40 Years Ago, 'SNL' Changed Late Night Forever

The original cast of "Saturday Night Live": nobodies who became legends. (NBC photo)

As much as "Saturday Night Live" has been in the popular culture for 40 years, which is being celebrated this weekend, it wasn't until 2006 until the first season was released on DVD. This, a look back at that first season almost 30 years later, first appeared in The Capital Times (Madison, Wis.) in December 2006.

 ***

The beginning came quietly enough, a call and response between a soft-spoken professorial type helping an immigrant with his English: 

    Repeat after me. I would like ...

    I wood like ...

    To feed your fingertips ...

    To feed yur fingerteeps ...

    To the wolverines.

    To dee wolver-eens.
 
And so it began on a TV Saturday night in October 1975, a bit of a different look for anyone who was looking for the Johnny Carson rerun that used to fill that spot. By the time that professor clutched his chest and collapsed of a heart attack, followed onto the floor by the immigrant who was told to mimic his teacher, late-night television had changed forever. 

Or at least it was on its way. 

For the first time, fans of "Saturday Night Live" can see the first season in its entirety with a new eight-DVD boxed set release of the original 24 episodes. Each episode is intact, including musical guests. 

Various versions of the 32-year-old sketch show have been available for years (come on, isn't "The Best of Chris Kattan" on everybody's Christmas list?). Cable reruns have chopped them up for decades, yet these DVDs are the first time in a long time anyone has seen the originals from beginning to end.

And for many Madisonians, it might be the first time many people have seen them, period. The local NBC affiliate, Channel 15, didn't carry the show until Feb. 14, 1976, opting to stick with its killer lineup of "Space: 1999" and "The Midnight Special." 

NBC affiliates in Milwaukee and Rockford carried it, though, and depending how good of an antenna a TV had, many people could watch it on those channels. School conversations on Monday centered around what happened on "Saturday Night" and not just Saturday night, told for the benefit of those whose TV wasn't good enough to tune in. I remember my sisters and I scurrying to nab the baby-sitting jobs in the homes that got a clear signal from Rockford so we could be sure to tune in. (And these people thought we loved their children. ...)

What didn't air here was a work in progress, and watching the DVDs doesn't so much solidify the "it used to be so much better" camp as chart the show's evolution.

That first episode, airing on Oct. 11, 1975, was nothing like the show that became iconic. For starters, it was called "Saturday Night" because Howard Cosell had a show called "Saturday Night Live" over on ABC.

George Carlin hosted the NBC version, and the first 30 minutes of the show included two of his four monologues, Weekend Update, the Muppets and two musical acts. Billy Preston and Janis Ian performed on the first show (because, really, nothing gets a party going like Ian's "At Seventeen"). 

Andy Kaufman was sweet and surreal, a world away from the obnoxious presence that led to viewers voting him off the show years later. The cast was barely acknowledged, introduced by announcer Don Pardo as "The Not For Ready Prime Time Players."

It didn't improve much the second week, which was more or less "The Paul Simon Show." He opened with a song, did some more songs with Art Garfunkel, later Randy Newman and Phoebe Snow did some songs, 10 in all in the show.

To think of "Saturday Night Live" at anytime in its history is to think of a certain format. So it's so surprising to see the early episodes and realize the format wasn't there. There was Weekend Update and a vaguely amusing opening monologue, and there were Bees. But all in all, it was a shadow of what it would become.

By the fourth week, things started to kick in. I have no idea what Candice Bergen was famous for in 1975, but she was the first host who clearly was not the star of the show. She was part of it, not the center of it, and the cast came alive around her. By the time John Belushi started riffing on Ray Charles while dressed as Beethoven, the show picked up a steam it wouldn't lose again for five years.

In finding a format of recurring characters and catch phrases, the show wasn't as revolutionary as it seemed. Yet the cast, which earned its tag as "The Beatles of Comedy," endures as a versatile troupe of performers. They did it all, a mere seven of them compared to the cast in recent years that seemingly required the show's first 10 minutes just to introduce.

The biggest impact was commercial; the show helped NBC find that younger viewers indeed were a powerful demographic, a demographic every media company has knocked itself out trying to reach ever since.

