BIG GROVE TOWNSHIP, Iowa — A couple of years ago the Solon American Legion moved their annual Memorial Day commemoration from Oakland Cemetery to the new service memorial at American Legion Field.
As remaining World War II veterans depart on their long journey after this life, the new field is level, lessening the possibility of a fall for increasingly fragile nonagenarians.
The annual event seems better attended since moving to town.
The township trustees consider the condition of the cemetery before Memorial Day and the legion adorns its roadway with full-sized American flags with the names of local veterans on each flag post. We want the cemetery to present well regardless of where the event is held. After inspections, we decided it looked good for the holiday, although the trash barrels needed emptying.
Memorial Day began as Decoration Day in 1868 — a remembrance established by the Grand Army of the Republic to recognize union soldier deaths while defending against the rebellion. Confederate women had begun decorating graves during the earliest years of the long war that took 620,000 lives. It was traditional to visit the family cemetery and enjoy a picnic lunch and family reunion near remains of the departed. It took an act of Congress (the National Holiday Act of 1971) to sort out differences and competing claims of the remembrance. In many places traditions have vanished as family cemeteries gave way to cremation and burial in larger, public and commercial places of rest.
Just as grilling at home or at a park supplanted picnics near the deceased, and Memorial Day gets confused with Veterans Day, not many here think about what divided the North and South in the 1860s. Neither is there common cause in the deaths perpetrated by our modern national militarism. Our constant state of warfare has become a part of background noise many people try to ignore.
My ancestors and shirt tail relatives in Virginia fought on both sides of the Civil War and those roots provided me a form of ethnic identity — an indigenous culture shared by a localized clan of kinfolk. I’m not sure such culture is even possible today.
As for this Memorial Day, I’ll be working a shift at the home, farm and auto supply store and unable to attend the commemoration.
Memorial Day will start the summer vacation season, like it does for most Americans, and be a chance to relax after getting the garden planted. The bloody wars our country has fought and continues fighting will seem distant for a while… almost an abstraction. I’m not alone in that. Even drone pilots can go home after a shift to spend time with their families.
Memorial Day is part of a procession of life events that helps things seem stable and predictable. We want that as politicians and corporate news media slam us with bad news and frightening potentialities every time we tune in on a device. The idea that the dead don’t move unless someone made a mistake, and that grave decorations aren’t intended to be permanent provides comfort.
On the way to my shift I’ll stop briefly at the cemetery and pay my respects to neighbors killed in action, most of whom I didn’t know. Such deaths seem tragic and complex — clouded in a present that assigns new values to them. I’ll stand in silence on the hill among old oak trees considering the meaning of honor and valor and why it’s still important. I hope that’s decoration enough.
We are blinded and forever changed by our experiences if we are lucky.
Insights and epiphanies are few in life’s span. They can shape who we are and the choices we make in profound ways.
Some become passions and border on enthusiasm. Enthusiasm as in close to spiritual ecstasy, or possession by a god or the devil.
It began when I was three years old.
In the basement of our home at 919 Madison Street in Davenport, I was playing on a swing set my parents set up. It collapsed and the next thing I knew I was laying in a pool of my own blood. Mother rushed me to Mercy Hospital where the physician made me breathe ether poured in a funnel before stitching me some 50 times to close the wound on my forehead. I stayed in the hospital for what seemed like a long time. My parents visited every day at least once.
It never occurred to me that hospitals existed, or that so many people outside our home were employed with systems that nurtured the sick and injured. It gave me comfort and curiosity, then, and now.
I began Kindergarten while we lived on Madison Street. Mother had me walking about three quarters of a mile to school for the half-day sessions.
One day I got lost.
The way was to walk North on Madison and then East on 10th Street until I reached the stairs on the steep hill that was Riverview Terrace Park. From there I not sure, but believe I walked North on Washington Street to Twelfth Street, then over to Marquette where I turned South until Jefferson Elementary School was on my left. It was a long trip for a Kindergartner.
One day I took a shortcut on the way home and got lost. My homecoming was delayed much so my mother came out to look for me. She set out on foot and eventually found me on the steps of the park. It was a scary thing for a young person. It taught me to persist in the face of the unknown.
