River Heritage Conservancy Blog

Stories Along The River #3

Thu, 26 Sep 2019 18:29:17 GMT

The iconic clock atop abandoned Colgate had stopped.

The iconic clock atop abandoned Colgate had stopped. Did you notice?

Jane Sarles did.

Of course Jane Sarles did.

No matter that, at 86, Sarles needs a wheelchair to get around and no longer drives. She remains on Clarksville's watch as well as anyone half her age could.

If only more of us in any community, of any age, care like does Sarles.

Here it was, time recently for Sarles to worry about getting time back on track. That clock is a Clarksville landmark. So, someday, can be a park along the Ohio River being planned by the River Heritage Conservancy.

A determined, respectful outfit, the Conservancy called on Sarles for stories about the property for which it imagines a future worthy of its past. To want to know Clarksville is to want to know Sarles, all right.

She actually wrote the book on the place.

A restless retiree, Sarles helped lead Clarksville's historic society to reality and stayed in front for years. She steadily convinced her hometown not only to recognize its uniqueness but to make the most of it. So little wonder the Conservancy gets more than Sarles' appreciation and cooperation.

Most notably, it also gets Sarles' pleas to dig - to unearth whatever remains of a riverside fort built centuries' ago by an officer in George Rogers Clark's army. Sarles provides both informed clues and hard-to-discount hope."That'd be a great thing," Sarles told me.

"I'm still trying to do my thing, put it that way."

Sarles lives these days in Westminster, a nicely-thought-of complex for seniors in the shadow of the Veterans Parkway mayhem. A widow, Sarles most looks forward to her next visit or chat from a child (three) or grandchild (also three).

She seemed considerably less thrilled about an approaching session with a physical therapist.

Born into a farm family in Livonia, in nearby Washington County, Sarles was still a girl when she began to call Clarksville home. She rode a city bus to high school in New Albany - Clarksville was yet to have a high school - and was graduated in 1950.

She married at 18 to a husband then transferred to a job in Richmond, Virginia. They divorced after 12 years and she returned to Clarksville.

Her second husband, Jerry Sarles, encouraged her every way possible. That included not only motherhood but also two college degrees and a career as a public and school librarian. Sarles was bitten by the library bug by happenstance. She needed work and IU Southeast, then in Jeffersonville, needed a part-time clerk type in its meager basement library. "All my life I've fallen into things," Sarles said. "I'm happy the way it worked out. I'm a pretty impulsive person. I go along with the flow.

"These little things - we hang our life on them."

Like when Sarles went to her local newspaper, the then-called Evening News, to complain about the content of its now-gone Olden Times column. Instead of lip service, Sarles was offered the gig. Like they could call her bluff. With a pro's touch and a zealot's commitment, Sarles wrote the column a decade. And if the pay sort of stunk ($30 a week), the accompanying profile did not. "I was a celebrity," she said, smiling.

Active in the League of Women Voters, Sarles volunteered to councilman Bob Popp to help organize the town's documents and such. That led to Popp, no fool, including Sarles in a group that formed the historical society. "I had retired," Sarles said. "I wasn't busy. I needed something to do."

Sarles was no expert on Clarksville history. Who was? "There never had been any real research done," Sarles said. "I guess that's what made it attractive. It was an open, unplowed field."

The challenge was clear and clearly daunting. Naturally, Sarles said yes two decades ago. Why? Why not? "Until I know better," Sarles said.

Sarles the historian had had a head start as Sarles the genealogist. There is a ton of fun, she believes, connecting dots discovered in old records and the like. A hoot as well was the group that formed. Membership grew to more than 200 and the society had to move meetings to larger rooms. "Clarksville people had always been conscious of being different," Sarles said. "They wanted the town to gets its due."

The Society jumped into Lewis and Clark reenactments. It led tours of the riverfront. Sarles put together a presentation and took it on the road. She published a popular monthly newsletter.

Available copies of Sarles' book on Clarksville history are few and far between.

To have something to say, to write, Sarles made herself at home in libraries near and not-so near. She blew dust off old maps as well as a copy of the minutes of town leaders' first meetings. "That was part of the fun of it," Sarles said. "I found out lots of things."

