eckermanmichigan.com Blog

   I noticed on the calendar this morning that April 1st is a week from today. April 1st marks my 14th year living here and my 14th year, that I haven’t had to prepare a ball diamond for a baseball game. I maintained the play and practice fields for: Football, Soccer, Lacrosse, Field Hockey, Cross Country, Track, Softball, and Hardball, which was the worst.

   When the ball diamond was first installed, it sat close to a large slope that dropped to a creek bed. When I arrived, the field had been expanded leaving another 50′ from the backstop to the edge, and the administration wanted it moved closer to the bus garage. After disassembling the fencing, we moved it over and layed it out so the first base fair line, was parallel to that hill side. After setting the poles, I rented a transit level and placed the plumb bob where the rear point will be on home plate: to lay out the first and third base lines. When I sent the man down the first base line to mark the fair poll, I discovered my first problem. When I sighted down the line to the idiot stick, (On a two man team, one man runs the scope, and the other holds a 9′ pole for sighting on) I couldn’t find it. I looked up over the instrument and could see the dude standing there with the pole, but not through the scope. Then I had him hold the pole up as far as he could and wave it back and forth. Through the bottom of the scope, I could see the top of it passing by. I then taped another 6′ of wood to the stick and discovered that there was a 14′ drop from home plate, to the right field fair pole. To stand there and look at it from either end, it looked almost level.

   Once I set that, I turned the scope 90º and checked the third base line. This side wasn’t nearly as bad, but it added into the problem due to it’s elivation. Not drop, but elivation, as it rose from home plate to the fair poll by 5′. I was just beginning to get my head wraped around that when I layed out the pitchers mound.

   Regulations state that there has to be a 10″ drop from the pitchers mound to the batters plate. That’s all fine and good if the field is level, but we had to add 2′ of soil to make it so. Add to that another 10″, and you’ve got every swingin’ dick in the school wondering what in hell was I thinking!?! There in the middle of the infield, 50′ from home plate, starts Mt. Suribatchi glistening in the morning sun.

   Frank Orlando, who was, and probably still is, the varsity baseball coach had been helping us with the construction. Every morning Frank would walk from his vehicle to the school by way of the ball field to see how it was coming. He’d started teaching the fall after I started working and had helped us from the time we set the backstop. Frank is a great teacher and an even better coach, but had/has no idea how the world works. Like most teachers there they can’t see anything that’s not currently there, and a lot of things that are. All he saw was one huge fucking pile of dirt in the middle of his beautiful ball diamond, and by God he was going to fix it. I showed him the transit, and even the idiot stick but that didn’t slow him down none. Within two hours I had every administrator in the building coming out and telling me how it was supposed to be done. Each time I’d show them the transit, and the idiot stick, but it wasn’t until a parent came by and backed me up, did they relent. There were many times when I wondered which were smarter; the teachers or the stick.

   The basepaths material as well as the pitchers mound were purchased from the same supplier that Tiger Stadium used. It is a very heavy clay with a sand mixed in, to give it a smooth and durable surface that can be groomed easily. It is also the reason Tiger Stadium purchased a tarp to cover it all, which we didn’t. Around this time of year, the team spent it’s spring break near Lakeland Fla, getting ready for another grueling season of baseball, and we, spent it trying to get the field playable.

   As soon as the snow melted we began watching the soil begin to change color from a wet, dark brown, to a workable tan. Until then, even walking in the crap would cause a hamstring pull and it wouldn’t do any good anyways. If we had to, which was often, we’d add Turface which is calcinated clay (Kitty Litter) to soak up the moisture and give it some stability. Then we hooked up a set of disc’s to a three point hitch and tear the livin’ hell out of everything not grass. We’d let that sit for a day or two, to dry it out, and then grade it to specifications. We used an adjustable hydrolic blade to level it out, where another problem showed up. With the differentiations in height, it was a real bitch to balance out level and flat….on the side of a hill that ran two ways. The baselines were easy as they were only 6′ wide, but from first to third was a bitch. The baselines were all chopped up using a rototiller rather than the disc’s, but the blade ran down them just fine. If Frank had left word before leaving, we would tilt the baseline to his requests, or if he hadn’t we’d make them level. For teams that had a history of bunting, we would grade both baselines so they always went foul and shortend the grass length. If Frank wanted to use the bunt in his offense, we’d tilt them fair, and grow the grass longer. We never made them tilt enough to be noticed, but idiot sticks aren’t known for their observational skills.

