text:
The South Shore Journal, Vol. 5, 2013, pp. 45-67.
The City Methodist Church, located in downtown Gary, Indiana, is the epitome of urban decay. What was once an impressive structure is now in ruins. The church's current state mirrors the decline of the city itself. The massive gothic cathedral is riddled with holes in its walls and ceilings. It is filled with debris that has accumulated with time. The church was built in 1926 at a cost of one million dollars donated by the company that built Gary, the United States Steel Corporation, as well as the city's namesake, Judge Elbert H. Gary. It seemed in 1926 that the church, just as the city of Gary itself, would permanently preserve the memory of Elbert Gary. This has not been the case. On a wall within the church a spray-painted message reads, "M.J.'s home."[1] While it is unclear exactly what the message's author meant, the appearance of Michael Jackson's name anywhere in Gary, Indiana, is unsurprising. Jackson has become the figure synonymous with Gary, Indiana, rather than the man for whom the city was named.[2]
Gary is the home of monuments honoring both Elbert Gary and Michael Jackson. In front of Gary City Hall stands a statue of Elbert Gary, U.S. Steel's C.E.O. from 1901-1927. The statue of Gary's founding father was erected in 1958, the same year that Michael Jackson, Gary's most famous son and the future "king of pop," was born. Jackson's death in 2009 prompted a monument to be built and later placed in front of his boyhood home. Unlike the Elbert Gary statue, the former Jackson home is a frequently visited site. Elbert Gary has become a distant figure of the city's past, whereas Michael Jackson's memory, as the graffiti hints, is alive and thriving. Gary and Jackson serve as useful historical figures of contrast: a study of Judge Gary and U.S. Steel's historical roles in the city's development and their respective diminishment in contemporary relevance provides insight into the environment Jackson came from and the city that reveres him today.
The erection of the Elbert Gary statue by U.S. Steel stood as an unsuccessful attempt to perpetuate the city's founder's memory. The obvious explanation for the forgetting of Elbert Gary is the passage of time – over fifty years have passed since the erection of the statue and over eighty years since his death. Many cities' founding fathers have floated to the back of local citizens' minds as decades pass, and Elbert Gary is by no means exceptional in this respect. Still, the passage of time does not completely account for the neglect of Elbert Gary's memory. The fact that Elbert Gary is forgotten and Michael Jackson remembered also reflects a complex socioeconomic evolution the city of Gary has experienced in its one-hundred plus years of existence.
Gary still holds tightly onto the memory of Michael Jackson for obvious reasons. There is no question that he is the most successful and famous product of the city. For the Gary community, many of whom struggle to attain economic stability, Jackson stands as a symbol of the American dream. His rags-to-riches story represents the hopes of those in Gary who strive to overcome poverty within a city that, for many, lacks opportunity. Besides Jackson's accomplishments, the Michael Jackson-Gary, Indiana, connection may be the key to the city's rejuvenation. The Jackson home, where the family resided from 1950-1968, has become an important attraction to Michael Jackson fans that swarm the Gary Midtown neighborhood on significant Jackson anniversaries. Also, talks of a Michael Jackson performing arts center, museum, and park could potentially bring much-needed jobs and revenue to the downtrodden city (although there has long been skepticism as to whether these projects will ever come to fruition).[3]
An examination of these two memorials and the meaning they hold for the city's residents provides insight into Gary's past and present. Elbert Gary and Jackson define two dissimilar eras in the city's history and reflect the transition between these two distinct periods. While Elbert Gary shares a similar fate as other cities' local historical figures, it is highly unlikely that he could become an object of admiration for Gary citizens today. In the historical narrative of U.S. Steel, Steel Serves the Nation (funded and published by the company), the city of Gary is described as "a monument to Judge Gary."[4] The statement conveys the belief that Elbert Gary would have an indelible place in the city's history and that U.S. Steel's role as the driving economic force of the town would further ensure the preservation of Judge Gary's legacy. But Elbert Gary's legacy in Gary, Indiana, is inseparable from U.S. Steel; no longer is Gary the steel center of the world, and no longer does U.S. Steel put food on the table for the majority of the city's inhabitants. Consequently, Judge Gary is no longer relevant to a city whose historical crises correspond with the dramatic decline in U.S. Steel's employment of Gary citizens. Had Gary, Indiana, not undergone such drastic changes, Elbert Gary's memory would have likely faded all the same. He was always a distant figure to Garyites – he never lived in the city and rarely visited. However, Elbert Gary's indifference to the institutionalized racism practiced in U.S. Steel plants, his staunch anti-union stance, and his refusal to address his employees' poor working and living conditions have created an unlikelihood of his legacy ever being resurrected in a positive light in Gary, Indiana.
U.S. Steel and the Founding of Gary
In 1901, Elbert Gary orchestrated the formation of U.S. Steel, a massive steel corporation and the largest conglomerate ever assembled up to that point. The corporation was a collection of 213 separate manufacturing plants and transportation companies. The purpose of the merger was to minimize "unhealthy" competition. The company was accused from the onset of being a monopoly, but successfully fought attempts by the federal government to dissolve the trust. Elbert Gary's prominent role in organizing the formation of the conglomerate earned him the job of C.E.O., a post he held until his death in 1927. U.S. Steel was the first billion dollar corporation in history, and Elbert Gary's place at the head of the helm positioned him as one of the most powerful men in the country.[5]
The founding of Gary, Indiana, in 1906 sprang from a combination of factors. The newly formed U.S. Steel had been struggling to supply the increasing steel demand in the Midwest, and Elbert Gary needed to find a large piece of land to build a major steel complex. U.S. Steel's first president, Charles M. Schwab, initially suggested a new location be placed in Pennsylvania, but it lacked the railroad and water transportation opportunities of a Chicago area position. Judge Gary proposed a spot by Waukegan, Illinois, but a number of U.S. Steel officials dismissed the idea because they feared the "political climate of progressive era Illinois" would not be conducive to company interests. Eventually, U.S. Steel officials looked to Northwest Indiana due to its proximity to Chicago and the region's railroads. The Hammond area was considered, but because the land in Hammond was too expensive, company men began to contemplate a section of uninhabited swampland and sand dunes at the southern shore of Lake Michigan. Land was cheap, Chicago was just thirty miles away, and the spot offered convenient transportation of Minnesota iron ore via Lake Michigan and Chicago's railroads. Moreover, Chicago would provide Gary with a consistent labor supply.[6]
The burgeoning industrial center attracted thousands of unskilled European immigrants looking for work. Unfortunately, city planning was not the main priority of U.S. Steel, and overcrowding and deplorable living conditions for unskilled workers became the visible consequence of poor city planning. The singular purpose of the town, from the company's perspective, was the manufacturing of steel; as a result of this thinking, unskilled workers' interests were never addressed. The failure of U.S. Steel to properly and humanely plan a town had far-reaching consequences for the city.[7]
U.S. Steel wished to avoid the same problems in Gary, Indiana, that had plagued the "Pullman Experiment," another company town on the outskirts of Chicago built for the sole purpose of housing workers. The Pullman fiasco – along with the negative press which haunted the project – was still fresh in the minds of U.S. Steel executives as they built Gary, Indiana. George Pullman, founder of the Pullman Palace Car Company, had hoped to create a content and stable workforce through the creation of an aesthetically pleasing town complete with a school, park, library, church, sanitation services, and company-provided housing. His motives were not absolutely altruistic: Pullman believed he could avoid strikes and the bitter conflicts between labor and industry through effective city planning and strict control of all aspects of workers' lives. The experiment occurred in a bubble, with the town almost completely isolated from any other inhabited area. Problems arose primarily because of Pullman's economizing drive. He saw the town and its inhabitants as a business venture, and workers were exorbitantly charged through the privatization of amenities such as water, sanitation, and utilities. Pullman not only wanted the town to pay for itself, but wanted to turn a profit. The violent strike in Pullman in 1894 has been attributed primarily to a reduction of wages without a reduction in the already-inflated home rental rates, but the wage cut was likely the final straw in a series of workers' grievances. Early twentieth-century industrialists like Elbert Gary took to heart the failure of George Pullman to control labor through extensive city planning.[8]
Officials of U.S. Steel did not share Pullman's ambition to create an industrial utopia, and many felt that the Pullman fiasco proved such a thing impossible. The company openly stated that the founding of Gary, Indiana, was not an attempt to create a model town; instead, the city was simply a practical necessity. Because of events in Pullman, U.S. Steel chose not to provide housing for unskilled workers and modeled the city based on a "limited involvement philosophy of town planning."[9] U.S. Steel only provided housing within its limited jurisdiction and did little to prevent the surreptitious real estate practices of unscrupulous businessmen south of the Wabash. As historian James B. Lane explains, "Successful city planning never became a reality because U.S. Steel put less emphasis on the welfare of the community than on efficiency and profitability."[10]
Gary's Founding Father
Elbert Gary lobbied to have U.S. Steel's new city named after him, and this desire would forever tie him to the steel town. Born on October 8, 1846, he came from humble beginnings, growing up on a farm in Wheaton, Illinois. His parents were devout Methodists, and he grew up in a household where piousness and morality were emphasized. From an early age he was a devoted student. Upon the completion of his school career, he graduated first in his class at Union College of Law in 1868. He started a law practice with his uncle and quickly gained a reputation as a skilled lawyer. In his community and career, he steadily became more prominent. When Wheaton was officially incorporated in 1890, Gary became the city's first mayor. The capstone of his legal career was in 1882 when he was elected as a judge in DuPage County. The next year he was elected president of the Chicago Bar Association.[11]
Although Gary's legal work was what began his life of success, his greatest legacy emerged from steel. In 1897, banker and financier J.P. Morgan called on Gary to consult on the merger of several steel companies, which would ultimately form the Federal Steel Company. Gary had innovative opinions on the matter. He argued that an "integrated production scheme" encompassing all aspects of the steel production process – a singular ownership of all facilities involving raw materials necessary for steel production and the transportation systems that moved these products – would dramatically increase efficiency and profitability. Gary's business savvy impressed Morgan to the extent that he offered Gary the job of president of the newly formed Federal Steel Company. In 1901, J.P. Morgan bought the Carnegie Steel Magnate, thus leaving Elbert Gary to manage the rising United States Steel Corporation. He effectively became the spokesperson for Big Steel. Judge Gary (as he continued to be called) at once became a national celebrity, appearing in advertisements, such as for a popular breakfast product, Cream of Wheat. Newspapers and magazines regularly featured Judge Gary, and in 1926 he even made the cover of Time Magazine. The cover story stated, "U.S. Steel was the sublimation of Judge Gary. He was the personification of U.S. Steel."[12]