She and Society members hiked along Silver Creek, likewise learning all the way. "My husband was right here with me," Sarles said. "We had wonderful times, wonderful days."

Sarles continued to pitch in on Clarksville's well being. She served on a board looking to breathe new life into the area around Colgate, for instance. Age tends to get the last laugh, though a slowed-down Sarles cannot totally be stopped. "Thank God for the computer," she said. "I do the best I can."

Sarles repeats how she had much devoted help and support. When asked, Sarles said she is proud of her research, proud of her role in Clarksville's stepped-up historic preservation.

A grateful town named a new street in her name.

And now Sarles' leadership includes guiding the River Heritage Conservancy to the ambitious heights it pledges to climb. Sarles cannot fix big, old, out-of-whack clocks. But she can urge the Conservancy literally to leave unturned no stone.

"It's always good to be involved with something bigger than yourself," Sarles said.

Stories Along The River #2

Tue, 20 Aug 2019 19:32:48 GMT

A Park of Some Sort, of Some Size, in Some Place

A park of some sort, of some size, in some place, is promised to us for some time.

Some might claim that is a lot not to know.

Fair enough for now, not yet spring of 2019. Whatever the River Heritage Conservancy has in mind indeed remains more notion than reality. Hopes are being raised, being shared. But this is not the government.

Any responsibility the River Heritage Conservancy takes on is self-imposed.

That is enough, though, more than enough, to give this group the benefit of the doubt. To be patient is not to be skeptical. A big commitment goes hand in hand with a big vision. The Conservancy continues already to buy large chunks of acreage. It arranges use of more land. It puts top-shelf planners to work.

And it has in place a day-to-day leader who knows well the tricks of this trade.

I have been asked to help tell the Conservancy's story. I look forward to chapters unfolding. Questions will be answered. Fuzziness will come increasingly into focus. People most involved know extraordinary success. This is more mission than hobby for them.

To wonder what we will end up with is understandable. What isn't is to wonder if we end up with something that boosts Southern Indiana. Will my pre-school grandchildren know exactly who to thank? Perhaps not.

Will they take joyful advantage of however the Conservancy's gift ultimately looks and feels? Seems certain.

I go out on that limb after visiting with three of the Conservancy's board officers. Each offers different experiences and perspectives and is at different points in life.

None needs this duty to keep busy.

All are immersed, nonetheless. They are bought in and then some. Their involvement is both necessary and nice. This project requires a conscience and these three help fill the bill. Let's take a little tour.

Kent Lanum chairs the Conservancy board. That is something of a spillover from his job as president of the Paul Ogle Foundation.

Lanum follows his father, Robert Lanum, as the CEO of the Foundation (the elder Lanum still chairs).

Kent Lanum's hard-charging approach is for the Foundation better to help set our area's agenda. This is a Foundation determined to propose and to push. It issues challenges like it writes checks.

Lanum is not bashful about saying no, which is how he reacted when invited onto the state-established Ohio River Greenway Commission. "I'm not into tree hugging," Lanum told me. "It's not for me."

However, this flirtation seems to have focused Lanum more on the potential for greatness along the Ohio. Hamstrung in one way and another, the Greenway Commission can do only so much. Let's do more, Lanum began to say.

With help, Lanum and the Ogle Foundation tried hard to steer a new state program, the Regional Cities Initiative, to the riverfront's aid. A $42 million shot in the arm was at stake. "It was an opportunity to bring economic development," Lanum said.

"It seemed like a natural fit."

Our region itself, however, did not fully agree. The state took elsewhere its rare sugar- daddy deal. A bruised Lanum breathed deeply and regrouped. Game-changing potential remained, dying for adoption. "Why can't we just go on and do it?" he said he asked. "We can make it happen."

He added, "What motivates me, I like being underestimated and getting things done."

The River Heritage Conservancy was born.

Lanum began to recruit allies, potent colleagues to provide brainpower and bucks or both. A plan-turned-spectacular-reality - the Parklands of Floyds Fork, in Louisville - could serve as handy role model.

Ramrods of the Parklands gladly coached Lanum to stand strong and to aim high. "It doesn't cost that much more for excellence," Lanum said he learned.

