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 Visitors take advantage of Cuba, MO's well-equipped Visitor Center. Most people in Cuba have never experienced our Visitor Center that sits at the junction of I-44 and the north service road across from the Country Kitchen sign. But visitors from around the U.S. and the world often find the Center and make use of its many resources: a friendly, informed staff, clean premises, and an abundance of local and national information for the traveler.
 The lightboard displays Cuba's murals and rows of brochures are available. It’s a great spot to stop for a break and to gather some local information. There are chairs that face the fireplace, clean restrooms, free coffee, and brochures galore. A free, wireless internet connection is available if you want to check your email using your phone or laptop.
The mural lightboard showcases the “Route 66 Mural City” and its murals. Ads from local businesses that are members of the Chamber brighten the display areas.
The staff not only helps travelers find information on out-of-town attractions, but they also guide visitors to local attractions, such as the World’s Largest Rocking Chair in Fanning, Cuba’s murals and History Museum, and other popular stops such as the antique malls. Information is also available on local restaurants, motels, businesses, and services. Staff members also field many phone calls about local events and attractions. During the Crawford County Fair in July, they sell season tickets and provide information about fair events.
Tour buses often stop for a break or to meet their guides for a Viva Cuba Mural Tour.
 Travelers can take a break in the fireplace area. The History Museum provides displays. The Visitor Center is a city-owned building and rented by the Cuba Chamber of Commerce. The building was funded, in part, from a Community Block Grant. The staff is paid for by the Cuba Tourism Tax, which is levied on motels within the city limits for the purpose of promoting tourism in Cuba. The building serves as a Visitor Center and an office for the Chamber.
While visitors from out of town make good use of the Center, many locals do not realize that it is an excellent source for them as well. If you are going on a trip, chances are there are free brochures, maps, and other information at the center for planning your trip.
Whether you are arriving or departing, the Cuba, MO Visitor Center can be a rich resource for you.
 Neatly arranged racks of information are available. Knowledgeable staff members are ready to help visitors. From the Chamber website:
Cuba Chamber of Commerce Visitor Center
The Cuba Chamber of Commerce Visitor Center is located at the northeast corner of the Interstate 44 and Highway 19 interchange in Cuba, Mo. Summer hours at the Visitor Center are 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.
Inside the Visitor Center you will not only find a host of information about Cuba and the surrounding area, but also a vast assortment of tourist information from your favorite destinations in Missouri and across the United States.
 The bright and clean Visitor Center provides a warm welcome for travelers.
 Viva Cuba digitally placed the shield at the Rt. 66 intersection. There are no plans to put the shield there. This photo was taken from the roof of Wallis Companies. Recklein meeting on Route 66 Corridor Plan for Cuba, MO Thursday, Feb. 11 at 6:00
Route 66 has influenced the culture and economy of Cuba, MO from the 1930s to the present. Think of the history of the road in Cuba: MoHick BBQ, the Wagon Wheel, Midway, the murals and the Viva Cuba Garden, the Phillips 66 Station, Wallace House, the World’s Largest Rocking Chair at Fanning, and the other homes and businesses along Route 66.
The Route 66 Association of Missouri has hired an organization Great River Associates to develop a Corridor Management Plan for the Rt. 66 Corridor.
The organization plans regional meetings to discuss preservation, protection, and enhancement along Rt. 66. The Cuba meeting will be held at Recklein Audiotorium on Thursday, Feb. 11 at 6:00.
The Cuba Free Press printed an article about the Corridor plan in the Feb. 4 newspaper on page 3A if you would like more information.
If you are interested in what may be planned for Rt. 66 in Cuba, MO attend the meeting and make your views known. Be informed.
For an example of Rt. 66 history in Cuba read “East End Square had it going on…Rt. 66 and Cuba, MO Hotspot…”
Many Cuba citizens have warm memories of growing up along Route 66. To see the influence of Route 66 on a new generation see “Cuba Fourth Graders Show Off Their History.”
 In Cuba, Historic Route 66 is also known as Washington St.
