A few weeks ago, on the back patio of the Handlebar, two dozen friends and well-wishers clustered around Paul Smith and Ben Helphand as they raffled off “vaguely democracy-themed” items from a battered UPS next-day-air envelope: a vintage paperback copy of Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals; a goody bag of swag donated by the Friends of the Bloomingdale Trail; a jar of honey from the North Lawndale-based Chicago Honey Co-op (“A model of democracy to emulate,” cracked Helphand, “minus the queen part.”); and to much giggling, a laminated copy of the Burger King Bill of Rights.
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The brainchild of Helphand and Smith, the colorful 11-by-17-inch calendar is the first product from Gerrymander, a new business they established to create and market novelty political paraphernalia. A wonkish tweak of the form familiar to legions of Sunday-schooled kids, the calendar, rather than telling the Christmas story, offers a way to count down the days leading up to the November 7 general election. Starting with October 10, each of 29 little card-stock windows opens to reveal a quote or factoid relating to the history of democracy in America. Helphand and Smith are both avowed Democrats, but they went out of their way to make the calendar nonpartisan, drawing on the political wisdom of experts from Winston Churchill to Jon Stewart and along the way referencing the 19th Amendment, the Voting Rights Act, and Reinhold Niebuhr (“Man’s capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary”). It’s about the democratic process, they aver, not politics. And no, there’s no chocolate.
For a 2005 Shore fund-raiser the pair designed a limited edition run of “Tap Brand Tap Water,” bottled directly from the faucet and labeled with information on Chicago’s water supply, its contaminants, and its environmental impact. It was great to watch people have this moment of recognition, Helphand says, as they slowly realized that they weren’t just drinking Poland Spring. It was a lesson that stuck with them, says Smith: “You don’t just learn by memorizing. You learn by experiencing things and by telling stories.”