But was it better? Little things stand out to answer yes, including a raucous performance by the rarely seen Patti Smith Group, the utter delight of watching Gilda Radner, the brilliant danger of John Belushi and topical humor that few would have the nerve to try on network TV today. (The Richard Pryor episode oozes with it.)

Other things stand out to answer no, including painfully boring films by Albert Brooks and the mystery of why Chevy Chase was the show's first big star.

So watch it for a time capsule or watch it to ride a nostalgic wave. Just watch it and remember there was a time when nobody bothered to put anything decent on TV after 10:30 on a Saturday night. 

Generations of baby-sitters remain eternally grateful.
   

Listing A Few Favorites Is the Best I Can Do

A still from "Take Me to Church," a video that matches the power of the song.

My favorite song of 2014 was Sinead O’Connor’s “Take Me to Church,” not to be confused with the song of the same name by Hozier, which wasn’t bad either.

My favorite album of 2014 was Lucius’ “Wildewoman,” which actually came out in 2013 but I didn’t get around to buying it until 2014. 

My favorite concert was Neko Case at the Orpheum in downtown Madison, as much because I was standing front and center as for the music.

This is the time of year for lists. Lists for movies, lists for music, lists for TV shows, lists for books and lists for news events. What’s listed above is sort of mine, with one big difference from the ones showing up everywhere else: the absence of the word “best.”

If there’s one thing the explosion of information – be it downloading music or video, or just having it at your fingertips 24/7 – has done has underscored the endless supply of this stuff. Bands and songs and movies have always slipped through the cracks, but now that there’s so much more around that’s easily accessible it’s easy to wonder just how one goes about picking the best of anything.

Don’t get me wrong; I love lists. I used to buy every year-end magazine I could get my hands on. Even now  I try to wade through the various lists that are now on various websites. Paste, No Depression, Pitchfork, NPR and local sources all give fodder to confirm choices made during the year or to introduce readers to something else. The big difference is now it takes much more patience; where once you could look over a list and flip the pages, now you sometimes have to have the patience to click 50 times just to go one-by-one to find out what the favorite picks might be.

I’ve even been in the list-making world. In my multi-faceted career I’ve reviewed records, concerts and films. I’ve made year-end or decade’s-best lists that sometimes proved prescient and sometimes proved ridiculous (I’ll forever defend the brilliance of “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure”; I’ll forever shake my head at my glowing praise for “Rattle and Hum” and I will always hate “The English Patient”).

To review things years ago was to help introduce people to things they otherwise might not find, to help people use their time and money well when it came time to entertainment. Now people can often find it by themselves and they can figure out ways to hear it or see it for free.

The role of a critic in today’s convoluted entertainment world is somewhat befuddling. On the one hand, people need a guide through this crowded market. In fact, as with news websites, often critics use the word “curate” when referring to their favorite music as they organize it. On the other hand, the easy access to so much out there makes it easy to look at anybody’s “best” list and say, “Says who?”

All of this makes it hard to use the word “best,” at least for me. Part of it is that maybe I had my shot as a taste-maker once upon a time and I don’t feel compelled to be that person anymore. But mostly I think it’s a feeling that an opinion is just that and while one might have the information, they might not have the taste or at least the taste to match the reader. 

Sometimes, though, having strong opinions about this stuff can pay unexpected dividends. Recently a 20-something I know well introduced me to his longtime girlfriend, who I had never met. Since he was a kid we always talked about music, and we did once again as we got caught up.

“Remember that time when I was in high school you told me to help myself to any of your vinyl?” he said. “Remember how I took a pile of records and you made me take Devo because you thought I should know about them?”

Being in a mode of feeling less bossy about my music these days, I felt a little sheepish about that.

“I’m sorry,” I said. 

“No, I wanted to thank you,” he said, bringing his girlfriend further into the conversation. “When we met we bonded over a love of Devo, and I wouldn’t have known much about them if you hadn’t made me take those records.”