 The railroad rocker is ready for a young train lover. Cuba, MO’s annual Chair-i-table auction
We’re saving you the best seat in the house…
In 2003, Viva Cuba, the non-profit beautification organization in Cuba, MO, was looking for a spring fundraiser that was in keeping with their organization’s role of beautifying Cuba with outdoor murals, plantings, and other projects to improve their small town of 3500.
Chairperson of the group Jill Barnett suggested having local artists design and decorate chairs that would be auctioned in a silent auction. The first auction in 2003 was held the weekend before Mother’s Day at the local Wal-Mart and was a great success. Now it is a tradition that the auction is held the Saturday before Mother’s Day.
Each year artists have created chair and furniture paintings in a variety of styles from a Route 66 themed vintage glider to needlepoint antiques. This year Missouri artist Ray Harvey, who painted two of the organization’s murals, will contribute a metal chair with a custom design. Viva Cuba never knows what twists of the imagination that the artists will use on their chosen furniture.
The furniture display and auction are free and open to the public.
Proceeds from the auction are used for mural lighting, maintenance, and other beautification projects.
This year’s auction is at Java.net Books & Gifts Coffeehouse (418 N. Franklin) on Saturday, May 8 from 9:00 am to 1:00 pm. The silent auction ends at 1:00 pm. Viva Cuba’s contacts for the auction are Judy Koski 573-885-2511 and Judy Workman 573-885-2775.
In April, Viva Cuba will post descriptions and photos of the chairs and other furniture on the blog. Mark Saturday, May 8 on your calendars; we’re saving a seat for you.
 The day of the auction Java.net will display the artists' creations inside and outside.
 The old door from the Wagon Wheel Cafe building needed a new look for the restored building. Cuba, MO…If it doesn’t move, we beautify it…
Janus, a god in Roman mythology, was the god of gates, doors, beginnings, and endings. January is named for him. He is often pictured with two faces or heads, facing in opposite directions. He looks both backward to where he has been and forward to where he is going.
It is seems a appropriate that one of Viva Cuba’s first projects in 2010 was completing a door project that we began in 2009.
Doors provide a way in and way out. This old door from the 1930s Route 66 Wagon Wheel Cafe building became a Viva Cuba project in 2009 that took us into 2010 when it took its place in the restored building that is now called Connie’s Shoppe at the Wagon Wheel Motel, a gift shop that sits in front of the original Route 66 Tudor-style Wagon Wheel Motel cottages.
Last August, the new Wagon Wheel Motel owner Connie Echols asked the Viva Cuba organization if we would like to take an old door that would be in the new restored gift shop and decorate it. With a little discussion, members decided it was doable, and we would use some of the photos and copy that we had in our file on the door. It would promote not only Viva Cuba but other attractions as well. Viva Cuba’s Route 66 Mural City logo would hold a prominent position. I believe that Viva Cuba member Jill Barnett said it sounded like fun. I would remember that later.
George Reed picked up the door in his custom (primer-covered) 1988 Chevy truck Ivan the Terrible and took it to the Hwy. 19 Peoples Bank basement while the Wagon Wheel building was undergoing renovation. The bank basement serves as Viva Cuba’s storage area for auction chairs, brochures, project materials, and sometimes a work area. As long as banking facility holds down the noise from the bank’s business upstairs, we don’t mind them being there.
Later, George took the door back to the Wagon Wheel to have it fitted to the new frame. Then he picked it up and drove it back to the bank basement. He wasn’t sure why he was driving the door back and forth across town, but he did it. I am not sure that he was having fun though.
We needed to fill the four inset panels with photographic panels, front and back and give the door a base coat of paint.
With a jumble of photos and copy available, it soon became apparent we needed some organization and artistic decisions. Artist Julie Brand provided her input on what images and copy seemed to go together. We wanted to give the door an antiqued look to fit with the buidling’s age.
Then the photos and print had to be organized digitally so four large resolution photographic panels could be printed. Our tech person Lisa Hoover started building the panels using Photoshop. There were many individual photos that had to be built into the design. A few adjustments had to be made and panels had to be adapted from the original design. It took time to get it all together.
