Chicago (Family), Cleveland (Rock n Roll!) & Williamsport (Hon-O-Lu-Lu!)

We expected to be in Chicago weekend-before-last, but things changed when Abby and I attended Tim Turner’s memorial service in California.

Thanks to our skillful trip-planning, we arrived in Chicago just in time to drive the rig through Friday-afternoon rush-hour traffic.We then enjoyed a happy evening at Clark’s and Abby’s new condo in Evanston (Clark is doing a post-doc in neuroscience at Northwestern).  Ginny then stayed in nearby Skokie (site of the only hotel we could find near Evanston that was both dog-friendly and had a big enough parking lot for us to park The Big T) over the weekend while Abby and I went to Santa Cruz for Tim’s service.
After a nostalgic, family-centric (past and present) trip to California, we flew back to Chicago Monday. 

Ginny and Clack got to spend a nice afternoon at a beach on Lake Michigan in Evanston while Abby and I were gone, but they missed seeing Magical Mia, who was in California with Pete and Angela instead of in Chicago attending a reunion of Angela’s family, as had been planned.

Tuesday, Abby, Clark, Ginny and I went to Chicago, where we cruised the Chicago River for a tour of the architectural marvels of the Chicago skyline.  And there are plenty of marvels…

plus one recent stain on the landscape.

We then traveled from one great Midwestern city to another – to Cleveland, to visit the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame. Cleveland takes credit for being the birthplace of Rock n Roll, mainly because a local DJ, Alan Freed, coined the name and hosted the first rock concert, the Moondog Coronation Ball, in 1952.  When the idea for the Hall was concocted in the early 80’s, the presumptive location was New York, home of much of the recording industry.   But Cleveland mounted a compelling campaign, one element of which was that it would be a featured, even singular, tourist attraction in Cleveland, compared to NYC, where it would have been a drop in a big bucket.

The Hall of Fame is impressive – a distinctive building suggestive of the pyramid on the cover of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album, located on the revitalized shores of Lake Erie.  

The museum artifacts include wreckage of the Otis Redding plane crash,

a Tom Petty concert jacket,

the settlement agreement dissolving The Beatles, 

a Jerry Garcia guitar

and an exhibit highlighting the latest Hall of Fame induction class (including Dire Straits and the Moody Blues – it’s about time!!!).

There’s even a drawing of an Oregon football player by “James” Hendrix when he was in grade school in Seattle.

Luckily, we visited while there was a special exhibit on the San Francisco rock scene of the 60’s…the music I grew up with!

Friday, we headed to Williamsport, PA.  For anyone who ever played Little League baseball or is the parent of someone who did, Williamsport was the seemingly unattainable destination – the site of the annual Little League World Series.

A city now of about 110,000 people in north central Pennsylvania, Williamsport is the birthplace of Little League Baseball and still is the beating heart of the sport.  

The Little League World Series is sports in its purest form in 21st century America.  Little League International is a self-effacing organization (which I got to know while negotiating ESPN’s media rights agreement in 2007) that administers thousands of local youth baseball leagues, culminating in an annual championship tournament of 16 teams (eight U.S., eight international).  The organization’s  priorities are sportsmanship, safety and fair play.  Because this is the 21st century, it’s an enterprise that is awash in television-related money.  ESPN televises the entire two-week tournament, plus the regional finals leading up to it.

The main ballpark in the complex, Howard Lamade Stadium, is one of the greatest settings for a baseball game  (or any sporting event) anywhere. 

Thanks to an old Bristol pal, I was able to get great seats for both days we were there.  The U.S. and International championship games (South Korea 2, Japan 1; Honolulu 3, Peachtree City, Georgia 0) were on Saturday and the final-final game between Hawaii and South Korea was Sunday afternoon.

We quickly became fans of the Hawaii team.  Their fans were great (featuring their cool “Hon-O-Lu-Lu” chant), plus they carried a morale-boosting burden for the entire state, which was hit by a major hurricane during the tournament.  The team also co-won the award for best sportsmanship among all the teams in the tournament.

While Little League is still predominantly about pitching, we marveled at the caliber of play in the field.  The final play of the International championship game was the South Korea pitcher catching a line drive against his stomach and throwing to first base to double off the potential tying run.  Georgia’s centerfielder made a diving, backhand catch to keep the U.S. championship game close, which rivaled any Web Gem on SportsCenter.  And all four teams’ shortstops repeatedly made eye-popping plays.  The whole thing was a joy to watch and when Hawaii won the title Sunday afternoon (3-0), Williamsport rocked!

We left Pennsylvania Monday to spend the next three-plus weeks in upstate New York.  Our next report will include pictures of Niagara Falls!