What's 20,000 extra to a hamlet of 26?

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By Bill Wundrum | Thursday, July 17, 2008 |

THE absolutely biggest thing to ever happen to little Argo, Iowa, isn’t rating more than a yawn.

Argo and its 26 residents aren’t a snit excited about RAGBRAI. That means at least 20,000 bicyclists will be riding through the Scott County town on the last leg of the trek across Iowa. Argo is claimed to be the smallest town on RAGBRAI, which ends July 26 in LeClaire.

Kenny Bowker, who runs the tavern-store in Argo, isn’t enthused.

“We’ll probably just stand outside and wave,” says Gwen Dykes, who tends bar there. “We were more excited when our mascot dog, Charley, disappeared.”

One would think that Kenny could make a million dollars if he’d put out a beer tent.

“To us, a bigger thing is our Halloween parade,” says Gwen. “We might have 50 or so people in it.”

Blame it on the pews

There was a lot of up and down this week at the memorial service for grande dame Elsie von Maur at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, Davenport.

George Coin poked me in the back:

“All this creaking — is it the pews or our bones?”

One hot summery day on the road

Little things please the heart as I’ve been on the road for the Sunday Quad-City Times series, “Wandering with Wundram.”

While we were lunching at the Carousel Café in Belleuve, Iowa, a pretty little girl, about 10, slipped alongside our table. She stood in front of the cookie counter, a charmer in a dress with a bow tied in back.

She studied the assortment of homemade cookies. It was a scene from a Norman Rockwell painting.

“I’ll take two,” she said to the clerk, adding the apology/explanation:

“One of them is for my little sister.”

Ach, no potholes

Comparison to back home: A Davenporter returned this week from Germany. He drove city and country roads in a rented car and didn’t hit a bump. “In 10 days, I didn’t see a single pothole,” he says. “Every road, perfectly paved. It was comfortable to drive, but gas was $8 or $9 a gallon.”

You can’t keep good kids down!

A week ago, there was a question if the Bix Memorial Youth Band would continue tooting.

The director had abruptly quit. The 15 young musicians — all the best in the Quad-Cities — were upset. Good grief, was there a possibility that the band would disband?

Now, all’s well — for the moment. The band, with a director pro-tem, will be in concert at 7:30 p.m. today at the Veterans Memorial Park bandshell in Bettendorf and will make five appearances at the Bix Bash at the end of this month.

“Those in the band insisted they’d stay together even without a director,” says Bruce Bogen, a Colona, Ill., musician who has taken over the director’s baton for the moment.

Ray Voss, prez of the Bix Society, is elated that the young musicians are so determined to play jazz as it should be played.

“If we didn’t have young people like this, how would we keep Bix’s music alive?” he asks.

We haven’t heard the end of all this. The pot will be stirred.

Bill Wundram can be contacted at (563) 383-2249 or bwundram@qctimes.com.