When I entered the seventh grade, we occupied a new school the parish built a block from our home. It was a terrible separating from my childhood friends as I was selected to join other seventh and eighth graders in an advanced class. The nun told us we were college bound and needed to begin preparing. I didn’t like the separation from my neighborhood pals, and occasionally I would hang with them at the Cue and Cushion, a local pool hall. That wasn’t meant to last. It was a blessing and a curse that we were separated. Less fun, more studies and some isolation from the roots I had formed with neighborhood kids as a grader.
My father’s death in 1969 was sudden and jolting. I had begun to consider college, and during a conversation with Mother after Dad’s death offered to give up those plans to help her adjust. She encouraged me to go to college and that forever broke me from the home where I’d lived in childhood. Once I left home, I would never really return.
My college years, military service and graduate school were a long transition from homelife in Davenport to living in the broader world. I experienced the world’s diversity during those 11 years and became a global citizen. In the end, I decided to stay in Iowa where Jacque and I met while working for the University of Iowa. We married in 1982 and to say it was a life-changer is an understatement. I hope we will remain married until death do us part.
The arrival of our daughter in 1985 was another formative experience, one that changed everything in a positive way. Having been lucky enough to be a parent, I discovered the tremendous opportunities and challenges of providing a home life so they could become a responsible citizen. It gives me a great deal of pride to see how she has grown and changed over the years since she entered the world. If all the world’s a stage, her entrance was notable and her performance enduring.
The decision to leave the transportation business after more than 25 years shaped how my life has played out. With that decision came a new world of engagement in society. For the first time, I’ve been able to concentrate on living how I want, writing, distracted only by the existential demands of society. I don’t know what enduring writing will be produced, but without the commitment that began July 3, 2009, nothing of my current life would be possible.
In reasonably good health, in a safe environment, much is possible. Where shall I go? I hope to be on the road to some usefulness in society.
That scholars would publish newly found material written by Walt Whitman is not surprising.
In a time where old newspapers are being digitized and new methods of scholarship seine existing publications like factory ships trawl the Bering Sea, Whitman’s voluminous work shows up.
My relationship with Whitman is comprised mostly of the 1983 visit my wife, her brother, and I made to Whitman’s home in Camden, N.J. It is a simple place, much neglected over the years. By then it was restored to be a fitting remembrance of his last days. It is the only home Whitman owned.
Whitman’s Last Home
It was easy to imagine supplicants waiting downstairs for their turn to meet with Whitman in his parlor/bedroom up the narrow stairway. More than the host of American writers who preceded him, Walt Whitman was tangible, with footprints in society. He left them everywhere.
I hope to return to reading Whitman’s work, even this newest publication.
Yet there is so much to do and take in — and even in good health, life is short. Nonetheless, a new Whitman book is news, and in the digital age, it is available for free to anyone with access to the internet. A type of democratization Whitman may have appreciated.
With yesterday’s announcement Hamburg Inn No. 2 is being sold by 68 year-old David Panther, another chapter in the long exodus of sixty-somethings from Iowa City’s public stage is closing.
With growth and a burgeoning new population, long time aspects of Iowa City iconography have changed and are changing. Old is giving way to new.
I more miss Hamburg Inn No. 1 on Iowa Avenue than any changes at No. 2 on Linn might bring. Arriving in Iowa City in 1970 to attend college, I had a notion I could experience every business and cultural institution in town and become a part of city social life. Hamburg Inn No. 1 was part of that. Like so many others, I left after graduation from the university, but remember fondly what the city was then.
My recent awareness of the exodus of sixty-somethings began with closure of Murphy Brookfield Books and the retirement of Riverside Theatre co-founders Ron Clark and Jodi Hovland. Hamburg Inn is another among many changes from what Iowa City grew up to be after the 1960s. Some businesses, like The Mill, made a successful transition. Others have not.
Why should we care? After all, change is the only constant in a transient city like Iowa City. It is made so by the University of Iowa: a primary driver of almost everything. It is partly nostalgia driven by personal memories and change in the world which increase in importance as we near the end of life’s span. There’s little reason to cling to the past instead of embracing the new. Opportunity also belongs mostly to the young, so some of us are going home.
I’ve never eaten a pie shake at Hamburg Inn, and until recently wasn’t aware they served such a dessert. It has been breakfast with our daughter or a friend that drew me there of late. The last political event I attended at the Hamburg Inn was with Chet Culver during his last campaign. Culver didn’t appear to have a clue how to get re-elected and the stop did little to enhance his chances.