The Steel Strike of 1919 and Elbert Gary's Legacy
Because of Gary's close identification with U.S. Steel in the public eye, he would be considered the man most responsible for the company's treatment of workers when strikes broke out nationally following World War I. The Steel Strike of 1919 illustrated Elbert Gary and U.S. Steel's innate fear of unionism. The cultural climate born of World War I patriotism set the stage for the strike as well as the strike's failure. Steel workers had been hailed as domestic heroes during the war, but by war's end workers felt uncompensated for their sacrifices. The emphasis on democracy and liberty that comprised patriotic war rhetoric created a sense in some workers that the existing corporate structure of industry was antithetical to democratic ideals. Many workers felt that their interests went entirely unrepresented and unvalued at the corporate level.[13]
For the most part, the steel industry successfully fought unionism since the 1890s, but by the end of World War I union men felt that conditions were particularly advantageous for workers to push the union issue. The American Federation of Labor (AFL) formed the National Committee for Organizing Iron and Steel Workers, which functioned as a large conglomerate of steel-affiliated unions. For a time, it seemed that President Woodrow Wilson and the public at large sympathized with steel workers' demands for collective bargaining and better working conditions. After all, unskilled laborers, who were disproportionately African American and foreign-born, worked twelve hour days, seven days a week, for meager hourly wages. Conditions were often unsafe, especially for the unskilled. Workers clearly had some valid grievances. Public opinion, however, took a radical turn, and the real issues of the strike were distorted through a propaganda campaign on the part of U.S. Steel.[14]
The steel men had several potent weapons at their disposal in their battle against unionism: financial prosperity from the WWI manufacturing boom, power over local city governments, and influence over the press. Due to the 1917 Russian Revolution, a strong anti-immigrant, anti-communist sentiment spread throughout the United States. Workers held strikes in U.S. Steel plants across the nation. Judge Gary stood as the figurehead of the "open shop" debate once the Steel Strike of 1919 began in September. He maintained that collective bargaining made it impossible for non-union workers to find a job and insisted his refusal to meet with union leaders stemmed from his concern for non-union workers. Moreover, the twelve-hour day, seven-day week would be impossible to abolish from a production standpoint, Gary contended. And most effectively, he publically claimed that the strike was led by socialist radicals who exploited ignorant immigrant workers.[15]
Elbert Gary argued that unions sought "the closed shop, soviets, and the forcible distribution of property."[16] On one level, such a statement reflects a reality of the strike; there certainly existed strikers who wished to see the industrial system fundamentally restructured, with more even or equal balance of power between workers and those at the top. On the other hand, Gary's statement reveals an overall wish to spin the strike as only radical in the public mind and dismiss the existence of legitimate complaints. Gary insisted that he had an open door policy, yet his office was in New York City, a far distance for most of his workers. When questioned in a Congressional hearing about his strict open shop dogma, he was unable to provide to the committee a clear method through which a steelworker could communicate grievances to any company official higher than a foreman. His argument that a closed shop took away an individual worker's choice neglected the fact that a worker had no avenue to voice complaints to higher-ups. Tensions between labor and Big Steel culminated in a national strike, and Gary, Indiana, was one of many steel towns affected.[17]
On October 4, 1919, a minor altercation between African American strikebreakers and union members escalated into a riot once Gary police came to break it up. The pro-management mayor, William F. Hodges, called in U.S. troops led by General Leonard Wood. General Wood enthusiastically put down the strike and claimed Gary a hotbed of radicalism. Some workers did desire "industrial democracy" as much as better working conditions, and whether these radicals comprised the majority or the minority of strikers was a nationally debated issue in 1919. Unions insisted the strike was politically moderate, while steel officials claimed the strike as inherently radical. Still, General Wood likely had some bias in how he approached the strike. Wood was not only actively communicating with Elbert Gary about the strike, but he also had aspirations to be the Republican nominee for president and hoped for Judge Gary's support in the endeavor. With Gary under martial law and basic civil liberties taken away, the strike was effectively dead.[18]
While both skilled and unskilled workers cooperated in the strike, African Americans were generally excluded by unions and solicited as scabs by steel companies. The preexisting racial and ethnic tensions were exacerbated by the strike, which may have had long-term effects on Gary. These racial divisions did not disappear with the end of the strike, and stand as one of the more devastating consequences of the action. The institutional racism seen in U.S. Steel plants was common business practice during this period, but any ethnic divisions present prior to the strike were consequently intensified and remained so long afterwards.[19]
Following the strike, public sentiment toward Elbert Gary in the city would likely have depended on a citizen's position on the strike. Unskilled workers would have more reason to hold resentments against Elbert Gary and U.S. Steel than privileged members of the community. Following Elbert Gary's death in 1927, Gary, Indiana, went into a two hour official mourning, but the business world and prominent members of the Republican Party mourned him with greater fervor.[20]
The Elbert H. Gary Statue's Dedication
The Elbert H. Gary statue, an idea conceived at a U.S. Steel luncheon during Gary's 1956 Golden Jubilee, was made possible through a fifty thousand dollar donation from the corporation. The statue was meant to boost morale and good feelings toward the company. During U.S. Steel President Clifford F. Hood's dedication speech, he spelled out the symbiotic nature of the city's relationship with the company. The corporation employed the vast majority of the city of Gary's workers, and, indirectly through tax payments, the industry supported much of the city's public services. In thirty years, this would no longer be so.[21]
The statue of Elbert Gary, crafted by English sculptor Bryant Baker, sits in the city's downtown district, just outside of Gary City Hall. While the surrounding buildings on adjacent street corners fall into disrepair, the monument remains in nearly pristine condition. The granite base contains a simple inscription: "Elbert H. Gary 1846-1927 Lawyer, Industrialist, Benefactor, Founder in 1906 of the City of Gary." Gary's face is distinguished, serious, and tense. The next notable quality of the work is the detail of the clothing. Elbert Gary himself dressed formally, often wearing a three-piece suit and jacket in his portraits. His right hand grasps a book with the word "Law" inscribed onto it.
One of Baker's most acclaimed statues, known as Pioneer Woman, is markedly unlike the Elbert Gary statue in that it displays a different approach to commemorating a historical figure. The contrast between these two figures can most easily be seen in the inscriptions: Elbert Gary's plaque contains the key facts of his life, while Pioneer Woman's inscription is more passionate. The Pioneer Woman plaque states, "…in appreciation of the heroic character of the women who braved the dangers and endured the hardships incident to the daily life of the pioneer and homesteader in this country." The choice to commemorate the pioneer women in such a manner indicates that the representation is relatable. Elbert Gary's inscription, in contrast, is unemotional and concise.[22]
Unlike Pioneer Woman, Baker's depictions of U.S. presidents Millard Fillmore and Grover Cleveland share a similar quality to the Gary statue. The three men hold a rigid, commanding stance that exudes a sense of authority. Significantly, the symbol of the Roman fasces is present in the three pieces which emphasizes the authority and official nature of these figures. In Roman culture, the fasces "was an axe with a bundle of birch or elm rods signifying the power of Roman magistrates" and was used in rituals "to portray order and symbolize the fine line that exists between a ruler's ability to grant life or death to its subjects."[23] In statuary, the fasces represent both the positive sense of order within society as well as an image of fear and distrust. One famous example is the Lincoln Memorial, where this symbol is proudly displayed on the arms of the sixteenth president's chair. The fasces are also used as a symbol of balance and order on the base of the Elbert Gary statue.
Interestingly, on the second floor of the City Methodist Church on one of the hole-filled walls is a spray-painted image of the fasces. A message below the fasces symbol appears to say "internal contrast."[24] The spray-painted fasces may indicate the artist's distrust of authority -- a far cry from the symbol's meaning on the base of the Elbert Gary statue, located less than a mile away. The graffiti artist's appropriation of the fasces may even reflect an overall shift in public attitude toward authority. Regardless, the presence of the fasces on both the Elbert Gary statue and in the ruins of the City Methodist Church helps bridge the gap between the past and the present.[25]
Racial Polarization and the Economic Decline of Gary
The white flight Gary experienced throughout the 1960s and 1970s coincided with the
rise of African Americans in city politics, most obviously with the election of Gary's first African American mayor (and the nation's second African American mayor of a major city), Richard G. Hatcher, in 1967. Like much of the country in the 1950s and 1960s, Gary was heavily segregated, and racism divided the population. Throughout the 1970s, businesses left at a devastating rate, debilitating the city's economy. Federal money devoted to the city dried up by the time the Reagan administration took office, cementing Gary's downward spiral. By the 1980s, what was once an impressive downtown area became filled with vacant buildings, and Gary's nickname went from "Magic City" or "Steel City" or even "City of the Century" to "America's Murder Capital." The growing black flight of the last two decades has worsened the city's problems, continuing the downward population trend.[26]
Beginning in 1970, the population of Gary dramatically declined with each subsequent decade. The ethnic and economic demographics drastically changed as well. In 1970, the city was 53.3 percent African American and 46.7 percent white with a population of 175,415; in 1980, the city was 73.6 percent African American, 26.4 percent white, 7.5 percent Hispanic, with a population of 151,953; in 1990, it was 81.6 percent African American, 16.3 percent white, 5.7 percent Hispanic, with a population of 116,646; in 2000, it was 84 percent African American, 11.9 percent white, 4.9 percent Hispanic, with a population of 102,746.[27] As of the 2010 census, Gary has a population of 80,294, with 84.1 percent African American, 10.7 percent white, and 5.1 percent Hispanic.[28] Over one-third of the population is living under the poverty line. With steel production now highly mechanized, U.S. Steel employs only a
Photo of Michael Jackson memorial taken August 3, 2011, by Amalia Shanks-Meile.
