Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Thursday, June 3, 2010
The Little Couple
Watch the reality TV show, "The Little Couple", on the Discovery Channel:
http://tlc.discovery.com/tv/little-couple/
http://tlc.discovery.com/tv/little-couple/
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Grant: Mom, I have a troll in the closet!
There is a story of a mother with a developmentally disabled son capable of staying at home alone while she works in an office. At her mid-morning break, she calls and discusses what he's found to do that day. She repeats the call again at noon, and in mid-afternoon, then runs errands in late afternoon before supper.
Read more: http://www.leader-vindicator.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=20423821&BRD=2758&PAG=461&dept_id=572980&rfi=6
Read more: http://www.leader-vindicator.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=20423821&BRD=2758&PAG=461&dept_id=572980&rfi=6
Little person, big problem
Gloria Allred is standing up for the rights of little people everywhere, by announcing she's filing a disability discrimination claim against a college that allegedly booted a 3'7" student because of her size.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Oz-Stravaganza!
http://oz-stravaganza.com/
Oz-Stravaganza! 2010 will take place in the village of Chittenango, in Central Upstate New York.
Oz-Stravaganza! 2010 is a full weekend of events that run from Friday, June 4th through Sunday June 6th.
Check out all the information on this website to learn more. The Oz-Stravaganza! Committee looks forward to seeing you and your family for this year's Oz-Stravaganza!!
Oz-Stravaganza! 2010 will take place in the village of Chittenango, in Central Upstate New York.
Oz-Stravaganza! 2010 is a full weekend of events that run from Friday, June 4th through Sunday June 6th.
Check out all the information on this website to learn more. The Oz-Stravaganza! Committee looks forward to seeing you and your family for this year's Oz-Stravaganza!!
Beyond Oz: Meinhardt Raabe 'led a fantastic life'
Source: Syracuse.com
Madison County, Top CNY, columns »
Beyond Oz: Meinhardt Raabe 'led a fantastic life'
By Sean Kirst / The Post-Standard
April 14, 2010, 6:52AM
0510 OZFEST 1.JPGJohn Berry / The Post-Standard, 1996
Meinhardt Raabe, who played the Munchkin coroner in "The Wizard of Oz," died last week. He attended the Oz festivals in Chittenango for many years.
The coroner is dead. Really, most sincerely dead. That’s how last week’s passing of Meinhardt Raabe, at 94, played around much of the movie-watching world.
Meinhardt was a little person. More than 70 years ago, he had a transcendent line while playing a Munchkin in a film that became an international classic. For the rest of his long life, he would be identified with that declarative ruling on the death of the Wicked Witch of the East.
Not so much in Chittenango. Sure, plenty of children will remember Meinhardt in his coroner’s robes, signing autographs and patiently sharing his famous bit from “The Wizard of Oz.”
He was an annual visitor to a community that trumpeted its link to native son L. Frank Baum, author of the Oz books. Chittenango celebrated with a festival now called Oz-Stravaganza!, at which Meinhardt generated both love and reverence.
As for the organizers, they soon forgot about the image and embraced the man.
“He led a fantastic life, and he did things many people could only dream about,” said Barb Evans, Oz-Stravaganza! co-director.
http://www.syracuse.com/kirst/index.ssf/2010/04/beyond_oz_raabe_led_a_fantasti.html
For the first 10 years or so, Meinhardt traveled to Chittenango with his wife Marie, another little person who was well-loved in the village, too. The couple always stayed with Louise and Pat Jerome, who recall how Marie and Meinhardt were inseparable — always talking, laughing, planning, arguing. For Marie, a favorite part of any visit was a trip to local thrift stores, where she’d go looking for children’s clothes that she could wear.
Marie died in a 1997 automobile accident in which Meinhardt was badly hurt. Many widowers, in that situation, roll over and give up.
Meinhardt “always bounced back,” said Pat Jerome, a retired superintendent of Chittenango schools. Over the years, Pat said, Meinhardt survived a brain tumor and broke nine bones in various mishaps. But he always made it to the festival, at least until a couple of years ago, even if he had to use a wheelchair to get around the airport.
“He was a very feisty guy,” Louise said.
Symbolically, Meinhardt had particular importance to Central New York. His arrival at the earliest festivals in the 1980s gave the local celebration a national platform. He introduced organizers to many of the original Munchkins.
As for his personality, it will be a long time before anyone in Chittenango grows weary of Meinhardt stories.
During his first visit, he stayed at the home of Doug Rainbow, an investigator with the village police whose job was always picking up Meinhardt at the airport.
At 5:30 on the morning after Meinhardt arrived, Rainbow was startled out of a deep sleep. Meinhardt, a master gardener, had an urgent matter to discuss with his host: He didn’t like the look of some weeds in Doug’s garden.
Traditionally, the community would greet visiting Munchkins with a big spaghetti dinner. Meinhardt smiled politely, but he wasn’t a spaghetti guy. Once he got back to the Jeromes, Louise would treat him to some lamb or a piece of steak.
Meinhardt’s relationship with the Jeromes evolved into deep friendship. The couple winters in Florida, and they made an annual visit to Meinhardt at his retirement community, just outside Jacksonville.
They were there two months ago. They knew his health was failing, but his mind remained sharp. He offered new details on a few old tales, and he told them he did not plan on traveling again. It had gotten to be too much. He was content.
His death, then, did not really come as a shock, although it will leave a void at June’s Oz-Stravaganza! Three surviving Munchkins have promised to show up, their presence an increasingly precious gift. Local devotees of the film will certainly miss the Munchkin coroner, but Louise Jerome will be missing someone else.
