Bob Lind column: Neighbors:
Lake Park man earns honor for his ‘Up’ side
rlind@forumcomm.com
The Forum - 09/30/2003
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| Larry Swenson of Lake Park, Minn., was recently honored in Boston for his work with the group "Up With People." |
Back in 1978, Larry Swenson had
no thought of becoming an “everyday hero.”
All he had in mind was to take this gal to an Up With People concert in Fargo
as her college graduation gift, then accompany her when she auditioned to join
the group.
Well, hey, as long as she was being
auditioned, he might as well give it a shot, too, just for kicks.
And the kicker was this: She wasn’t accepted, but he was.
So it was that Larry, of Lake Park, Minn., wound up touring with Up With People, a group of 120 young people which seeks, it says, “to build bridges between countries and between peoples.”
It does it by giving concerts overseas as well as in the United States, with its performers staying with host families allowing both to learn about each other’s cultures.
Larry, who plays the piano and sings, toured the United States, Canada and Europe with the group in 1978-79, staying with 130 families in seven countries.
Recently, Larry received a special honor. It was in Boston, at a reunion of 900 people from 28 countries who had traveled with Up With People over the years.
The organization’s alumni association gave Larry the James MacLennan Everyday Hero Award, after being nominated by two past presidents of the association.
A number of factors were listed by the association as reasons for singling Larry out for the honor. A big one was the link he helped establish between provinces in Sweden and Becker County, Minn.
While he was in Sweden with Up With People, he visited Äppelbo, the town from which his ancestors had emigrated, and found many family connections with people in Becker County.
Out of his visit came many visits of Äppelbo and Becker County residents to each other’s areas; some of them saw family members they hadn’t been in contact with for 70-some years.
“As relatives and friends welcomed guests and traveled themselves,” the association said, “a whole new understanding between history and customs, adaptations and folklore … became an exciting cross-cultural exchange.”
Larry’s role in this, the association said, “was crucial; it was through his pictures, storytelling and welcome that people were willing to step out of their comfort zones and experience travel, history, people and music in new ways.”
Larry had been exposed to international culture when, while a Concordia College student, he was a 4-H Youth Exchange student in Egypt, then a student in Calcutta, India, as a Rotary International Foundation scholarship winner.
After traveling with Up With People, he became a Becker County extension agent. Always, he found ways to promote better cross-cultural understanding.
He directed international language schools in China. He developed methods to help school children gain cross-cultural knowledge in fun and interesting ways. He’s a volunteer in the International Camping Association. He has hosted foreign exchange students and escorted 4-H students to Japan. He has organized canoe trips on the Crow Wing River for Minnesota 4-Hers and their international guests. He sends hundreds of Christmas cards around the world.
He has, the association says, “created (many) opportunities for youths and adults alike to gain a greater understanding of themselves and others through challenge courses he designs and builds, conferences, musical programs and madcap mayhem.”
Today, Larry splits his year between Minnesota and Mexico City, Mexico, where he trains company employees. Well, actually, he says, “I do all sorts of programs for schools and companies.”
He spent many summers working at Fair Hills Resort in Detroit Lakes, Minn., where he, naturally enough, put on evening shows featuring the young people who work at the resort (and which one year included the ever-popular song, “Send Me to Glory in a Glad Bag”).
He did that sort of thing this summer, too, along with working with the recreation programs and heading the resort’s staff reunion which featured such events as a barbershop sing-along and, in the spirit of Larry’s ability to produce “madcap mayhem,” a belly flop contest.
Larry’s latest venture is the production of three CDs for children.
The first two feature international children’s songs sung in English, Spanish, Swedish, Japanese and an African dialect.
His most recent CD, titled “The Three Bears,” is a compilation of songs which have some animals in each or are stories built around the songs.
One of the songs features his maternal grandfather, Harvey Case, of Akeley, Minn., who died in 1994. Larry recorded him playing his accordion and singing and included it on the CD.
Other voices and instrumentalists on the CD are special, too. They are some of the men and women who toured with Larry in the 1970s with Up With People.
The CDs are available at Nelson Drug and Cenex in Lake Park; the Sound Shop, Multiple Technologies, The Holmes Theater, and Fair Hills Resort in Detroit Lakes; and at the Holiday Station and Riverview Place, Pelican Rapids, and Jillybeans at West Acres in Fargo as well as online at a number of Web sites, including www.tower.com and www.cdbaby.com.
If you have an item of interest for this column, mail it to Neighbors, The Forum, Box 2020, Fargo, ND 58107; fax it to (701) 241-5487; or e-mail rlind@forumcomm.com