fraction of the number of workers it once did. These metamorphoses have affected the collective consciousness within the city, and in turn the way Elbert Gary and Michael Jackson are presently viewed by Gary citizens.[29]
The Jackson Family
The Jackson family left Gary in 1968, a year after Mayor Hatcher won office. The family patriarch, Joe Jackson, worked at Inland Steel, and his job was difficult and monotonous. Michael's mother, Katherine, worked at the Sears department store on Broadway, which closed just a few years after the family moved to California. Michael Jackson and his family left the city just before it experienced its drastic economic decline. Had the Jacksons not found success in the music industry and instead remained in Gary, they may have seen hard times. [30]
Michael Jackson grew up in a house on the 2300 block of Jackson Street in Gary's Midtown neighborhood. From the age of five, Jackson performed in a musical group with his brothers under their father's guidance. Joe Jackson was a strict disciplinarian, and throughout his life Jackson complained he was deprived of a childhood because of the father's pursuit of success in the music business. His experiences touring with his band in Gary were unsavory, as it was not uncommon for the children to perform in bars or strip clubs. The Jackson 5 found success while Michael was a young boy, and by the time Jackson was a teenager, he was internationally famous.[31]
The controversies of Jackson's adult life are well-known. He was seen as an eccentric figure in the 1980s, with outlandish rumors swirling about him, but molestation allegations in the 1990s forever tarnished his reputation. A survey of Indiana University Northwest students was conducted in the fall of 2011 to gauge the variety of opinions on Michael Jackson. Most answers were verbose and passionate, suggesting Michael Jackson's powerful influence. One person described Jackson as "the world's greatest celebrity," and another said "his music lives on." When asked, "Who was Michael Jackson?" some of the most revealing answers were "pedophile," "child molester," "singer, switched from black to white," "a pathetic excuse of a musician," and a "child molester, rotting in hell." Although many answers were an attack on his colorful personal life, eight percent of participants specifically stated they had a heightened sense of regard and/or sympathy for him following his death.[32]
Still, the city's reaction to Jackson's 2009 death revealed that much of Gary had stayed loyal to him despite the negative publicity. Fans from Gary, along with many out-of-towners, swarmed Jackson's childhood home in the wake of his death, leaving piles of gifts outside for the late star. A city-sponsored memorial service was held at the U.S. Steel Yard two weeks following his death, with over six thousand in attendance. The construction of a Jackson monument was rushed by an Indiana company in order to be unveiled during the ceremony. This memorial reflects a new age in statuary. In a far cry from Baker's statue of Elbert Gary, the company created the design by computer, and the etchings were done by laser on the five-thousand pound granite slab. It took just forty-eight hours to complete. It has Jackson's likeness on both sides, a collage of pictures, and a short biography. The company took the opportunity to self-promote by placing its website in large print on the lower section of the monument.[33]
Public Memory
Both the Michael Jackson and Elbert H. Gary monuments were created to serve a specific purpose, and each serve as a way of preserving and shaping public memory in the city. Social historian John Bodnar defines public memory as "a body of beliefs and ideas about the past that help a public or society understand both its past, present, and by implication, its future." In turn, any memorial or monument represents publicly shared beliefs regarding the past that often reflect present concerns.[34]
Bodnar argues that public memory is shaped by two distinct forces: official and vernacular. He defines official memory as a product of a state's effort to promote positive feelings toward authority (whether economic, cultural, or political); vernacular memory is defined as a product of the local, non-ruling sects of society (essentially those who are not in power). The Elbert Gary monument could be described as a product of official memory, with the official interests being U.S. Steel and the Gary city government. At the time of the Gary statue's conception, the corporation and the city still enjoyed a mutually beneficial relationship; the construction of the statue celebrated the role of U.S. Steel and Elbert Gary in the creation of Gary, Indiana, and was intended to promote a future relationship between the company and the city. There was never a clamoring for an Elbert Gary memorial by the larger public, and the statue was erected over thirty years after his death. Although Elbert Gary made many philanthropic donations to the city – he had the Gary Land Company donate property for parks, churches, hospitals, a YMCA, a YWCA, several public buildings, as well as the previously mentioned donation to the City Methodist Church – a public memorial took several decades to appear.[35]
Jackson's memorial, on the other hand, displays a combination of vernacular and official interests. When Jackson died, the city went into mourning, and a permanent memorial was the means through which Gary citizens could find solace and honor Jackson's connection to the city. And Jackson may possibly have a more positive influence on Gary in death than in life. There have been numerous reports that the performing arts center, museum, and theme park projects are progressing, but the projects' futures are uncertain. (Gary's current mayor Karen Freeman-Wilson has stated that a large-scale project seems unlikely in the near future.) If these ideas come into existence, they may prove to be the catalyst that could lead to Gary's rejuvenation. Fans from all over the world have visited Gary to see Jackson's boyhood home. Moreover, in the three years following his death, Jackson family members have come for city-sponsored birthday celebrations which attract large numbers.[36]
The city is not entirely pro-Jackson. Many still judge him based on his controversial behavior, and widespread media attention compounded negative feelings. Some in the African American community criticized him for bleaching his skin. This particularly impacted the Gary community, with segments of the population believing he turned his back on his race. Others took child molestation allegations on face value. Still, one of the most serious criticisms citizens of Gary have of Jackson is that he did not do enough to help the community. While he made huge charitable donations to countless causes throughout his life, Gary, Indiana, was never the recipient. A 2002 Gary mural project, with paintings made upon boards on abandoned buildings along Broadway, depicted Michael Jackson "symbolically turning his back on Gary, [with] three digits of his bejeweled glove-hand blotted out with graffiti, as if he were giving his birthplace the finger." [37]
In 2003 Jackson made a trip to Gary, his first visit to the city since he was a small boy. While in Gary, he announced plans to open a Jackson museum and performing arts center, but these projects never moved forward. Part of his 2003 trip's itinerary was to meet with the mayor and receive a key to the city. A video of his visit shows him passing by the Elbert Gary statue – the man whose memory he would eclipse – as he walks up the stairs of Gary City Hall.[38] The crowd's eyes stood fixed on Jackson, while Elbert Gary's statue stood obscured in the background. This moment perfectly represents the dichotomy between Gary's past and present.
The socioeconomic changes the city of Gary has experienced explain both the neglect of Elbert H. Gary's memory and the embrace of Michael Jackson's. Elbert Gary's statue still stands and the city still holds his name, but the memory of the man is hardly present in the city's collective consciousness. This is because Elbert Gary's relationship to the city relates only to the past; Michael Jackson's relationship with the city, on the other hand, is deeply rooted in his relationship with the current vernacular forces of the city. Perhaps more importantly, Jackson's connection to the city may provide a basis for economic hope for the future. A study of the Elbert Gary and Michael Jackson memorials reveals that public memory is dictated by the present as much as by the past. Both men embody the American rags-to-riches story, but Jackson's is more relatable to the city's population. Jackson's early life, in many ways, resembles much of the Gary community's present. As a boy, Michael Jackson struggled within the same city that is experiencing similar struggles over forty years later. Elbert Gary's connection to the city, quite simply, is no longer relevant or visible to the Garyites of today. The passage of time accounts for the city's disinterest in Elbert H. Gary, but so do the changes that have occurred over time.
[1] The authors saw the spray-painted message on a trip to the City Methodist Church on January 27, 2012.
[2] "Endangered Structures in Gary, Indiana," Preserve Indiana, http://www.preserveindiana.com/pixpages/nw_ind/orrcitymeth.htm (accessed January 27, 2012); Kendall F. Svengalis, Gary, Indiana: A Centennial Celebration (North Stonington: Duneland Press, 2006), 126; J. Randy Taraborrelli, Michael Jackson: the Magic, the Madness, the Whole Story (New York: Birch Lane Press, 1991), 3; A subculture of 'gravers' visit landmarks like the Michael Jackson home in Gary, Indiana, that are associated with deceased celebrities. See, Stephanie Shanks-Meile and Charles P. Gallmeier, "Grave Robbing, Virtual Cemeteries, and Participant Observation: Doing Ethnography on the Subculture of Gravers," Journal for the Liberal Arts and Sciences 15, no. 1, (2010): 7-24.
[3] Andrew Grenier, "Michael Jackson Museum to Get Rides, Golf Course," NBC Chicago, January 30, 2009 http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/Garys-Jackson-Museum-Plan-Grows-80336147.html (accessed January 2, 2012); "No Thrills Yet at Michael Jackson Museum Site," ABC 7 Chicago, November 22, 2011, http://www.abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/special_segments&id=8442413 (accessed December 3, 2011).
[4] Douglas A. Fisher, Steel Serves the Nation: The Fifty Year Story of United States Steel (New York: United States Steel Corporation, 1951), 38.
[5] Paul A. Tiffany, The Decline of American Steel (New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 1988), 5; Svengalis, A Centennial Celebration, 57; Edward Greer, Big Steel: Black Politics and Corporate Power in Gary, Indiana (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1979), 51-52.
[6] Svengalis, A Centennial Celebration, 57, 58; Mohl, Steel City, 12; Svengalis, A Centennial Celebration, 57.
[7] James B. Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years: A Centennial History of Gary, Indiana 1906-2006 (Valparaiso: Home Mountain Printing, 2006), 25, 19; Mohl, Steel City, 5, 18.
[8] Almont Lindsey, "Paternalism and the Pullman Strike," The American Historical Review 44, no. 2 (1939): 273, 286.
[9] Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years, 17.
[10] Paul O'Hara, Gary, the Most American of All American Cities (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2011), 71, 47; Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years, 19.
