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Hot Springs potter named 2022 Arkansas Living Treasure

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Hot Springs potter named  2022 Arkansas Living Treasure


WASHINGTON — The Arkansas Arts Council is happy to announce James “Kimbo” Dryden because the 2022 Arkansas Residing Treasure for his work and dedication to the craft of pottery.

“Kimbo Dryden is a compelling addition to our Residing Treasure program,” stated Stacy Hurst, secretary of the Arkansas Division of Parks, Heritage and Tourism. “His lifelong ardour, dedication and mastery of pottery has not solely added to his household’s heritage, however to the heritage of Arkansas.”

The Arkansas Residing Treasure program yearly acknowledges an Arkansas inventive who excels within the creation of a standard craft or people artwork and who preserves and advances their craft by group outreach and instructing others.

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“It’s essential to have a good time the cultural significance of the humanities in Arkansas,” stated Jimmy Bryant, director of Arkansas Heritage. “The Arkansas Residing Treasure program is a wonderful approach to honor those that have devoted their careers to sharing their creativity and inventive expertise.”

Dryden was chosen by an impartial panel of judges. He shall be honored at a ceremony Friday, Might 20.

“Kimbo Dryden is really a one in all a sort. His ability, creativity and fervour may be seen in every bit of pottery he throws. It’s an honor and a privilege for the Arts Council to current this award to him,” stated Patrick Ralston, director of the Arkansas Arts Council.

Dryden laughed when requested the way it felt to be the subsequent Arkansas Residing Treasure.

“About time,” he stated. “I’m only a potter. It’s an honor, you already know? Like I stated, it’s about time.”

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The respect and legacy additionally belong to Dryden’s father. “Ought to’ve been my dad,” Dryden stated. “With out him, I might be digging ditches.”

Dryden grew up within the pottery enterprise. His father, AJ “Jimmy” Dryden, began Dryden Pottery in Ellsworth, Kansas, in 1946. His pottery operation moved to it’s present location in Sizzling Springs in 1956.

Dryden was put to work by his father as early as 10 years outdated. He first began his coaching utilizing a kick wheel. In 1970, Dryden studied his craft at Huge Creek Pottery College in Davenport, California. He then rejoined his father on the manufacturing unit creating mugs, vases, plates and extra.

Since shifting the Dryden pottery enterprise to Arkansas, their course of makes use of Arkansas novaculite in each the clay of his items in addition to the glazes, that are distinctive to his pottery.

Dryden has been open to guests, speaking to them about his work and giving free, stay pottery demonstrations. He has helped aspiring potters succeed of their crafts with steerage and instruction free of charge.

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Though Dryden retired in 2013, his son Zack has taken up the mantle of Dryden Pottery, persevering with the generational creativity of his father’s and grandfather’s enterprise.

His son Zack Dryden stated, “I really like my dad. He’s a great man; he’s all the time been kind-hearted to me and my brothers. Him, together with my grandfather, actually pushed us, inspired us to be within the enterprise and make it a household affair.”

Dryden’s conventional course of consists of distinctive, in-house, formulated clays, glazes and methods that end in a recognizable look and elegance. Dryden stated anybody can pick a “Dryden,” which is why the household’s slogan is “A Melody in Glaze.” Zack Dryden stated, “You possibly can just about have a look at our pottery and from the traits you may simply inform by it should you’re accustomed to it, you may inform it’s Dryden.”

“Issues progress, issues modified. Individuals are sick of brown stoneware. It’s all the identical coloration. Uninteresting, brown,” stated Kimbo Dryden. Zack Dryden stated, “Lately folks need one thing that’s distinctive.”

Kimbo Dryden stated, “Yeah, one in all a sort, distinctive items you may’t discover wherever else, that’s us.”

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In regards to the Arkansas Arts Council

The Arkansas Arts Council, an company of Arkansas Heritage, advances the humanities in Arkansas by offering companies and supporting arts endeavors that encourage and help literary, performing and visible artists in attaining requirements {of professional} excellence. As well as, the Arkansas Arts Council supplies technical and monetary help to Arkansas arts organizations and different suppliers of cultural and academic applications.

