Rebuilding Joplin’s Stonebridge

Jo Dee Messina’s recent announcement that proceeds from her June 25 concert in Kansas will aid those affected by the massive May 22 tornado that flattened Joplin, Mo., is welcome news to the thousands of survivors who are still literally picking up the pieces of their lives one month later.

Al Zar, and his wife, Chris, who owns and operates Stonebridge Productions that is promoting Messina’s concert at Pittsburg Memorial Coliseum, are two of those survivors.

“We lost two houses, three cars and 29 years of business records,” Al Zar told Pollstar. “Think back to if you’ve ever seen any documentaries … about the atom bomb. That’s what our town looks like in the middle.”

Zar, who says he’s a retired, “unpaid consultant” to Chris and the business, said the two of them were at the house where his 94-year-old father lives, across the street from their home, when the tornado hit.

“We rode the storm out in his center bathroom, which was the only [section] left standing at that house,” he said. “If we’d stayed at our house, we wouldn’t be here. Our house was totally leveled to the ground.

“It was quite harrowing. [There are] possessions, memories and a lot of things that we’ve lost from 29 years in the business, all of our family pictures and what have you. But we’re alive and the possessions can be replaced.”

When Messina originally offered to donate her concert proceeds directly to the Zars, they instead suggested the money be donated to the Red Cross, whose volunteers continue to help Joplin residents as much as possible.

“Until you’ve seen it, you wouldn’t believe it,” Zar said. “This has affected the fourth-largest city in the state of Missouri.”

In the meantime, Zar said he and his wife are taking things one day, sometimes one hour, at a time personally and business-wise.

“There’re so many things you don’t realize when all this happens that you have to do. Everything is a lot more of a struggle now to find contacts and people you want to talk to. You don’t have hard copy files or computer files,” he told Pollstar. [But] it’ll all come together sooner or later.

“We’re starting over with just the clothes on our backs. But the thing we always go back to is that we are OK. [And] Chris is rebuilding [Stonebridge] as we speak.