[11] Ida M. Tarbell, The Life of Elbert H. Gary: The Story of Steel (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1925), 18, 40, 50, 65, 68, 72.
[12] Mohl, Steel City, 11; Fisher, Steel Serves the Nation, 43; Mohl, Steel City, 11.
[13] David Brody, Labor in Crisis: The Steel Strike of 1919 (Philadelphia: Harper and Row Publishers, Inc., 1965), 95-96; "Business and Finance: Steel," Time Magazine 8, no. 1 (1926): 28-30.
[14] O'Hara, Gary, the Most American, 71; Brody, Labor in Crisis, 68; Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years, 63.
[15] Brody, Labor in Crisis, 115; While he followed orders from his non-radical superiors in the AFL and National Committee, union leader William Z. Foster was later revealed to have indeed been a socialist; this fact was later used by anti-unionists to validate their assertion that the strike was radical in nature.
[16] "Report on Steel Strike of 1919," Interchurch World Movement of America (New York: Harcourt, Brace, and Howe, 1920), 33.
[17] Benjamin Sevitch, Elbert Gary: Spokesman for Steel, (PhD diss., Indiana University Bloomington, 1978), 103
[18] Brody, Labor in Crisis, 32.
[19] Mohl, Steel City, 6.
[20] Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years, 25.
[21] Remarks of Clifford F. Hood at Elbert H. Gary Statue Dedication, June 18, 1958, Peter Mandich Papers, Box 2, Folder 33, Calumet Regional Archives, Indiana University Northwest, Gary, Indiana. The Calumet Regional Archives has within its collections a rare video of the unveiling of the Elbert Gary statue.
[22] Bryant Baker, Pioneer Woman, 1927-1930. Bronze, Ponca City, Oklahoma.
[23] Anthony J. Marshall, "Symbols and Showmanship in Roman Public Life: The Fasces," Phoenix 38, no. 2 (1984): 120; Jack Tresidder, The Complete Dictionary of Symbols (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2005), 177-78.
[24] Message seen by authors on a January 27, 2012, trip to the City Methodist Church.
[25] Bryant Baker was commissioned to do the Millard Fillmore and Grover Cleveland statues at the same time. They are located on opposite sides of Buffalo City Hall in New York. The statues were unveiled together. Bryant Baker, Millard Fillmore, 1930-32. Bronze, Buffalo City Hall, New York and Grover Cleveland, 1930-32. Bronze, Buffalo City Hall, New York; Marshall, "Symbols and Showmanship," 20; James Percoco, Summers with Lincoln: Looking for the Man in the Monuments (New York: Fordham University Press, 2008), 174.
[26] Greer, Big Steel, 50; Mohl, Steel City, 7; Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years, 231.
[27] Barnes, The Cost of Being Poor, 24.
[28] "Gary, Indiana," US Census Bureau, http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/18/1827000.html (accessed December 5, 2011)..
[29] Barnes, The Cost of Being Poor, 175.
[30] Tarraborrelli, Michael Jackson, 3; Michael Jackson, Moonwalk (New York: Harmony Books, 1988), 50.
[31] Ibid.
[32] Poll taken by authors at Indiana University Northwest on November 6, 2011.
[33] Tom Coyne, "Michael Jackson Hometown Memorial: Crowds Flooding Gary," Huffington Post, July 11, 2009, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/10/michael-jackson-hometown_n_229638.html (accessed November 8, 2012); "Michael Jackson Memorial – By Stone Plans," Stone Plans, http://www.stoneplans.com/component/content/article/53-spotlight-news-3/121-michel-jackson-memorial-by-stone-plans (accessed December 3, 2011).
[34] John Bodnar, Remaking America: Public Memory, Commemoration, and Patriotism in the Twentieth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 15.
[35]Ibid., 13-16; Lane, Gary's First Hundred Years, 25.
[36] Bryan Smith, "Can Karen Freeman-Wilson Fix Gary, Indiana?" Chicagomag.com, April 3, 2012, http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/April-2012/Can-Karen-Freeman-Wilson-Fix-Gary-Indiana/ (accessed June 12, 2012).
[37] Jessica Hopper, "Why Michael Jackson's Past May Be Gary, Indiana's Only Future," Village Voice, July 1, 2009, http://www.villagevoice.com/2009-07-01/news/why-michael-jackson-s-past-might-be-gary-indiana-s-only-future/ (accessed October 3, 2011).
[38] Austen Taylor, Michael Jackson Commemorated, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KoQfv6u4sI (accessed December 3, 2011).


text:
September 15-September 17, 2011
The Ponderosa Stomp has spent the last decade bringing icons of American music back to the stage, shining a spotlight on the architects of songbooks that are part of our collective musical DNA. 2011 marks the 10th anniversary of the Stomp, which has expanded over the years from a 2-day concert to include a film festival, music conference, record hop and a DJ dance party.
This milestone year will be hailed with tributes to the essential New Orleans producer Cosimo Matassa, Stax Records, Excello Records and Southern music with Allen Toussaint, William Bell, Big Jay McNeely, Eddie Floyd, Lady Bo, Sir Mack Rice, Lazy Lester, Dave Bartholomew, The Bo-Keys w/ Skip Pitts and Howard Grimes, Carol Fran, Classie Ballou, Warren Storm, The Relatives and more.
Celebrating the seminal songs that formed the backbone of American pop culture from the post-war era through the generations is not for the meek of heart – founder Dr Ira (Dr. Ike) Padnos and his fellow members of the Mystic Knights of the Mau Mau specialize in finding performers missing from the stage for decades as well as reuniting the bands who've not performed together in decades. The New York Times described it thusly, "Among other things, the Stomp is a gathering of survivors: musicians who have been picking, pounding and wailing professionally for many decades, and whose gray hair and career setbacks haven't tamed their music yet."
Ponderosa Stomp 2011 includes:
Allen Toussaint
Dave Bartholomew
William Bell
Eddie Floyd
Sir Mack Rice
The Bo-Keys featuring Skip Pitts & Howard Grimes
Jimmy "Duck" Holmes
Lazy Lester
Big Jay McNeely
The Relatives
Lady Bo
Arch Hall Jr
Carol Fran
Lavelle White
Little Leo
G.G. Shinn
Michael Hurtt and his Haunted Hearts
Classie Ballou
Warren Storm
James Johnson & Rudy Richard of Slim Harpo`s King Bees
Lil Buck & the Top Cats featuring Stanley"Buckwheat" Dural
Roy "Boogie Boy" Perkins
Clayton Sampy
Bobby Allen
Johnny Legend
CP Love
Joe Clay
Little Freddie King
Guitar Lightnin' Lee
Robert Parker
Billy Boy Arnold
Earl Stanley
Deke Dickerson & the Eccofonics
Jivin' Gene
Gerri Hall
Creole Zydeco Farmers featuring Jockey Etienne
The Ponderosa Stomp Music Conference and Film Series will take place September 15-17 at the Renaissance Arts Hotel at 700 Tchoupitoulas Street. The conference will feature Rock Hall educators Lauren Onkey and Jason Hanley, as well as historians and musicologists Jeff Hannusch, Scott Bomar and Alison Fensterstock tackling Louisiana garage, an oral history with Big Jay McNeely and panels on Stax Records, Ernie K-Doe and Bobby Marchan. The schedule also includes a Q&A with Dave Bartholomew and a screening of a 1962 Fats Domino concert film.
The second incarnation of Clandestine Celluloid will feature a special tribute to the B-movie exploits of actor/musician/pilot/writer Arch Hall Jr., with the screening of 60's cult classics, Eegah!, The Sadist, and Wild Guitar, introductions and in-depth discussions with Hall and special guests, and selected excerpts from other films including The Choppers and Deadwood '76. Master Archivist Joe Lauro of Historic Films will return with a mondo blend of found footage and his annual performance compilation featuring Heroes of the Stomp.
The Tenth Annual Ponderosa Stomp Concert will take place September 16 and 17 at the Howlin Wolf, 907 South Peters St in New Orleans, Louisiana. The show will run from 7:30 pm - 2:30 am. Tickets will be $50. For ticket info, please go to www.ponderosastomp.com.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
We know you use social media. So do we! Connect with us online — whether you are on Facebook, Twitter or Google Plus, you'll find the Dugoni School of Dentistry there too. Come and join the conversation!
University Privacy Policy
University of the Pacific (Stockton)
McGeorge School of Law (Sacramento)


text:
This one is for my sugar-free, gluten-free, dairy-free people! Oh, and the raw food eaters if you are out there. Are you out there?
If you'll remember, last week I took part in a baking challenge that had me adopting another gluten-free blogger. So I chose Heather from Life, Gluten-Free because I've really been wanting to try some of her super healthy recipes. Last week I successfully tested the Chocolate Fudge with Sunbutter Swirls . And um, they were super yummy.
So today I got up the nerve to try one of Heather's raw food desserts. If you're unfamiliar with raw food, it means just that. The food is RAW. I'm not sure I've ever made a raw dessert before (do fresh berries count?).
So I'm sure you're wondering how on earth is a pie not baked? I was skeptical at first too. I think that's why I waited so long. If you know me though, you know that food MUST taste good in order for me to eat it.
Well this passed my yummy test.
Here's a list of the ingredients so you know what I was working with:
pie crust – sunflower seeds, pumpkins seeds, a date, honey, and coconut oil
filling – unsweetened cocoa powder, honey, coconut oil, and avocado
I know!!! I know, relax. It DID taste good. Can you believe it? A.V.O.C.A.D.O. We love our avocado in this house. But in dessert? Are you kidding me?
Seriously, if you tasted this chocolate pie without knowing, YOU WOULD NOT KNOW that avocado was in there!
I did make a couple of changes based on taste and an avocado that was just not ripe (don't you hate it when you slice into a beautiful avocado and it's not ready). I followed the pie crust recipe to a tee (including soaking the seeds overnight). However, I added a ripe banana and some almond butter to the filling. Smart, I know 🙂 We love the chocolate and peanut butter marriage almost as much as we love the Angelina and Brad marriage.
