Father Dan's Boot Camp for Do-gooders
Camping out in eastern Kentucky with Father Dan Sweeney and his army of teenagers from Pittsburgh is not hard work for the soul
In June of 2000, just after I defected from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to the Pittsburgh Tribune Review, I went down to Kentucky to do a feature story on a bunch of Catholic do-gooders from Pittsburgh who went there to build and repair houses for some of the poorest people in America. It was one of my favorite adventures in journalism.
July, 2000
Lee County, Kentucky
It's going to be another long, miserable day of doing good in the hollows of deepest, poorest Appalachia, but Father Dan and his faithful army of volunteers can handle it.
It's 5:50 Wednesday morning. Workday No. 4 at Appalachian Work Camp 2000 is about to start. The rising sun is only a feeble yellow glow in a low charcoal sky, but already the air over Eastern Kentucky is heavy and humid.
Dew coats everything -- the grass, the cars and vans, the small city of colorful tents and the camp's main building, where since 4:30 a saintly crew of seven women has been quietly preparing breakfast in the big kitchen.
Except for the racket of the birds and a bullfrog bellowing by the pond, the camp is peaceful and quiet.
You'd never guess that 142 men, women and teenagers from five Western Pennsylvania churches are living here, working 12-hour days and doing without TV and hot showers while they build and repair houses for some of the poorest people in America.
But they've been here for four exhausting days already -- which is why nearly no one has gotten up extra-bright-and-early. That even includes the group's tireless and much-beloved maximum leader, Father Dan Sweeney, the pastor of Epiphany Church in Pittsburgh's Hill District.
Stretched out on his cot in a row of cots in the sweltering kitchen, Father Dan, who was up till 3:30 a.m. doing his work-crew lists, is not exactly a vision of earthly or heavenly power: It's hard to look authoritative when you are shirtless, wearing cargo shorts and lying on top of your Mickey Mouse sheets.
But it is Father Dan, 45, the down-to-earth man of God and Pittsburgh native, who started organizing and leading these annual expeditions to Appalachia 17 years ago.
Since Sunday morning, his work crews have been fanning out into the hollows of nearby Owsley County, where families live in shacks on incomes of $500 a month and one woman lives in a chicken coop.
By the end of the week, if all goes according to Father Dan's carefully made and budgeted plans, his army will construct four new homes from scratch, put on five room additions and do 20 major repair jobs. Everything will be done for free -- and with no religious strings attached.
To accomplish all of this, Father Dan must lay down some strict rules and regulations. Weeks before they leave Pittsburgh, everyone got a 10-page guide and rulebook.
It stresses the spiritual benefits to participants of putting Jesus' commands to help the poor into action and the rewards of having the chance to "do something active, challenging and meaningful with your friends."
But it also lays down rules about dress codes (no nighties or bikini underwear) and doing your own dishes after each meal. It sets down nightly curfews, outlaws radios and almost threatens ex-communication from the church for showers that take longer than three minutes.
The brochure could scare off the most dedicated doer of good works—especially teen-agers. Yet Father Dan's army grows every year. This July's contingent includes about 100 veterans of past expeditions.
Some people like Marcie, Anthony and Tommy Joseph of New Castle's St. Vincent DePaul Church go back year after year for good reason. They've learned from experience that Father Dan's boot camp for do-gooders is not just personally or spiritually rewarding, it also can be lots of fun.
Waking up at 6
Shortly after 6 a.m. the alarm clocks start going off. Dozens of sleep-deprived adults and young people who were up all night playing ping-pong or sitting by the bonfire soon appear.
They stumble from tents. They straggle from the "barracks" in the main building, where 50 or 60 or probably more tired teen-age bodies have spent their fourth straight night zonked out in chairs, fold-up beds and sleeping bags that consumed virtually every inch of floor space.
Wandering the camp in search of food and toilet facilities, they resemble the zombies from "Night of the Living Dead.” Most of them are drawn from the parishes of St. Margaret's in Green Tree and St. Joan of Arc in Library, where Father Dan was serving as pastor until he was moved to Epiphany 11 months ago.
