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Mike Mapes grew up thinking everyoneâs dad wrote poetry.
âIt seemed natural to me. Thatâs what dads did,â he said when he and his siblings gathered in February for a video about their father â Arthur Franklin Mapes â author of Indianaâs state poem.
Arthur Franklin Mapes wrote âIndianaâ while sitting at the kitchen table . he would get something in his head and he would jot it right down, his children recalled, in various ways.
A machinist at Flint and Walling in Kendallville by day and a dad, nature enthusiast and poet at all other times â thatâs how his children remember him. During the day âheâd think about nature and the great outdoors and heâd come home with thoughts in his head, grab anything, a napkin or whatever, and heâd start writing out his poems .â
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Ten years ago, Indiana House Democrats walked out of the Statehouse and headed to Illinois in the middle of session, halting all legislative business for more than a month.
It was a legislative walkout that made national news and had an impact that’s still felt today.
Democrats had controlled the Indiana House for most of the first decade of the 2000s. But Republicans recaptured the majority ahead of the 2011 session, and with that came Right to Work – a controversial bill affecting labor union dues.
The measure drew ire from Democrats and brought thousands of protesters to the Statehouse. But Democratic lawmakers couldn’t stop the bill’s momentum – until on Feb. 22, 2011, they used a procedure other minority caucuses had employed before: a walkout. The House needs two-thirds of its members to conduct business, whether in committee or on the floor. By leaving the chamber, Democrats put a halt to everything.