How a small sonic boom came to represent homelessness in Reno, and how the city responded to unhoused people taking up sonic real-estate. // Utility, aesthetic language, 911 tape and the search for Reno’s master whip maker.
(church bell)
It’s a cold, windy morning in downtown Reno, Nevada, and I’m standing on the steps of the Methodist church. I’m waiting for a guy named Nando, who promised to meet me here and teach me how to make a bullwhip.
Nando made that promise yesterday too. But I was here at high noon and was still here when the sun got low, and so I walked a few miles down the the river, asking people in every tent encampment if they’d seen him today.
Over the past few years, an unlikely culture of whip making and whip cracking has proliferated in the houseless community of Downtown Reno And during an exhaustive investigation of this world, I keep hearing one name — the best whip braider in town: Nando.
Usually when I’ve seen Nando, he’s been on a bicycle by the Truckee River. He’ll zip by with a fishing rod way too fast to stop for an interview. Which is exactly what he does again, right now, in front of the church. He lets his bike coast as he speeds around the corner. But this time instead of just waiting or leaving, I decide to tail him. I’ve been watching a lot of Noir films lately, and my jacket collar is already pulled up on account of the cold wind.
I lose him for a block, but when I round the next corner I see he’s stopped, talking to someone on the curb. When I approach he says he's busy right now and before I get a word in, he pedals across the street. I just stand there, and I watch him walk into a weekly motel, below a faded neon sign, broken room numbers hanging askew. The wind whips at my back as some wispy clouds muffle the sun.
I’ve surprised myself with this decision, but I’ve been trying to get a minute with Nando for almost two months, and this is as close as I’ve been.
When he reemerges a while later, he has someone with him. They head toward the river, and I keep following them, Nando’s friend occasionally looking back at me. They pass through the plaza where the guys practice whip cracking, they cross a bridge to convene with a small encampment of people in the willows, and eventually the second guy breaks off.
I approach Nando and say something like “Hey man If you want me to leave you alone I will, but…” No problem. We walk and talk for a few blocks. He says he was just arrested on a failure to appear warrant, spent a night in jail. The cops broke his phone and he’s been trying to find a new one.
He tells me Yes, he’ll still teach me to make a whip, but I need to go get supplies — 4 bundles of para-cord and a roll of athletic tape — then come by his room tomorrow. “You saw where I live” he says.
And like that, I’ve got an appointment with the master whip maker of downtown Reno.
•••
Mayor Hillary Schieve: "Alright thank you so much. At this time I'd like to start the pledge allegiance (sic).
(group of people reciting pledge of allegiance in City Hall)
It’s a hot day in August. Outside, the air is thick with smoke, but inside city hall in downtown, it’s air conditioned. Lt. Ryan Connelly with the Reno Police Department gets up in front of the city council.
Lt. Ryan Connelly: “Lt. Ryan Connelly with the Reno Police Department for the record…”
He queues up some PDF slides on the projector. And then, he asks the Reno City Council to outlaw whips.
Lt. Ryan Connelly: “The popularity of possessing a whip and cracking has grown significantly over the last few years as you’ve heard several citizens say.”
He claims the department is getting flooded with calls: not only about the actual whip use, but also by people mistaking the crack of a whip for gunshots.
Lt. Ryan Connelly “Calls for service regarding the whips have nearly doubled over the last year.”
He says in the last year, they’ve received 176 calls about it.
911 Calls:
Dispatch: Dispatch, How may I help you?
Caller: There's a whip...the guy with the whip intimidating people downtown at the square downtown near the river.
Dispatch: 911 what is the location of your emergency?
Caller: It's on first. What sounds like gunshots to me.
Dispatch: 911 What is your emergency?
Caller: I just got a report of shots fired down at the truckee river.
Dispatch: It looks like we're on our way down and it's possible there's a subject with a whip. She might of been hearing that. But we're sending someone down to go and check.
Caller: Well that's what I suspect it is.
(Whip Cracking)
The Lieutenant plays this shaky cell phone video on the projector.
8:57 Lt Ryan Connelly Um As you can see that second video was taken downtown in the middle of one of our parks. Broad daylight.
It shows a couple of guys with bullwhips cracking them in a downtown park on the river, just a few blocks upstream from City Hall.
(WHIP CRACKS)
A quick diversion into the weeds here: As you probably know from physics class or pub trivia, that sound is what happens when the tip of the whip breaks the sound barrier. A sonic boom happens when something goes faster than the speed of sound, which in air is typically around 750 miles per hour. Basically, if an object is traveling slower than the speed of sound, it sends sound waves ahead of itself, so you hear it coming. But if it’s going over 750 miles per hour, it passes…..then BOOM
All that sonic energy basically bunches up behind the thing, and it smacks you all at once.
And in City Council, what we’re seeing unfold is a direct reaction to that little sonic boom.