Smaller numbers come from churches where Father Dan also made pastoral pit-stops, St. Titus in Aliquippa and St. Vincent DePaul in New Castle, and from Epiphany Church in Pittsburgh.
They are more than a volunteer workforce.
They have paid $50 for their own food and brought their own hammers and nail aprons. They've held bake sales and raffles all year long to raise the $58,000 needed to fund this year's trip, which began Saturday, July 8, with a 415 mile convoy from Pittsburgh.
Teen-agers like Danny and Michael Harcum of St. Titus in Aliquippa have willingly given up their TVs and computer games. Adults like Joe Enos, a contractor from South Park who will work so hard today that he'll make himself sick, are taking vacation time to come to Appalachia.
The volunteers make these sacrifices for a hundred different personal reasons — for the love of God or their fellow man, perhaps, or because of the Appalachian families they help and get to know and love.
Most of all, though, they do it because they like -- make that love -- Father Dan.
As he leaves the virtually abandoned camp behind and climbs out of the valley at 7:30, Father Dan is driving the empty U-Haul hard and fast. The first stop on what will be a brisk, 125-mile tour of 11 work sites is the Lee County Building Company.
Father Dan, dressed in his Kentucky uniform of running shoes, white socks, cargo shorts and a T-shirt, has been an important regular customer at the store since the mid 1980s.
He has already spent $25,000 there this week and will drop another $10, 000 before he leaves town. After ordering 46 sheets of drywall, 3 sheets of OSB plywood, 5 rolls of insulation and 30 8-inch concrete blocks, Father Dan pulls the truck around back and helps the lumber yard guys load everything on.
As he puts the concrete blocks in the nose of the 15-foot U-Haul, another church group that combines the social gospel with home-improvement projects is loading up their van with lumber.
It is the Appalachian Service Project of Johnson City, Tenn., which is affilated with the United Methodist Church. It has been working in the area for 31 years, says Brian Grafton of Connecticut, the 21-year-old in charge of loading the van. During 10 weeks this summer the group will bring in 550 high school kids to repair homes and put on room additions.
Father Dan isn't worried about the competition. There's plenty of poor people and an infinite number of good works to do in Eastern Kentucky, where coal was king until the mines closed about eight years ago.
Now pot is the No. 1 cash crop. A pound of tobacco grown in the rich bottomland brings $3, Father Dan says, while a pound of marijuana grown on hillside plots in the thick woods or hidden among the tall corn stalks fetches upwards of $1,200. At those prices, it's not surprising that state police say 11,183 plants worth $28 million wer eradicated in Owsley County last year.
After years of running work camps, bringing van-fulls of used clothing down from Pittsburgh each spring and fall and trucking in toys at Christmas, Father Dan knows the county, its people and their timeless culture about as well as any outsider ever can.
Unfortunately, many of the poor or needy people his army of young do-gooders helps do nothing to erase the common hillbilly stereotypes. Some speak a folksy, time-warped tongue city folks can barely understand -- “tomatoes” are “maters.” “Asthma” is "the smother."
And while some locals keep their places immaculate, others surround themselves with junk and trash and the hulks of rusting cars and kitchen appliances. They are often short on teeth, uneducated and they move slow, but the are not necessarily stupid or lazy.
"It's a different mentality here," Father Dan says. "They're very laid back. They look at us and shake their heads. ‘Why are you so excited?' They are also clannish. Family and community are hugely important.”
Churches are everywhere. Cemeteries are lovingly maintained and permanently festooned with flowers. Big families are common — and very supportive. It is family that often keeps folks from leaving here for better paying jobs in the cities.
Another reason for staying put generation after generation is the cost of living. It's dirt cheap. Rents on house trailers are as low as $150 a month. Local taxes on new one-story houses like those Father Dan's Army build run only about $60 a year.
If you're going to be living on minimum wage jobs or receiving $500 a month in welfare, Father Dan says as we turn off into a v-shaped hollow by the First Regular Baptist Church, it makes more sense to stay here than to move your family to a big city.
Socioeconomically, Father Dan says he has seen things improve 100 percent. While driving the good country roads, you can see little evidence the extreme poverty that makes the area one of the poorest in the state.
