By G. Michael Dobbs, Correspondent
Sometimes if you’re in a creative endeavor it’s good to have support from peers. A new group in Springfield is doing just that.
And sometimes retirement allows people to pursue a new hobby or continue another with the extra time they now have.
In the new space housing Make- It-Springfield at 286 Bridge Street, a group of men, most of whom are over the age of 55, meet on a Tuesday morning. The goal is to share what is going on in their projects, drink coffee and “see what the morning brings,” as one member described the group.
On the February morning Prime visited, Don Smith, an avid musician leads the group. He explained that his son Sheldon Smith, who is the program coordinator for Make-It-Springfield, saw a need for retired men. “We talk about the things we do, we share about our hobbies,” Don explained to Prime.
The group meets from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. twice a month and the nature of the meetings is based on what the members want to share. This is the only morning program Make-It-Springfield offers, with the rest taking place after 2 p.m.
Smith noted there is one member, who couldn’t make it to this meeting, who is a nature photographer in Longmeadow. He supervised a field trip to the Fannie Stebbins Memorial Wildlife Refuge in Longmeadow with other members to bring their cameras.
Another meeting, the group took the short walk up to the museums at the Quadrangle.
Smith said the group is more about the camaraderie and building friendships. “I think we’ve achieved it,” he added.
Smith is a drummer who said that after 50 years he still has “as much passion as I did in eighth grade.” He is also interested in drawing and painting.
“Music has been in the center of my life,” he added.
One goal is to encourage the members “not to be afraid to try something,” Smith said.
One member is a poet who also is interested in founding a church in Springfield. Ken Laughlin said he came to the group after hearing about it from a man he met at church. He explained, “My poems run the gamut from romantic to religious themes” and noted he has had one published.
“I need to do something with my life,” he added.
Bryant Ronstandt isn’t retired but he joined the group for the friendship and support. He crochets and has taught classes at the Mason Square Library. He has made clothing, rugs and even sculpture.
“It’s been a wonderful journey,” he said of being in the group.
Group member Robert Loesch is a retired United Church of Christ minister who is a graduate of Oberlin College, Yale University Divinity School and Hartford Seminary. He has written short stories that have been collected in the book (available online) titled “Out on a Limb and other stories.” His stories are based on the Springfield area and use actual locations. The bulk of his writing work through his life has been non-fiction.
He noted, “the group presents people who are creative in different ways.” Since joining the group, Loesch said he has become a supporter of business in the downtown areas. Smith added that he really didn’t care much about downtown Springfield until he started coming to the group.
Loesch said the Make-It-Springfield’s new home is “a really great location” and that “it reflects the renaissance of downtown Springfield.”
He added he has not heard of any other such group in the region.
Smith said he has been reaching out to friends about the group. “Hopefully it will grow,” he added.
The new space for the nonprofit Make-It Springfield is much larger than its previous home on Worthington Street with almost 4,000 square feet. There is a bike repair workshop, sewing machines, visual arts and crafts supplies, design software, 3D printers and tools for light woodworking. The public is invited to drop in any time during open hours to use supplies and equipment, or to arrange events or meetings.
Make-It Springfield describes itself as a “dynamic, eclectic learning environment that invites people of any background or skill level to explore and create, while promoting inclusion and collaboration in all forms of culture, art, and technology.” Their mission is to provide “space, tools, and vision, especially for low- and moderate-income individuals and families, to explore and work on creative projects,” and to be “a multicultural home that invites creativity, invention, and artistic experimentation through dialogue, collaboration, and the sharing of skills and ideas.”
Its programs include RAD Springfield which teaches bicycle repair and refurbishes donated bikes to give back to the community, Emerging Young Creatives summer program, and a wide variety of workshops, classes and presentations for the general public to enjoy.
For more information go to https://makeitspringfield.org.
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Reverend Robert Loesch discovered Make-It-Springfield when, in 2016 as a retired pastor, he moved to downtown Springfield to be “within walking distance of all the great resources Springfield had to offer.”
