VISIT Mcminnville playing cards

THE STORY OF MCMINNVILLE … ALMOST

In 2023, I was commissioned to illustrate a custom deck of playing cards by Visit McMinnville. I took that as a chance to expand on an idea which I had used previously in another project. The idea was that each suit in the 52 card deck could be its own little story. Part flip-book, part unanimated animation, if you will. First I made a list of interesting things about McMinnville and then narrowed that down to a few facts that were interesting enough to expand on in the suits, and, lucky me, McMinnville happens to have a pretty odd, pretty interesting story.

Each suit concentrates on a specific site, myth, or person from town. After visiting, reading about and googling McMinnville, I decided to focus on a few interesting things about Mac: 1) the author Beverly Cleary (Ramona the Brave) was a native, 2) in 1950 a UFO was photographed on a McMinnville farm, 3) the legendary Spruce Goose is housed in a museum nearby, and 4) there is an odd (to me) Ben Franklin statue in the middle of town where he's just casually sitting on a bench, 5) the town founder was a man named Newby, and 6) there are more than a few ghost stories about town.

THE CONCEPT: ONE SPRUCE GOOSE JOKE TOO MANY

Yes, the idea was to illustrate the cards to tell a story, but I wanted to make it a little more interesting and interactive. Beginning on the 2 card, a short, fictional story evolves as the card numbers grow. To connect with the card number, there is always one item that is equal in number to the number of the card. For example: in the Hearts or “Spruce Goose” suit, a beaver begins whittling away at a log of spruce while a second beaver observes. 2 of Hearts = 2 beavers, 3 Hearts = 3 beavers, and so on. Gradually, the first beaver’s audience grows until in the 10th card there are nine beavers watching the unveiling of a true work of art, a spruce Goose. A bust of Goose (from Top Gun) chiseled out of spruce. The (dum)best "dad joke" ever printed.