New and eager, the Conservancy board set out to find the ideal executive director. It was willing to look far and wide. It needn't. Turns out that Scott Martin, who had nurtured the nearby Parklands to life, wanted a convenient, professional repeat.

Martin moved into an office in Jeffersonville and moved the River Heritage Conservancy from talk to action. "It's not easy," Lanum said. "But it's not hard when you get the right people involved."

Count Madison Hamman among those right people. He was soon to turn 32 when we talked but looks more a teen man looking forward to the senior prom. Hamman's career certainly is one for a special grown-up, though.

Hamman manages the Blue Sky Foundation, established to do good by the John and Jane Shine family, owners of Samtec in New Albany. The proposed park is a key Blue Sky thrust, so Hamman is vice president of the Conservancy board.

The riverfront emerged on Blue Sky's radar because the Loop Island wetlands, in New Albany, all-but begged for a rescue. Blue Sky passed on jumping in - the city of New Albany took it on - but a desire lingered.

Hamman grew up in Clarksville and, like many, spent time in the hard-edged area of town that is the Conservancy's chief target. Hamman found car parts at the junkyards there, for instance. Could the hugely-historic area be reclaimed, rehabbed, made again more of an magnet than an eyesore? "We always like projects for the good of Southern Indiana," Hamman said.

"Let's look at what would that mean."

Already occasional partners the two foundations - Ogle and Blue Sky - paired to put riverfront overhaul high on their to-do lists. For Hamman, like for others, the project makes sense in so many ways, however painstaking. "It's not for the faint of heart, that's for sure," he said.

Blue Sky generosity affords land purchases, 280 acres or so as of this writing. The ease of deal-making was unpredictable. "We've got some big wins," Hamman said.

The acquisition effort steadily goes on, of course. Fruit remaining may not be so low-hanging. The pace of progress happily surprises Hamman, however. "The past two years have been really exciting," he said.

Fair or not, this seems now to be mostly no-man's land. Some of it routinely floods, its reuse restricted. "That's not going to change," Hamman said.

Optimism abounds in step with patience. Lots of parts are moving. Momentum is clear and hopefully unstoppable. Questions will be answered. "If not us then who?" Hamman asked. "If not now then when?"

Jim Kenney became one of the 'us' from a different direction. He takes care of his two grandchildren, not a foundation. His citizenship had centered on a stewardship ministry at St. Anthony Catholic Church.

But when the River Heritage Conservancy settled on Clarksville as central focus, a trusted town elder needed to be in the middle of things. Enter Kenney, a lifelong resident and retired corporate lawyer.

"Sounds like something I'd like to do," Kenney said he responded when invited. "I like to be involved. Retirement allows me to be more involved."

Kenney, the Conservancy board secretary, lives a veritable stone's throw or two from the target zone. He shot his b-b gun there as a boy. He learned to rely on it as a cut- through as a commuting man.

No arm-twisting was needed for Kenney to share the vision. He said, "Obviously it's a huge challenge - to take land abused over the last 50 years and get it in condition for a park."

Taking me on a look-see, detail-oriented Kenney pointed out the status of this parcel and that one. Very familiar with what the area is, Kenney easily imagines what it could be. Encouraged like is Hamman, Kenney nonetheless respects the tasks ahead. "We have a long way to go, we sure do," he said.

At 63, Kenney said he tells his wife he may not experience the full-fledged glory in which the River Heritage Conservancy intends to bask. So be it. This is hard work certainly still worth doing. Any and all uncertainties are but temporary. "Every generation needs to do something for the next generation," Kenney said.

Stories Along The River #1

Thu, 18 Jul 2019 20:18:08 GMT

Al Goodman & The Loop Island Wetlands

Al Goodman finished both his diet cola and our chat and headed backed to a really rural suburb of Palmyra.

Grandsons waited to work up a sweat on the zip line grandpa set up. Then the old man might show the kids a thing or two about long-range shooting. Or perhaps they'd switch on grandfather's maze of model trains.

At 70,Goodman does grand-parenting like he does most everything. He is all in on going all out. Which is reason aplenty for Goodman to be among ideal friends of the River Heritage Conservancy.

