Close To Home

Periodically, while looking through the wacky bizarre calendar for column topics, my mind will ponder the curiosity about the who, what, where, when and why of that goofy resource.

Adrienne Sioux Koopersmith, she’s the who behind a lot of the eccentric holidays there. The what/where/when centers around a particular occurrence that altered her path. It was not a good one. Approaching 40 years ago, in the lobby of her Chicago apartment, a mugger hit her in the face with brass knuckles.

Koopersmith exemplifies a premise I’ve mentioned recently - that horrendous events can have seemingly silver linings, exposing us to exciting paths we might not have considered otherwise. As a therapeutic response to the trauma, she started writing and cartooning. She happened to thumb through a book that listed “dull and stupid” holidays, so she created her own whimsical “holidates.” There’s the why.

She possesses some unique abilities, like knowing the calendar dates for specific times in her life, not all of them pivotal, just memorable to her. She is the daughter of a one-time mayor of Mendota, and a promoter of rock bands, a student of sociology and art at Washington University in St. Louis and perhaps the coiner of the term eventologist.

Browsing in a library, she came across Chase’s Calendar of Events (the one with dull entries), submitted an idea for Caveman Never Days, which eventually led to her - as the copyright holder of 1275 holidates - being identified by Insight Magazine in 1995 as “America’s Premier Eventologist” and by the Chicago Tribune in 2001 as “The Premier Eventologist in the History of the World.” (The title should not be confused with an event planner, an actual paying position. Koopersmith’s fame did not bring her comfortable fortune).

Chase’s Calendar of Events was the brainchild of the Chase brothers in 1957: Bill - a journalist and publisher and Harrison, a social scientist. The need for a single reference source was obvious to Bill, a newspaper librarian, so they worked together bringing the first to print in 1958. It sold for $1 a copy and had 32 pages. Now published by Bernan Press, a division of Rowan & Littlefield, it has 752 pages and sells for $108 a copy.

There are other eventologists out there. Thomas Roy has 90 to his credit. Back in the ‘80’s he began his sideline while hosting a Pennsylvania radio show. His most famous creation is perhaps Hoodie-Hoo Day, which is coincidentally celebrated on Feb. 20, the day I’m typing this column, wearing my red hoodie to top off my layers on this frigid day. He is popular with the BBC, having appeared on that network more than any other because Brits, according to Roy, “love crazy Americans.”

Oh, today, Feb. 27, is Koopersmith’s No-Brainer Day. You, too, can attain eventologist status with your own entry in Chase’s Calendar of Events. Check out their website for the submission form. It’s a no-brainer.