Superior Woman--Summer 2020--Final Edition
Superior Woman Summer 2020 is a publication about women living, working and playing in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Superior Woman Summer 2020 is a publication about women living, working and playing in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
MARYBETH KURTZ baking up a storm SUMMER 2020
- Page 2: We Give Back 10% of All Purchases D
- Page 5 and 6: CO-EDITORS/PUBLISHERS PATTI SAMAR &
- Page 7 and 8: BAKING up a storm BY DALE HEMMILA E
- Page 9 and 10: commercial art degree from Macomb C
- Page 11 and 12: DECISION maker BY DALE HEMMILA IIn
- Page 13 and 14: customer service being our differen
- Page 15 and 16: LASER focused BY DALE HEMMILA Edito
- Page 17 and 18: So, how has this partnership worked
- Page 19 and 20: GOSSARD girls BY DALE HEMMILA Edito
- Page 21 and 22: WOMEN HARD AT WORK AT THE GOSSARD F
- Page 23 and 24: FAMILY tradition BY DALE HEMMILA Ed
- Page 25 and 26: want to be the U.P. point of contac
- Page 27 and 28: SINGING the blues BY DALE HEMMILA E
- Page 29 and 30: “We are your out-sourced Marketin
MARYBETH KURTZ<br />
baking up a storm<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong>
We Give Back<br />
10% of All Purchases<br />
Donated to Nonprofits in Michigan<br />
www.43DegreesNorthGifts.com
VOLUME 1, NUMBER 1 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong><br />
<strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> is published quarterly by The Write Company,<br />
511 La Salle Blvd., Port Huron, MI 48060. Circulation 5,000.<br />
Co-Editors & Publishers:<br />
Patti Samar<br />
Marquette Senior High School 1981<br />
Northern Michigan University: B.S. 1985 & M.A. 1989<br />
Dale Hemmila<br />
Negaunee High School 1968<br />
Northern Michigan University: B.S. 1973<br />
Advertising, questions, comments or story ideas:<br />
Email Patti Samar at pjsamar@aol.com<br />
Mission:<br />
<strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> is the premiere publication<br />
for women living, working and playing<br />
in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.<br />
Its stories and features are written and designed<br />
to be inspriational, motivational and encouraging.<br />
www.<strong>Superior</strong><strong>Woman</strong>.Net<br />
© <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> is the property<br />
of Patti Samar of The Write Company<br />
The Write Company is a writing, graphic design<br />
and marketing consultation firm.<br />
View our online portfolio at: www.TheWriteCompany.net<br />
ADVERTISE<br />
IN SUPERIOR WOMAN!<br />
The ad deadline for the next issue<br />
of <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> is October 1, <strong>2020</strong>.<br />
CONTENT<br />
3 From the Editors<br />
4 Marybeth Kurtz<br />
8 Roxanne Daust<br />
12 Stacey Willey & Jackie Bessner<br />
16 Sandra Arsenault<br />
20 Stacy Welling Haughey<br />
24 Lorrie Hayes<br />
Prices:<br />
Business Card Ad: $125/issue<br />
Quarter Page: $250/issue<br />
Half Page: $500/issue<br />
Full Page: $1,000/issue<br />
Advertorial: $1,500/issue<br />
For more information, contact:<br />
Patti Samar<br />
810-300-2176 • pjsamar@aol.com<br />
Dale Hemmila<br />
906-204-8111 • dalehemmila@gmail.com<br />
www.TheWriteCompany.net<br />
2 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
CO-EDITORS/PUBLISHERS<br />
PATTI SAMAR & DALE HEMMILA<br />
FROM THE EDITORS<br />
SSoooo…welcome to <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> 2.0: the Digital Magazine <strong>Edition</strong>!<br />
Two years ago, my husband and I began <strong>Superior</strong><strong>Woman</strong>.Net in an effort to see if there was any interest in sharing<br />
women’s stories in the Upper Peninsula. Both of us are Yoopers – I’m a Marquette Senior High School graduate, he is a<br />
Negaunee High School graduate, and both of us are Northern Michigan University graduates – but we currently live in<br />
Port Huron, where, for the past nine years, I have published a regional women’s magazine called Blue Water <strong>Woman</strong>.<br />
Because my husband is retired (and I am not), and he has a background in media and journalism (among other<br />
prolific skills), he became the chief storyteller for <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong>. He was making regular trips to the U.P. to visit family<br />
and friends, so he scheduled interviews with interesting women, mostly in the Marquette area.<br />
Once he returned home and wrote the stories, he handed them over to me and I planted<br />
them on the <strong>Superior</strong><strong>Woman</strong>.Net website as a part of the blog. Over the course of the past<br />
two years of doing that, we have watched the number of subscribers to the blog grow, as well<br />
as the stats related to how many people were clicking and reading the stories.<br />
Yoopers, it seemed, wanted to read more stories about the incredible women living in the<br />
U.P. And why wouldn’t they?<br />
Creation of an online magazine…<br />
Therefore, we are excited about taking <strong>Superior</strong><strong>Woman</strong>.Net to the next level, moving<br />
the stories beyond just a simple blog post. We have created a full-fledged digital magazine,<br />
complete with a flipbook that allows readers to turn the pages and click on embedded links<br />
within the stories and advertisements.<br />
Speaking of advertisements…<br />
In this issue, you will find advertisements for tee shirts, hoodies, coffee mugs, wine<br />
tumblers, beer steins, face masks (oh so <strong>2020</strong>!) and other items designed by, well, me, as a<br />
part of my business, Blue Water Publishing. All of these items can be purchased by visiting<br />
www.43DegreesNorthGifts.com.<br />
As a bonus: My online shop donates 10 percent of profits to five Michigan nonprofits,<br />
including the Marquette Women’s Center and U.P.A.W.S. of Marquette County.<br />
Does your business need to reach the women’s market?<br />
In this issue, we invite businesses in <strong>Superior</strong>land that wish to reach the women’s market<br />
to join us on this <strong>Superior</strong> Journey. If it makes sense for your business to reach our target<br />
market of women, aged 35 to 65+, in the heart of <strong>Superior</strong>land, then please contact one of us,<br />
below, for more information about advertising in a future issue. You can also find advertising<br />
information on our website at www.<strong>Superior</strong><strong>Woman</strong>.Net.<br />
About this issue…<br />
My husband last visited the U.P. in February before the COVID 19 pandemic hit. He interviewed four women and<br />
we posted one story on the blog before the pandemic and then we decided to hold onto the other stories until the world<br />
felt more stable. The end result was the decision to create this digital magazine. We’ve included two additional stories<br />
that were placed on our blog in the past year.<br />
All told, there are seven <strong>Superior</strong> Women featured in this issue, and we are already planning the Fall issue, and I am<br />
so excited about some of the names I am seeing on Dale’s “potential story ideas” list. We are also very open to accepting<br />
recommendations for stories, so please do not hesitate to email either one of us if you know a <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> with a<br />
