UPDATE!!!!

Current mood: excited

OK, so first to update on my letter to the editor, it was published in the Record-Courier today. Yesterday I got an e-mail from Roger Di Paulo basically thanking me for the support and explaining why he writes historical columns. Here is the text of that e-mail for those interested:

Mr. Ridinger:

Your letter, with the correction you noted, will appear in
Thursday's R-C.

Thanks for your support. I walked a very fine line when
writing this column (especially given the fact that
descendants of some of the members of the lynch mob are
very much alive and among my readership) and did my best to
put the incident into an historical perspective. I have no
problem when my work is criticized, but I thought the
letter writer's remark casting asperions on Joseph Smith's
revelations was especially offensive.

I learn something every time I write a history piece, and
in this case, I think what I most appreciated is that many
people are not fully aware of the importance of Portage
County, and especially the Johnson Farm site, to the
history of this worldwide religion. I hope that I helped to
"educate" people a bit with what I wrote.

Again, thanks for writing.

Roger Di Paolo

It was cool to get that note. I also heard from my sister Becky that a co-worker of hers told her that she (the co-worker) thought my response was very professional. ANYWAY, today I also took my last final EVER at BYU-Idaho and then just completed my last assignment for one of my classes that I'd been putting off. SO, my semester is OVER!!! For now I'm packing up my room and am planning on leaving tomorrow morning for Utah before beginning my trip home Saturday morning. I am SO EXCITED to be coming home and to be FREE of the semester and DONE with Rexburg. YEAH!!! And in case you're wondering, all of my finals went GREAT! I even surprised myself!

Here's what my letter looked like in the paper...it was the only letter published today.

Letter to the editor

Current mood: productive

Well, I did finally write a letter to the editor of the Record-Courier, but it ended up being about something else instead of the recent acts of vandalism and cries of racism at Roosevelt High School. In fact, it was about my religion. On Saturday, March 25, the Record-Courier ran a great article by Roger DiPaolo in his "Portage Pathways" section about the tarring and feathering (and near lynching) of Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon in Hiram, Ohio in 1832. The article was very objective and I felt it was very accurate. Most people don't even know the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) was headquartered in Ohio for seven years (1831-1838) and a few of those years were headquartered in Portage County at the John Johnson farm in Hiram. Anyway, some lady named Dianne Centa sent a letter to the editor that was published in today's (April 3) paper which was very negative about the Church and basically seemed to justify what this mob did back in 1832. Well, I have about three things I could write the newspaper about, but my own religion always takes precedence, especially at home. Well, I just sent my letter in, so it probably won't be published for a few days, but here's what I wrote. My mom helped with some editing too =). Here is her letter and below it is my response.

Response to Column
"I'd like to make a few comments about the Portage Pathways column of March 25, in which Mr. DiPaolo writes about the attack on Mormon leaders in Hiram in 1832. He mentions "theological differences" as the basis of the dispute between Smith and Rigdon and the local community. However, the cause of the mob action was more specific than that. Joseph Smith had (in the words of his biographer Fawn Brodie) begun to find monogamy "an intolerably circumscribed way of
life." He was frequently attracted to women other than his wife Emma. While staying with the Johnson family in Hiram Township, Joseph had purportedly "bedded" their 15-year-old daughter Marinda. This is why the mob had been set on castrating — not just tarring and feathering — Smith. The column also says the Johnson home is a shrine because "(Smith) received 16 revelations there." Let us be clear: what should have been said is that Smith claimed to have received revelations there. He no more actually received revelations than did any of the other so-called prophets scattered through our history."

Dianne Centa
Kent

"In response to the letter by Dianne Centa ("Response to Column," 3 April 2007), the basis for Roger DiPaolo's well-written and objective article was to point out the significance of an historical event in our county's history and to show where intolerance and hatred can lead. It was not to make a Mormon doctrinal statement or support Latter-day Saint theology in any way. Further, there are many biographies written on the life of Joseph Smith. Fawn Brodie's should not in any way be considered authoritive. Her book is noted for its antagonism towards Smith and the history of the LDS Church and her scholarship is questionable. I advise anyone trying to learn about someone or something not to rely solely on a source that is biased against the subject, but to research a variety of sources with a mind to fairness and balance.

Ms. Centa's letter seems to suggest that the mobs were justified in their near lynching of Joseph Smith and Sydney Rigdon. I agree with Mr. DiPaolo when he said this was a dark period of our county's history. Mob rule makes it too easy for emotions to rule and for fairness, truth, and justice to be completely ignored. It is, in essence, lawlessness. There is no justification for Portage County residents taking the law into their own hands, either then or now.

