PEORIA MAGAZINE August 2023

S P O T L I G H T

‘AN ASSEMBLY LINE OF RHYME’ For 80 years, the Peoria Poetry Club has offered an eager ear and ‘mutual help’ to the area’s wannabe Robert Frosts and Amanda Gormans

BY PAM TOMKA RON JOHNSON

D o you remember the first nursery rhyme you committed to memory? Hickory Dickory Dock? Humpty Dumpty? Did Dr. Seuss draw you in? Goodnight Moon? Perhaps it was a first introduction to poetry. Perhaps the cadence and the rhyme contributed to a love of listening to words being read aloud. What happened to that love? Did it end in high school when you had to identify iambic pentameter or write a haiku? There is an organization in central Illi nois that will not let its love of poetry die. The Peoria Poetry Club (PPC) was founded in 1941, during World War II, with the sole purpose of promoting the reading and writing of poetry. The club currently meets monthly – every second Saturday at the Germantown Hills Public Library – but over the years has convened in many places, from the Hotel Pere Marquette to the late Bishop’s Cafeteria to the Peoria Public Schools Administration Building. The group “is truly a family of poetry loving people,” said current President Lois Funk. Though small in number – about 20 at any given time, ranging in age from 40 to 80 — the group’s members are a diverse bunch. They are less likely to be English teachers than bartenders, mathematicians, Caterpillar workers,

a format for our work, where fellow poets do pay attention and support your poetic efforts.” Another member, Patrick Johnson, said he belongs because “my soul is enriched by knowing other souls. A soul enriched overflows into better writing.” Each month, they share a poem they have written or one that has special meaning for them. They write about personal experiences, beliefs or even worldly activities that stir some person al passion. PPC member John Fendrich began writing poems “as a teenager, when I started falling in love.” Larry Campbell’s interest in poetry grew from “fragments of thoughts written in a personal journal,” which “demanded further development.” Back when the group formed in the 1940s, members such as Private Ernest W. Bullock wrote about current topics like the war. Early member Lewis M. Woodruff, whose daughter would become Congressman Bob Michel’s wife, wrote about daily life in central Illinois. For many years, the Peoria Journal Transcript published a Poets’ Corner in the Sunday editorial section. A 1991 Journal Star story noting the Peoria Poetry Club’s 50th anniversary described the group as “a chronicler of local history, vehicle for social protest and assembly line of rhymes.” The same holds true today.

counselors and coaches. Some are published authors, writing for the likes of Hallmark Cards and Ideal Magazine . Others have won awards for their work – through the Carl Sandburg and Edgar Lee Masters poetry contests, for example. Many have self-published. Most are amateurs who just love writing. Every few years, the group’s members compile an anthology of their poetry. The goal is to share their work for the pure pleasure of enjoying what is fast becoming a lost art. Regardless of their topics or their writing skills, the motto of the group is “mutual help for writers.” “A poet finds that he/she spends most of the times wandering in the wilderness, no one interested in reading or listening to their art,” said member George Tanner. “Our meetings offer

108 JULY 2023 PEORIA MAGAZINE