compelling story who would be willing to share her story with our readers.<br />
Most of all, thank you. Thank you for taking the time to read this publication. Your support means more to us than<br />
you can ever know.<br />
We look forward to spending even more time in the U.P. in the coming year as we ramp up our storytelling<br />
adventures and meet even more spectacularly special and <strong>Superior</strong> Women.<br />
Peace,<br />
Patti Samar<br />
Co-Editor & Publisher<br />
<strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong><br />
pjsamar@aol.com<br />
Dale Hemmila<br />
Co-Editor & Publisher<br />
<strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong><br />
dalehemmila@gmail.com<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 3
4 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET<br />
MARYBETH KURTZ
BAKING<br />
up a storm<br />
BY DALE HEMMILA<br />
Editor’s Note: The story, below, was filed just before the COVID 19 pandemic hit hard. Subsequently, the business was<br />
shuttered for two months. Back online now, the owner says she is happy to be back and pleased to see her regular customers (“at<br />
least what you can see above the mask”). Business, she says, has been good, even without indoor seating. The outdoor garden<br />
and sidewalk seating has been very popular. A $10,000 grant from the Michigan Economic Development Corporation helped<br />
pay the rent, utilities and payroll during the shutdown. Now that the business is back up and running pandemic-style, owner<br />
Marybeth Kurtz says “I have been very lucky.” <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> wanted to present the original pre-pandemic story of this<br />
business and business owner with the hope that more normal times will be in our future soon.<br />
IIn the middle of the main street, in a small Upper Peninsula mining<br />
town, sits a bright blue building that stands out among the drab<br />
stone and brick structures that occupy the remaining blocks. Its bright<br />
façade almost compels you to step inside and check it out. Once<br />
inside, the sights and smells of a small-town bakery/restaurant lets you<br />
know you have found a hometown treasure for the senses, including,<br />
ultimately, your sense of taste.<br />
The bright blue building houses Midtown Bakery & Café in<br />
downtown Negaunee, Michigan, and over the past two decades it has<br />
become well-known for its made-from-scratch baked goods, and its<br />
soul- pleasing homemade soups and sandwiches. Operated by owner<br />
Marybeth Kurtz, and staffed by a loyal group of longtime employees,<br />
Midtown has become a destination for the discerning epicurean in<br />
Michigan’s central Upper Peninsula.<br />
Actually, “discerning epicurean” is probably not the market<br />
demographic Kurtz and her then-husband envisioned when they<br />
opened the shop 24 years ago. But, over that generational time<br />
period, the shop has developed a very loyal and discriminating<br />
following.<br />
That following might get a whole lot bigger very soon. Kurtz<br />
recently participated, as part of a two-person team, on the Food<br />
Network’s “Winner Cake All” program. Teaming up with local baker<br />
Joe Heck, who received the original invitation from the network and<br />
enlisted Kurtz as his teammate, the pair faced off against three other<br />
two-person teams. After surviving the elimination round, they were<br />
given six hours to come up with a “Broadway Princess Party Cake,”<br />
working against the final two other teams.<br />
“We had to create a cake for the client and the client wanted<br />
chocolate and peanut butter,” she said. “So we used my Mom’s<br />
Chocolate Cake and Joe had a peanut butter frosting recipe.”<br />
Unfortunately, the judges chose a different cake as the winner.<br />
“They loved the cake, not necessarily the way it looked, but they<br />
loved the cake and we just had fun,” she said. “Once we saw the<br />
episode it was like, oh, yeah, we did pretty good. Our goal was to go<br />
and represent the U.P. and have a good time.”<br />
From Retail to Baked Goods<br />
Originally opened as an antique shop, the bakery end of Kurtz’s<br />
business came along six months later. After six years, the antiques<br />
were “pushed out” and soups, salads and sandwiches were added. As<br />
their reputation grew, catering events, whether that be in the form of<br />
delivering sandwiches to the local iron ore mines, or catering dinners<br />
for various customers, became what Kurtz calls a “pretty good chunk”<br />
of the business.<br />
Kurtz, now the sole owner of the shop, is a transplant from the<br />
Detroit area, but there are no big city airs among the mismatched<br />
tables and chairs that seat about 50 patrons, and which, on most<br />
days at lunch time, are fully occupied. The atmosphere can only be<br />
described as hometown casual.<br />
“Most people think of it as home,” she said on a recent Friday<br />
afternoon as she laughed with some of the regulars. “We’ll joke around<br />
with people and tell them if you need anything, either holler loud or<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 5
get up and get it yourself. People like coming here. It’s not pretentious,<br />
and it is a little weird, with all the different tables and chairs.”<br />
Making her point, she gestures to the largest table and chairs.<br />
It was the dining set in the home in which she grew up. It now<br />
accommodates some of the regular group visitors.<br />
“We have quite a few standing reservations,” she said. “There’s a<br />
group of guys that come in the first Monday of every month. There’s a<br />
group of women that come in the last Thursday of every month.”<br />
“’68,” hollers someone from the staff.<br />
“Yeah, class of ’68,” Kurtz said with a laugh. “So I’m very grateful.<br />
As someone who is not from around here, it took a while to get that<br />
people are so tight, but now I can’t imagine living anywhere else.”<br />
Hands-On Management<br />
As a bakery owner, you might imagine that Kurtz is in early in<br />
the morning baking up a storm, but that’s not usually the case. She<br />
says a typical day would have her arriving by mid-morning from her<br />
apartment above the shop. That doesn’t mean the place is idle, as she<br />
notes her baker begins at 6 a.m. and her manager opens the shop at<br />
8 a.m. Baking continues throughout the day, and when Kurtz joins<br />
in, she is just one of the crew, waiting tables, taking orders, making<br />
deliveries, and doing whatever needs to be done.<br />
“I don’t spend a lot of time sitting in my office eating bon-bons,” she<br />
laughed.<br />
“Thank God I have a wonderful staff; I’m very lucky,” she said,<br />
referring to her nine-person team. “I don’t have turnover, so I am very<br />
lucky. I go on vacations, and I don’t think about work. I know it’s in<br />
good hands.”<br />
Kurtz grew up in the metropolitan Detroit area. She earned a<br />
“<br />
Our banana cake is a family recipe, and our<br />
baker is super-talented and likes to create new<br />
recipes and try new things.<br />
”<br />
Family recipes, like our most popular cake,<br />
is Mom’s Chocolate Cake, which is my<br />
grandmother’s recipe.<br />
