June 16, 2007

A final volley of affection for MacBeth

Dedication of trail a 'sequel' to funeral

By Mark Fischenich

NORTH MANKATO — There were a few tears, some poetry recitation and a couple of dozen shotgun blasts from guys dressed in cowboy attire.

And there was consensus from people who knew Rex Macbeth: He would have been pleased.

“I think he would have liked this,” said North Mankato Police Chief Mike Pulis, wearing a black cowboy hat, red vest and gun-belt. “He might have called his funeral his last production. But there was a sequel to it, and this was it.”

Officially, the event was the dedication ceremony of the Rex Macbeth River Trail, a new bicycle and pedestrian trail that runs along the west side of the Minnesota River. But it was also a celebration of Macbeth’s contributions as a promoter, cowboy poet, historian of the Old West and local businessman.

Macbeth wasn’t a bike rider but he still was an early supporter of one of the area’s initial bike paths, the once controversial Red Jacket Trail, because he thought it would be good for the community.

Jessica Smith said after the ceremony Saturday afternoon that she’d been thinking about what her father’s reaction would have been to having a trail named in his honor.

“I think he’d laugh first,” Smith said. “He’d say ‘What on earth did I do to deserve this?’ But then I think he would have thought it was neat.”

Macbeth, who succumbed July 14 to a fatal blood disease, would have been tickled to have earned a small place in North Mankato’s history after spending much of his life sharing his love of the past.

“He wasn’t afraid of the spotlight,” Smith said with a laugh, “so he would have liked that.”

Looking at a metal bench, laser cut with one of his poems, and the massive boulder holding the plaque with the likeness of Macbeth, Smith said much of the work on the trail head at the foot of the Veterans Memorial Bridge came from the efforts of people who cared about her father.

“I think it’s a testament to the power of friendship because it was friends that got this all done,” she said.

The idea of dedicating the trail to Macbeth came from City Administrator Wendell Sande and was unanimously agreed to by the City Council just 10 days after his death. Pulis, who was one of the people dressed in cowboy garb who served as Macbeth’s pall bearers, also served Saturday as the master of ceremonies for the dedication.

But when the cowboy shooters lined up to shoot blanks toward the Minnesota River, Pulis hurried over to join them.

“I don’t want to miss out on this either, so I’ll be right back,” he told the crowd.

Darold Schaefer, Macbeth’s son, said he was waiting for one more particularly loud blast after the last of the shooters had fired.

“I was expecting him to shoot a lightning bolt out of that cloud up there,” Schaefer said. “He was never one to miss a chance to shoot something when it was available.”

Coleman Pitts

AKA

Dwight "Rex" MacBeth