Back in the hollows, however, some people who live in trailers or shacks are amazingly poor -- in some cases 1830s poor. The state pegs the official unemployment rate in the area at just under 4 percent, but that can be misleading.
Good jobs are scarce or 75 miles away in Lexington. Wages are mostly the legal minimum -- sometimes less. Land is abundant and cheap at $500 an acre and even the poorest folk often own 10 or 20 acres. It's just that there is no one to sell it to.
Still, he's seen real progress, says Father Dan as the now loaded U-Haul takes 30 seconds to enter and exit downtown Boonesville, the tiny one-square block town of about 250 that serves as county seat of Owsley County.
More roads into the hollows are paved now. City water reaches nearly 90 percent of the county. Nearly everyone who wants it can get cheap electricity. And he says the county's get-tough trash cleanup efforts have made a noticeable difference.
Father Dan works closely with local officials and county social workers in Owsley County, where he has concentrated most of his efforts for 14 years. Most residents have grown to know and appreciate what they simply refer to as "the church group," but it wasn't always so.
In the early years, says Father Dan, he and his work crews were often mistaken for revenue officers looking for illegal stills. They had dogs turned loose on them and had shotguns fired in warning. That's not true today.
"Everyone really respects them now, " says Lora Turner, the Owsley County social worker who for more than 14 years has been helping Father Dan select the local folks most in need. "We really appreciate them. They are a fantastic bunch. They are a giving bunch.”
As for Father Dan, Turner simply says, "He's done a lot of good work. You're never going to find another like him."
The Bailey Place
The road to the Bailey work site starts as most hollow roads do: a twisting driveway-wide strip of asphalt edged by a trash-littered creek and spotted with schoolyard-size tobacco patches.
After passing several tidy and perfectly fine looking houses and one badly dilapidated one, the asphalt gives way to a smooth gravel road. A few minutes later, Father Dan pulls up into the front yard of the zoning-officer's nightmare that is the Bailey place.
On one side of a small creek is the main house, the century-old, sagging, dry-rotting wreck where Dennis Bailey pays $100 a month rent to live.
One of Father Dan's work crews, which has already rebuilt the front porch and coated the metal roof with almunium paint, is trying to repair a room with a 5-foot ceiling so it can be used for a kitchen.
Sitting quietly on the porch, smoking a cigarette she rolled herself with Prince Albert tobacco, is Goldie Bailey. Straight from the pages of a Depression Era photo gallery, she is Dennis' frail, weathered ex-wife.
Goldie lives across the little creek -- upslope from a dangerously leaning old barn and next to a large functioning satellite dish -- in a 7x14 shed. Her single room, which also costs $100 a month in rent, is an old chicken coop.
Furnished with a bed, a small table, a hot-plate and a small TV hooked to the satellite dish, she kept it neat as a pin. But it is uninsulated, cheaply paneled and protected by a rusted tin roof.
A team of young workers is in the process of more than doubling Goldie's living space. They are adding a 10x14 front room, complete with a new door and lock, drywall and two thermal pane windows. They also are insulating the entire structure, putting up new painted siding and building a new roof.
Jason "Spanky" Machak, an apprentice carpenter from St. Titus in Aliquippa, is the 20-year-old crew leader. While Machak and Robin Sampogna are working on Dennis' dark, dank kitchen, his sister Jessica Machak is up on Goldie's roof installing shingles with Mike Alexander, Kevin Hartbauer and Lauren Mangus, all of St. Margaret's.
Goldie, 58, doesn't talk much, but her accent is straight out of a bad hillbilly movie. She urges her visitors to get Dennis to play his "banjer." And when she is asked how she got to this point in her life, this is the answer she gives: "Got married to him. Got divorced. Live here by myself. I'm happy."
Dennis is also straight out of central casting. A cross between Robin Williams' Popeye character, a country preacher and a standup comedian, he's a natural entertainer who tells -- and enthusiastically acts out -- an incessant stream of jokes and hunting and fishing stories.
It's impossible for an outsider to understand 30 percent of what he says. He quotes whole paragraphs from the Bible, shares his special recipes for cornbread and bean soup and praises the taste of groundhogs.
