Wednesday, May 13, 2015 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Tales from a
Sisters
Naturalist
by Jim Anderson
recollections
You know how some lit-
tle thing can suddenly take
you back? I had one of those
moments recently while
driving into Bend, glancing
at the fuel gauge when the
little red window to the left
of the “E” came on in my
4Runner.
Took me right back to
when I was taking my first
flight in a Citabria, fly-
ing over a solid deck of
Montana clouds heading
for Spokane and talking to
Charlie Wessinger — who
was doing the navigating —
ahead of me in his Cessna
206.
“Charlie, I’m right close
to the ‘Big E’.”
“Hang on Jim, I’ll go
find a hole,” he replied, and
I watched the 206 pull away,
leaving me and the Citabria
all alone at 12,500 feet with
a whole lot of Montana real
estate under me.
My wife, Sue, and I had
purchased an entire glider
operation from a well-pre-
served gilder operator in
Montana. We had to wait for
three days while he sobered
up so we could make a deal.
I eventually hauled a
grand old Schweizer TG2
World War II training glider
on its trailer back to Bend
behind a 1952 Buick con-
vertible that had a launching
winch mounted in the back.
(A couple of years later I
achieved my five-hour soar-
ing badge in that grand old
TG2.)
Sue was driving my Aunt
Dutch’s camper, behind
which she was towing a
trailer with a 1938 Weihe
(German for Harrier), a sin-
gle-seat, high-wing, high-
performance sailplane back
to Bend.
When we got back home,
Charlie offered to fly me to
Montana so I could fly the
Citabria tow-plane back
home. It took some doing
to find it, but we finally
located it in a homemade
hanger made of billboards at
the end of a wheat field. The
battery was dead, but it had
half-a-tank of fuel, and we
put in another five gallons
of av gas (“just to be sure”)
and got the battery charged.
After we both preflighted it
thoroughly, we got it going
and I took off for Spokane
for more fuel.
Yo u k n o w a b o u t
“Murphy’s Law?” It states
that if something can go
wrong, it will. Well, it did.
We got into snotty weather
and a headwind neither of
us planned on and there
went the Spokane objective,
and a lot of the Citabria’s
gas.
I never felt so help-
less, looking down at the
solid deck of clouds under
me, with not a sign of any-
thing poking up, not even
a tree or a mountain goat. I
gave Charlie the bad news;
“Charlie, I’m on the empty
BB,” I croaked.
“I’m comin’ Jim…” he
responded, “and I found a
hole.”
There was a short pause
and he added, “Turn on your
landing light so I can find
you.” I did. “I see you,” he
said, and before I could say
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Arts association celebrates launch
By Jim Cornelius
News Editor
The secret is out — Sisters
is an arts town. The arts —
from fine arts to music to
the kind of art produced in a
kitchen — not only form the
backbone of local culture,
they drive the local economy.
The newly minted Sisters
Arts Association is dedicated
to bringing artists from all
media and all levels of com-
mercial engagement together
“to provide its members with
a unified voice for promotion
of the arts, and to create a
spirit of cooperation and fel-
lowship among artists and the
community,” as its mission
statement avers.
“The vision for the Sisters
Arts Association began with
recognition of the Hood
Avenue Arts District by OTE,
Oregon Travel Experience,”
founders Dennis Schmidling
and Bob Burgess explained in
a written statement. “The Arts
District began to draw support
from the City of Sisters and
the Chamber of Commerce.
Additional support came
through a resurgence of vital-
ity among businesses situated
on Hood Avenue. But interest
quickly spread beyond Hood
Avenue into the community at
large.”
The fledgling organiza-
tion will take wing on Friday,
May 22, 5 p.m., with a kick-
off celebration at Ken Scott’s
Imagination Gallery at 222 W.
Hood Ave.
The event is a kind of
photo by Jay mather
Sisters artists are coming together in the new Sisters arts association.
“soft opening” for the Hood
Avenue Arts District and is
being held in conjunction with
Cascade A&E’s 20th anniver-
sary celebration.
“Even though it’s a Fourth
Friday, all the gallery own-
ers will show up there,” said
Schmidling, who operates
Sisters Gallery & Frame Shop
with his wife, Helen. “It’ll
hopefully alert the community
to something new going on.”
While the Sisters Arts
Association obviously
includes Sisters’ many gal-
leries, it’s not a gallery
association.
“ I t ’s a b o u t a r t i s t s , ”
Schmidling said. “It’ll include
artists in a broad range.”
That includes artists who
have a low profile in Sisters
Country but market their work
nationally and internationally.
And it includes emerging
artists.
“That would include stu-
dents,” Schmidling said.
“We’re hoping to spotlight
students with talent here.”
Burgess emphasized the
broad consideration of art. For
example, he noted “we’ve got
some incredible chefs here.”
Some of them have expressed
interest in teaching their art
through workshops.
The new association will
work on issues in the commu-
nity that effect and are acted
upon by the arts, all for the
betterment of the Sisters com-
munity at large.
“It’s a whole system,”
Burgess said. “You bring in
more people (for arts events),
guess what — you need more
lodging.”
Schmidling and Burgess
noted that the association
is not designed to duplicate
efforts or to create com-
petition with events and
activities that are already
established.
“Our mission is to add legs
to what’s already been accom-
plished,” he said.
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