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Leverage Press Technology as Part of a Survival Strategy
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Capital-equipment purchases no longer are just about the press. Metalformers must address the entire stamping system. For some companies, a starting point might be purchasing better material through vendors with stricter quality standards. Better raw material means better part consistency.
The Right Press Optimizes Output and Efficiency
Once a stamper has sourced the raw material, it then can identify the most efficient production system to make the part—progressive die, automated press-to-press movement or transfer. Other questions a stamper might address:
• Can a tool station be eliminated if the press has a modified slide motion?
• Can a better part be produced with the addition of one or more tool stations?
• Will a quick-die-change (QDC) system be beneficial?
should specify press lines flexible enough to efficiently handle
changing order quantities, illustrated here by this progressive-die
straightside press automated for transfer and feed-line capabilities.
Photo courtesy Luitink Mfg. Co.
• What is the best to handle offal?
• How should finished parts be packaged?
• What is the best method for storing and shipping finished parts?Output and efficiency can suffer due to a lack of the right equipment. If a stamper needs to run tighter-tolerance parts, it must operate tighter-tolerance presses. The press accurately (or inaccurately) provides the force to the die. Part accuracy cannot be achieved by only optimizing die design and build.
Technology developments during the last decade have greatly improved press tolerances. For example, the accuracy of some mechanical-press guiding systems can so closely control punch motion and the relationship between the punch and die that some mechanical presses now are more accurate than the die set.
The introduction of lube-free preloaded roller bearings into the slide-guide system of some presses eliminates the potential for press-oil contamination of a part. And, development of a dry slide guide—different from standard high-speed slide-guide technology —employs a proprietary roller-bearing mount with the ability to swivel. This helps the roller maintain contact with the guide surface on the column during off-center-load situations.
Lube-free, preloaded, roller-bearing slide guides allow metalformers to use a straightside press to produce a variety of stampings from high-volume, thick progressive-die parts to larger, lower-volume cosmetic pieces.
The latest development in precision slide guiding is the preloaded zero-clearance slide-guide system with high-pressure oil lubrication, which creates a press more accurate than a die set. This system avoids slide tipping caused by high off-center loads; slide shimmy caused by shock at the point of contact between the punch and material; and snapthrough at the time of material fracture. The guides comprise spherical shoes operating against flat guides attached to a massive frame structure. The very tall press slide enables the guide points to be spaced far apart and provide extremely long slide guides. The surfaces of the mating components are of materials that possess natural lubricity. Oil then is forced between these preloaded surfaces. This combination of preload and oil lubrication not only makes the slide guide very stiff, but also provides long life with little or no wear.
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Design for Flexibility Optimizes Uptime
A stamper's ability to achieve high machine-uptime rates is equally important to becoming more competitive. A recent article from Reuters states, "Manufacturers can reduce costs by anywhere from two to 10 percent by cutting scrap and factory downtime and taking waste out."
Machine flexibility—a press that can produce a wide range of parts—and capabilities such as QDC and fast part-to-part changeover—can improve uptime. Stampers should aim for a machine-uptime rate of 70 percent or more—this means actual cycling of the press to produce parts and does not include QDC, part changeover or other ancillary processes. And today, QDC systems allow metalformers to change dies in a matter of minutes.
However, proper use of QDC and other means to achieve fast part-to-part changeover requires the stamper to consider the entire
|Transfer lines—this one comprised of servo-driven gap presses—help stampers minimize costs and run lean. Photo courtesy Newman Technologies S.C.
For progressive-die press operations, coil-handling systems offer numerous opportunities to improve uptime. The use of coil cars and double dereelers is a good place to start. Follow this by adding a threading table and a programmable control that allows for the storage of setup parameters for the entire feed line, and a stamper is well on its to improving machine uptime.
Quick Tips for Dispensing of Downtime
Once a new strip has entered the die, having a strip start mark on the die block can save time and avoid die damage. Also, during die design, the designer should account for automatic threading in continuous mode, a feature that can save many minutes of downtime.
In transfer-die and press-to-press transfer systems, using the proper blank-feeding device can increase productivity by sensing and correcting double-blank misfeeds and reloading the blank feeder without requiring the operator to stop the press. The blank feeder should automatically discharge extra blanks upon double-blank detection. Blank-hold devices allow a few blanks to be automatically held while the next blank stack moves into position. This also eliminates the need for the operator to stop the press when the blank supply runs low.
Stampers also can set up a data-bank program in the system controller that houses all of the machine settings for each part to be run, which will raise productivity by allowing quicker part-to-part changes.
A servo-transfer or coil-feed mechanism allows a press to change motion profiles for the transfer pitch, the bar-clamp motion and lift motion. Or, with a coil feed, the progression as well as the acceleration and deceleration of the material in the feed cycle can be changed.
An electronic servo-transfer or coil-feed mechanism can deliver increased production speeds and greater efficiency because all feed profiles can be adjusted and retimed for each part or job to achieve optimal operating speed. In addition, once job programs have been written, they can be stored, eliminating the need to constantly reprogram the press.
Servo Technology: Reduce Rejects, Slash Energy Costs
Stampers also can leverage press technology to minimize offal, by producing parts close to specification. Servo-drive presses give the stamper fully programmable slide motion and adjustable stroke length, which can reduce reject rates by allowing stampers to form parts from material that would normally carry a high reject rate. In addition to controlling the amount of scrap generated, the nearly limitless number of s stroke, velocity and dwell profiles can be programmed and combined provides the flexibility to quote jobs stampers may not have considered in the past.
Energy savings also come with the investment in servo technology. Operating costs are reduced with a high-capacity capacitor bank circuit. Huge capacitors store energy when the servo motor is not under load, and when the motor is loaded, power draws from the capacitors and not the main line. As a result, power consumption often is less than that of a standard mechanical press. Depending on the part produced, a stamper can expect to achieve energy savings of 30 to 50 percent. MF
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See also: Aida-America Corporation, A Subsidiary of AIDA Engng LLC
Related Enterprise Zones: Automation, Coil Handling, Presses


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By Pat Jordan
I was standing on the sidewalk in front of the deli when the truck parked at the curb. It was early morning, sunny, cool, a dry Napa Valley day. Good for growing grapes. The Ford F-250 was caked with dirt, a working man's truck, a vineyard worker's truck. The guy who got out was big, burly, wearing a trucker's cap, flannel shirt, dirty jeans, work boots and a pair of grape pruning shears on his belt. He looked over the truck's bed at me. I laughed. He said, "What's so funny?" I said, "You still look like Tom Seaver." He had streaks of silver in his sandy-colored hair, a craggy, yet still boyish face, and that high-pitched voice I remembered.
Tom and I have known one another for 40 years, over many stories I have written about him. He's 69 years old now; I'm 73. We used to see each other once in a while in our 30s at the Greenwich (Conn.) YMCA, bump into each other in our 40s and 50s at Mets or Yankees games, call each other now and then. I asked him once to send my grandson his autograph, and he sent him a laminated photograph of himself as a Met. Tom had scrawled at the bottom, From Tom Seaver, your Grandfather's friend, to Adam, and then something about my having been a terrific pitcher too, something he had never admitted to my face. I figured it was embarrassing for him to admit to me that Pat Jordan, a minor-league washout after three years, had had a better fastball than Tom Seaver, a five-time 20-game winner in the majors. Whenever I reminded him of my superior fastball, he'd get apoplectic and scream out, "In your fucking dreams, Jordan!" I forgave him, chalking it up to envy.
Our friendship began after the first time I interviewed him in 1973, when we went to the Greenwich Y and played basketball one-on-one. They were vicious games, two big guys trying to pound each other into submission. Tom was 6-foot-2, 220 pounds, 28 years old. I was 6-1, 200, 32. By the end of those games, we had bloody noses, welts on our foreheads, bruised jaws we couldn't open. After one particularly brutal game, I said to him, "I let you win that game, Seaver." He looked at me and said, "Jordan, you never let anyone win at anything in your whole life."
We liked that about each other, an almost insanely blind competitiveness. Tom also liked that he could talk to a writer who, as an ex-pitcher, understood the fine details of his pitching mechanics, philosophy and psyche. And me, what did I see in Tom Seaver? The major leaguer I should have been and never was. Why? What did this man know that I never knew about pitching, and (as I would learn over the years) many other things? Why him, and not me?
By our mid-60s, we had lost track of each other. He and his wife Nancy had moved to a mountaintop in Calistoga, Calif., with their three dogs, and Susan and I had moved to an isolated little town in upstate South Carolina with our four dogs. I guess we were all seeking the same thing in our old age: seclusion.
He walked around the truck in that shoulder-weary, graceless, plowman's walk that he always had, even when he was a young pitcher with the Mets. He was always a blue-collar pitcher, plodding to the mound as if to a hated, backbreaking job; always the dray horse who had to plow the fields, never the thoroughbred. He wasn't born Tom Seaver, The Franchise, with a blinding, God-given talent. He made himself into Tom Seaver through a monumental act of will. Years of painstaking, meticulous, disciplined, intelligent, hard work.
We shook hands. He said, "Your beard got white." I said, "No shit." He laughed, and I added, "You forget I'm older than you, Tom." He said, "That's a fact." I said, "And smarter, too." He hung his head and said, "Aw, I don't know about that."
We sat at a table in the deli and ordered breakfast. Tom spread a newspaper on the table and studied it. When he was a famous pitcher, he opened the newspaper every morning and studied the previous night's box scores. Now, he studied the weather to check on his "babies."
When I'd called him a few weeks before, very early in the morning, he answered the phone out of breath. I said, "It's me." He said, "I know." I said, "What are you doing?" He said, "I was sleeping until you woke me up." I said, "Oh, geez, Tom, I'm sorry. I forgot the time difference." I heard his evil cackle, and then he said, "I've been up two hours, watching the sun rise." I said, "You prick!" He laughed. I said, "You're out of breath, watching the fucking sun rise?" He snapped, "I was working, for chrissakes, taking care of my babies." I said, "Your grandkids are there?" He said, "No, my babies. My grapes." I said, "Tom, you gotta get a life."
