Celebrating the Keweenaw’s Signature Food

Pasty Fest celebrated its 20th year in Calumet last week, uniting people across the Keweenaw over the region’s traditional dish: the pasty.

This year was renaissance themed, and attendees of all ages dressed for the occasion. Opening ceremonies at noon were led by CLK Marching Band, MTU Pep Band, and all manners of knights and mages, along with the famous “Cousin Jack” Pasty and human pasty ingredients like carrots and rutabagas.

Volunteers Rebekka and Rachael pose with Cousin Jack. Photo courtesy Lily Venable.

The festival featured medieval roleplay, from smithing to sword fighting, by a local LARPing group. The group is called the Shire of Skerjestrand or Hancock Houghton Regional Rattan Armored Combat and represents the UP chapter of the Society for Creative Anachronism (or SCA). According to group member Eleanor McKinney, the group mainly does European historical reenactment from the early prehistoric to late medieval eras, ending around the 16th century.

They hold fight practices down on Hancock’s Quincy Green every Saturday and crafting nights every Thursday.

LARPers conduct swordfighting, smithing, archery, and enjoy pasties. Photos courtesy Lily Venable.

McKinney says the group is an amazing creative outlet.

“I just really enjoy historical fashion. A lot of the research elements of it I found interesting. It’s creative anachronism - melding actual historical elements with people's own creative touches, which creates really fun parts of the society at large because it includes this entire country, but there’s also people that do it internationally… There are groups in China, groups in Australia. So you get to see people’s own creativity and also their cultural touches, which is really, really neat, and I really enjoy it.”

Music was on every corner at the festival, and vendors lined the streets, offering food, cotton candy, face paint crafts, and other wares, while the Calumet Farmers Market happened just a street away. Children enjoyed playing in bubbles pouring from the giant bubble machine, while attendees chased suds that floated down foggy 5th Street.

Kids play in the suds from the bubble machine. Photo courtesy Lily Venable.

East Fork Pasty Company took home this year’s trophy for Best Pasty, receiving the most votes from taste testers and ending Slim’s Cafe’s 3-year-long reign. Competition was fierce, with new and old participants, including Sheboygan Pasty Company, who traveled all the way from Wisconsin to participate.

The pasty eating competition was a tie between Greg “the Pennsylvania Pasty Proprietor” Esser and Lord Brendon the Hungry of Laurium, at 2.5 pasties each. In the face of an eat-off, Lord Brendon ceded, and Esser took home the prize, as well as this year’s pasty-eating glory.

Pasty Fest is a fundraiser for Main Street Calumet, which is run by volunteers. Volunteer Abe Stone says the theme was definitely a hit, and they’re hoping to have a similarly exciting theme for next year.

Big Annie’s Likeness is Coming to Calumet

“Big Annie” Klobuchar Clemenc stands tall in Calumet’s proud history. A labor activist in the early 20th century, she drew women out of their traditional roles and helped shape the labor movement in the U.P.  Soon Calumet will have a life-sized statue downtown honoring her. 

A local artist, Jerome Patryjak, created a piece of art that will be used as inspiration for the sculptor to design the statue. A sculptor will be selected once the Big Annie Statue Committee has reached their fundraising goals.

The Big Annie Statue Committee recently awarded Patryjak a $500 grant funded by the Keweenaw Community Foundation to create a conceptual rendering of the Big Annie statue. The committee is planning a June 22 fundraising gala at the Calumet Theatre, where the artist’s rendering of the statue will be revealed. 

Sara Fletcher with the Keweenaw Community Foundation awards local Calumet Artist Jerome Patryjak with $500 for a conceptual rendering of the "Big Annie" Statue. Photo courtesy the "Big Annie" Statue Committee.

WHO WAS BIG ANNIE?

Anna Klobuchar Clemenc was known as Big Annie because she towered over most other women, standing six foot two inches tall. Although her brother Frank described her as “mild and well-mannered,” she turned out to be a firebrand when it came to supporting the role of women outside the home and fighting for economic and social justice. It made her both a hero and a pariah in her time. 

