Synopsis
Clarence Jonk is not a household name, even for the most devoted fans of Midwest-based American writing. But Jonk, who grew up on a farm near Raymond, MN in the early 1900s, is an individual worth knowing and a writer worth reading. A Long Shout: Selected Writings of Clarence Jonk, a new collection of his work, reveals why. In 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, Jonk and a friend tried to sail a rudderless houseboat, the Betsy-Nell, down the Mississippi from St. Paul. They put into the river in October and made it only to LaCrosse, WI before being iced in for the winter. But the story Jonk wrote about his adventure, River Journey, has become a kind of cult classic of life on the River. Published in 1964 and again in 2004, it is Jonk s main claim to fame, but not his only one. A Long Shout offers selections of Jonk s work, most of them previously unpublished. There are excerpts from River Journey and the sequel, River Journey II, which include odd characters and extraordinary stories of life on the Mississippi during the Depression. Remember, Pa? is an anthology of tales about growing up on a farm in western Minnesota as seen through the eyes of a young boy. Crescent Moon is a sequence of love letters Jonk wrote to his wife, Virginia Dunn, before, during and after they got married. Tales of the Pirate Mice is a strange experiment in children s literature that includes pictures of dead mice dressed in costumes to illustrate verse narratives. Black Lace is a titillating collection of poems that scandalized residents of Stillwater, MN. Jonk is one of the great, unrecognized storytellers in American letters, a kind of Huck Finn meets Little House on the Prairie, with a bit of Robert Frost thrown in. A Long Shout -- at long last -- introduces him to modern readers. A Long Shout: Selected Writings of Clarence Jonk Edited by Doug Wihide Biographical note by Lee Pederson ISBN 978-0-9777915-1-4 Paperback, 5.5X8.5 280 pages, including 16 pages of photographs Trolley Car Press 3019 West 43rd Street Minneapolis, MN 55410 612-926-3939 wilhide@skypoint.com
About the Author
Clarence Jonk grew up on a farm near Raymond, MN in the early 1900s. In 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, Jonk and a friend tried to sail a rudderless houseboat, the Betsy-Nell, down the Mississippi from St. Paul. They put into the river in October and made it only to LaCrosse, WI before being iced in for the winter. His story of the adventure, River Journey, has become a kind of cult classic of life on the river. Jonk worked on the Mississippi, helping to build the first locks and dams for the Corps of Engineers, and in a munitions factory during WW II. He ran a quarry, raised 11 kids, and built two houses (one of which used the remains of the Betsy-Nell). He invented games and contraptions. And he wrote memoirs, children s books and almost every day poetry. In 1962 Jonk left his family behind in Minnesota and headed for the warmer climate of northern California, where he lived for 25 years. Like Thoreau, Jonk considered himself a radical critic of established social norms. He attracted a following of friends and acquaintances that included Dr. Seuss, Dalton Trumbo and hundreds of wandering souls who shared his take on life. He died in 1987.
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