   Once the grades had been set, two or three of us would take brooms and walk the basepaths, grooming them to Country Day standards, and then spray water to keep the dust down. The baselines where then chalked, and painted from the edge to the poles and it would be ready. Normally, we had all day to do this and it often did, but on days when rain was added, it got a little hinky. Frank would come out during lunch and see how things were going, expecting to see everything done, but it had rained all morning. Some days he would become quite frantic, but never was a game cancelled because we didn’t have it done in time. In fact, we became so good at it, that other schools would opt to play one of their home games at Country Day, so the game could be played.

   One time, we had rented a D-3, a John Deere bulldozer, to do some gradework to a different area, but I’d use it to tear up the field so they could play on it. The material would go from muck to cement in one day, and it would play like being held in a Wal*Mart parking log. We’d have to bust that stuff up to an almost dust like state and then grade it out,  and water the top. I saw that Deere sitting there doing nothing, and to fuck with Frank, I used it to tear it up. When he walked out from lunch, I was doing circle 8’s between second and third and had huge piles of the crap everywhere. He went friggin’ nuts and headed into the school to see about getting my ass fired. An hour later when the Headmaster came out to see what Frank had been making an ass of himself over, it was all graded out and ready to go.

   In the fall of ‘94, I told my boss that I would be leaving in the Spring, and when he asked me which day, I asked him when did baseball season open? March 31st, I walked out of there a very happy man.

      This morning I’m sitting in my glassed in front porch, watching the sap boil. I live in a Northwest Michigan town of 2,000 people, and most of them don’t live on this block. We’re mostly retired in this corner with the exception of the couple across the street. They are the proud benifactors of a huge sugar maple and will soon have a couple bottles of syrup. The snow still covers most of the landscape, but there’s patches of lawn showing up everywhere and robins looking for something to eat.

   Next to my front, front porch, I have a stainless steel container, very similar to a deep fryer used for chickens and turkeys. Normally, this is used to batch off the syrup that had been evaporated in a pan, but I’m using it to boil off the water. I have a 30″X6′ pan, but I don’t have an arch, or firebox, to heat the material.

   I got these two pieces of equipment, and a lot more, from a co-worker/teacher at Detroit Country Day School. The only thing he didn’t purchase was the arch, because I built one. We had used two sheets of 3/16″ X 5′ X 8′, cold rolled steel for protection when we were excavating and repairing a storm drain line. We’d used it to protect ourselves from cave ins, and now it was just taking up space. We had our own set of cutting torches and an arc welder and once we had the pan, I cut it to fit. The firebox was 3′ x 3′ x 6′ and eventually, brick lined. The thing wasn’t pretty; it looked very similar to something used in Central Poland during WWII, and was as effecient as theirs. One evening, I had a clean blue flame shooting out the top of a 14′ stack, but I was burning apple wood.

   The rest of it: spiles, tubing, connectors, gasoline 1/2″ drill motor, and plumbing for the evaporator was bought by Randy, with his own funds. Besides working with me in Grounds, he was a Middle School Science teacher that tought by doing, as well as reading. He remembered his boring science classes and vowed to change the method so more kids would benifit. Part of his class program, used 10 acres of wooded river bottom. The creek is a tributary of the Rouge River, that eventually runs into the Detroit River. Before Country Day bought it, it was part of a pasture for the family’s milk and meat. Cows make a remarkable herbacide and they ate everything in sight if it was small enough. Three or four Oaks and several sugar maples were huge and old when the cows showed up, and even bigger after they left. 25 years after the cows left, Country Day arrived and 20 years after that, we turned it into a science labortory. The department created a path through it and built 5 bridges that crossed the creek in various spots. Through out the area, and mostly along the hill on both sides, grew several of these old maples and most of them were large enough to handle multiple taps.

   Using several hundred feet of 1/2″ plastic tubing, we connected all these trees in line and then down to 55 gallon Rubbermade containers, that collected the sap.

   Each year during the last week of February, the crew would go out and start tapping the trees and setting up the lines. Randy would call one of the local t.v. stations and invite one of it’s reporters out to do a segment. 10 minutes before the t.v. crew showed up, he would bring some of his students down, and we’d give them our tools. Then we’d head up in the woods and watch the class do it’s thing with the reporter, and after they’d leave we’d go get the tools and finish the instalation.

