February 8, 2012 Edition
Serving Belle Plaine and Surrounding Communities for Over 131 Years
30 Years Ago
60 Years Ago (1952)
Creamery Day here was a gala event. A contributing factor to the big attendance was the announcement that there would be a dividend distribution of $40,803.29.
In the DeKalb five-acre corn growing contest for 1951, William Koniarski and Edward Otto won the second and third awards, respectively, Scott County.
Mrs. Jos. Witt sold her farm in Belle Plaine Township to Wallace Miller of New Prague.
Howard Schultz sold his 200-acre farm in Blakeley Township to Ivan Theleman of Le Sueur.
The Blakeley Farmers Creamery Association held its annual meeting. The guest speaker was J.C. Stiles of the Golden State Dairy, representative one of the largest distributors of dairy products in the West.
Captain Donald Westhoff, just back from 17 months in Korea, was the guest speaker at the regular meeting of the PTA. He talked on the subject of Universal Military Training. He was the former assistant pastor of Sacred Heart Church.
Bernard Conlin, native of St. John’s, died at his home near Monticello. He was 57 years old.
The winter weather continued to charm everyone. Local thermometers hit the middle 40s.
The funeral of Mary Conlin, daughter of James and Anna Conboy Conlin, was held at her native parish church at St. John’s. She was 82 years old.
Frank Dvorak of Helena Township told authorities that four hogs were stolen from his farm.
Gilbert Dammann and Clinton Luedtke, Norwood, drove to New York, then boarded the Queen Mary for Europe to tour England and the west European countries.
An open house took place at the new community hospital in New Prague. The building provided 42 beds and had facilities for 14 bassinets.
At a meeting of the directors of the Minnesota River League, it was decided that the league would go ahead as an eight-team league with the exclusion of Shakopee. The action was necessitated when no delegate from Shakopee appeared at the meeting.
The Belle Plaine High School cagers dropped their fifth conference game in eight total starts to a powerful Arlington quint, 44-33.
In a tight battle all the way, the New Prague town team edged the Belle Plaine Independents by one points, 59-58.
90 Years Ago (1922)
There was a rumor that the cereal mill would reopen. Harrison Thompson, the new owner, was here from Minneapolis to look over the plant.
A group of five acquired 18 acres on Bow String Lake, Itasca County, for a fishing and hunting ground. They were J.S. Effertz, J.F. Schmidt, Harry A. Irwin, Fred J. Keup and H.A. Nitz.
J.G. Hinman, who had operated a shoe repair shop here, moved to Savage with his family.
At the reorganization meeting of the livestock shipping association, the following directors were elected: J.A. Lundborg, J. Theo Bieder, John Olson Bratt, Pat Hessian, Chris Woestehoff, W.J. Sharkey, Swan Halquist, Jas. F. McDevitt, Thos. Newell.
While Mr. and Mrs. Emil Spander were attending church in Belle Plaine, their farm home burned to the ground. With the house were lost all their accumulated family effects.
The Blakeley Creamery held its annual meeting with E.E. Schultz being elected the new president. During the year the creamery manufactured 175,000 pounds of butter.
The Legion Auxiliary unit was organized with Mrs. Emeline Whitlock commander, Frances C. Irwin vice commander, Mary Wilson secretary and Mrs. Frances Mohrbacher treasurer.
The hog sale conducted by Henry Ahens of Jordan amounted to $2,106. Purchasers from this locality were John P. Holden, C.R. Lundquist and Joe Solheid.
Several Sibley County rural schools held a spelling contest at Blakeley. The Kerry Lake school, represented by Jay Bailey and Lawrence Bigaouette, won first prize.
Mrs. A.P. Felt died at the family home in West Union, in which community she was born in 1858. A resident of West Union all her life, she was survived by her husband and five children.
Con Hogan, son of pioneer Assumption settlers, died while on a visit at the home of his sister, Mrs. Garvey, in Graceville. He was born in Hancock Township in 1863 and lived there until 1881.
Mr. and Mrs. Chas. Strobel of Arlington located at East Union where he took charge as manager of the East Union Creamery.
Five creameries in the locality – Belle Plaine, Blakeley, Jordan, Lydia and Le Sueur – united in shipping a solid carload of butter to New York.
(1982)
Six projects were bequeathed a total of $18,390 at that Monday night’s Chamber of Commerce meeting. The money was surplus funds accumulated in the Bar-B-Q Days fund. The largest dollar amount ($6,500) would go to the swimming pool, followed by the softball park ($5,000), the historical society ($3,000) and the hockey and broomball rink lights ($2,350).
Prairie Plastics was the name of a new company that was in the process of setting up in Belle Plaine. Bruce Edberg, Louie Lieske, John Buszmann and Jerry Fahrenkamp were the incorporators. All four were from Belle Plaine and collectively had almost 50 years in the plastic-molding business. The four former Norwesco employees leased the 50- by 100-foot steel building east of the Sales Barn from Convair Inc.
It was announced that Mr. and Mrs. Mike Flaherty would be grand marshals of the 1982 Belle Plaine St. Patrick’s Parade.
It was announced that the number of driving while intoxicated (DWI) arrests increased by 40 percent in Minnesota for the first nine months of 1981, and there were some people in the state who wanted to do something about that – they wanted the number of arrests to go down. Those were local legislators, Gov. Al Quie, gubernatorial candidate Warren Spannuas and local law enforcement officers who were working on new proposals that would tighten laws and make the penalties for drunk driving so strong that anyone even slightly tipsy would think twice before getting behind the wheel, which would lead to fewer arrests.
The Belle Plaine High School basketball team evened its record at six wins and six losses for the season with nonconference victories over Maranantha Academy (70-63) and Shattuck (53-44) sandwiched around an exciting but very disappointing loss to conference foe Mankato Loyola (51-50). Brent Meyer had 19 points for the Tigers in the loss to Loyola and 14 in the win over Shattuck. Mark Sellnow led the way against Maranantha with 16 points.
Montgomery defeated the Belle Plaine girls’ cagers 43-40 in overtime, lowering the Tigers’ record to 8-6. Belle Plaine’s Sandi Schmidt and Mary Leonard scored 12 and 11 points, respectively.
The Tiger wrestlers beat Mankato Loyola 43-12 and lost to Shakopee 40-9 that week. Ed Fogarty (pin) and Jim O’Brien (decision) accounted for Belle Plaine’s only points against AA power Shakopee.
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120 Years Ago (1892)
One morning thermometers recorded 24 below zero and by noon the same day it was thawing weather.
Mrs. Bridget Glynn sold her farm to Adam Ruhland and bought a house in Belle Plaine.
There was some agitation towards getting a creamery started here. It was claimed there would be big money in it.
There was rivalry among farmers as to who could haul the largest load of wheat to town. Wm. Flynn held the record with 95 bushels until Thomas Baldwin brought in a load that held 105 bushels.
Sensations were crowding each other at Chaska. The latest was the disappearance of the city treasurer under strange circumstances.
The country was concerned over numerous outrages by the “White Caps.”
Science Fair Winners
First-place winners in the 1982 Belle Plaine Science Fair at the elementary school were Denise Koepp, Julie Johnson, Sean Fogarty, Ron Iverson and Pat Daly. Iverson’s project is pictured.