But of course, he had a life, a new one -- Tom Seaver, owner of The Seaver Family Vineyards on Diamond Mountain -- which was why I'd called him in the first place. "One last story," I'd said. "You and your babies." I spent 16 hours driving, waiting in airports, flying, changing planes, driving some more, just to see Tom Seaver again. The greatest right-handed pitcher of the modern baseball era. Twelve-time All Star, three-time Cy Young Award winner, 311-game winner, 2.86 career ERA, more than 3,000 strikeouts. Recipient of the highest-ever percentage of votes, 98.84, of any Hall of Fame member. And, as always, my idol -- as, I am sure, I am his.
When he finally turned to the sports pages to check out the Tigers-Red Sox score in the ALCS, he threw up his hands, knocking off his cap, and grabbed his hair like a frustrated teenager, which in some ways he always was. Detroit's Max Scherzer had pitched brilliantly for seven innings and was beating the Red Sox, 5-1, on a two-hitter, until he was yanked before the eighth inning. His relief pitchers gave up five runs in the next two innings, including David Ortiz's grand slam, for a 6-5 Red Sox win.
Tom screeched like a girl, "Why'd they take Scherzer out?" I said, because his pitch count had reached 109. He screeched again, "Pitch count? Pitch count? Baseball's not brain surgery. You don't look for a reason to take him out. You look for a reason to leave him in! Guys like him and Verlander, their three setup men and closer don't equal them, or else they'd be starting pitchers! I'll tell ya, you wouldn't be able to get Bob Gibson off the mound in the eighth inning." Then he told me a story. Three stories, actually.
When Tom was pitching for the White Sox, as he was approaching his 300th win, he was warming up in the bullpen before a game. Dave Duncan, the pitching coach, watched him throw. He shook his head and said, "Tom, you don't have shit." Tom said, "Yeah, so what?" Tom pointed to the other team's dugout and said, "They don't know that! So what's the problem? By the time they find out, it'll be too late."
A few games later, he was on the mound in the eighth inning with runners on base, when Ozzie Guillen, his young excitable shortstop, came to the mound. Tom said to me, "Ozzie was like a baby robin, always chirping. He thought I was in trouble. He said, 'Hey, Tom. Don' worry, mon, I get you outa' thees. Jus' make 'em heet to me.' So I said to him, 'OK, Ozzie, where do you want me to make them hit it, to your left or your right?' He looked at me and said, 'You serious, mon?' I said, 'Absolutely.' Ozzie's eyes got big and he said, 'Mon, you crazy.' I said, 'Now, Ozzie, that's an entirely different issue.'"
I laughed out loud. Tom reached across the table and tapped his fingers on my arm. "Serious," he said. "I wasn't kidding. If I executed correctly, I could do that."
Then he told me a third story, from his earlier years with the Mets. Again, he was pitching in the later innings with runners on base. Before the catcher threw the ball back to him, Tom crouched like a quarterback in the huddle, propped his elbows on his knees and stared at the dirt. His pitching coach, Rube Walker, came hustling out to the mound. Rube said, "Tom. Tom, you all right? You hurt? Maybe you should come out." Tom looked up at him, as if he had no idea why Rube was there. He said, "What the hell you doing here? This is my mound, get the fuck off it." Rube said, "But Gil [Hodges] thought you may be in trouble." Tom said, "Trouble? I was fucking thinking. Now get the fuck out of here."
Tom's a throwback to the days when pitchers finished what they started. It's part of his workingman's ethos. You don't leave the construction site because you're tired. You put in a full day's work for a full day's pay. Tom started 647 games and finished 231 of them. He pitched until he couldn't get anyone else out, and only then did he leave the game, usually against his will.
"There was no pitch count in those days," Tom said to me. "I regularly threw 135 pitches or more. It's what I was capable of. There should be different rules for different pitchers." I mentioned Justin Verlander, "He's a horse." Tom said, "Then he should have different rules for him." Tom believes young pitchers today hurt their arms because they throw not too many pitches in a game, but too few. Pitchers strengthen their arms by throwing. He mentioned Joba Chamberlain and Stephen Strasburg as examples of pitchers who were babied and still hurt their arms. Who's to know why a pitcher hurts his arm? A mystery. But in today's game, there's no room for mystery, only numbers, statistics, so Scherzer comes out after 109 pitches, and the Tigers lose the game and the series.
The waiter brought our food. A bran muffin and orange juice for Tom, pancakes for me. Tom took a plastic baggy out of his shirt pocket and emptied a bunch of pills on the table. He began popping one after another into his mouth. "Mostly vitamins," he said. "I have stage-three Lyme disease from a deer tick back in Connecticut, years ago. A few months ago, I thought my mind was going. I couldn't remember things." He thought he was suffering from the onset of dementia. He became fearful, withdrawn, for the first time in his life. He was afraid he'd get lost in the New York City streets he used to own. After some tests, it was almost a relief to find out that he had Lyme disease, which could be controlled by vitamins, medicine, diet -- no wine, a cruel irony. And mental stimulation.
That's another reason I was there. To stimulate Tom, or, as he used to put it, to drive him mad with my incessant, intellectually abstract questions. "Tom, did you ever think about innocence?" I once asked. He looked at me. "I mean, if you lose it can you ever get it back?"
"Who thinks about such shit?" he said. "Innocence! You either have it, or you don't."
Ever since I left baseball, I've spent my life thinking about "such shit." Tom has spent his life doing physical work, pitching, gardening, sweating, his hands caked with dirt. It's how we're different. Oscar and Felix. Except in some ways, we're not different. I'm a blue-collar guy, too, but I'm doing a white-collar job. Tom's a blue-collar guy who has hidden his considerable intellect, as if embarrassed by it.
"My brain is almost working again," he said, as he swallowed the last of his pills. "But I still have short-term memory loss." I said, "Me too. We're getting old, Tom." He shrugged, said, "Maybe. Lyme disease makes me sleep a lot, too. I was tired all the time." Then he smiled. "But yesterday I worked 12 hours in the vineyard. That was a great day." I told him I never sleep. Two hours, then awake three hours. He said, "That's 'cause your brain is always working. You have to get it right. You want to sleep? Get Lyme disease."
Then he told me about his daughter, Sarah. When she was 17, she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease. "The doctor told her she'd never have kids, because of the radiation," Tom said. His eyes reddened, but his anger stopped the tears. He said, "I walked out of that doctor's office and said to myself, That doctor doesn't know shit about my daughter." He calmed himself, then added, "She got married and had three sons, boom-boom-boom. I told her, 'Sarah, enough already.' She said, 'Dad, I've never been so happy in my life.'"
We ate in silence for a few moments. Then Tom said, "Did I tell you the Ozzie story?" I said yes, he did. He said, "Oh! I forgot. The Lyme disease. Do you know Ozzie?"
I said, "His wife's beautiful."
"I didn't ask that."
"But she is!"
"Just answer my question. Do. You. Know. Ozzie?"
"I was just giving you some context, writerly details to flesh out the picture." He glared at me. I said, "Yes, I know Ozzie."
"Thank you very much."
"You're still a pain in the ass."
"To you, I am." He laughed. He looked at my empty plate. "Didn't you get anything to eat?" I nodded. "Oh, yeah, you had the … the …"
"Right. You gotta fill in the words for me sometimes." I nodded and changed the subject.
* * *
Ever since I've known Tom, back in 1973, he was an avid gardener. He stuck galvanized nails into the dirt in flowerpots to give his flowers iron. He'd chew tobacco and spit the juice into the pots, saying it was good for the soil. At the deli, he told me that his father used to be in the raisin business in Fresno, but gardening didn't interest him until he got to the big leagues. It was a good way to relax between games. "I love the artistry of it," he said. "Laying out the flowers in aesthetic patterns. But never on days I pitched. I was afraid I might hurt my hand." He went from flowers to grapes and a vineyard, after he'd been out of baseball for about 10 years. It was a natural progression for him -- a return to his home state, back to gardening, and a vineyard -- because he had cultivated a taste for fine wines during his baseball career.
"Outlining a vineyard," he said, "is the same as outlining your pitches for a game, or outlining an artwork. I shouldn't tell you this, 'cause I don't want you to think I didn't value my pitching. But if I could go back and have a second run at it, I'd have become an artist." Instead, now he's just a day laborer in his vineyards. "My vineyard manager is my teacher," he said. "I just do what he tells me. Every day is exciting for me. I get mad when the sun isn't up yet. I'm a single-focus guy. Pitching. The vineyard. I'm the worker. I pick up crap. Trim the vines a little. I did that yesterday for 12 hours, worked all my muscles and slept like a baby."
When Tom first bought his property on the top of Diamond Mountain, he found a place where he could grow Zinfandel grapes for his favorite wine. He hired a vineyard manager, Jim Barbour, who told him, "You don't do Zin on Diamond Mountain. You do Cabernet." Tom grinned and said, "So, I told him, 'That's what I said, Jim. I want to grow grapes for Cabernet.' I don't argue with anyone anymore. I'm on a learning curve. I've reversed the role I had when I pitched. Nobody came to the mound and told me what to do. I'd earned my stripes. Now I ask the questions. I'm a big pain in the ass -- like you. I do what I'm told now, and it's fascinating for me."
After breakfast, we went outside. It was warm now, in the sun. The little town had come alive, the sidewalks crowded with tourists in shorts with backpacks, fanny packs, bottled water. Calistoga is one of those picturesque, 1890, Napa Valley towns: old Victorian houses, red brick buildings renovated into bed-and-breakfast hotels, trendy restaurants, boutiques, wine stores. There was a wine tasting in every third store on Lincoln Avenue, the main drag. Calistoga began as a mining town, silver and mercury, and then became an agricultural area -- grapes, prunes, walnuts. When hot springs were discovered there, it became a health-spa destination, and it still is.
Tom got into his truck. I went to the passenger side and looked through the open window, to tell him I'd follow him to his house in my rent-a-car. The inside of his truck was a mess, vineyard dust coating the interior like a dusty film; Styrofoam coffee cups, tools, papers and crumpled bags littered the seats and the floor. I said, "Geez, Tom, this looks like the kinda' truck a guy drinks out of a paper bag in."
"I told you, I don't drink anymore," he said. "Besides, I keep it this way so no one will want to get in it. But I'm thinking of getting a new one. I saw one at a Ford dealership with a row of lights on the roof. I told the salesman, 'That's the one I want, an F-250 with lights on the roof.' The guy said only the F-350 came with the lights." Tom looked at me with that mischievous grin of his and said, "I told him, 'You wanna sell me a truck, put the fucking lights on the 250.'"