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "The tip of the whip obviously breaks the sound barrier, if used correctly, the integrity of the whip is compromised, due to not being professionally constructed and the materials that they are made out of."
Not professionally constructed, Connely Says.
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "The vast majority of the whips that we have seen in and around town are homemade, and they use a variety of materials such as rope, string, chains, leather to name a few."
Connelly wraps up the presentation with a slide of the proposed new ordinance. It would outlaw the possession of a whip on all public ground.
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "This proposed ordinance will assist in keeping these areas safe and will significantly reduce these types of calls for service which will allow our officers to focus their efforts elsewhere...elsewhere in the community where they are needed."
•••
Though I had lived in downtown as the whips became ubiquitous, I had never actually asked anyone about them. So, I began searching.
A friend told me there was a code of silence around the whips. That the community was insular and on guard. And for several weeks, I failed constantly. I’d walk up and down the Truckee River through tent camps in vacant lots, and with every approach, I’d be rejected. Or more often, I’d hear a whip in the distance, only to arrive to an empty field or park, minutes too late. After about a month though, I walked up to a group at a plaza in downtown. Most of the group got their stuff and left, but one person welcomed me over.
Monica Plumber: “It’s a hobby. And we wrap them ourselves. And they come together and we try each other’s out…"
This is Monica Plumber.
Monica Plumber: “Usually you get given one, and then you have to make one. And then you can start giving them away. You make one and give it away or whatever, and you just pass it down.”
Monica was barefoot, and as we spoke she pulled a handmade red whip from her backpack.
Observing these things from afar over 4-5 years, I’d noticed a sort of aesthetic language. They often show bright colors, interesting textures and unlike a traditional bullwhip, they’re not made of leather. Instead they’re made of old braided rope, tape, chain, and on almost all of them, neon shades of a type of thin rope: nylon para-cord.
The Wind: “You were just saying that the whips are like something you can use for…
Monica: "Of course. like when we’re going down the trail in the night time or whatever because we don’t like to be out during the day you know, we gotta travel at night, we don’t want all of our stuff out here. So we travel the bike trail. And there’s skunks and raccoons and even snakes, gosh you name it. Well we had a bear down here, know what I’m saying? So that crack is very useful to make em go away for sure.”
Of the group, one guy did stick around and listened in. At some point he walked across the plaza and grabbed a huge blue whip from a guy on the other side. It was over a dozen feet long. I set up my mic, and he began cracking the thing.
(cracks)
It was a loud crack that ricocheted off the surrounding buildings and down the city streets. You could hear a short slap-back echo off the church and the movie theater, and a long quiet tail of reverberation.
(crack)
Unexpectedly, in the distance from across the river, someone answered.
(crack + response crack in distance)
A call and response.
(crack + response crack in distance)
A window into this whole world began to open. Eventually the second whipper walked over the bridge and, though he wouldn’t answer questions, he let me record his whip up close:
(CRACK!)
It was an incredible sound. Clean, booming and very, very loud.
(CRACK!)
Monica Plumber: “and you know one has a different sound than the other and like we can tell who’s who just from the crack from down the river. And it’s amazing you know. You can really tell where your family is at and stuff.”
Not only do these thing deter skunks, Monica said, but they’re also a communication device. You can tell who’s who from far away, which is a real asset for a community largely without cellphones.
•••
Reno, like a lot of American cities, has seen a devastating increase in houselessness in recent years. Using the county’s Point-in-Time count, homelessness almost tripled from 2015 to 2021, from 567 people to 1477.
In that same time, the amount of people without any shelter increased 690%.
It is of course a complicated systemic problem, but at the core of it, the rent is too damn high. And exacerbating this problem is a wave of demolition of affordable housing, including old motels, which have become the defacto last-resort housing for low income residents. Developers have been buying up these motels and clearing the land, seemingly with support from the City government, and leaving behind dirt lots accompanied by online architectural renderings.
A person with a full time minimum wage job In Reno cannot afford to rent a market rate studio apartment.
After this interview with Monica, I went back out looking for her. She didn’t have a phone but said I could find her at this plaza. I looked for several days, asking around, explaining I wasn’t a cop, and even walking a 10-mile stretch of river. But I never saw her again.
At the end of that 10-mile walk I heard a crack. I followed it to the steps of the methodist church, and that’s when I met Nando for the first time - a stocky guy around my age with close cut black hair. After some back and forth, he eventually let me record.
(Crack)
and then, he agreed to an interview.
The Wind: “Mind if I sit in between you guys?...Do you have quite a few, have you made a few of em?"
Nando: “I’ve made about 67 of em in the last past year."
The Wind: "That's... a lot."
Nando: "yeah"
It seemed like I had found exactly who I was looking for - an expert downtown Reno whip maker.
But 1 minute into the interview, before I even got his name, a car pulled up and the driver called Nando over.
