For the first time I saw Dennis Albaugh’s collection of 130 Chevrolets. What a collection! My favorite was the one-of-a-kind 1928 Chevrolet Camp Car owned by John and Dora McMullen and shown below. It came complete with a non-anchored wicker chair driver’s seat with a second for the front seat passenger. Imagine what a State Trooper would say about that! It also had a quilt rack to the left of the driver’s seat, drop leaf dining room table just behind the front seats, and roll down window shades. Move over Winnebago!

The Albaugh’s Collection represents a Chevrolet and a Corvette from every year, and some years with two. It’s a privilege to walk through. Watch for Dennis to open his garage again. You’ll get your chance and you don’t want to miss it.

Speaking of you don’t want to miss it, watch for the 2009 Salisbury Automobile Classic on September 13.

photos by James G. Lindberg

It’s your chance to see Dennis Albaugh’s collection of 130 Chevrolets; some say it is the best Chevy collection anywhere!

At the same event you will see the cars that hundreds of other folks are bringing

• classics (pre-War and post-War)
• street rods and modified
• Corvettes
• cars and trucks

You will be able to vote for your favorite 12 classics and see what the judges think of cars and trucks in 20 other categories.

Where? Albaugh, Inc. at 1525 NE 36th Street in Ankeny. (Do not believe the maps you get from either Google or Mapquest!) Instead take I-35 to exit 92, turn west on E. 1st Street (0.2 mi) then north on NE Delaware (2 mi), turn east on NE 36th (0.4 mi) and you will see it on the right as you approach the underpass at I-35.

When? Saturday, August 8th from 6:30 am until 4:00 pm. Get there early. It’s going to be hot!

How much? $10 or free to those 12 and under.  Thanks to Karl Chevrolet all the proceeds go to Ankeny High School.

photos by James G. Lindberg and dok1

The Brookings’ MetroMonitor report was released today (6/17/2009), and based on “overall performance” Des Moines is ranked in the top 20 of the 100 largest metropolitan economies in the U. S. where overall performance was based on recent changes in 4 indicators:

• employment
• unemployment
• gross metropolitan product
• housing price index

The full rankings are available.

In employment were are in the top 20% along with Omaha-Council Bluffs and Kansas City. The middle quintile included Denver, Minneapolis, St. Louis, and Chicago.

In the rate of increase in unemployment, the report showed that Des Moines was best in the country. We have lost jobs more slowly than any other metropolitan area. This was attributed in part to the relative insulation of the insurance industry to rapid change during a recession. Omaha-Council Bluffs was also in the most favorable 20%.

The question of wages which typically do not drop during a recession, Des Moines did not compare as favorably where we were in the second to the lowest quintile.

In recent changes in the gross metropolitan product, Des Moines was in the middle quintile.

The strength of the real estate markets is reflected by our position in the 2nd most favorable quintile. If you want to sell a house, it is most favorable to live in Houston, Buffalo, or Dallas, but you are in a lot of pain if you are trying to sell in Modesto, CA, Las Vegas, NV, or Stockton, CA. New slogan opportunity for Las Vegas: “If you bought a house in Vegas, your money will stay in Vegas.”

A final category considered in the Brookings report is real estate owned by lending institutions. These are properties that have been foreclosed, that the lender has tried and failed to sell at auction, and that remain in the hands of the lending institution. The Des Moines metro is in the middle. The fewest such properties are in Syracuse and Albany, NY and greatest number in Stockton, CA and Las Vegas, NV.

During the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, while we are suffering individually and collectively as institutions, a city and state, the Des Moines metro is doing relatively well. We couldn’t ask for a lot more.

photos by flickr by recentexposurephotography

It’s hard to miss Iowa’s new wind turbines. They continue to spring up in Western Iowa along Interstate 80 in areas including one called Windy Hills. The turbines are on both sides of I-80 in Adair , Cass , and Pottawattamie Counties. 

Today we find that Mid-American Energy has over 100 turbines in Pottawatamie County alone where many of the pictures above were taken at the Walnut Wind Project.

Money is blowing in the wind.

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists each turbine will net the landowner $2,000 -5,000/year in royalties. That’s great news in counties where the average farm is near 440 acres and the crop value per harvested acre has been running between $205 – 225/acre.

How are we doing in terms of absolute capacity compared to the rest of the country? We’re doing well; currently we are even with California in absolute capacity. DOE puts us 3rd in the nation; citing Dirk Lammers Yahoo says 2nd, where Texas is first. 