Life will continue with the best intentions, which is what I’m reading in the news. The operation will continue at Hamburg Inn No. 2 and importantly, people will keep their jobs. I read Panther will be retained by the new owners for a year as a consultant. According to the Warren Buffett playbook for business acquisition retaining current managers is important to a smooth and profitable transition. I wish everyone well.
Details of the sale aren’t quite worked out, according to news reports. We should embrace the change and give the new owners a chance or two as they continue the effort in its new form. If new management focuses on the quality of food and customer service they should be alright. A different, and new chapter in the life of an aging Iowa City scene being reborn.
How does one recognize society is in decline? We participants probably can’t.
In 1540 conquistador Hernando de Soto sent a messenger to Quigaltam, supreme leader of a people whose ancestors had built mounds and lived in the Mississippi River basin for 700 years, to say, “the son of the sun” expected his people to obey him and do him service.
“With respect to what he said about being the son of the sun,” Quigaltam responded through the messenger, “let him dry up the great river and he would believe him.” [1]
While neither party knew it at the time, this incident was part of the beginning of the end of a civilization and a 350-year war between cultures. It ended with the more familiar massacre at Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, Dec. 29, 1890.
If modern society — the one cultured in North America by immigrants — has reached its zenith, and it’s all downhill from here, the methods of knowing it are elusive if not impossible. Life comes into a sharper focus when our perspective spans multiple centuries.
Earth has its troubles. Improvements in public health enabled population growth resulting in 7.4 billion people on earth today. Deforestation to harvest timber, grow crops and build cities is changing a long-standing environmental equilibrium. The rise of industrial society and its reliance on fossil fuels has changed the makeup of the atmosphere and contributed to global warming that in turn is changing climate patterns we have come to rely upon. People are increasingly connected by a world-wide communications network. They both say a lot more and have nothing to say. None of this is new, and the earth will likely be fine — achieving a new equilibrium that considers and incorporates all these changes.
What’s new is the rise of lamentations about how the old values are in decline. Families are not what we believe they were, politicians and religious leaders are corrupt, corporations only out to make a buck, the rich get richer and the rest of us are left on our own. If one buys into this paradigm society may well be perceived to be in decline.
I don’t believe it is and here’s why.
As long as there is clean air and water, a place to live and an opportunity to earn a living, there is hope for society. All of this is under pressure from multiple sources today, but like the polar vortex chilling the atmosphere this morning it’s only temporary.
There will be whiners and complainers, but William Faulkner said best what I would during his 1950 Nobel Prize speech.
I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet’s voice need not merely be the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail.
Is society in decline? The better question is what can we do to contribute to its rise? The age of humans is not over. Despite our problems we must have hope the progress started long ago is far from over. How else can we go on living?
[1]Old Man River: The Mississippi River in North American History by Paul Schneider. Henry Holt & Company, 2013.
The deer population is abundant because of a lack of predators, including the mostly male deer hunters currently in the field.
People freak at the idea of wolves or large cats being near, so culling the herds has become a human activity. There is little danger of taking too many.
Almost three months into the Iowa deer hunt, the second shotgun season begins Saturday. The other day, I found a deer hoof in a parking lot, picked it up, and tossed it into a trash bin. There are no intuitive rules for disposal of deer hooves. Meanwhile, deer hides have been piling up at the home, farm and auto supply store as hunters bring them in.
Deer licenses are issued mainly to male hunters for a personal, annual ritual. They gear up with ammunition, waterproof clothing, meat grinders, jerky seasoning, hats, and undergarments designed to wick perspiration away from the skin. Male comradery—the kind deer hunters share—is both common and rare.
My experience of the hunt is minimal. Closest I got to hunter’s comradery was hanging out with Dad’s golfing partners at the public course club house. I took everything in as they threw dice, played cards, smoked cigars and cigarettes, and waited to secure early tee times. My memory is like the stories I hear when asking hunters what they do when they hunt. Male bonding never became important for me.
I recently overheard a conversation between two teenagers that went something like this:
She: Everyone knows women are smarter than men.
He: Yeah, but you menstruate.
She: Only one day a month.
He: But still, you bleed.
I was taken aback. Maybe I haven’t spent much time with teens since ours left home. Maybe it was the inherent competitiveness. What also got to me is my concurrent reading of Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristoff and Sheryl WuDunn. In some of the countries depicted in the book, he would have raped her to settle the question of domination.