It would be an understatement to say that was the favorite thing I heard this year. Hands down, absolutely, completely and without question there’s just one way to describe it: It was simply the best. 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sinead O'Connor: "Take Me to Church"

Lucius: "Turn It Around"

Neko Case: "Ragtime"

Coming Home Can Be a Winning Strategy

Once upon a time he was just a kid, now he's coming home a champion.

Forget what the old adage is, you can go home again. You just have to have your head and heart open to what might happen there.

Six years ago, I moved back to my hometown after being away for 29 years. I lived a whole life mostly far away from the place where my life began. It was college and professional life, some success and some heartbreak.

Next week when the NBA season begins again, LeBron James returns home to play for the Cleveland Cavaliers after spending four sesasons with the Miami Heat. In a Sports Illustrated story last summer, the four-time MVP from nearby Akron said leaving Cleveland to go to Miami was his college education, the growing-up that every adult has to do. 

I liked that comparison, even if it might have been a slick PR move. James sought the bright lights of the bigger market and won two championships. But unlike so many superstars who chase that, he came back. And he came home before the twilight of his career. This isn’t Henry Aaron coming to the Milwaukee Brewers to be a DH for a few final seasons, this isn’t O.J. Simpson playing for his hometown San Francisco 49ers when he could barely move. This is a superstar coming home young and fit, an intriguing situation no matter the outcome.

Coming home isn’t for everyone. I can understand why some people might think it inconceivable. But doing so can create a certain kind of joy, one that is so esoterically difficult to describe that the Germans probably do have a word for it. 

That being said, and because I’m sure he’s really paying attention to me, I’ve got a few tips for LeBron James as he begins the next step of his professional career at home. It isn’t easy. But if it works out, King James, trust me: The joy will be indescribable.

People will call you by your sister’s name: OK, I don’t know if you have a sister, LeBron. I don’t even know if you have a brother. But when you go back home, people often just generally know who your family is, maybe not specifically who you are. That’s not a bad thing, if you don’t have siblings who are wanted by the law. 

Usually it’s OK. Sometimes I don't even notice. Once, though, there was a guy who mistook me for my sister – who I do resemble - and when I corrected him, he said, “Really?” as if I did not know who I was. When he said, “Really?” a second time, I called him by his brother’s name. 

Everyone has an opinion about what you do: I'm a reporter, so people tell me over my morning scone that their paper didn’t show up that day. You, LeBron, make millions of dollars and probably should have to answer for everything in your organization even if it’s not your responsibility. Even so, don’t be surprised if someone you went to high school with complains about the price of beer at Quicken Loans Arena. Or maybe about the actual name of Quicken Loans Arena.

You spend a lot of time at the funeral home: This was one of the biggest surprises of all, something that never occurred to me. Suddenly you are entwined again with the people who were part of your life in ways you didn’t think of until you returned home, and sometimes they, or their parents or siblings, die. At some point you just realize it’s your place to be there, to be part of what helps bring people comfort. It sounds morbid, but trust me, it’s not.

You truly feel the expectations of people around you: Working in a visible job, one that people have opinions about, in your hometown has its own set of challenges that go with the joys. For every hand-written note that comes to you at your home address telling you “Your mother would be proud” comes a voicemail on your home phone from someone telling you something you should have done better. Writing a story that touches on topics that are familiar to the people around you is nerve-wracking enough, I can’t imagine trying to win them a championship.

You communicate via hug: Sometimes, that’s all you can do. Sometimes it’s the only way to communicate. Something terrible happened to someone you’ve known forever and you see them walking down the street or in your coffee shop or the grocery store. You know, they know you know, you both know there’s nothing that can be said so all you do is wordlessly hug them. I’m not one of those demonstrative, warm grade-school teacher types to whom hugs come so naturally, but in this case it’s as natural as can be.

You find out your teachers have first names: And they will want you to call them by their first name. You will not be able to. Ever. 

You become aware of who has dementia: Twice in recent years I have had people in my community tell me to say hello to my dad for them. Both times it was a heartbreaking revelation and both times I said, “Sure.” My dad died in 1999.

You will remember the goofiest things about people: Maybe it’s the way someone walks or the way they wear their hat. Suddenly you realize that’s someone you’ve known your entire life and maybe have never even spoken to. But after all these years, they have a bounce in their step that’s unmistakable, are wearing a certain kind of scarf they've always worn or there's a voice you hear in a doctor's office or a bagel shop that you don't even remember that you remember. 