As for the John Johnson farm in Hiram being considered a "shrine," Mr. DiPaolo simply stated a fact: the house is considered an important and significant religious site for some 13 million members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, roughly 12 thousand of whom reside right here in Northeast Ohio. Hundreds of thousands of people visit the site each year. Your personal feelings on Joseph Smith and whether or not he received revelations are irrelevant to that fact."

JON RIDINGER
Franklin Township

In other news, I got my placement for student teaching today. I'll be student teaching at Bennion Junior High School in Taylorsville, Utah this fall. I'm very relieved to know where I'm teaching, but I still need to resolve my housing. The University is almost insisting that I live in their "approved" housing in Draper, Utah despite the fact that it's $1500 for just over three months with a shared bedroom (by comparison, I paid about $1900 total for two semesters in my current apartment and I have my own bedroom). I have to fill out this "request" to not live in "approved" housing and hope it gets approved. I'm sorry, I just have a problem with the fact that as a 25 year old I have to have permission from my university to live in housing I choose myself. Worse, if I were married, this wouldn't even be an issue (married students aren't required to live in approved housing even here at school; only single students are regardless of age). Talking with the one guy in charge of distant placement student teaching was pretty worthless. It was basically, "well, you can apply, but we don't usually approve requests." ARG...I CAN'T WAIT TO BE DONE WITH THIS SCHOOL FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Comments

LDS Drama Queen (Becky); April 4, 2007

The only thing that isn't right is her name. You spelled it correctly when copying her letter but wrong in your own...it is Dianne, with two "n"s. ANYWAY, other than that, GREAT letter, it is exactly what I would have said!! You should be proud, it was NICE.

As far as student teaching goes, hang in there...BYU-I is dumb but hey, you only have to deal for a little while longer. Trust me, I'm at Kent State. Don't you think I've got a countdown of hours???

HAHAHAHA...seriously, great article. See you soon!

Dorese; April 4, 2007

Great article! And congratulations on getting your placement for student teaching! And if your request gets denied, just know that Draper is a ritzy area and 1500 for 3 months doesn't really sound too bad. And remember, it's only 3 months, so even if things get on your nerves, it will all be over fast! Good luck with everything, Jon, and keep your chin up! Again, great job on the article. It was very well written!

What a weekend

Current mood: tired

So I've had quite a weekend already and I still have one more day...

On Friday I went down to Provo, Utah for a mission reunion. I was already running late thanks to Utah's WONDERFUL traffic, but wasn't going to be THAT late. Well, as I was going through American Fork on I-15 and suddenly I realized my passenger side back tire had failed! I pulled off and looked it over, then unloaded my trunk to get my spare out (of course this always seems to happen when I have lots of stuff in my trunk). After getting the car jacked up and getting the old tire off, I discovered the spare I had didn't fit my car. Yeah, the dealer sold me a spare that doesn't fit. I got it two years ago and this is the first time I've had to use it. Thank goodness for my friend Manda and AAA! I got the car towed to a Wal-Mart (it was in view from where I got the flat), but they closed 30 mins before I got there. They let me leave the car there overnight and then Manda came and got me, so I was able to catch the very end of the reunion and at least see a few people I remember from the mission ("the mish"). I picked the car up the next morning and came back to Rexburg.

Here's the tire...ya, not sure what caused this really. It was a Goodyear, not a Firestone! On the left is the spare that didn't fit. At least the jack works! This is BEFORE I found out the spare didn't fit...

Manda and me at the American Fork, Utah Wal-Mart when I picked up my car. Manda and I go way back...we both were at Kent State in 2001 before I went on my mission.

Manda and I trying to take a funny picture...

I got back around 4pm and had a date with my friend Mindy. That was kind of interesting too as we went to Olive Garden in Idaho Falls. After waiting about 15 mins to get in, we got seated but no one came to get our orders for like 10 mins. Finally someone came and was very apologetic (he wasn't supposed to wait on us either; just took over). We both ordered my favorite thing, Chicken Alfredo Pizza, only to find they were out (AHHHHHHH!!!!!!!) so we had to order something else. Well, I had a wonderful time talking with Mindy and getting to know her a little better. We were about to leave after we finished and our waiter was still very apologetic about us having to wait, so he had the manager come out and he offered us free desserts!! YES! The weird thing is, we didn't even complain! While we were waiting for our desserts another server came by with two of those pizzas (they had gotten a shipment right as we had gotten there) and was about to serve them to us, but we explained how we had ordered them, but they said they were out, so we ordered something else. Anyway, something was messed up (maybe new people or just busy), but they were really nice about it all and the free dessert I got was WONDERFUL!!!!!!!!!! Plus, the date was a lot of fun too!

