Hemingway Haunts

An education program of Michigan Legacy Art Park

During the 2003-04 school year, Traverse City Central Grade School 5th graders participated in Patricia Innis’ pilot program for Hemingway Haunts. During the 2004-05 school year, the program expanded to include the schools and surrounding communities of Frankfort, Mancelona and Kalkaska. A number of resulting student works were exhibited that summer within the MLAP’s Discovery Grove student exhibition area and in the students’ home communities.

Mancelona
Fifth-grade students collaged designs on wooden cutouts of Bass fish, which were introduced during the MLAP’s Opening Day and at Triangle Park at the Mancelona Bass Festival in June. The fish displays will continue in both locales throughout the summer. The students created Hemingway-connected Michigan poetry and seven of the students wrote a play, which was performed during MLAP’s Opening Day. 

High School students were involved in three different public art works. They designed a 4’ x 8’ mural that includes Hemingway, which was installed in June at a Mancelona city park. Then, the high schoolers helped Innis paint Hemingway’s figure on a tree near the railroad tracks (on the corner of Highway 131 and Hinman Road). A third installation of work, a painted mural composition with Hemingway figures at various times in his life, was installed on the side of a Mancelona building.

Kalkaska
Students from Kalkaska High School took part in three separate public art works. They created cut-out figures of people, including Hemingway, from the year 1916, which were then installed throughout downtown Kalkaska. Then the students created a series of 4’ x 4’ murals that include Hemingway and reflect the history of the town around 1916. A third installation of work—figures painted on trees—is located along the Rapid River. 

Rugg Pond, near Kalkaska, is already the site of a Hemingway figure that Innis painted on a tree two years ago, near the dam where the author once fished. 

Frankfort - Elberta
Hemingway first experienced fishing, a sport that would become a lifelong passion, during his early journeys to Elberta. Frankfort High School students in the classes of art teacher Kristine Harvey worked with Innis to create 2’ x 2’ paintings that reflect the history of Elberta. These paintings were placed in businesses throughout the Frankfort/Elberta area for a one-year period. These students also helped Innis paint figures of Hemingway and his friends on trees. 

Fourth-grade students in art teacher Eileen Millard’s classes painted fish on large paper murals that are on display in the school’s cafeteria. They also created Michigan-related short stories in the shape of a tree, which are on display in Discovery Grove throughout the summer. Select students were presented their literary works during MLAP’s Opening Day. 

Michigan Legacy Art Park
MLAP is the site of five Hemingway silhouettes on trees, painted with natural dyes. These figures depict Hemingway as Nick Adams the young man; as Nick Adams the child; a character—a skinny old man—from the book, The Old Man and the Sea; and two characters from the movie version of the book For Whom the Bell Tolls—Robert Jordan, modeled after the actor Gary Cooper and Maria, modeled after the actress Ingrid Bergman.

The “Hemingway Haunts” program in Frankfort-Elberta, Mancelona and the Michigan Legacy Art Park is supported by the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs and the National Endowment for the Arts, with additional support from in Frankfort from the Jewell Arts Foundation and in Mancelona from the Mancelona High School Art Fund and the Mancelona Fifth-Grade Fund. In Kalkaska, time and services were donated by Patricia Innis. 

This unique educational project combining history, literature, science and the arts is igniting interest and excitement throughout Northern Michigan. Stay tuned as more inspiration becomes reality under Innis’ talents, or contact the Michigan Legacy Art Park if you would like to become involved.