Nando: “Pretty much I use them all..Hold on one sec.”
He paused the interview, got in the car, and said he’d be back. But he never came back. And so began weeks and weeks and weeks of searching.
•••
Mayor Hillary Schieve: "Madam Clerk I'm going to send it to you right now for role call."
Clerk: "Thanks, Madam Mayor...We're on Item A3, which is public comment. If you're ready, I'll go ahead and move forward."
Mayor Hillary Schieve: "Perfect, thank you"
Reno City Hall is right in downtown. It’s a black monolith of a building that overlooks the Truckee river, and a large plaza where people practice whipping. Inside, council begins to hear public comment. But from what I can tell, there aren’t any actual whippers speaking.
Eric Lerude: "Good morning. Mayor Schieve, City Council members. My name is Eric Lerude, I'm a downtown Reno resident living at xxx Sierra Street.… I ask that you pass the proposed ordinance regarding whips. I frequently hear the whips cracking. I hear them from my home. I hear them when I'm out and about. They make a very scary noise. They basically sound like a gunshots."
Caller 1: "The whip cracking… creates sonic booms. Which rattle my windows, cause the seizures, cause my blinds to drop. Cause the cat to run over the bed."
Eric Lerude: "On one occasion, I was out walking with my wife and two visitors from out of town one evening downtown and we encountered somebody with a whip. It was very frightening. The person was cracking the whip. We paused, and then we quickly went the other way, which was out of the way from which way we were going. It was a very frightening experience. It was very intimidating. It was very uncomfortable."
Gabe Stransky: "Hello, So I'm speaking in opposition of the whip ban. I mean, if there's if there's an issue of them attacking people with the whips, that should be a an assault thing. And there's already laws in place for that… So why are we doing this? Why are we making criminals out of people over something that helps them?"
Holly Wellborn: "My name is Holly Wellborn, I’m the policy director of the ACLU of Nevada it’s a pleasure to be here this afternoon… The unsheltered population is over-policed, lacks trust in law enforcement, and this ordinance threatens any efforts to build that trust."
Bill Simms: "why do you guys have such a consistent erection for punishing homeless people?"
Anthony Townsend: "My name's Anthony Townsend, and I live just a couple of blocks from here and I enjoy the public spaces and the last couple of years, it gets worse and worse. Three a.m. in the morning, it's simulated gunfire. And it's a means of intimidation...And I'm not one to make laws, like the voting laws that we're comin up with across the country that are somewhat discriminatory, but I don't believe that's the case here. The people that are doing it, if you'll notice they're almost 100 percent between 20 and 45 years old that are able-bodied because it takes a reasonable amount of strength and dexterity to crack a 16 foot whip...But the police keep telling me they can't do anything about it because it's not considered a weapon. So I went up to the old country store up here and I bought a an inexpensive whip because I was going to bring it just to show you, well, the guys out here says it's a weapon, so it's in a trash can out here…"
Amy (voicemail): Hello, my name is Amy. I have vagrants living outside my door in the alleyway... If somebody can take a look at this, have them removed. Do whatever needs to be done. This is a shame that this is actually going on in this city, that these people have more rights than the citizens. ...please have something done, thank you."
After listening to Public Comment, and that PDF presentation from the Reno Police Department, City council begins discussion.
Here’s Councilmember Naomi Duerr
Naomi Duerr: "I don't believe that artistic expression should interfere with people's quiet enjoyment of their property...Hey, if there's stress, I get there's stress. What can we do to help people besides get them housed and provide them with services to relieve some of the stress, if that's what it's about?"
Councilmember Oscar Delgado
Oscar Delgado: "If a person purchased a whip somewhere, and they carried it from A to B. They're houseless, they could potentially be pulled over and ticketed. Is that what this is suggesting?"
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "Correct, if the mere possession in public is ..."
Oscar Delgado: "Ok just wanted clarity. If somebody had a gun on them and they were houseless, would they also be ticketed?"
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "As long as it wasn't concealed no."
Oscar Delgado: "As long as it wasn't concealed."
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "Yeah if it was a concealed weapon, then they would need the permit for concealed firearm."
Oscar Delgado: "So someone can carry and not be cited with the misdemeanor with a gun, but they can with the whip."
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "Correct."
Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve
Mayor Sheive: "And then I also think it's unfair that we say that this is, you know, something that the homeless are doing. I've seen people that are not homeless doing this, but I got to tell you, I think it's intimidating. I think it's absolutely dangerous...This is no way an art form. I'm sorry…"
And Councilmember Jenny Brekhus
Jenny Brekhus: "I don't like to presume who's homeless and who's not because I don't think it's a very it's oftentimes not a good street discernment someone can make...But but I've heard from the people for this ordinance and people with concerns for this ordinance that they understand the whip crackers to be people who are homeless. Is that like a universal given as we move forward with this?"