In 1913, miners on the Keweenaw Peninsula held a labor strike protesting their hazardous working conditions and extremely low wages. During the strike, Clemenc, only 25 years old at the time and herself the wife of a miner, founded a Woman’s Auxiliary of the Western Federation of Miners in support of the miners’ cause. She marched with the strikers daily, often waving an American flag on a 10-foot pole as a reminder of every citizen’s fundamental rights.  

Clemenc was arrested and jailed twice for her activism.  The first time, she and five other women stopped a man from going to work whom they thought was a non-striker. They were arrested after fighting with deputies. She also served a 10-day jail sentence for previously assaulting a non-striking miner. 

Clemenc and the Women’s Auxiliary planned the historic Christmas Eve party at Italian Hall, which turned into a mass disaster after someone falsely shouted “fire” and 500 children and 175 adults stampeded to get out of the building. Seventy-five people died, most of them children. Carrying her flag, Clemenc led the funeral procession for the victims. 

Her legacy was mostly forgotten for decades, until the Michigan legislature declared on June 17, 1980, as Annie Clemenc Day, describing her as “one of Michigan’s most valiant, yet largely forgotten and unrecognized women.” 

ARTIST’S CONNECTION TO CALUMET

Patryjak’s grandmother and grandfather both emigrated to Calumet from the Austrian-Hungarian Empire in the late 19th century. They raised a family there, moving from town to town as he followed work in the mines.  

When the mines started closing, they moved to Detroit, where Patryjak was born and raised. He worked there for most of his life, though his family visited Calumet occasionally, and he has fond memories of the Keweenaw. 

During the isolation of the COVID pandemic, Patryjak realized that he wanted to live in a more beautiful place filled with what he recalled as “wonderful people.”  So he moved to Calumet, opened a studio on 5th Street, began volunteering at the Calumet Art Center and joined the boards of the Copper Country Associated Artists and the Keweenaw Heritage Center.

Patryjak’s interest in Big Annie began when he started looking into the history of the Italian Hall disaster. He learned about Big Annie’s role and wanted to know more about her.

“I was interested in her very human story,” said Patryjak.  “I believe my grandmother knew Annie when she was young.”

Among the items Patryjak’s mother left to him was a crocheted table piece with a note that said it was a gift to her mother from Annie’s mother, Mary Klobuchar.

The artist was also interested in what drove his grandparents to leave a European empire to seek opportunity in America and become citizens instead of subjects. To him, Big Annie personifies their drive.

“She was a leading figure for self-determination, respect and community over corporation,” he said.

Now, Patryjak has brought Big Annie back to life on his drawing table. The Big Annie Statue Committee can’t wait to see what a sculptor does with his rendering.

Edit: Paragraph 2 was edited for wording after this story was posted.

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Welcome to the Brand New Copper Beacon: What We’re Doing and Why

Today marks the relaunch of a new and improved Copper Beacon. Let me tell you about its history, mission and plans for the future. 

A teleconference between the volunteer relaunch team: Josh Vissers, Laura Smyth, Jennifer Donovan, Juxta Sprague, and Lily Venable.

Just as there is no perfect person, there is no perfect media. We all, mostly, try our best. When I taught media studies, I would start each semester with a lesson on propaganda and faulty logic, because deceit, self-interest, and manipulation are as old as humankind. But so is seeking truth, helping community, and a need to communicate with each other. So, along with propaganda, I would talk (probably a lot) about personal bias—how to recognize it and move past it. One mistake we often make, both as media “consumers” and media “producers” is believing we are without bias. That’s not humanly possible. But recognizing our own biases, our own blind spots and prejudices, is not only possible, it is essential, both in a democracy and in a news outlet.

Joshua Vissers started this online news source, now called Copper Beacon, as an exercise in delivering local news to a rural community without the undue influence that can come from relying on advertising revenue.

(Read a short history of the publication here: https://www.copperbeacon.org/about-us).

It is the ideal of every journalist I have ever met not to be thwarted in what they cover and how it can be covered by the commercial necessities of their news outlet. Investigating stories, writing stories, editing stories, getting good visuals to help bring stories to life…all of this is expensive, and the tried-and-true model in American journalism has been advertising. Subscriptions in this model help, certainly, but primarily to give advertisers a sense of the readership they can reach if they pay for an expensive advertisement. The potential conflicts of interest are ever-present and obvious.