I followed him out of Calistoga, a town ringed with mountains. He turned down a two-lane blacktop, with vineyards on either side and mountains beyond. He parked his truck on the side of the road and got out. I parked behind him and got out. "I just wanted to show you," he said. He pointed to the top of a mountain. "See that tiny little open space at the top?" I nodded. "That's where our house is. We can see the whole valley from there."
We stood in the sun, looking up at the mountain for a moment. Then Tom said, "Did I ever tell you the McCovey story? No, I didn't." So he told me.
Tom used to plan out his game four days before he pitched against a team, the way an artist sketches out a painting. "Pitching is simple," he said. "If you dissect pitching seven days to Sunday, you're done." The first pitch of every inning is the most important. That pitch had to be a strike. The first batter of every inning was the most important. He had to get that batter out. He tried never to put the potential winning run on base with a walk, or, God forbid, an intentional walk. (Once, when pitching for the White Sox, his manager, Tony La Russa, came to the mound and told him to intentionally walk the potential winning runner. Tom refused. He told me, "Tony always thought too much, until I trained him.")
Tom Seaver's Rules for Pitching, as methodical as a CPA. Another rule was: A pitcher should never get beat in a crisis situation with anything but his best pitch. Tom's best pitch was a 98-mph fastball that he could throw wherever he wanted to.
Finally, a pitcher must always avoid his W.C.S. He told me, "I always tried to avoid my Worst Case Scenario, and if I couldn't, I had to have a plan on how to deal with it when it came up. This one game against the Giants, you can guess what my W.C.S. was." I said, "Willie McCovey, with the bases loaded." He said, "Thank you very much. So what do you think happens in the late innings?" I smiled. He said, "Thank you very much. Willie McCovey, up with the bases loaded. So I'm saying to myself, 'OK, big boy, you think you're so hot, a couple of Cy Youngs, what do you do now?'"
There, by the side of a road between vineyards in Calistoga, 30 years later, he looked at me as if he were seeing that moment right now. Big Willie McCovey, waiting at the plate, the bat on his shoulder. Tom said, "This is my all-time favorite moment in baseball. I managed to get 3-2 on Willie, and all of a sudden, it came to me. I'm in my stretch, and I keep checking the runner on first. Now, everyone knows the runner can't go anywhere, the fucking bases are loaded, so what is Seaver doing? I keep checking him, refusing to make eye contact with Willie, throwing him a little birdseed, getting him to think, 'What the fuck is Seaver doing?' I wanted him to be anxious, confused."
He stopped talking. I blurted out, "So what happened!"
"I struck him out on a changeup. Twenty years later, we're at the Hall of Fame, and Willie says to me, 'Tom, why the hell did you throw me a changeup in that game?'"
"Why did you?" I said. "You broke your own rule."
"That's the point, big boy. Everyone knew how methodical I was. How this pitch had to be a fastball. I was Tom Seaver. So this time, I went on instinct." He looked at me with a grin. "Even Tom Seaver has to acknowledge mystery in life."
* * *
A few minutes later, I was driving behind Tom's truck up Diamond Mountain Road. It was very steep, narrow and curving, with a dark canopy of trees hanging over it. There were no guardrails, only the soft dirt on the side of the road and a steep falloff that tumbled down the mountain. We passed a few mailboxes by the side of the road and driveways that went far back into the woods, where houses and vineyards were. Tom pulled his truck off onto a driveway, stopped at an electronically controlled gate, opened it and drove through. I followed for a few hundred yards until the driveway dipped down a bit, and suddenly we were in front of his house, perched on the edge of the mountain.
It was one of those low, ultramodern homes out of Architectural Digest, glass walls everywhere and dun-colored wood that blended into the mountain. We went into the kitchen. Tom introduced me to his other daughter, Anne. The Seaver Family Vineyards is truly a family-run operation. Anne, Nancy and Tom's nephew's wife run the business side. Tom does the grunt work. I saw Nancy to my left, at her desk in the loft, talking on the phone. Tom said, "Nancy's in charge of the business side. I can't concentrate on that stuff 'cause of the Lyme disease. Besides, I hate sitting at a desk."
Anne said, "Dad, Mom's so smart when it comes to business."
"Yeah, she always had this thing about not going to college," Tom said. "This is good for her." Tom and Nancy have been married for more than 45 years. Tom told me that the secret was, "Nancy accepted [that] we didn't live a normal life. I could tell her what I did at the office if I had a good day, and if I didn't have a good day, she knew I wasn't talking to anybody. She accepted it." Today, with Tom's short-term memory loss, Nancy watches over him. She leaves notes all over the house to remind him of things, like meeting me for breakfast this morning.
Anne excused herself and went upstairs to help her mother. Tom gave me a tour of the house, with its poured, concrete floors and wide, open spaces, one room flowing into the next, only a few of the rooms separated by walls. Tom pointed to an Andy Warhol painting of himself as a young pitcher. It was just a photograph, surrounded by a few colorful splashes of paint. He pointed to two smaller paintings on the inside of the exterior wall. They were identical paintings of a spade from a deck of cards, except that one was painted in vivid colors and the other in black and white. "Richard Diebenkorn," Tom said. "My favorite artist. I wish I could paint like him." Diebenkorn was a master, especially reknowed in California, who was equally successful painting abstract and representational pictures. He had a reputation for being a blue-collar, hardworking artist without pretensions.
We went into Tom's small office. It looked unused, as if Tom rarely sat behind his desk, but it was still perfectly decorated with his baseball memorabilia, photos of himself, teammates, other famous players, his parents, his daughters. There were books, too, and old, scuffed baseballs on aluminum racks that ran up an entire wall. He showed me a copy of Hank Aaron's autobiography, inscribed by Hank to Tom.
"My favorite player," Tom said.
"Why? He's not a pitcher."
"I wasn't just a pitcher. I was a baseball fan. These guys were my heroes. I love the history of the game." He shook his head with disgust. "Guys today don't care about the game's history." Then he remembered that I had signed with the Braves in 1959. He said, "Did you know Hank?"
I said, "Yes. I went to spring training with him in 1960. I pitched against him in an intra-squad game."
"How'd you do?"
"Walked him on four pitches. The story of my career." Tom laughed.
He showed me some of his cherished baseballs. A scuffed Babe Ruth League ball. The ball he threw for the last out of his 300th win. The ball he used for his 20th victory, the first time he won 20 games. His prized possession though, was a scuffed Little League ball from 1957. He held it up for me and said, "I pitched a perfect game."
I said, "I pitched four perfect games in Little League and struck out every batter I faced in each one."
He said, "Yeah, well, you gotta move on, big boy."
He was right, of course. I never bring up my baseball past with anyone but Tom. It's childlike, an irrational compulsion to remind him that I pitched, too. I once sent him a photograph of me in a Milwaukee Braves uniform, taken at County Stadium in 1959. I was on the field, standing between Warren Spahn and Braves pitching coach Whitlow Wyatt. Spahn and I were smiling at each other. I was 18. That photo was my way of saying to Tom, "See, Tom! I was good once! Like you!"
Just then, Nancy and Anne came into the office. Nancy gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. I said, "You don't have to say it, Nancy. I know. I haven't changed a bit." She looked at my white beard, fluttered her eyelashes and said, "Pat, you haven't changed a bit."
We all laughed.
I said, "I heard you've become quite the businesswoman."
"Well," she said, "for years I was just eye candy."
I said, "Nancy, you were never just eye candy." She had been a tanned, beautiful, California blonde when I first met her, in 1973. She's still beautiful in her 60s, with blonde hair and sharp cheekbones that could be Slavic or Native American. In all the times I met her, she always had a sly remove. She was enigmatic, unreadable, like January Jones in Mad Men. Her husband was the obvious one, a big, emotional, blustering teenager. Nancy was the mystery.
We explained to Anne how we'd known each other for 40 years but haven't seen each other much in the past 20. When he was still pitching, a lot of my communication with Tom was over the phone. I'd call him up after a game and say, "It's me." He'd say, "I know. What do you want?" I'd say, "You're throwing too many breaking balls." He'd say, "You really think so." I'd say, "Absolutely." He'd say, "What the fuck do you know?"
I said to Anne and Nancy, "Tom's always been jealous of my fastball." Nancy tilted her head slightly and said, "Really? I didn't know that." I nodded and said, "Of course, he'll never admit it."
Tom bellowed, "Yeah, and between the two of us, we won 311 major league games."
I said, "I tell everyone that."
Anne looked at us both, then said to her mother, "Dumb and Dumber."
It has not escaped me over the years that Tom's and my vaudeville routine, Frick and Frack, might seem tiresome to others. Childish even. But it's always been our way of connecting with each other after long absences. We don't know how each other's lives have unfolded during those absences. Happiness, tragedy, Sarah's Hodgkin's disease, my wife's breast cancer. When I'm not interviewing Tom for a story, we don't talk about those things, except in a general way.
I ask him if he's happy. He'll say, "Yes. I have my wife, my kids, my grandkids, my dogs, my work in the vineyards. And you?" I say, "The same, wife and dogs and my work." He'll say, "That's all anyone needs." Then we'll slip quickly into our vaudeville routine, as if embarrassed by our small intimacies, and Tom can assume the role of the long-suffering Sundance Kid, burdened by Butch Cassidy's incessant questions, interruptions and delusions of past glory: "You just keep thinking, Pat. That's what you're good at."
* * *
Tom and I went outside to the back deck that looked out over his property, on a brilliantly sunny afternoon that was now hot. His terraced vineyards were off to our left, his swimming pool below us. The Napa Valley and the Palisades mountains were all around, off in the distance. He said he had found these few, then-undiscovered acres because they were all overgrown, trees and scrub. He cleared the land, got in water and electricity, had his house built and laid out his vines.
"The grapes get the south sun," he said, "which is a big deal, apparently."