The Conservancy counts on its finished product - grand, unique, sprawling parklands - to spill from Clark County into Floyd County. The hope, the goal is to include an oasis-like area in New Albany known as Loop Island Wetlands.

Goodman gave that land both its revived name and its worthy-high profile. Goodman offered it for get-away use. He urged we all embrace its natural charm and help him preserve and promote.

"If somebody didn't take this on, it would just sit there," Goodman told me.

After indeed taking it on, providing all the tender loving care he could as long as he could, Goodman sold the Loop Island area five years ago to New Albany. "We closed the deal in about six weeks," Goodman said. "Financially - the only reason was financially."

Trails have been improved but the city has not spelled out the wetlands' long-range vision. Meanwhile, the Conservancy leans eagerly on Goodman, an engineer with specialties galore. Goodman is glad to continue as Loop Island cheerleader, passionate as ever about unfinished business. "I'm proud I helped make this area known," he said.

"I'd like to offer my knowledge, my experiences, really give this the prominence it needs on both sides of the river."

The oldest of seven children, Goodman grew up in Clarksville the son of a plumber who himself learned his way around a wrench. Goodman latched instead onto chemistry, though, inspired by a chemist cousin. Goodman became one of then-Bellarmine College's early chemistry grads and passed on some out-of-town job offers.

He opted to run the lab at Jeffersonville's sewage treatment plant. His first day on the job was, gulp, his first day in any such place.

Nonetheless, as soon as Goodman found the restroom, odd things turned way odder. By first-week's end, the plant manager was canned and Goodman was put in charge. Like that, at all of 21, he was the boss of 23 people and was most responsible for a city's waste.

It did not hurt that Richard Vissing, the mayor of Jeffersonville, was another Goodman relative. Like always, though, Goodman proved up to the task. "I was learning on the job, learning by trial and error," he said. "I was challenged - put it that way. But I had the support of the right people, as well as people at the plant."

Goodman stayed six uneventful years - uneventful is golden in sewage treatment - before joining the private sector. He helped communities open such plants, he trained their employees. He went on to co-own a firm that specialized in the removal of hazardous wastes.

"I had four small kids and I was gone a lot," Goodman said. "We were busy. We were busy and making money."

Goodman started his own firm in 1986. His second client was Moser Leather, near the Ohio River on New Albany's east side. The company relied on a lagoon to deal with its waste. Blood Pond was the body's spooky nickname - red not with blood, Goodman assured, but with red algae. The look was no more appetizing than was the smell. Goodman persevered until he figured solutions. He now chuckles, thinking of that triumph as part of his legacy.

"Blood Pond is no more," Goodman said.

Goodman's vocation bled, if you will, into an avocation. He had hunted and fished in the tannery's shadow. He cherished what it had offered him and could offer to one and all. Goodman discovered and revived the old name of Loop Island, a reference to when Silver Creek looped.

Goodman led the alert of the public to Loop Island Wetlands. He arranged for people to discover such a handy oasis. He welcomed development of the bisecting Ohio River Greenway. "This was unknown to the people right here," Goodman said of Loop Island. "It was an unknown gem, an unknown asset, hidden for 150 years."

Moser went out of business in 2002 and Goodman became Loop Island Wetland's owner as well as its guardian angel. He had big plans and high hopes - such as a tannery museum - that fell short. "I never could quite make it happen," Goodman said. "I invested everything. I couldn't keep doing that."

He sold his company and took a job with CDM Smith in Louisville. Goodman is now mostly retired. "It's been a wonderful career, a very wonderful career," Goodman said. "My environmental work is not work, it's an environmental passion. I like the opportunities, like the challenges of doing good on a long-term basis."

Goodman shares confidence that the River Heritage Conservancy will attract crowds to the riverfront, will cap off already-burgeoning efforts. Like do few others, Goodman relates to the height both of the Conservancy's challenges and its potential rewards. "This is definitely game changing," Goodman said, grandsons awaiting. "They are looking at a much bigger scale, more elaborate features.

"There's a huge interest, I believe, especially with younger folks, to sit in nature, to experience nature. We've got it right here."