Fall into Winter — Readers capture seasonal sights in Redoubt Reporter photo contest

Best in Show: “Ice Formation,” by Vickie Tinker, of Soldotna.

Editor’s Note: Thank you to all our participating photographers! Selected prints will be invited to participate in a photography show in October 2013 at the Kenai Chamber of Commerce and Visitors Center.

Plugged In, by Joe Kashi, for the Redoubt Reporter

Generally, the “Fall into Winter” photos that caught my eye were photos in which the traditional “rules” were disregarded in order to capture the strongest possible composition.

Edward Weston, certainly one of the 20th century’s premier photographers, once defined good photographic composition as the “strongest way of seeing.” Good composition is not a set of cliched rules to be followed to the letter in the same uninspired manner used in filing out a tax return.

Using the EXIF data found in the photos, I was able to gain some general information about the cameras and lenses employed as well as how the various photographs were exposed. However, don’t fear Big Brother — your EXIF data does not include names, unless you intentionally programmed them into your camera, nor location data unless you have an activated GPS in your camera, and only one winning photo had either name or GPS data. (By the way, deployed military and their families are all advised to deactivate the GPS in any camera because posting photos that include GPS data can result in dangerous security breaches for both service personnel and their families back home.)

The basic lens, camera and exposure EXIF data allows us to draw some helpful technical conclusions that complement the more evident aesthetic and compositional ones.

Perhaps most significantly, so far as I can tell all of the placing and honorable mention photographs apparently were taken using large-sensor cameras, mostly digital SLR cameras of varying ages, although some Olympus Micro Four-Thirds cameras also did well.

We can draw two possible conclusions from this — either technically adept photographers with an already-practiced “eye” tend to use large-sensor cameras because of superior image quality, or the superior image quality of large-sensor cameras simply resulted in better-looking photos regardless of who took them. I believe that the former alternative is the more nearly correct conclusion — the photographs that most caught our attention show the experience and good “eye” of our successful entrants.

Judge’s selections

Fall into Winter photo submissions

“First Snow” on Resurrection Trail, taken Sept. 28 at Juneau Creek, between Juneau Lake and Swan Lake, by Cindy Finwall, Kenai Peninsula College.

“Snow Grass” was taken Oct. 16, by Hannah Joy, of Soldotna.

“Stalk” was taken Oct. 17, by Hannah Joy, of Soldotna.

“Foggy Sunrise on Browns Lake,” by Barbara Henry, of Soldotna.

“My Favorite Tree” on the Kenai Perninsula, on Funny River Road, lost all its leaves, by Barbara Henry, of Soldotna.

“Mountain Scene,” taken Oct. 28 in Cooper Landing off of Snug Harbor Road, by Brett Newsome, of Soldotna.

“Ice Stalactites” form on a fallen tree over the Anchor River, taken Nov. 3, by Kayla Yotter.

“Caddis Fly Larvae” underneath the ice on one of the lakes in Nikiski, taken Oct. 28 by Peter Ribbens.

“Lily Pads on Fresh Ice, by Margie McCord, taken in October on Denise Lake, in Soldotna.

“Ice Formations 1,” by Vickie Tinker, of Soldotna. “I took a series of photos by laying my camera right up against the ice on Denise Lake on Nov. 4. The sun was bright and the ice clear. This was over a lily pond and these bubbles are from the escaping gases.”

“Ice Formations 2,” by Vickie Tinker, of Soldotna.

“Ice Formations 3,” by Vickie Tinker, of Soldotna.

“Chill,” by Kayla Winter.

“Fall Reflection,” by Kayla Winter.

“Cold Casting,” by Marcus A Mueller, of Kenai. Brendyn Shiflea (with permission) casts in the Kenai River on Nov. 17.

“Spawned Out,” by Paul Gauthier, of Kasilof.

“My Kind of Weather, At Last,” by Dan Skipwith, of Kasilof.