It’s them – the person who’s been in the background of your life forever and you never realized until now. Now you’ll see them everywhere, and they’ll help you know one big thing: You are home.

It's Not a Convenience; It's a Way of Life

Not the most beautiful thing to live near, but handy.

Each day, there is the realization that something is missing. Nothing is as it was, yet life must go on.

My world has been turned upside-down lately and the adjustments are slow, the emptiness lingering. I wake up daily with a yearning for something I cannot have at that moment if I need it -- panty hose, Pepsi, toilet paper, a Slurpee.

I have now gone two whole weeks without a convenience store in my neighborhood. The 7-Eleven down the street closed and in its place is an empty shell.

People live with far less, this I know. Why, there are unfortunate children in the suburbs who probably never got the chance to have a Big Gulp. Or, there are unfortunate people who live so close to fabulous 24-hour grocery stores that they never got the chance to pay way too much for toilet paper at midnight.

Of coure, I never planned my meals around what I could buy at a 7-Eleven. Sometimes the cats might be stuck with whatever was for sale there, but not me. Yet having the option 24 hours a day affected how I shopped.

This is a trait I inherited from my parents. When I was growing up in Mount Horeb, Wis., therer were two grocery stores that were open until 9 p.m. but just 5 p.m. on Saturday or Sunday. You bought what you needed ahead of time, or else you starved. You had to plan, you had no choice.

Somewhere along the line, however, it changed. The gas station next to my parents' house turned into a quasi-convenience store. Not much in the way of food was offered, but the pop was priced reasonably and the gallons of milk were only a few cents more than they were at Kalscheur's Fine Foods.

In a family of eight, those gallons of milk disappeared quickly. To buy them ahead of time meant the entire refrigerator was full of milk, not food. That wasn't practical.

So suddenly the gas station became our source of milk. Pepsi was never consumed with a meal, but my family managed to slam a good amount nonetheless. We also had tons of relatives who were often over for holidays or Sunday meals. Business boomed at the little station to the east of us, much to the delight of a high school friend whose father owned the place.

"The only reason my parents can afford to send me to college," my friend joked, "is that this is where the Burnses buy their Pepsi."

Sadly fo rmy friend's family, it was not to be. The big gun -- a real convenience store -- opened on the other side of my parents' home. Apparently, they knew that being next to my parents would likely ensure convenience-store success.

My parents stayed loyal to the little shop, but the big old Kwik Trip won out in the end. However, my family's shopping was changed yet again by the new, improved version of a convenience store to the west of them.

This one was open on holidays. This was an amazing concept in a small town, meaning that yes, Mom could buy the big old Butterball turkey when it was on sale and keep it in the fridge long enough because we wouldn't have to buy milk until Thanksgiving Day. The Kwik Trip gave us our freedom, not to mention something to do besides eat on the holiday because we could actualy rent a video, too.

So I learned that fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants shopping long ago and perfected it by living just yards from a 7-Eleven. If I had a party, I got my ice at the 7-Eleven and never ad to worry about running out of potato chips, beer or pop. Before I went into a movie, I'd stock up on my Everlasting Gobstoppers. When my cats howled because I forgot they didn't have any food, I could wander up and get them some Tender Vittles. I could run my tank down to empty knowing I could always coast to the corner.

Only once did the convenience store let me down. I had a cookout, and it was time for dessert.

Just go to the 7-Eleven, I said, and get some stuff for S'mores. My friends returned with makeshift ingredients that tasted OK, but weren't quite perfect. It's hard to handle S'mores made out of Teddy Grahams.

I'm going home to visit my family soon and they'll understand my loss. My mom will send me to the Kwik Trip for a gallon of milk and I'll be reminded. I'll stay with my sister, too, and tell her this sad tale as she gets her morning coffee.

She'll understand for sure as she buys that cup of coffee. After all, this convenience-store business is a family way of life.

She lives across the street from a place called PDQ.

This post first appeared as an essay in the Des Moines Register on Oct. 24, 1997.