It's General Conference weekend in our church too; that's where we can watch or listen to a live broadcast from Salt Lake City with talks from many of our church leaders in four general sessions, each of which is 2 hours (you can go to conference in Utah too...I've done that a few times). It's always a great weekend with lots of good information and a great spirit! I mostly listened on the radio (something I can't do at home) as I drove back to Rexburg from Orem, Utah.

Comments

Nari; April 1, 2007

Phew you had yourself quite the weekend there, J. I had no idea that Utah had any kind of traffic, let alone heavy traffic...lol.

glad that you made it to your mish reunion!

WOW it's been awhile!

Current mood: contemplative

WOW, it's been two months since I posted a blog at all and that last one wasn't much. I really do have a lot on my mind and it's getting to the point where I need to express myself of I'm just going explode!! SO, hopefully I'll be posting some more soon in more details, but I'll give all my loyal blog-watchers (all three of you!!) a "sneak preview" of sorts.

First, I was just reading the blog of Dave Ruller, who is the city manager for Kent, Ohio. I just want to say what a great idea it was for him to start it in the first place, plus it has TONS of great information and ideas on helping Kent improve as a community. I just wish I would read it more often! I think I'm going to start reading it every day I can, just like I read the news everyday on Cleveland.com, Ohio.com, and RecordPub.com. If any reading this are interested, his site is at www.kent360.com. GREAT site for anyone interested in Kent! I, for one, have great hopes for Kent and think it's a great place. It has so much potential still that hasn't been realized yet.

Here's some other things on my mind:

Racism at Roosevelt? For those who didn't hear, someone (looks like maybe three people) broke into my alma mater Roosevelt High School last week and spray-painted racist graffiti on the walls in one of the hallways. To me, it seemed like an unfortunate, yet isolated incident. Now, though, the floodgates have been opened and people are acting like Roosevelt has this huge racial tension and problem when it really doesn't. Many people are also making it look like it's only one way; this is, white racism towards blacks or other minorities. In reality, yes, racism does exist at Roosevelt and in Kent, but find a diverse commmunity where racism DOESN'T exist at all? In addition, the racism and prejudice come from all races, not just one. I heard many racist statements from black kids when I was in middle school for instance. Is it widespread? HARDLY. Kent is a very liberal town and as such is VERY "politically correct" and racism (or anything even romotely close to it!) is NOT politically correct. Most students, teachers, and community members have been stunned by this latest event. Unfortunately, it seems in our society at the moment, racism and derogatory remarks towards white people (especially men) are OK, but not to anyone else (white people are the worst perpetrators of this, in my opinion). Well, guess what? It's WRONG towards ANYONE or any group!! Until Kent (and our country for that matter) realizes that racism has to be dealt with from every angle, it's not going to go away. Racism and other forms of like prejudice are problems that every race, group, and community faces, not just us white people! Am I making myself clear that I think all that stuff is WRONG?!? We're all children of God for goodness sakes...it's time we started treating each other more like good family members than dividing each other up into races and the old "us and them" mentality!! Watch the Record-Courier for a letter to the editor sometime soon!

Iraq: I've been quiet about this for awhile, but I have to say something. This deserves its own blog though, so I'll keep it brief here. It seems to me we're suffering from "simplistic" thinking; that is, the false idea that if we didn't attack Iraq, radicals in the Middle East would hate us less or that if we "just believe hard" that we can have peace (or just let everyone do whatever they want) then POOF we'll have peace. I wish it were that simple, but unfortunately, it's not like that. The hatred towards America and the West in the Middle East stems all the way back to the Crusades, which first started in AD 1099. Yeah, almost 1,000 years ago, yet to many in the Middle East, this is considered a "recent event" that is discussed like it happened in the last few years. It would be like us still hating the British for all the destruction from the War of 1812 (it is worth noting along that line that the original third verse of "The Star-Spangled Banner" is hardly ever sung or even known anymore because it speaks pretty bluntly against the British and was de-emphasized as we became allies with the UK). I have tons more to say on this, but what the US has done in Iraq so far has been shortchanged by the media (who only report on the bad stuff) and by the vocal-yet-destructive minority that continues to cling to their destructive and backwards ways. The only reason it seems things are "worse" in Iraq than before the 2003 invasion is that prior to 2003, Iraq had state-run media, meaning the only news that came out was filtered by Saddam. Hmmm, think he's going to broadcast to the world what he was really doing to his people? O don't think so. The Chicago Tribune stated that it is estimated that Saddam was responsible for the deaths of over 300,000 of his own citizens. Instead of a car bomb going off in the marketplace, family members just disappeared in the middle of the night. ANYWAY, more to come on that. I've really been thinking a lot about it and analyzing it from different angles and perspectives.