So? You're wondering what it tasted like. We weren't huge fans on the crust (I can hear my Uncle John laughing at the thought of a seed crust, "Did ya share the pie with some birds?"). But we did LOVE LOVE LOVE the filling.
Next time I make this I will skip the pie crust and put the filling in ramekins (little bowls) and chill it that way. It would make for a yummy and healthy treat for my babes. And I think anyone who tried it would like it (FYI the coconut flavour was there). It was fast to prep too – I'm all over the "throw it in the food processor" recipe.
I can't post the recipe here so click on this link and check out Heather's blog and her recipe for this yummy little chocolate pie. I do hope you'll give it a try.
P.S. I have some good friends who are on a little break from refined sugars (bless their healthy little hearts) and they read my blog so girls YOU BETTER TRY THIS and report back!


text:
We just received some interesting spy shots feturing the next BMW 3-Series Cabrio. The "F33" has been spotted at a perfect time as we got a sequence of pics showing its hard top coming up. These pisc seem to put an end to the speculations that the model was going back to a soft-top in order to save weigh.
The three-pieces system that we can see in these images seems to be quite similar to the device equipping the current version, with all the parts folding on each other and then disappearing in the trunk. However, front end as well as head- and tail-lights of the new model are expected to be pretty different and way sportier than the F30 sedan. The final version of the model - which might end up being called 4-series - is expected to appear at some point next year.


text:
[Update: This study was formally retracted by Science on July 22, 2011]A genome-wide association study of extreme longevity published last week in the journal Science has been receiving a lot of press attention. The results are quite extraordinary: the authors identify 70 loci with genome-wide significant evidence for association with living past the age of 100, and they construct a SNP-based model for predicting exceptional longevity (EL) that has 77% accuracy in an independent set of individuals. We were initially very excited by the article and thought it would be of great interest to the 23andMe community. However after a closer reading of the article and supporting materials, we think this study actually inadvertently points to some of the pitfalls in analyses of genome wide datasets.There are several reasons for skepticism about these new results. Another recent genome-wide study has reported no significant associations with longevity. There is suggestive evidence of genotyping quality control problems in the new results, and some routine quality control checks do not appear to have been done. The design of the study is particularly susceptible to introducing biases into the results. And a preliminary analysis of the proposed 150-SNP model for predicting longevity indicates that it is not predictive in the 23andMe community.We expect that most of the results of this study will not have the same longevity as its participants. In genetics, as with most things in life, if a result seems too good to be true, it probably is. That said, this study does contain some interesting tidbits, such as the association of near the ApoE gene with longevity. This SNP has previously been shown to be associated with Alzheimer's Disease. For the time being we won't be incorporating the data from this new study into our Personal Genome Service or putting information about any of the other SNPs here in the Spittoon. But we will be on the lookout for other attempts to replicate the study's findings. If and when such a replication is published, we'll scrutinize it like all of the papers we cover, and we'll let you know what we find.(A more technical discussion of the issues follows)– A large study combining results of four genome-wide association studies of longevity was published in May in the Journals of Gerontology. That study found no associations meeting their pre-specified criteria for genome-wide significance. While they used a more inclusive phenotype (age 90 or older), it is surprising that there could be so many loci associated with survival to age 100 in the new study, some with very large effect sizes, yet none were found in the larger study from earlier this year.– An important part of designing an experiment is choosing the criteria that will constitute convincing evidence of a positive finding. We have to make a trade-off between setting the bar so high that we will miss many interesting and true results (false negatives), or setting the bar so low that we will get many spurious findings (false positives). In the new study, the authors use an unusually permissive standard for genome-wide significance that appears to allow a false positive rate of 6 per 100,000 SNPs tested, or 18 false positives across the whole study. A more conventional standard for significance is to control the false positive rate at 0.05, genome-wide, meaning that we expect only a 5% chance of even one spurious finding.– None of the strong associations appear to be supported by any evidence from nearby SNPs. Each of the reported associations stands alone, but typically, we expect that nearby SNPs will show some intermediate evidence for association, because nearby SNPs tend to be correlated. This is a red flag because genotyping quality issues can produce these kinds of uncorrelated association signals.– Many of the associated loci have high rates of missing genotypes in the EL individuals compared to the controls. For the 70 genome-wide-associated SNPs, the median missing data rate in EL samples was 9%, compared to 3% in controls. Some of the SNPs with high EL call rates appear to have large deviations from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in the EL group. For instance, the two SNPs with strongest evidence for association, and , are far out of equilibrium (P < 10-20). Both of these are suggestive of data quality problems that can produce false associations, though there can be other valid explanations for the Hardy-Weinberg results.– While the authors performed a replication of their results in an independent set of EL samples, the replication may share some biases with their initial genome scan. The authors drew most of their controls for their initial scan from a reference dataset, and used this same source of controls in their replication. And both sets of EL samples were genotyped with the same method. They show that substituting an alternate set of controls makes little difference, but this does not rule out a genotyping issue in the EL data.We took a preliminary look in our customer data to see if the proposed SNP-based model described in Sebastiani et al. is predictive of exceptional longevity. A commonly used measure of test discrimination is to calculate how often, for a randomly selected case and control, a test correctly assigns a higher score to the case. This is known as the "c statistic" or "area under the curve". The authors of the new study say their model scored a 0.93 for this statistic. But when we compared 134 23andMe customers with age ≥ 95 to more than 50,000 controls, we obtained a test statistic of 0.532, with a 95% confidence interval from 0.485 to 0.579. Using 27 customers with age ≥ 100, we get a value of 0.540, with a 95% confidence interval from 0.434 to 0.645. A random predictor of longevity would give a 0.5 on this scale, so based on our data, performance of this model is not significantly better than random. Even with our small sample size, we can also clearly exclude values as high as the published result of 0.93.Study designs that use independently collected control genotype data require extra attention to quality control to rule out the possibility of systematic differences in genotyping between cases and controls. In any experiment that tests hundreds of thousands of SNPs, a small proportion of SNPs can be expected to have problems with automated genotype assignment. This may not be a problem if cases and controls are affected equally, but if cases and controls are genotyped separately, then errors or missing genotypes may be concentrated in just the cases or just the controls, and these can give the appearance of a relationship between genotypes and phenotypes that is actually an experimental artifact.The results could be strengthened if the authors could inspect the raw data for the associated SNPs to verify that genotypes are being assigned consistently. Differential missingness in the EL samples is a major issue because if it is the result of poor clustering, it will almost always tilt the apparent genotype frequencies of affected SNPs. If the clustering does suggest that there is a "batch effect", then there are some strategies that can be used to rescue the analysis. One approach is to aggressively filter the data using strict quality criteria and manual inspection of putative associations. Another approach is to directly model the batch effect and then test for association conditional on the batch structure of the data. This only works if the problem is not perfectly confounded with the phenotype. If that is the case, the only resolution may be to use another technology to verify genotypes of associated SNPs and fill in missing values.Addendum:We repeated our analysis restricted to individuals with European ancestry. The results were similar: for 129 customers with age ≥ 95 and more than 43,000 controls, we got a test statistic of 0.534, and for 26 customers with age ≥ 100, we got a value of 0.558. In both cases, the 95% confidence interval includes 0.5.
SNPwatch: Uncertainty Surrounds Longevity GWAS
Published by DaveH under 23andMe Research
You may also want to check out:
- We've Come A Long, Long Way Together... But We're Not There Yet!
- Genetic Armor in Flu Season
- An Ocean of Hope For MPN Research
- Pfizer's Director of Precision Medicine, Dr. Kenneth Eugene Hung
- Ten percent inspiration, ninety percent perspiration (and sixty percent genetics...
- A Conversation with Population Geneticist David Poznik
Although I am only generally familiar with GWAS studies, it would seem that better controls could have been performed… I appreciate the critical analysis of the paper by the 23andme team.
Thank you for this posting. There are other reports about anomalies in Illumina's 610-Quad DNA chip used for some of the Science paper's analysis. 23andMe use an Illumina chip. Is it the same one? Have you used different chips in providing your service and if so what precautions does the company take to avoid chip model anomolies?
We do not use the 610-Quad, we use a customized version of the 550-Quad with some 23andMe-selected content. That said, I think every high density array product has its own quirks and probes that do not work as intended. We take special care with SNPs that are included in health and trait reports; this is a small enough number that we can manually verify that they are well behaved. The algorithms that use the rest of the data (i.e. Relative Finder, ancestry determination) are tolerant of a small number of misbehaving SNPs. We also track a "blacklist" of SNPs where we've detected issues and exclude these from analyses. We also do additional data quality checks when we are doing analyses for research.
This is an interesting example of how the database can be used for quick turnaround to validate other studies. One question though; how do you know that the 134 customers with ages >95 are really >95? Given that many people are concerned about genetic privacy, and there is no requirement to use real names or identifying info to use the service, is it possible that many of these customers were just using a made up date of birth?
Is there any other self-report data that might help clarify this– for example, you would expect higher self-reports of conditions like arthritis, which are much more prevalent in an aging population.
And as an aside, I just find it very interesting that someone who has made it past age 95 would use a genetic prediction service! I wonder what they would be looking for….
We cannot directly verify customer-provided information. We know that, generally speaking, the accuracy of our self reported data is reasonably good, based on our ability to replicate known associations. Birth year (not birth date) is part of the customer profile so we have a value for most customers, but it is not mandatory to provide a value. We have corroborating evidence in some cases, depending on which surveys a customer has filled out. For instance, most of the individuals with age 95+ who have filled out the alopecia survey report substantial hair loss.
We have done some targeted recruitment of older adults as part of a "healthy aging" research project. Some of our customers are primarily interested in the ancestry functionality. Also, sometimes one customer will recruit multiple family members to provide samples, though those individuals may never use the site directly. So it is hard to generalize about the motivations of this group.
I'm wondering what the ethnic background of the people you used was. The NECS subjects were all Caucasian.