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6 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
commercial art degree from Macomb Community College. She<br />
worked for the Chuck Muer restaurants in downstate Michigan, which<br />
was a small chain of fine dining establishments that eventually were<br />
shuttered or sold following Muer’s death. As regional pastry chef for<br />
about 10 years for those facilities, she received some of those recipes as<br />
part of her severance pay when the last restaurant she was working at<br />
closed. But they aren’t the only proprietary recipes in use at her shop.<br />
“Family recipes, like our most popular cake, is Mom’s Chocolate<br />
Cake, which is my grandmother’s recipe; our banana cake is a family<br />
recipe, and our baker is super-talented and likes to create new recipes<br />
and try new things,” Kurtz said.<br />
Enjoying the Ride<br />
With her Food Network-brush-with-cake-fame behind her, Kurtz<br />
is satisfied to be back where she is, in Negaunee, working nearly every<br />
day (her shop is closed on Sundays) and greeting her customers.<br />
“I’m grateful that (business) is steady all year round,” she said. “In the<br />
wintertime, I get all the locals, and in the summer, they are all out to<br />
camp, so then I get all the tourists. We get a lot of people that we are<br />
on their route. They come up for their summer vacation, and we are<br />
one of the stops they have to make.”<br />
No matter what the season, however, it’s that downhome feeling once<br />
inside the Midtown Café that just works.<br />
“One of the best sounds of owning your own business is hearing<br />
people laughing, enjoying their time here, and having fun,” she said. “I<br />
know my customers, and my customers know me, so I’m content, I’m<br />
very lucky.”<br />
www.facebook.com/MidtownBakeryCafe<br />
“<br />
One of the best sounds of owning your own<br />
business is hearing people laughing, enjoying<br />
their time here, and having fun.<br />
I know my customers, and my customers know<br />
”<br />
me, so I’m content. I’m very lucky.<br />
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SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 7
8 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET<br />
ROXANNE DAUST
DECISION<br />
maker<br />
BY DALE HEMMILA<br />
IIn life, the decisions you make may not seem momentous at the<br />
time, but when looking back, you can sometimes pinpoint reallife<br />
game-changers. That seems to be the case for Roxanne Daust,<br />
currently chairman, president and chief executive officer of Range<br />
Bank, an independent community bank with nine locations in<br />
Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and in Green Bay, Wisconsin.<br />
For Daust, that type of decision came early in her working career<br />
and began a process that ultimately led her to the top leadership<br />
position of a 133-year-old banking icon in the Upper Peninsula.<br />
“I was working as a 20-year-old waitress at the Villa Capri<br />
(restaurant),” she recalled recently while discussing her path in the<br />
banking world. “I had the opportunity to be a teller (at another<br />
banking institution) and I had to question whether it was worthwhile,<br />
because with the money they were paying, I could barely afford to<br />
live off of, with a child; I was a single mom. So, I did decide that it<br />
made sense to take that bank telling job, because what’s your future as<br />
a single mother waitress? So I started off as a teller and worked (there)<br />
for 10 years in a couple of different departments.”<br />
Her life-changing decision has now come full circle. The Lake<br />
<strong>Superior</strong> Community Partnership (LSCP) has named Daust the<br />
recipient of the <strong>2020</strong> LSCP Distinguished Service Award. She was<br />
recognized at the organization’s annual dinner in March.<br />
“I am excited that Roxanne has been chosen as our Distinguished<br />
Service Award winner,” said Amy Clickner, LSCP chief executive<br />
officer. “She has excelled in her career and in her community. She is<br />
a role model for our future leaders. As for the LSCP, she serves in a<br />
leadership role and has helped set up the organization for continued<br />
success. Over the many years of working together, I am honored to<br />
also call her a friend.”<br />
The path to Daust’s success and high achievement in the banking<br />
industry was not necessarily a straight line. During her first decade<br />
working in the banking industry, Daust finished off an accounting<br />
and computer information systems degree at Northern Michigan<br />
University, and her career path continued in a little different direction.<br />
She actually ended up leaving the banking industry and went to work<br />
at an accounting firm for a couple of years.<br />
“I learned a lot, because I did a lot of auditing of banks and credit<br />
unions,” she said. “I feel like it was a good two years; I liked the<br />
experience because I learned a lot.”<br />
Ultimately, the required travel during auditing assignments led<br />
Daust to return to banking full-time as a better career choice.<br />
“I had seen an ad for a cashier position at First National Bank of<br />
Negaunee (which would ultimately become Range Bank) and I didn’t<br />
even know what a cashier was at the time; it’s kind of an old name for<br />
the accounting person.”<br />
She got the job and continued to move up in her career over the<br />
next 20 years, first as chief financial officer position, then becoming<br />
executive vice president, and finally taking over as president in early<br />
2018. She was promoted to chairman and CEO six months later,<br />
when her predecessor, Ken Palmer, retired.<br />
She credits Palmer with helping her make the moves that lead to her<br />
current leadership position.<br />
“Ken Palmer was a really great mentor to me,” she said. “He always<br />
pushed me to do more and believed in me. He asked me if I wanted<br />
to apply for the executive vice president position, and the first time, I<br />
said no. I was happy where I was at. But as I grew more confident, I<br />
felt that, yeah, I can do this job.<br />
“And then we knew that this was the path that I was kind of on,<br />
in training to take over for Ken, when he retired. Ken did a good<br />
job of backing off on his role for the last year, so there weren’t really a<br />
lot of surprises. I knew what I was in for, and it was a pretty natural<br />
progression, but there is a lot of burden because the buck stops here.<br />
The additional pressure is knowing that, ultimately, the decisionmaking,<br />
along with the board, is up to me.”<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 9
As in any business where leadership at the top changes, the new<br />
leader tends to reshape the business to reflect his or her vision. For<br />
Daust, that meant making some cultural changes.<br />
“We have made a ton of changes, and it all comes down to the<br />
fact that I am very focused on people,” she explained. “I formed a<br />
leadership team, which we never had before. We have a really strong<br />
leadership team, and I collaborate with them, and we make decisions<br />
together. It’s not just me sitting at the top, telling people what to do; it’s<br />