Arkansas Heritage

Arkansas Heritage was created in 1975. There are eight businesses with distinctive heritage focuses beneath the umbrella of this division: Arkansas Arts Council, Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, the Delta Cultural Heart in Helena, the Previous State Home Museum, the Arkansas Pure Heritage Fee, the Mosaic Templars Cultural Heart, the Historic Arkansas Museum and the Arkansas State Archives. Arkansas Heritage is a division of the Arkansas Division of Parks, Heritage and Tourism. Jimmy Bryant serves as director of the division whereas Stacy Hurst is the secretary of the Division of Arkansas Parks, Heritage and Tourism.



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Arkansas

Sam Pittman breaks down Arkansas' biggest transfer portal needs

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Sam Pittman breaks down Arkansas' biggest transfer portal needs


With the transfer portal in full swing, Arkansas coach Sam Pittman addressed some of the biggest areas of need for his team. The Razorbacks are coming off of a 6-6 finish in the fifth year under Pittman and looking to boost their roster for another run in 2025.

Speaking with media, Pittman highlighted both the offensive and defensive line as the areas where Arkansas needs to be most aggressive in the portal. He also cited the linebacker group as a the position that the team feels best about, saying the Razorbacks will look to improve its defensive backs room first.

“Offensive line would be one (area of need),” the coach said. “Defensive line would be one. We felt like we were pretty good at the linebacker spots. If you go back and look a couple of years ago, the world was falling because this linebacker (left), that linebacker (left).

“I think we all agreed out linebacker room was a strength for us this year. But that would be probably the least worried about (position). We need some safeties. We need some corners. But I think O-line and tight end’s a big deal. Wide receivers. We’ve got several spots to fill, but off the top of my head, that’s who it would be.”

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Since Pittman’s comments, Arkansas has been active in the transfer portal to bring in 13 players. Unfortunately, they’ve also lost 26 more and rank just No. 59 out of 70 teams in On3’s Transfer Portal Team Rankings.

Staying true to to his word, Pittman has brought in four offensive linemen and a pair of defensive lineman through the portal. Former Georgia Tech offensive tackle Corey Robinson II is the highest rated of those additions, coming in as the No. 32 overall player and No. 5 player at his position according to On3’s Transfer Portal Player Rankings.

Arkansas also brought in former Charlotte receiver O’Mega Blake and former Cincinnati cornerback Jordan Young to give it three players ranked in the top 150.

The Razorbacks still have a long way to go to complete their portal class, likely hoping to add some more defensive linemen before it closes later this month. They are looking to make the next push in the SEC next season and the players they’ve gotten so far are a good start.



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Part of Arkansas book ban law is unconstitutional, federal judge rules

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Part of Arkansas book ban law is unconstitutional, federal judge rules


A federal judge ruled on Monday that sections of an Arkansas law, which sought to impose criminal penalties on librarians and booksellers for distributing “harmful” material to children, were unconstitutional.

The law, known as the Arkansas Act 372, was signed into law last year by Republican governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders. It was challenged by a coalition of organizations in the state, leading to a lengthy legal battle that concluded this week.

Two sections of Act 372 subjected librarians and booksellers to jail time for distributing material that is deemed “harmful to children”. Proponents of the law, including Sanders, said the law was put in place to “protect children” from “obscene” material.

“Act 372 is just common sense: schools and libraries shouldn’t put obscene material in front of our kids,” Sanders said in a statement to KATV-TV. “I will work with Attorney General Griffin to appeal this ruling and uphold Arkansas law.”

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The governor signed the bill into law in March 2023, and a coalition of organizations in the state, including the Central Arkansas Library System in Little Rock and the ACLU of Arkansas, challenged it last year, saying the law was vague, overly broad and that the fear of criminal penalties would have a chilling effect on librarians across the state. A federal court temporarily blocked the enforcement of the two sections in question, while the law was being challenged in court.

The two sections that were struck down on Monday had established a criminal misdemeanor for “furnishing a harmful item to a minor”, and would have required local governments to create oversight boards to review challenged material. The organizations opposing the law argued that local officials, at their own discretion, could censor whichever books and material they pleased.

“This is a significant milestone on a long, sometimes rocky road we were obligated to travel after the passage of Act 372,” said Nate Coulter, executive director of the Central Arkansas Library System, in response to Monday’s ruling.

“We took that path to protect our librarians from prosecution for doing their jobs and to prevent some local elected officials from censoring library books they did not feel were ‘appropriate’ for our patrons to read.”

