Featured guitarist Jim Seeley of Tampico, IL, serenaded vendors and visitors at “The Best Little Farmers’ Market in Northwestern Illinois,” on Saturday, June 7, 2014. His instrumentals emitted a special joy, because he played a sweet, new acquisition. He holds the late Eddie Loy’s Gibson 1S75D guitar. He explained that Loy played in Eddie Crow’s band during the 1960’s through 1980’s, along with musicians Spike Jones and Don Lee. Loy has been dead for 20 years. Recently his widow, Mary, sold the guitar, strap, and case to Seeley. He cleaned the instrument and replaced the strings. He replaced the strap, but used Eddie’s to make a bracelet for Mary. Loy had used a guitar pick he made from an American Express card. Seeley drilled a hole in that pick and attached it to the leather bracelet.
“It’s a treasure,” he said of the guitar. Seeley noted the wear from years of play, but that only makes it more precious.
Jamie Rodriguez manned the Alumni Football USA booth alone this week. He offered Morrison High School football fans the first red t-shirts designed to support the team during the “Dutch Bowl” match up with the Fulton, IL, Steamers. The second annual adult game is Friday, June 27, played at home on E. M. “Bud” Cole field, 643 Genesee Avenue, Morrison, IL. There will be alumni bands from both schools, with alumni cheerleaders and pons to add to the authenticity of the experience.
Around the calendar, Diane Michele Volrath LLC works hard on her art and works hard to protect it. From nearby Camanche, IA, she returned to the market for the first time this season. Her stained glass artistry exemplifies her trademarked slogan: “Creating Happiness Each Day.” This whimsical dragonfly encircles a vintage insect repellant sprayer. Volrath often combines old metal buckets and watering cans to contain her whimsical stained glass flowers. They are pretty in a garden or pot and can bloom inside the house or on the porch. Her color combinations vary by season. She transforms smaller glass pieces into pendants or mosaic tiles, as seen in the orb she holds. Pieces have handpainted details fired on and are signed. New this year are patio candle holders, combining twisty copper tubing, interesting candle cups, and colorful leaded glass “bead ” accents. She sells bagged, make-your-own votive kits, which are a fun party idea.
Two years ago she and her father built a studio from a horse barn to handle her expanding market. Volrath sells to over 100 retail shops in the United States and Canada and on both coasts; many are in Illinois and Wisconsin. She will only be at the Farmers’ Market “a couple more times,” as she has to fill lots of retail orders. Local shoppers can find her work at Sweet Woodruff in Fulton, IL, or on her new website: www.cupandgallery.com.