more of a collaboration of what’s best for the bank. ”<br />
So, with her people-focused approach, Daust has instituted short<br />
employee surveys to obtain opinions about working at the bank, and<br />
then getting together with all the employees in small group meetings so<br />
staff can share ideas to improve the banking experience.<br />
Daust believes that businesses need to keep up with competition in<br />
order to move forward. During her first couple of years as CEO, Daust<br />
and her team have provided the leadership to address the challenges of<br />
banking in the 21st century.<br />
To help keep the bank on this path, Daust brought in a consultant<br />
to help improve services to both retail and business clients, to provide<br />
employee training, and to provide marketing assistance.<br />
“One of our key focuses at the bank is making sure that we have<br />
the technology that customers need to do business with us,” she said.<br />
“Which means they don’t have to come to the bank very often, so we<br />
need to provide the products and services they need (online).”<br />
But even with new technology and online competition, she also<br />
hasn’t lost sight of the people aspect of her industry.<br />
“With community banking services, that’s always going to be the<br />
key,” she said. “I mean, when you have a problem, or you have a<br />
question, we answer our phones, we answer your question, you can<br />
come into one of our offices. We’re never going to get away from<br />
“<br />
We have a really strong leadership team<br />
and I collaborate with them.<br />
We make decisions together.<br />
It’s a collaboration of what is best<br />
for the bank.<br />
”<br />
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10 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
customer service being our differentiator, but we also need to have the<br />
technology that customers demand.”<br />
Meanwhile, sitting at the top of a regional banking operation, it is<br />
not lost on Daust that she is a woman in what has traditionally been a<br />
position filled by a man in most of the banking world.<br />
“When I’m sitting in a room of bankers, I’m definitely in the<br />
minority,” she said. “But when we’re in that room, I don’t think of<br />
myself as a woman; it’s more about getting stuff done and working<br />
together.”<br />
She does note, however, that seeing more women in leadership<br />
roles in what were, at one time, considered mostly a male domain, is<br />
inspiring.<br />
“I think it’s a great time for women to be in business, but it hasn’t<br />
always been that way. It’s good to see progress, and I see all the women<br />
across the U.P. that have gained higher level positions, and that’s been<br />
good to see.”<br />
As for her own skills that lead her to her current role?<br />
“I don’t give up,” she said. “I kind of have, ‘I get it done attitude,’<br />
where there’s a way to figure out a solution to any issue that comes up.<br />
It’s just getting the right people in the room, and working hard, and<br />
not giving up.”<br />
Daust has carried that attitude outside of her bank office into<br />
volunteer positions with organizations such as The Marquette<br />
Ambassadors and the Lake <strong>Superior</strong> Community Partnership (LSCP).<br />
As for Daust, as a woman leader in the business world, she has advice<br />
for young women who aspire to something similar.<br />
“Do things that make you feel uncomfortable,” she said. “Because<br />
you learn and you can be proud of yourself. You can learn that you<br />
can do things that you never thought you could do. If you don’t try,<br />
you will never know.”<br />
www.rangebank.com<br />
“<br />
Do things that make you feel<br />
uncomfortable because you learn<br />
and you can be proud of yourself.<br />
You can learn that you can do things<br />
that you never thought you could do.<br />
”<br />
If you don’t try, you will never know.<br />
<strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong><br />
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SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 11
STACEY WILLEY & JACKIE BESSNER<br />
12 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
LASER<br />
focused<br />
BY DALE HEMMILA<br />
Editor’s Note: The story below was filed just before the COVID 19 pandemic hit hard. Subsequently,<br />
the business involved has been impacted by the storefront closure, while online sales have continued.<br />
Although summer trade shows were canceled, wholesale orders have begun to pick up and they saw an<br />
uptick in sales after federal stimulus checks were distributed. <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> wanted to present the<br />
original pre-pandemic story of how this business partnership began with the hope that more normal times<br />
will be in our future soon.<br />
Two women, a business, and a plan: that’s inspiration right there. So,<br />
it shouldn’t be a big surprise that their business is called Be Inspired UP.<br />
The women are Jackie Bessner and Stacey Willey, their shop is a<br />
small storefront in downtown Ishpeming, Michigan, but their business<br />
is much bigger than that.<br />
The shop is filled primarily with laser-cut jewelry. Most of those are<br />
Bessner’s designs and they feature images related to Michigan’s Upper<br />
Peninsula, with an eye toward the natural beauty outdoor activities.<br />
The shop also features the books written by local authors that are<br />
part of Willey’s book publishing business. With some additional local<br />
art on sale, and a few other odds and ends related to the 906 area code,<br />
there is a lot to take in once you step inside.<br />
But that is not the only place to find their unique items. With a<br />
presence on Shopify and Etsy, they reach a much larger audience,<br />
and their own website features 24 pages of unique earrings, pendants,<br />
bracelets and a whole lot more.<br />
Recently <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> met with Willey and Bessner to learn a<br />
little more about their inspiration:<br />
So, how did this business come about?<br />
SW: I opened the gift shop and I still run the book-publishing part,<br />
and I’m still pretty busy with that. This location has been open about<br />
two years. Jackie, a couple of years ago, started her own jewelry line<br />
business. So she approached me about helping her with this stainless<br />
steel line of Be Inspired jewelry.<br />
JB: I had my own little jewelry line and I would do a craft show<br />
here and there and some gift shops started reaching out asking can you<br />
make us some things, but it got to be too much. Getting up at 5 a.m.<br />
to package jewelry, making jewelry, working again after I got home<br />
from my regular 8 to 5 job, so I built a website, I did Etsy, I built a<br />
Shopify site, and realized this could be something, but I don’t have the<br />
time to dedicate. I needed help.<br />
You kind of found each other then?<br />
JB: Stacey did jewelry and I got to chit-chatting with her one day. I<br />
was at the point where I either needed to sell it or bring on a business<br />
partner who has a vested interest in it.<br />
SW: At one point, Jackie really broached it as looking for rental space.<br />
JB: I was looking for rental space to get it out of my house. I just<br />