Today, his Seaver Family Vineyards is a small, highly respected, boutique winery, producing about 600 cases a year. He makes a good profit, enough to live on. "I wasn't afraid to do this," he said, "I didn't want to go to the end of my life and wish I had done it. I don't want to retire, but now the winery is pretty self-sufficient. I'll probably turn it over to the family in a few years, but there's not much more we can do with it. The next thing I want to do is paint. I want to paint these mountains, but I could never paint at the level of Diebenkorn. You know, I used to draw pictures when I was on the road, in my playing days."
It is not odd that Tom equates his gardening, his winery and his painting aspirations with his pitching successes. He sees them all as intertwined, aesthetic enterprises meant to give himself, and others, pleasure. The label on his wine bottles reads: "May you enjoy this wine as much as I enjoy the journey of bringing it to you from day-to-day, month-to-month, season-to-season."
I asked him if it was hard to convince Nancy to leave Greenwich and New York City, to come out here to this seclusion. He said, "She was a little uncertain. We had this beautiful, renovated barn in Greenwich, antique furniture, her garden club, bowling team. But I told her I had to see if I could do this. If I stayed in Greenwich, I'd be Tom Seaver for the rest of my life. I'd die there. Now, she's bought into it, she has her house here, and she's part of something with the business." He glanced at me. "I'm not supposed to wear shoes in the house. I can't bring my dogs in, either. I used to sleep with my dogs when I was a kid in Fresno, because we had no heat. Imagine, me, a kid from Fresno, in New York City. You know they're going to name a street after me in Fresno. 'Seaver Way.'"
He went silent for a moment, looking out over his property. Finally he said, "This was a blank palette when I first saw it. Now it's the most exciting thing I've ever done."
Before we went to the vineyards, he wanted to show me something else. He pointed down to a sculpture by the lip of the swimming pool, overgrown with brush and falling down the mountain. We both hobbled down the stairs and walked to the end of the pool. I had fallen off my stairs the day before I'd come to California, hurting my leg, and Tom was limping, too. I got on the lip to walk around to the sculpture. The lip was narrow. Tom said, "If you fall off, I'm not jumping in." So instead, we both walked through the brush that sloped down, holding on to each other's arms so we wouldn't fall.
* * *
We walked between the rows of vines, up and down the steep terraces in the hot sun. Tom's three Labrador Retrievers romped around us. Big, playful, doofus dogs with their tongues hanging out. He told me their names. "Major, Bandy, Bricks." I said, "Bricks, like in chimney bricks?" He said, "No, Brix." I said, "Bricks?" He said, "No, Brix." I said, "Who's on first?" He didn't get it, so I said, "Spell it." He spelled, "B-R-I-X. It's French for the sugar content in grapes."
We stopped at a vine drooping with clusters of grapes. He snipped off a cluster and handed it to me. I held it over my head, like in one of those old paintings of Roman orgies, and ate the small, black, sweet grapes off the cluster. "Delicious," I said. Tom explained that each variety of grapes had different characteristics that you could only tell by tasting them. That's why each row was numbered.
I said, "Very good, Thomas. You always did explain things precise."
"Ly," he said. "Precise-ly. You're supposed to be the fucking writer, and you don't know your grammar."
"OK. Precise-ly."
"Thank you very much. You know I got a journalism degree from USC." Irony of ironies! Tom Seaver, trying to impress me.
I said, "Yeah, and I had a better fastball than you."
But he went on. "I was always like that about pitching. I had to be precise. I couldn't just mail it in!" Then he began to explain more about his vines, about the cordon and proper height for each vine. I tuned him out and ate my grapes, the juices running down my sweatshirt. He looked at me, annoyed, and said, "Pay attention. I'm gonna give you a fucking lesson."
"I don't want a fucking lesson."
"That doesn't matter. I'm giving you one. Now, if the secondary fruit grows too high, you have to snip it off or else they'll take energy from the vines."
I feigned interest. "How high?"
"Each row has to be only to a height of 14."
"Fourteen what? Inches, feet?"
"I don't know. It's just a standard height. Stop asking questions and just listen. This is important, for Chrissakes. If you didn't talk so much you might learn something. If the vines are too high, you have to trim them." He reached up with his snips and trimmed a vine.
"Oh, I see. The height of each vine is a template for the row. Your job is to go down the row trimming the tops, to make them conform to the template. I can see how the monotony of this appeals to your precise, fucking methodical nature. It's therapy for you."
"Bullshit. You think too much. You always did."
"I had a better fastball than you."
"In your dreams."
"I did."
"Yeah, and between us we won 311 major league games."
"Abso-fucking-lutely! I tell everybody that!"
I asked him if he'd still have his vineyards if he hadn't missed out on today's big baseball paydays. Tom made more than a million dollars a year only twice in his career. If he were pitching in his prime today, he'd be making $30 million a year.
"I started to lose interest," he said. "I wanted to go home. I couldn't do it anymore. I never was pissed I missed the big paydays. Be careful what you wish for, you might get it. If I'd made that $30 million a year, maybe I'd just have bought that huge, finished vineyard and let others do it all. I'd have missed out on the pleasure of being in the vineyards every day. My pleasure has always been in the work, not the ego."
I told him that when I first got to Calistoga, I asked people in town where Tom Seaver's vineyards were. Nobody knew. I said, "You do know Tom Seaver lives here?" They shrugged. I said, "You do know who Tom Seaver is, don't you?" No.
"I like it like that," he said, "not being known. I put up an emotional barrier. You know, Stan Musial used to say hello to everybody. I can't do that. It's all one way with me. I'd rather learn about someone else than be Tom Seaver. Oh, you're an ankle doctor. Where'd you go to school? Was your dad a doctor? No? He was a coal miner?" He looked at me and said, "Now you got a pretty good story. I love the story stuff."
I said, "You mean rising action, climax and denouement." He looked at me as if I was speaking a foreign language. I said, "I got that from Susie. She was a theater actress for years. I used to run her lines with her. She was like you, fucking methodical. She'd memorize all the other actors' lines in a play, in case they forgot them."
"I like her already," he said. "Baseball is theater, too, only no script. McCovey has a say in the action, not only me."
* * *
In a way, Tom was something of a recluse, even at the height of his fame. He did not want much to do with the world beyond baseball. Outside the game, he cultivated a studied dullness, but Tom was a gregarious guy with his teammates. The clubhouse was a respite from his reclusive nature. Now, left to his own devices, he's let that reclusiveness take over his life. Long, solitary days in the vineyards. They may be good for his psyche, but not for his Lyme disease. He can't exercise his memory if each day in solitude is like the last.
Tom told me a story once. He was 28, at the height of his fame with the Mets. One day he was pitching a game so superbly that its result was a foregone conclusion, to him, at least. He went into the clubhouse between innings to change his shirt, and the "clubhouse kid" told him, "Players aren't supposed to be here between innings." Tom told me, "That kid always used to bust my chops, so I asked if he wanted to play a game of gin rummy." They played while Tom kept his ear tuned to the game on the radio. When it was his time to go back out to the mound, he warned the kid, "Don't you dare look at my cards, I'll be right back." He got three quick outs and returned to his clubhouse card game. He told me, "It was one of those days, Pat, give me a run and the game's done. I got back to the clubhouse and asked the kid if he'd looked at my cards. He said no, so we began again. Then my roomie, Buddy Harrelson came in. He saw me and said, 'Roomie, what're you doin'?' I told him I was playing rummy between innings. What's it look like? Buddy shook his head and said, 'Man, you're crazy!' I said, 'Now, that's a different issue.'"
On this hot afternoon walking among his vines, I wondered why someone like Tom, who loved the company of men in the clubhouse, had turned his back on it. I asked him why he hadn't become a manager or a pitching coach. He said, "Because no one ever asked me." And he was too proud to ask them. He was, after all, Tom Seaver, the greatest pitcher of his age. That's what his contemporaries, Gibson, Don Sutton, Jim Palmer, Juan Marichal, called him.
He was tired now, he said. "Let's go sit in my office." His vineyard office was a circle of trees with two chairs in the open space in the center of the trees. We sat there in the cool shade. His Labs lay around us and went to sleep.
"They've got to be the laziest dogs," I said.
"That's the way to get on my bad side," he said. "Dissing my dogs."
"But they don't do anything."
"They do when they have to. Chase away the deer and scare off the coyotes. All I have to say to them is one word. Kill!" We sat there for a few minutes, and then he said, "I come here when it's hot and I'm tired. I do the crossword puzzles." He looked at me. "I don't believe the way I'm talking today, relative to three months ago."
I asked him what the turning point in his life was. He said, "When I joined the Marines when I was 17." Tom had been just an average-sized kid in high school, and only the third or fourth best pitcher on his team. "All I cared about was baseball," he said. "I was not a good student. Fractions to me were like the Rosetta Stone. I failed advanced algebra in my junior year. My dad was not happy. So I went to summer school, worked my butt off and got a D. My teacher said, 'I'll give you a C if you promise never to take another math course in your life.'"
So, after high school, with no professional baseball or college offers, he joined the Marines. He got taller, heavier, stronger, and most of all, he said, "I learned discipline, discipline, discipline. Somebody says, 'Do it,' you do it, and eventually you come out the other end, and you're proud." He also came out the other end with an improved fastball that got him a scholarship to USC, and later, a bonus contract with the Mets. He got 16 wins (for a lousy team) in his first year with the Mets and was voted Rookie of the Year. He never looked back.
I asked him who were his idols in those days. He said, "My older brother, Charles. He was a beautiful man, 6-foot-4, dark hair like my dad. He had a huge intellect. He wrote poetry, was a sculptor and lived in lower Manhattan. Whenever he'd see me pitch, he always asked me the same question: 'What does it feel like to strike out 14 batters?' I told him it all had to do with how I prepared for a game, how my brain went to a different level three days before I faced a batter, how I created a situation in a game I prepared for. I explained it in artistic terms for him, like it was an artwork you created, physically and mentally." He looked across at me, his eyes reddening with tears, and said, "Charles died of cancer when he was 55."
We got up and walked back to my car in silence. I understood now why Tom was so dismissive of intellectual abstractions. His brother was the brain, so Tom mapped out a more physical persona for himself. Before I left, Tom told me to come back at 6:30 a.m., to watch the sun come up over the mountain with him. It was his ritual every morning, before he went to work in the vineyards in the cool, gray morning. Then, as I backed my car out, I saw him take out a worn little notebook from his jeans pocket, to write down my name, the date and the time I'd arrive.