5 hours into the meeting, despite some council members expressing wariness, they vote unanimously to advance this ordinance to a second hearing.
It’s not law yet, but it’s one step closer.
•••
Jessica Bruder from previous interview: “In a country where the social safety net is so thin and porous, a lot of people try not to think about it, but the fact that Homeless as a word has come to imply this caste system, and kinda everybody has a way not to be it, which is understandable because of the stigma.”
That’s Jessica Bruder, author of the book Nomadland.
As councilmember Jenny Brekhus said, presuming somebody’s housing status by sight is not great. It’s rude, it’s often inaccurate, and labeling somebody as, in Jessica Bruder’s words “Capital H Homeless”, simply ignores the incredibly complicated gradient that is homelessness in America. There are people in shelters, sleeping in friend’s houses, sedans, vans, RVs, tents, and even when people do get off the street into a weekly motel, they can still be considered homeless — especially if they’re bouncing between the two.
Monica Plumber: “This is rough. This is really rough. And it’s really scary sometimes."
The Wind: "And what do you mean by this?"
Monica Plumber: "Being out here. Homeless.”
I spoke to a handful people who I would not have guessed were houseless, but were, or were in some sort of in-between place.
Monica Plumber: “I mean it’s not even just part of the homeless community, i mean people who have whips have apartments. I mean, I had an apartment, you know...so...”
The line is porous. But every whipper I asked, identified as homeless. A couple had access to a friend’s apartment for showers, and even the folks in a weekly motel saw it as an ephemeral reprieve. Houseless with a temporary bed. Even with blurry edges, the world seemed bound by its own culture and subcultures. The whips, part of a shared language.
The Wind: “Does it make you feel safer to have one?
Monica Plumber: "Absolutely. I’m alone. I don’t have boyfriend or any of that. And I don’t have knives. I don’t carry a knife…So…It’s nice to know that my family is out here with me. And if I crack my whip, somebody will crack theirs."
Hatchet: "Yeah, mine’s just to get attention from like everybody around, they know I'm in the area when I crack my whip...Hatchet, they call me hatchet."
One autumn night, I hear a crack on the river. I jog over the bridge and pick out 2 kids. One, named Dusty, has a bass guitar, and the other’s named Hatchet; a whip is wrapped up under his arm.
Hatchet: "Once I got started just comes naturally. And you know, just, it's addicting."
Dusty: "They get real deep with it Like man, all the different patterns in like, I didn't know that there's so many different knots you could do. And they they tie so many..."
Hatchet: "We have little competitions and stuff and who could be the fastest or who could braid different ways to get the most like…. Yeah, yeah, there's more… more to it than just cracking the whip."
I ask him what it feels like when he does crack it.
Hatchet: "it's like me putting on a music. I'm ... I put my headphones in and I have my whip in my hand. There's no like, no telling me something. I'm just in the zone, just how I can describe it? I'm in the zone, I'm doing my thing. I have no... I pay attention to nothing besides the whip."
The Wind: "Is it like… Do you think it's about power or control at all?"
Hatchet: "It's more like releasing… Because when I get angry, when I get sad or something, I just pick up a whip, it helps me release it to where I might be. I can usually, honestly, I use to get physical. With people and stuff when I get angry, but not anymore. Once I start doing the whip, cracking the whip, It just released all that. Like, I just I don't feel like like one of those like a mean body in my soul dude, it's crazy. It's like part of me now."
The Wind: "… I mean, like… the way you break the sonic barrier is because the energy goes through your arm through that and out that little string, you know?"
Hatchet: "yeah"
Dusty: "Yeah"
The Wind: "Who are some of the...Do you have a favorite in town?"
Hatchet: "My favorite has to be Fernando. He braids the best."
I hear this several times. The best in town is Nando, the guy who I got 50 seconds of interview with before he disappeared. At this point I’ve been searching for him for about a month, and have only caught glimpses from afar.
When we finish the interview, I ask Hatchet if I can record his whip. He takes a deep breath, looks around, and he enters the zone.
(Three Whip Cracks)
As Hatchet and Dusty fade into the night, tourists and locals stroll down the river walk.
The wider reaction to the whips has been complicated. The idea of the "Reno Whip Man" briefly became a kind of absurdist folk hero on social media, with both appreciators and detractors in the comments. In real life, some people grant a very wide berth to the whippers, some call 911, but many just carry on as normal. It seems to be a heightened analog to the response to houselessness in general.
In the police presentation, Ryan Connelly claimed that the main reason they needed a new law was because they were getting flooded with 911 calls about whips, and people mistaking them for gunshots. Through a public records request, I was able to obtain about one hundred 911 audio files.
Those 911 calls, a trip to California, and the final vote, after the break.
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I got around one hundred 911 calls about bullwhips through a public records request. It’s about 4 hours worth, but here are a handful of them.
(911 TAPE)
Dispatch: Dispatch this is Chelsea, how may I help you?