knew Stacey sold jewelry and she filled the other piece from the<br />
graphic art point that I needed help with, as well. So I approached<br />
her and at first, she said, ‘Well, maybe I’ll help you a little bit,’ and I<br />
showed her what I was doing, and what the potential was, and she<br />
said, yeah, and here we are.<br />
And how is all of that going?<br />
SW: Organically, I think things have fallen into place.<br />
JB: This is a ‘labor of love,’ is a good way to put it, because the<br />
amount of hours it takes to get where we’re at, if someone would have<br />
told me how much labor I would put in without any monetary value,<br />
most people would say, no thanks.<br />
SW: Neither one of us is getting a salary at this point.<br />
JB: It’s dumbfounding how much work it is, but we’re at a pivoting<br />
point right now, and I think it could be a successful business.<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 13
A lot of your products are U.P.-based, but you also<br />
have expanded, right?<br />
JB: The U.P. is limiting so that’s why I’ve branched out designing<br />
the kayak, the skiis and even the full Great Lakes.<br />
SW: As far as our online orders, we get orders from all over; it’s not<br />
just the U.P. We’ve even shipped to Finland. We’ve had to get a little<br />
bit out of the box of the U.P. You have to push it; you have to push the<br />
reach. You can’t just build it and they will come.<br />
So, there is a lot more to this than just the designing?<br />
JB: Our goal was to build it, and work as hard as we can to afford to<br />
bring in staff so they can do the filling of orders. We’re still working on<br />
the infrastructure and the website, but the designing is the fun part.<br />
SW: The designing is a lot of fun.<br />
JB: And we keep coming up with different designs. Stacey will<br />
message me and say, “What do you think of this design?”<br />
SW: I had my own jewelry that I was doing prior to Jackie, using<br />
gemstones and wire wrapping, that kind of thing, too.<br />
Beyond a business partnership, this appears to offer<br />
some creative satisfaction as well?<br />
SW: I do what I do because I love it. I love my job. I feel like I have<br />
been totally blessed to be able to help people with the creative process. I<br />
love doing what I do.<br />
JB: I’ve always been crafty in some capacity; this just kind of had its<br />
natural progression into another realm, and it took off. But in order<br />
to bring it to the next level, I realized it wasn’t going to happen unless I<br />
partnered with someone else who had the same creative end drive that<br />
I have.<br />
“ ”<br />
To shop for Jackie & Stacey’s<br />
original artwork and jewelry, visit:<br />
www.beinspiredup.com<br />
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14 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
So, how has this partnership worked out?<br />
JB: I think it’s phenomenal. We work really well together. We each<br />
bring differences, we work together, I think it’s worked really well.<br />
SW: It’s kind of just naturally fallen into place. The things that she<br />
has been able to do at home, on the computer, have naturally kind of<br />
fallen to her responsibility, as far as the day-to-day responsibility, that<br />
kind of falls to me, and if I don’t have a book to design, then I can help<br />
with the website, too.<br />
How nice is it to see people enjoy what you create?<br />
JB: It’s really exciting to see somebody with your jewelry on, or have<br />
someone tell me that they wore one of our glass pieces on a trip to<br />
France and received all these compliments. It’s something Stacey and I<br />
built together, and it feels good that somebody is enjoying it.<br />
That’s the kind of inspiration any business partnership can<br />
appreciate.<br />
<strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong><br />
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SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 15
16 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET<br />
SANDRA ARSENAULT
GOSSARD<br />
girls<br />
BY DALE HEMMILA<br />
Editor’s Note: The story below was filed just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit hard. Some<br />
planned outreach and celebrations related to the Gossard Company’s 100th anniversary in Ishpeming,<br />
and the same anniversary of the first national election where women could vote, were put on hold, due<br />
to COVID-19. The hope is those events will be able to be held in 2021. Nonetheless, the story of the<br />
Gossard and especially the women who worked there is still compelling and <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> wants to<br />
continue to honor their legacy and tell the story of the Gossard, the women who worked there and one<br />
woman’s efforts to make sure we remember it all.<br />
When you think of <strong>Superior</strong> Women, you should consider the<br />
hundreds of women who kept a garment factory humming in<br />
Ishpeming, Michigan, for decades. Now, one <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong><br />
is making sure their legacy, and the history that’s included, isn’t<br />
forgotten.<br />
The factory was owned by the H.W. Gossard Company, and<br />
the hundreds of women were those who worked there from 1920<br />
to 1976. The <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> maintaining that legacy is Sandra<br />
Arsenault, who, with husband Paul, owns the historic Gossard<br />
Building in downtown Ishpeming.<br />
In <strong>2020</strong>, the year in which women will celebrate the 100th<br />
anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment, is also the<br />
100th anniversary of the first Ishpeming “Gossard Girls,” when the<br />
factory opened in 1920.<br />
In honor of that 100th anniversary, Arsenault and her husband,<br />
Paul, are planning to create a much larger tribute, with displays<br />
encompassing nearly the entire building.<br />
“There’s going to be a lot more information in the building,” she<br />
said. “All three floors are going to have more information about their<br />
picnics, they had bowling teams, baseball teams and their cafeteria.”<br />
In addition, there will be an expanded display relating to the employee<br />
strike of 1949.<br />
“The story I want to tell, is to focus on the women,” Arsenault said.<br />
“In 1920 women were allowed to vote, and all along women have<br />
grown. At the time that the Gossard was here, there were no females in<br />
management. Now we have women who run for president, we have<br />
women CEOs, we have businesses that are run by women.<br />
“Now, people come into the building, and they take pictures, and<br />
that’s what I want them to do, and I think they will be really excited<br />
when they see what Paul and I have in store. (They) will be able to go<br />
through the building and read about the items (on display).”<br />
To capture that history and recognize the work of the people of<br />
the Gossard, Arsenault has researched the history of the Ishpeming<br />
operations, salvaged much of the equipment, photos, samples and<br />
other items left behind when the facility closed, and reached out to<br />
the more than 1,000 employees and their families in order to build an<br />
