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TO THE EDITOR
HOEDADS ARE BACK
Former members of the Hoedads, the
forestry workers cooperative that, in the
late 1970s, had one of the largest payrolls
in Lane County, will be having a reunion
in Eugene Aug. 12-14.
The Hoedads did reforestation
work in every state west of the Rockies,
including Alaska. Hoedads fought forest
fi res, built hiking trails, did watershed
restoration and technical forestry work,
advocated for the right for women to work
in the woods, formed a crew of Mexican-
American workers, fought in the Oregon
Legislature against the rampant use of
herbicides, pushed federal agencies in
developing more ecological forestry
practices and helped to form and support
dozens of other worker cooperatives.
In Eugene, Hoedads provided loans
and grants to many local alternative
businesses — from providing initial
operating expenses for the WOW Hall to
providing startup money for cooperative
businesses, among them restaurants, auto
repair shops, wholesale food suppliers and
construction companies.
The Hoedads fl exed their organizational
muscle in local politics, enlisting hundreds of
Hoedad volunteers and electing Jerry Rust,
the fi rst Hoedad president, as a Lane County
commissioner in 1976. Rust ultimately
became the longest-serving commissioner
in Lane County.
For a period of time, Hoedads and
other forestry worker cooperatives cast the
Oregon treeplanter as an iconic parallel to
the Oregon logger.
If you are a former Hoedad or know
of someone who was, please pass the
word. There’s a Hoedad Reunion site on
Facebook. There will also be Hoedad entry
in this year’s Eugene Celebration parade!
Roscoe Caron
Eugene
POOR OBSERVATION
It appears that intern Brit McGinnis,
in reviewing (8/4) our production of Dead
Man’s Cell Phone, made the common
mistake of allowing preconceptions
and expectations to interfere with good
journalism. Your novice reporter admits
wanting to see “a satire about technology,”
but neither the author nor our production
offers such.
4
AUGUST 11, 2011
EUGENE WEEKLY
To claim that the play is “genuinely
not funny,” is to ignore or simply not
notice the audience response throughout
the evening, which on several occasions
caused the actors to pause for the laughter
to subside.
The play is not about “the technology-
addicted masses,” nor “the rest of my
Facebooked and Twittered society.”
Perhaps McGinnis missed all the
references to Charles Dickens. One of
the characters reads a paragraph from A
Tale Of Two Cities. Another refers to it
again three times. The character Hermia
paraphrases from the novel “we drive
alone in our separate carriages never to
truly know each other and then the book
shuts and then we die.” The play is about
how we have always lived in isolation and
the need for real connection-love.
We were not infl uenced by The
Jetsons nor did we have “day-glow
colors.” Perhaps McGinnis didn’t see the
poster which is an homage to the painting
“Nighthawks,” nor the lobby display on
Edward Hopper. Hopper’s art was Skip
Hubbard’s infl uence in creating a set that all
observers but McGinnis saw as beautiful.
The projections were not of “street signs”
but names of restaurants. Good reporting
should start with accurate observations.
Everyone connected with this
production is experienced and educated in
the art of theater, and while we don’t expect
every reviewer to have the same expertise,
we do want them to know something about
their own craft. Don’t you?
Patrick Torelle
Director, Dead Man’s Cell Phone
SNEAKY DEATHTRAPS
I’m delighted to see the recent
pedestrian-friendly letters (“Just Go” and
“Pedestrians, Too”). As a person who
enjoys getting around by foot, I’m familiar
with Eugene’s sneaky little deathtraps.
Like the painted crosswalks at Willamette
and 15th — no one ever stops (there
isn’t even a sign reminding drivers that
they must stop, by law, for pedestrians).
And those nasty double-turn lanes. And
the treacherous unmarked intersections
mandated by an obscure rule of the road
that goes against human instinct — the
two-lane one-ways, for example: when
a car slows for a person safely waiting
to cross, the driver behind instinctually
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