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As a storyteller, Joseph Healy 'really knew how to talk to people'
Tuesday, March 07, 2000 By Monica L. Haynes, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
From the fables of Aesop to the parables of Christ to the old wives' tales of your grandmother, every story needs someone to tell it.
Storytellers are the weavers of words, the spinners of yarns, the bearers of legends, the makers of myth. They pass down the history, impart the morals, entertain and enlighten.
"That's how we communicated," said Joe Wos, a professional storyteller cartoonist who lives in Penn Hills. "Every single culture has some form of storytelling."
Storytelling has evolved from cavemen sitting around a fire recounting the day's events to men and women traveling the world telling their tales for a fee.
Wos, 29, is a member of the tight-knit group of Pittsburgh area professional storytellers. He knew Joseph Healy, the former priest and storyteller from Wilkinsburg who was killed in last week's shootings in his town.
"I think one of the most important things about storytelling is you have to really know your audience," Wos said. "That's what made him a great storyteller. Joe really knew how to talk to people."
Wos is a member of Storyswap, the Pittsburgh Storytelling Guild. Healy also belonged to the group and had served on its board. "It's open to professional tellers as well as [non-professionals] who just love storytelling," Wos said.
Alan Irvine of Squirrel Hill is also a member of Storyswap and was a friend of Healy's. Irvine's been a professional storyteller for about 20 years, starting as a camp counselor while in college.
"Most people start out sort of informally," Irvine said. They may put something together for a friend for a gathering. Someone else hears the storyteller and asks him to come to their meeting. Pretty soon, the storyteller has enough of a repertoire and confidence to begin marketing himself. Storytellers in Pittsburgh can make from $100 to $300 per session.
They usually gather stories from books and develop their own tales. Irvine does a good bit of original storytelling based on his own research of Western Pennsylvania history.
"Joe's storytelling started back when he was still a priest and he starting using stories in his sermons. As Joe used to put it, over time, people were remembering the stories and not the sermons," Irvine recalled.
Healy also used his storytelling skills as a counselor for a group called Theos that he directed for those who were grieving.
"His stories were something that would carry a moral or message, not overtly, but something you could think about afterward," Irvine said.
Healy was responsible for getting Pittsburgh involved in Tellebration, a national evening of storytelling for adults, his friend said. The two worked together on a number of storytelling projects in the area, including the East Hills Elementary School program in the Pittsburgh Public Schools called the Heartwood Storytelling Bus.
Storytellers regale students with tales that teach a moral lesson while they ride the bus to school. On Thursday, the day after the shootings, Healy had been the storyteller scheduled to ride the bus, said another friend and fellow storyteller, Bob Gore of the Hill District.
Gore rode the bus on Friday as students expressed their feelings about Healy. "They certainly showed that they were glad they'd been a friend of his," Gore said.
An actor by training, Gore began storytelling about 15 years ago after a friend asked him to do a story for a dance program. "Once I did it, I said, 'Geez, this is what I should have been doing all my life.' "
It is essential that storytellers love the stories they tell, said Pittsburgh favorite Temujin the Storyteller, who also knew Healy. "That for me is the essence of it."
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