This publication has never sought or accepted advertising. We rely on subscriptions, though we now are seeking other local and national, non-commercial sources of funding. 

Copper Beacon has  been and continues to be hyper-local. We cover four counties: Baraga, Ontonogan, Houghton and Keweenaw. With the view that journalism is a community service and not a product, we value local knowledge. 

As I was working on this article in my Hancock office in late April, I decided to get out and enjoy the sunshine and clear my head. Walking down Quincy St. I found myself in the middle of the setup process for this year’s Puppy Parade. How perfect. I leave my office to clear my thoughts and immediately am immersed in an important and lovely community project. Students from Hancock High School were creating the route all along the sidewalk with chalk, leaving inspiring messages and colorful pawprints. The coordinator for the Puppy Parade, Rachel Lamppa from Copper Shores Community Health, chatted with me about the artwork the students were making and her passion for helping survivors of sexual violence. Officer Olsen was on hand, helping with the artwork and looking after the students. I had walked out of my head and into a community event outside my door. I encouraged the students to consider writing an article for the Copper Beacon about their experience on this project. Citizen journalism recruitment on the fly.

Victim advocate Rachel Lamppa with Hancock Police Officer Olsen at the Copper Shores Puppy Parade.

Rather than attempting to cover the entire U.P., Copper Beacon chose a deeper focus on truly local issues, and our plan is to grow through the development of local journalists and citizen journalists. 

One big accomplishment that the publication has achieved so far is obtaining a 501(c)3 status. Being a non-profit will help us with our mission: Copper Beacon will deliver high-quality journalism featuring diverse voices and deep research to the residents of Houghton County and the surrounding area. With ethics, accessibility, and media education held as core values, we will lead the way for the modernization of news production in the Upper Peninsula.

Yes, that’s a big mission, but what’s the point in a small one? Together, we don’t need to do this instantly but rather can build on past achievements and develop new local talent. We have a dedicated local board to help guide the way. We are actively seeking input from residents for stories that could use greater coverage, and we will be training local writers to take a leap into this important project: local news.

We’re currently an all-volunteer staff, although freelance writers are paid contributors, but one of the goals we have as a non-profit is to develop foundational funding sources from both inside and outside the region that will allow us to develop more opportunities for paid writers and also to engage and educate local communities on the importance of local news coverage. Money coming into our non-profit organization brings funds into the local economy rather than sending money out of the area through advertising revenue to a national or international corporate parent company. As Joshua said to me in a recent phone conversation, corporate news ownership is “a straw for sucking money out of the community.” And that straw seems to get bigger with each passing day. 

So, moving forward, we will keep the community events calendar going on a weekly basis along with smaller news items as they arise. The primary change will be to take a monthly deep dive into one specific topic of importance in the community and cover it in-depth. Look for story topics to be announced in the next few weeks and contact the editor if you would like more information about writing for (or learning to write for) the Copper Beacon. We’re excited about the future of this news outlet. Taking my cue from the students who were enthusiastically chalking up Quincy St. before the parade, I can tell you that we do this work with a deep commitment to the well-being of the whole community, and also an appreciation of good chalk. 

Edit: This article was corrected for typos after posting. “Office” was changed to Officer and “conversion” changed to “conversation”.

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Unsold and Neglected: Six major Finlandia properties face abandonment

Quincy Green is often the site of public events, like the Canal Run. Photo courtesy of Brockit Photography.

Finlandia University is in receivership, a judicially supervised dissolution process. Almost everyone in the Keweenaw knows that. But what is receivership anyway? What does it mean and how does it work?

Receivership is a powerful legal and financial mechanism designed to protect the interests of creditors when a company or property is in default or facing severe financial distress.

In this process, a court-appointed receiver takes control of the assets and operations of the entity in distress. The receiver's primary responsibility is to maximize the value of the entity's assets to repay its creditors. This often involves selling assets, restructuring operations, or even running the business for a period of time.

While receivership can be a challenging process for the entity involved, it's often a better alternative than bankruptcy.

Per the Michigan Receivership Act of 2018, a court appoints an independent receiver, or trustee, to take possession of commercial property that is in default on its debts and receive, collect, care for and dispose of the property or proceeds from the sale of the property.

