House Painting Amish-Style
Gay Davidson-Zielske
Roving Girl Reporter

My curiosity was first piqued as I watched a guy unload a bright blue Porta-Potty across the street at the modest home of Frank and Frances Patton, long-time TLNA neighborhood residents. Frank likes to hold garage sales, I know, but I wondered if this one was going to require a Porta-Potty for the crowds. Or maybe the Stones were special friends of the Pattons and had agreed to hold a concert on their lawn . These explanations didn't seem likely, but you never know with these two lively neighbors.
Never having been one to dwell long in suspense, I called and worked the subject around to why said convenience was on their lawn. When Frances told me painters were coming the next day, I thought it was interesting, though in my experience, housepainters were not usually this well-accommodated.

Still, when I heard the rattle of ladders the next morning, I thought nothing of it, until I noticed that there were a LOT of ladders (21 bright orange ones of various lengths) followed rapidly by a LOT of painters (43 altogether). While some people set up the ladders-on all sides of the small house-others set up a long buffet-style table (complete with a silk-flower centerpiece), a huge coffee urn, a tub of iced soft drinks, and lawn chairs. I saw kids and women and men of a rainbow of colors and ages. While some workers swarmed over the house, others joked and began arranging provisions.
"Hey, are we really supposed to paint this house lime green?" I heard someone call out. LIME GREEN! I thought to myself. Frank and Fran have always seemed so, uh, normal in their other exterior color choices. But, as the owner of a Pepto-Bismol pink house (not entirely by mistake-those tiny paint sample cards just look so different from broad expanses of color), I knew I wasn't one to criticize. Though it was still quite early on a Saturday, I finally broke down and called Fran.
"So, how many Wisconsinites does it take to paint a house?" I asked, attempting to coin a new genre of joke.
"Isn't it amazing?" she said. As we spoke, I saw walkers slow and then stop to chat. Later, someone told me there had already been one fender-bender as someone gawked too long from his car. Unable to contain my natural (let's call it by name, shall we?) nosiness any longer, I moseyed over to get some first-hand information. By then, the sign was up- it was a Dane County Paint-a-thon project. As older members of our community, my neighbors had wisely taken advantage of a terrific service. All volunteers, these nice people (all smiling and chatting as they scraped, primed, even tuck-pointed the chimney) this day were from Oscar Mayer, including several members of their retired employees' group, READI (Retired Employees Are Dependable Individuals).
The coordinator of the project, Bill Adomaitis, by day a financial analyst at Oscar Meyer, told me that at least one worker had actually been trained as a painter, and that he himself had once worked for a masonry outfit, but most were just good-hearted citizens looking forward to the reward of a little party at the Sports Pub when the house was finished. Mr. Adomaitis and his wife told me that this abundant turn-out is not unusual for these projects. The week before, several folks had showed up to move a disabled Oscar Mayer employee into his new home.

At noon (they were three-quarters finished by then) everybody sat down to pizza and sodas, inviting the passersby and neighbors to join them. The scene looked and felt to me like an Amish barn-raising-and the work flew. By two o'clock, the painters had moved on. Once upon a time (and still today in some tiny communities) "to each according to his need" was the rule, not the exception. The relative newcomer on the American scene, selfish individualism, has all but obliterated more soul-nourishing ideas of progress like this one.
Of course, coordination is needed. In this case, Project Home was the Pattons' first stop. Then, volunteer coordinators John Kanvik at IBM and Mr. Adomaitis were contacted. Mautz Paints, another local and neighborhood business, donated all the paint and some of the materials. Oscar Meyer rented the ladders, furnished breakfast, lunch, and bar tab, and chose the house from among two or three needing paint. In business for eight to nine years and serving low-income, elderly, and disabled clients, the Paint-a-Thon pulls volunteers from thirteen to fifteen businesses and church groups. Other frequent corporate supporters include American Family and Rayovac.
The painting was a great distraction for us neighbors, and when the day was done, Mr. and Mrs. Patton (you can see their home at 403 N. Brearly, one of the original homesteads in our neighborhood, in the Walking Tour of historic structures brochure recently published by TLNA) had a lovely freshly painted house....and it's CREAM and TAUPE, not lime green. Now this is the kind of thing I want my tax dollars supporting.