* * *
Early the next morning, in darkness, Tom and I stood in his vineyards, staring off at the mountains, waiting for the sun. His three Labs snorfled around us. Tom was drinking his coffee. I was smoking my cigar. He looked at it and said, "You're gonna burn down the whole fucking mountain." So I let it go out. We stood side by side, like two old-stone savages, waiting for the miracle of the sun they didn't understand.
Tom asked if he'd ever told me his Ron Hunt story. I said no, but Hunt had been my teammate one year in the minors, and he went on to a 12-year career with the Mets and four other teams. He was famous for crowding the plate to get hit by pitches. Tom said, "I faced him this time and threw him a high, inside fastball, and followed through and lost sight of him. When I looked up, there was a pop fly over my head. I caught it for an out, I thought. And then I looked back to home plate, and there was Ron, sprawled in the dirt, unconscious. I'd hit him right in the head." I told him Hunt was a pain in the ass to pitch to, always crowding the plate, slapping foul balls. "He drove me nuts," I said. "You did good hitting the sonofabitch in the head. I tried to hit him once in a spring training game. Didn't even come close. Walked him on four pitches." Tom laughed. I looked at him. "You think it's funny? It wouldn't be funny if it had been your fucking career."
Just then, the sun came up on cue, click, like stage lights in a theater. It was a pale, reddish-blue color on an overcast day. Tom was disappointed. He'd wanted me to see it in all its fiery glory. Still, the sun's pale light on the vineyards was eerie and beautiful, the vines all darkish shadows without color, until they became a dark green flecked with purple as the sun rose higher, like a French Impressionist painting.
Tom said, "In a way, I'm painting this vineyard as if it was my artwork."
I said, "Yeah, well, I'm doing the same with you. You're like this big, blank block of marble I'm chipping away at. I'm gonna sculpt a Seaver."
For the next hour, I let Tom work in silence. I watched him go up and down the rows, picking up bits of paper or plastic, anything that marred the beauty of his artwork. He studied the top of a vine that was maybe an inch higher than the rest of the row. Then he snipped it to fit the template. He reminded me of the farmer in Robert Frost's poem, "Mending Wall": Good fences make good neighbors. But who was Tom keeping out?
He was such a contradiction, a recluse who loved the company of men. Was he lonely up here? I remembered how he'd reacted at breakfast the day before, when I told him about Justin Verlander. He asked me a dozen questions about Verlander. I told him how Verlander and I argued over who was better, today's players, or players from my generation and before. He said today's players were better hitters, with their short, compact swings, compared to the longer swings of Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio. Tom piped up, "Yeah, but those older guys had multiple swings, depending on the situation. Today's hitters have just one swing, for the fences."
I told him Verlander was a tough pitcher. Great overhand fastball and curve. But he wasn't as smart as Tom, or as disciplined. When he got in trouble, he didn't know what to do, except just throw harder. Tom said, "He sounds like my kinda guy. An old-time pitcher." Then he looked at me and said, "Do you know him well?" I said, "Well enough. Why?" Tom said, as if a little embarrassed, "Maybe the next time you talk to him, you could tell him I'd like to talk to him. He could come up and visit sometime."
When it was fully light, we walked back to his truck to go into town. We were going to meet the photographer, Kelley, who would take Tom's picture this morning for my story. She had driven up from Berkeley, so we told her we'd buy her breakfast at the deli.
I got into the passenger side of his truck. "Geez, this thing is filthy," I said. "I'm gonna have to burn my clothes tonight."
"I like it this way," he said.
"Yeah, so everyone will know you're a working man," I said. He drove the truck onto Diamond Mountain Road, and we moved down the steep, curvy, dangerous path. I said, "You know, I worked construction once. When I came back from baseball, I dug ditches. I learned there's an art to digging an even ditch. You don't stab the shovel at the dirt with your arms. You use your leg, pushing the shovel into the dirt with your foot."
He looked across at me. "And I never figured that out? There was a reason they put a little flange on the shovel? All these years I was doing it wrong, until you just told me how to do it right."
"I'm glad I taught you something."
"Yeah, the Art of Shovelry."
"Wow! Big boy, watch where the fuck you're going! You're gonna drive us off this fucking mountain."
Still looking at me with an evil grin, he said, "Now you're gonna teach me to drive, too?"
"Yeah, and then I'll teach you how to pitch."
"Good. I'll teach you how to write. You don't even know proper grammar."
"Fuck you."
The trees hanging over the road like a canopy made it seem as if we were still driving in darkness. We must have been thinking the same thing. Tom said, "The woods are lovely, dark and deep." I said, "And we have miles to go before we sleep -- so keep your eyes on the road."
"I thought I'd give you a little something to make you feel good about yourself."
We ate breakfast with Kelley, the photographer. She was in her 20s, tall, slim, blonde. She picked at her food while Tom and I performed for her, two bratty school kids sniping at each other -- Frick and Frack, Felix and Oscar, the Katzenjammer Kids, Dumb and Dumber. While we ragged each other, Kelley surreptitiously raised her camera and snapped our picture. She seemed not to know what to make of these two old guys acting like lovesick schoolboys, trying to charm her. What were we going to do next, pull her hair? She had assumed, at least, that this writer and this famous ballplayer would be grownups!
Kelley followed Tom's truck up Diamond Mountain Road in her Prius. Tom drove more slowly now, so she could keep up. When we reached the mountaintop, Tom checked in his rearview mirror to make sure Kelley was behind us, then turned down his driveway. He was quiet for a moment, as if something had been bothering him.
Finally, he said, serious now, "Did you really throw harder than me?"
I laughed. "The truth? Probably not. My best shot was 95, 96. But I had a great overhand curve. Straight down. If I didn't throw it in the dirt or over the batter's head, it was unhittable." Tom laughed now. I said, "My manager called it 'The Unfair One'."
While Tom posed for Kelley in the rows of his grapevines, I went into his "vineyard office," in the midst of the trees. I watched Tom pose, smile, it all coming back to him now: the right camera angle, one hand on his hip, the other draped over a vine, slouchy-hipped. So natural with the camera aimed at him, in a way only famous people can be.
Later, we all walked back to the cars and stood around for a few minutes, while Kelley snapped a few more pictures of Tom and me.
Tom said, "Did I ever tell you my 'Boomer' story?" Boomer had been a young catcher who caught some of Tom's games, later in his career. One night, Boomer started the game so zonked out on greenies, he forgot to give Tom a sign for each pitch. Finally, Tom called out to him from the mound: "Get your ass out here, Boomer. Put some fucking numbers down." Boomer, with his drug-fueled bravado, said, "If you're so goddamned good, you won't need any signs." Tom said, "OK with me, you gotta catch them."
I interrupted Tom. "Was he serious?"
"I'm telling the fucking story. Just be quiet and don't ask questions."
"What'd he do if he was guessing fastball and you threw a slider?"
"Not my problem. Will you just listen? I'm building a story here. In creative writing, you've got to set the reader up for the … the …"
"… the climax and the denouement." Tom laughed. I said, "So what happened?"
"I'm trying to tell you, but you keep interrupting."
"Did you win the game?"
Tom threw up his hands in frustration and exhaled a great breath. "All right, you win. Yes, I won the game."
"End of story," I said. Tom glared at me.
After Kelley left, I thanked Tom for his time. "I had fun," I said.
"I can't believe the way I've been talking today," he said.
We shook hands, and I got in my car. Tom stood by my window. Then he leaned over to get closer to me. He said, with wonder, "You know, I can still see every pitch."
* * *
Pat Jordan is a freelance writer living in Abbeville, S.C. He is the author of A False Spring and 10 other books, and has written for The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Harper's, Sports Illustrated, Playboy, GQ, Rolling Stone, Men's Journal and many others.

subset: commoncrawl


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Flash: Berkeley Fire Caused by Punctured Gas Line
An underground gas line near the driveway of a Berkeley home was punctured by a worker doing excavation today, causing a fire that burned the front of the home and a van parked outside, Berkeley fire officials said.
The fire was reported at 1710 Martin Luther King Jr. Way at 2:28 p.m.
It was initially reported as a car fire, but when Berkeley police arrived they realized the blaze was threatening the home and firefighters enacted a full one-alarm response, acting Deputy Fire Chief Avery Webb said.
Flames were spreading to the eaves along the home's roof line, and had engulfed the van's rear compartment, he said.
Crews used a hose line to contain the flames and stripped off a 15- to 20-foot section of the eaves to prevent the fire from spreading. No fire got inside the house, which is home to eight or nine people, Webb said.
Firefighters then turned their attention to the burning van, using hose lines to contain the fire.
Webb said the gas pipeline was left burning because it was safer to allow the gas to burn than risk having it escape into nearby houses and vehicles where it could create an explosion risk.
PG&E was called to the scene and arrived at 2:56 p.m. but had difficulty accessing the line that had been punctured. Crews dug a hole to reach the line and finally shut off the flow of gas and stopped the fire at 3:58 p.m., Webb said.
PG&E spokesman Jason King said the homeowner had hired a day laborer to do sewer work on the property but the worker did not call PG&E to find out where the underground gas lines were before digging.
The contractor ended up hitting the line with a pick, puncturing it and igniting the gas, possibly through sparks created by striking metal, King said. King said it is important that anyone doing any kind of underground work call 811 to check on the location of PG&E gas lines to avoid accidents that could risk lives and property.


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Holidays in Tramin an der Weinstraße/Termeno sulla Strada del Vino
Holidays in Tramin/Termeno are all about wine. The village is the home of the famous autochthonous grape variety called Gewürztraminer. Surrounded by vineyards and orchards along the South Tyrolean Wine Road, Tramin is located just a few km from the warmest and largest bathing lake in South Tyrol, the famed Kalterer See. The gothic parish church is the symbol of Tramin and is the highest walled, free-standing church tower in South Tyrol. In addition to wine and indulgence, discover the magnificent landscape, as well as fantastic possibilities for hiking and cycling, awaiting holidaymakers in Tramin.