The voice - and voiceover - for a generation

There was drama in those countdowns, even with the silly songs that were on them.

If you’re lucky, there are voices who provide the soundtrack of your life and stay with you for a long, long time.

There are baseball announcers like Bob Uecker, who has been calling the games of my beloved Milwaukee Brewers my whole life. There is Terry Gross, whose “Fresh Air” program on National Public Radio debuted about the time I began to pay attention to what National Public Radio was.

Then there are voices like Casey Kasem’s, once seemingly everywhere and these days, thanks to things like satellite radio and YouTube, seemingly immortal.

After Casey Kasem died on Sunday, the ever-snarky Internet was kind. There was genuine fondness from those remembering him, and remembering the faceless role he played in their lives.

And let’s face it, there would be things to chuckle about. “American Top 40,” heard now, is so saccharine your teeth could rot just listening to it, not to mention the songs it featured weren’t exactly the cutting edge of music.

To some extent, that’s the point. Radio once played a role in our lives that is gone now, replaced first by MTV and then all the things technology brought. For better or for worse – and for younger kids, it was a good thing – radio brought people together. Sure, there was a sameness of what was playing, but there was a familiarity to the music around us, a shared sense of songs we loved or didn’t love.

I remember a classmate in junior high school once writing down the names of various songs that were on the radio, and asking us which ones we liked best. (I voted for “Pick Up the Pieces,” by the Average White Band. Hey, I played trumpet and I liked the funky stuff.) Now, I’m wondering if junior high kids – who have the Internet and their parents’ music to add to what they hear on the radio – would even all have heard of any five or so songs a classmate would give them on a list.

Those Top 40 countdowns and the charts that fed them were the grade-school equivalent of water cooler conversations. (I grew up in Wisconsin, that made them bubbler conversations.) We’d listen to the songs on WISM or WTSO (AM, of course) and eagerly await the fliers that would list the weekly Top 40. The fliers were sponsored by the radio stations and would show up at Zwald’s Appliance or Bubby's Ben Franklin store, the places where we would buy our records.

Those countdowns were so important that one of my tentmates got a Top 40 flier sent to her when we were spending two week at a Girl Scout camp called Camp Black Hawk in northern Wisconsin. We were so out of the loop, being out there in the wilderness and all, that we were stunned and excited that “The Night Chicago Died” had shot up the charts so much. I don’t remember who the tentmate was, I just remember our excitement over “The Night Chicago Died” now being No. 1.

To hear Casey Kasem count them down was something else. There was his enthusiasm for a new artist, that this singer might be the pride of Spring Hill, Nova Scotia, or the way he could gracefully dance around the subject of a song such as “Afternoon Delight." There was the complete lack of irony, because he wouldn’t have known what was to come, when he’d introduce a band with “their first song on the charts,” only to have it be their last.

And there were the long-distance dedications. Oh my. As read by Casey Kasem, they conveyed all the drama that could be milked out of the earnest letters from listeners, hoping upon hope that their dad they never met or the child they gave up for adoption would hear the song and magically understand everything there was to understand.

I often listen to the countdowns now, both from the ’70s and ’80s, replayed on satellite radio and the dedications really give me pause for thought. For starters, I wonder about the people writing the letters, if they ever connected with that estranged relative or unrequited love. But also I think of the letter-writer because it conveys what people had then: a faith, a trust that their radio – this medium – was such an important part of their lives.

As the news has come in about Casey Kasem’s death, once again it’s something that is seen through the eyes of baby boomers and once again something that makes me cringe at being considered a baby boomer.

Baby boomers  have a wide range to them, as people born between 1946 and 1964. I’ve always thought that you can’t truly be a baby boomer if you don’t remember JFK getting shot, if you don’t remember the Beatles on Ed Sullivan, if you loved the Partridge Family and if you didn’t buy bellbottoms with your own money.

And a true baby boomer had all that ’60s music many still consider vastly superior to anything that followed. True baby boomers aren’t Girl Scouts who get giddy over “The Night Chicago Died” hitting No. 1 on the charts in 1974.

Conversely, Generation X is generally considered to follow, from 1965 to 1984. They had grunge and bad TV shows that featured black kids with growth problems being raised by white people.

