MissouriLife Articles

The Acid Test For Gold

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 19:55:23 GMT

By Danita Allen Wood

The story started out as a special project
by a University of Missouri journalism graduate
student, Ali Ryan, who was working for
us. She initially surveyed readers, prominent
Missourians, and state travel experts to propose
a list, and then we had the excruciating
task of narrowing it down to a mere one
hundred. Rebecca French Smith came
onboard to complete the project and
proved so savvy an editor of the package
that she is now overall managing editor.

We’ve won four other IRMA awards,
but this was our first gold. We appreciate
the validation, of course. It’s a
real honor to be given a gold, along
with other gold winners in other categories
by magazines such as Arizona
Highways, Texas Parks & Wildlife, and Cottage Life.

But then I started thinking about
gold, the value of gold, and what
winning the award meant. I recalled
a term associated with gold, which is
“the acid test.” The term refers to the
fact that nitric acid is used to confirm
the presence of gold because gold is
insoluble in nitric acid, which will
dissolve other base metals and silver.

We realize the acid test for us isn’t winning
awards. It’s keeping you reading. That’s what
we strive for—simply to entice you into reading
as we celebrate and explore Missouri and
it’s people and places, past and present.

The Civil War in Missouri
I’m also pleased to announce that The Civil
War’s First Blood, Missouri 1854-1861 is finally
off the press. You can read about the book on
page 142. We spent almost two years creating
the book, and authors James Denny and John
Bradbury have done a superb job telling the
dramatic story of the Civil War in our state
before and through 1861. Our state actually
saw the first battle, five weeks before the Battle
of Bull Run (Manassas) in Virginia, and of
course, Missouri saw some of the most vicious
guerrilla action along the border even before
the war began.

Our New Gift Shop
If you’re looking for Missouri-made gifts this
holiday season, visit Missouri Life Marketplace
online at MissouriLife.com. You can also come
see us in Boonville and visit our small gift
shop in the Hotel Frederick, right on Highway
5, next to the river. Our office is only a block
away, so stop and say hello to us, too. We’ve
also compiled a gift basket of Missouri-made
products to go along with a gift subscription,
which you can see on page 10 or online at
MissouriLife.com.

Biggest Issue Ever
This issue has the most pages we’ve ever produced,
with a whopping seventy-one pages of
editorial. That’s more than were in the entire
magazine in our early days, when a typical
issue was sixty-eight pages, containing both
advertising and editorial. We thank you for
reading Missouri Life, and we thank our sponsors
for making it possible for us to continue
offering the magazine at the same price as
when we revived the magazine, back in 1999.