What line does our culture draw between commonplace banter and the realities of oppression? If there is one, it is difficult to discern. Suffice it that American cultural restraint keeps most young men from sexually assaulting women with whom they compete. At the same time, something elemental is lurking with unstated intent.
Deer hunting is acceptable social behavior with formal rules and regulations coupled with diverse, personal traditions. In some ways the annual hunt is grease on the skids of normalcy — a form of culture that can lead to civilization. I suspect the teen boy will ultimately become a deer hunter if he isn’t already.
I use fencing to protect plants I like more than deer need in an effort to coexist. Today I put out a bushel of apples for them. I am beginning to understand how to get along.
There is something appealing about the way deer hunting creates long-term relationships between hunters, and with their respective spouses. This season I’ve come to understand the blood sport more than I did — as much as I may be able.
Any useful discussion of guns in society is personal.
Frequent shootings have been reported in nearby Cedar Rapids, often in the neighborhood where we lived when our daughter was born. We heard gunshots while we were there. Most times a weapon was discharged with no one injured and no subsequent news story. The main reason we moved was not the presence of guns, but to find a rodent-free rental home in which to raise our daughter.
At the shopping mall in Coralville where I buy button-down shirts, neckties and dress slacks, a man shot and killed a women near her workplace at the Iowa Children’s Museum on June 12. The murder appears to have been premeditated. This and other shopping mall shootings are a constant reminder of the peculiar risks of our consumer culture.
When I hear about shootings, it often takes the form of an anecdote. Like the Nov. 27 incident in which a man was asked to stop smoking by a restaurant employee in Mississippi, and then shot the woman dead. If you’ve never been to a Waffle House, like the one where this murder occurred, I recommend it. The counter is close to the kitchen and it is hard not to get involved in the drama acted out between customers and staff. There was drama at all the Waffle Houses where I dined.
What to do about the increasing number of firearms discharges in populated areas and public places is an open question our society won’t ask with any seriousness. By serious, I mean addressing the related political, regulatory, Constitutional, educational and public health issues in a way that would reduce the frequency of shooting incidents and the number of people killed and injured in gun violence. If we don’t ask the question it won’t get answered.
As a soldier I trained on every weapon in our company’s inventory from personal weapons like the Colt 45 revolver and the M-16A1 rifle, to mortars and the TOW anti-tank missile system. I became an expert marksman and have the badge to prove it. When I left the Army I checked my guns at the arms room and never looked back.
The existence of guns and weaponry in society is not our American problem. How they are used and regulated is.
Guns are regulated — just go to a gun shop and try to buy one. Changing regulations to address gun violence in mass society seems a logical way to address the problem — a no-brainer. A large majority of Americans would support tightening regulations with simple solutions like restricting gun purchases by people whose names appear on government terrorist watch lists. There is also broad support for universal background checks, such support blocked by a few vociferous pro-gun advocates.
There is a black market in gun sales and an active off the books exchange of weapons between friends and family. Criminals and terrorists will always be able to locate some of the hundreds of millions of firearms in the country to do their malevolent deeds. That is less the issue.
There is a lot of stupid stuff going on: things like keeping loaded weapons where toddlers can access them. Reasonable people who own guns take appropriate action to keep guns safely, or at least out of the hands of toddlers. We all need to stop doing stupid stuff, and media should develop common sense in reporting gun violence.
The media, both corporate and social, is culpable in gun violence. As data journalists Ritchie King, Carl Bialik and Andrew Flowers pointed out yesterday, mass shootings have become more common in the United States, but overall, gun homicides have decreased. If the Cedar Rapids Gazette writes a story about every reported gun discharge inside city limits, the issue of gun control would be escalated to higher importance than when shootings were commonplace in my family’s neighborhood — background noise while living in a rodent-infested area. There are few ledes to gun stories that capture the broad issues of what happens when our educational system is underfunded, mental health care is inadequate, people fear loss of Second Amendment rights, and politicians won’t take action to fix obvious problems with gun regulations. How writers spin this matters and the stories are spinning out of control.
Personal responsibility, while lacking in large segments of society, would be something, but it is not enough. As Tracy Leone posted after the recent San Bernardino, Calif. shootings,
Prayer is for church. Congress legislates.
— Tracy Leone (@LeoneTracy) December 3, 2015
It is time for elected officials to act to reduce the frequency and severity of gun violence. We need to coach them in this as they need it.
