04/14/06 Risser To Stand Alone In Longevity

JOHN J. Marchi, a legendary New York state legislator who once beat John Lindsay in a mayoral primary in New York City, announced this week that he will not seek re-election.

It was big news in New York, where Marchi has served his Staten Island district in Albany for 50 years, having first been elected in 1956.

It's also news here, because of the approximately 7,500 state legislators around the country, Marchi is currently tied in length of service with only one other state senator: Fred Risser.

So when Marchi's term expires in January, Madison Democrat Risser will take the title of the longest-serving state legislator in the United States. Risser does not face re-election until 2008.

Reached Thursday, Risser said he was aware that Marchi was retiring. "I've known him for a number of years," Risser said, adding that they've both been active in the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Risser, first elected in 1956, was also aware of the longevity record, not that he spends a lot of time thinking about it. "The time goes pretty fast," he said.

Marchi is 85 and has had some health issues. Risser is 78 and in good health, but said he hasn't really considered whether he'll run again in two years.

"I don't want to be carried out of here feet first," he said.

Still, he loves being a lawmaker. "I've given my heart and soul to it," he said. "I don't think I've missed a single legislative day since I've been here."

Risser pointed out that he was born "with a political spoon" in his mouth. His father, grandfather and great-grandfather all represented Madison in the Wisconsin Legislature.

Asked about the changes he's seen in the Legislature over half a century, Risser mentioned that money spent on campaigns, noting he raised no money at all in his early races.

Another change is the presence of many women in the Capitol. "When I was first elected there was one woman in the Legislature," he said.

Still another change is the shift to a full-time Legislature. "I used to tell people I was a part-time legislator and a full-time lawyer," Risser said. "Now I say I am a full-time legislator and a part-time lawyer."

In 2001, a building on West Main Street overlooking the Capitol Square, housing a law library and offices for the state Justice Department and Wisconsin Supreme Court, was named the Risser Justice Center.

At the time, Risser said, "I can't think of anything I'd rather be associated with than a justice center." ...

RAINER MARIA, the pop-punk band that formed in Madison a decade ago and returned last month to headline the first MadisonFest at Union South, received a huge boost Thursday with a glowing story in the New York Times by Kefela Sanneh.

The occasion was the release last week of the band's new CD, "Catastrophe Keeps Us Together," which Sanneh calls "a good, sometimes glorious collection of loud pop songs and quiet punk songs."

The Times article helped the "Catastrophe" CD leap into the top 200 sellers on Amazon Thursday.

Reading it reminded me of the time I interviewed Rainer Maria (named for the poet Rainer Maria Rilke) guitarist and vocalist Kyle Fischer when the band was still in Madison and just tasting some national success. (The other members are drummer William Kuehn and singer and bassist Caithlin De Marrais.)

This was 1999, the band was still in Madison, but Spin magazine was preparing a big feature story on them. I asked Fischer about the name. "Rilke was a German poet," he said. "I studied German, and, well, it was the prettiest thing we could come up with."

Fischer told me the band was thinking of relocating to New York. "We want to see how far we can go with this," he said.

Pretty far, it would seem. ...

MOE KNOWS: Another trip down memory lane with the arrival this week of an invitation to Isthmus' 30th anniversary party. It's Friday April 21, at 8 p.m. in the Great Hall of the Memorial Union, but the thing that stuck with me was the 30. Thirty years? Is it really 30 years since I would stop in and grab an Isthmus off the front desk of the Washington Hotel, near the railroad tracks on West Washington Avenue, usually around noon on Thursday? Maybe I would go upstairs to the second floor offices and chat with publisher Vince O'Hern, or editor Marc Eisen, or Fred Milverstedt or Joanne Weintraub or Bruce Murphy or Mike Baron or Kathy Foster.

Well, no, it wasn't 30 years. My first Isthmus story was in 1979, and let me tell you, it doesn't seem like 27 years ago. I wrote a review of "The Executioner's Song," by Norman Mailer. Next week's party is free and open to the public.

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