For the analysis we reported, we did not filter on ancestry. Our long-lived subset is nearly all European ancestry (126 out of 134 classified as European). The remaining customers are predominantly European. We'll redo the analysis on the European subset but given the numbers I wouldn't expect a substantive change in the outcome.
Thanks, David, for the critique of Sebastiani et al.'s paper. Your points are well reasoned and do cast doubt on the validity of the paper's central results. Have the authors of that paper seen your comments and made any responses?
We have been in contact with them however I think they are understandably busy. While we would welcome their feedback, it may make more sense for them to work on a single discussion of the various criticisms that have appeared, rather than responding specifically to our comments.
Thanks a lot for the info, David.
A question: the same group published previosuly their GWAS results from a smaller effort (Sebastiani P et al. (2009) RNA Editing Genes Associated with Extreme Old Age in Humans and with Lifespan in C. elegans. PLoS ONE).
Did you try to replicate whether genes ADARB1 and ADARB2 are associated with extreme old age in your database? More frequent in nonagenarians/centenarians vs. the regular-age folks?
Regards, DK
Our dataset is not powered to address the ADARB1/B2 hypotheses because the reported effect sizes are fairly small (which is not at all unusual for association studies of complex traits). We would need a much larger number of older customers to be able to effectively test whether we could replicate those results. We were well powered to evaluate the predictive accuracy of the model described in the more recent paper only because that was such a strong result.
Thanks for putting detailed info like this on the blog.
Dear David,
Will 23andme try to use a similar approach (nested genetic risk models) as Sebastiani et al. to find their own list of predictive SNPs? (you might use 90 years as cutoff to increase group size)
Also, will 23andme publish the above described analyses, as your data and analyses appear very convincing and strongly impact the conclusion? Doing so would reach a larger scientific community. Or can 23andme never publish anything due to legal issues?
Finally, compliments for doing and openly posting these rigorous analyses and my compliments on the clear presentation!
Our dataset isn't nearly large enough to that kind of modeling, even with a more inclusive phenotype.
We are certainly able to publish, and we have a number of papers in various stages of preparation. In this case, we decided that it didn't seem worth the substantial time and effort that would be required to turn our findings into a publication. Much of our evidence of problems in the original analysis is circumstantial and Sebastiani et al are the only ones who can really assess what went wrong. They are doing that now, and I think it makes sense to wait and see what they come up with.
I wondered if these SNPs are proved wrong do they get removed from the GWAS catalog (www.genome.gov/gwastudies . I was looking through the catalog today and saw that 29 of the SNPs from this study were included there. It seems to me that the catalog is quickly updated with new data, but do you know if studies that are show to be in error are often removed?
How about 23andMe's database? If you find out that a study was shown to be incorrect, do you update the analysis for your customers? Do they get notified? I recently became a customer of your service so I am interested in this as well.
Dear David,
You mention that Sebastiani et al. report no SNPs in LD ("None of the strong associations appear to be supported by any evidence from nearby SNPs.)
However, in section 4 of their Supporting material (page 3), the authors mention: "SNPs in strong LD were removed using the program PLINK with a SNP window of 50 and sliding window of 5 SNPs and we removed 1 SNP from each pair of SNPs with r2 > 0.30 leaving 97,508 SNPs for this analysis."
I think this might explain why "none of the strong associations appear to be supported by any evidence from nearby SNPs". It seems this eliminated 2/3 of all SNPs.
@Superedu: that section of the Supporting Online Material is describing how they performed their principal components analysis to assess population structure; it does not describe the SNP association analysis.
I'm not sure whether the genome.gov site has a protocol for removing erroneous results. It should be very rare that a study is actually wrong due to an experimental or analytical error; on the other hand there are lots of valid reasons why a signal that shows up in one study may never be replicated (i.e. subtle differences in phenotype definitions, differences in populations, or simple false positives due to the luck of the draw). The genome.gov list has set a low threshold for inclusion, so they are willing to tolerate some false positives. Which is a reasonable standard, for their purposes.
For our health reports, we are much more picky, so it should be much less likely that we would include a false report. However, we do update reports as better information becomes available. For example, our Type I diabetes report was recently updated and a SNP was replaced.
Defending the Boston University Longevity Study!
A number of independent researchers are questioning the validity of this study. I have read all of the negative reports and news stories as well as the comments from staff. If I hadn't previously read about the study I would probably go along with all the negative comments and look somewhere else for answers but then I would miss the wealth of information and insight found in the Boston University, BU, study.
The Boston study found an extremely good relation between longevity, disease and SNPs/risk alleles. The purpose of this paper is to put the facts about this study in proper perspective as critics comments are never unbiased no matter their source. I will endeavor to address each negative comments/criticism and explain what actually happened so that even a person non-versed in this field will understand what, apparently, the experts seem to have missed.
The chief criticisms about this study are listed below:
1. The SNP data is flawed.
2. The statistics are misleading and can't be reproduced.
3. The Manhattan Plot is not representative of conventional Manhattan plots where numerous related SNPs are always seen.
4. Identical analysis were done using other centenarian data with the 150 SNPs by independent researchers and only random correlations were found
5. 10% of the centenarians tested were done with a flawed chip.
To follow along the reader is urged to obtain a copy of the BU Main Research paper and its Supporting Material paper. The Main Research paper can be found here: http://www.bumc.bu.edu/medicine/files/2010/07/longevity-genes.pdf
The Supporting Material paper can be found here:
Before we start I would like to briefly explain the way the experiment was run otherwise some of the results discussed may not make any sense as seems to already be the case at least in part. The BU study started out by individually phenotyping each of the centenarians used in the study. The major part of the phenotype survey was a list of specific diseases (cancer, cardiovascular, COPD, dementia, diabetes, hypertension, macular degeneration, and stroke); If the subject had ever been diagnosed as having any of them and when. There were many other questions as well about their family, health, etc.
From looking at the historical disease data from the centenarians the researchers came up with a brilliant idea; to manually add a list of disease related SNPs (for the diseases in the survey) to the test. Their idea was if centenarians don't all get these diseases until very late in life, which is a fact their survey turned up, then their disease related SNPs may be turned off which may be a good way to look for longevity traits.
After all of the centenarians were genotyped their data was individually inspected for the disease related SNP alleles. Searches and comparisons were done and finally the researchers identified a list of slightly over 2000 SNPs to be classified and used in their study. From this list 150 SNPs were eventually selected with what they initially thought had the highest correlation to longevity.
When they matched these 150 SNPs to three centenarians, see Figure 2A at the top of page 7 in their Main Report, they found there was very little correlation. Eventually they decided they needed to group the subjects according to phenotype and try again. They did this and settled on 19 groups. They initially had over 30 groups but when they discarded all groups with less than 6 candidates they arrived at the 19 groups used in the study. There were over 100 centenarians in these discarded groups.
The BU researchers found that there was very little correlation with groups C14 to C18 and no correlation at all in group 19. There were 114 in these last six groups. They found very high correlation in groups C1 to C4 which contained 109 centenarians. The remaining groups contained 487 centenarians for a total of 710 that remained in the study.
The brilliant thing about this study was it defined 19 different groups from just prior historical subject data. Each one of these 19 groups had a longevity and disease risk factor associated with it. If you know which group you were in you would know about how long you will live and when you might acquire some of the very bad diseases that generally plague older individuals.
By the end of the study they had found a way where each group could be identified by the percentage of an individuals SNP matches (to their 150 SNP set). Now, there were two ways to determine which group you belong, 1. By going through their initial survey process, or 2. By determining the percentage of the SNPs your genotype matches. Both of these could only be done on an individual basis.
Now, on to the criticisms:
1. The SNP data is flawed.
In the 23andMe comments on The Spittoon they stated the error of faulty SNPs had to be as high as 18 SNPs in the 300,000 SNPs analysis. The Boston University, BU, researchers had previously stated they expected 11 SNPs could be flawed. From a Newsweek article two of the flawed SNPs had been identified from the history of the new chip used near the end of the study. These two SNPs were rs1036819 and rs1455311.
The problem arose when the last 10% of the centenarian subjects were run using a different/new chip. This new chip that had known problems with these two SNPs. The other 90% were run with a chip that had no problems with these two SNPs. That means 90% of the data for these two SNPs was read fine.
The BU researchers stated in their papers that 10% of the centenarian data was outside of their cluster groups so it was not used. It isn't known if the 10% discarded was the same 10% ran on the new chip or not. A little over 1000 centenarians were initially removed from the study and later another 100 had unusable data. By the end of the study over 200 of them were dropped from the study.
Except for the two SNPs, set out above, all of the questionable data had been removed from the study. This left two possibly flawed SNPs out of 150 (90% of the data for these two SNPs was fine). As the BU study was also grouping by percentage of total matches not OR values the maximum error, if the two SNPs were not excluded from the study, one would expect to see would be 2/150 = 1.3 % in determining group membership which was all they were concerned about.
2. The statistics are misleading and can't be reproduced.
The criticism here is the 77% predictability, claimed in the study, is too high and should be only 3%. The 77% number came from the results shown in Figure 2B in the middle of page 7. Here, a separate analysis was preformed on a test set of centenarians and a set of controls. In the study two correlations were run, one with just a select group of centenarians (the makeup of which isn't fully known) and one with just controls.
The data showed the centenarian's, in this select group, correlation ranged between 0.5 and 0.9 with a median of 0.77. While this is a rather wide range the researchers chose to publish the median value of 77% rather than the range of 50% to 90%.
What the 77% showed was for a small sample, where all the individuals had specific genetic signatures, the researchers were able to predict longevity to a reasonable degree. However, their paper also stated for the most part there was little correlation with many of the other groups.
The list of 150 test SNPs had been pulled from their initial set of 2000 SNPs and refined for the high value groups C1 to C4. Only 13.6% of the centenarians in this study were found in the high value groups.