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Respite Care
When home care givers need a break from the challenge of caring for an elderly or infirm family member, Grosvenor Park is there to step in and help out. We provide a short-term, home-away-from-home where compassionate care is unsurpassed. And because our facility is so comfortable, their stay — whether a couple of days or a couple of weeks — will feel like a welcome vacation. Our seamless admissions process and our welcoming staff make the transition smooth and effortless. Like all our residents, Respite Care guests receive all the amenities of our Favor™ customer satisfaction program.


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Scott noted earlier today that the currency war is underway, with countries around the world debasing their money to disguise the fact that they can't control their spending. While the phenomenon is becoming worldwide, some countries are ahead of others. Like Argentina.
ZeroHedge comments on Argentina's utterly pathetic decision to freeze supermarket prices:
Up until now, Argentina's descent into a hyperinflationary basket case, with a crashing currency and loss of outside funding was relatively moderate and controlled. All this is about to change. Today, in a futile attempt to halt inflation, the government of Cristina Kirchner announced a two-month price freeze on supermarket products. The price freeze applies to every product in all of the nation's largest supermarkets…. As AP reports, "The commerce ministry wants consumers to keep receipts and complain to a hotline about any price hikes they see before April 1."
Perhaps they will. What consumers will certainly do is scramble into local stores to take advantage of artificially-controlled prices knowing very well they have two short months to stock up on perishable goods at today's prices, before the country's inflation comes soaring back, only this time many of the local stores will not be around as their profit margins implode and as owners, especially of foreign-based chains, make the prudent decision to get out of Dodge while the getting's good and before the next steps, including such measures as nationalization, in the escalation into a full out hyperinflationary collapse, are taken by Argentina's female ruler.
Presumably all of our readers know how stupid price controls are. Inflation is out of control in Argentina, and the government has responded by threatening to jail economists who dissent from the government's fictitious numbers. That's one measure the Obama administration apparently hasn't thought of yet.
In other news Argentina, just like the rest of the "developed" world, appears to have a slight inflation tracking problem:
Polls show Argentines worry most about inflation, which private economists estimate could reach 30 percent this year. The government says it's trying to hold the next union wage hikes to 20 percent, a figure that suggests how little anyone believes the official index that pegs annual inflation at just 10 percent.
It couldn't happen here, right? Don't be too sure about that:
The BLS has the solution: just exclude any product whose price is rising from your CPI calculation, and voila. For everything else there is a hedonic adjustment.
The ironic comparison to the US does not end there however:
A more effective way to contain inflation would be to "reduce government spending, which is financing an expansion of the money supply, and to have a credible price index."
Wait, are they still talking about Argentina or the US?
The government announced the price freeze on the first business day after the International Monetary Fund formally censured Argentina for putting out inaccurate economic data. The IMF has given Argentina until September to bring its inflation and economic growth statistics up to international standards. If Argentina doesn't comply, it could face expulsion from the world body in November.
So to summarize: first capital controls, then a currency crisis, then expectations of sovereign default, then a rise in military tensions, and finally – price controls, after which all out chaos usually follows.
Study this sequence well: it is coming to every "developed" country near you in the months and years ahead.
But we shouldn't be too pessimistic; there is always an upside, right? Like the fact that the stock market is rising. That's happening in Argentina. Unless, of course, you take into account the declining value of that country's currency:
But, as with every other hyperinflationary implosion, there is a silver lining: the stock market is soaring…
… at least in Peso terms. When priced in USD, the 360% stock market "rise" is more like -9% in the past 21 years. But luckily, the general public has a gene that prevents it from grasping the difference between nominal and real – something Ben Bernanke is very well aware of.
Some people are excited about the fact that the Dow Jones average is flirting with 14,000. I'm not: it was around 12,000, in nominal terms, thirteen years ago, and was higher than it is today–again, in nominal terms–in October 2007, five and one half years ago. The market is finally getting back to where it was before the crashes of 2002 and 2008-09, just in time for another crash. Just keep telling yourself, it could be worse: we could be Argentina.


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Building on existing partnerships and a wide network of historic sites, Viva Florida promotes cultural heritage locations and events around the state. To support our partners, Viva Florida has a number of ways to get involved to highlight Florida history and cultural heritage statewide. Please take a moment to explore how your organization may participate in this ongoing statewide promotion of Florida using the links below.
National Travel & Tourism Week Social Media Campaign
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I was on Catholic Answers Live Friday (7/20/21) to discuss the heated topic of "Homosexuality and the Bible." The phones really lit up with this topic. Below in green and brown are the questions I answered. (To stream on-line click HERE, for other listening options and podcasts, click HERE.)
There are many who push the gay agenda shouting, "Jesus was not a homophobe!" and "Jesus was nice, not hateful like you Christians." Now there are "gay theologians" who attempt to prove that Jesus was gay and that the Bible does not condemn homosexuality; rather, they say, the Bible actually approves of homosexuality.
Catholics will need to understand this issue clearly, biblically and with the mind of the Church. We need to defend ourselves, the truth, morality, and the family — and to clearly demonstrate why we oppose the gay lifestyle. At the same time we need to love the sinner while hating the sin.
The Gay Agenda will become more and more of an issue — actually a tyranny of intolerance. Christians, especially Catholics, are already called homophobes, bigots, old fashioned and un-Christlike. Gays do not just want to be accepted and treated equally — they want us to approve of the depravity and to celebrate their perversions. Anything less and you are a bigot!
Here are several articles I've written on the topic for further information:
– Was Jesus Homosexual? Some Say "Yes" and Try to Prove it from the Bible?
– "Jesus was not a Homophobe" – Allowing a T-Shirt in School
– More Discussion on Jesus and Homosexuality
– Homosexual Genes in Humans and Animals?
– Interesting article by Angela O'Brian: "Can Two Men Just Be Friends Anymore?"
Questions I Answered on Catholic Answers Live about Homosexuality
1. In the story of Sodom the men want the male messengers to come out so they may "know them." Is this referring to homosexual activity?
2. Are the Gay Parades and other such events becoming more prevalent and is government starting to promote this kind of thing?
3. How do we respond to the argument that homosexuality is found in nature, and that animals practice it?
4. Can you recommend resources to learn about freedom of speech and how to to learn about defending the Church's freedom to speak out about homosexuality?
5. What is the best response to my Catholic homosexual brother (and his Catholic partner) who says that if God allowed them to be this way why would he not allow them to live out their lifestyle?
6. I have a homosexual Christian friend who was ready to leave the lifestyle when his gay friends ganged up on him and convinced him to stay living gay. Do you know of any support groups to help people in his situation?
7. Are you familiar with the book Same-sex Unions in Premodern Europe by John Boswell? (I had not hear of this book but discovered later it is a huge fraud which is explained by Jimmy Akin's site below). See also First Things article.
8. How is a person to understand their own sexuality (regardless of orientation) according to the Catholic Church?
The Catechism and Scripture are clear: Here are two paragraphs from the Catechism:
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered." They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
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Danielle Clark
Lincoln High Warren, MI Class of 1999
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|Head Men's Coach
|(916) 278-7975
|Previous College:
|Chico State, '08
Christopher Hall was elevated to head men's
golf coach at Sacramento State during the spring of 2011. Hall had
been an assistant with the team since being hired by the Hornets in
August of 2010.
Hall made an immediate impact as head coach, guiding the Hornets to a second place finish at the America Sky Championships during his first season. The following year, Sacramento State won by an amazing 42 strokes and earned the school's first NCAA Div. I Regional apearance.
In 2012, Hall coached Ryan Williams and Jordan Weir to the NCAA Pullman Regional where both qualified as individuals. Williams set the school single-season scoring record (72.69) during the year and was named the school's Male Student-Athlete of the Year as well as the American Sky Scholar-Athlete of the Year. Weir was the medalist at the America Sky Tournament.
That same season, Hall organized the Sacramento State Invitational at Valley Hi Country Club. The tournament brought in 14 teams from around the nation for the largest Div. I field in school history.
"The Invitational is a great event to get the community involved and will be a great avenue for our alumni to stay connected to the program," Hall said.
Several former Sacramento State golfers who were coached by Hall are currently playing on mini tours including Wililams, Grant and Cameron Rappleye and Jake Johnson.
Prior to coming to Sacramento State, Hall served as the volunteer assistant coach at Fresno State for the past two seasons. While with the Bulldogs, he helped guide Hali Coppin to an individual Western Athletic Conference title and also an appearance at the Women's U.S. Open Qualifier.
Along with his coaching duties, Hall also spent time with members of the men's and women's golf team and swimming and diving as a sport psychologist.
A native of Murphys, Calif., Hall played collegiately at Butte and Cabrillo junior colleges before transferring to Chico State. He earned his bachelor's degree in kinesiology from Chico State and later added a master's in sports psychology from Fresno State.
He and his wife, Shannon, reside in Sacramento with their son Wyatt.


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Basic handheld vibration sensor
Machine monitoring, made simple
Now both novice users and experts can easily, quickly, and accurately check the condition of rotating equipment throughout your facility. Equipping your maintenance and operations personnel with this rugged, ergonomic and easy-to-use instrument can provide early warning of potential machine problems before a costly failure occurs.
- Quick and easy to set up and use, measurements are shown on a bright display viewable in low light to direct sunlight. Free on-line training is also available.
- Lightweight, compact, and ergonomically designed, the SKF Machine Condition Advisor fits neatly at the belt line, in a pocket or a tool kit. Exceptionally durable, the unit is rated IP 54 for use in industrial environments.
- Alert and Danger prompts provide increased diagnostic confidence.
- Measuring velocity, enveloped acceleration and temperature simultaneously saves time.
- Efficient, economical and environmentally friendly, the rechargeable SKF Machine Condition Advisor operates 10 hours on a single charge.
- Flexible enough to work with standard 100 mV/g constant current accelerometers, an optional external sensor can be used for hard to reach locations and for more repeatable and accurate measurement results.
- Features English, French, German, Portuguese, Spanish and Swedish for user convenience.
Multiple measurements with a single device The SKF Machine Condition Advisor provides an overall "velocity" vibration reading that measures vibration signals from the machine and automatically compares them to pre-programmed International Organization for Standardization (ISO) guidelines. An "Alert" or "Danger" alarm displays when measurements exceed those guidelines. Simultaneously an "enveloped acceleration" measurement is taken and compared to established bearing vibration guidelines to verify conformity or indicate potential bearing damage. The SKF Machine Condition Advisor also measures temperature using an infrared sensor to indicate uncharacteristic heat.
