.

“There’s place and means for every man alive,” says the character Parolles in his moment of greatest loss. He means “every” person, not just those we want to have around. But how do we find a place for those who hurt us the most? In Shakespeare’s “All’s Well That Ends Well,” his most modern woman, Helena, defies all cultural norms to answer this question. Like everyone, she has faults, but unlike most, she has unwavering love and baffling forgiveness. Helena travels through darkness and undergoes suffering to save the man of her heart’s desire. Through this journey, she unlocks the key for social change, healing and growth.

“All’s Well That Ends Well” is directed by Sewanee senior theater major Chase Brantley, with scenery by Mary Morrison, costumes by Josie Guevara-Torres and lighting by Chynna Bradford.

The production has a large cast of students and faculty, including faculty members David Landon, Marcia Mary Cook and Christopher Bryan.

Poet R. S. Gwynn on the Mountain Thursday

On Thursday, Feb. 26, at 4:30 p.m. in the Torian Room of duPont Library, R. S. Gwynn will delight and instruct with his characteristic wit, and this time in verse. Gwynn was last on the Mountain in 2011 to deliver the Aiken Taylor lecture on Billy Collins. A. E. Stallings, a faculty regular at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, describes Gwynn as a “comic genius with a tragic sensibility,” and says that his “mastery seems to encompass nearly every received form known to man, and some of his own invention.” But she saves her greatest praise for Gwynn’s political poetry: “his wit and intelligence let loose on our private foibles and public dysfunction. … In Gwynn we have an ironist worthy of our magnificent failings.”

Poet, editor and critic R. S. (Sam) Gwynn is the author of several poetry collections, including “The Narcissiad,” a book-length satirical poem; “The Drive-in,” which won the Breakthrough Award from the University of Missouri Press; “No Word of Farewell,” his new and selected poems; and the most recent, “Dogwatch.” Of this collection, released in 2015, Joshua Mehigan says, “Gwynn has a neoclassical flair for satire, epigrammatic wit, and refined technique, but without all the silly insistence on good taste and decorum. … the appalling comedy also often yields to moments of real tenderness and poignancy.”

Gwynn’s poetry and criticism appear regularly in the Hudson Review and the Sewanee Review, and he is the editor of the Pocket Anthology Series from Pearson Longman.

Born in Leaksville (now Eden), N.C., Gwynn received a B.A. from Davidson College, where he was the two-time winner of the Vereen Bell Award for Creative Writing. He earned both his M.A. and his M.F.A from the University of Arkansas, where he was the recipient of the John Gould Fletcher Award for Poetry. Gwynn is the winner of the Michael Braude Award for Light Verse from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Since 1976 Gwynn has taught at Lamar University, where he is the poet-in-residence and university professor of English. 

The reading will be followed by a reception, and Gwynn’s books will be for sale. This reading is supported by the Aiken Taylor fund.

Friends of the Library Celebrate Patterson’s Book

The Friends of the Library of the University of the South will sponsor a symposium on “William Perkins and Elizabethan England” on Friday, February 27, in Gailor Auditorium at 3:30 p.m. The occasion of the symposium is the publication of W. Brown Patterson’s book, “William Perkins and the Making of a Protestant England” (Oxford University Press, 2014). Patterson, C’52, is the Francis S. Houghteling Professor of History, emeritus.

James W. Dunkly, associate University librarian and School of Theology librarian, will preside at the symposium. The Rev. Benjamin J. King, associate professor of church history, will introduce the program. He will be followed by J. Ross Macdonald, assistant professor of English, who will speak on William Perkins and Christopher Marlowe, and by Patterson, who will talk about William Perkins and Richard Hooker. James F. Turrell, professor of liturgics and associate dean of the School of Theology, will provide a commentary. There will be an opportunity for questions and discussion.

The program will be followed by a reception and a book-signing in the foyer of Gailor Auditorium. The symposium is free and open to the public. 

