Historical April 1989 report or notice. Original dates, prices and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
Dan Shea tells a wonderful tale about Skinker-DeBaliviere in the early ’70s, a story that he calls a metaphor for the spirit of the neighborhood.
The setting is an evening dress rehearsal at Grace Methodist Church for the first neighborhood dinner theatre, “The Fastest Thimble in the West!’ Dan says that he and the other cast members were all dressed in their cowboy costumes, complete with hats, string ties, chaps, six guns loaded with caps, and so on. Suddenly there was a cry as a woman outside had her purse taken. “All of the cowboys and the sheriff spilled out of the church, running after the thief!’ Dan recalls. “There we were, chasing him down Waterman wearing our cowboy outfits, looking like something out of the movies!’ It sure must have been an exciting time to live in Skinker-DeBaliviere!
Dan is a professor of English at Washington University.
He and his wife Kathleen, a psychiatric social worker, live in the 6100 block of Kingsbury. It’s a home that has seen Dan raise his five children since he purchased it in 1967. Recalling the purchase of his home, Dan says, “I was advised not to buy in the neighborhood by many people, including my department chairman.
There were many ‘doorbell thieves’ here in 1967.
Yet we found it an elegant home at an affordable price with grosses of children to be seen for our kids to play with. “The neighborhood has always reminded me of a ’30’s movie!’ Dan says, “I thought I was in Marty or something, an old black and white movie set in the Bronx. “Skinker-DeBaliviere is a neighborhood that inspires loyalty. It’s like a small town, the people know and look after one another and the church bells ring on Sunday morning.
It seems like a little town. Of course the mayor lives a block away. Isn’t that always true in small towns?” A Minnesota native, Dan came to St. Louis from Stanford University in 1962, armed with a master’s degree and an almost-completed Ph.D. (which he finished in 1966).
He and his first wife lived in University City for three years.
They then rented on the 6100 block of McPherson until they purchased the home on Kingsbury.
We always hear that fate works in strange ways, and Dan’s presence at Washington University is proof of this.
A colleague of his at Stanford had been offered a job in the English Department at Washington University and turned it down, but in doing so mentioned Dan to the department chair.
The chair then wrote to Dan and hired him sight-unseen!
In October 1983 Dan had a quintuple coronary bypass surgery.
It both saved and changed his life. “I didn’t realize until the last couple of years what the impact was!’ Dan says. “Step One is realizing that I could die on the table. Step Two is feeling frail, weak, mortal.
In the long run, you can stay with that step, or you can recycle yourself entirely into a kind of Step Three.
I feel younger now than I did before the operation. There’s some kind of leveraging that happens. I now swim for 30 minutes four to five times per week, I’m on a low cholesterol diet, and I’m 10-15 pounds lighter than before the surgery. “After the surgery, I got into acting!’ Dan continues. “I was going back to something that was great fun in high school. Acting has a quality of play to it; it’s a kind of sanctuaried fantasy that appeals to me.
If tomorrow was your last day, what would you want to do?
And how do you know it won’t be?” Dan asks.
In addition to his family, Dan’s life revolves around three interests today: teaching, writing, and acting.
When asked which of these he would choose to define himself, he ponders and replies, “I was a scholar-teacher ten years ago.
Now it’s like keeping all of the plates spinning on the ends of sticks. Ten years ago I wouldn’t have even said ‘writer’ or ‘actor’; now I do those things. “The most rewarding part of being an English professor is teaching. I’m enjoying it more than I ever did. I’m amazed. Acting has helped, not because one acts as a teacher. I mean because acting is connecting.
If you don’t connect with the other actors on the stage, nothing happens.
If actors don’t connect with the audience, nothing happens. I’m aware that there are real people out there in the class, and I’ve got to connect with them. I look forward to it working!’ In addition to the local Skinker-DeBaliviere dinner theatre group, Dan has also performed for The New Theatre (most recently in “And A Nightingale Sang”) and has done local commercials for “Geraldo” and cataract surgery, among others.
He is represented by “Talent Plus!’ an area talent agency.
Dan recently received the Richard Beale Davis Prize of 1988 for the best essay to appear in Early American Literature, a journal of the Modern Language Association of America.
For this, he says, he earned a free trip to the convention in New Orleans and a certificate, “the size of a holy card!’ Dan is living proof that good teachers continue to grow and learn.
Original photograph caption
Dan Shea. The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, April 1989, page 7. Photographer not credited.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, April 1989.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1989_04.pdf, printed page(s) 7; PDF page(s) 7.
