MO-TELL Member of the Month: Glen "Papa" Wright

How did you get involved in storytelling?

There was a guy who lived down the street from me who was dressed up one day like Abraham Lincoln. I asked why he was dressed like that and he told me he was a storyteller. His name was Bert Minkin. I told him I was a percussionist and asked if he had ever thought about adding percussion to his stories and characters. Bert thought that was a good idea so we started working together. He and I were doing a performance at a community center and Gladys and Truman Coggswell were in the audience and saw our performance. During the performance, I interacted with the children and my instruments on my own. Gladys liked what she saw and introduced herself. As our friendship grew, she invited me to do a percussion workshop at her By Word-of-Mouth Storytelling Conference/Festival. That was around 1994.

Shortly after that, I began working with Gladys, Glynis Brooks, and January Kiefer. At that time, I played sitting down. I did not approach playing the instruments the way I do now. When my wife, Jackie, became a storyteller, I did not freelance anymore. She and I became Tales Told the “Wright” Way and we worked at developing our own style of storytelling. I add sound effects, color, and texture with a variety of percussion instruments as Jackie tells folktales and fables.

Why did you join MO-TELL?

I joined MO-TELL to support storytelling in Missouri. I was on the board years ago as Vice President. I recently became a lifetime member.

What are some of the things you like to do?

Besides dining out and traveling, which I have not done since March 2020, I enjoy playing creative improvised music. It gives me a chance to use my imagination, create my ideas, be spontaneous, and release a lot of energy all at the same time. My goal as a creative improvisational musician is to perform on a national level. In June of 2022, I joined Fred Tompkins, bass flute/C flute and Greg Mills, piano/melodica to createfree improvisational music. I have already recorded with Greg on an avant-garde CD entitled “KUVUKA,” featuring Greg on piano and me on drum set. The Tompkins, Mills, Wright Trio just recorded one CD and another is due to be released soon. I am also working on a CD with musician Tory Starbuck.

What do you want people to know about you?

I am a professional percussionist and puppeteer. I taught percussion at the St. Louis Conservatory and Schools for the Arts for 23 years. I also taught St. Louis Community College’s Applied Music students for 3 years. I have performed with St. Louis Symphony musicians on various projects. I have also worked with world class jazz musicians. I have been a teaching artist with “The Wright Rhythms for Small Hands” workshops and residencies over 30 years with Young Audiences of St. Louis that is now Springboard to Learning, a national organization that sends artists into the schools for enrichment programs. I also play solo vibes or marimba for private parties and art exhibits.

I am a member of Puppeteers of America and the Puppet Guild of Greater St. Louis. I was the President of the Puppet Guild from 2005-2015. Together with Jackie, we formed our business called

The ‘Wright’ Entertainment for Children. We offer puppet shows and puppet workshops, children’s percussion workshops, and storytelling. We published a children’s story- coloring book based on one of our puppet shows.

Besides being an artist, I am a former marathon runner. I ran 100 miles a week to train for marathons. My best marathon time is 2 hours and 41 minutes for the 26.1 miles. When I was 30 years old, I ran the Alton, IL Ten Mile Run in 54 minutes flat. Now, I am too busy to run like that; so I only jog slowly for an hour every day; and I do not miss a day.

In 2018, I was featured in an article in St. Louis Magazine about my work as a performing artist. I was honored in 2012 by receiving the Luminary Award from Springboard to Learning for my percussion work with young children in St. Louis City and County Schools. Jackie and I were recipients of St. Louis Magazine’s 2007 A-List Award for Best Story Time. In 2006 I receivedthe Progressive Youth Connection’s World of Children Award for my work with children through Young Audiences of St. Louis. I received the 2005 Pillar Award given by the Intercommunity Housing Association for dedication to serving the poor of St. Louis.

Website: www.jackieandpapawright.com

A Note from the President

Hello my friends,

How are you all doing? I am swell. This season keeps me very busy. I have programs to do, taxes to mail and gardens to grow. It seems like I get busier and busier. It is so much fun.

The Liars Contest will be here before you know it. We have a few changes in the rules for this year. Members spoke to us about the rules, and we listened. The rules will be on the website, so take a look. The deadline is still June 1, 2023, for entries. Our event takes place on July 8, 2023, in Webster Groves, Missouri. We have scoped out a venue and found a great one. There will be a workshop again. This year we have engaged the wonderful workshop leader, Sherry Norfolk.

We will have lunch together and a story or two before the contest. Once again, there will be a silent auction and a book sale.

Come for the contest, the tales and to meet up with friends. It will be so good to see everyone face to face. Bring a story to tell at the swap.

Love to you all,

Joyce Slater

President of MO-TELL

“The power of storytelling is exactly this: to bridge the gaps where everything else has crumbled.”

– Paulo Coelho

Story of the Month: Fact-Tale: The Birds & the Beavers

In 1825 when white men first saw the San Pedro River in southeast Arizona, it had so many beavers that they called it Beaver River. But they were trappers, who had already wiped out the indigenous beaver populations of the north and east to provide pelt hats for European and American gentlemen. They soon exterminated the San Pedro beavers.

Cottonwoods and willows along the riverbanks grew tall, no longer pruned into bushes by the nibbling beavers. Western Willow Flycatchers lost their willowbrush nest sites. Ranchers and farmers settled the floodplain, thinking its grassy flats would make excellent pasture and farmland. Unfortunately, the native bunch grasses (unlike prairie grass) could not withstand the pounding of hooves. Broken down, they left the land prey to erosion during rainy season floods.

Farmers’ plows also destroyed the grasses. Eroded sand and earth scoured out the river’s channel to 6-12 feet deeper than its earlier level. The water table dropped. People decided the San Pedro valley was good for little but as a resting place for migrating neotropical songbirds. The San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area was established in 1988. Ranching and farming stopped. But the ecosystem did not rebound, and the Western Willow Flycatcher did not return.

In 1999 American Rivers, a national conservation group, listed the San Pedro as the fourth most endangered waterway in the United States. Yet a year later, it wasn’t on American Rivers list at all. The difference was beavers.

Reintroduced in 1999, the beavers got to work building a dam, which nearly doubled the local width of the river and pushed water into places that had been high and dry. They brought cottonwood and willow back toward their earlier role in the ecosystem and created willow brush for the flycatchers.

Now Western Willow Flycatchers have returned to the San Pedro.

The San Pedro River is still at risk from developments along its headwaters in Mexico, and from the water-hungry city of Sierra Vista. But Beavers have shown how quickly they can improve ecosystem health and diversity when they are allowed to resume their ancient relationship with Willow.