Don H. Corrigan - Nuts About Squirrels: The Rodents That Conquered Popular Culture

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina

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e-ISBN: 978-1-4766-3635-1

2019 Don H. Corrigan. All rights reserved

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McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640
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This squirrel treatise is dedicated to Captain Meriwether Lewisexplorer, soldier, politician, and public servant, best known as the leader of the Corps of Discovery, which explored the new American territory known as the Louisiana Purchase in 1804. Lewis marveled at the ways of squirrels when he first witnessed a mass migration of the creatures on the waters of the Ohio River. On his travels up the Missouri River with William Clark, his fascination with the barking squirrel inspired him to send one back to President Thomas Jefferson; the squirrel subsequently became a vocal inhabitant of the White House. This author pays homage to Lewis at his statue in St. Charles, Missouri, whenever traveling the Katy Trail along the Missouri River, a favored habitat of the gray squirrel.

There are many companions, colleagues and scholars to be acknowledged here. First, I must reference my late father, who was no friend of squirrels. His antipathy for them attracted my attention at an early age. My father always tried to outsmart squirrelsto no avail. When squirrels took a liking to his chimney stack, he took my toy saxophone and tried to drive them out by playing discordant notes into the flue. Later, he climbed to the roof to place a barbecue grill grate atop the chimney to screen out the squirrels. After retirement, he sat on his backyard porch with a BB gun aimed in the direction of the squirrels that raided his tomato garden. It was a long saga without a happy ending (unless this book constitutes a happy ending).

Other kind kindred souls who merit acknowledgment are my wife, Susanne, and Millennial children, Christa and Brandon. My wife showed immense patience with my hours of researching and talking about squirrels. My daughter, Christa, drew on her vast knowledge of Sandy Cheeks, the squirrel from SpongeBob SquarePants, to assist with the chapter on squirrels in animated cartoons. Likewise, my son, Brandon, provided an assist with his video game knowledge of the squirrel in Conkers Bad Fur Day, though he remains skeptical that I have any business writing about video games.

As a college student, I enjoyed the many squirrels on the campus of Knox College on the plains of western Illinois. My fraternity brother, Greg Divers, was also in the thrall of squirrels. A very successful quarterback for Knoxs Old Siwash, Greg channeled his inner squirrel before many a football contest. He would hop on his waterbed and emulate a squirrel anxiously examining and gnawing on an acorn, which somehow served as preparation for winning football games against the likes of Monmouth, Grinnell and St. Olaf colleges. In graduate school, I enjoyed watching the many squirrels outside of Walter Williams Hall and Neff Hall at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. The oldest school of journalism in America prepared me for a career in community journalism and occasionally writing stories and columns about (what else?) squirrels.

Squirrel articles have been published in my time as editor of the Webster-Kirkwood Times newspapers in suburban St. Louis. Its important to thank my newspaper partner, Dwight Bitikofer, and managing editor, Kevin Murphy, and the staff and photographers of the newspapers for their forbearance with my frequent forays into squirrel journalism. I must also acknowledge the late Kirkwood, Missouri, councilman Francis Scheidegger and the Wildlife Rescue Center for their story leads on illegal squirrel trapping and releases in the St. Louis area. In addition, Erin Shank, a wildlife biologist with Missouris Powder Valley Nature Center, has been a font of knowledge on squirrel behavior and population fluctuations.

On the academic side, my dean and department chair at the Webster University School of Communications, Eric Rothenbuhler and Gary Ford, have my gratitude for approving a year-long faculty development leave to complete this book project on squirrels. My teaching career at this global institution in Webster Groves has spanned four decades, during which my colleagues have assisted me on a number of projects. Faculty members knowledgeable about animation, film and video gamesVan McElwee, Chris Sagovac and Josh Yatescontributed to this project. A past department chair, Art Silverblatt, has joined me in efforts to get a star for Marshall McLuhan on the University City Walk of Fame in St. Louis. McLuhan, who is referenced frequently in this book, distinguished himself on the faculty at St. Louis University for several years before becoming an international guru of mass media.

Finally, it would be impossible to thank all the people who have forwarded me audio, video and newspaper clips about squirrels after learning about this project. I would, however, like to single out Mark Sableman, a media attorney with Thompson Coburn, LLC; Bill Ruppert and Dave Slane, professional tree huggers and squirrel lovers; Jim Wright of the KirkwoodDes Peres Chamber of Commerce; Roland Klose, an editor with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, as well as members of the St. Louis Press Club; and Mike Phoenix, Daniel Yezbick, Dan Martin, Bill Smith, and members of the St. Louis Comic Book Club. Last but not least, I must thank Holly Shanks, a Webster University journalism graduate familiar with my lectures on squirrels and mass media. Holly has been instrumental in the editing and formatting of this book. She has also served as a journalist with the Webster-Kirkwood Times and joins me as coeditor of the blog Environmental Echo.

The uncompromising mission of this book is to make the point that, collectively, squirrels are a major presence in our flesh-and-blood lives as well as in the virtual lives that we enjoy through popular culture and as delivered via the channels of mass communications. When it comes to animated creatures on television and in film, everybody knows about the famous mice and the ducks. Mickey and Minnie Mouse are celebrated worldwide (Mickey even has theme parks dedicated to him), and Donald Duck and his nephews, Huey, Dewey, and Louie, can be found in comics, cartoons, television shows and movies. But what about the squirrels? Squirrels have a lot more personality, energy and natural genius than either mice or ducks. Squirrels deserve some special attention.

Thanks to our mass-mediated world, we do know a few celebrity squirrels on a first-name basis. We may be surprised at just how many squirrels are in our circle of acquaintances. In books, some of the better-known squirrels include characters named Cyril, Earl, Nutkin, Tippy-Toe and Mr. Peanuts. On television and in the movies, there are such well-known squirrels as Twiggy, Tommy, Rally, Rupert and more. In popular cartoons and animated movies, squirrels named Rocky, Slappy, Skippy, Sandy, Hammy and Surly scamper across screens and into our living rooms and family rooms. In comic books and video games, squirrels are tagged with odd monikers like Nutsy, Ray the Flying Squirrel, Conker, Squirrel Girl and many more. The irony of all this hoopla is that none of these squirrels will answer to the names theyve been given. These squirrels are, for the most part, just figments of fertile imaginations that created them for our entertainment, if not necessarily for our edification.