Iowa Life Episode 308

[CHARITY NEBBE] Coming up on this episode of Iowa Life, we are going to meet three extraordinary Iowans. A Des Moines entrepreneur creating space for local talent --

[TOBI PARKS] Come into the space, enjoy the music, enjoy the community. Get to know somebody that you might not otherwise know or get to talk to.

[NEBBE] A coffee shop owner brewing opportunity in Independence.

[MYKENZI MEIKE] Em loves being the boss. She just embodies it and she's a natural saleswoman. You will buy coffee from her.

[NEBBE] And a lifelong conservationist.

[BRYAN HELLYER] Ron was the pioneer for wetland restoration in Iowa.

[NEBBE] It's all coming up next on Iowa Life.

[ANNOUNCER] Funding for Iowa Life is provided by the Lainie Grimm Fund for Inclusive Programming at the Iowa PBS Foundation. 

[ANNOUNCER] And by Friends, the Iowa PBS Foundation.

♪♪

[NEBBE] Hi, I'm Charity Nebbe and this is Iowa Life. We are at XBK Live in Des Moines’ Drake neighborhood, a small venue with a big voice in the local music scene. After years in New York City, Tobi Parks chose Iowa's capital city for her next chapter, creating an inclusive space known for its eclectic lineup and strong support of local talent. Let's find out why Parks chose this spot to help shape the sound and spirit of the community.

Let's go. 1-2 1-2-3-4.

[TOBI PARKS] You know, the great thing about music is it's a common denominator. It doesn't matter what your politics are or what your, you know, general beliefs are. You know, you can be the polar opposite of what I am and my politics and we can all like the same song. I’m much more of a fan of calling people in than calling people out, right. And I think music is one of those things that is a real connector. Really our motto is like, just don't be a jerk. You know, come into the space, enjoy the music, enjoy the community. Get to know somebody that you might not otherwise know or get to talk to. But, you know, like all of my entire career has always been this sort of like, I've wanted to do music, which I'm really thankful for because it's been able to sort of grow into the different things that I've been doing. But it all started from wanting to just play.

[applause]

[TOBI PARKS] You know, I started playing quasi professionally, if you will, at age 14. I mean, that was my first job playing in these bar bands in my small hometown in rural southeast Missouri, and just continued to do that. And I moved to New York because I wanted to play professionally. That was the goal. But, you know, I also liked to eat food, so had to have a job. I had reached out to a friend of mine that worked for a major label, tired as a temp, worked in copyright, publishing, that kind of stuff. There's a lot of things I love about New York, and I miss it every day, you know. But my wife and I have two kids, and we're living in New York City, and it is really hard to raise kids in New York City. Though I considered myself a New Yorker for for a long time, there's just something about a Midwestern sensibility that I never kind of caught up with that in New York. At that time, our prerequisites for wherever we were going to move would be someplace where gay marriage was legal and some place where we had family. And by default it was Iowa, because my sister-in-law had left New York and came to be a professor at Drake. So coming back here felt a lot like coming home. And Patti Smith had given this interview and she was talking about the nature of art and culture. And, you know, the thing that she said that really stuck with me is like, you know, the next art revolution isn't going to happen in a city like New York or LA or Chicago. It's going to happen in some of these secondary and tertiary cities. And that's exactly what I felt when I came here. So I came out to visit based on my wife kind of pushed me like, just go check it out. And I was like, listen, I'm not moving any place where there's not a creative community, a place where I can't make music, whatever, and totally fell in love. And again, I had no idea what I was going to do when I got here. So some of the things that I did is I remember going downtown and looking at some of the older buildings that were around, and I'd been accepted to law school and then had started an artist incubator called Station One Records, kind of a nonprofit record label in partnership with the Social Club and Drake. It just so happened that that building next door, the folks that owned it were looking to sell it. I happened to have just sold my house in New York. And, you know, my wife and I had some money and we're like, okay, well, let's try and do this. So when I first moved, I kind of jumped into all of those things at once. And that kind of the iterative steps of that sort of led to what I'm doing now.