One minute he is showing off his prize chickens, his beloved patch of beans or his garden "tilter." The next he is offering sample sips of his home-made brew of natural Viagra from a Folger's coffee jar or whispering the most intimate details of his wife's alleged serial unfaithfulness.
According to what Dennis said, or what he appeared to say, he is a happy man who knows he's a hillbilly and is proud of it. He and Goldie raised five children. One son is in prison for a double murder. Another overdosed on 130 pills of some kind.
An ex-coal miner who has ulcers and "bad nerve trouble," and who catches a few fish or sells a few gallons of green beans when he needs gas money, Bailey is not kidding when he cheerfully boasts that, "You ain't never met a man like me."
Father Dan’s model home
Father Dan spends the rest of the morning cutting back and forth across Owsley County, visiting worksite locations locals would have had trouble finding. He passes a roadside flea market at a church where people are buying everything from fresh fruit to shotguns.
In Spencer Fork "holler" he drops off a ladder off at Wayne and Wilma Roberts' place, where a dozen kids from Pittsburgh are shingling the roof of a house behind their own badly weathered 100-year-old old house.
The new structure is a standard, 24x32-foot, one-story Father Daniel model. With two small bedrooms and one bath, and fully insulated and wired for electricty, it will cost Father Dan about $11,000 to build, plus $2,000 for a septic system.
As with all of the new homes the church group builds, it will not come with plumbing, kitchen appliances, bathroom fixtures or interior paint. It will be weather tight and will have good doors and windows.
The Roberts, who own their own land, have been on Father Dan's waiting list for five years. Wilma, 44, has lived in the old house all her life. Her husband Wayne, who tends tobacco 10 months a year, has never been more than 10 miles from where he was born.
Three other new houses are being built this year. Each of their owners is a worthy recipient, chosen because of their need and because they can be counted on to stay in their place and improve it the way past recipients have.
But Robert Campbell Jr. is especially needy. He lives across a 15-foot creek whose depth prevents Father Dan from visiting in his truck. He was crippled in a severe logging accident. Then his wife left him. Then his house was burned down by a lightning strike. Like the others, he'll be in his new home by Saturday.
At Herb and Judy Wilder's rented house trailer, another crew was working on a new bedroom addition. Herb’s medical maladies include diabetes and bronchitis. He and his wife Judy, who had open heart surgery four years ago, live with their paralyzed aunt and their cousin Melvin Wilder.
As Father Dan and Carolyn Burton of St. Margaret's off-loaded lumber and plywood, Herb watches and boils water for coffee in an old pan over a fire in the junky backyard where his two grandchildren play.
"Money is the problem, " Father Dan says later, speeding off to the next destination. "It's not that these people are lazy. They have more God-given, basic, put-it-together common-sense skills to figure it out than anybody. They just don't have the money to make it happen."
Before Father Dan returns to the quiet base camp, it will be mid afternoon. He makes seven or eight stops, and each work site contains more amazing sights and sounds than the next.
At the Nobles, who live in a trailer deep in a hollow with no car, no electricity, 13 goats and three little girls, a new front room was being put on. The crew was led by two Pittsburghers, big Mike Sculli and Vince McMasters, the former homeless man/street-person Father Dan recently hired as the live-in maintenance man for Epiphany Church in downtown Pittsburgh.
As Marge Hoehle of St. Margaret's cooks the workers a lunch of grilled hot dogs, across the way the Nobles' neighbors are cutting the head off a chicken and hanging it upside down on a clothes line. It continues to flap its wings for several minutes.
Meanwhile, at the Reynolds' house, which is 100 years old and landscaped as well as any in a Pittsburgh suburb, a kitchen floor is being replaced. The floor had rotted out and fallen in because the house's sewer line had frozen and cracked long ago.
Yesterday some of Father Dan's kids were throwing up at the smell of raw sewage. Today several bags of cat litter are cutting most of the stench so that Dave Lafferty of St. Joan of Arc and Becky Schenck, 18, of St. Margaret's can work.
It is a particular messy initiation to the downsides of Father Dan’s workcamp for Fred Hirt, a systems operations supervisor for Duquesne Light and member of St. Joan of Arc who is making his first trip.
Still, Hirt says, "I like it." He's especially pleased at the effect the experience has had on his son Steven, 18, who is down for his second year.