historical display on the Gossard building’s first floor.<br />
“My first goal is a tribute to the women,” Arsenault said recently<br />
while discussing her project. “Their legacy should be told.”<br />
The Gossard facility in Ishpeming came about when the Chicagobased<br />
manufacturer of women’s undergarments was looking to add<br />
a facility large enough to accomplish the piece-work nature of their<br />
garment assembly in a location that featured a ready workforce.<br />
Following a recruitment visit to Chicago from a representative of the<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 17
ADVERTISEMENT FOR GOSSARD UNDERGARMENTS<br />
City of Ishpeming, the Gossard Company sent their own agents to<br />
review the potential site and staffing possibilities. What they found was<br />
a three-story, 12,000 square foot building that would fit well with their<br />
manufacturing process. A bonus was finding that there was an eager<br />
and available employee base.<br />
“The two reasons that they came, was that they had the building,<br />
and they knew they would have the workforce because of the mines<br />
up here,” Arsenault said. “The men (miners) were married, and had<br />
daughters, and that’s kind of what sweetened the pot to come to<br />
Ishpeming.”<br />
It was those wives and daughters that became the bulk of the<br />
workforce for the company. More than 1,000 of them worked at<br />
the Gossard over the years. Some were long-term employees, some<br />
were short-term employees who may have worked for a while before<br />
getting married, having children, or moving away. At its peak in 1950,<br />
the facility employed 680 people. Eighty-five percent of them were<br />
women, many of whom walked out of high school and directly into<br />
factory employment.<br />
Their job was to sew different pieces of corsets and brassieres to<br />
manufacture the final foundation products the company sold. The<br />
more you sewed, the more money you made.<br />
“<br />
They came because they knew they would have<br />
the workforce because of the mines up here.<br />
The miners were married, and had daughters,<br />
and that’s what sweetened the pot to come<br />
to Ishpeming.<br />
”<br />
18 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
WOMEN HARD AT WORK AT THE GOSSARD FACTORY IN ISHPEMING<br />
“It all was piece work, and if you were liked by your supervisor, they<br />
would give you the pieces that you could sew faster making more<br />
money,” Arsenault said.<br />
That money usually averaged out to minimum wage, beginning in<br />
the 1920s at about 35 cents an hour, ranging to about a dollar an hour<br />
following union affiliation and a four-month strike in 1949. By the<br />
time the factory closed in 1976, minimum wage was about $2.30/hour.<br />
Long before the more common two-income families of today, the<br />
Gossard provided that opportunity to their employees.<br />
“They really had a big impact on economics in the city,” Arsenault<br />
said. “The paychecks the women took home stayed local.”<br />
And over the years, that was a lot of paychecks and a lot of women.<br />
Arsenault has more than a thousand names in what she calls her<br />
“bible” and she continues to add names as family members provide<br />
information about their relatives who were employed by the Gossard.<br />
“Every time I put something out on Facebook looking for<br />
information, I get more and more people saying ‘grandma worked<br />
there’ or ‘my great aunt,’ and the way we’ve gotten these names is by<br />
people coming in to see if their relative is on the wall,” Arsenault said.<br />
That’s because once she has an employee’s name, she adds a<br />
nameplate on the tribute wall. The plates appear on salvaged metal<br />
patterns that were used to make the garments the factory produced.<br />
(Full disclosure, the tribute wall contains the names of several of this<br />
writer’s family members, including my grandmother’s name, as she<br />
was employed by the Gossard Company for many years.)<br />
It might be hard to imagine now, but during its heyday, the Gossard<br />
was a hub of activity. Women, many of whom walked to town, would<br />
begin the workday at 7 a.m. For years, the Gossard maintained its<br />
own chef and cafeteria to provide a “full noon meal,” and by quitting<br />
time at 4 p.m., hundreds of “Gossard Girls” spilled out of the building<br />
and onto the surrounding streets. Much of this is captured in photos<br />
and memorabilia on Arsenault’s tribute wall.<br />
“And I want to do it with the whole building; I want it to be a time<br />
capsule,” she said. “Kids don’t know what piece work is, they don’t<br />
understand an assembly line. This building has such a rich history, and<br />
it was home to many women, and it’s about the women; this is a labor<br />
of love for me. It’s like I know these women, and I just want to share<br />
their lives.”<br />
To add to her story, Arsenault said she is looking for artifacts, stories and<br />
yes, the names of more women who may have a Gossard connection.<br />
To learn more about the Gossard factory in Ishpeming, visit<br />
www.oldgossard.com.<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 19
20 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET<br />
STACY WELLING HAUGHEY
FAMILY<br />
tradition<br />
BY DALE HEMMILA<br />
Editor’s Note: Earlier in 2019 we shared the story of Stacy Welling Haughey, as the first female to serve as the<br />
Upper Peninsula Regional Coordinator for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. We thought Stacy<br />
was quite accomplished in her role and apparently the Michigan United Conservation Clubs (MUCC) agreed,<br />
as later in the year Haughey was presented with the MUCC’s 2019 Unsung Hero Award for her work as an<br />
“integral connector of U.P. stakeholders, bringing understanding and two-way communication to the people of the<br />
U.P.” <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong> was glad we were able to recognize Welling Haughey’s accomplishments then and wanted<br />
to re-publish her story in this edition of the magazine. Congratulations, Stacy!<br />
Stacy Welling Haughey grew up immersed in the natural resources that<br />
surrounded her childhood home in the Upper Peninsula, learning how to<br />
fish and hunt.<br />
The Welling family had always been engaged with the great outdoors.<br />
So much so, that her grandfather, Gerald Welling, was a conservation<br />
officer with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.<br />
And then, he was killed by a poacher.<br />
Gerald Welling was on duty, patrolling for illegal bear hunting activity in<br />
Menominee County, when he was killed by poachers in 1972.<br />
That event changed Welling Haughey’s family unit, and, though she<br />
was not yet born when that tragedy took place, it became a part of family<br />
lore that made an impact on her life.<br />
“I was the kid on the playground defending the DNR,” she said. “If<br />
anyone said anything bad about the officers, I was the one supporting<br />
them.<br />
“I wanted to be a conservation officer,” she said, pointing back to when<br />
she was kid.<br />
Though she initially followed a different career path, she ultimately<br />
took a job that certainly would have made her grandfather proud: since<br />