♪♪She's wasting every night ♪♪

♪♪

♪♪Waiting for Jesus ♪♪

[BILL ROGERS] There is such a wealth of talent in Des Moines in the central Iowa music scene. It's underrated. Being a small venue that we are, we are able to really, connect one on one to a lot of patrons and artists alike. So I think that that kind of really makes a big difference in cultivating community.

[TOBI PARKS] You know, we're capped at 250 for that venue, but I think that's the thing that, you know, I want people to really understand is like, small venues are here around community building. We're presenting artists that are just kind of bubbling up and, you know, we're the first step before they get to Val-Air or, you know, the arenas, like you have to have a network of the small spaces like mine before you can even get to those next steps.

[applause]

[TOBI PARKS] You know, we opened in September of 2019, the world's worst time to open a music venue because we were open for six months and then Covid came. I don't rely on XBK as my primary income. I'm an attorney by trade. So after the pandemic, I actually went back to work at Sony full-time and was working for them. So I was able to kind of keep things afloat. And I also got heavily involved with the National Independent Venue Association, and we lobbied the federal government for $16.4 billion grant program to save independent venues. And that $16.4 billion is the biggest federal investment in the arts in American history. Why they gave it to a bunch of concert promoters, I don't know. And right as we came out of the pandemic, I rented the office upstairs in this firehouse building, which is adjacent to the club, had an idea originally of turning the downstairs into like a cocktail lounge, like the entire space. And I was like, oh, well, wait a minute. There's a door that connects this patio. Let's make it more of an extended piece of XBK. So now we have the Annex space, which is half the first floor of the firehouse.

[BILL ROGERS] Well, the Annex is much smaller, obviously, but we're able to host trivia nights and open mic nights, poetry, we've had lectures. It's a lot more of a community space.

♪♪Homemade haircuts, trampolines ♪♪

[TOBI PARKS] Sort of owe this to my therapist from many, many moons ago. So I remember living in New York City and being so frustrated. Like, you know, I moved here because I wanted to be a musician and I just can't figure out how to do that. I can't figure out how to pay my bills to do that. And she was like, well, you're still working in music though, right? Like, isn't that what you want to be doing? And it was an epiphany to me, you know, being a musician or working in music can look different ways. If you build value for your community and you build value for the people around you, you'll be able to sustain yourself, you know. But you have to look at it from that perspective and not so much from the dollars and cents. Maybe I might be wealthier if I looked at it more at the dollars and cents, I don't know, but this seems to be working out pretty well for me.

♪♪

♪♪ Life is short but sweet ♪♪

[NEBBE] We're traveling now to Independence, where a small coffee shop is making a big difference. Em's Coffee Company was created to provide meaningful employment for its owner, Emilea. It's a place where everyone has a role and everyone belongs.

[MYKENZI MEIKE] Right away in the morning, 6:15 on the dot.

[MYKENZI MEIKE] If I'm late, I get a phone call. So 6:15. I mean, she gets in the car and she she's spitfiring and she's like, what are we doing today? This is our plan. She doesn't let you not be a morning person. She's very like, she is up, she is ready. And if you're not on her level, she is gonna get you there.

[EM] Brr brr brr brr brr brr brr brr brr brr brr. I'm cold, I'm cold, I'm cold, I'm cold, I'm cold. Turn on the lights.

♪♪

[TAMI FENNER] She does a full espresso bar. They make their own gelato. Paninis. Very big cinnamon rolls, homemade pecan rolls, scones, strudel sticks. The coffee shop is located on Main Street. It's across from City Hall. It is on 150. It's a very bright, happy place. It reflects her personality.

[EM] Here you go, Bill. Have a good day.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] There's this welcoming atmosphere, and it's usually full of chatter. The coffee shop is not a quiet place.

Have a good day.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] It is bustling at its best.

[NIKKI BARTH] Em is probably one of the most light hearted, welcoming people you're going to meet in our downtown. If you haven't been here before, she's going to ask you everything about yourself, who you are, where you're from, what you're doing here, what you like to drink.

[JOHN KLOTZBACH] She's so effervescent. She's very joyful and and connects with everyone who comes in the door, whether it's a stranger or a regular.