Jill Barnett consulted with Echols, picked a base color, and gave the door a couple of coats of a neutral color.
When the four photographic panels were ready to print, John Herman of the Anheuser-Busch Distributorship graciously worked with Lisa Hoover to print the panels using his commercial printer. The panels with adhesive backing looked good after they rolled off the printer.
It was time to put them on the door. Janet McLain who had done this type of work before was called in for her expertise on getting the panels on the door. The panels would have to be covered with several layers of water-based polyurethane to protect them from everyday wear.
 Paint and photographic panels transformed the old door. It doesn’t seem like it would take much time for the project up to this point, but believe me it took hours of consultations, emails, and running around. But the panels were looking good.
Putting coat after coat of sealant on the first side started. It was a two-coat a day process with light sanding between coats. It received seven coats in all. Christmas Eve, it only got one coat.
Then after Christmas there was the big flip (assisted by Kim Baldwin), and I started in on the second side. Did I mention that this was tedious work. I planned my days around coating, dry time, and re-coating. I carried my brushes back and forth from home to wash them. But after I finished one coat on this side, I noticed there was a typo on the top panel. Coating ceased, and we asked John Herman to print a new, corrected panel.
 The process of sealing the door was tedious. The new panel was applied. Coatings of the sealant resumed until the job was finished.
George Reed and his truck Ivan the Terrible picked up the double plastic wrapped door and delivered it to the Wagon Wheel where it was placed in owner Connie Echol’s office while she was out of town at a gift show.
While not perfect, it’s done. The door has taken its place in the Route 66 landmark Wagon Wheel Cafe building. It’s unique, and I hope when you go into Connie’s Shoppe, you give it a look. Viva Cuba is proud to have had this small role in the Wagon Wheel’s new life.
For a little more history on the Wagon Wheel Cafe building, see the Cuba Free Press article “Wagon Wheel Cafe known for its fine food.”
 The spruced up old door has taken its place in the restored Wagon Wheel building.
 Glen Tutterrow sculpted the elk that stands proudly above his business sign.
One in a series of Viva Cuba artist updates for 2010
Glenn and Curtis Tutterrow are a father and son duo that do their work at the family business Wildlife Unlimited. They are taxidermists, craftsmen, and artists.
Their work is in museums, businesses, and homes around the country. Their business at 702 S. Franklin/Hwy. 19 features animals in their habitats, photography, paintings, sculpture, and some of their current projects. So closely do they work together that it is often tell who does what on their projects.
 The Tutterrows' store is a rich gallery of their projects. Glenn sculpted the elk out front by his sign when he couldn’t find someone to make one for him at an affordable price. And his pheasant sculpture would do any home or business proud.
 Glen Tutterrow sculpted this pheasant out of 18 gauge metal. The Tutterrows fabricated the 1873 train replica for the Viva Cuba Garden and, currently, they are making some decorative metal brochure boxes that will hold tourist informational brochures about some of Cuba’s art, history, and businesses. Glen contributed a painted chair to last year’s Viva Cuba Chair-i-table Auction.
 The Tutterrows fabricated and installed the 1873 train replica in the Viva Cuba Garden. A niche product for the Tutterrows has grown out of a humorous commission of the back end of donkey for the Toby Keith movie Beer for My Horses with Keith, Willie Nelson, Mel Tillis, and Ted Nugent. If you have seen the comedy, do you remember the back end of the donkey that was on the saloon wall during the shootout in the Mexican bar? Well, that little stage gag was the work of the Tutterrows.
 The Tutterrows are always up for a challenge. This is the stage prop in production. The mounted front end is still available. 
Recently, they were contacted by a Harley Davidson dealership in Louisiana that also wanted another back end of a donkey to use in an ad. They had seen Beer for My Horses and wanted the same thing. Who knew that there would be a demand for this unusual commission.
Now, if you know someone with a “man shed,” who would like to have a mounted front end of a donkey, Glen has a couple in stock. When the guys kick back to watch Beer for My Horses, the owner of the front end can be proud in his ownership of a part of movie history. Or Glenn can make another back end. It’s a niche market, but Glen and Curtis get a kick out of it.