"I noticed a big change in him last year, " the proud father said. "After seeing people with almost nothing, he appreciates what he has more. He's a lot more self-confident. It's win-win for everybody.”
Thursday is traditionally “hootenanny” night, when local folks are invited to the camp for dinner, socializing and a night of fireworks and musical merry-making on the big front porch.
Following a quick prayer over the PA system by emcee Father Dan, who dressed up for the affair by putting on a fresh Mickey Mouse T-shirt, the honored guests were, as is the custom, invited to get their food first.
Families like the Arnolds and the Flannerys -- in all about 50 past recipients of the church group's charity -- came forward. The saintly kitchen ladies -- who had been preparing the feast for days -- stood at the ready.
They filled their guests' plates with roast beef, chicken, sausage, scalloped potatoes, rice pilaf, green beans, corn and spaghetti, with watermelon, cookies and cake for dessert.
Rhonda Arnold of Long Branch hollow, a mother of five, had her house built for her in 1998. She says it is impossible to describe how she felt.
"Oh, gosh, " she says, "when Father Dan handed me the keys, it was something like you never dreamed of having."
Brenda and Paul Flannery had six kids in 1991, when her house was built in Little Sturgeon hollow near Boonesville. She and her husband -- who has lymphoma and “is not doing too good" -- now have nine children, ages 5 to 25.
Another hootenanny guest is Ricky Sebastian, 33.
As Laura Turner, local boy Jason Bolan, camp caretaker Wayne Spurlock and others start to sing and play guitars and banjos on the porch, Sebastian smokes a chain of cigarettes and matter-of-factly tells the sad story of his hard life.
He and his wife Geraldine and their baby were living in an uninsulated 16-foot-square shack when Father Dan built them their house, which they have since expanded by adding two rooms and enlarging the kitchen.
Like many of the locals who have been helped in the past, Sebastian used to join in to help Father Dan's work crews each summer. He feels bad about not being able to help this year, but the father of three is too sick and his back is too crippled from a car accident 11 years ago.
A painful back that makes him sleep in a chair at night and won't let him sit at a desk isn't his only problem, however. Sebastian, who lives on $500 a month in disability payments, has asthma, a bad heart, bad nerves and gets blackout spells.
"There's hardly a day I don't have pain," he says, as Ricky Jr., 10, draws dinosaurs in a notebook. "I've laid in bed a week praying to die. I've been hurting so bad I tried to kill myself."
Most of Sebatian’s medicine is paid for. He cans vegetables and his neighbors are kind and helpful. If someone gave him $10,000 in cash tomorrow Sebastian says he'd first pay off all his bills. "On that much at one time, he says, "we could probably live three or four years, maybe five. We don't waste no money."
Before the night ends, Curt Spurlock holds a microphone and stands before everyone to express how he feels about getting his new home. He is the brother of Wayne Spurlock, the camp caretaker.
Curt's house is going up across the way and he'll be helping his brother maintain the 10-acre property Father Dan and four others bought a few years ago.
It's a great dream to him, Sperlock says carefully, his voice breaking. "My brother told me what a wonderful person Father Dan is, and how wonderful you are, and what you people do. I want to thank all of you for what you've done.... Most of all, I want to thank the Lord and Father Dan."
Father Dan, as he always does, gently deflects Spurlock's heartfelt “thank you” to where he thinks it belongs: his loyal army who does all the work. This program does not come from me, he says, it comes from you. Then he thanks everyone and signals for the fireworks to begin.
Finishing up and testifying in church
Friday and Saturday pass quickly, as Father Dan and his crew leaders push hard to finish their projects. Because contractor Joe Enos is still sick on Friday morning, Father Dan deploys 21 workers, plus himself, to put up wallboard at the new house being built for Paul Barrett.
Friday night, following a thunderstorm that had 90 people cowering on the front porch, the bell rings for Father Dan's customary post-dinner housekeeping meeting.
Tomorrow, as always, is camp-cleanup day and a voluntary work day on the building sites. But six sites still have work to be done before the closing Mass is held in Beattyville tomorrow afternoon.
"I'll leave a tablet on the kitchen table," Father Dan says. "Sign it if you want to go. It's up to you."