Finlandia’s board voted in March to seek state court receivership. They had three choices: state receivership, federal receivership or bankruptcy.

Receivership put all the university’s real estate and personal property up for sale.

The university’s receiver is O’Keefe and Associates Consulting LLC, appointed by the Ingham County Circuit Court on recommendation from the Finlandia University board. Ingham County is the headquarters of the Michigan Attorney General, and the Attorney General is the one who files for receivership with the court.

Patrick O’Keefe

The university’s board recommended O’Keefe and Associates because of their experience in higher education and their respect for the community and stakeholders, said CEO Patrick O’Keefe.

“We understand the impact of the loss of Finlandia on the community,” he explained. “There’s a right way and a wrong way to bury things. We hope we are doing it the right way.”

What Happens During Receivership

During receivership, the receiver steps in to manage the university’s assets, making all financial and operating decisions. According to the Receivership in Real Estate Transactions on the website of LexisNexis—a firm that provides verified legal information to lawyers, corporations and academics worldwide—receivership allows courts to preserve and/or maintain the value of assets.

If it can be avoided, lenders usually do not want to foreclose, taking title to assets or real property collateral, the Practical Guidance Journal says. They want to avoid the expense and effort of foreclosure and having to assume the responsibilities and liabilities of ownership.

In Finlandia’s case, some of the lienholders are resisting the purchase offers the receiver has brought them. O’Keefe declined to name any of the property’s lienholders.

“The secured lenders were unwilling to work with a national real estate marketing firm for the auction, or fund ongoing expenses,” O’Keefe said. “They wouldn’t cooperate with us. These properties are generating almost no interest above the mortgages.”

There are 27 properties in Finlandia’s receivership, two were sold pre-receivership, O’Keefe said. His firm has sold three others. Eleven are under sales contracts and three are going to auction. Two are being purchased by the City of Hancock, and the city is negotiating for three other Finlandia properties.

At this week’s Hancock Public Schools board meeting, they closed on the purchase of McAfee Field for $400,000.

City of Hancock’s Involvement

Hancock is purchasing Quincy Green and the Ryan Street Community Garden, said Mary Babcock, Hancock city manager. The city is paying $140,000 for Quincy Green and $27,000 for the community garden. Hancock is looking at purchasing three properties on Franklin Street that the receiver has filed a motion to abandon; Mannerheim, Nikander, and Wargelin Halls. The city council approved a purchase agreement for the properties on Oct. 17 for a total of $30,000. Babcock said they have no specific plans for the properties yet, but the council vote was unanimously in favor of making the purchase.

If they are abandoned, there would be no current owner and it would take a minimum of four years to have a tax foreclosure, Babcock said. The city is putting Finlandia properties on the tax rolls next January, and if there is no owner, no taxes will be generated. The city is also concerned about the security of buildings left empty for such a long time.

The Ryan Street Community Garden. Photo via Patronicity.

“It’s a tough situation,” Babcock said.

It’s important if residents have an opinion about the purchases, that they contact the city at 906-482-2720 or email manager@hancock.net, she added.

Properties already approved for sale in Ingham County Circuit Court include three parcels on Navy Street and a building at 417 Mine St., according to online court records. O’Keefe has filed motions to sell McAfee Field and four lots on Franklin Street.

Abandoning Properties

O’Keefe has also filed a motion in Ingham County Circuit Court to abandon some of the largest properties on campus. He told the court they could not find buyers willing to pay enough for the buildings.

The six properties O’Keefe has filed to abandon are the Jutila Center, Mannerheim Hall, Nikander Hall, Wargelin Hall, the Paavo Nurmi Center and Old Main, though the city of Hancock has since agreed to purchase the three residence halls.

“These big ones, they have been neglected for a very long time, and no one wants to pay for them,” he said.

“There was some initial interest in the Jutila Center at amounts that wouldn’t cover the lien,” O’Keefe said. “That’s true with Old Main, too. Paavo Nurmi doesn’t have any parking, and the lender didn’t want to put it into an auction.

If the properties are abandoned, Finlandia will still own them, but will not be responsible for the upkeep, O’Keefe said. He hopes that putting the buildings in limbo will accelerate discussions with lenders.

