{"id":1022,"date":"2011-07-13T11:33:10","date_gmt":"2011-07-13T15:33:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artsci.case.edu\/magazine\/?p=1022"},"modified":"2017-02-09T12:04:43","modified_gmt":"2017-02-09T17:04:43","slug":"a-passion-for-storytelling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artsci.case.edu\/magazine\/2011\/a-passion-for-storytelling\/","title":{"rendered":"A Passion for Storytelling"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Jim

Jim Sheeler, the Shirley Wormser Professor in Journalism and Media Writing, sends his students into the community, where they write about people whose stories have never been told. Photo by Ellen Jaskol.<\/p><\/div>\n

In early January, when some of his journalism students were about to conduct their first interviews of the semester, Jim Sheeler <\/strong>sent them off with a flurry of practical advice. Take careful notes, he cautioned them, in case your digital recorder stops working. Invite people to talk about their experiences in detail: Can you paint a picture of that for me?<\/em> When they fall silent, give them time to think. When they say something interesting, express your appreciation. \u201cThis isn\u2019t 60 Minutes<\/em>,\u201d he reminded the class. \u201cYou\u2019re not trying to put them up against the wall.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sheeler and the students were meeting off campus, as they would for most of the term. They had taken a university van to Eliza Bryant Village, a complex of senior housing units and medical facilities in Cleveland\u2019s Hough neighborhood. Hundreds of elderly people receive services at Eliza Bryant\u2014everything from routine check-ups to rehabilitation therapy to skilled nursing care. Now Sheeler had arranged for his students to talk with some of the residents. He wanted them to learn about people they never would have met otherwise, in a place where everyone was full of stories.<\/p>\n

Sheeler had told the students that it might take three or four interviews before the residents opened up to them. But Emily<\/strong> Hoffman <\/strong>and Molly<\/strong> Drake <\/strong>didn\u2019t have to wait that long. Later that day, they were sitting at a table in a multipurpose room with Andrew Bailey, who had lived in an Eliza Bryant apartment for the past few years; his wife, Ethel, was a patient in the nursing home. Mr. Bailey was soft-spoken but not at all reticent. The recorder resting on the table, and the tiny microphone clipped to his sweatshirt, didn\u2019t seem to make him self-conscious.<\/p>\n

He told the students where he grew up, how he met his wife, what he did for a living before his retirement. When he described his last job, operating a gas station and restaurant at the corner of Chester Avenue and 79th Street, the students set aside their prepared questions and asked where he\u2019d learned to cook. His answers were always to the point, but he added details that gave insight into his character. Both he and his wife had been married once before, and together they had raised all nine of the children from their previous unions. In their house, Mr. Bailey said, there was never any talk of stepchildren or stepparents; they were just a family. And when he referred to a son who had served in the military or a daughter who worked at University Hospitals, it was clear that there was no such talk now.<\/p>\n

Twenty minutes into the interview, Mr. Bailey invited Sheeler and the students to see his apartment. (Not everyone, he pointed out, could bring in visitors on the spur of the moment and have them find everything in order.) Surrounded by familiar objects, he was more forthcoming than ever. He showed his guests his 103-year-old bedroom set\u2014an inheritance from his wife\u2019s great-aunt and uncle, who had once been slaves. He brought out a sealed pack of Pall Mall cigarettes with \u201c1999\u201d written in black marker on the cellophane\u2014a memento from the year he quit smoking. He took a manila envelope from the top of his dresser and pulled out a certificate for burial insurance\u2014an investment he\u2019d made when an unexpected windfall came his way. At that time, he had also indulged in some reckless spending, and now he was glad he had never won the lottery. It would have changed him, Mr. Bailey said; he would have forsaken \u201cthe original God\u201d and worshipped his riches instead.<\/p>\n

\"Emily

Emily Hoffman, one of Sheeler\u2019s journalism students, wrote a profile of Andrew Bailey, who met with her for interviews and provided commentary on the decades-old photographs in a family album. Photo by Daniel Milner.<\/p><\/div>\n

On the ride back to campus, Sheeler asked the students what struck them most about the interview. Drake had noticed how Mr. Bailey kept turning the conversation back to his wife. \u201cShe is a beautiful person,\u201d he\u2019d said, and he would have liked for them to meet her, but she had Alzheimer\u2019s now and no longer spoke. Hoffman noted that Mr. Bailey\u2019s favorite word was \u201csatisfied,\u201d as in, \u201cI am satisfied with the care at Eliza Bryant.\u201d (\u201cGood ear,\u201d Sheeler told her.) Both students remembered hearing him say that he had counted the footsteps from his apartment to his wife\u2019s bedside. By his calculation, he covered a mile a day walking back and forth, since he went to see her every hour or so.<\/p>\n