In the meanwhile, we live our lives as best we can with the ubiquitous presence of guns, shopping in the mall, and engaging in the drama of everyday life, all the time understanding that if we don’t follow the golden rule, our chances of avoiding gun violence decrease.
I reached into the rusted storage cabinet to find the silicone spray.
The padlock needed lubricant before securing the employee locker at my newest job.
It’s not like I’ll keep valuables inside. My lunch and mobile device when I’m working, my box cutter, tape measure, name tag, note pad, ink pen and radio earpiece when I’m not.
I expect to enjoy helping people solve everyday problems at the home, farm and auto store. Problems like having a corroded padlock.
Tuesday’s thunderstorm blew the remaining apples off the tree. We had a tornado warning so I turned on the television to view weather radar. It turned out the remote that controls the analog to digital converter went missing. I couldn’t tune in. One of two things will happen: 1. Get rid of the TVs altogether, or 2. Buy a digital set. No hurry on a decision because television viewing is a dying practice when life offers better options.
The apples in storage need using before turning to compost so I made applesauce – the first of many batches over the coming days. To give it a twist, I added cinnamon, allspice and cloves with a handful of dried fruit. It was delicious.
The terrorist attacks in Paris were breaking news when I returned from my first day of work at the store. The morning after details are sketchy. The death count mounts. Reasons are unknown. The French border remains closed.
I have two direct connections. My friend Ed Fallon is currently in Normandy marching to Paris on foot for the December convention of the parties on climate change. Al Gore was broadcasting the Live Earth – 24 Hours of Reality event from Paris, and suspended programming to recognize and respect unfolding events. I’ve been to Paris a few times, but that was decades ago.
“Once again we’ve seen an outrageous attempt to terrorize innocent civilians,” President Obama said last night. “This is an attack not just on Paris, it’s an attack not just on the people of France, but this is an attack on all of humanity and the universal values that we share.”
Social media was quick to respond with memes. Commentators became immediate experts in terrorism whether they knew anything or not. It was predictable and sad.
Humanity is on the move, not only from Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Rather, civilization as we know it appears to be collapsing.
In the wake of World War One, William Butler Yeats wrote “The Second Coming,” which in part says,
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned.
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Almost a century later it is unexpected that “gyre” has come to define the largest ecosystem on Earth and home to a very large collection of man-made debris in the Pacific Ocean. The detritus of a deteriorating civilization coming together.
We feign shock at the latest unfolding terrors when it’s the bigger picture that may injure us.
I’ll take the apple peels and kitchen food waste to the compost bin. Cold weather may delay the deterioration until spring. One can only believe that the new season will also bring hope. So too for our society, although in the darkest hours that seems far from certain.
For now, I’ll lock up my gear and continue to solve everyday problems. And contribute to hastening the compost and tilling it into into the soil for next year’s garden. It’s no satisfaction, but rather what I can do to create hope.
Author at Kraft Foods Oscar Mayer plant on Second Street in Davenport, Iowa, Nov. 25, 2011 Photo Credit Dan J. Czolgosz
DAVENPORT — The Kraft Foods Oscar Mayer plant on Second Street will be razed as its new owner, Kraft Heinz, plans to move operations and layoff much of the workforce at the long-time meat packing plant.
Wednesday’s announcement, that Kraft Heinz will close seven plants in the U.S. and Canada over the next two years as part of a downsizing that will eliminate 2,600 jobs, or roughly 14 percent of its North American factory workforce, was widely anticipated by workers.
The company plans a new Davenport facility, contingent upon government financial support, however, some view it as a devil’s bargain because the net impact will be to lose about 800 jobs.
United Food and Commercial Workers Local 431 had not been consulted about the changes.
“They threw the union under the bus,” plant employee Curtis Grant of Eldridge said in an interview with the Quad City Times.
Concessionary bargaining is nothing new to Local 431 whose members ratified a four-year contract with Kraft Foods Oscar Mayer on Nov. 13, 2014. The sticking point in those negotiations was insurance and pensions.
“Now with Heinz, the company is basically telling Davenport give us subsidies to shutter the Second Street plant and build a new facility on the north side or we will close completely and take all the work to Missouri,” said a local worker who requested anonymity via email. “Both the city and the union are painted into a corner. And now with them talking about building a new $200 million plant, the building trades are excited to get those jobs. It’s a devil’s bargain.”