Father Dan also announces that keys to new houses will be given out at the sites tomorrow by crew leaders when the work is done. There will be no hollow-clogging traffic jams like last year, when 20-some vehicles went from site to site to perform the army's favorite ceremony.
On Saturday every crew is fully staffed by volunteers. At noon in Wayne and Wilma Roberts' new house, Father Maranowski, the son of a construction worker, is slathering joint compound on the wall like a pro.
With him are a pair of ace handymen, Bob Brobeck and John Radilla. Brobeck and Radilla -- each of whom has been slipped a small gift by Wayne Roberts (a knife and a bottle of local moonshine) -- are framing windows and putting up soffit.
The rest of the crew -- Robin Sampogna, Sean Sweeney, Mary Lou McFeaters, Linda Ausk, Mike Dobos, Dave Lafferty, Erin Kriceri and Lauren Sheratt -- is slathering or painting as fast as they can.
By 2 p.m., the crew gathers to present Wayne and Wilma their keys to their 80-percent-completed new house, which they will finish. After hearing Bob Brobeck's little speech and receiving several big hugs. Wilma -- through her teary eyes -- simply says, "We appreciate what you all done for us."
Meanwhile, after spending the morning working at Paul Barrett's new house, driving to check the other projects and pay off all his local bills, Father Dan returns to the camp to get the cleanup going.
At 3 p.m., with four new homes, five more additions and 19 repair jobs to add to his army's record of accomplishment, Father Dan is already talking about coming down in October to see how the new homeowners are making out.
“We make it very clear up front that this property can not be sold, only transferred to the children," he says. "If they move, the property reverts to us. That hasn't happened in 17 years."
At 4 p.m. the entire camp caravans about 10 miles to Beattyville, where, in one of the few overtly religious events of the week, they fill up every seat in Queen of All Saints Catholic Church.
Wearing fresh T-shirts and running shoes under their vestments, Father Dan, Father Maranowski and deacon Dan Kielar of New Castle say the closing Mass.
During the ceremony, which includes hymns sung by the folk choir, Father Dan stands before them in his robes.
He asks for forgiveness for his crankiness during the week. He compares the work crews to Christ's 12 disciples, only, he says, they were sent out in 10s and 12s to do their good works, not in twos or threes.
He tells them they have truly lived their faith this week, and they should continue to do so when they go home. He reminds them of the many new friends they have made and the good times they have shared since they sat in this same church last Sunday.
And he gives thanks to God “for keeping us well so far, except for the burned up U-Haul and sick group leaders.”
After Mass, everyone stays for the emotional open discussion period that many think is the highlight of their weeklong experience. After Father Dan gives his post-game wrap up, detailing what they had built and what it cost, it begins.
One by one, nearly 140 persons stand and speak.
Dave Harris, the camp ping-pong champ from St. Joan of Arc, says he had a great week and is proud of the work they've done. His 11-year-old nephew, Martin Harris, who is visiting from England, says he wants to come back next year.
Marci Joseph wishes the real world could be like this week and that everyone could experience what she did.
Big Mike Sculli of Epiphany, who fell in love with the Noble family while building them a living room, tries to explain how much being in Appalachia had helped him emotionally and mentally, but he chokes up and has to leave the church.
A young girl says after the first day she wanted to leave and never come back, "But after you see what is here, you can't not come back."
Deacon Dan Kielar says he doesn't understand how he could work so hard, be so hot and enjoy it so much.
A young man speaks for a dozen others when he says the best part of the week was seeing how grateful and happy the families they helped were.
Another says he was touched by a matchbox car given to him by a local boy.
Another boy tells of having a child handing him page after page of notes saying "I love you.”
On and on they spoke.
In three hours there were many laughs and many more tears, especially from the veteran teen-age girls sitting on the altar steps.
But nothing anyone said contradicted what Father Dan had told his volunteer army of do-gooders three weeks before at an orientation meeting: "It's not so much what we do for the folks down there, it's what they do for us. Our lives are the things that are changed. If not, we wouldn't be in our 17th year."
Believe it or not, Father Dan’s Appalachian Work Camp is still going strong. Go here for the latest details and links to the churches involved.