The students planned to write their profiles of Mr. Bailey after several more weeks of interviews. By then, they might know more about him than they did about some of their relatives. But as Sheeler had explained to the class earlier that day, their job as reporters wasn\u2019t to present every single fact about someone\u2019s life. Rather, it was to \u201cdistill that life into a story.\u201d<\/p>\n

New Worlds of Writing<\/h3>\n

Writing such stories has long been Sheeler\u2019s specialty. During the mid-1990s, he made his reputation by leaving the front-page news to others and composing richly detailed obituaries about people whose names had never been in the paper. In 2006, he won the Pulitzer Prize in feature writing for \u201cFinal Salute,\u201d a 12,000-word story about the relationships that a casualty notification officer had forged with the families of Marines killed in the Iraq war.<\/p>\n

Last fall, Sheeler joined the Department of English as the Shirley Wormser Professor in Journalism and Media Writing. The professorship was created and endowed in 1998 by Shirley Wormser Shapero <\/strong>(FSM \u201940), who foresaw that the 21st century would be characterized by \u201cnew worlds of writing.\u201d Her gift was a way of ensuring that students in the college would be prepared to enter those worlds.<\/p>\n

Sheeler is very much at home with today\u2019s new media and integrates them into his courses. When he taught introductory journalism last term, his students analyzed blogs as well as newspapers and magazines. They learned how reporters use Twitter updates to cover breaking news. They also created audio slide shows for the Internet, with photographs they had taken themselves and excerpts from interviews they had recorded.<\/p>\n

As English department Chair Mary Grimm <\/strong>points out, Sheeler combines a \u201cmultimedia outlook\u201d with \u201cthe values of a traditional journalist.\u201d Both in his own work and in his classes, digital tools are always deployed in the service of solid reporting.<\/p>\n

\u201cJim is very passionate about journalism, teaching and writing,\u201d says Associate Professor Thrity Umrigar<\/strong>, an acclaimed novelist who began her career as a newspaper reporter. \u201cHe exudes a kind of joyfulness when he\u2019s talking about interviewing his subjects and making their stories come alive on the page. I think he will really motivate students with his passion for storytelling.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also believes that students will learn essential lessons simply by reading his work. \u201cJim\u2019s writing is so elegant and precise,\u201d she explains. \u201cHe never seems to overwrite or go for the melodramatic. There\u2019s a compressed, controlled quality that is just lovely. I would ask my students to really pay attention to his technique\u2014the telling anecdote that encapsulates the theme, the unforgettable image, the quote that takes your breath away.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recognizing Lives<\/h3>\n

When he was still a student himself, Sheeler planned to be a broadcast journalist. He completed internships at CNN in Atlanta and at various television and radio stations before deciding he would be more comfortable at a newspaper. \u201cIn the end, I think that broadcast experience helped me develop into a better print reporter, because I was trained to think in terms of scenes and pictures,\u201d he remarked in a 2008 interview. \u201cAlso, lugging the camera around on my shoulder taught me not to rely on the telephone. I still feel that there’s no substitute for meeting people in person and spending the time it takes to immerse myself in the story, no matter the medium.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 1992, Sheeler landed his first job at The Daily Camera <\/em>in Boulder, Colorado, where he covered everything from business news to rock concerts. Four years later, he helped found a community paper, the Boulder Planet,<\/em> where one of his duties was to type in the obituaries that local funeral homes faxed to the newsroom. As he worked on the copy, certain details leapt out at him; for instance, he still remembers reading about a woman who had a career as a \u201cbutcher and florist.\u201d Naturally, he wanted to learn more. \u201cThere were some amazing stories that we had missed,\u201d Sheeler says. \u201cBut we still had one last chance to recognize those lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

He began to choose one person each week as the subject of a feature-length obituary. Gradually, a few recurrent themes emerged in his work. For instance, Sheeler loved to write about people who represented a vanishing era in Colorado history\u2014an era of family farms and mining operations and small towns in the middle of nowhere. Yet all of his subjects emerged as distinct individuals. A master gardener whose neighbors still grew poppies from seeds he had carried home from a trip to Alaska. An amateur printer who published her own poetry until she was in her mid-80s, on a letterpress her father had taught her to operate in 1929. A magician whose favorite trick, involving a silk handkerchief and a clock, was to make time disappear.<\/p>\n