Accuracy, flexibility and confidence
When performing measurements, the SKF Machine Condition Advisor's acceleration sensor input signal is processed to produce two different measurements for each POINT on the machinery – overall velocity and enveloped acceleration. At the same time, the SKF Machine Condition Advisor's non-contact infrared sensor measures the surface temperature of the measurement location and simultaneously displays all three measurement values. Depending on the SKF Machine Condition Advisor's System setting, the front-panel LCD simultaneously displays:
- Metric or Imperial units
- Velocity in mm/s RMS or in./s derived Peak
- Temperature in Celsius or Fahrenheit
Acceleration enveloping readings in gE


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In July, ambitious Finnish startup Jolla announced it had adopted the abandoned — by Nokia, at least — operating system MeeGo, and would be designing and developing new smartphones based around it.
Jolla's seriousness was proven by the members of its team, the majority of whom worked on MeeGo with Nokia, and therefore were both personally and professionally attached to the project from the start. MeeGo has plenty of fans around the world too, thanks primarily to the Nokia N9, the one and so-far only MeeGo smartphone to be released.
That could all change very soon though, as Jolla has announced that it has raised 200 million euros/$260 million in funding, and that its first smartphone is almost ready for its public debut.
Details on the funding are sketchy, with Jolla saying only that it has formed an alliance with "leading players in the industry," and that a data center to host the OS's cloud services and infrastructure will be setup through Cyberport in Hong Kong. This is an important point, as Jolla plans to aggressively target the Asian and Chinese market, calling China a "game changer in the technology industry," adding how it wants to create the "third smartphone ecosystem in China," after Android and iOS.
Jolla's MeeGo OS has a codename too, Sailfish, and it will make its first appearance very soon. Jussi Hurmola, Jolla's CEO, called the OS "more open than Google Android regarding apps and service development," and said in a tweet that now the ecosystem support system is in place, the company "is very close to announce the date for the device launch." Speaking to Lightreading.com, Hurmola said that the launch dates for the hardware would be decided later this week.
International availability promised
International fans of MeeGo shouldn't despair at this apparent focus on Asia, as a tweet from Jolla's official Twitter account stated that Sailfish is "definitely not for China only."
As for the first phone, if Jolla listens to those who voted in its poll to find out the preferred form factor for the debut device, it'll be a touchscreen QWERTY slider. Of the just over 3,000 people who voted, 47-percent chose it, despite — or perhaps because of — the design having fallen from mainstream grace over the past few years. The phone announced is almost certainly going to be a pre-release device though, as Sailboat isn't going to be available for licensing until early 2013.
Speculating on whether Jolla has a meaningful future ahead of it is almost impossible at this stage, particularly without a look at the Sailboat OS and the phone on which it will first appear. Concentrating on rapidly developing markets — in this case China — is a solid tactic, and something which other companies looking to re-invent themselves are also doing.
Competition is fierce though, with ZTE already adopting Mozilla's Firefox OS, and the Alibaba Group pledging to invest $200 million per month into its Aliyun mobile OS. Jolla has certainly got some hard work ahead if it wants that coveted third position in the market.
Jolla has announced via its official Facebook page that we'll get our first look at the new user interface, and hear details about the app ecosystem and SDK, at the Slush startup conference to be held in Helsinki, Finland on November 21 and November 22 this year.
Editors' Recommendations
- What to expect from smartphone makers now that MWC 2020 is canceled
- Coronavirus woes could cut the supply of TVs, iPhones, cars, and more
- Nokia and HMD Global won't be in Barcelona. Will coronavirus cancel MWC 2020?
- What is 6G? It could make 5G look like 2G, but it's not even close to reality
- Wyze customers hit by online data leak, company confirms


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Blue Velvet Monster: On David Foster Wallace
By Stephen Graham Jones
So David Foster Wallace is getting the Joyce treatment, where each and every little scribbleydoo we can unearth from him is magic, golden, poked and prodded from every angle so we can see the genius beneath. And there was plenty there, don't get me wrong. Granted, the pedestal he's being put on now that he can't do anything about it, it's kind of scary high, makes me nervous he might get elevated so far out of reach we forget about him altogether (and thus feel better about ourselves, without his talent in the room), but that kind of stuff's inevitable, really. His legend'll ride it out or it won't, and, either way, we'll still have some of his books around.
However, what I have legitimate concerns about is his influence.
It's for the simple fact that his mode of storytelling doesn't transport well. Or, to look at it from a different angle, the magic of DFW's fiction, it wasn't all the double-wraparound sentences, all the wink-wink clevernesses, and it wasn't his pretty much complete control of language. Nor was it his narrative velocity, his inventiveness, or his imagination, and it wasn't the way he could stitch together a series of tangents and indulgences such that you kind of felt like maybe you'd actually gone somewhere on the page.
No, the magic of DFW's fiction (as very distinct from his essays and journalism, which is great influence) was that he used all of this and more as a prose mechanism to allow the reader a level of intimacy—a snapshot of his mind, in-process—that very few other writers have achieved. And then, somehow, he could sustain that for hundreds of pages, keep the good times rolling, until he escaped his own story from the usual constraints and expectations of Story, such that what we were really reading was one brilliant, brilliant dude peeling his scalp away time and again, letting us look into his head. His writing, I read it as a form of exhibitionism, yes, but the best kind, as what he was exhibiting was nearly always our own better selves, at least as we liked to imagine them. Weren't we also secretly this clever, this funny? Didn't we also suspect there was some cultural sinew between this sitcom and that gubernatorial campaign platform? Don't we also pay this close attention to every single little thing there is?
Which, great. He was amazing, left us with some pretty cool stuff, but his fiction's not for emulating. Appropriate his voice and story tricks in an ironic way, sure—I'd guess he'd appreciate that, and also see it as a challenge—but never forget that, while you may very well be as smart as him, you're smart in a completely different way. And this isn't about the dangers of being derivative, it's about the fact that doing a mimic-job on David Foster Wallace, you're only ever going to be able to repeat the surface level characteristics of his fiction, maybe luck into the lope of his voice every now and again. His sentences really aren't that hard to do, after all, and it's even possible to sustain them for pages, through digression after interesting digression, but all that is style, and style is always empty, is what you do when you don't have any real content.
Or, to use his (note the lowercase) fiction as a template for your own, all you're really going to end up doing by using some cut-rate version of DFW is showcasing that you don't have DFW's fascinations, his unwillingness to ever let anything go, his faux-rigorous, deadly-serious attention span. All of which is what's so endearing about his work: his mind. So, find your own prose mechanism, your own bag of tricks. Write and write and write until you luck into something that works. I mean, hopefully it's what you were doing anyway, it's just that, in the wake of the loss of one of our literary giants, it's all too easy to think that if it worked once, it'll work again.
It will work again, yes, but in a completely different way. Find that way, please. And then stay alive.
Stephen Graham Jones
Boulder, Co
4 May 2011
Stephen Graham Jones has seven novels and two collections on the shelf. The most recent novel is It Came from Del Rio, currently up for a Colorado Book Award. The most recent collection is The Ones That Got Away, currently up for a Bram Stoker Award and a Shirley Jackson Award. Up very soon in Dzanc's rEprint series are Seven Spanish Angels and a completely redone All the Beautiful Sinners, then, still with Dzanc, the novels Flushboy and Not for Nothing. And also a surprise zombie novel he doesn't think he's supposed to say anything about. Though of course linking doesn't count. As for what he's writing now: part II of the Bunnyhead Chronicles. Started nine days ago, already a hundred pages deep. Would be farther, but he had to stop to write a long old story just now.


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420 N Tennessee Ave
Morton IL
Louise Wanner
My husband and I attended the Morton Methodist Church for two years or so when they were meeting at the downtown Civic Building. When the church was finished we took the big step and were in one of the first groups to join in April 1952, which basically turned our lives around, and we have been soblessed to be part of a fellowship of believers. I have had 61 years of spiritual growth and I thank those who helped me along the way. Blessings
The Holy Spirit is definitely alive at Morton UMC!!! From the beautiful music of the choir to the heart-felt sermons, I feel close to the Spirit of the Lord!
Paul Uhlman
Raising our family here has been a lot of fun; to watch them be involved and be accepted by our church family at every stage has been a blessing! It's a good Bible-preaching church, not only on Sundays but with many opportunities for study and fellowship throughout the week.
Julie Mooberry
My mom was First Christian Disciples of Christ and my dad was Presbyterian when they married and moved to Morton a year later. They weren't Catholic or AC and we lived on Glen Street behind the old church …. so I became Methodist. Haha!
Debbie Lane
I came because I was invited; I stayed because I found what I was looking for!
Debbie Veltman
What I love about our Morton United Methodist Church is the diversity that is offered. We have three styles of worship and multiple programs that cover ALL age groups. Everyone is encouraged to experience programs that meet their needs and that will work into their daily spiritual walk.
Lori Walters
My dad (John Lindquist) grew up in the United Methodist church in Kansas and my mom (Elaine Lindquist) was raised Presbyterian in Colorado. When they were transferred by Caterpillar to Peoria, they fell in love with the Morton United Methodist Church–their home away from home. Many of the people they met in church during that time continue to be their dearest friends today. My brother, John, and I have many fond memories, too, from growing up in such a supportive church community. We will…
Deb & Jim Rada
Worship service leaves us feeling excited and passionate about our Christian walk. It's great to feel a sense of connection to the scripture and how it applies to our everyday lives.
Mary Jane Davis
MUMC is like my home away from home. I feel love, support, acceptance and guidance whether it is in choir, Bible study, Sunday morning worship or through participation in congregational care. Since my retirement, my purpose going forward is to worship and serve and MUMC provides many opportunities to do just that. MUMC is truly a blessing in my life!
Lisa Hutchison
I was searching for a place that would encourage my family's faith journey. We have found that at Morton United Methodist Church!
Join us for Sunday Morning Worship!
8:00 AM- Traditional
9:30 AM - Traditional
9:30 AM - Sunday School - ALL AGES
10:45 AM - Contemporary


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Score Breakdown based on
27 Reviews
5 on October 03, 2017
Had a wonderful time visiting the Fryeburg Fair, and staying at Main Street Bed & Breakfast. The house was beautiful, and the location was perfect. Margaret also gave us a great hike recommendation!