Another project they are working on for lodge style decor is Curtis’s casting replica molds of 25 African animals with a European mount of heads and horns. Some are on display in their store, and it will be a continuing project during the summer.
For a look at some Ozark ingenuity and craftsmanship, stop by Wildlife Unlimited. There is always something new to see. In fact, when I stopped by to take photos, I found so many projects going on that I may have to write The Tutterrows II at a later date.
Number 1 in the 2010 Day trip attractions series for Cuba, MO
In 2010, we will tell you about some other local attractions that you can combine with a visit to Viva Cuba’s murals.
Wildwood Lodge, which opened in 1922, in Steelville, Missouri perches on a bluff above the river and offers great food, some of your music favorites in an intimate setting, and takes you to back in time to a river resort of the past.
Full details are on the Wildwood Springs Resort webpage. There are accommodations in the main lodge and in nearby cabins. For many visitors, the groups that play the “living room” concerts’ will bring back warm memories. Innkeeper Bob Bell grew up in the area, and he knows a wealth of local history.
You can book just the concert. Tip. Get there early enough to put your name on a chair. People who are eating at the lodge, usually put their name on chairs in the great room before they go in to dinner. If you are early, there is a bar in the room where you can get a drink. You can also watch the band set up in front of the fireplace.
 There's a reason they call them living room concerts. You can book the concert and dinner. Jeanette Freeman is the head chef, and she and her staff use the finest ingredients to whip up some great meals and desserts. If food like honey and brown sugar ham, pecan chicken breasts, Wildwood’s signature poppy seed and house dressings, and brownie pies drizzled with chocolate ganache call your name, you will enjoy the Wildwood dining experience. And the dining room looks like a movie set from the twenties.
 This looks like a movie set from the 1920s. You can book the dinner, the concert, and overnight accommodations. There are rooms in the main lodge or in nearby cabins. Long porches and rocking chairs provide a good view of the outdoors. Details and photos are on the Wildwood website. Sign up for Bob’s email on concert updates and details.
 Whether you rock on the porch by day or rock at the concert at night, it's a good time at Wildwood. Come to Cuba, MO to visit the murals and an option is a trip to Wildwood for what some of their regular clientele call a little Wildwood magic.
For more information and photos read this article from the Ozarks Mountaineer magazine “A Step Back in Time at Wildwood Springs Lodge.” (Note that the concert lineup in the article is from 2009. The line up for 2010 is at the top of this page.)
 Sky, ocean, and flying aircraft create a fitting scene for Ozark Technologies. When you think of art, Cuba’s Industrial Park probably doesn’t come to mind. But art is what Viva Cuba members found inside Ozark Mountain Technologies, Inc., a factory that does specialized chemical metal finishing for the aerospace industry and the military.
Company President Greg Smotherman Sr. recruited Jesse LaForet, an employee with artistic talent, for the project of painting their customers’ aircraft in a facility mural.
Using acrylic paints, brushes, and some airbrushing techniques, LaForet spent three months creating the mural featuring aircraft and an aircraft carrier. He took a little artistic license and added helicopters to the scene.
 Jesse LaForet's creation is a welcoming site for visiting cusomer representatives. All of the aircraft companies are customers of Ozark Technologies, so when the company representatives visit the plant, a welcoming mural greets them. The mural also reminds employees how critical and important their work is for the safety and protection of the Armed Forces and Americans.
 It's blue skies and fluffy clouds for these aircraft. Although LaForet has no formal artistic training, both his parents were artistic, and he grew up working on projects with them. His regular job at the plant is a lead man in metal processing. But he also helped design the new Ozark Mountain Technologies logo.
Terry Sanders, Vice President of Operations, says that the company looks forward to having LaForet continue his murals on other walls featuring private jets and commercial aircraft. “All the client reps that come to the plant are so impressed with the mural,” stated Sanders. Sanders is proud of LaForet’s work and the team at Ozark in creating the pictured aircraft.
