Miss Ida, Miss Ida, you are near.
You’re sitting with me right here.
I’m trying to get some things clear.

We are sitting on Doc Wollenmann’s porch.
Two spirits sitting on a Swiss Chalet porch.
Different times and races trying to touch.

We both live inside our skin.
Different hues color our skin
but spirits touch deepest within.

I got a guitar I’m holding tight.
I’m trying my best to play it right,
To find blue notes, not just white.

Miss Ida, please sing to me.
My guitar is tuned in open D.
I’d love to help you sing to me.

We come from almost the same place,
even though we are not of the same race.
Sing me, sing me, some Amazing Grace.

Sing me also a story song.
Doesn’t have to be long.
Sing me your sisterly song.

Restoration Project
(excerpt)

Ida, I’m building you a new
house made of old words,

because you are part of this
gingerbread house, this story, forever.

A house is rooms full of stories. I hear
whispers of your life between these walls.

Ida Hagan Centennial
(2012) excerpt

One hundred years later, the Wollenmann
house is still standing. How many people

in Ferdinand remember African American
Ida? How many people heard stories

about Ida from their parents, grandparents?
How many of these stories still breathe?

How many people heard stories of Pinkstons
and Hagans who hauled wagons of

vegetables from the Settlement to sell
in Ferdinand? Now that the house is saved,

won’t memories of Ida and her Family
also be preserved? If the Swiss Chalet

has come back alive, won’t Ida also live?
Whose stories will bring her back to life?

Spinning on Main Street
(excerpt)

From a distance I feel
your presence everywhere
inside and outside this house.

Ida Hagan, descendant of slaves,
great-granddaughter of Emanuel
Pinkston, free founder of

The Freedom Community
in the hills not far away.
To keep Doc Wollenmann’s

chalet standing on Main Street
is to keep at least part of
our memory of you alive.