2008, Welling Haughey has served as the Upper Peninsula Regional<br />
Coordinator for the Michigan DNR.<br />
An Upper Peninsula native, Welling Haughey graduated from North<br />
Central High School in the southern U.P. She went on to earn two<br />
degrees from Northern Michigan University: a bachelor’s degree in<br />
business management, and a master’s degree in public administration.<br />
Following a stint in development and community relations for OSF<br />
St. Francis Hospital in Escanaba, she moved into public service, first as<br />
Governor Jennifer Granholm’s Northern Michigan Representative. She<br />
was then tapped to be deputy chief of staff for U.S. Representative Bart<br />
Stupak, working out of the Congressman’s Washington D.C. office.<br />
“That was such a good growth experience,” she said recently as she<br />
reflected on some previous career activities. “I got to work for someone I<br />
respected, and for the district, and I got exposure as to how government<br />
works.”<br />
After coming back home to Michigan to work on the Congressman’s<br />
2008 re-election campaign, Welling Haughey felt a strong pull to return<br />
to her roots.<br />
“I loved being home, I loved being with family, and I knew I had to<br />
figure out a way to stick around,” she said.<br />
That “way” popped up when the DNR regional coordinator position<br />
was posted in October of 2008.<br />
“I looked at that and said, ‘Wow, this would be a great opportunity,’”<br />
she recalled.<br />
She knew, based on her family’s experience in losing her grandfather,<br />
that working for the DNR wasn’t “just a job.”<br />
It was a calling.<br />
As it turned out, her wish to be part of the DNR was fulfilled when she<br />
was hired by then-Michigan DNR Director Rebecca Humphries, but at<br />
first it seemed to come with the caveat of, “be careful what you wish for.”<br />
As the first woman — and an outsider — in the top DNR position in<br />
the U.P., did not initially sit well with longtime observers of the agency.<br />
“It was not easy,” she said. “I came from the outside, and on paper it<br />
looked like I landed from Capitol Hill.”<br />
Among the comments she recalled hearing were: “unqualified,” “political<br />
hack,” “this girl is coming from D.C.; what does she know?”<br />
While she came to the job with excellent professional credentials, she<br />
faced several challenges. First, she was new to the department, which had<br />
typically filled position from within. Second, she faced questions about<br />
her knowledge related to the state’s natural resources and field work. And<br />
third, her gender was a sea change in that position.<br />
Early in her tenure, she sat down with a veteran outdoor reporter, and<br />
she recalled their initial exchange.<br />
Reporter: “You’re the first woman in this job, how does it feel to be a<br />
woman in this job hired by a woman?”<br />
Welling Haughey: “Well, I never considered that, but how would that<br />
be different if I was a man hired by a man. Would you still ask that?”<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 21
Reporter: “I never thought of that.”<br />
Welling Haughey: “No, I didn’t think you would.”<br />
While the critics continued, Welling Haughey understood what they<br />
seemed most concerned about.<br />
“They wanted to know what my resource background was,” she said.<br />
“(They were asking) ‘Can she bait a hook? Can she gut a deer?’”<br />
To that end, she put together a photo collage on paper, handwritten at<br />
the top, “Welling’s Resume,” which showed her fishing as a youngster;<br />
on a successful pheasant hunt as a teen; as a proud adult showing off the<br />
camp buck pole; and more. She promptly printed 100 copies and handed<br />
them to those interested in her outdoor background.<br />
“It was kind of a conversation starter,” she explained. “They needed to<br />
see that I had been in the field. There were a lot of questions I wanted to<br />
answer. I wanted people to know me, not just what they thought (they<br />
knew).”<br />
Ultimately, she was able to get past the criticism.<br />
“I definitely had my guard up for a long time; it was a challenge,” she<br />
said. “I’m very thankful I had a great network of amazing family and<br />
amazing friends. They just kept pushing me to not give up.”<br />
That has allowed her to spend the last decade doing the work she was<br />
hired to do.<br />
Welling Haughey pointed out that part of that work included a change<br />
in the position, which once ran all of the DNR operations in the U.P.<br />
When she accepted the job, the position was changed and became more<br />
stakeholder-oriented, reporting up to the state DNR Director.<br />
“I’m not telling the fisheries biologist what to stock, or the forester how<br />
much cedar to harvest,” she said.<br />
Instead, as a representative of each division of the department, with 10<br />
sections that range from fisheries, mining, real estate and more, she finds<br />
herself more in the customer service business.<br />
“I coordinate and try to keep things running smoothly,” she said. “I<br />
“<br />
They wanted to know what<br />
my resource background was.<br />
‘Can she bait a hook?’<br />
‘Can she gut a deer?’<br />
They needed to see that I had been<br />
in the field.<br />
”<br />
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22 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
want to be the U.P. point of contact if there’s an issue. I might not have the<br />
answer, but I usually know who does. I try to connect the dots.”<br />
Much of her work includes being the DNR liaison on the U.P.’s two,<br />
20-member citizen’s advisory councils. The councils provide local input<br />
to the DNR on programs and policies, and identify areas where the<br />
department can be more effective and responsive.<br />
The citizen’s advisory councils came on-line in 2008, the same year<br />
Welling Haughey was hired. And while she may have questioned her<br />
own hiring, once telling then-DNR director Humphries they might have<br />
been the only two people in Michigan who thought her hiring was a good<br />
idea, the woman who hired her didn’t question the move.<br />
“I wanted someone to be my eyes and ears in the U.P. and tell me the<br />
unvarnished truth about what the community felt, both good and bad,”<br />
Humphries said recently from her South Carolina office where she is<br />
CEO of the National Wild Turkey Federation. “Stacy does that in a<br />
very professional way. She’s shown her worth over and over again, and it’s<br />
worked out very well.”<br />
And it has apparently worked well for Welling Haughey.<br />
“I love being able to solve challenges,” she said. “I have a passion for the<br />
U.P. I feel like an advocate for the U.P.”<br />
Meanwhile, since landing with the DNR, Welling Haughey has added<br />
two new job titles in her life: “wife” to her husband, Jared, and “mother”<br />
to two daughters.<br />
While juggling DNR responsibilities across the entire U.P., like most<br />
working mothers, it is the job at home that keeps her focused.<br />
“Being a parent is the best thing I have ever been a part of,” she said. “It’s<br />
fun and it’s crazy. We have an amazing network, and family is a godsend.<br />
My mom helps out two days a week, and my husband is very supportive.<br />