December 2007

Thanks To Teachers

Tue, 29 May 2007 18:11:46 GMT

There are about sixty-three thousand public school teachers, kindergarten through twelfth grade, in our state, according to the Department of Education. Every one of them, plus private school teachers, teacher’s aides, and all of our schools’ staffs deserves a great big thank you. I’m thinking about school because I’m looking forward to it starting again soon. In spring, I eagerly anticipate summer vacation from school, and the more relaxed schedule of summer for the ones still in school. But about this time of year, I begin to look forward to that schedule that seemed so restrictive last spring. Maybe that’s because I have two teenagers at home, and their nocturnal hours — so natural to them — wear on me. This seems like a good time to give a round of applause for our educators, and especially the many, many fine teachers I’ve had. In my little four-room school, Shawnee R-3, I remember especially Mrs. Margaret Ragland and Mr. Grady Hibbs. Mrs. Ragland’s requirement for us to diagram sentences taught us the rules of grammar and the parts of speech, and maybe planted the first seed for an editing career. I loved diagramming sentences — weird, I know. Every time I asked Mr. Hibbs a question, he made me look up the answer; perhaps this was a precursor to a journalist’s love of digging deeper, finding answers. Then in high school, I had another teacher, Miss Adah Peckinpaugh, who likely contributed to my career choice. I have long forgotten whether it was Miss Peckinpaugh, who is now ninety-two, or my mom who encouraged me to enter a county Rural Electric Cooperative writing contest, but Miss Peckinpaugh attended a dinner for the finalists in that contest. We had to recite our papers from memory, as I recall, in front of a small panel of judges. When they announced the winner, I had to recite the paper again, but this time to a room full of strangers. Even though I had already won the contest, I was so nervous my knees were knocking! Miss Peckinpaugh told me that she was so nervous her knees were knocking, too. The prize was a fantastic ten-day trip, along with every other county winner, to Washington D.C. to visit monuments, legislators, Congress and the White House. The writing business seemed pretty attractive to this farm girl who hadn’t been out of Missouri, except to visit grandparents in Arkansas. Then in college, when I was dithering and anxious about making a career choice, my mother told me she’d read about a degree program called agricultural journalism. I investigated and made an appointment with Dr. Delmar Hatesohl. After that appointment, I knew I’d found a major, a career choice, and a college home. Delmar was part of a two-man team that infl uenced the lives of many students; his compatriot was Dr. Dick Lee, who was head of the degree program. Both men knew all their students by name, a rarity even back then. Both guided and advised, and Dick later became my boss, transforming from teacher to mentor. Both gentlemen taught me about being a professional as well as a journalist. know that one of them helped me get an internship that later led to a terrific magazine career at national magazines before Greg and I decided to return home and launch our Missouri Life! The last teacher that I need to thank is Dr. Don Ranly. I had many world-class teachers at Missouri’s world-famous School of Journalism, but Don had the most influence on my magazine career. Quite simply, he taught me how to edit. It sounds simple and easy, but that’s deceptive. I hope you see the difference in Missouri Life. I appreciate all of these teachers, and I hope you’ll thank those teachers you remember who made a difference. I wonder which of my children’s teachers may greatly influence their futures. Thank you to all teachers – past, present, and future.

A Rewarding Season

Sat, 28 Oct 2006 17:13:28 GMT

*By Danita Allen Wood* "To refuse awards is another way of accepting them with more noise than is normal,” said the late Peter Ustinov, though the quote also has been attributed to Mark Twain. With that in mind, we at MissouriLife never refuse an award, but we will give them some noise! We’re so honored to be recognized and feel a bit like Sally Field when she accepted her second Oscar with the enthusiastic line, “You like me!” We thank you for liking us! We are pleased and proud to have received the tourism industry’s 2005 Navigator Media Award. The Missouri Tourism Awards were presented at the Governor’s Conference on Tourism at Springfield in October. The thirty-seventh annual conference was coordinated by the Missouri Division of Tourism. Each year, the Navigator Media Award recognizes a print, broadcast, or electronic medium that has supported and promoted Missouri tourism with stories and images that inform and entice. Indeed, we’re almost surprised ourselves that nearly ten percent of our subscribers are from out of state. Who knows, a holiday gift subscription might lure one of your loved ones to Missouri! Everyone on our staff contributed to our receiving this award, so we all share the credit. In September, we received our second bronze award for Overall Art Direction from the International Regional Magazine Association at the group’s annual conference in San Antonio, Texas. Thanks go to our Art Director Drew Barton and Graphic Designer Barb King for making us look so good. Drew also received an impressive national honor from the editors of the biggest magazine about magazines. He was named to Folio: magazine’s Dream Team as an up-and-coming art director. The team of magazine professionals was selected from a group of two hundred nominees to reflect the staff industry leaders would want on board to launch a new magazine. I first hired Drew as a graphic designer for Weekend magazine in 1998 when he was a sophomore at the University of Missouri at Columbia and I was a faculty member at the School of Journalism. We worked together for three years before he graduated and moved to California. He began designing MissouriLife from the West Coast, before Missouri lured him back to St. Louis in 2003. I’d also like to introduce our newest team member Margaret Rose Tollerton. Margaret joins us as an advertising executive who helps our clients plan successful marketing programs. Margaret is one of the warmest, most cheerful, enthusiastic, and encouraging people I know, and I have every confidence she’ll be an award-winning member of our staff, as well. Simply, Margaret inspires. We wish you an inspiring 2006 filled with wonderful new discoveries. In keeping with MissouriLife’s motto “The Spirit of Discovery,” may you greet the New Year with the vigor of this quote — which we found attributed only to Mark Twain: "Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” December 2005