For those who don’t consider themselves in either generation, perhaps our unnamed sub-generation has Casey Kasem as our icon the way others might have John Lennon or Kurt Cobain. After all, besides being the voice of all our music, Casey Kasem was, like, the voice of Shaggy in “Scooby-Doo.” He was the voice of so many commercials we heard, not to mention a voice on other cartoons from our era: “Hot Wheels,” “Cattanooga Cats,” “Super Friends.” He also made guest appearances on “Charlie’s Angels” and “The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries.”

If you remember the Beatles on Ed Sullivan, you never watched any of those shows. If you thrashed to Nirvana, you probably have never heard of most of them.

But for some of us who have always lived our lives on that bridge between the generations that got the fancy names, maybe it’s Casey Kasem who is our touchstone, our icon.

It’s probably why you’re not hearing too much snark (yet) over the death of Casey Kasem. It was his voice that carried us through our young years until we got to the point where we grew out of it and didn’t listen to him anymore.

But he was there, like the music itself, when it counted, when the quality of the music wasn't as important as its presence. For some, that will always make him No. 1.

A Crowd of Cousins Is the Gift of a Lifetime

Even Grandpa looks a little overwhelmed by the pile of cousins.

The holiday season can crowd one's schedule with multiple parties on any given night, so the range of conversations one can have over the course of an evening can be very entertaining.
    

Yet on a recent Saturday, the juxtaposition of one conversation with the reality of a previous party seemed almost preordained.
   

"I have about 12 or 13 cousins," a new acquaintance told me for reasons I don't remember. "I guess that's not a small number, but we don't really know each other. That's kind of sad."
    

He spoke of how there was bad blood in his family at the parent level, and at a recent funeral, he and his cousins decided that when all their parents were dead, maybe they'd start hanging out.
    

That seemed particularly sad to me because I had come to this second party after being over at my cousin's house. While there, I hung out with about eight other cousins. Some of the cousins said something about joining them on Monday for a birthday gathering, but I couldn't because I was already going to be joining some cousins for another birthday gathering on Wednesday and then a bunch of us cousins would be getting together to see our cousin, a musician, play on Thursday.
    

I have a lot of cousins.
    

What struck me as sad about the guy's comment was not so much that he didn't know his cousins, but it's clear none of those parents made knowing them a priority. I can't imagine my life without my cousins.
    

Generally speaking, children of a generation are members of at least two families and maybe as many as four. Distance and family size likely define to whom we become closest (barring no family drama or ill will). My father was from Hollandale, a small town in southwest Wisconsin, and my mother is from Hilbert, near Lake Winnebago. They met in Milwaukee and returned to this area after they were married.
    

Because of that, I grew up closest to my father's side of the family. There were 10 kids in his family, three of whom died before I was even born.
    

That pile of kids then had their own pile of kids. There were 27 in my generation, and we've lost three because of Vietnam, a car accident and cancer. But because there's such an age gap between youngest and oldest (32 years, in fact), I consider another 10 or so around my age to be my cousins when actually they are my cousins' kids.
    

On what seemed to be every Sunday, we were together. We didn't live in the same town, yet we came together often for dinner or cookouts, for family celebrations, for holidays or for dancing if family musicians were playing somewhere.
    

Watching some of my Uncle Dave's old movies a couple years ago, we saw the same cluster of people grow up together, year by year, at what could only be called the family compound in Hollandale. Little children turned into teenagers, the sort of age where many would want to be anywhere except a family gathering, yet there was nowhere else any of us would have wanted to be.
    

It's only now, years later, that I realize what a conscious choice this had to have been for our parents. They understood that family was what was important and made sure we got together. It had to have taken a great deal of work for the cooks and a huge amount of patience for the grown-ups (and OK, maybe a lot of beer). We were good kids, but we couldn't have been quiet.
    

It's also only now, years later, that I have great admiration for my mom and for my aunts and uncles who are not related to me by blood; this was the lot they married into and became willing participants in. My mom didn't have to take us to my dad's relatives all the time. She could have chosen that we spend more time with her side of the family (and we did, quite a bit -- just not as regularly).
    