A lifelong writer and recently published author, Loesch often walked by the newly opened space on Worthington Street, and intrigued, would “look in the windows” to see what types of activities were being offered at the new arts hub. I’d “see that they were doing a vendor fair and I’d stop in to buy something and to see what they were doing, “Loesch shared with Prime.
What started as curiosity soon turned into a connection for Loesch. Prime chatted with him about writing, and how he became a founding member of the social circle for creative men 55+ that now meets regularly at Make-It-Springfield.
Prime: What brought you to the writing life?
Basically, all of my life I’ve been writing. In college and grad school I always enjoyed writing term papers and essays, and as pastor I’ve always been writing sermons. I’ve been ordained for 50 years – writing sermons and lectures and leading study groups. In every community I worked in, I’ve also been involved in writing publicity and public relations materials for groups – both news releases and columns for newspapers.
Back in 1993 [ during his first stay in the city] I wrote a history of the religious heritage of Springfield. That was one of my earliest experiences writing a book. It was published locally, [and] It talked about the religious life of different ethnic communities in Springfield, starting with the city’s founding in 1636.
I started my recently published book, “Out on a Limb” in 2018; nine short stories with a special focus on locations in greater Springfield, locations are real, but the characters were fictional.
Prime: Why do you think telling local stories, such as the fictionalized accounts in “Out on a Limb are important?
I think it is important because I wanted to lift up the qualities of the community and show all the activities and opportunities within the community, to lift them up in a positive way. All the stories have positive endings. They’re about ordinary people in the community and how they learned from their families and the neighborhoods and religion and how they contributed to their communities.
Reaction [to “Out on a Limb] has been very positive. People share with me how it touched their lives [and] how they identify with experiences in the stories. I like to have people move into a story. I like to hear people identify with the people and the area where the story is based.
Prime: How did you connect with the Men’s 50+ Creative Group?
When I first moved back from Albany into the area I lived in 16 acres, but when I retired, I moved to downtown Springfield. My coming back to the area was about the same time they [Make-It-Springfield] opened on Worthington Street] and I used to walk by and look in windows and see what they were offering. Prior to their move [to Bridge Street] Marla [Shelasky] who was one of the volunteer managers at the time, asked what I did and I told her about the book I’d written. This was at the beginning of COVID-19, and she asked if I would be willing to read one story virtually on Zoom, so once a week I did [the reading] and had discussions with people on Zoom.
One of the times I was in there I began talking to some of the other people. Some of them said it was enjoyable just talking to each other in this space, so we so said let’s try having a group of men talking together. In this case we were all retired so we decided to have an over-50 men’s group that meets at a time when there are no other activities in the Make It Springfield space.
We’ve just been meeting for a year and a half now. We have seven or eight members – it’s still a small group that started at Make It Springfield on Worthington Street and now moved to Bridge Street – but in that period they had been closed for a while, so we were meeting not [at Make It] but at different locations. They are just one block from Main Street, fairly close to Granny’s Baking Table, so sometimes we met there. I find it’s very important to support other small businesses- especially mom and pop businesses.
Prime: Why do you think groups such as this are important for creative people such as yourself?
What we’re finding is a lot of the men in our group have not been involved with other people, sharing what have done so at the time we meet we have members talk about their life, their passions, what they have done and what they are doing in retirement.
For example, one of our members had been very active drumming in a band – he spent a whole hour talking about his experiences as a child and in high school and what he did in different bands, and he will catch us up on what he’s doing now.
We develop very good relationships within our group, and now that Make It Springfield has moved, we hope we can expand with people living downtown to join. We are always supporting downtown and Springfield’s development.
I want to emphasize we are an inclusive group; we accept people who are a little bit younger [than 50], there is no membership fee to come join. We are able to grow because there is a larger space – I think there are a lot of service organizations and a lot of membership groups [ in the area for retirees], but our group just popped up on its own, we just thought it would be neat to get together.