   Every morning someone would take the utility vehicle, which held two of these 55 gallon containers, and make a collection. We had 5 of these gathering spots and it was often that the guy had to make multiple trips to ferry the sap to the sugar shack. The shack was built the year after we started with the evaporator, and we built that too. We built it with the idea to use it as a teaching tool, so the top half of one side could be opened and the kids could line up along the evaporator and see. We’d poured a concrete floor because that thing was extremly heavy and it had to be perfectly flat. A 12″ double walled pipe led up through the roof to 14′ so there was pleanty of draft. Next to the shack on a table built 5′ off the ground, were two more 55 gallon containers with house spigots attached near the bottom. We then used a 5/8″ garden hose that lead to a coil of 2″ copper tubing, that wrapped around the chimney on its way to the evap pan. That was hooked up to a float device that’s very similar to the one in your toilet. As the sap level dropped due to evaporation, the valve would open and let fresh material into the pan keeping it flowing.

   Once we had the operation running, Randy approached the Lower School Director and offered our services to her students. Until then, the kids were bussed over to Cranbrook School, and take a tour they provided, for a fee.

   Cranbrook and Country Day have been in competition from the day Country Day opened. They both cater to the “very well off” portion of our society but Cranbrook was there much earlier than Country Day. There are two main differences in these schools: Cranbrook is old money (real old in some instances) and Country Day is new money, (as in Isiah Thomas as a parent, and Chris Webber as a student), Cranbrook is Liberal Arts, and Country Day is Capitalism. Country Day would like to have the reputation of Cranbrook, and Cranbrook looks down on Country Day, like Europe does to the United States. Over the years the two schools have competed in every factor of the institutions’ programs and this was going to be another one.

   At first, the Lower School Director balked at the idea because it was being run by a bunch of grasscutters. She couldn’t fathom the idea of us having the mentality to do something so complicated. There’s a lot more to that, but this is getting long enough as it is. Once reminded about the cost to the school, she said she’d send over one class and make a decision.

   I greeted them at the North end of the property; at the residence of the Headmaster, Dr. Schlegel, along with his wife Margo. The house lies adjacent to the stadium field and at the North end of this nature area. The trail was originally built to accomidate the cross country team and the collection points were located on this trail. The two of them were from the Northeast and they had become huge supporters of our department, and what we could do. When approached about the maple syrup production and the labor costs involved, he was all for it. The rest of the administration thought we were a bunch of morons and it was a stupid idea, but the boss liked it.

   I’d lead the students behind the residence where our first collection point was, and talked about osmosis and transperation, and then how we drilled and tapped in spiles along with the tubing. I talked about how the indians would cut v’s in the bark and using birchbark, channel the sap into containers. It was then boiled with hot rocks thrown into it until it was pure sugar granuals. At the end of my talk, I asked if there were any questions and one mother asked if their shoes were going to get wet on the walk. I told her no, we had spread wood bark along the entire length, and looked down to see she was wearing Prada’s. The kids always paid attention and wore their play shoes, it was the teachers and parents I had problems with. We’d then walk along the trail and I’d show them different plants that were beginning to grow or the different birds that were flying overhead. At the other end of the trail, at another residence, was the sugar shack and the evaporator.

   The pure sap entered on one corner, and after traveling down the three channels, it would exit at the other corner as pure syrup. It was quite easy to see the color changes from totally clear, to it’s amber color at the other end. As the water evaporates, the remaining sugar caramelizes as it travels. If processed correctly, you should be able to read a newspaper through a pint bottle of syrup. When I’d finish with the demonstration, I’d give everyone a taste and ask for questions again. The kids asked questions about the production and the parents would ask me if they made 1 calorie syrup. It was during the Q&A period that I brought up Cranbrook.

   When Randy and I were purchasing the equipment, from a supplier in Mason, Michigan, he asked us if were going to buy bulk syrup along with the rest? When we asked him why, he said that Cranbrook buys hundreds of gallons of it each year to sell with their program. Randy started laughing and told me that he’d been to see their program and they advertised the stuff as being harvested from their trees. Once word got out about that, and the show we put on, I spent the next two weeks giving tours and selling syrup. The next year, we started making reservations for other schools and I made it to the 5 o’clock news.

   By the first day of Spring, all the equipment had been stored away, and the profits made from the syrup, were invested in the next project. On the 20th of March, the phesants begin to lay their eggs and they’ll soon need to be fed. We also had a breeding/raising/releasing program using phesant, but I’ll get to that later.

   So now, I’ve got 5 taps dripping instead of 100, but there’s two kids living across the street wondering what the hell I’m doing, and I’m gonna show’em.