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In 2004, a federal judge struck down a similar law. The year prior, the state passed a law that required booksellers and librarians to hide materials deemed “harmful to minors”. It was deemed unconstitutional after legal challenges.



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Awash in Christmas’ glow | Arkansas Democrat Gazette

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Awash in Christmas’ glow | Arkansas Democrat Gazette


Editor’s note: This is a revised and updated version of a column first appearing Christmas Eve 2015.

On a Saturday morning that spring, I sat alone, having breakfast at Leo’s in Hillcrest. A text came in from Gwen Moritz, then editor of Arkansas Business and regular estate-scale scavenger.

She said she was at that moment looking quite possibly at the very item I’d written longingly about in a Christmas column.

She was at an estate sale at a house maybe five blocks away. I hurried over and went upstairs.

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Indeed, she’d found it, or, more precisely, one very much like it.

There was a brief discussion of estate-sale strategy. You could take a chance that the item wouldn’t sell, in which case you could get it for less on Sunday afternoon.

I took no chance. Full price. Right now. Into my Jeep. Then into the attic, until it was time.

And now it is time.

If all goes according to recent tradition this evening, at or about midnight, I will sit in a comfortable chair next to a deeply warming splash of Jameson whiskey.

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I will turn off all lamps, overhead lights, smartphones, laptops and television sets. I will gather the beagles Roscoe and Sophie at my feet. Shalah will be nearby, pleased to behold my rare serenity.

In the darkness, I will gaze upon, and lose myself in, the vintage 6-foot aluminum Christmas tree, circa ’65, in the corner, a wonder of glorious nostalgia and tackiness.

I will watch the slow-circling color wheel transform the shiny tinfoil of the tree to a calm deep blue and then a peaceful yellow and then a shining green and then an understated red, and back around.

I will listen for the brief grinding sound each time the wheel reintroduces blue.

I will escape to childhood, to life at 10 to 12 in that flat-topped, four-room house at the end of a graveled lane in southwest Little Rock. I will recall a tree like this one, and a permanently creaking color wheel a little bigger and better than this modern online discovery.

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I will be returned to that hardwood floor of the mid-1960s, flat on my stomach, eyes fixed, deep in my happy certainly that this exotic aluminum tree–framed by a picture window outlined in blinking lights–was surely the most magnificent among all monuments of the season.

I will remember the happiness and safety of those 1960s Christmases–of, in fact, an entire childhood.

I will be thankful for the hardworking low-income parents who provided that happy and safe childhood, and the little fundamentalist church that nurtured it, and the public school that educated it, and the community that encouraged it, and the backyard that was a field of dreams–a baseball park, a football stadium, a basketball arena, a golf course.

It was there I threw and caught the passes, even punted high and ran to make the fair catch.

It was there I provided the roar of the crowd and the play-by-play announcing and color commentary.

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I concocted a baseball card for myself, one with impressive statistics and a brief biography that included the nickname: “Fly Ball Brummett.”

My dad told me that you don’t want to hit fly balls, boy, because they get caught for outs. And I explained that fly balls sent airborne by “Fly Ball Brummett” arced like gentle bombs to distant places no outfielder could reach.

He said I was talking about line drives. I said these soar higher than that.

We’d argue that way, and more seriously, for a few more years, and then each of us would realize that the other was smarter than we had thought. Then we got along fairly well.

Cigarettes took him much too young, younger by seven years than I am now. My mom gave me his cufflinks and tie clasp that first Christmas without him. I fled the room teary, much as he’d fled the room that Sunday afternoon years before when I coaxed enough Okinawa memories out of him that he mentioned “Sarge.”

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After a half-hour of Jameson sips and color-wheel hypnosis, I will head to bed. And I will think about Mom, gone now three years, after four years in a nursing home for what they call “cognitive decline.” I will wonder if she remembered at the end, if but for a fleeting moment, that aluminum tree and color wheel of our cozy, happy little home.

It’s more likely that she remembered instead in those last years the very thing I’d spent those moments remembering–the safety and happiness of childhood, her own, which is where she spent her final days.

There are far worse places to be.


John Brummett, whose column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, is a member of the Arkansas Writers’ Hall of Fame. Email him at jbrummett@arkansasonline.com. Read his @johnbrummett feed on X, formerly Twitter.

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