•  Iowa has 2862 MW of capacity (with our population of 3 million that’s about 1 kW/person)
• California has 2868 MW with their population of 36 million
• In Iowa we’re producing 10% of the nation’s wind power. I’m impressed!

Resources for further information

• National Renewable Energy Laboratory (US DOE)
• energy matters (Australia)
• Wind Power A to Z
• You Tube videos on wind energy

photos by James G. Lindberg

After all, you will wake up on Tuesday June 2, 2009, and there will still be a General Motors. (That’s good.) You will own the lion’s share of GM until (and if) it starts to make money, and then someone else will get to buy it back. (That’s mixed.) I would probably favor the idea that we (aka, the federal government/U. S. Treasury) would make some big bucks before we sell. Some question whether making money anytime soon is going to happen.

If you read 2008 Salisbury Automobile Classic on AroundDesMoines.com last September -especially the links to Billy Durant – you know that GM has had its share of trouble.

Billy Durant created GM in 1908 for a small sum of money, raised a large sum of money by selling stock, bought Buick, Oldsmobile, Cadillac, and Oakland (Pontiac), was pushed out in 1910, quickly joined forces with a race driver named Chevrolet and founded Chevrolet Motors, regained GM in 1916, was forced out again in 1920, and before he could rebuild his fortune, was ruined in the stock market crash of 1929. Durant was a dandy entrepreneur who lived too close to the edge once too often.

You can examine the way GM views its history. While the Web site has a corporate spin, the photos make it great fun for a car buff.

CNBC.com has a timeline history that was posted on May 27 2009. While it wanders a bit, it has a lot of facts.

The foreign press is sometimes a nice read since they mince fewer words. Try the Telegraph.co.uk from England.

So while the trouble at GM is not the first trouble, it is the biggest bankruptcy in U. S. history, and it does have our attention.

I sure hope we like the changes in GM ‘cuz looking for a Chevy is never going to be the same.

photos by flickr by bobster885 and James G. Lindberg

Maybe they hoped you wouldn’t notice, but The Hershey’s Company changed the formulation for some but not all of their candy. The news broke in September, 2008. Now Hershey’s has changed the names of some of their products because they can’t call them milk chocolate. What’s that slogan again? Is it, “If it’s Hershey’s, you’d better read the label?” I am not sure I have it quite right, but it’s something like that. I’m afraid, we’ll just have to read the label carefully. With an American icon like Hershey’s, I shouldn’t have to do that. Some of it’s milk chocolate; some of it ain’t.

Chemists use the term formula to describe the mixture of particular materials (ingredients) and amounts that go into various products, especially those that are sold to the public. It might be food, paint, steel, medicine, paper, ink, glue, or plastic. The term formulation describes the process of putting it together. Every commercial product has its own formula.

By law you can’t call a product milk chocolate unless it contains cocoa butter. In 2007, according to the New York Times (and elsewhere) in spite of lobbying by U. S. manufacturers to cheapen the ingredients, the FDA held their ground on chocolate.

On Friday when I told a friend of mine about the recent changes in some chocolate-like candy, she talked about her perception of the difference between real chocolate and the chocolate-like candy that looks like chocolate but now lacks the name. She talked about the oily film that formed on the roof of her mouth with some products. We talked about some of the better chocolates including European chocolate. She asked me what brands. When I suggested Lindt’s as one, she happily showed me the Lindt chocolate her husband had given her for Valentine’s Day. Lately I have found European chocolates Lindt, Toblerone, and Ritter Sport and American chocolate Ghirardelli in a lot of local grocery stores.

Of course you can always find great chocolates at Chocolaterie Stam right here in Des Moines too.

If you see a little chocolate on the Purple Wren’s beak this week, it came from Chocolaterie Stam on Ingersoll.

Real chocolate costs a little more, but after all it’s not my lunch, it’s dessert!

photo by flickr by fensterbme and eszter

John Nielsen, international visitor and chemist from the University of Copenhagen, is visiting Grinnell College this week. As we talked this afternoon I found we had some unusual chemistry in common. On a hunch I pulled out the framed group photo on the right and asked, “Are you in this picture?”, to which a surprised John replied, “I have that picture hanging in my office.”

And here is where we get to Des Moines!

The photo was taken at a 2001 conference honoring Des Moines native Marvin H. Caruthers,

• Johnston High School (’58)
• Iowa State University (B.S., 1962)
• Distinguished Professor at the University of Colorado,
• winner of the 2006 National Medal of Science presented by President George W. Bush in 2007,
• co-founder of Applied Biosystems and Amgen, the world’s largest biotech company
• given the National Academy of Sciences Award for Chemistry in Service to Society in 2005 and
• one of the world leaders in biotechnology.