“Right now, we’re not even getting responses,” he said. ‘It’s crazy. Nobody has a sense of urgency, but we do because we don’t have the money.”

A hearing on the motion to abandon was delayed until Oct. 18, while O’Keefe tries to work things out with the lenders.

“They wouldn’t let us sell them, and they didn’t want to foreclose on them,” the receiver said. “Some have been more cooperative than others. We think the motion for abandonment was a wake-up call, a little sobering.”

The receiver explained that he needs to generate revenue to pay teachers who deferred salaries, as well as local creditors. Also, with little or no equity, the firm cannot fund the costs of maintaining and heating the largest properties over the winter, he said.

“Our singular focus is to get enough money to pay the teachers who delayed pay through the summer, as well as local creditors,” said O’Keefe.

O’Keefe’s firm had initially planned to auction off Finlandia properties in October. However, the secured lenders were unwilling to work with a national real estate marketing firm for the auction or fund ongoing expenses, O’Keefe said.

The commercial real estate market is relatively soft in our area, O’Keefe said. Only 38 commercial properties have been sold here in the past two years, “and the Finlandia receivership dumped 27 on the market at once,” he said. Still, he adds, “I am cautiously optimistic.”

Photo by Paul R. Burley, via Wikimedia Commons.

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Metaphysical healers, musicians and artisans gathered in Lake Linden

Jackie Froiland offered magickal treatments to visitors at the People’s Celebration Fall Healing Fair in Lake Linden Saturday. Photo by Paula McCambridge.

Fall Colors Healing Fair will be an annual event

LAKE LINDEN — With Friday’s full moon and resounding thunder, it was as if nature itself couldn’t wait for the People’s Celebration Fall Colors Healing Fair in Lake Linden Saturday.

By Saturday morning, the storm had subsided and, instead, the sun emerged and shone its light on more than 20 metaphysical healers and artists from across the Midwest. The healers basked in the summery weather, starting their day in a meditation and prayer circle outside the site’s cream-colored yurt, a large, round tent.

They prayed, they held hands, they hugged — hugs were plentiful to both friends and strangers throughout the day.

And when the healers dispersed from prayer, they sold their services - readings of tarot, chakra, akashic records. Tarot consists of a deck of special cards used by readers to gain insight on past, present, and future. The chakra refers to energy points throughout the body, and akashic records are records of a soul’s life from creation, including past lives.

“This gathering is a safe place for healers, metaphysicians and artists,” said Kent Richards who organized the event with Jen Nilsen. They plan to make it an annual event during the last weekend in September, so consider this your save-the-date.

Aware that the healing arts sometimes create discomfort among those unfamiliar with it, Richards and Nilsen hope those who are curious will come to find out what it’s all about.

“You’re forced to grow when you go into the unknown,” Nilsen said.

Kent Richards creates a sound bath for those visiting the Fall Colors Healing Fair in Lake Linden Saturday. The fair was organized by Jen Nilsen and Richards at his Wild Blue Wander UP, 20 acres available for camping on Rice Lake Road. Photo by Paula McCambridge.

The fairground filled a section of Richards’ Wild Blue Wander UP, which he describes as a sacred 20 acres between Lake Superior and Rice Lake where people can camp and hike for solitude. There are suggested prices and what Richards calls a love donation. Visitors are welcome here regardless of their finances - if you have more, share more; if you have less, they still want to share their fire pit with you. The fair charged no admittance.

Nilsen describes the land as magical like the people who are drawn there, people like intuitive guide Jackie Froiland who set up her table of spell jars and inspirational cards.

“I’ve always been into this,” said Froiland, a Copper Country local, formerly an obstetrics technician. “I took three months off to become a better tarot reader, and that three months became a year.”

Why the life change? Froiland said she’s called to help empower women, especially those who have found themselves in relationships with narcissists.

“My big thing is to show women their worth,” she said. “It’s been too long that we’ve been told we come last.”

That thread of empowerment connected the work of one healer — fostering strength, courage and confidence in those who visited them.

