Racine native wears his politics on his chest

By Michael Burke

Tuesday, November 22, 2005 2:03 AM CST

"Intelligent design is stupid," declares one T-shirt.

Another shows the head of Jesus and proclaims, "If I had a grave, I'd be spinning in it."

Then there's the one that counsels, "Practice safe secularism."

Racine native Patrick King is starting to take his political and social opinions to the masses through the vehicle of T-shirts.

His new enterprise, Progresswear, sprang from his design company, the King Group. But the offspring could outgrow the parent. And that would be just fine with King, 48, now of Philadelphia.

"The real goal would be to have this replace my design firm so I could paint more often," said the 1975 St. Catherine's High School graduate.

King, a talented painter with a long resume, said he'd rather spend his time using those talents than continue to design other people's marketing materials for hire.

"I took off eight years to paint full time," he said, and only reluctantly went back to the workaday world.

With some help from his brother, Chris King in Wausau, Patrick has been building his T-shirt company in earnest since his last visit to Racine over the July 4 holiday.

He came up with all the sayings on the shirts so far; he is both copy writer and graphic designer. Putting his thoughts on a T-shirt, he said, requires a heavy hand in self-editing.

"I'm usually too loquacious to edit my own stuff," he said. But with a T-shirt, the sentiment has to be boiled down to a few words.

King had been scrawling ideas for sayings on business cards, matchbook covers, Post-it notes and anything close at hand. When he decided the shirts could sell, he started committing those thoughts to cloth.

His first round of shirts, he said, is aimed at spearing the religious right. However, "I will have lines that will get into other progressive issues," such as social decency.

"I really want to make people stop and think for a second."

As a kid, King was a "voracious" reader who was also shaped by TV images of U.S. soldiers returning from Vietnam in body bags. He got involved at a young age in political campaigns of progressive candidates, including presidential candidates Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern.

With his T-shirts, he said, "I want to be able to look at what I'm doing as informing the misinformed and malinformed."

Some of the shirt sayings are pretty cryptic, such as, "Grow up," "Your future," and "Evolve."

King said, "Sometimes ambiguity is good because it makes people think a little harder."

Via his Web site, http://progresswear.com, the shirts cost $20 plus shipping. King is also looking for retail outlets such as Urban Outfitters.

"I will continue to add lines," King said. "There are a dozen other issues I have barely even touched upon."

New art gallery Speaking of art and paintings, The Bottom Line is very belatedly going to mention this item that came in quite some time ago: It's Yours, a consignment boutique at 3120 Washington Ave. in West Racine, sells original art. They now consider themselves part art gallery.

Holly-day trivia This column hits print just three days before the most insanely commercial time of the year starts with the day-after-Thanksgiving shop-a-thon.

So let's deck the column with bits of holly-day trivia focused on the action at shopping malls. Not surprisingly, these factoids come courtesy the little elves at the International Council of Shopping Centers.

Hey - just for fun, let's list them as trivia questions, with the answers below. Can you guess:

1. On what date did the average mall begin decorating for the holidays? 2. Only 0.4 percent of those malls would include decor for this winter holiday.

3. The song most-played to death in malls.

4. The second-most-often played song.

5. Percentage of malls that extend their holiday shopping hours.

6. In the 1850s the Howard Banking Co. issued a $5 bill featuring this well-known character.

7. The biggest shopping day last year was not the day after Thanksgiving, which came in at No. 2. The biggest day was what? All right, now for the answers: 1. Nov. 1.

2. Kwanzaa.

3. "Jingle Bells."

4. "White Christmas."

5. 91 percent.

6. Santa Claus. And it was legal tender, because private banks were allowed to issue currency notes of their own design.

7. Saturday, Dec. 18. The Saturday before Christmas is always first or second-greatest.

Business reporter Michael Burke can be reached at (262) 631-1716 or by e-mail at: mburke@journaltimes.com

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