“Silent Spokes,” by Caz VanDevere, of Kasilof, taken Aug. 20. Reflection of trees on the windshield of a car in a junkyard.

“Willow Zilla,” by Jeff McDonald, of Kalifornsky Beach Road.

“Jellyfish,” by Desiree Bell, of Kasilof, taken Nov. 10 on Kasilof Beach.

“Lasting Leaf,” by Desiree Bell, of Kasilof, taken Sept. 16.

“Starry Turnagain Arm,” by Yvonne Leutwyler, of Soldotna, taken Oct. 28 of the Kenai Mountains seen from the highway between Anchorage and Girdwood.

“Relentless Climbers,” by Yvonne Leutwyler, of Soldotna, showing human and canine friends near the summit of Skyline Trail.

“Frosty Pushki,” by Yvonne Leutwyler, of Soldotna, taken Oct. 20 on Resurrection Pass Trail near Hope.

“Demise of the Pushki,” by Yvonne Leutwyler, of Soldotna, taken Nov. 17 at Bishop’s Beach, in Homer.

“Mountains Through Pushki,” by Clark Fair, of Sterling.

“Skeletal Pushki Stand Sentinel,” by Clark Fair, of Sterling.

“Stump in Slough,” by Clark Fair, of Sterling.

“Spirea,” by Wade W. Wahrenbrock, of Sterling, taken Aug. 23 in the Caribou Hills. “This plant was adorned in its fall colors and shortly after a midday rain shower.”

“Mountain Ash,” by Wade W. Wahrenbrock, of Sterling, taken Nov. 22. “The robins and waves of grosbeak harvested many of the clumps of berries on my mountain ash tree, but there were enough left to take this photo of berries with crowns of early winter snow.”

“For Sale,” by Wade W. Wahrenbrock, of Sterling, taken Oct. 23 in Clam Gulch. “This house is located right next to the Sterling Highway. I don’t think anyone has lived in this abode in the 30-plus years I have been driving past.”

“Fireweed Aglow,” by Wade W. Wahrenbrock, of Sterling, taken around the Stariski Creek area Sept. 12. “This is a macro close-up of fireweed into fall season color transition to dormancy. Backlight sun helps with the ‘aglow’ part.”

“Bright Leaves” by Sue Biggs, of Soldotna, taken Sept. 29.

“Last Rose,” by Sue Biggs, of Soldotna, taken Oct. 13. A rose hip picked outside the Kenai Fine Arts Center

“Rustling, Swanson River Road,” by Jennie Barenholtz, of Kenai, taken Sept. 25.

“Follow U Anywhere,” by Tony Oliver, of Soldotna. Two jellyfish stranded on the beach in Thumb Cove across Resurrection Bay from Seward over the Oct. 5-6 weekend.

“Hug in the Sand,” by Tony Oliver, of Soldotna. Footprints left from a hug on the beach in Thumb Cove across Resurrection Bay from Seward over the Oct. 5-6 weekend.

“Sunshine Fence,” by Sarah Goodwin, of Sterling.

“Mirror Scout,” by Sarah Goodwin, of Sterling.

“Heart Leaf,” by Orion Satori, of Soldotna.

“Grass Seeding,” by Orion Satori, of Soldotna.

Sunset through the trees at Peterson Lake in “Star Light, Star Bright,” by Laura Rhyner, of Kenai, taken Oct. 11.

“Fall Foliage, Redoubt,” taken Oct. 22, showing barren fall branches against Mount Redoubt, by Michael Fastabend.

“Kasilof Freeze.” by Michael Fastabend.

“Illiama First Snow.” by Michael Fastabend, taken Oct. 19.

“Skilak Lake,” by Kevin Keshan, taken Oct. 15.

“Ice Circles,” by Sybille Castro, of Nikiski, taken Nov. 25 at Jim’s Landing. “Bear tracks followed to the river and I saw ice circles floating in the river as well as a very old and dying silver salmon swimming slowly under them.”