The publisher describes Patterson’s book as “a new interpretation of the theology and historical significance of William Perkins (1558–1602), a prominent Cambridge scholar and teacher during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.” It adds that Perkins’ “contributions to English religious thought had an immense influence on an English Protestant culture that endured well into modern times.” An endorsement by Diarmaid MacCulloch, professor of the history of the church at Oxford University, states that the book “excitingly recovers an English divine usually portrayed as an arch-Puritan.”

Patterson has written widely on British and European history and religion. His publications include “King James VI and I and the Reunion of Christendom” (Cambridge University Press, 1997), which won the Albert C. Outler Prize in ecumenical church history from the American Society of Church History. 

More information about the Friends of the Library can be found at <http://libguides.sewanee.edu/FOL>. For more information contact Judy Rollins at 598-1265 or email <jrollins@sewanee.edu>.

Community-Building Focus of Civic Association / Call for Nominations for Person of the Year

by Leslie Lytle, Messenger Staff Writer

Community-building was the theme of the evening at the Feb. 11 dinner meeting of the Sewanee Civic Association. Following updates on the Community Chest fund drive and Elliott Park renovation, members and guests learned about two new Grundy County initiatives born of a desire to improve the quality of life for residents on the Plateau.

Civic Association president Kiki Beavers announced the Community Chest fund drive was within $2,200 of reaching its goal.

Beavers also announced the Civic Association had regained tax-exempt status after losing the designation a number of years ago for failure to file the required IRS documentation. The Community Chest has separate tax-exempt status and was not affected.

Parks Committee chair Stephen Burnett said the playground company designing the Elliott Park renovation recommended a larger “footprint.” The committee met with University Physical Plant Services to discuss increasing the area designated for the park and erecting a retaining wall using local Sewanee stone. Fund raising will begin as soon as design plans are final, with an estimated cost of $75,000–$80,000. A fund-raising chair is needed, Burnett said. The committee will apply for financial assistance from the Community Council project fund.

Part of the construction for the park will be done in a “community build,” Burnett said. Historically, all Sewanee parks have been community-driven initiatives, Beavers said, citing a 40-year history of complaints about lack of an adequate park system in Sewanee. Civic Association treasurer Lisa Rung said she wanted a written guarantee from the University the park would not be “torn down.” Burnett said the guarantee would take the form of a Memorandum of Understanding with the University.

Beavers called for nominations for the Person of the Year award, which recognizes organizations or individuals for “good work” in Sewanee and the surrounding vicinity. Nominations can be made by email <sewaneecommunitychest@gmail.com> or postal mail to P.O. Box 99, Sewanee, TN 37375. The deadline is March 2. The Person of the Year will be announced at the next meeting on April 15. The Civic Association will also vote on officers for the 2015–16 academic year.

Members and guests learned about two new community-inspired initiatives from the evening’s guest speakers, Lucas Finney, creator of the Guitarsome Project, and Micah Sparacio, owner and director of Tenacity Adventure Fitness Center in Tracy City.

A visiting instructor of guitar at the University, Finney saw a need for music instruction in Grundy County, where elementary school children have limited or no exposure to music in their school day.

The Guitarsome Project is an after-school program in which Finney teaches guitar via Skype. The computer technology allows Finney and the students to see and hear one another. On-site assistants offer backup support. Finney launched the program last spring, offering classes at Tracy City and Coalmont elementary schools. Every child learned at least one song and several chords.

Funding is a problem, Finney said. Implementing the program at two schools cost $3,000 for the technology and to pay assistants. This past fall, Finney offered instruction at Monteagle and North Elementary. He hopes to expand the program to Sewanee Elementary and other Plateau area schools. The Community Chest awarded Finney $500. To learn more or make a donation visit <www.sewaneeguitar.com>.

Micah Sparacio and his family moved to Tracy City five years ago. Sparacio learned about the benefits of physical fitness as a graduate student, when he suffered from depression. Sparacio saw the need for a local facility that would make physical fitness fun and confidence-building.