Whats on Your List

Thu, 05 Oct 2006 02:03:19 GMT

The project we’ve undertaken in this issue is a big one for our little staff. We started with MU journalism graduate student Ali Ryan. First she researched options and methods for identifying a list like this. Then she composed a survey thatmany of you kindly answered. We thank you readers who helped us pick items. Ali compiled those results and then wrote about half the package. Next, everyone on our staff here made lists and more lists that numbered way more than a hundred. We also asked Director of Tourism John Robinson for his thoughts, and he asked his staff for their thoughts. During this process, we learned that nobody knows the state like John, partly because of his position, but also because of his personal resolution to drive every mile of every state road. He knows everyone, everywhere. A special thanks to him for suggestions that we would have overlooked without his contributions — and also for getting so wrapped up with our project that he volunteered to write a few items. Then, we came back and began what was indeed a painful process of cutting the list down to a measly one hundred. We argued some, but we on staff eventually compiled the entire list. We would think the list was final, and then someone would think of something that we all agreed belonged. We even cheated. If you count the items in the Ultimate 100, you’ll actually find about 159. We excused ourselves from even more painful cutting by grouping some things together. For example, we grouped six world-class museums in St. Louis into one item. We listed three locations tied to Daniel Boone, but only counted him once. It hurt to cut the list. I kept trying to think of how to get MissouriLife’s headquarters at Fayette onto the list, but could never quite justify it, much to my dismay. Next, Rebecca Smith in Columbia jumped in where Ali left off, and finished researching, writing, and checking the remaining items, as well as gathering photos. She remained unflappable when I kept changing the list. I confess I still have about thirty on the list to visit myself and will use it to guide my summer jaunts around the state. If you’re one of the rare people who can claim to have done or seen all hundred items, please let us know! And I’m ready; also tell me what you would have put on the list! *NEW COLUMNS* We introduce a few new columns in this issue. Note our new column on page 8 giving you background on Missouri symbols. There are eighteen Missouri symbols, so look for this column to continue for a couple of years. We’re also pleased to bring you a new column on Missouri wines on page 62. I occasionally encounter people who snicker when Missouri wines are mentioned. I delight in mentioning a Missouri wine that was featured as one of the best of its kind in Time magazine a few years ago. We’ll show them! Email danita@missourilife.com *-Danita Allen Wood* February 2006

The Cave State

Wed, 04 Oct 2006 14:29:52 GMT

*By Danita Allen Wood* In addition to “The Show-Me State,” Missouri has also earned the moniker, “The Cave State,” because of the more than six thousand caves on record here. Missouri became known as “The Cave State,” even though Tennessee has more caves recorded than we do. Most of our caves are formed in dolomite or limestone, but some are in sandstone or other non-soluble rocks. Scott House, the cave database manager for the Missouri Speleological Survey, reports that 6,110 caves have been recorded in 83 counties, with about 145 of those caves having been recorded since January 2005. Counties with the most caves are Perry, with 657; Shannon, with 548; Greene with 366; Pulaski, with 356; Stone, with 297; Christian, with 220; Crawford, with 210; and Texas, with 182, also according to the Missouri Speleological Survey. There’s something reassuring about these solid rock walls, the primeval shelters for humans and animals. As a child, I toured Marvel Cave at Silver Dollar City on school trips, and I still like to take the tour when I’m in Branson, in spite of Tall Man’s Headache. That’s actually the name of a low-hanging roof at a turn. The guide warns you about it, but once, when the children were young and a little afraid because it was their first cave tour, Greg was distracted and ran head-on into it. He fell flat on his back and learned the origin of the name. We were all worried about him, but he was fine. I’ve also been through Fantastic Caverns, Bridal, Mark Twain, and other caves. There was also a little-known cave, shut part of the year to protect an endangered bat, which became one of our regular trail-ride destinations in Pulaski County along the Big Piney River, when the cave was open. Perhaps the most exciting cave tour I’ve ever gone on, though, was in Kentucky at Mammoth Cave, years ago. During a six-hour wild cave tour, which involved crawling through mud and narrow tunnels, I was behind a large guy who got stuck in a tight passage. The tour guide had actually measured the guy to make sure he didn’t exceed the size limit before we left, but maybe he had twinkies in his pockets. He was close to panic, and so were the two of us behind him. The tour guide kept telling him to relax, that tension made the problem worse. Finally he squeezed through, and I rushed through right behind him. Even that tight spot didn’t cure me. I’d like to go on the wild cave tour in Missouri, at Devil’s Icebox in Rock Bridge Memorial State Park near Columbia. Perhaps it’s the adventure, the mystery —what’s around the next corner? — and the beauty of caves. We will begin sharing Missouri’s caves with you in every issue. Read about the amazing Onondaga Cave on page 12. I hope you’ll be as fascinated as I am. April 2006

