Late Tuesday morning The Chronicle news team put up a poll on chronline.com asking “Who is the most famous person still alive from Lewis County?”
As of early this morning, 247 people had voted.
The results are: Lyle Overbay, 30 percent; Detlef Schrempf, 26 percent; Speedo Man, 13 percent; Merce Cunningham, 10 percent; Sandy Hill, 5 percent; Richard DeBolt, 4 percent; Orin Smith, 4 percent; Charlie Albright, 3 percent; Craig McCaw, 3 percent; Michael Brager, 1 percent; and Brock Peterson, less than 1 percent.
It’s not surprising that the top two are sports stars, as America is devoted to big-time sports. And Speedo Man, with his recent popular video on chronline.com, is enjoying his 15 minutes of fame.
That Merce Cunningham garnered only 10 percent is also not surprising, but this giant of the dance world most likely is the brightest star to ever call Centralia home. He was born here on April 16, 1919, and made his way to New York and the world of Martha Graham, who gave Cunningham a boost through her dance company.
The idea for the poll was prompted by a long story in The New York Times yesterday on Cunningham’s plans for his legacy once the 90-year-old dies. Cunningham is considered a genius in the dance world, combining art, music, dance and theater for more than half a century. His creations have been celebrated in major art centers across the world.
Locally, Cunningham is honored with a spectacular mural in Washington Hall, just outside the Corbet Theatre on the Centralia College campus.
Cunningham said when he dies, or when the time is right, the Merce Cunningham Dance Company will go on a two-year international tour, then shut down for good. His dances will be detailed and preserved, and licensed to future dance companies. The Merce Cunningham Trust, his foundation, is starting the effort to raise $8 million for the transition.
“The plan is Mr. Cunningham’s effort to confront the vexing problem of how choreography created by a lone master and interpreted by a dedicated company should be treated once the master has died,” The New York Times’ Daniel J. Wakin wrote.
Cunningham said, “It’s really a concern about how do you preserve the elements of an art which is really evanescent, which is really like water. It can disappear. This is a way of keeping it — at least with our experience here — of keeping it alive.”
Overbay, if he wins a World Series with a home run or some other such on-the-field heroics, might be remembered into the far future. Speedo Man, his fame is fleeting.
Despite today’s very unscientific poll, we suspect that a century from now, Cunningham’s work will still be studied.