In the takeover of Kraft Foods by Heinz, business partners Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway and global investment firm 3G Capital hope to reduce expenses by $1.5 billion by exploiting synergies among operations and consolidating back office functions including supply chain management, accounting and administration.
On Friday, Berkshire Hathaway reported third-quarter profits more than doubled to $9.4 billion as the completion of the Kraft-Heinz merger boosted the paper value of its stake in the food giant. The deal was good for the third richest man in the world.
Thursday, the Iowa Department of Economic Development announced a $4.75 million incentive plan for the Davenport plant closing, including $3 million once the facility is razed.
“We are glad that Davenport, was able to successfully compete for a new, state-of-the-art manufacturing facility that will certainly position it for future growth,” said Debi Durham, director of the IEDA in a press release. “As major brands merge in this sector, consolidation and modernization will be the outcome.”
Durham said to the Quad City Times she is aware of the potential negative perception of providing state-funded financial assistance to a company that is downsizing its workforce both in Iowa and nationally.
“The optics are not lost on us, and believe me, the sensitivity is not lost on us. We care about people,” she said. “So we do the plays that we believe give us the greatest opportunity for the future, and I think that was what you saw here today.”
Durham said offering financial assistance to a company that is downsizing is not unique and could become more common as more large companies merge.
“We’re going to see more of this,” Durham said. “You’re seeing large mergers going on at a very high level between equals. And any time that happens and we have facilities, that’s something to watch for us.”
It appears Durham’s department has become like a turkey vulture picking over the carrion of what used to be a robust manufacturing economy and the middle class it supported.
If we consider what the Davenport plant makes – bologna, Lunchables, and other branded, highly processed meat products – this day had to come. In part, consolidation of the food industry is a reaction to the fact that tastes have changed and sales of some traditional products have declined. The processed meats industry is experiencing declining consumption of meat in general, and an interest in healthier options, according to data aggregator Statista, Inc.
The World Health Organization supports moderation of consumption of preserved meats to reduce the risk of colorectal cancer and has been doing so since 2002. On Oct. 29, WHO released a new report regarding the connection between red meat and cancer. Juxtaposition of this story with news about Kraft Foods Oscar Mayer, and Buffett’s third quarter financial results tells a broader story. Things have changed since Oscar F. Mayer immigrated from Germany and began selling sausages from his butcher shop in Chicago in 1883.
This story hits personally because not only did my maternal grandmother, my father and I work at the plant, the rise of Oscar Mayer as a global brand framed my early participation in our consumer society. I’m not alone in that.
When the Mayer family sold the company to General Foods in 1981, the Reagan revolution that resulted in decimation of the middle class had already begun. While it would have been hard to predict today’s outcome in 1981, what’s happening is not surprising in that context.
The two year transition to plant closure will hopefully enable employees to figure out what to do with the rest of their lives. Perhaps that is the best that can be expected.
Here is the entire statement provided to employees at one of the affected plants:
“Following an extensive review of the Kraft Heinz North American supply chain footprint, capabilities and capacity utilization, we are announcing the closure of seven manufacturing facilities in North America: Fullerton, California; San Leandro, California; Federalsburg, Maryland; St. Marys, Ontario, Canada; Campbell, New York; Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania; and Madison, Wisconsin. In a staged process over the next 12-24 months, production in these locations will shift to other existing factories in North America.
We are also planning to move production from our existing Davenport, Iowa, facility to a new, state-of-the-art location within the Davenport area; and move part of our cheese production from our Champaign, Illinois, facility to other factories within our network, which will create will make Champaign a center-of-excellence in dry and sauce production. Both moves will take up to two years to complete.
Our decision to consolidate manufacturing across the Kraft Heinz North American network is a critical step in our plan to eliminate excess capacity and reduce operational redundancies for the new combined Company. This will make Kraft Heinz more globally competitive and accelerate the Company’s future growth.
We have reached this difficult but necessary decision after thoroughly exploring extensive alternatives and options. This action will reduce the size of our North American factory-based employee population by a net number of approximately 2,600 positions.
At the same time, we will invest hundreds of millions of dollars in improving capacity utilization and modernizing many of our facilities with the installation of state-of-the-art production lines.
We will treat our people with the utmost respect and dignity. At the appropriate time, affected employees will receive severance benefits, outplacement services and other support to help them pursue new job opportunities. Kraft Heinz fully appreciates and regrets the impact our decision will have on employees, their families and the communities in which these facilities are located,” Michael Mullen, SVP of Corporate & Government Affairs.
