Author: Jon Gauger

Now that summer is upon us, it's best we made peace with the insects around us.   Why, you ask?  Because….well…resistance is futile.  I was reminded of this when reading Anne Rooney’s book, You Wouldn’t Want to Live without Insects.  In it, she offers insect insight.  Across our globe, there are six to ten million species of insects, although scientists have only named about 900,000 of those species. Insects are found everywhere in the world—even in frozen Antarctica! And boy, are we outnumbered. There are 200 million insects for every person on earth.  About 90% of all life-forms on earth (not…

It’s the largest home in America. Can you name it?  It’s Asheville’s Biltmore estate. When railroad and shipping magnate George Vanderbilt first visited Asheville in 1888, he fell in love with the place and promptly amassed land to construct his sprawling residence.  Forget acres.  The Biltmore sits on nearly 11 square miles!                     Any sense of scale was out-scaled in the construction of this home.  To ship in the raw materials and labor, a special railroad spur was created.  Every day for nearly seven years, hundreds of workers plopped themselves on…

The animals are leaving! A favorite small town nature museum is about to get a make-over.  But maybe not for the best.   Currently on display are more than 50 mounted and stuffed wild animals ranging from a beaver to a bison. They represent life on America's plains and frankly, they are magnificent. I never tire of crouching down and locking eyes with a trio of coyotes.  Processing the span of a wolf's paw is enough to bring a shudder.  And peering at a mountain lion up close jerks one into a fresh reality of the killing machine these creatures can…

Spring has finally reached Illinois.  And trust me, this year we had our doubts. If you are fortunate enough to live outside the Midwest, kindly indulge my excessive jubilation over the sight of leaves on trees.  While you may have been enjoying them for weeks or months now, where we go camping, many of the trees are still only budding. As I pondered their green grandeur, I was struck by the potential of just one tree. Consider this.   One single tree provides shade that means comfort for picnics…and lower air conditioning bills at home. A tree provides food.  Caterpillars and…

Some missionaries work in foreign countries. My friend Jack works as a missionary in (mostly) foreign cars—Chicago cabs (where the Toyota Prius is king).  Crazy guy, Jack.  He'll talk to any taxi driver, any time about Jesus. But his latest ride in downtown Chicago is a conversation I just had to pass along.  Here's how Jack told the story to me: “Clearly, my driver was not born in the U.S., so after the usual greeting stuff, I asked him straight up, 'What is your country of birth?'  He says, with a playful smile, 'Can you guess?' “Well, I've traveled a…

The April edition of the American Legion Magazine featured an eye-popping article with regard to ISIS here in America.  According to the Foreign Policy Institute, the source of this article, in 2015… 56 Americans were arrested for their connection to ISIS. As of 2016, more than 20 American ISIS recruits have been killed in action. 71 Americans have been arrested, indicted, or convicted for joining or supporting ISIS. 250 Americans have attempted to travel to the Middle East to join ISIS. There are at least 900 active FBI investigations against stateside terrorists.  Most are linked to ISIS. While on the one hand, it's…

There is much to like about spending a night at the 1874 mansion known today as Pinehill Inn (http://www.pinehillbb.com/).  Upstairs in the Somerset suite, a full canopy bed, period furniture and a (non-period) Bose Wave radio wafting classical music all bid you welcome.  The fireplace mantle is bedecked with lovely books, including several volumes by the room's namesake, author Somerset Maugham. I inhaled a 110 year old volume from the fireplace collection, then found myself absorbed in—of all things—a 1948 edition of The Handbook for Boys, published by the Boy Scouts of America. Let me quote a few paragraphs: A…

If you live beyond the reach of a Portillo's restaurant, I pity you.  Not just for your lack of access to their unequaled Italian beef sandwiches, but also for your dwarfed understanding of what a chocolate cake really can be. I accept (even anticipate) your skepticism.  But be assured my chocolate cake claim is far from exaggerated.  Just check the buzz online. So there we were, at our local Portillo's, sharing pieces of this fabulous fabled cake with our daughter and son-in-law and their three children.  Their eldest had just received her three-year Sparky Awana award and we were celebrating–big…

Of course you've heard about Auschwitz.  The complex was the largest of its kind established by the Nazi regime, which included three main camps. There, 1.1 million people were murdered.  But it's rare to meet a survivor.   Raise a salute to one Fritzie Fritzshall. Just 13 years old when she arrived at Auschwitz – Birkenau, her train car was so overcrowded, half its occupants were dead on arrival—including her own grandfather.   “A Jewish man in a striped uniform was forced to clear out the train car as quickly as possible,” Fritzie remembers.  “He asked me how old I was…

It's one thing to read about the holocaust in a book. Quite another to read it in the face of a survivor.  At the Illinois Holocaust Museum, (ilholocaustmuseum.org), I sat across from Fritzie Fritzshall who lived in the former Czechoslovakia.  After the Nazis occupied her town, Fritzie and her mother and two brothers were forced into a ghetto, and ultimately deported to Auschwitz.  She was just 13.   Jammed into a railroad car, there was standing room only.  One tiny window offered far too little ventilation for the more than 100 people crammed inside.  With agonizing detail, Fritzie described the…