[MYKENZI MEIKE] The coffee shop is owned and operated by Em. She is an individual with disabilities. She is bubbly and joyful. She's Em.

[EM] All right, boys.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] Em runs the show. Em loves being the boss.

[EM] Thank you. 

SPEAKER 6: Thank you.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] She just embodies it. And she's a natural saleswoman. You will buy coffee from her.

[TAMI FENNER] Emilea is my daughter. She was born with agenesis of the corpus callosum. They told me she could be a monster. They told me to institutionalize her. She wouldn't be able to walk, talk, basically do anything. Her right and the left half of her brain don't really communicate except through a very small passageway. She looks pretty normal. You can't really tell by your first impression that she has a disability. So she was just one of the family.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] When Em graduated from high school looking for employment it was traditional for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities to go and work with other people with disabilities in a facility based setting.

[TAMI FENNER] We tried it for about nine months, but Em is very, very chatty and it was not a good fit.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] And so then it was self-employment is part of our family coming from business owners, of our grandparents owning the local hardware store, and then our parents. Self-employment was a pathway that felt achievable.

[TAMI FENNER] We just kind of all brainstormed. The City of Independence at the time, did not have a coffee shop. Em does not like coffee, has nothing to do with coffee. She loves to get up early and she needed a place where she could talk.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] We realize now that Em was pioneering something in particularly our mom, because she was the one who was always pushing the system.

[TAMI FENNER] I contacted the IRS. I contacted the disability world. But at this point nobody had done that. The IRS didn't understand the disability side. Disability didn't understand the IRS side. She is the pioneer of a person with a significant disability with a Main Street business.

♪♪

[TAMI FENNER] The coffee shop was originally the newspaper office. It's long, it's narrow. We got it at – it was in need of lots of love. We retrofitted it for Em. The espresso machine is marked. So if it's one shot for small. They know which button to push. 

[EM] 1 or 2 shots?

[CUSTOMER] Two shots.

[EM] Sure. When I pushed the button, she comes out super duper fast.

[TAMI FENNER] The cash register is square. It's a touch screen with pictures and everything ends in a quarter. And tax is included so when you ring it up, it's very easy to make change.

[EM] There you go. 

[CUSTOMER] Thank you. 

[EM] Have a good day.

[CUSTOMER] You too.

♪♪

[ASHLEA LANTZ] Independence is a small town in northeast Iowa. I think 6,000 people. Her community supports her and she supports her community.

[EM] That is my customer John Klotzbach right there.

[JOHN KLOTZBACH] This has been in my wallet for over ten years. You know, that's my order right there. Caffeinated. Whole milk. Sugar free. Chocolate syrup. Five pumps sugar free raspberry syrup. Topped with whipped cream. And sugar free chocolate swirl at the top.

[NIKKI BARTH] You always leave here with a smile. So even though you've come in and you may not have had any caffeine in the morning and you're in that like uncaffeinated mode, you're always going to leave with a smile.

[EM] Nikki and I are buddies, aren't we?

[NIKKI BARTH] We are, aren't we?

[TAMI FENNER] It makes me very proud that she's so accepted. And she's a business owner. She's very, very successful. Prior to her, there were two coffee shops in Independence. Each one of them lasted two years. She's on year 16.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] There's a sense of belonging that exists there that is hard to replicate. That comes from energy. It comes from culture and being seen and feeling safe and being part of something. It started with who is Em and who is Em at her best.

[EM] Have a good night you guys.

[CUSTOMERS] Night, Em.

[ASHLEA LANTZ] And the best thing is that Em doesn't drink coffee. And I think so many times we first start with, well, what do you love to do. Em loves people and coffee I think is the the mechanism that helps deliver that.

♪♪

[NEBBE] Next we'll meet a man who has dedicated his life to caring for Iowa's natural resources. For more than 50 years, Ron Howing has worked to restore wetlands across northern Iowa, bringing balance back to the land. Here's the story of one man's enduring impact on Iowa's landscape and wildlife.