5 on January 25, 2016
Lovely inn. Located on large property. Walked out the door and around the barn to go for a walk in the snow down to the river. Nearby cross country skiing although downhill is also available. Comfortable beds, great breakfasts, an affable hostess who's very familiar with what the area has to offer. It's always a pleasure to stay at Main Street Bed & Breakfast. We plan to return.
5 on August 06, 2014
We stayed with Margaret last week for two nights. It was fabulous! Margaret is a perfect hostess and a great cook. Breakfast was filling and incredibly tasty. She'll give you the little extra you need if you just let her know. Margaret left a jar of ice tea in the guest refrigerator so we could refresh ourselves any time we wished. I found nothing better than to grab one of her books, pour myself a glass of ice tea and sit outside on the deck reading and relaxing.
5 on June 10, 2013
My cousin and I visited Fryeburg for an event at Fryeburg Academy, and Main Street B&B was the ideal place for us to stay. Margaret knows how to create comfort for her guests: in the bedrooms we found fresh flowers, a bookcase of good reads, a down comforter, and a thirsty bathrobe. The living and sitting rooms were comfortable with graceful art and an unfussy, cozy New England flavor. Big lawns, a deck off the dining room, a fantastic view of the White Mountains out the back -- Main Street felt like a welcoming home in a beautiful place. Breakfast was substantial, delicious, and fresh, fresh, fresh; Margaret knows her way around a kitchen. She is very personable, and interested in making her guests' stays as pleasant as possible. I'd go back in a millisecond, and would definitely stay here again when I went.
5 on March 26, 2013
Main Street Bed and Breakfast is a charming Inn with fabulous antique heart pine floors and spacious rooms that are beautifully appointed. It is impeccably clean. Margret is a gracious host that make you feel right at home and the breakfast was excellent. Ask for the blueberry pancakes - they are killer!
5 on February 24, 2013
We were in Fryeburg for a Christian Motorcyclists association rally. The rooms were immaculate and the food was amazing. Margaret was an excellent host and immediately offered the barn as covered storage for our motorcycles... We eagerly await our next stay for the National rally!
5 on February 10, 2013
Our entire family spent a wonderful holiday weekend at the inn this past January. Breakfasts are amazing. There is enough variety of food to satisfy every appetite. The Innkeeper is a gracious host which allows guests feel comfortable. There are lots of nearby outdoor activities to keep everyone busy. We opted to go cross country skiing for one day and hiking on another day. We plan to return again and again and again.
5 on January 23, 2013
My husband and I stayed with Margaret at the Main Stree BnB for two nights in January. We had a great time exploring the area, doing some hikes, cross country skiing and shopping. The inn is very comfortable, with good size rooms and bathrooms and nice common areas. Margaret is a great host and makes a wonderful breakfast. We would return if we are back in the area.
5 on August 17, 2012
Very, very nice. The house Main Street B&B is in is a 200-year old house that has been meticulously maintained and is sumptuously decorated. Our room was large and comfortable with an adjoining private bath that was easily as large as the room itself (very spacious). The hostess was wonderful and made the stay almost like staying with family. She has a great sense of humor and is a wonderful cook, serving up a huge breakfast in the morning. Everything was absolutely wonderful. Would stay again in a heartbeat.
5 on April 27, 2012
My husband I stayed here for one night in early February. Not only was it the perfect location for our snowmobiling trip just up the street Sunday morning, but it was also plenty close enough to all the tourist stops over in Conway & Jackson, NH. The inn is so comfortable and beautifully decorated and Margaret, the inn keeper is very accommodating. She also makes an incredible breakfast! We had a huge stack of blueberry pancakes (just like in the pic on the website!), organic teas, and absolutely amazing cranberry scones. (I wish I could make them myself!) We had a wonderful stay and especially enjoyed our time playing with Bacci, the resident house cat.
5 on February 27, 2012
My partner and I just had a wonderful stay at the Main Street Bed and Breakfast in Fryeburg, ME to take advantage of cross country skiing in nearby Jackson, NH. The owner Margaret was attentive and enjoyable to talk to. The inn was spotless and comfortable with wonderful wide plank hardwood floors on the first floor. Our room was kept a nice comfortable temperature and was nicely decorated without being fussy. The bathroom of the Primrose Room was spacious. The breakfasts Margaret made each morning were fantastic! There is a comfortable sitting room on the first floor with a fireplace that Margaret kept going in the evening while we read. We really enjoyed our stay!
5 on February 05, 2012
This is our 2nd stay at this lovely inn and we continue to be impressed. The inn keeper indulges guests with wonderful breakfasts and creature comforts. If you don't want to go out exploring, you could happily take advantage of a lovely fire in the sitting room and just read your book or one of the many books available from the bookshelf. Cross country skiing is a short drive away and we took a lovely walk in the snow through the inn's backyard. We plan to return again in the future.
5 on January 16, 2012
This is our second time staying with Margaret for MLK weekend to cross country ski up in Jackson. Once again the house was completely charming. She made sure the fire was raging in the living room for our return from the slopes, and cooked up a great breakfast of eggs, bacon, cinnamon buns and fruit. We'll be back up there soon.
5 on October 03, 2011
My husband and I decided to go to Fryeburg, Maine for our honeymoon and were thoroughly delighted when we found Main Street Bed & Breakfast online. Upon our arrival, we found that it was even better than it appeared online! Margaret gave us WONDERFUL recommendations as to where to go, etc. Anytime we needed any information or wanted anything, she was quick to provide us as best as she could (which was ALWAYS above and beyond what our expectations were). We felt very much at home at the bed and breakfast, yet we felt very pampered! Breakfast was ALWAYS delicious, on time (we picked which time slot, and BEAUTIFULLY prepared! If you're looking for a delightful place to stay in Fryeburg, Maine, then Main Street Bed & Breakfast is for you! We were delighted to realize that it only took about 10 minutes to get to North Conway, NH. It's just far enough away to feel out of the busy area, yet close enough to go to North Conway for dining, shopping, etc. My husband and I definitely plan on going back! Thank-you, Margaret for making our stay delightful and memorable!
5 on July 03, 2011
Greeting me with a cold juice drink and a bowl of fresh cherries the innkeeper joined me on the back porch while we savored the warm summer afternoon air and the view of the mountains. I had a wonderfully cozy little room in the back part of the upstairs and slept far longer than I normally do when on the road. A delicious breakfast with great coffee, fruit and eggs, along with pleasant conversation got the morning going right.
5 on January 25, 2011
We have styed here twice. Both times we had the primrose room. It's absolutely gorgeous. It's a nice old house, with a gorgeous rooms, a wonderful view, and an amazing hostess. She's always warm and inviting and makes you feel welcome every time. Hoping to make it back again soon.
5 on January 23, 2011
We had the pleasure of staying at the Main Street Bed & Breakfast in mid January for two nights. The rooms are tastefully decorated and comfortable. The house is a wonderful blend of modern comforts (updated bathrooms) with the fine features of an older home (lovely old pine floors). The innkeeper is gracious and clearly delights in cooking. Breakfasts are both artistically presented and delight the palate.
5 on October 10, 2010
I was lucky enough to get a room on short notice when someone else cancelled. The Innkeeper, Margaret, was delightful and welcoming. The entire house is charming, totally clean and tastefully decorated. The breakfast was the most delicious breakfast I've had in my life!!! The guests were delightful, the local beautiful. Did I mention the most fantastic breakfast?!
4.6 on October 01, 2010
What a wonderful place! I couldn't have enjoyed myself more! The location is perfect! Rooms were spacious and comfortable! Breakfast was absolutely delicious! Will be coming back again and again! Margaret, thank you for making our stay so enjoyable.
5 on August 22, 2010
Although I only spent 1 night at this wonderful B&B, the memory of my experience will remain etched in my mind for a long time. Margaret, the innkeeper, truly went beyond the call of duty to make me feel welcomed and to find creative and practical solutions for my needs and special requests. The grounds and the view of the mountains are truly magnificent. The rooms are spotless and incredibly charming. It is a must stay for anyone passing through Fryeburg or the surrounding area. Thank you again!!
5 on August 09, 2010
My sister and I spent last week at the bnb and were so pleased with the service,cleanliness,the view and the caring attitude of its innkeeper. WOuld go back anytime....
5 on July 29, 2010
First time in a B&B, ever, in July 2010. The Delphinium room was great and spacious, especially for a single person. The B&B was spotless. Margaret Cugini was helpful with everything I needed, was not intrusive, and was more than willing to talk if I wanted to (and she had a great sense of humor). I truly felt I was at a home away from home (with someone else taking care of all the things that have to get done!). Will definitely return if I return to this area of Maine.
5 on July 17, 2010
1820 home lovingly renovated; expansive views; beautifully appointed, from the teeming bookshelves in the living room down to the locally handmade soap; best omelet in memory; way above average conversation with innkeeper. Simply put, it was perfect!
4.2 on July 15, 2010
My girlfriend and I had a lovely stay. The place is decorated in the best of taste and is immaculate! Breakfasts were specially prepared and excellent, something special each day. The innkeeper was friendly but unintrusive, respectful of privacy. We had to INVITE her to join us at the breakfast table and were glad we did. A very interesting and engaging person. I highly recommend the place!
5 on July 14, 2010
My stay at the Main Street B&B was wonderful. The house is in immaculate condition with beautiful grounds in perfect view of the mountains. Quiet, relaxing, and peaceful. I'll definitely return!
5 on February 18, 2010
The Main Street B&B is everything you could ask for in a place to stay while visiting scenic Maine. The house is gorgeous, Colonial style, nearly 200 years old and in terrific shape. Margaret prepares an exquisite breakfast (eggs, pancakes, scones, coffee, tea, juice, fresh fruit!) every morning and is very accommodating as she sincerely wants you to have the best experience possible. I will definitely return!
5 on December 15, 2009
Me and my fiancee have stayed here a few times and aboslutely love it. Margaret is a wonderful hostess and treats us with kindness and warmth. She's also a terrific cook. The rooms are extremely comfortable and cozy. This is definitely a bed and breakfast you need to try for yourself. Not far from the shopping of North Conway.