What the critics did was look at the data in a different way and they came up with numbers that ranged between 3% and 77% (yes, one of the critics actually said the 77% number could be arrived at but then said it didn't mean anything). It has been said "with statistics you can prove or disprove about anything if you have enough data" all it depends on is where you want the numbers to go and how creative you are with your sample definitions.
If you want to show a very low number, like 3%, then select a very large data set, not a small select group of subjects. Then you will get small numbers which is what the critics did. As the actual makeup of the select group was not divulged it isn't possible to replicate this test or verify the 77% number or not. As such this statistical criticism has no merit.
3. The Manhattan Plot is not representative of conventional Manhattan plots where numerous related SNPs are always seen.
This criticism is discussed in length in the Scienceblogs.com link set out above. The problem here is that independent researchers expected to see sharp vertical columns of associated SNPs by each of the high significance SNPs found in the study. As this didn't happen these researchers assumed it had to be a 'red flag' indicating bad experimental data.
What they failed to realize was that in the BU study the researchers had manually selected over half of the SNPs from disease related SNPs. Most of the SNP selection had been selected manually rather than automatically and when the Manhattan plot was made only the specific SNPs that had been manually selected from the set of 2000 stood out. There was never any effort made to look for or incorporate any associated SNPs related to the 150 they decided on and this was mentioned in the paper. From looking at their Manhattan data plot, page 22 of the Supporting Material paper, it isn't clear if this plot contains only their 150 SNP subset or their entire data set of 2000 SNPs.
However, this is not the worst mistake the experts made. After careful reading of the BU papers it should have been obvious that the Manhattan plot for each of the 19 groups will be very different. The two extremes would be for groups C1 and C19. For C1 the Manhattan plot would show the standard base compaction we are all familiar with and above that would be a horizontal straight line going from chromosome 1 to chromosome 22 with nothing above or below the horizontal line except for the base compaction. For C19 the plot would resemble a random number scatter plot with no discernable features (other than its randomness) for all the SNPs in the study.
The Manhattan plot shown is representative of group C9 but I think its really a median plot from the variations in the 150 SNPs. No one knows for sure except the BU researchers but which one is actually irrelevant. The way the BU study found their longevity associations does not lend itself well to a Manhattan plot. This type of plot is more representative of data that lends itself to whole population scans which the BU did not endeavor to do and was never their intension.
Related/associated SNPs were never entered on purpose. In their paper the BU researchers stated they only wanted to use a very small set of SNPs. The intent of the BU researchers was to find a small group of SNPs, the 150 they decided on, that would confer group identification not to look for definitive SNP proof of longevity. To look for SNP proof of longevity one would expect to see the associated SNPs in the Manhattan plot.
4. Identical analysis were done using other centenarian data with the 150 SNPs by independent researchers and only random correlations were found.
Several independent research groups tried to replicate the results using their own in-house data. These attempts were all utter failures. This is because the BU study required the subjects to be sorted by phenotype into 19 groups first and even then only a few of these groups exhibited high correlation with their SNPs.
Figure 2A at the top of page 7, in their Main Report, shows what a failure it is to do this without presorting the data into phenotypes first. Figure 2A shows the initial correlation between the 150 SNPs and three centenarians. For a 106 year old centenarian the correlation was around 50%, in the 107 year old the correlation was around 70% (it was almost the inverse of the control group correlation). The 119 year old had a 99% correlation with the 150 SNPs. The point here is if you don't take the group affiliation into account you aren't going to know what the results mean.
As none of the risk allele data has been publicly released for all of the 150 SNPs means these independent researchers were just matching their centenarian data against all 450 alleles, for each centenarian, without knowing which allele was the correct one to look for. They could have assumed matching against the minor allele but from the released data, Table S1 and S2 in the Supporting Material. It can be seen that some risk alleles are the minor component and some are not. Even among the minor alleles some have OR values less than 1 and others have OR values greater than 1 (normally one would expect a risk allele to have an OR, odds ratio, value >1). Without knowing the specific risk alleles used for each of the 150 SNPs in the BU study any matching study will produce nothing more than random numbers with a mean about 0.5.
Even if the independent researchers had been given all of the risk alleles for all the 150 SNPs it would have made no difference. Because without knowing the phenotype grouping of their centenarian data their analysis would still have centered about 0.5 (the mean for random numbers). The BU model works great for a very small number of data sets but breaks down for large data sets, >10.
Another problem, with the way the independent researchers attempted to validate the BU study, is not all of the 150 SNPs and risk alleles were common in all of the phenotype groups. The high predictability (99%) groups of these 19 groups were comprised of as few as 8 to as many as 64 subjects out of over 1000 centenarians. This would indicate the selection criteria for the high predictability groups only comprised a small percentage of the total centenarian population. Without knowing the group selection criteria there is no way one can say whether the Boston study's 150 manually selected SNPs were good or not. Unfortunately, the group characteristics are proprietary, as they are selling this information, so this information may not be forthcoming in the foreseeable future.
Just having a SNP to search for does no good unless you know the risk allele for the trait of interests. For example rs2075650 has been shown to be a predictor of Alzheimer's Disease for GG genotypes. But in the longevity study this same SNP was only considered significant, as far as longevity is concerned, if the genotype was AA. This particular SNP was manually selected for inclusion in the study based on initial centenarian surveys.
One of the technical comments I saw from several independent researchers, about this study, was "finding an Alzheimer SNP related to longevity is very interesting." The point here is these independent researchers either didn't read the BU study's reports or else they didn't comprehend what they read, as the paper clearly pointed out that SNPs related to diseases were manually included in the study set (Alzheimer's Disease SNPs were specifically set out on page 7 of the Supporting Material paper and several times in Table S3 on page 39).
The bottom line is if you search a large data set for matches against a SNP, without knowing the risk allele, you will get a match for almost every single data set and they will be clustered into three sets depending on the different population types included in the data. Searching/matching for a desired trait without knowing the risk allele for that trait is just a worthless waste of time and energy. Apparently the independent researchers thought all centenarians would have one specific set of these 150 SNPs and when they didn't see any they attributed the error to the BU study instead of their own short comings.
5. 10% of the centenarians tested was done with a flawed chip.
More than 10% of the centenarians were initially discarded from this study because of very bad data fits. Another 10% belonged to groups where there was little correlation. The researchers are aware of the 10% flawed data and have issued a response to the critical Newsweek article (at the very end of the Newsweek article).
No one seems to dispute the fact that 90% of the centenarians data was read with the old/good chip, that no one had any problems with, and with the exception of the two aforementioned SNPs there was no other known problems with the new chip used in the last 10% of the study. With 90% old/good chip data plus discarding 20% of the data, because of poor data correlation, could mean that 99% of the data used in the BU study was all good. However, the critics were all extremely careful not to mention the fact there could be a lot of good data included in the study.
This criticism is close to the one that said they used flawed SNP data. When the SNP data was looked at closer even the critics agreed the flawed data to only be a maximum 18 SNPs out of the 300,000 scanned. Of these 18 only two SNPs were found in the high correlation set.
While over 20% of the centenarian data was discarded because it didn't fit the model, it isn't known how much of this data was in the 10% that was read by the new chip. The researchers would know but so far this information has not been released.
Keep in mind that we are only looking for percentage matches to whole groups not individual SNP response. One would also expect if the new chip produced 10% flawed data this data may not match the earlier 90% data and therefore would not correlate and as a result be removed from the study data. This is what the BU researchers found and all the non correlate able data was removed from the study.
While this study had some short comings thinking outside the box wasn't one of them. While their model didn't work very well across the board, as was pointed out in their Main Research paper, the BU model was extremely predictive of exceptional longevity for the first six phenotype groups (C1 to C6). For the later groups (C7 to C14) their model became less predictive and for the remaining groups it didn't work within reasonable limits. Even though this study wasn't the end all solution to longevity it was an extremely good start.
Even if some of the BU study results are flawed that is no reason to also exclude the pre-study data associations derived from their test subjects: ie centenarians don't come down with any of the deadly dieses until very late in their life (as this was historical data collected from the test subjects). This information is extremely important and has not been associated in a longevity before. Even though a small portion of the test data may be flawed (18 per 300,000 SNPs) there is no reason to condemn the entire study or question its validity to the degree that is being done.
If this study was actually as bad as the critics would like everyone to believe it would be removed from the Government GWAS data base (which is where it still is after nearly eight months) as it would be misleading for future researchers. Instead, the Government only removed or noted the very few SNPs that may have been flawed and nothing more. Apparently, the United States Government, including NIH, seems to think the BU study has merit.
You've clearly spent a lot of time thinking about this paper. However, your defense substantially misrepresents both the original BU work and the criticisms of that work. I'll try to make just a few points:
Your description of the overall design of the BU study is incorrect. The BU researchers did not preselect disease-associated SNPs for study. They conducted a genome wide association study with ~300,000 unselected SNPs, using off-the-shelf SNP arrays manufactured by Illumina for this purpose. The 150 longevity-associated SNPs are selected from these 300,000. Also, the BU researchers did not choose to divide the centenarians into 19 groups based on their phenotype data. The 19 groups were chosen solely based on genetic information from the 150 selected SNPs.
The SNP data quality problems I described (differential missingness, and deviations from Hardy Weinberg equilibrium) were pervasive and not limited to a few SNPs. Your characterization of the Manhattan plot is also incorrect. The plot shows genome wide data for all ~300,000 SNPs that were tested, not 2000 or 150.
You assert that the NIH has somehow endorsed the study results by leaving them in the NHGRI GWAS catalog. A search of the catalog for longevity associated SNPs shows that the top two SNPs listed for the BU paper are rs1036819 and rs1455311 — the two SNPs widely reported as giving erroneous results. It is somewhat disappointing that the study remains listed, but the catalog is not closely curated and it may be that the maintainers feel they should leave these results in as long as the paper is part of the scientific record (i.e. until it is actually retracted).
peter ezzell
Near the end of April I communicated with one of the papers authors, Tom Perls, and asked about the status of resolving the criticisms. He wrote that an independent lab at Yale independently produced a clean data set from which the same analyses were then peformed. He also noted that the corrected findings have been submitted to Science and they are awaiting word. He did not characterize how the findings changed
I'll look forward to seeing how this works out.