Caller (Matt): "Oh Hi thank you my name is Matt and uh I was just gonna see if there was any chance an officer might be able to swing by, I know you guys are super busy, but on 1st and West Street there's a guy that's been whippin the whip for probably three days...I thought after 3 days it might get better but toniight he's just goin at it. And... "
Dispatch: "Sure what's your phone number?"
Caller (Matt): "...sounds like gunshots"
Caller 2: "Hi I'm calling from Arlington Tower downtown and there's some whippers, they been whipping for about a half an hour, I was wondering if someone could come down and shut them up."
Caller 3: "Yeah can you hear me alright?
Dispatch: "Yeah what's the address of your emergency?"
Caller 3: Idlewild Park.
Dispatch: "Ok what's the phone number you're calling from?"
Caller 3: "You can see the phone number. There's a man with a bullwhip out here you need to send a cop out here, that's..."
Dispatch: "Ok I do have to confirm the phone number with you sir because it's..."
Caller 3: (yelling) "916-5xxxxxx !... I'm not gonna go up and talk to him. (cross talk)
Dispatch: "About how old is he?"
Caller 3: "I don't know does it matter? 20, 30 (cross talk) Did you get the part about the bullwhip? Get a cop. Get a cop on the way."
Dispatch: Dispatch can I help you?
Caller 4: "I'm at Wingfield park downtown and there's somebody cracking a whip in the amphitheater area there."
Dispatch: "I'm gonna get some info in just a second, So they're at Wingfield park, at the amphitheater where the stage is?"
Caller 4: "Yea they've been...On the stage, and that's meant to be acoustic so the crack just made me absolutely jump out of my skin."
Caller 5: "Hi I was just giving you guys a call... they're just at the city plaza and it's crack after crack... It doesn't sound like gunshots."
Dispatch: "911 what's the address of your emergency?"
Caller (Jeff): "The problem is coming from the Wingfield Park with bull whips, sounding like gunshots all today, non-stop."
Dispatch: "At Wingfield Park?"
Caller (Jeff): "Correct. In that little plaza there where all the dirtbags are. That's where the bullwhip's coming from."
Dispatch: "Did you get a description of the person?"
Caller (Jeff): "They're all the same. They're homeless people."
About a quarter of the 911 calls I obtained are from the same two apartment buildings: Arlington Tower and Park Tower right in downtown. And listening through them, I start to recognize the voices. There are several repeat callers. One is a guy named Jeff:
Caller (Jeff): "Never in my life have I lived anywhere where it was a requirement for homeless people to have bullwhips! Unbelievable.
Dispatch: "Um How many people are out there?"
Caller (Jeff): "I dunno, there's always a handful of these dirtbags in this area."
Dispatch: "And are you only hearing it or are you seeing them?"
Caller (Jeff): "I'm hearing it. If I go down there and see it, I'm gonna wrap it around his neck."
Dispatch: "I wouldn't make threats like that on an a recorded line sir."
Jeff calls 4 times in a 10 day period. The first 3 specifically reference whips outside of his apartment, then in the 4th, he calls 911 to report a dozen gunshots at the same location.
This happens more than once in these 2 apartment buildings. People who have called 911 about the whips calmly calling 911 to report gunshot.
•••
The escalation of urban noise is a problem. The whippers do take up a real chunk of sonic real estate. But things that are much louder to my ear — sirens, demolition equipment, cars with modified exhaust systems, motorcycles — none of these seem to be as much of a lightning rod as the whips. The police, as far as I know, haven’t presented a PDF about motorcycle noise.
It’s also worth mentioning, it’s not only housed people who are bothered by the whips. Some of the unsheltered people I spoke to, especially the older folks, didn’t like ‘em. One guy said it was annoying, something for tweakers. One woman, Mary Gallegas says whip cracks make it hard for her to sleep. She invites me over to her camp on the river bank, as she burns twigs of cottonwood.
The Wind: “How do you feel about em?"
Mary Gallegas: "I do not like it myself. so yeah. Kinda hoping that from what we heard they’re supposed to make it illegal or something. I hope.”
The Wind: "You hope so?"
Mary Gallegas: "Yeah."
When I leave Mary’s camp, sirens blare in the distance. 2 people set up a tent on a flat spot nearby and tell me it doesn’t matter where: the cops always wake them before dawn.
(Sound of whips in a park)
Matt Franta: "Yeah, My name is Matt Franta and we're in Los Angeles, Burbank specifically. At one of the parks here and this is where we hold our twice-monthly whip cracking meetup group, the Los Angeles Whip Artists."
This park in Burbank California is penned in by the Freeway, the Los Angeles River, between Warner Brothers and Walt Disney Studios. It’s a Saturday morning.
Matt Franta: "Yeah. So my professional background, so I do stunt work and fight choreography."