Len Novak displayed his hand-made percussions, including one hollowed out tree limb filled with Lake Superior stones. It slowly rattled as it was tipped from end to end. He called it a lake essence percussion creation meant to sound like the shores of Lake Superior.

Visitors regularly spent a half hour or more with the empathic Novak whose eyes filled with tears whenever his musical work mesmerized a listener.

Len Novak presents the sounds of the Lake Superior Shoreline in his lake essence percussion creation. He sold handmade percussion creations at the healing fair Saturday. Video by Paula McCambridge.

Hiking trails through the property brought surprises, like an outhouse that appeared to be a door standing in the middle of nowhere. Tiny gnomes and fairies dotted the paths resting on tree stumps and reclining in mossy ground. The delighted squeals of children could be heard as they discovered each one.

And then, there were group experiences in the yurt. Richards himself led a sound bath with the cost simply a donation. Sound emitted from crystal and brass singing bowls, steel drums and flutes. The crowd came in chattering in introductions and soon fell into a shared state of calm as Richards drew them together in soothing sound.

For healers, the fair isn’t all there is. Anyone looking for community with fellow healers can join the group at Wild Blue Wander UP every two weeks through November and again in the spring.

“It’s a time for us to do healings on each other,” Nilsen said.

Weekends are open to all - just contact Richards through his website at WildBlueWanderUP.com. He said he also responds to the good, old-fashioned phone call. He can be reached at 906-369-1819.

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Single-track mind

Local group teaches kids about basics of mountain bike riding and trail maintenance

Registration open for Parade of Nations scavenger hunt

Sign up to be on a hide team, a hunt team, or both

Last year, the COVID-19 pandemic necessitated the canceling of most of the traditional Parade of Nations activities, but the organizing committee was still looking for ways to keep the spirit of the event alive.

One of the volunteers, Will Schuette, had the idea for an informative scavenger hunt that would allow people to participate in small, socially responsible groups.

“I really liked that idea, and we went with it,” said Donna Cole, who is organizing the hunt this year.

Nine teams composed a series of three clues for hunt teams and members of the public to chase throughout the communities of Houghton and Hancock. One series of clues, from the Bangladeshi Student Association, helped tell the story of International Mother Language Day by requiring hunt teams to learn about the details leading up to its declaration by the United Nations and use those details to solve a puzzle. Cole said the organizers who hid the clues had to double-check with the student organization to make sure they hid them in the right spots.

“So that was the most elaborate of them,” she said. “And some of them were pretty easy to decipher.”

The City of Hancock created a hunt sequence that interwove with their Detroit Institute of the Arts “Inside/Out” displays.

Another, from the League of Women Voters, highlighted Vera Mize’s contributions to the community by leading people to the small park dedicated to her (which is now moved).

The Chinese Student Association had a clue that led to a big tree by Michigan Tech’s parking lot with a hole high in the trunk.

“So you had to be on a ladder or something so you could lean in and take a picture of the QR code,” Cole said.

Barbara Wheeler, on one of the hunt teams, had pictures of her children in the hole from when they were young.

“She knew right away about that hole,” Cole said.

This year the Parade of Nations itself is on, but the festival is still canceled. The parade route is slightly changed. The hunt is being maintained as another way for people to teach and learn about the culture, heritage, and traditions of the diverse people who live here.

People can participate on both a hunt and a hide team.

“The registration for both teams is the same,” Cole said. “If you want to do both, you just go back and do it a second time.”

Prize money is awarded for the first teams to complete all the hunts. Emails go out to registered hunt teams with the clues shortly before the clues are posted to the website for general public participation.

“So it gives the registered teams a little headstart,” Cole said. “If they’re watching their email.”

Clues are submitted to the organizers, who review them, create the laminated QR codes that link to the follow-up clues, and hide them in advance of the hunt, which launches on Sept. 7.

The deadline to submit clues and hiding places is Aug. 23.

The registration form, guidelines for participation, and other information can be found at the link below. Questions can be emailed to paradeofnations@mtu.edu.

Official Hunt Website

Photos provided by Donna Cole.

EPA conducts hazards cleanup at former Julio Scrapyard

Minor improvements to the trail to follow scrap and dirt removal

Miner's Revenge trails faster than ever

Dry conditions unusual for the literally underground mountain bike race