“I don’t see him in the movie,” she said Tuesday. “I see him as he was.”
Madison County, Top CNY, columns »
Beyond Oz: Meinhardt Raabe 'led a fantastic life'
By Sean Kirst / The Post-Standard
April 14, 2010, 6:52AM
0510 OZFEST 1.JPGJohn Berry / The Post-Standard, 1996
Meinhardt Raabe, who played the Munchkin coroner in "The Wizard of Oz," died last week. He attended the Oz festivals in Chittenango for many years.
The coroner is dead. Really, most sincerely dead. That’s how last week’s passing of Meinhardt Raabe, at 94, played around much of the movie-watching world.
Meinhardt was a little person. More than 70 years ago, he had a transcendent line while playing a Munchkin in a film that became an international classic. For the rest of his long life, he would be identified with that declarative ruling on the death of the Wicked Witch of the East.
Not so much in Chittenango. Sure, plenty of children will remember Meinhardt in his coroner’s robes, signing autographs and patiently sharing his famous bit from “The Wizard of Oz.”
He was an annual visitor to a community that trumpeted its link to native son L. Frank Baum, author of the Oz books. Chittenango celebrated with a festival now called Oz-Stravaganza!, at which Meinhardt generated both love and reverence.
As for the organizers, they soon forgot about the image and embraced the man.
“He led a fantastic life, and he did things many people could only dream about,” said Barb Evans, Oz-Stravaganza! co-director.
http://www.syracuse.com/kirst/index.ssf/2010/04/beyond_oz_raabe_led_a_fantasti.html
For the first 10 years or so, Meinhardt traveled to Chittenango with his wife Marie, another little person who was well-loved in the village, too. The couple always stayed with Louise and Pat Jerome, who recall how Marie and Meinhardt were inseparable — always talking, laughing, planning, arguing. For Marie, a favorite part of any visit was a trip to local thrift stores, where she’d go looking for children’s clothes that she could wear.
Marie died in a 1997 automobile accident in which Meinhardt was badly hurt. Many widowers, in that situation, roll over and give up.
Meinhardt “always bounced back,” said Pat Jerome, a retired superintendent of Chittenango schools. Over the years, Pat said, Meinhardt survived a brain tumor and broke nine bones in various mishaps. But he always made it to the festival, at least until a couple of years ago, even if he had to use a wheelchair to get around the airport.
“He was a very feisty guy,” Louise said.
Symbolically, Meinhardt had particular importance to Central New York. His arrival at the earliest festivals in the 1980s gave the local celebration a national platform. He introduced organizers to many of the original Munchkins.
As for his personality, it will be a long time before anyone in Chittenango grows weary of Meinhardt stories.
During his first visit, he stayed at the home of Doug Rainbow, an investigator with the village police whose job was always picking up Meinhardt at the airport.
At 5:30 on the morning after Meinhardt arrived, Rainbow was startled out of a deep sleep. Meinhardt, a master gardener, had an urgent matter to discuss with his host: He didn’t like the look of some weeds in Doug’s garden.
Traditionally, the community would greet visiting Munchkins with a big spaghetti dinner. Meinhardt smiled politely, but he wasn’t a spaghetti guy. Once he got back to the Jeromes, Louise would treat him to some lamb or a piece of steak.
Meinhardt’s relationship with the Jeromes evolved into deep friendship. The couple winters in Florida, and they made an annual visit to Meinhardt at his retirement community, just outside Jacksonville.
They were there two months ago. They knew his health was failing, but his mind remained sharp. He offered new details on a few old tales, and he told them he did not plan on traveling again. It had gotten to be too much. He was content.
His death, then, did not really come as a shock, although it will leave a void at June’s Oz-Stravaganza! Three surviving Munchkins have promised to show up, their presence an increasingly precious gift. Local devotees of the film will certainly miss the Munchkin coroner, but Louise Jerome will be missing someone else.
“I don’t see him in the movie,” she said Tuesday. “I see him as he was.”
No yellow brick road needed for this 'Dwarf Empire'
[Source: Metro, April 14, 2010]
The long and the short of it is simple — this is the world’s only Dwarf Empire and if you’re above 1.5 metres, you’re not coming in.
But this land of little people in Kunming, in the Chinese province of Yunnan, where little people live in a sanctuary entirely separate from the average-sized world has become an unlikely tourist attraction.
Everyone at the settlement has their accommodation, healthcare and food taken care of in return for performing musicals and shows for average-sized visitors.
Their community, set on the Xishan mountain, in which they will allow you into their mushroom-roofed houses to make you cups of coffee and smoke shisha, is a trek up a windy, vertiginous road, but at the top the little people provide a giant welcome.
You can take in one of the spellbinding musicals in their ramshackle amphitheatre, where performances include ballet, Shaolin martial arts, breakdancing, traditional folk Chinese songs and a dwarf version of U.S. pop act the Pussycat Dolls.
The performances aren’t always note perfect, but the tiny showmen are hard to take your eyes off.
On arrival you will be greeted by around 100 people in fancy dress —belly dancers, Roman centurions, folk dancers, and dwarf men in top hats rush out to meet you through the mountain fog.
The community was set up by average-sized businessman Cheng Mingjing, a former electronics salesman who spent millions on building a butterfly park as well as the settlement.
The settlement is a haven for dwarves who have been abused in the wider world.
It even has its own parliament, which settles domestic disputes and promotes the regular activities outside the park, and their own national anthem which is sung before each performance.
No little person — regardless of musical talent — is turned away from the park, if they do not perform they are given maintenance catering, public relations or security roles.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
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