Matt trains actors in hand-to-hand combat, sword fighting, and as you can hear in the background of this tape….whips.
Matt Franta: "But yeah, there's been a been a few different shows that I have worked on that have required the use of a whip … the two productions in New York were using whips and it was definitely not Western themed… It was more of a lifestyle kind of approach to the whip..."
Matt explains that in addition to the meetup, the group hosts a whip competition, which draws participants from all over the world. Though niche, it’s clearly a thing.
The Wind: "And I mean, so with your background, with martial arts had like, does the whip fit into that at all as far as you know, something that that might also lean kind of spiritually or, you know, a way that not not just physically having fun with it?"
Matt Franta: "Yeah, absolutely. …for me, like any sort of kind of like spiritual practice or, you know, trying to to cultivate mindfulness or meditation as a movement artist, I prefer moving meditation, right? Something that I can connect body and mind that way rather than sitting still. It's something I'm trying to get better at..."
He says attendance varies, but today there are about 12 guys, practicing different techniques. Chatting with Matt, he mentions that there are specific routines that you can learn. And that some date back centuries.
Matt Franta: "you know, with a lot of uses with the whip, they're using just the sound of it, there would be different patterns or different sequences usually referred to as a flash..."
The routine Indiana Jones does in Raiders of the Lost Ark: that’s called the Cairo Flash.
Matt Franta: "But yeah, there would be these set patterns, you know, used historically that people could recognize."
The Wind: "And you were saying to that when used on livestock, I think a lot of people expect that they're hitting, you know, the animals with it, where in reality they're using the sound to direct animals."
Matt Franta: "Yeah. You know, these ranchers and cattlemen… they don't want to damage their livestock, right? And if they were to strike, you know, whatever animals they they are herding. They don't want to damage the hide or injure the animals any way. It's it's purely the sound of the whip that induces the behavior of, you know, getting getting your cattle to move or or to stop or whatever it is. But just using that crack above them, but not ever using it to strike them."
On the way out, I strike up a conversation with a professional whip maker. I explain the story, but he’s already heard of the Reno ordinance, hundreds of miles away. He says the news made the rounds on the whip facebook groups. That they’re all confused by it.
I tell him that it’s become a subculture within the houseless community and that people are teaching each other how to make them, holding informal meet ups and competitions. And I think he starts to understand the rub — it’s not a dozen stuntmen in a park for a few hours a month; the whips have become an audible representation of the presence of homelessness. And that’s something that exists day and night, with no gaps in between.
•••
On a cold December day, I return to Nando’s motel room with a bag of rope. I go to the room number he gave me, and when I knock on the door it swings open at my touch… like in a movie. It’s a dark motel room filled with people on the bed and the floor. People who aren’t Nando. A man in bed seems unfazed by my entrance and says he ain’t seen him.
I close the door and wait, then leave, then search the river.
After our 1 minute interview, I’ve spent weeks searching. I’ve waited multiple days in front of the church, given notes to people who know him; one night a guy even offered to go find him, returning 45 minutes later, alone. It seems like I will never find this guy.
But when I return to the motel, Nando appears in the walkway. He takes the bag of rope. His wife is sleeping and he tells me to come back later.
When I come back the first time, somebody I don’t recognize opens the door and tells me to go to the plaza, where Nando will meet me in an hour. I do, he doesn’t. So I return. It’s still windy and overcast and when I knock this time, Nando lets me inside
.
It’s a standard motel room. Spongey carpet, a kitchenette. 2 dogs, a couch. There’s a small screwdriver sticking out of the wall, and tied around it is the beginning of a whip. My whip — I didn’t just ask Nando to teach me, I also hired him to make me one in the process.
The Wind: "All right. So, yeah, can you kind of describe what you're doing right now?"
Nando: "Right now I'm just braiding pretty much the haul of it, getting the base of it, the form for the whip...Yeah, I actually started this one today. So first, actually, I'm using pretty much the whole everything, the whole para-cord."
I spend a lot of the interview asking about technique. Though people have told me in loose terms how to make them, definitely not details I could compare between whip makers.
The Wind: "And so what's the braiding technique you're doing?"
Nando "this is this is a circle braid, just a spiral. I find my whips last longer when I circle braid 'em."
In addition to braiding, I ask about cracking technique.
Nando: "Whips are done by its hand movement and it's also done by weight. So if you if it's light, you know, you can't get it over your head or you can't get it behind you, but the longer the whip, the longer the motion has to sit. So it's kind of like, Like I say, it's like fly fishing."
The Wind: "Yeah, that's super interesting because I've seen you with your fly rod, too. I mean, how do they compare?"
Nando: "Well, technically, whip is more elbow. And then fly fishing is more of it's more of a wrist action. But they all do the same thing though. You know, because a fly fishing using nylon string, you know, that's your weight, that's your everything. So you got to get that out towards the river. This is the same thing. Nothing but cord or nothing but paracord."