Sheeler usually spent an entire day talking with his subjects\u2019 relatives, friends and co-workers. Like any reporter, he sometimes felt awkward approaching a bereaved family. And yet, he says, \u201cOnce the family realized that I really wanted to know the story of the person\u2019s life, the awkwardness almost always disappeared.\u201d Before he began his interviews, Sheeler explained that he would be writing \u201ca well-rounded story,\u201d not a eulogy. It was important, he says, \u201cto include the good and the bad\u2014often there are lessons to be learned from the way that someone overcame (or didn\u2019t overcome) the struggles that each of us faces.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2000, the Planet <\/em>went out of business, and Sheeler began writing obituaries for the Denver Post. <\/em>Soon they were one of the paper\u2019s most popular features. \u201cI never complained about having my stories in the back of the newspaper,\u201d Sheeler says, \u201cbecause I knew that most of the front-page stories would be fish wrap in a few days, while the obits would be cut and pasted on refrigerators and scrapbooks and read for generations.\u201d Meanwhile, he was gaining the knowledge and experience he would need for his most difficult assignment.<\/p>\n

Bringing the War Home<\/h3>\n
\"On

On Veterans Day 2006, at 2 in the morning, Sheeler visited the pressroom at the Rocky Mountain News to inspect the first copies of \u201cFinal Salute.\u201d Photo by Todd Heisler.<\/p><\/div>\n

In March 2003, Marine Lance Corporal Thomas J. Slocum became the first Colorado native to die in the Iraq war. A day before the funeral, Sheeler, who was now working for the Rocky Mountain News<\/em>, drove out to Fort Logan National Cemetery and spoke to a veteran named David Turner, who had just finished digging Slocum\u2019s grave. “He was in the same division as me\u20141st Marines,\u201d Turner said. “He’s part of the family.”<\/p>\n

During the next year, Sheeler attended nearly a dozen military funerals. He got to know several of the groundskeepers at Fort Logan; like Turner, they were all veterans, and they all spoke of their responsibility to the dead. He observed the faces of Marines in dress uniform as they kept watch beside a casket or folded the flag that would be presented to a grieving family. He learned that some of these men carried pictures of their friends\u2019 funerals inside their caps. None of this fit with Sheeler\u2019s mental image of the Marine Corps\u2014the impassive stare on the recruiting posters. And he realized that he was seeing things that most Americans were simply unaware of.<\/p>\n

A similar feeling haunted him as he came to know the families of the war dead. In \u201ccountless living rooms,\u201d he later wrote, \u201cI sat on the floor and played with children who would never see their fathers. I listened to widows read their husbands\u2019 last words. In a small northwestern Colorado town, I watched as a little boy the same age as my son ripped the rose boutonniere off his grandfather\u2019s lapel and placed it in the casket with his father\u2019s body.\u201d Some of these experiences made it into his obituaries. But he still hadn\u2019t found a way, he felt, to \u201cbring the war home\u201d to his readers.<\/p>\n

Then, at the Fort Logan cemetery, Sheeler met Major Steve Beck, who was responsible for notifying the families of Marines killed in action. Delivering this news was only the first of his duties, Sheeler soon learned. Beck tended to the families during the arrival of the casket at the airport, the viewing of the body if a viewing took place, the funeral itself. And for months afterward, he remained involved in their lives. He sat with them as they sorted through the personal effects of their sons and husbands, helped them deal with the military bureaucracy and arranged ceremonies for the posthumous awarding of medals.<\/p>\n

Like Sheeler, Beck believed that the country paid too little attention to the sacrifices of these families. So he allowed Sheeler and Rocky Mountain News<\/em> photographer Todd Heisler to shadow him for a year. The journalists never witnessed the initial knock at the door; they would visit a home only after Beck had obtained the family\u2019s permission. But from that point on, they entered into the survivors\u2019 ordeal as fully as strangers could. Sheeler told the families that if they ever needed time alone, he and Heisler would disappear. But no one ever asked them to leave.<\/p>\n

On Veterans Day, 2005, \u201cFinal Salute\u201d appeared as a 24-page insert in the Sunday paper. The following April, Sheeler and Heisler each won a Pulitzer Prize.<\/p>\n

Sheeler invited the families to the newsroom the day the awards were announced. A young widow named Katherine Cathey came with her parents and her four-month-old son. Recalling the night she first met the two journalists, she said that she appreciated their coming to her home and \u201clistening to what I had to say about my husband.\u201d Then she added, \u201cThey made a lot of sacrifices, too, so that everybody would have a very clear picture of what the families had to go through.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Better World<\/h3>\n