That's why it was ironic to hear someone bemoan his cousin experience. About an hour earlier at my cousin's house there was a moment of melancholy because I saw his family pictures and realized how much I miss my Uncle Bob and my Aunt Marie. Of course, I miss my parents terribly and all the uncles and aunts who died before them, with whom we all spent so much time.
   

But in missing the generation that has passed, I couldn't help but think at this holiday season what a wonderful gift they had given us. It's one that has lasted more than half a century and grows as the years go by.
    

They gave us the gift of each other. 

So as parents knock themselves out trying to figure out what to get their kids this Christmas, it's important to think of what lasts. Families aren't as nearby as they once were, and not nearly as large, so it takes some work. Have the little ones make cards for their cousins across the country. Open your homes to extended family when the kids come home from their college breaks. Visit the relatives instead of Disney World. Let the next generation grow up hearing the stories families pass down and help them feel they are part of something bigger. 

It's what our family did for us, and our crowded social calendars show that we can never thank them enough. 

Still hanging out after all these years.

 (This post first appeared as an essay in The Capital Times on Dec. 23, 2006)

October in Transylvania? No trick, it's a treat

Old and new: A horse and cart head up the street while being trailed by a man with a cellphone.

To be certain, there are things to fear while walking down an unpaved lane around midnight under a nearly full moon on an October night in Transylvania.

Cow pies, mostly.

    
Oh sure, it was a little creepy to open and close a giant, creaky manor house gate that looked as if it could have come out of any horror movie. This one, however, was beautifully finished wood that evoked elegance and charm, not chills and screams. 

And indeed, it was interesting to meet a real count, who looked more like a well-heeled Ivy Leaguer than anyone Bela Lugosi would play. 

Because in Transylvania, reality is so far beyond -- and so much more beautiful -- than the stereotypes and the legends perpetuated by books and films. It only took one week to be reminded of what is a good rule for travel or for life: Never believe anything until you see it for yourself.

                             ***

Traveling to Transylvania was pretty much a fluke of a holiday. About a year and a half ago I was on the Internet searching for something else and I found a link about a count who got his property back after the Communists were overthrown in Romania. The count, Tibor Kalnoky, turned his property in a semi-remote Transylvanian village into a place for visitors.

Half-joking, I sent the link to friends, one of whom has some weird vampire obsession. "When are we going?" seemed to be the general response. 

After a little more homework, it seemed like the ideal vacation. "Old Europe," "a disappearing way of life" and "breathtaking landscapes" seemed to be the words that popped up most. Unlike those vampires, the phrases turned out to be true.

Transylvania is a region of Romania, taken from Hungary when the borders were redrawn after World War I. With a geography dominated by river valleys and the Carpathian Mountains, it can be a skier's dream and a hiker's paradise.

It's also a place where sustenance farming is still an important way of life, and lone farmers harvesting with scythes can be seen loading hay onto their horse-drawn carts. Those same horse-drawn carts are as common on the highways there as is an SUV in the States. Village roads also become filled with cows going to and from the fields in the mornings and evenings, so watching your step is important.

That's the Transylvania that Count Kalnoky wants the world to see, which is part of why he created his guesthouses

 "I wanted to show that this country is more than Dracula, orphans and Ceausescu," the count said over dinner one night at the manor house that is the heart of his visitors' compound.

At Count Kalnoky's estate, visitors are pampered in beautifully restored cottages in what could be called an all-inclusive vacation. It's a perfect escape: no phones, no TV, no alarm clocks needed because I woke up every day to the sounds of cows mooing under my window. 

For a reasonable fee depending on the length of stay, guests get their elegant but cozy cottages or rooms, transport, all meals -- including a three-course dinner with wine -- and a variety of guided tours, hikes and other activities. 

That fee, in turn, helps to restore the properties in the village of Miclosoara (called Miklosvar by the 400 or so Hungarian-speaking villagers) and pay the wages of the 15 families employed at the estate.

"Right now we have more families working here than guests," the count joked, but later it was noted that accommodations had already sold out for New Year's.
   