The Wind: "Yeah. And I mean, they both taper."
Nando: "Yeah, pretty much."
The fishing line or the bullwhip has more mass at the base, so all of the energy you put into the handle accelerates as it passes through lighter and lighter material. This is how you get a fly way out into the river, or how you get rope to break the sound barrier.
The Wind: "so how did you get into making whips?"
Nando: "Well, I've been homeless. I've been on the streets since I've been to Reno, so I've been in Reno for 14 years…I got into it because I was homeless and if I seen a friend and I was like…. At first I didn't like it. I was like, “These are stupid you guys are you're wasting your time.” But then I was like, man, “if you guys can make it, I bet I can make a better one.” Competition. Then I know after that I started -- I have ADHD. So my hands are always moving, and this right here, constantly you're moving up and down... So it's fascinating how you can make something so long, give it weight and all the sudden, you know, it's breaking sound barriers. It's an amazing thing."
•••
About two months after RPD’s presentation on the whip ordinance, City Council meets for a final vote.
City Attorney Karl Hall: "Ordinance adoption, ordinance numbers 6607. Ordinance to amend title 8 chapter 8.18 of the Reno municipal code titled Weapons: creating a new ordinance RMC 8.18.035 Unlawful use of a whip, together with other matters properly relating thereto."
Though there’s public comment on other houseless issues this week — namely, the unsafe conditions at the city’s new shelter — there’s not much on whips. It seems to me the city is poised to make this decision, and that the advocates who typically speak on behalf of the unsheltered see the writing on the wall. After all, the whole whip thing is just one small battle in a war with very high stakes and multiple fronts.
When the whip ordinance comes up about 8 hours into the meeting, there is a public comment left as a voicemail.
Lisa (Public comment voicemail): "Hello this is Lisa, a local resident of Reno, and I'm very concerned about the current atmosphere and the knee jerk reactions going on with these horse whips. It's called a crop. They are used for the hind quarter of the horse to move the horse out of tough situations such as the river, any kind of running water. Rocky areas they're important to have. So to just suddenly ban them? It's it's silly. Being a horse rider and knowing many ranchers here in town, we're just appalled. I can't believe this. Please reconsider the decision…I cannot stress to you guys the value and the importance of retaining the horse crop for use in public service. Thank you."
This seems to set off an interesting exchange between Councilmember Jenny Brekhus and City Attorney Karl Hall.
Jenny Brekhus: "I did not think the ordinance was going to come back geographically described, I thought it was going to be citywide. Can you explain why it came back with geographic boundaries and how those were selected."
Karl Hall: "Yes, the reason it was restricted geographically is because that's where we were receiving reports of use of these whips in the downtown area as we just had the public comment, You know, areas outside of the downtown area, there may be uses for whips, but we were getting all the complaints downtown, and so this ordinance is addressing the issue that was presented through the police department to address people cracking the whip downtown, threatening people with whips downtown and intimidating people with whips downtown area. And that's why it's geographically restricted."
This reminds me of something Brekhus asked back in the first meeting. Here she is speaking to Lt. Ryan Connelly in August:
Jenny Brekhus: "But but I've heard from the people for this ordinance and people with concerns for this ordinance that they understand the whip crackers to be people who are homeless. Is that like a universal given as we move forward with this?"
Lt. Ryan Connelly: "I wouldn't say it's a given. Like the stats indicated, a large majority of the calls for service related whips are in Central District, but there are also citywide and we have whip calls from every district, every ward, every beat."
And yet, here we are with a final ordinance that draws a box around downtown, and largely around the houseless population.
Assistant City Attorney Jonathan Shipman: "So what it does is it makes it illegal to possess a whip in that corridor area..."
That’s assistant city attorney Jonathan Shipman. In short, this isn’t about people like Lisa with horses. This is about the largely unhoused community in Downtown, who have turned bullwhips into a shared hobby. It’s about the space they’ve begun to take up both physically and especially sonically.
Jonathan Shipman: "If you've got a horse and you're down south, that's totally fine and fair and you're not going to be penalized for using that whip. So again, it really gets... the problem is the downtown. The problem is we have, you know, whips cracking downtown sounds like gunshots. People report gunshots and that activity has got to stop and we don't expect to see that outside of the downtown corridor area."
With no further discussion, Councilmember Naomi Duerr makes a motion.
Naomi Duerr: "I would like to make a motion that we adopt this ordinance and have to as written."
Neoma Jardon: "Second."
Vice Mayor: " …All those in favor say aye."
Council: "Aye. (6 members)."
Vice Mayor: "Opposed?"
Jenny Brekhus: "Opposed."
Vice Mayor: "The motion. The motion carries with a nay, a no vote by council member Brekhus. Is that correct? OK, good."