“Additionally, Kraft Heinz is announcing that in 2016 we will move Oscar Mayer and our US Meats Business Unit from Madison, Wisconsin to our co-headquarters in Chicago. The move will bring 250 jobs to the Chicago area.
Members of the Oscar Mayer and US Meats Business Unit will have the opportunity to move with the business to Chicago. The move centralizes all our U.S. Business Units to our co-headquarters of Chicago and Pittsburgh, which will drive increased collaboration and efficiency.”
By design, we built our home not in, but close to Iowa City when we moved back to Iowa from Indiana. The intention was to be within commuting distance of jobs in Iowa City, Cedar Rapids and the Quad Cities. Over the years I’ve worked in all three, so the idea has been validated.
Iowa City is a UNESCO City of Literature. With my long interest in culture, it was inevitable to have some relationship with Iowa City. That is, as long as I considered myself to be an Iowan, which these days is not a given.
The University of Iowa dominates the culture of Iowa City, providing a diverse mix of people and an economic engine some take for granted. There’s sports as well, although I’m not a fan and haven’t been to a Hawkeye game for more than a decade and that was mandatory for work. I lost interest in the Hawkeyes during the Ray Nagel years.
There are things to like about Iowa City and here’s my short list.
County Seat – It is convenient to live near the county seat. I enjoy paying my property taxes in person and voting at the auditor’s office. I have come to know many elected officials and encounter some of them at the county administration building when I’m there. As a community volunteer, and as an elected official, I’ve consulted with elected officials and staff, and the proximity has been valuable.
Change – Iowans are moving from rural to urban areas and Iowa City has changed in a way to support incoming and transient people. Changes in downtown over the years have been arguably for the better. I remember people running down Wilfreda Hieronymous for her urban renewal developments. I was living in an apartment above a restaurant just before the wrecking ball tore it down to make way for her Old Capitol Center. People hated it. I hated it because of losing the $85 per month rent on a three-room apartment across the street from Schaeffer Hall. In the long run the development of downtown has been a good thing.
Personal History – I demonstrated against the Vietnam War on the Pentacrest the spring of 1971, and saw George McGovern campaign there in 1972. We married at the Unitarian Universalist Church on Gilbert Street and Iowa Avenue. Our daughter was born at Mercy Hospital. I had my last conversation with an uncle on the west steps of Old Capitol. I’ve come to know and love spending time at the intersection of Market and Linn Streets, meeting with friends at the ever-changing coffee shop there. We still buy the occasional pie from Pagliai’s Pizza when I’m in the city before dinner time. These and a hundred more memories are an attraction.
High Culture – Iowa City attracts writers and musicians from around the world and there are opportunities to have a moment with them. I ran into James Van Allen on Market Street, Frederick Exley at the dental clinic, and Donald Justice at UPS. Over the years, I attended readings and events with John Cheever, Saul Bellow, Margaret Atwood, James Laughlin, Hunter Lovins, Edward Albee, William Styron, Toni Morrison, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and many more. I heard guitarists Andrés Segovia, Duane Allman, Albert King, Freddie King, Luther Allison, Jerry Garcia, Bonnie Raitt, Greg Brown, Christopher Parkening and others. The convergence of creativity is unique in the land of the sleepy ones.
Old Things Giving Way to New – With each passing year the Iowa City I know is fading. Old buildings have been torn down and construction is everywhere. The public discussion about historic preservation is a unique, peculiar and engaging endeavor. There is controversy about money and incentives given to developers – when hasn’t there been? Development has been part of Iowa City’s history for as long as I can remember.
Iowa City is making people and corporations rich, while attracting new poverty and crime. Urban sprawl seems uncontrolled. On the outskirts of the city, distinct neighborhoods with singular cultures are nascent. It is a sign of life in a turbulent world.
When I visit Hamburg Inn No. 2, I remember No. 1. I park on Brown Street and walk to town on the grid of streets laid out in the 19th Century, remembering what was here, considering what will be here. Eventually the old grid will give way to something new, and I don’t mean large multi-use properties that currently are in vogue. It is hopeful and energetic – engaged.
I would be loathe to give up our current home to move to Iowa City as so many retirees are doing. There is a cottage industry in people my age seeking something in the county seat. Despite the attractions, I’m not ready to move there, at least not yet.
With yesterday’s announcement 
Journey Home 
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