After the Pulitzer, Sheeler began hearing from agents and publishers who encouraged him to expand \u201cFinal Salute\u201d into a book. At first, he resisted. \u201cRevisiting those stories would mean giving in, emotionally, all over again,\u201d he said in a 2008 interview. \u201cThese stories hurt, as does telling them. At the same time, I realized that the emotional weight I felt was nothing compared to the loss these families shoulder every day. I asked some of them if I should write the book, and they urged me on.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Sheeler

Sheeler was initially reluctant to expand \u201cFinal Salute\u201d into a book, but the families he had written about encouraged him. When the book was published, a bereaved mother said of Sheeler, \u201cHe has been given a magnificent gift of writing from the heart.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

Sheeler took a leave of absence from the paper. Now, instead of going to the newsroom each morning, he worked alone at a desk in his basement. After a couple of months, he says, \u201cI realized that I needed to step away at times.\u201d He found a position as an adjunct professor at the University of Colorado, where he taught a course in advanced reporting.<\/p>\n

This was his first stint as a teacher. At first, he says, putting together a syllabus was \u201cpretty intimidating. But it was also fun\u2014and so was the class, from the very first day. I was able to go back and think about what got me into journalism in the first place, what excited me. I looked over all my old stories and the stories that inspired me, and I had the chance to share that with students who were as enthusiastic as I was back then. I fed off that energy when I needed to go back into the basement and write that book.\u201d<\/p>\n

Final Salute <\/em>was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2008. By that time, the University of Colorado had created a position for Sheeler as a scholar-in-residence. In one of his classes, students produced stories and multimedia presentations about a local retirement community. It was a precursor to the course he is teaching this spring at Eliza Bryant.<\/p>\n

As a newcomer to Cleveland, Sheeler has been learning the city partly through his students\u2019 reporting. In one assignment last fall, he asked the students to spend time in places where they would be \u201cout of their element.\u201d Reading their stories took him out of his <\/em>element, too.<\/p>\n

Erin Wendell <\/strong>found her way to a Civil War reenactment in Cleveland\u2019s Tremont neighborhood. She interviewed a mortgage banker pretending to be an army corporal in the 8th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regiment, Company B. Initially, she felt a bit strange talking to a man in a \u201cperiod wool uniform\u201d while muskets fired in the background. But when the banker spoke of his role in \u201ceducating the public, being a voice for the guys that aren\u2019t around anymore,\u201d she came to respect his motivation. \u201cI learned from him that reenactors aren\u2019t just playing dress up and hanging onto something that\u2019s been over for nearly 150 years,\u201d she wrote after finishing her story. \u201cInstead, they are dedicated to studying the period and accurately portraying history so that the public may better understand what the actual soldiers experienced.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"As

As students in Jim Sheeler\u2019s introductory journalism course, Zak Khan (left) and Erin Wendell wrote about people with life experiences very different from their own. Photo by Mike Sands.<\/p><\/div>\n

Closer to campus, Zak Khan <\/strong>spent an afternoon in the corridors of University Hospitals, shadowing two patient transporters. Unlike some of their colleagues, James Felder III and Renee Peterson make a point of talking with patients and their families, Khan noted. \u201cBoth say they are in the job not just to get people from here to there, but to have an impact.\u201d Reflecting on his story later, he added, \u201cThere are many people you may never even think of who are working hard to make connections and help humanity, all while remaining in the background.\u201d<\/p>\n

The students who take journalism courses in the College of Arts and Sciences are not necessarily preparing for careers in the news business. They may simply enjoy writing, or wish to gain a better understanding of our media-driven culture. Often, they recognize that improving their skills as researchers, listeners and writers will help them in other professions. For his part, Sheeler is happy to see students in any field sign up for his classes. After all, he explains, \u201cA world with more storytellers, whether they\u2019re in journalism or not, is a better world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Andrew Bailey, who generously shared his stories with Jim Sheeler\u2019s students, died unexpectedly on February 28, a few days after he had his picture taken with Emily Hoffman. It was a privilege to meet him, and we offer our condolences to his family.<\/em><\/p>\n

Many thanks to William Claspy (WRC \u201988, GRS \u201993), humanities librarian and coordinator of library instruction at Kelvin Smith Library, who hosts the podcast series Off the Shelf. His October 2010 interview<\/a> with Jim Sheeler provided some of the quotations in this article. Other quotations came from these sources:<\/p>\n