ISI intellectual retreat at the home of Russell Kirk

Here is a group photo inside the Kirk home at the conclusion of the ISI intellectual retreat at Piety Hill in Mecosta, Michigan.

On Friday, September 29, we kicked off an intellectual weekend in Mecosta, Michigan at the home of Russell Kirk. Kenneth and I at ISI led another ISI intellectual retreat, featuring Annette Kirk, author Jim Person, and Professor Richard Gamble (Hillsdale). 14 students attended, from schools including the University of Notre Dame, Indiana Wesleyan University, Hillsdale College, Wayne State University, and Michigan State. Three Wilbur Foundation Fellows took part in our weekend as well (they are "in residence at Piety Hill for the semester).

On Friday night, we met at the Outback Lodge, a large bed and breakfast place where all the students stayed for the weekend. It's about 10 minutes from Piety Hill, the Kirk home. They made us a "ribs and chicken" buffet spread with lots of other pickings. After dinner, I introduced the weekend and then Annette Kirk gave a talk about her Life with Russell Kirk. Following her talk, she answered questions. The whole segment went on for about 90 minutes. The students (and myself) absolutely loved hearing her talk about her life, and her life with Russell Kirk, who wrote The Conservative Mind in 1953, a book that identified a conservative tradition in American and gave a "name" to the movement.

On Saturday, the students gathered in the Kirk library and we heard from author Jim Person, a Michigander who wrote the first biography about Kirk titled, Russell Kirk: A Critical Biography of a Conservative Mind. Mr. Person and Mrs. Kirk fielded some questions about the library, the home, and the man and his thought. We had lunch at the Checkerboard Diner in downtown Mecosta and then made a visit to the gravesite of Russell Kirk. On his grave is a quote from his favorite author, T.S. Eliot. It says: "The communication of the dead is tounged with fire beyond the language of the living." His grave is situated in a very pastoral setting, in a cemetery of the parish of St. Michael's in a town called Remus, about 10 minutes from the Kirk home.

After we paid our respects, we went to the bookstore in Mecosta, which has about 100,000 books! I picked up a couple Kirk titles and another title. The students and I spent at least an hour or two in the bookstore. Then, we went back and rested for the evening, some spent some quality time of their own in the Kirk library.

That evening, we returned to the Kirk library, all dressed up, and heard a lecture from Professor Richard Gamble of Hillsdale College. He gave a splendid talk on "Russell Kirk and the American Identity." It was a reflection on Kirk, his thought on American history and America's role in the world, and the students asked questions about Kirk's thought with contemporary issues in mind. Dr. Gamble recounted some personal encounters he had with Kirk towards the end of Kirk's life. This was his first visit to Mecosta and he told me that visiting Piety Hill and lecturing in the Kirk library was one of the thrills of his academic calling.

After the lecture, we went to the Kirk home (which Kenneth and I had been privileged to be at earlier the previous day to prepare with Mrs. Kirk for the weekend). We had a catered dinner in the home and then Jim Person led some Kirk ghost stories in the living room. (In addition to being a writer on political thought, Kirk also was a fictional ghost story writer and he had some real ghost stories in his home that he often drew from). We turned off all the lights, lit some candles, and listened intently. We then closed the official activities of the weekend and left the legendary Piety Hill at dark. It was an experience I'll never forget.

Kenneth and I had pulled up to Piety Hill on our own on Friday morning well before the students arrived and we had lunch with Mrs. Kirk. At a table that sat four, Mrs. Kirk sat at one end, and Kenneth and I sat across from each other. To my left, there was an open chair, but during the course of the nearly 90-minute lunch, I glanced over a few times to that empty chair, I kept thinking in the back of my mind that Russell Kirk was sitting there listening in on our conversation, perhaps listening with hope for the rising generation. I only hope our weekend helped inspire that rising generation.