Road Trip to Burlington

...Julie Gammack's Potluck heads east

Oct 11, 2022

BURLINGTON, IA

Our first actual Potluck happened on a glorious fall afternoon in the home of Susan and David Beckman Sunday, October 9. Their English Tudor house is on a hilltop overlooking the Mississippi River. David, 72, grew up there with three siblings.

David's best friend in high school was the son of the famous Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, John 'Mac' McCormally, who died in 1993 at 71. His neighbor down the road a few houses was Elaine Baxter, a former legislator who served as Iowa Secretary of State; Elaine Baxter died in 2021 at 88.

So David Beckman, a third-generation local attorney, is almost as 'Burlington' as the river town.

Susan was a widow and David a widower when they met online, and she was living in Clive. They have been married for 11 years.

Susan attended the first Okoboji Writers' Retreat initially because, having grown up in Storm Lake and worked for the Storm Lake Times, she wanted to be one of the first to see the documentary film about the Cullen family newspaper. During the retreat in 2021, we hosted the third Iowa showing of 'Storm Lake.'

She returned the second year and signed up for the 2023 Okoboji Writers' Retreat. Susan and two other women formed the First Offense Writers Group because they got a warning ticket during their first meeting when they lost track of time on their parking meters. Susan started an online column recently: https://susanbeckman.substack.com.

When I announced in this column that I wanted to talk to folks outside of the greater Des Moines metro area about their communities and wondered if anyone was willing to host a potluck for these discussions, Susan invited me to Burlington.

The enticement of coming to an eastern Iowa river town in mid-October as the leaves begin to turn yellow, red, and orange was exciting.

I requested that we have a group of no more than 12 gather to talk about life in their community. The population was 23,982 in the 2020 census, a decline from the 26,839 people in 2000. Burlington is the center of a micropolitan area, which includes West Burlington and Middletown, Iowa, and Gulfport, Illinois

We had a mix of retirees and a couple whose then 11-year-old son suggested during Covid-quarantine they move from their home in downtown Chicago to Burlington, where they now live in the house where his mom spent part of her youth. They are neighbors of the Beckmans.

I’m speculating., but I'm confident there are a few zeros difference in the cost of housing in Burlington versus their Wrigley Field neighborhood in downtown Chicago. The couple didn't have to change jobs to make a move as they both work remotely.

"I love it here," said Doug Dickson," I can drive anywhere in minutes.”

He realized his son had forgotten his soccer cleats as they drove to practice. He turned around, picked them up in four minutes, and they were still early for practice.

This Burlington transplant grew up in Michigan but has happily adjusted to raising a son in a town with a population that is a tiny percent of the Chicago metro area.

One thing this couple would hope to see as a helpful change would be, however, an increase in young families. The aging population issue is a concern for all present. They are working on encouraging friends with families to move to Burlington.

The first potluck attendee to speak when we gathered in the Beckman living room was David Camp, who launched his Burlington dental practice in 1967.

He said the best assets of Burlington are the river and the downtown architecture. The challenges, he thinks, can be traced to the lowering of the cost of living wages by large employers.

"Workers at the Case plant had excellent dental coverage when I started to practice. I'll admit, I was a bit resentful as they made good wages and had great healthcare coverage."

But over the years, that changed. Today, their coverage is not much, and it's hard for workers to get time off to get to the dentist.

Overall, the conversations about Burlington were positive. The arts are thriving, they agreed. The downtown buildings are getting a facelift, and tourists disembark from cruise ships that help sustain restaurants that include Thai, Greek, Hawaiian, and Italian cuisine. The Beckmans took me to a delightfully restored 170-year-old stone house along the Mississippi downtown. It is named 'Good,' and the food was good. https://www.goodburlington.com

My intention with these gatherings is not to fuel division but to discuss common interests and concerns. This sampling is not scientific and perhaps not even particularly representative. I did not ask about political affiliation, but most were more likely moderate to liberal.

One man did say he was a Republican and would vote for Grassley, 'but the guy should retire. He's too old.'

There was a Black Lives Matter rally after the George Floyd murder, and they said the local police chief was an organizer.

As for ongoing conversations, one in our gathering participates in a regular prayer session with a racially mixed group of ministers.

Will the reversal of Roe V Wade have an impact on Burlington? One woman said, 'I hope so,' and another said, 'I think so,' while another said, 'I don't know.'

A new effort to organize a League of Women Voters has begun in Burlington.

We did discuss how divisive politics can be today. This tidbit might shock political pundits, but no one in the group is on Twitter, and only half use Facebook.

Where do they get their news and information? The question evoked a laugh. The Burlington Hawk Eye, the so-called oldest newspaper in the state, has less and less local reporting. They are gravitating toward a new upstart paper called the Burlington Beacon, founded by former Hawk Eye employees. It is a print product produced weekly, where the owner initially delivered copies and managed all the other duties of publishing a paper—more about him in an upcoming column.

Our assembled group says they need more local news but find what they can on radio and television from the Quad Cities.

After about two hours, we decided it was time to get down to the potluck part of the potluck, and it didn't disappoint, either.

A few favorite recipes will be posted soon (amazing squash, apple salad, and raspberry bars to come).