Caruthers has been fortunate enough to be able to reap and share significant financial rewards for his work. In 2007 in honor of his late wife (Jennie Smoly Caruthers), he contributed $20 million dollars to the University of Colorado to encourage collaborative work in biotechnology.

If you look at the photo in this linked story, you will find two local boys, Marvin Caruthers and Douglas Dellinger. Doug Dellinger is a graduate of Hoover High School, Drake University, and the University of Colorado where he earned his Ph. D. under Caruthers while John Nielsen was a post-doctoral student in the same lab.

It’s good to live in a state with only 3 million people. It’s easier to keep track.

photos by Jim Lindberg

The people who thrive do not wait until a flood happens to prepare for it nor wait until evacuees show up on a doorstep to figure out how they will be fed and sheltered. Similarly, recovery planning cannot wait for people to finish their grieving. Already the state legislature has talked about holding a special session for flood relief. Media outlets are reporting on financial damages. The governor has stated Iowa will rebuild.

As the Des Moines River rose in downtown Des Moines several days ago, I wondered how much money would have been diverted from Project Destiny tax revenue to rebuild the Riverwalk, had that sales tax proposal been passed by skeptical voters. Similarly, I grow very nervous about who is going to benefit under governmental incentives related to flood relief. Add in the tremendously-negative citizen response last month to the Des Moines Area Metropolitan Planning Organization’s Horizon Year 2035 transportation plan, and now is exactly the time that Iowans need to be thinking about flood relief, who should pay for it, and who should get to decide how the relief is distributed.

As a side note, the National Association of Regional Councils is meeting at the Des Moines Marriott now through June 17th. The theme of this transportation gathering is “Building Regional Communities.” The agenda also shows a heavy discussion focus around public/private partnerships, including one on emerging energy markets such nuclear power. I suspect this relates to the possibility of using clean-burning nuclear power plants to generate energy to run electric trolley systems and to fuel personal electric cars. I would love to be able to cover this gathering but my schedule will not allow it.

All the questions that have been raised before about economic development, urban sprawl, and the best use of rural land should continue to be raised during any discussions around post-flood rebuilding. The diversity of Iowa’s economy also needs to be a subject of conversation. As a whole, the state is diversified. We have national headquarters, regional call centers, manufacturing, agriculture, tourism, and education. However, we could do a whole heck of a better job at diversifying entrepreneurs and connecting people with ideas with people who have the resources to make business happen.

M.R. Field has written extensively about new ideas to increase wealth for women and minority business owners.

The Pajama Game

A few people sitting behind me at the Saturday, April 12, 2008, performance snickered several times during the first act. While I did not appreciate the distraction, I agreed with their reaction. There are numerous similarities between a 1950’s factory as presented in the musical and modern day work places. However, there are also many significant changes, not least being the power of unions. An updated version of the play would be more likely to hold the attention of audience members younger than 40. One song in particular, “Steam Heat,” offers a good example of changes time has brought. While I have lived in numerous places warmed with steam heat and know what it is like to have radiators, years of central air heating reduced my emotional reaction to the song.

The premise of The Pajama Game is simple. There is a new male superintendent at the Sleep Tite pajama factory in Cedar Rapids. He has an encounter with the female head of the union’s grievance committee. Sparks fly, conflict erupts, all turns out perfectly. Boy gets girl and gets the union a 7-1/2 cents raise that lets the workers live like royalty, or so they dream.

Alison Shafer’s choreography was the first thing that I admired about this production of the musical. It offered an energetic coordination of moving bodies and objects in “Racing With the Clock” and a playful pas de deux in “Her Is.” After I stopped trying to think of the show in terms of a story and started looking at it only as a series of musical entertainment, I began to enjoy the singing, too. Susan M. Grozier (Gladys), Craig Peterson (Sid Sorokin), and Jim Benda (Hines) had choice roles and all deserved them. Andrea Markowsi (Babe Williams) gave a decent performance but she seemed to be trying too hard to get the chorus correct in “There Once Was a Man (I Love You More).” Yet she got the shouting in “I’m Not At All in Love” just right. She also had the misfortune of a small microphone problem at the start of another song. Lenny Houts (Prez) deserves mention for his acting and for the puppy dog steps in “Her Is.”

The entire cast earned the plentiful applause. The scenic design and most of the costumes complemented the story well. The lighting could have been much better. The musical was directed by John W. Viars. Viars is executive director of the Playhouse and was a member of the 1967 cast of The Pajama Game.

M.R. Field reviews arts for AroundDesMonies.com.