Winding Down: John Bushey Memorial Lecture with David Gaines

David Gaines at Wednesday evening's poetry event, Teatro Zuccone.
Photo: Michael Anderson

It's the end of an eight-day week and the sun is shining. Our farewell brunch behind us, we've dispersed to our various homes and a return to the semblance of normalcy. Time to get the lawn mower running, move some hay to the garden and start checking off items on the ever-expanding "to do" list of summer projects.

It's Memorial Day weekend, so two other traditions are in play as Duluth Dylan Fest cones to a close: The Battle of the Jug Bands at Amazing Grace in Canal Park here, and the Indianapolis 500, won by a racer from France wrapped in a bright yellow car, not a yellow vest.

The miserable misty rain that assaulted us while cutting the Bob Dylan Birthday Cake Friday had departed by Saturday. The striated lake was near smooth as a mirror, a view worth inhaling and one of the rich features of our city which hugs the Western tip of the largest freshwater body in the world.

Our John Bushey Memorial Lecture speaker this year was David Gaines, a Professor of English and Director of National Fellowships and Scholarships at Southwestern University. And the author of In Dylan Town: A Fan's Life. As last year, the lecture took place at Karpeles. He was introduced to us by Phil Fitzpatrick, a poet and retired teacher whom Gaines met on his first Northland trek during the 13th annual Dylan Days in Hibbing a few years back. Each was working on a book, and Prof. Gaines has finished his. (For the record, Phil will have a book of poetry released this fall. With illustrations by Penny Perry, the book is Hawks on High: Everyday Miracles in a Hawk Ridge Season)

Karpeles Manuscript Museum is housed in a former Christian Science sanctuary that is itself a wonderful piece of local architecture.  A portion of Bill Pagel's archives--this year titled "Which One is the Real Bob Dylan?"--will be on display through August 1 in the event you didn't get to see it this past week.

The John Bushey Memorial Lecture Program derives its name from multi-dimensional man whose influence transcended even what his closest friends realized. Bushey, for 26 years, was the voice of KUMD's Dylan-themed radio hour Highway 61 Revisited. (EdNote: Louis Kemp, author of Dylan & Me, will be here Tuesday, June 18 to talk about his upcoming book and more. Reception @ 5:30 p.m., lecture 6:30-7:30.)

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The title of David Gaines' talk was "From the North Country to Stockholm and Back: A Tale of Two Journeys." At the outset he mentioned John Bushey and described some of the amazing magic tricks he did on the Blood on the Tracks Express the year he visited. One amazing trick involved he and another gentleman initialing a pair of cards they'd selected, which they never showed John, and how after some hocus pocus the two cards merged into one, back to back. Gaines pulled the card from his wallet and noted that he's been carrying it ever since, something akin to a good luck charm.

Prof. Gaines' talk, as the title suggests, was the story of two artists, the first being Bob Dylan' and his journey from the Northland to the Nobel Prize. The second story was about,"my other favorite artist –myself—and my journey."

"So many of the good things that happened to me have happened since I came to the North Country.
How intertwined all our lives are through Dylan. I will let you be in my dreams if I can be in yours," he added.

He shared a story about getting permissions, which is an essential part of producing a book like this.

David Gaines (L) with author Dave Engel.

Bob's story began 78 years and a day ago, in St. Mary's hospital a few blocks from here. He was a 24.5 inch baby, "about as big as a good-sized lake trout," Gaines said, quoting Dave Engel's Just Like Bob Zimmerman's Blues.
(EdNote: 24.5 is actually his birthday reversed, if you didn't catch it, 5-24.)

Gaines produced a litany of references where Dylan cites the importance of the Northland in his life. A few of these included the final two pages of Chronicles Vol 1

“My Life In A Stolen Moment”
Duluth’s an iron ore shipping town in Minnesota It’s built up on a rocky cliff that runs into Lake Superior I was born there — my father was born there...

In 1978 Dylan told Playboy that this place has a spiritual quality.

He then cited Dave Engel’s meticulously researched book Just Like Bob Zimmerman's Blues,  and Highway 61 Revisited: Bob Dylan’s Road from MN to the World by Colleen Sheehy & Thomas Swiss.

Gaines then drilled down into the importance of teachers and how there are certain teachers whose influence exceeds the small communities where they give a life of service. The noteworthy piece here is that having been a teacher himself, it is his hope to have been this kind of influence in some of his students. At Hibbing High, B.J. Ralphzen's class—Room 204--was an influential place for many students, including for Bob.

Of the school itself, Greil Marcus called Hibbing High "the most impressive public building I ever saw outside of Washington DC." If you come to the Northland at a time when you get the opportunity to visit the spacious auditorium, you will go away impressed indeed.

Bob Hocking shared how much this teacher meant to Bob Hocking, how transformational teachers can be. In his AARP interview, Dylan said, “If I had it to do all over again I would probably be a school teacher… teaching Roman History or Religion."

Dylan’s love of literature began in the North Country, and ultimately took him to Stockholm where he received the Nobel Prize.

He then shared this quote from Mary Keyes who with her husband own the Howard Street Bookstore: “If Bob walked into the store today, I would day, ‘Because of you, Bob, I have met the nicest people in the world.’” Certainly that is what happened again here in Duluth this past week, and will no doubt happen this coming week in Tulsa at the International Dylan Symposium.

"These words are at the heart of why I wrote the book I did," he said.

Flash forward to 2016. One morning his wife was unusually buoyant. “Guess what! Bob just won a Nobel Prize.”

Journalists all over the world reached out to people for quotes. John Bushey fielded calls that day. I was contacted from Tokyo because of this blog. And Professor Gaines received a call from Al Jazeera, where he was interviewed by a talking head. “I don’t think that anyone has the staying power of his importance,” he told the reporter. “He’s just a whole other level.”

The Nobel Prize is like a Super Bowl and Mardi Gras rolled into one.

He then played a clip from an interview he did in a Stockholm documentary about the Nobel Prize, followed by an NPR clip in which he looked especially charming and where he said Bob is “the gift that keeps on giving”

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The talk was a series of anecdotes that illustrated his own Stockholm journey and featured...
--A Christopher Ricks story
--Writing on a blog called The Big Tent
--Buying a croissant from Johanna
--The changing of the guard at Stockholm
--A Martini in Stockholm's grandest hotel
--How he seized the day and met Patti Smith
“I love your coat.”

Bob Dylan's influences began in grammar school and high school… here in the Northland, he again underscored. As an outro he played "When the Ship Comes In."

The best place to find David Gaines' book for purchase is here at the U of Iowa Press.

See photos of Hibbing High School in Architecture MN Magazine.

EdNote: Louis Kemp will be visiting Duluth to talk about his soon to be released Dylan & Me, also as part of the John Bushey Memorial Lecture Series. Tuesday, June 18. Reception at 5:30 and lecture from 6:30 to 7:30 p..m.

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AND FINALLY

A few photos from the Bob Dylan Revue Concert

Saturday night at Sacred Heart.
Photos courtesy Michael Anderson.

Thank you to everyone who contributed to make these events possible.