A Pallid Sturgeon and a Petroglyph

Wed, 04 Oct 2006 03:48:12 GMT

*By Danita Allen Wood* Leave it to my husband, Greg, to wade into the Missouri River, bend down, stick his hand into the water, and pull out a rare endangered species. He does things like that. Our encounter with the pallid sturgeon happened during a delightful six-and-a-half mile float on the Missouri River from Rocheport to a landing at Huntsdale last summer. The tour was organized and guided by Brett Dufur, the owner and operator of Mighty Mo Canoe Rentals. Brett is also the author of several Missouri guide books and owns Pebble Publishing, a firm that specializes in Missouri books. When I was in my twenties, I floated a lot of Missouri’s Ozark rivers and streams, and it was one of my favorite pastimes. But I hadn’t been in a canoe for many years. I was a little nervous about canoeing, and I was very nervous about canoeing on the Missouri, a river with a storied reputation as a dangerous river, dating back to steamboat days. Brett told us that we could hug the shore, and that sounded good to me. He also guaranteed us we’d soon be crossing the river to explore sandbars on the opposite shore, and he was right. To start the float, Brett and his helpers carried the canoes down a steep bank to the water and then helped us into the canoes. After my initial nervousness, my river legs and paddle arms came right back, and I felt at home with the rhythm on the river. The Missouri River didn’t intimidate at all. It seemed a slow, relaxing float compared to some Ozark rivers, where you must constantly dodge rocks and trees or navigate swift water at sharp bends. Soon we joined other floaters in crossing the river to sandbars on the opposite shore, anticipating looking for arrowheads and colorful rocks. That’s when Greg hopped out of the canoe and pulled the prehistoric-looking pallid sturgeon from the river. He had noticed a fish floating and wondered what it was. It had become entangled with a hook and some nylon fishing line. Greg and some helpers removed the hook and line and, after showing the endangered species with the bony, dinosaur-like scales to other floaters, set it free. Removing the hook and line seemed to revive it, and it swam away strongly. We hope it survived. We continued our float, exploring and swimming off sandbars and enjoying the Manitou Bluffs scenery. Later in the afternoon, our guides treated us to a watermelon break. We climbed the bank up to the Katy Trail and were rewarded with another treasure in addition to watermelon. Even though I’ve biked right by them on the Katy Trail many times, I had never been able to make out the petroglyphs on the bluffs, in spite of a marker describing them. Not until one of Brett’s guides pointed them out could I see them; I’d always looked too high on the bluff face. Seeing the red marks made by American Indian hands before Lewis and Clark’s time was the second thrill of the day. Brett wants people to get to know our mighty Missouri River in a different manner than driving up to a lookout, popping out of our air-conditioned cars, snapping a picture, and then moving on. His float trips are a tremendous introduction. _Brett or guides lead a float every Saturday during the summer and on other days for at least four canoes. Visit www.mighty-mo.com or call 573-698-3903. The trip costs $30 per person, including canoe rental._ June 2006