Trashing the myth — Clearing the air on Kenai Peninsula Borough recycling

By Jenny Neyman

Photo by Jenny Neyman, Redoubt Reporter. Recycled paper is loaded onto a conveyor belt drawing it up into the bailer at the Central Peninsula Landfill. The materials are compressed, strapped and sent to a recycling center in Anchorage.

Redoubt Reporter

As the custom usually goes, someone separates a penny out of a handful of change and makes a wish while tossing it into a fountain. It’s kind of like that for Rhonda McCormick, of Soldotna, and her garbage.

She does the separating — cans, glass, plastic containers, newspaper, mixed paper, plastic bags and film, and cardboard — from the rest of her trash and makes a wish as she tosses it all that she really is making a change for the better in her community and environment.

“I have no idea what happens to it. I’ve heard people say before that they don’t think it goes anywhere, they think the dump just takes all that recycling stuff up to the landfill and dumps it in with the other garbage,” McCormick said. “I’m hoping they don’t do that, because that means what I’m doing recycling is a waste of time. But I am an optimist and I’m hopeful that they really are doing something with it, and whenever I find a product that says, ‘This was made out of recycled materials,’ I almost kind of smile a little bit and think, ‘You know, I really am helping.’”

Jack Maryott, solid waste director for the Kenai Peninsula Borough, can attest that McCormick’s wish is true.

“A common misconception that we hear oftentimes is that the borough just buries the (recyclable) waste. We hear it over and over and we’ve heard it as long as I’ve been in the solid waste industry,” Maryott said. “And that is totally, absolutely untrue.”

Teacher contract talks near finish — Arbitrator issues recommendations on salary, benefits

By Jenny Neyman

Redoubt Reporter

The arbitrator had spoken. The next meeting of the bargaining teams for the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District, the Kenai Peninsula Education and Education Support associations will demonstrate how much of the arbitrator’s advice will be heeded.

After a year of negotiations, including a round of mediation, between the district and associations failed to produce an agreed-upon contract to cover a three-year period beginning with the current 2012-13 school year, the bargaining teams presented their proposals and arguments regarding the final few sticking points of the contract to arbitrator Kathryn T. Whalen on Oct. 1 and 2, with written arguments being accepted up through Nov. 21. Whalen issued her recommendation Dec. 21.

The format is nonbinding arbitration, so her judgment does not automatically settle the remaining disputes, most notably over financial issues of salary and health insurance. The teams still must meet and come to agreement, but now have the guidance of an unbiased third party to help break the stalemate.

Pegge Erkeneff, communications specialist for KPBSD, is unavailable for comment until Jan. 2, though she sent a press release Dec. 21 stating that the KPBSD Board of Education would review the arbitrator’s advisory award/opinion in executive session Jan. 14, and that the district and associations’ bargaining teams would meet at 1 p.m. Jan. 22.

LaDawn Druce, president of KPEA, said that the association teams were eager to get back to the table and were pleased with the arbitrator’s recommendations.

“I just felt like overall it was a real good decision and very favorable for our cause going back to the table. Hopefully, given that, we can come to some kind of an agreement very quickly,” she said.

The biggest sticking points have been regarding the highest-dollar areas of the contract: salary and health care.

Gun run — Sales of firearms peak following school shooting

By Joseph Robertia

Photo by Joseph Robertia, Redoubt Reporter. AK-47s and similar firearms are among those highly sought for purchase in the wake of the deadly shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.

Redoubt Reporter

Some are calling it a gun-buying panic, referring to the spike in sales of firearms — especially semi-automatic rifles and high-capacity magazines for them — which began in the days following the deadly shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., on Dec 14. 
Travis Wright, owner of the Impact Area gun shop on Kalifornsky Beach Road, said that he can’t remember a time when people bought guns in such a frenzy.