For security reasons and a no camera rule in the plant, only clients and workers are allowed to see the mural, but the company gave Viva Cuba members permission to photographit, so we are sharing it with you. Now if they would just do an outside mural, everyone could enjoy it.
 LaForet helped design the company logo.
Another in a series of Viva Cuba’s Mural artist updates for 2010
Julie Balogh Brand, who worked with another local artist Shelly Smith Steiger, on the Amelia, the Millworks, and River murals, never set out to be a mural artist. She is a fine art ceramic artist who works from her studio in the lower level of her home. She uses clay and glazes to create beautiful handmade objects that are also practical such as a bowl, a vase, or a pitcher.
She uses stoneware clay and paints her underglazes directly onto the pottery, firing it in her kiln more than once. Each piece takes many hours of shaping, painting, and firing to create the colorful pieces that have her distinctive style. Balogh Brand creates custom pieces for many clients.
 Balogh Brand fires pieces more than once in during production. Balogh Brand was born in in Cleveland, Ohio and lived in New York City but has been living and working at her country home in Cuba since 1994. She is largely self taught although she has taken workshops with internationally known ceramic artists. Her father’s Hungarian ancestry and trips to Hungary exposed her to colorful Hungarian pottery and embroidery, which are influences on her art.
 The glaze painting process takes several hours. Since moving to Cuba, Balogh Brand learned mural painting, married, and had a son Ian (an aspiring artist himself). Before Ian’s birth, she taught children and adults from her home studio. She currently teaches ceramic courses for various schools and from her studio.
 Julie Balogh Brand with some of her work at Java.net. For more details and photos of her art, visit her website at www.julieblaoghart.com. Brand’s art is sold locally at Java.net Books & Gifts at 418 N. Franklin/ Hwy. 19 in Cuba.
 Chubbs Stillman and Bill Gunn pose on the set of the Today Show. Bill Gunn grew up in Cuba and graduated from Cuba High School and returned to teach social studies and coach. His parents still live in Cuba.
Bill met his wife Brandi Goodwin Gunn, another Cuba teacher, at Cuba. They married and moved to improved coaching duties for Bill. They started a family and have three great kids. They call Kirkwood, Missouri home.
 Bill and his wife Brandi met while teaching at Cuba. Recently, Bill and his student Chubbs Stillman were catapulted into the news. You can google Chubbs Stillman and read the articles and see the video of what happened. The attention led to an interview by Matt Lauer with Chubbs, his parents and Gunn on the Today Show.
Whether you follow basketball or not, the interview that Coach Bill Gunn, student Chubbs Stillman, and Stillman’s parents did with Matt Lauer will warm your heart. Their story has been in the making for four years.
The story is not about violence, bullying, or a dysfunctional family. It’s not about poor schools or out-of- control young people. It’s about family values, a caring coach, and young people with big hearts. It’s about a young man called Chubbs who doesn’t see limitations.
Watch the video here.
 Bill focuses on the action when his team is on the floor.
Viva Cuba feels that young people are an important part of beautification, preservation, and the history of Cuba. For that reason we were glad to read of their success in this week’s Cuba Free Press.
According to the article, the Cuba School District is among the top districts of the state. It has a been a long road for the district that has dealt with curtailed budgets, rising costs, and the need to improve academic ratings.
But Missouri’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education announced in December that Cuba was the only Crawford County school awarded the performance distinction award for the 2008-09 school year.
This is only one indication that things are looking up for Cuba Schools.
*Building and remodeling have provided improved facilites for students.
*The new high school vocational agricultural program established new opportunities for students.
*The district is completing a school track that will allow more track meets in Cuba and provide students with a great place for outdoor exercise.
*Last year’s seniors were the first to benefit from the A+ program, which pays two years at a community college for students who meet the guidelines.
*The new Watch Dog program is involving more dads and grandfathers in the lives of Cuba students.
*Programs are in place to help students who are behind in graduation credits to persist toward graduation.
Go Wildcats!
To read the complete Cuba Free Press article go here.
Read “Cuba, MO fourth graders show-off their history” here.
Read “The murals and young people…a winning combination” here.
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