[DREW HOWING] All right. You want to start letting your chair down? I'll start getting you dressed. 

[DREW HOWING] He just loved hunting anything. Deer hunting is something that in his older age, he can still do. He can't chase a setter anymore. We've got him in a duck boat, but it's a job. We can't -- he can't get out on the marshes like he loved to do. But he can get in a blind with a wheelchair. 

[DREW HOWING] I'll do all that once I get these.

[RON HOWING] I love to hunt. It meant a lot with hunting with my grandson.

[DREW HOWING] We're going to sit right there and they're coming out right up on top there. I had some deer jerky packed, but I think I forgot to grab it off the counter. You walk in, he's got a big smile on his face. He goes, well, each day I'll wake up and I'll just take what the good Lord gives me. And that's what it'll be. And he's just he's so content in that. And I think that's really powerful at that age. Of all the things that he loves to do -- and I think that's the hardest thing -- watching that deep like desire to go is still there. And it's one thing that I feel like as a family, we can still give him an opportunity to go do that. He can't see very good. It takes a lot of attention. I mean, you're doing everything. But he can still successfully hunt deer. To be able to be like, hey, you did this for me my whole life, and now I get to take you and do that. It's been, like, imprinted on us. From the time we were little we were trapping, we were hunting, we were fishing. That's what we did in our free time.

♪♪

[BETH HINDBJORGEN] All of us kids were so fortunate to grow up in nature. We lived on a unit game reservation area where the Canada Geese flock was just down the hill. We had the woods nearby. He would take us out sometimes on some of the pheasant counts.

♪♪

[BETH HINDBJORGEN] He taught us every plant we would walk past. He would stop and take the time to tell us what it was and to tell a story about it so we could remember. And that was really special. I remember going canoeing a lot. I remember getting caught in rainstorms and tipping the canoe as well many times, but those were some really fun memories.

[BRYAN HELLYER] Ron was the wildlife management biologist at the Ingham-High Wildlife Unit. He worked for the Iowa DNR for 50 years. Ron was the pioneer for wetland restoration in Iowa. Iowa and the prairie pothole region had several hundreds and thousands of acres of wetlands, and a lot of those wetlands were drained.

♪♪

[BRENT HOWING] Up here in northwest Iowa, the farmers back in the 70s and 80s, they pretty much farmed every possible inch of ground they could. And that didn't leave a lot for wildlife.

[BRYAN HELLYER] Ron started restoring wetlands on private and public lands, going clear back to 1980. Some people might not think is that long ago, but restoring wetlands in Iowa is still a relatively new thing. Ron pioneered and championed that cause for the Wildlife Bureau and has restored hundreds of acres of wetlands across this state.

[RON HOWING] Conservation Reserve Program – land a farmer had difficulty farming. It was an opportunity for him to enroll in that program. It was highly erodible land. They were losing soil. It set aside acres to preserve them for future use.

♪♪

[BRENT HOWING] He would purchase a lot of public hunting ground with the state's money. Other farmers, they would have to bid against him. And if they didn't think it was worth farming, then the state would get it and plant it to Big Bluestem or grasses and and restore wetlands.

[BRYAN HELLYER] He's been a mentor and a coach for a lot of Wildlife Bureau personnel. There's the part that you come and go do in the field for the citizens of Iowa. You don't learn all of those things in school. So it takes special people like Ron to take the time to teach all of us how to properly restore wetlands, how to properly restore grasslands.

[DREW HOWING] For as long as God's earth is here, those wetlands will be there. They will never be drained. They're protected federally. That's pretty cool that he's had that impact.

[BRYAN HELLYER] It's not only important for water quality, but quality of life. And then the wildlife that is dependent on that.

[DREW HOWING] In Iowa, we're ranked almost 50 for public land ownership. The little bits and pieces that we've restored and put back on the landscape to provide for the migratory birds that that pass through this area, I don't know if I'd say it's enough, but it's it's a heck of a lot better than, than where we would be otherwise. And grandpa was very instrumental in that.