“As of the Monday after the shooting we had 70 AR-15s in stock with as many as 12 rifles in stock for some of the more popular models,” he said. By that weekend he had sold out of all of them.

A Bushmaster XM-15 rifle, modeled on the AR-15 platform, was among the four firearms that Adam Lanza, 20, brought with him when he fatally shot 20 children and six adult staff members, wounding two others, at the elementary school. He also fatally shot his mother before heading to the school. The incident has lead some to predict that the federal government would be making changes to the existing gun laws for AR-15s and other similar tactical rifles types, such as AK-47s and Uzis. 
Days after the shooting, President Obama stated on Dec. 19 that he would make gun control a “central issue” at the start of his second term of office. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Sen. Joseph, I-Conn., called for a reinstatement of the federal assault weapons ban, which lapsed in 2004, with Feinstein voicing her intent to introduce a ban bill on the first day of the new Congress.

“This is worse than anything I’ve seen since Obama took office. There was a light bump in sales when he took office for his first term, and then again when he was re-elected, but after Sandy Hook it just took off. It started with ARs, then quickly went to AKs, Mini-14s and other semi-auto ‘black rifles,’ and then magazines for them. But then it was just everything: bolt-action rifles, handguns, parts, ammo, everything — it didn’t matter what it was,” Wright said.

Skate into better cross-country ski technique

By Alan Boraas, for the Redoubt Reporter

Editor’s note: This is part three of a series of columns explaining the techniques of cross-country skiing. Part one, Dec. 5, and part two, Dec. 12, focused on classic skiing. They can be found at http://www.redoubtreporter.wordpress.com.

To say one is skating through life means they are taking it easy, not putting forth much effort and coasting along through whatever twists and bumps come. That is decidedly not the case when the term skating refers to a style of cross-country skiing, but for those who master this speedy, smooth technique, they will fly along the trails, looking to others as though they just might be coasting through the air.

Skate, also called freestyle, skiing utilizes a “V” or diagonal stride, similar to ice skating or in-line roller-skating. It uses lighter, narrower skies, longer ski poles and more reinforced boots and is best done on wide, groomed trails. Skate skiing can be a faster and more glide-efficient means of motion over the forward foot kick motion of classic skiing.

Drinking on the Last Frontier: Growlers — New style, old idea

By Bill Howell, for the Redoubt Reporter

Photo courtesy of Elaine Howell

With the rapid expansion of craft breweries and brewpubs across Alaska and the rest of the country, a new word has entered our everyday speech — growler. Yet while this word may seem new to us, it’s actually quite old.

Originally, the term referred to a galvanized or enameled steel pail with a lid. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, prior to home refrigeration, most people had to purchase their beer from a saloon, even if they wanted to consume it at home. The growler was the means by which a family member, often a woman or a child, would carry the beer from the saloon to their home.

This was referred to as “rushing the growler,” and was so common that many pre-Prohibition saloons had small service windows — nicknamed euphemistically the “family entrance” — to allow growlers to be filled without the woman or child actually entering the saloon proper. It’s thought that the actual name “growler” was derived from the rumbling sound of carbonation escaping by lifting the pail’s lid on the way home.

The images of children rushing beer home to their parents from saloons (and possibly sampling it along the way) were frequently cited by the anti-alcohol crusaders of the Anti-Saloon League. When the ASL finally succeeded in imposing Prohibition on America, it spelled the end of the growler’s original incarnation.

Even when repeal came, the days of children carrying pails of beer home never returned, and soon the development of home refrigeration and canned beer removed the need to transport beer from bar to home. The growler, it seemed, had been consigned to the dustbin of history.

Until craft beer came along.

