For pictures of the memorial service and information concerning the death of Leon Chapman owner of River Falls Lodge see David White's letter to the contra dance community.

When Leon Chapman was in fifth grade in the early 1950s, his teacher told the class how to grab a piece of the American dream. Study hard, get good grades, graduate from college, Chapman recalls her saying. Then you can get hired by a big company, become a CEO, buy a big house and join the country club. Everyone in the room was just wide-eyed, recalls Chapman, 56, "and all I could say was"'Yuck.' If that's what I'm studying for, I might as well drop out here. It seemed so materialistic."

Fast-forward nearly 50 years. Meet Leon Chapman of Greenville, a smiling, stocky '90s businessman who wouldn't be caught dead in a suit and tie. He prefers a jaunty beret, shorts and knee socks, a sartorial statement of his determination to remain an individual and live the simple lifestyle he embraced in the '60s. As the new millennium approaches, the Leon Chapmans of the world are getting more attention. All around them are stories of people who are forsaking their corporate jobs and credit cards in an attempt to revert to simpler times. And many who aren't making such drastic lifestyle changes are at least digging in their closets, searching for those long buried berets. "I've heard it all my life," Chapman says, "that I'm marching to my own drummer. I've always been out of step." Who are these people, the ones who latched onto specific ideals in the 1960s and early '70s and never let them go? Then they were the counterculture. Today, they're all around us, still advocating self-reliance, questioning authority and working for world peace. But in the meantime, according to Dr. Kevin Sargent, assistant professor of communication studies at Furman University, the line between "mainstream" and "counterculture" movements and forms of life different from the dominant culture has blurred considerably. Americans in the '90s are growing more tolerant of people who "do their own thing."

On a given day, you may find Chapman brandishing a hammer at the house on Butler Avenue that he's renovating, or rewiring his Saluda River cabin. He fixes up old houses for resale and owns a Marietta pawn shop, liquor store and party shop. A sign in his ABC store reads, "Kill your enemies; love them to death." He's not materialistic, he says, and acquires many of his belongings by bartering. "I think I've a better opportunity to observe what's going on because my primary focus is not financial." Chapman spends many a Saturday night at the rustic River Falls Lodge, happily twirling and gliding on the crowded dance floor. The converted dance hail built in the 1940s on the banks of the Saluda River is another of his enterprises and is the scene for contra dances, a style that incorporates folk and square dancing. The Leon Chapmans of this world share a strong sense of identity, of being comfortable with what and who they are. "I don't know a soul I'd trade places with," Chapman says. " I am who I am." "When people ask me what I"ll be when I grow up, I say, "dead."