CAPITAL TIMES, October 4, 1989
Clogger dances for fun, takes environment seriously
Mary Lee Schnable
Capital Times Staff
One of the "cloggers" who entertained
the Penn State Harrisburg community
during the recent campus picnic spends a
great deal more of her time "unclogging"
than "clogging" these days.
Jody Quimby, who teamed up with
Dr. Louise Hoffman for the entertaining
dance routine, is currently a graduate
student working toward a Master's
Degree in Environmental Pollution
Control. In her "office" in the Science
and Technology Building she upholds
her ideals with a ceramic mug, cloth
napkin and placemat, real silverware and
a virtually empty trash can.
"You could probably empty my
waste basket once a year," Quimby said,
pointing out a drawer full of paper with
one side still blank (used for notes), and
a round canister of paper with both sides
used (ready for the recycling pile).
Recycling is really a three stage
process, she said. First, we need to
separate our garbage for pickup. Then, a
useful product needs to be made from it,
and last, we need to purchase and use
recycled products.
The latest quest for biodegradable
products doesn't really solve the solid
waste problem, since today's landfills are
lined to prevent leakage of harmful
substances and the trash that is dumped
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Mary Lee Schnable
into them won't decompose for years.
"We are entombing our garbage,"
Quimby said.
An archaeologist from the University
of Arizona recently dug up a 10 year-old
carrot, and found it to be as bright
orange and carrot-like as the day it was
dumped. A newspaper dumped in a
landfill will look almost like new in 30
years, and a disposable diaper can be
expected to last about 400 years.
Even though, she admits to being
downright scared when faced with the
rate at which Americans are piling up
garbage, Quimby confesses that deep
down she has hope. "I have this
optimism that people are going to
change once they realize the
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environmental cost of what they are
doing," she said.
"There are so few things in the world
and the country that we really have the
ability to change," she said. "This is
something where we can have an
impact."
Quimby, stepdaughters Christine and
Sarah, and husband John, who also
works in the Middletown area, live about
10 miles from the Penn State Harrisburg
campus, midway between Elizabethtown
and Hershey. The elder Quimby's both
bike the 10 miles to Middletown each
day.
"It makes you aware of the flowers
and the farmers," Quimby said, "and
everything that's happening outside the
sky." Initially she thought she would
feel abandoned without a car, she says,
but that hasn't happened.
Quimby's "clogging" days began in
1982, while she was working as a
computer consultant for NASA in
Washington D.C. An ad in an area
university catalog of things to do offered
clogging lessons, which she says,
"sounded neat." After beginner's
lessons, intermediate lessons, and a
move to Pennsylvania, she joined a
group of cloggers who performed in
Elizabethtown.
Then, until she began graduate school
here last January, Quimby was a
member of "Feet First," a group of
cloggers that met at "Cheers
Restaurant/Lounge" in Columbia. It had
gorgeous wooden floors, she said, and
"Feet First" was allowed to make use of
them, since the restaurant portion was
closed on Mondays.
The combination of wooden floors
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experience, plans to teach at the college
level.
If she could "wish" a bill passed by
the U.S. Congress, it would be to put a
symbol on every product that is
considered household hazardous waste,
and to require that consumers be told
how to dispose of the products properly.
Some people, when faced with the
need to bundle newspapers, separate
garbage, and sometimes pay higher
prices because of environmental
improvements say, "what does it matter?
I won't be here in 70 or 80 years
anyway."
Quimby summed up the reason for
the sense of urgency she feels with the
quote of an American Indian in a West
Virginia University Newsletter: "This
land belongs to my people. Some of
them are living; some of them are dead;
but most of them have not been born."
and leather soled shoes result in the
unique sound of clogging, which is
similar to tap dancing.
Fortunately for the group, the lounge
was open, since, Quimby said, "cloggers
do get thirsty!"
The Free Style Appalachian
Clogging that Quimby and Hoffman
performed at the picnic was done after
only a few practice sessoins. They had
never met before, but Quimby said she's
willing to do it again next year.
Meanwhile, she will continue
working on her Graduate Fellowship,
which involves a curbside recycling
center for Lower Susquehanna
Township. She hopes to be employed
by the summer of 1990, with only a few
classes to finish part-time for her degree,
and after she has gained enough industry