[BRYAN HELLYER] Giant Canada geese are an important part of Iowa. They've been here for a long time. They were gone for a period of time. And Ron was a part of the first captive flock, which we started in 1964. Ron had his fingers in that right from the beginning. And now to have them back. The great thing for the department, a great success story. And that couldn't have happened without Ron's influence.

[BRENT HOWING] Next comes the hunters can come in and harvest a renewable resource.

[RON HOWING] I have a code of ethics that we want to preserve all things so that they can be used in the future.

[DREW HOWING] It's a part of so many people, and it's a legacy that's going to go on through our kids and through all of the other people that he's had an impact on in all of their kids.

♪♪

[DREW HOWING] It's a legacy of faith and family and then of conservation.

♪♪

[DREW HOWING] It is very rewarding.

♪♪

[DREW HOWING] How's that? Do I need to move you at all? I'm not doing it for me. But, boy, it's. It's so cool to be able to share that with him.

♪♪

[RON HOWING] If I could walk right now, I would go back to work for him and work until I died.

[laughter]

[RON HOWING] Come on deer.

♪♪

[NEBBE] As you travel across Iowa, you may, if you're lucky, come across an intriguing site. An unusual place beyond the beaten path. The kind of thing you won't find unless you know where to look.

[birds chirping]

[NEBBE] Hickory Grove Cemetery is one of those places, and it holds a piece of Iowa history that has sparked curiosity for decades. The great pyramids of Avery.

[birds chirping] 

[NEBBE] To explain how they got there, we're going to start with the man who built them.

♪♪

[NEBBE] Like many men in Monroe County in the early 1900s, Axel Peterson worked as a coal miner. But beyond that, there was little about him that was typical. A bachelor with a knack for saving money and a head full of ideas, he was something of an eccentric. Axel called himself the philosopher of Avery and published his own newspaper called the Avery Boomer. Using it as a platform to share his theories with anyone willing to listen.

[TOM WOODARD] It's a very interesting little newspaper. Mostly his opinions, his beliefs about religion and politics and how people should conduct themselves and, boys and girls should act in certain ways. Basically, what he thought and hoping that people would side with him on that. Actually, he won the printing press in a poker game.

[NEBBE] Axel was also an avid reader who became fascinated with Egyptian history and culture.

[TOM WOODARD] And he decided that he wanted to be buried in a pyramid.

[NEBBE] The pyramids were to be monuments to a religion he founded based on truth and common sense.

[TOM WOODARD] He thought that if everybody would just debunk the bunk, everybody would just get on and all the ills would be cured.

[NEBBE] Axel once said, it is impossible to save the world from sin who does not make mistakes. But if we try to save the world from bunk, then we will get somewhere.

[NEBBE] To help bring his vision to life, Axel turned to those who owed him money, enlisting their labor to pay off their debts.

[TOM WOODARD] We started this project in 1939 and they were pretty much done by 1941.

[NEBBE] Axel's three pyramids were made out of sandstone and concrete. The tallest rises 15 feet and has a crypt at its base, with walls and ceiling fashioned from an upside down dump truck bed.

[TOM WOODARD] He wanted his printing press put in the crypt with him, and he wanted to be buried, sitting up at the printing press.

[NEBBE] In the end, Axel was not buried in his pyramids.

[TOM WOODARD] The state wouldn't allow him to be buried in them. Of course, it kind of irritated him. So he's not even buried in that cemetery at all. He's buried a few miles down the road at Cuba Cemetery.

[NEBBE] Though his final wishes couldn't be carried out, Axel's pyramids have endured securing his place in Iowa history.

[TOM WOODARD] I mean, Axel will always be an icon for Monroe County. There's no doubt.

♪♪

[NEBBE] That's all for this week. Thank you for joining me as we've gotten to know three extraordinary people whose passions are shaping Iowa's arts, creating opportunity and caring for the land. I'm Charity Nebbe. See you next time for more Iowa Life.

♪♪

[ANNOUNCER] Funding for Iowa Life is provided by the Lainie Grimm Fund for Inclusive Programming at the Iowa PBS Foundation. 

[ANNOUNCER] And by Friends, the Iowa PBS Foundation.