Clerk: "All right, Madam, vice mayor. Moving on to Item G one… " (fade out)
It passes. 6-1. Whips are now illegal in Downtown Reno.
•••
Nando: "A lot of us, we live downtown. I mean, homeless, you know, I mean, like, we live downtown and it is what it is. We don't really we don't have the means to go all the way up to the country and all that."
Back in Nando’s motel room, I ask him if he knows how the whole thing started.
Nando: " it started off as nothing but communication. That's what I started off as. And now it's become a sport, you know, and that's pretty much that's all the history of it, really. There's another guy. His name is Pauly…. And pretty much I look at him as the The Godfather of whipping...you start off with him or whoever, and then people just picked it up. They got interested in it, you know, because about. Let's say 2012, when I was really out there and I was young, I didn't. We never heard whippin. I never heard a whip. You know, unless you're like, I don't know, rodeo or something like that, but I never heard of a whip."
I’d heard of Pauly a lot. They say he and a guy named Fuzz started the whole thing. He is apparently still around, though Fuzz died in downtown recently.
Nando: "A lot of us came together because of this because I love people who who, who, who don't like me, you know, like, you know, it's OK. Everybody's entitled to their own opinion, but. At the end of the day, I'll catch them coming to my door, Nando I need your help. you know, my whip's broke, I can't get it to stay or I can't. What's going on? You know, just like you don't even talk to me, you know, but you because I know what I'm I'm taking my time and I know I know what I'm doing. So they are willing to put their pride aside and imagine if people can put their pride aside for for this. Imagine what they really do for anything…so it builds friendships, friendships that some people never even had."
Going into this world, I had this feeling that the whips where about power. Unhoused people reclaiming a little bit of the control that society wouldn’t afford them. But on several occasions I was told, no. It’s not about power. It’s about release. Something heavy and interior, being exerted, shed, accelerated, and let out.
Nando: "I feel like each time I make a whip, I lose a piece of my soul and not for not for the not for the bad and not I'm going to die and I just lose… I like when I do go one day if my whips are still around, if they're not in waste management, in the garbage. I'm still going to be here because I'm like, because each whip like this one right here when you take this one, when I'm done with it. This is...my spirit is in this. A piece of my soul goes, know what I mean?
I grow a new soul. But it's like each…. all the time I've had on the streets and all that, just everything and everything I've been through and all like, it's all the bad. It gets put into these whips, you know, I mean, I become a new me each time."
Nando: "My name's Fernando Tate. I've been here for about 14 years and I plan on staying for a little bit longer and I and I damn sure, bout ta keep on cracking my whips and making them."
I come back 2 days later to pick up my whip. It’s 14 feet long, and all nylon of alternating shades of green. When Nando cracks it in front of his motel, it makes an illegal sound, echoing through all of downtown Reno.
•••
On a reporting trip in early November, I spend several hours walking up and down the river, with no luck. A few hours after dark I give up and head back toward my truck. But on my way a younger guy walking right in front of me cracks a short whip. It's snappy and small.
He stops and sits on a stone table in the park and I approach him. After assurance that I’m a journalist and not a cop, he says yes, but when I begin to grab my mic he says, no recording. I agree and continue to ask about his whip.
He picks up a nylon bag from the bench, filled with whip making supplies — it’s the only thing he’s carrying with him. It’s 8pm, a cold night, and the park is dead silent.
He pulls out a larger uncompleted whip from the bag. It’s wrapped haphazardly in black and purple rope and has a metal hook protruding from the bottom. He shows me how it lets him wrap the whip and put it away in seconds, like those plastic hooks on a vacuum cleaner. Now that whips are illegal, it seems this might become a necessary new feature.
He’s been working on this whip all day, and the repetitive action of wrapping and braiding calms him. “Which I needed today.” he says “I dealt with some stuff today. Really bad stuff.”
He says he can’t believe he’s about to do this, but offers for me to hold it. I handle it carefully, feeling the bends and the weight.
He says his name is Spooks and he’s probably around 20 years old, maybe younger.
I ask him why he does it.
Whips are about communicating with each other, sure, but that it’s more than that too. The braiding is a meditation on its own, and as he twirls and snakes it back and forth he says: “see this? this is all me. This is my energy flowing through it.
“I can take every stresser and every bad feeling and I can put it into this whip, all the way through” — he swings his arm, lifting it above his head, fluidly waving it toward the fork in the river — “and I can… *CRACK*
“It breaks the sound barrier,” he says, “but it’s more than that. It breaks…I don’t know how to say this but… It breaks realities.”
•
•
The Wind is produced by me, Fil Corbitt.
This episode was scored by Emily Pratt of the band Howls Road. Plus this song by friend of the show Yclept Insan. I will link Emily’s full soundtrack which is great, plus photos of the whip Nando made and more at TheWind.ORG.
Thank you to Emily Pratt, Mike Corbitt and Anjeanette Damon for advice and support on this piece.
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