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Friday, July 30, 2010
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Serving Maine and Lincoln County for over a century. |
Volume 135 Issue 30 |
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| | Email this article • Print this article | Traveling America with The Young Americans Project
Sherwood Olin
Adam White is spending his post graduate fall in the time honored tradition of the American youth. He is taking a road trip.
White and three companions are currently traveling across the country in a battered RV, dubbed “Harvey".
The quartet, Wigginsand fellow Dartmouth alums Ben Wiggins, Matt Heineman and Boston College student Matt Wiggins, have collectively dubbed their expedition The Young Americans Project. They are recording their trip in video, photographs and notes for a future book and documentary.
The group's progress can be followed with near daily updates all four contribute to the project's website http://www.tyap.com.
The website was contributed by one of the group's sponsors, Red Door Media. Red Door principals Michael Richards and White's mother Wendy Hebb of Nobleboro also produced the award winning alewife documentary “Closing the Circle".
White credited Richards for the look of the website. “They have done some really nice stuff as far as web design goes," White said.
According to the website's mission statement, The Young Americans Project (TYAP) seeks to provide a voice for America's youngest adult generation. Not Gen-Xer's, not Slackers, not yuppies, yippies or hippies, the current college age group is not a faceless shapeless generation, says the statement.
“The young men and women of America are in fact a burgeoning and dynamic class that is coming of age in the post-9/11 era. They are working to find their place in a changing world, growing into their adult skin, and yearning to be heard."
Throughout its pages, TYAP's website is brimming with a youthful exuberance.
“The authors recognize that their generation is immeasurably diverse and therefore impossible to paint with one narrow brush. As a result, the aim of this project will not be to originate a blanket moniker for a generation, but rather to provide a megaphone to a wide range of personalities who come from varied backgrounds and offer distinctive views on their community."
On the day White spoke with the LCN, the quartet had just completed touring Newmar Corp., a manufacturer of high end Recreational Vehicles in Nappanee, Indiana. Ironically enough, White said, Nappanee is in the heart of Amish country.
The company is owned by an Amish multi millionaire and staffed largely by Amish people.
The strange dichotomy between the beliefs of the Amish, who typically shun modern day conveniences, and the real world fact they have to make a living is exactly the kind of real life America the Young Americans Project intends to illuminate.
“You don't get much more self indulgent than an RV," White said. “It's an interesting contradiction."
The tour started on Cadillac Mountain in Maine Sept. 21 and will wind up in the southwest Dec. 21. In between, the young road warriors hope to visit every state in the lower 48, stopping in communities large and small.
Along the way, TYAP plans to interview several subjects for profiles in the future book. Via the website, the general public is invited to suggest subjects for interview and unique local places to visit.
“We don't want to get in our own way by being too fixed and we don't want to be too flexible," White said. “In large part we are going to places that accurately represent us. Sometimes the experience seeks you out."
So far, White said, the Americans they have met have been very receptive to the project.
“It has been great," he said. “We have found a lot of interesting things everywhere we go. We have found that if you put someone in front of a camera they will do pretty much anything you ask them to."
While on the road, White and company are living and working out of an aging 30 foot RV, dubbed “Harvey". Harvey was donated by another trip sponsor, Cruise America RV. White said the accommodations are comfortable enough but for all of his good points, Harvey is little more than a means of transport from point A to point B.
Coming into East Lansing, Mich., the troupe toured the University of Michigan campus for two hours looking for a parking spot. As White notes, time spent traveling or dealing with other issues, food, money, or parking, is time away from the main purpose of the trip.
“That's the biggest hurdle," he said. “It's frustrating when you have to deal with transportation."
For Heinemann and Wiggins, this is their first cross country trip. Grinnell has seen other parts of the country before. White has done a coast to coast run before, helping deliver his girlfriend's car in one single 47 hour push from Oregon to New York, but this trip will make his first visit to the American Southwest.
“What we are planning to do is visit all 48 lower states," White said. “In some instances, that will literally be driving through. We are trying to get both urban and rural perspectives."
Together, the four participants are all contributing to the documentary record of the trip. All four are contributing to the web log of their travels. Heinemann and Wiggins are handling the bulk of the filming chores. White is focusing on writing. Grinnell is handling photography duties and Wiggins is producing the musical soundtrack for the project.
By design there is some overlap in the process as all four share the workload. White said, “All of us contribute to the website. Three of us are doing some writing and two of us are doing the film. As far as planning goes, it has been the four of us from the get go."
For the sake of organization, the group has divided the country into four parts, with each man taking his turn as a group leader. White, for example, is responsible for coordinating the group's venture through the Northwest.
“I have kind of a vague outline of what we are going to be doing," he said. “There was a lot of planning that went into this trip but we were literally planning right up until the last minute. Right now we are still in the first section of our trip. I think as we go along there will be less planning and more doing… We are trying to strike a balance between being highly organized and not planning too far ahead."
As the miles and experiences rack up, White and Company hope to attract larger media attention which, in turn, can help lead to career and promotional opportunities for the book of their travels.
“This is not just traveling," White said. “It is traveling with a purpose… The meat of our project is not us traveling around the country," White said. “It is the people we meet."
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