WSHS Grad's Life Takes a Colorful Turn

It is not every day a young man's life is transformed by a neon sign. But that is what happened to 2002 Winona Senior High graduate Jordan Gensmer.

Thanks to his grandfather, Jordan was offered an opportunity from out of the blue, and now he is launching a career of making blue, green and red neon signs.

Along the way he has picked up a mentor for his new art and craft — Mike King of Bristol, Tenn., who says, "With his ability in graphic design, he's probably the most extraordinary student I've ever had."

After working a year in grandfather Willis Gensmer's business, Winona Diesel, a truck repair and sales operation located in Goodview, Jordan was preparing to enroll in Western Wisconsin Technical College in La Crosse, Wis., to study graphics.

Early this year, Willis Gensmer made a trip to Tennessee to pick up two neon signs from King, looked around at the neon sign production facility and said, "I have a grandson who would be very interested with this."

King, who manufactures point-of-purchase neon signs and who has trained 200 people in the craft, agreed to consider Jordan as a student. They later interviewed each other on the phone.

"From the questions he asked me, I knew he was serious about it," King said.

In March, Willis parked a camper in King's parking lot to act as Jordan's home and the lessons began.

Jordan describes his first reaction to the workshop, "There were weird looking burners and gadgets. I had no clue." Thus commenced an intensive course in learning what King had learned from 23 years in the business. King himself had learned from a man with 48 years' experience.

"I bent (glass tubes) during the day and night and I slept when I could," Jordan said. Learning was "terrible" and "hard" at first, he said, but once in a while there was time to go fishing for trout and bass in the east Tennessee hills.

"You have to really want to do it to get the five basic bends down," he said. When you finish a sign and light it up, "it's totally worth it."

Being enamored of his new craft, Jordan proceeded to set goals for himself. By the fifth week of school he had decided "this is what I want to do," he said.

Now Jordan has set up a neon sign studio in a loft of Winona Diesel. Willis and wife Carol Gensmer have added a neon sign division to their business, fronting the cost of equipment. Jordan's mother, Lori, as part of her normal duties for Winona Diesel, handles the billing for his clients.

Father Pat Gensmer, who runs the truck repair shop, helped set up the studio. And Jordan's sister Jenna and his girlfriend Kelsey helped paint the loft.

Meanwhile, King is spending two out of every three weeks in Winona continuing the young man's education. There are less than 5,000 neon technicians in the U.S., he says.

"In seven months, he is doing third-year work," King said. "I want to pass the torch. I want to make sure he gets plugged into all the right connections."

Jordan says of King, "He's the best thing that's ever happened to me. He's like a second father. He does everything my dad would do for me."

One of Jordan's first Winona neon signs depicts his high school mascot over the wording "Winhawks." He made it for his former band director, Randy Blaser, to raffle off at a December fund raiser for the high school band.

By David Krotz | Winona Daily News

Contact reporter David Krotz at dkrotz@winonadailynews.com or call (507) 453-3524.

Story originally printed in the Winona Daily News or online at http://www.winonadailynews.com