                                      ***

"We are so lucky to live here," said Karsci, who accompanied us on our hike around clear, clean Lacul Sf. Ana (Lake St. Anne), Europe's only volcanic lake.

It was probably hard to imagine such enthusiasm about life in Romania before 1989, when a revolution overthrew the regime of Nicolae Ceausescu. Kalnoky had sneaked onto his family's estate once or twice in that time, but now is home for good. 

Likewise with Karsci, who worked in tourism in Norway and on this day was leading a group of Americans, Irish and English through the same woods he camped in with his grandparents when he was a little boy. 

A day at the lake, and a later steep climb to a sulfuric cave casually referred to as the "Stinky Cave," was the most outdoorsy choice we made for an activity. Each day, we were presented with two options, one cultural and one nature. The choice wasn't always easy. 

The medieval city of Sighisoara, with its narrow passageways and cobblestone streets, provided a great introduction to the region. The small city's skyline is dominated by a 14th-century clock tower, and the community retains much of its Saxon (German) heritage. 

Sighisoara would be a draw itself, but is also notable to tourists as the birthplace of Vlad Tepes (Vlad the Impaler), whose cruelties while Prince of Wallachia and family name of Dracul help create the myth that he was the original "Dracula." 

Other choices offered to guests at the Kalnoky estate include cart rides, medieval churches, an introduction to life in the village, high mountain tours, bird watching and, in the winter, sleigh rides.

One choice wasn't so tough, however. Because we were in Transylvania, there was one place we had to go.

                               ***                                    

"A farce. A farce," said Josef, who drove us the three hours from Bucharest to Miklosvar. He had been asked by one of my friends about the vampires, and he dismissed it with the sort of wave of a hand that clearly is an international symbol for "that is such a load of crap." 

Yet the tourism draw wouldn't be the same in some places without the legends that reached their zenith with the publication of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" in 1897.

It all comes to a head in the town of Bran, where an imposing castle looms overhead. It's the same castle seen in myriad Hollywood horror films. Below it, the tourist trade runs rampant, as if we've stumbled upon a Romanian Wisconsin Dells, without the water slides and go-karts.

"I like this the least," our guide Imre said of the trip to Bran. Fortunately we were there in midweek, minus the pack of tourists, so it wasn't so painful for him or us. Indeed, in the narrow quarters of the castle's interior, we probably wouldn't have enjoyed it much with a crowd, either. 

Yet like Transylvania itself, Bran Castle is nothing like it seems. The imposing exterior hides an elegant interior that resembles a vintage Hollywood mansion. It looks more like a place where Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford would have lived, not characters played by Gene Wilder and Madeline Kahn.

The castle was a royal residence, a gift of the people of Transylvania to Queen Marie of Romania in 1920. She restored it in a grand manner, and her heirs lived there until forced out by the communist-controlled government in 1947. 

The association with Dracula is sketchy at best. Imre said Vlad Tepes might have been thrown into the dungeon there for a couple days.

In May 2009, the castle was returned to its owner, Dominic von Habsburg, grandson of Queen Marie. The family has kept it open as the country's first private museum and are working with the village of Bran to ensure its place in the heart of the country's tourism.

                             ***
This is a country in transition; Romania joined the European Union in 2007. On the one hand, outsiders could see that as a chance to pull the country into modernity. The locals in the village we visited worry about outsiders buying up bargain real estate and small farmers having to conform to a different standard. Count Kalnoky spends a lot of time at antique fairs, trying to find traditional furnishings before bargain-hunting foreigners cart them all out of the country. 

But one thing is certain. The people there live in a land that deserves the pride they exude. As one born and raised in southwestern Wisconsin, I understand pride of place and the feeling that you live in one of the most beautiful areas the world has to offer. 

It's why the count has opened his home to intrepid travelers.

It's why our guide Imre goes out of his way to show us a spectacular view above the beautiful city of Brasov. 

It's why our guide Karsci felt so lucky to spend his day with tourists in a peat bog.

Their love of home is why I took a little part of Transylvania with me back to Madison. 

And not just on my shoes. 


This article first appeared in The Capital Times on Oct. 31, 2006. 

Bran Castle looms over a busy area for tourists.