I think it's important to gather as much info as I can before making my opinions "public."

WOW that turned out to be long! By the way, I have just one week of classes left and then finals. I'll start heading home probably around April 6th or so. YEAH!!!! I'm hoping to be home sometime in between April 10-12, the earlier the better. Anyone have any good job leads in or around Kent?? Also, I'm going to ENGLAND from April 30-May 12 to visit my friends the Wilcocks (I first met them on my mission while I was in New Mexico)! I CAN'T WAIT!!!!!!!!! How exciting!!!

Comments

LDS Drama Queen (Becky); March 26, 2007

Yeah, I have a few things to say about that Roosevelt thing too....grrr

Can't sleep

Current mood: thoughtful

I can't sleep so I thought I'd post something here for those that actually care. I do plan on at least two somewhat lengthy posts coming up, one political and one about some recent changes in my home ward (congregation). For those that didn't hear, my home ward (Rootstown) is going to be part of the new Youngstown Ohio Stake, beginning February 17. I'll explain it all later for those that need it. Basically, a stake is a group of wards (congregations) and for the last 32 years Rootstown has been part of the Akron Ohio Stake. It'll definitely be further to go to Youngstown than to Tallmadge, but I honestly think now it will end up being good for our ward. I wish I could be there to be a part of this. For a Latter-day Saint, the formation of a new stake is a big deal! More to come...

Comments

Nari; February 13, 2007

I look forward to the political one

Jon is...blonde?!? (and done with the semester!!)

Current mood: excited

For those of you who didn't see my bulletin the other day, yes, I did bleach my hair and so now I'm bright blonde. I did it, well, because I could and I've wanted to do something like that for some time now. I'll have you know it took three days to get this bright since my hair is so dark to begin with. At least I know how to do it now!! Hope you like it!! =). Also, I'm just about done with the semester...two more finals to take today and then I'm FREE at last!! I'm so excited to be done and going home in two days. Just one more semester of classes left here!!!!!!

Comments

Kristi; December 18, 2006
Wow! That's really something to behold!

My recital is OVER!!

Current mood: ecstatic

This is my "note" from Facebook that I wrote pretty much right after my recital this past Saturday, Dec. 2. The concert right after went very well!

Well, it has come and gone...my recital that is. Right now I'm in a small break between my recital and our second concert of the day, which starts at 7:30. We already had a concert at 2 this afternoon and my recital started at 4:30. Oh yeah, we had a concert last night too at 7:30, so once this next concert is done, I'm going to need a break from singing! My recital went pretty well. Was it perfect? Hardly, but that's more me being highly critical of myself than anything. "The Glee Club" went REALLY well and people seemed to like it and I also did "The Buckeye Battle Cry" to end my recital and that went well too, especially when I spelled O-H-I-O at the end. My only disappointment was the attendance. I had my posters all over campus and I sent out e-mails to probably 50 people, all of whom either live in or near Rexburg. Not only did I hardly get any response to the e-mails, but of all those I e-mailed, I don't think any of them came. Those few (and MUCH appreciated) that came were people I have classes with for the most part. Of course I'm thrilled that they came, but I would've liked to have seen more people especially since I printed 100 programs. I really expected a much larger crowd. There were probably around 30 people there if that. If it weren't for my sister being there, no one from my family would've been there at all. Not that I expected any family from Ohio to come, but it would've been nice if some of my Utah family could've made the three-hour trip here. After all, I've made the trip down there countless times. Oh well...now to other things like FINALS!

The pictures below are 1) Me, Br. Dresen, & Zoe doing the "poster pose" after the recital; 2) Elissa, Zoe, Me, and LaRenzo after the recital. We were all an Aural Skills study group in Aural Skills 2 and then we were a mentor group in Aural Skills 3. We named ourselves the "Solfegers" 3) The "cast" of my recital with our "Glee Club" outfits on (Men's Choir blazers). 4) Andrew, Ray, and Me in our Collegiate Singers outfits after the end of the final concert that night.

Comments

LDS Drama Queen (Becky); December 8, 2006
I'm glad it went well. I would have been there had it not been across the country. I'll watch the video though when you bring it home. :) I like your pictures!!

See you soon!!

Love ya.

Nari; December 13, 2006
Great pics!!