We approach all of it as a team and our girls are priority number one. I<br />
love what I do, I am passionate about my job, but family comes first.”<br />
I love being able to solve challenges.<br />
I have a passion for the U.P.;<br />
“I<br />
”<br />
feel like an advocate for the U.P.<br />
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SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 23
LORRIE HAYES<br />
24 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET
SINGING<br />
the blues<br />
BY DALE HEMMILA<br />
Editor’s Note: Earlier last year we wrote about Lorrie Hayes and her singing<br />
career, including her inclusion in the Flat Broke Blues Band. Since then the<br />
COVID-19 pandemic created some setbacks for the band as they weren’t able<br />
to perform for nearly six months. The band, and Lorrie, are back on stage these<br />
days, though the venues are outdoors and involve proper social distancing. As<br />
she noted, recently lost gigs have happened to all musicians these past few months,<br />
but she said: “We will prevail.” We think Lorrie’s story is worth republishing<br />
now as she truly embodies the spirit and will that make her a <strong>Superior</strong> <strong>Woman</strong>.<br />
When Lorrie Hayes is singing the Blues, she is in a happy place.<br />
That is understandable because Hayes is the lead singer of the Marquette, Michigan-based Flat Broke<br />
Blues Band, one of the more prolific, and longest lasting, live entertainment bands in Michigan’s Upper<br />
Peninsula.<br />
And while she hasn’t been singing the Blues all the time, Hayes has been performing most of her life.<br />
“Music has driven my life,” she said recently from her office at the screen printing shop she owns in<br />
Marquette. “My first solo was at age five. At about seven, I made a deal with God: ‘If I can be a singer,<br />
I will let people know about you.’”<br />
As a youngster, she would sing with her mother, who regularly performed at weddings and funerals.<br />
“I sang with her every day,” she said. “That helped me develop a vibrato, and it made my voice<br />
somewhat more sophisticated.”<br />
In addition to helping her mother rehearse, there was also some fantasy time.<br />
“I sang with a hair brush (as a mic),” she said with a laugh. “And I had a lip-sync group at about (age)<br />
10 called ‘The Paulettes.’ We had dance moves and were inspired by TV shows. And I watched music<br />
from Elvis and the Stones. Whether (or not) I believed I would have a music career, it was my love—I<br />
just did it.”<br />
Though music was her passion, she took a more practical route and studied art in college, eventually<br />
SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET 25
“<br />
I like to sing songs that are telling stories,<br />
something I’ve experienced. You get more<br />
emotion from that.<br />
It’s not making perfect music; it’s how we make<br />
you feel.<br />
We just want to make you feel good.<br />
”<br />
(PHOTO<br />
earning a master of fine arts degree in art education at Northern<br />
Michigan University in Marquette.<br />
“I wanted to be educated,” Hayes said of her choice of studies, “and I<br />
loved art. It was between art and music.”<br />
And while art is still a big part of her life, it is music where Hayes has<br />
made a more significant mark.<br />
That began with singing, over a long period of time, with different<br />
groups, beginning in her early 20s, before the Flat Broke Blues Band<br />
came along.<br />
With a couple of decades of performing experience behind her,<br />
Hayes and her bandmates performed their first gig in 2001 as a benefit<br />
for the American Red Cross following the 9/11 attacks in New York<br />
City.<br />
The band probably didn’t realize it at the time, but they would still be<br />
making music nearly two decades later.<br />
“That, my friend, is unheard of,” Hayes said. Given her previous<br />
experience, she would know that there are challenges to keeping a band<br />
together.<br />
“We all have lives, homes, children,” she explained. “Sometimes the<br />
motivation isn’t the same.”<br />
So what has kept the current group of five together for 18 years?<br />
“It’s an equal partnership,” she said. “We are (like) five CEOs sitting<br />
down at the table figuring things out. We all take possession, and have<br />
an equal work load, and equal reimbursement. It’s like a family. We<br />
respect each other, we know each other well. There are marriages that<br />
don’t last this long. This is very rewarding. ”<br />
Just as with marriages and other relationships, it helps to keep things<br />
exciting and fresh, and a large part of the way the Flat Broke Blues<br />
Band does that can be found in the way they approach their creative<br />
process together.<br />
“What has helped (us) is writing music and doing our own CDs,”<br />
she said, adding that more than half of the music they play is written<br />
by the band members.<br />
And in the end, it is all about the music they like to play and where<br />
they play it.<br />
26 SUMMER <strong>2020</strong> SUPERIORWOMAN.NET<br />
SUPPLIED BY LORRIE HAYES)<br />
“I like to sing songs that are telling stories, something I’ve<br />
experienced,” she said. “You get more emotion from that. It’s not<br />
making perfect music; it’s how we make you feel. We just want to<br />
make you feel good.”<br />
The band is in high demand throughout the Upper Peninsula, and<br />
they will play nearly any venue.<br />
“We love festivals,” Hayes said. “Private parties, we’re always trying<br />
out different bars. Most towns have a music series, and we like to play<br />
those.”<br />
And for Hayes, the thrill of performing never goes away.<br />
“It’s an excitement,” she said. “If we have a Friday night gig, I start<br />
getting revved up on Wednesday.”<br />
Along with vocals, she is also known for her play on the harmonica.<br />
Self-taught, the turns she takes on the harmonica add to the special<br />
sound of the band.<br />
“It’s not a common thing that a woman plays the harmonica,” she<br />
said. “(But) having that adds to the authenticity of the Blues. (The<br />
band) hasn’t told me to stop yet, so I must be doing okay.”<br />
That authentic sound has been captured so far on two CDs, and<br />
she said the band is planning to put together another one soon. The<br />
band’s music can be found online at the CDBaby website store.<br />
Looking back on the deal she made with God as a youngster, Hayes<br />
said it feels like it worked out pretty well.<br />
“I’m so blessed, I’m so lucky,” Hayes said. “Whenever new doors<br />
open and new opportunities come, I always feel it’s God’s direction,<br />
and that he has his hand on me continually. I still pray for his help and<br />
I get it. It was a lovely deal from a once lovely child, but it has been<br />
working for a long time. And I’m grateful.”<br />
That deal is going to have to last a lot longer because Hayes is not<br />
planning to quit singing anytime soon.<br />
“When I leave this earth, there’s going to be some gigs on the<br />
calendar.” she predicted. “Someone’s going to have to call and say<br />
‘Lorrie’s not going to make it.’”<br />
For more information about the band, visit their website:<br />
www.flatbrokeblues.com
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