Almanac: Popular Kenai fishing park has chilling past

Editor’s note: This story features two key characters whose names have varied spellings. The first is Ethan (or Ethen) Cunningham, and the second is William “Bill” Frank (or Franke). Most of the information for this story came from four sources: the book, “Alaska Odyssey: Gospel of the Wilderness,” by Hal Thornton; an Anchorage Daily Times article from Jan. 22, 1948; an occasionally inaccurate Dec. 4, 1997, letter (and accompanying documents) from Sara Cunningham Scott to the Kenai City Council; and the research of Kasilof historian Brent Johnson.

By Clark Fair

Photo by Clark Fair, Redoubt Reporter. A lone hooligan fisherman walks along the river at Cunningham Memorial Park, in Kenai, preparing to cast his net.Redoubt Reporter

Redoubt Reporter

The night that Jimmy Minano raced up and issued his nearly breathless command, Hal Thornton was relaxing with Pappy and Jessie Belle Walker in Kenai.

“That Jeep!” said Minano, indicating Thornton’s vehicle. “Take me to the marshal! There’s been a murder!”

The date was Monday, Jan. 19, 1948, and the law officer was Marshal Allen Petersen. The murder, it was speculated, was the result of what Thornton called some “bad blood” between the killer and his victim. Now, some of that blood had been spilled and was “staining a snowbank where one of them lay — the victim of a point-blank gun blast.” Thornton and Minano sped toward the Petersen residence, which included the jail.
Once he had learned the few facts available thus far, the stout, middle-aged marshal moved quickly into action. Turning to Thornton, he said, “You and Jimmy get a posse in order. Do you mind using your Jeep to gather up some men?”

Thornton didn’t mind. He headed for the home of Al and Jessie Munson, where Henning and Ruth Johnson were visiting. Al Munson and Henning Johnson joined the posse, as did Odman Kooly, and they all motored off toward the end of the road a short distance beyond the local cannery.

Then the posse, with rifles ready and flashlight beams dancing in the darkness, set off on foot up the trail along the river toward the old Windy Wagner cabin (off present-day Beaver Loop Road), where the killer was said to be holed up.

Despite all the possibilities posed by the accumulated manpower and firepower, the conclusion was rather anticlimactic: The accused, William “Bill” Frank, surrendered to the marshal, was taken into custody, and freely admitted to killing Ethan Cunningham after an argument. (Johnson and Munson were left to guard the prisoner while the marshal went to recover the body and inspect the crime scene.)
The simplicity of this conclusion, however, belied the ensuing rampant speculation concerning Frank’s motive for murder.

Do you hear what echoes I hear?

Hunting, Fishing and Other Grounds for Divorce, by Jacki Michels, for the Redoubt Reporter

Echoes are intriguing. All one has to do is yell across an expanse and, “Hello! Hello. H-e-l-l-o.” Your own voice bounces back to you.

This is not unlike the phenomenon one experiences while listening in on adult children in the process of raising their own little children.

Words we’ve once uttered bounce back and reverberate off your children’s lips. Then they float over the air and tickle our ears in an eerily familiar way.

For us, these echoes do not bounce back from afar, but from various locations of the house as several of our children (and their children) have bounced back home. Whew!  Christmas was, of course, the best ever, and I am so, so, so glad I get a year to recover — oops! I mean, prepare for next year.

So as we fill our days sweeping up stray pine needles and enduring — I mean, savoring — a few more precious days of vacation before returning to our regularly scheduled lives, various carols replay in my mind. However, the lyrics to the carols keep getting all jumbled up in all the chaos — oops, I mean, delightful quality time. One warped tune goes something like this:

“Said my grown girl to her little lambs (while they were bickering and she was on the phone and they were interrupting, tattling, whining and in general risking being in time out until they were eligible for Social Security).

“Do you want me to settle that for you? I said, DO YOU WANT ME TO SETTLE THAT FOR YOU? I’m Mom, Mom! And what I say goes, so do as you’re told, oh please oh do as you’re told!”

And when she sat down to dinner, after a very long day, and she was hoping the baby was finally asleep, she muttered something like, “Do you hear what I hear? The baby cries, she cries, Oh!”