This study has now been formally retracted. See here for discussion.
Pingback: Controversial longevity paper formally retracted | SpittalStreet.com()


text:
A New Hampshire woman who was charged with receiving stolen property and theft of lost property has been acquitted, according to Seacoast Online. Alice Giordano, a 47 year old woman from Portsmouth, was found not guilty for stealing a dog after a long trial on Tuesday, May 20, 2014.
Giordano was accused of stealing a Boston Terrier named Mickey. The 8 year old dog was microchipped and belonged to Natasha Curtis. Curtis, who claimed she searched for months for Mickey, saw a stranger walking her dog six months after he went missing. Giordano stated she found him wandering the streets and after looking for his owners, took him in.
Though Giordano's story kept changing, the judge determined there was not enough sufficient evidence to charge her for criminal activity.
Witnesses for the prosecution testified that Giordano did not do enough to find Mickey's owners. He was, after all, microchipped with up-to-date information. Witnesses for the defense testified that Giordano put up flyers, asked around and even found Mickey's owners but could never get in touch with them.
At one point, Giordano reported to have rescued Mickey from abuse. Curtis reported that when Mickey was returned to her, he was filthy, lacking his testicles and had bite marks on his rear end.
Giordano was relieved and thrilled after hearing the not-guilty verdict.
NH woman accused of stealing dog claims she rescued him from abuse
In other news:
Dog thrown from car and run over in Chicopee
Dozens of cats abandoned, not once but twice; reward offered
Goat stolen and confined as part of high school senior prank
Turtle mascot stolen from Fall River Library
Severely neglected dogs seized after owner refuses to provide basic care


text:
KINGSTON, Jamaica -- Ousted Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide is making final preparations to leave Jamaica and take asylum in South Africa, an official said Friday. Although there is no firm departure date, Aristide will fly to South Africa with his wife, Mildred, and the couple's two daughters, according to his spokesman Huntley Medley.
The Jamaican government has said Aristide's stay would not exceed 10 weeks. Since his March 15 arrival, he has been staying at a government-owned villa in a rural section of central Jamaica.
Aristide fled Haiti on Feb. 29 amid a spreading rebellion in the impoverished nation. He was flown aboard a U.S.-supplied jet to the Central African Republic and accused the United States of forcing him from power, a claim U.S. officials deny. He left two weeks later for Jamaica.
© 2016. All Rights Reserved. Contact Us


text:
Bell (2002) noted that the preamble to learning is risk, the willingness to take a shaky step without the security of perfection. I find this to be a compelling thought and as such I will attempt to develop it a bit further. An individual's willingness to be less than perfect is a courageous act as credibility and perhaps even a career may be perceived to be in jeopardy. Obviously, if the desire for learning is to endure some of this risk must be mitigated and that mitigation comes from the leaders of the organization. I argue that there are two primary ways in which leaders facilitate learning. The first is through information caretaking; the concept that information is a valuable resource and that the allocation of said at the right time, to the right people, and without undue restrictions enhances the creativity capacity of the organization. As such continuous communication by leaders is essential and will increase creativity and innovativeness, because it accumulates knowledge inside the organization, and it becomes possible to develop these shared ideas (Hypia & Parjanen, 2008).
Second, leaders facilitate learning through ethical leadership behaviors. Specifically, fair and balanced decision making shapes follower's perception of the social exchange relationship resulting in followers reciprocating the same behaviors (Avey, Palanski & Walumbwa, 2011). Therefore ethical leaders can have an impact of the self-efficacy of their employees through their credibility and ethical standards (Avey, Wensing & Palanski, 2012). Ethical leaders provide a psychologically stable and safe environment where creativity is endorsed as a standard organizational practice. The psychologically stable environments offer a form of consistency that often mitigates the fear that can develop during organizational change events. Human beings are adaptable creatures however, expecting "double" adaptation because of inconsistent leadership is beyond most people's abilities.
Avey, J. B., Palanski, M. E., & Walumbwa, F. O. (2011). When leadership goes unnoticed: The moderating role of follower self-esteem on the relationship between ethical leadership and follower behavior. Journal of Business Ethics, 98(4), 573-582.
Avey, J. B., Wernsing, T. S., & Palanski, M. E. (2012). Exploring the process of ethical leadership: The mediating role of employee voice and psychological ownership. Journal of business ethics, 107(1), 21-34.
Bell, C.R. (2002). Managers as mentors: Building partnerships for learning. SanFrancisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.
Hyypia, M., & Parjanen, S. (2008). Boosting the Creativity and Communication in the Innovation Processes-Preliminary Results from the Qualitative Study. In 5th International Conference on Intellectual Capital, Knowledge Management and Organisational Learning: New York Institute of Technology, New York, USA, 9-10 October 2008 (p. 225). Academic Conferences Limited.


text:
Humanity|3D Life:urban is Out of the Box!
Humanity|3D's first volume 'urban' of the H3D Life series is now available. The H3D Life series are collections of low poly animated 3D people that you can use to quickly populate an urban scene with casual and business commuters, students, shoppers, etc. doing everyday actions like, walking (up and down stairs, walking dogs), eating (standing, sitting), using phones, laptops, tablets. Well you get the point. The first of the series urban is a collection of casual characters, check it out. 🙂


text:
Walk With Mischa Fun Dog Walk and Festival
The Park City Lions Club is hosting the first annual Walk With Mischa Fun Dog Walk and Festival at the Newpark Amphitheater, 1456 Newpark Blvd., at Kimball Junction on Saturday, May 10, from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. The event will include a one- and three-mile walk around the Swaner Preserve, a dog-costume contest, dog games, music, food and more. Admission is $15 for the first dog, $3 for additional dogs. For more information, visit www.walkwithmischa.com.
Newcomers of Greater Park City Coffee
The Newcomers of Greater Park City will host its annual coffee at Park City Community Church, 4501 N. S.R. 224, on Wednesday, May 14, from 10 a.m. until 11:30 a.m.
The speaker will be Casey Vorwaller, fire inspector for the Park City Fire District. The presentation will be about home fire safety and the forecast for the upcoming fire season. Come and learn how to be prepared and safe. For more information, visit www.parkcitynewcomers.org
University of Utah Park City Institute: Sugar Toxicity
The University of Utah Park City Institute will present Dr. Wayne K. Potts, Professor, University of Utah Department of Biology when he talks about sugar toxicity at the Utah Olympic Park, 3419 Olympic Parkway, on Wendesday, May 14, from 6 p.m. until 8 p.m. Dr. Potts will discuss the adverse effects sugar can have even in the "safest" doses on the human body.
Stand-Up Utah at the Egyptian Theatre
The Egyptian Theatre, 328 Main St., will host Stand-Up Utah, featuring five comedians — Mike Anderson (Emcee), Chris Dowell, Greg Kyte, Mike Grover and Andy Gold — on Thursday, May 15, at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $15 to $28 and can be purchased by visiting www.parkcityshows.com.
Locals' Free Day at the Park City Museum
The Park City Museum, 528 Main St., will host a locals' free day on Thursday, May 15. Park City and Summit County residents will be admitted for free all day to explore the permanent exhibits and the "Mines to Moguls: 50 Years of Park City Skiing" display. For more information, visit www.parkcityhistory.org/events .


text:
Refis and Low Mortgage Rates Leave Bond Market Slumping
By Al Yoon
Some homeowners are beginning to refinance their residential mortgages faster than expected in response to falling long-term interest rates, causing a chunk of the $5 trillion in mortgage-backed securities to slump in secondary markets.
Prepayments on 30-year fixed-rate loans, the return of principal when a loan is refinanced or withdrawn from the MBS, jumped nearly 30% last month, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac said late Thursday. That was well above forecasts of a 20% rise, though was focused on newer loans with lower interest rates to borrowers with better credit, according to strategists at Morgan Stanley and Credit Suisse.
"Rates went lower, and people that could refinance went to the front of the line," said Bryan Whalen, a managing director at TCW in Los Angeles. "Lenders picked the low-hanging fruit, where they know people had good credit."
Refinancings are expected to accelerate in coming months as the Federal Reserve tries to stimulate the economy by lower borrowing costs, using purchases of long-term Treasury bonds and reinvesting proceeds of its MBS portfolio.
The data were based on refinancings that started in July and August, when rates were between 4.60% and 4.15% in Freddie Mac's mortgage market survey. That rate this week dropped below 4% for the first time, Freddie Mac said.
That is a problem for MBS investors because when a loan is paid off, principal is returned to investors at 100 cents on the dollar even though many paid more than that to reap the relatively high interest rate. They would lose some of the money they had invested, and may be forced to reinvest at a lower interest rate.
"If Fed purchases keep these rates low at these levels then it will have an effect on future prepayments," said Qumber Hassan, strategist at Credit Suisse, adding that his bank raised its short-term projections based on "the reality" seen in the September reports.
Overall, mortgage-bond investors had become accustomed to muted consumer responses to falling interest rates. Tighter credit standards, falling home prices and the inability of banks to handle the volume of applications are all hurdles that have prevented many borrowers from refinancing.
The pickup last month for low-coupon MBS, securities with a low nominal interest rate, suggests that refinancings could come close to the levels seen last year, when rates last fell sharply enough to trigger a refinancing boom, Hassan said. Prepayments in September were led by loans serviced by Wells Fargo & Co.
For homeowners unable to tap lower rates, the Obama administration and the Federal Housing Finance Agency are discussing ways to expand the Home Affordable Refinance Program. That program, which allows borrowers to refinance loans up to 125% of a property's value, has helped fewer than one-quarter of those first thought eligible, in part because banks are concerned about liability in making new loans.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told Senate lawmakers Thursday that the program changes will be "meaningful enough to make a difference." The regulator is examining a "range of things and you'll see more details in a couple of weeks," Geithner said.
–Alan Zibel contributed to this article.