Adventure-inspiring equipment at Tenacity includes a vertical ramp, rope climbing, a rock wall, and for kids, a trampoline and a room filled with huge foam objects for bouncing on and into. Instruction is offered in martial arts, tumbling, yoga, Zumba, Parkour and self defense.

Sparacio said the biggest challenge is making the gym affordable in a community where many residents live paycheck-to-paycheck. The gym does not bind users to a long-term contract. Visitors pay by the day or month. 

The gym sponsors 20 local children who participate in all activities fee-free.

Happy Birthday, Messenger. A Word from the Editor.

Happy 30th Birthday, Sewanee Mountain Messenger

by Laura L. Willis, Editor

Is the printed newspaper on its death bed? Will we read all our news online in the future? I’m no prognosticator, but I know one thing: I believe in community newspapers. And I believe in the Sewanee Mountain Messenger.

Thirty years ago this week, the Messenger published its first issue. Geraldine Hewitt Piccard had great writing and editing skills, plus a typewriter, so she could begin a community paper. She’d planned on it beginning in early February, but the catastrophic ice storm of 1985 slowed her plans. With the help of Mary Smalley as business manager, Geraldine sold the ads, wrote the copy, and produced that eight-page issue on 9x12 white paper. The University press did the actual printing and she distributed it to post offices and businesses in the area. 

On page 1 under the headline, “Community Spirit,” she described the many people who helped Sewanee and her residents survive that historic storm: Carl Reid, Doug Seiters, Dwight Sholey, Ernie Butner, Galon Sherrill, Jim Franklin, Dan Rather, Bob Ayres, John Kildoo, Tom Watson, Doug Cameron, John Greeter, Lisa and Tim Keith-Lucas, and the members of the Sewanee Fire Department. If you’re new to Sewanee, you might recognize only a few of these names; if you’ve been on this Mountain for awhile, reading this list of names may stir memories for you.

In that first issue there are advertisements, many of which remain the same today. For their continuing support, I want to thank the Lemon Fair, Rob Matlock Construction, Monteagle Florist, Sewanee Auto Repair, the Sewanee Inn, the Sewanee Market, Shenanigans and Taylor’s Mercantile. 

Also in Vol. 1, No. 1, were many of the very same things that appear in our paper today: a notice of the Otey Parish Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper, the obituaries of esteemed community members, birth announcements and wedding announcements, descriptions of meetings and gallery openings, a call for singers to join the Sewanee Chorale in its spring production of “H.M.S. Pinafore,” reviews of the SUT movies, the St. Andrew’s-Sewanee School’s headmaster’s honors list, and a couple of letters to the editor (which are really letters to the community-at-large). The back page was, even then, devoted to the community calendar.

Looking back at its beginnings, the Messenger has always been dedicated to supporting the greater Sewanee area by providing news and information that affect residents’ lives and encourage meaningful community engagement. We are more explicit about this mission now, especially as we watch the number of newspapers decline and the news business change dramatically. Our mission hasn’t changed, but we are very clear about our role in this community. You won’t learn about the votes scheduled in the State Senate; you won’t read stories that “shout” at you or provoke you; and you won’t be embarrassed if your name appears on our pages. We are, with only the tiniest hint of irony, the Good News Newspaper.

Geraldine brought to life the Sewanee Mountain Messenger from the Sewanee Siren, the community newspaper from 1967 to 1984. We haven’t changed its name, but the paper continues to evolve. While we dabble in an online presence, we know that most of you still like to hold the Messenger in your hands and read it on paper, whether standing at the table in the post office or sitting with a cup of coffee at the Blue Chair or pushing a cart through the Piggly Wiggly. 

The printed newspaper is not dead, especially on this Mountain. I believe in our little free, weekly community newspaper. And I think you do too. May the Sewanee Mountain Messenger continue to be of service to the people of this Plateau for another 30 years.