125 YEARS AGO: 1898
Some men have a most distressing habit of carrying their business home with them in the evening and lying awake at night to think about it. This is a bad habit, which anyone with any sort of control over himself can break. The conclusion of the whole matter is that man walketh in the vain shadow and disquieteth himself in vain, and the most unhappy man is the one who thinks everything is wrong and that it is his special calling to set it right.
It looks as though his groundhogship got unduly frightened when he popped back into his hole at the sight of his shadow. We can easily stand six more weeks of winter like this.
Chris Madsen and Chris Nygaard sallied out to make a friendly call and thereby hangs the tale. Their objective was Soren Sorenson’s home. The boys claim to have been in ignorance of the formidable fortification, which Mr. Sorenson had prepared in the vicinity of his chicken coop for the reception of nocturnal marauders. They suddenly found themselves ambushed by bear traps, Gatling guns, pitfalls and burglar alarms. At the first onslaught, the owner of the place appeared on the breastworks armed to the teeth. Our heroes fled in ignominious defeat and so they stoutly declare, four “sassy” bullets pierced the air in close proximity to their persons. Sorenson’s hen coop must and shall be protected.
100 YEARS AGO: 1923
All first-class letters addressed to Hutchinson city will have to bear two-cent stamps after the establishment of city free delivery, unless you are positive that the addressed still has a post office box. The safest way to avoid delay will be to place a two-cent stamp on all first-class drop letters.
Dr. H.J. Hanson of New London has devised a new and better system for visiting his patients in the winter and this clever scheme is a bob that has both wheels and runners. Dr. Hanson has worked on the vehicle all summer and he has reason to be proud of it now. The bob is the body of a Ford car narrowed to the width of sleigh tracks with the driving shafts shortened. There are runners at both the front and back and a pair of wheels in the center. The bob seats two people, one in front and one in back. Dr. Hanson tried the bob recently and said it runs just fine.
75 YEARS AGO: 1948
A fire broke out and spread with lightning-like speed, gutting the new Goebel Cabinet Shop building,causing a loss of more than $20,000. Hutchinson firemen battled the blaze in below zero weather for almost four hours, pouring an estimated 100,000 gallons of water on the stubborn flames, which were finally contained in the space between the ceiling and roof. Major loss was in the form of finished wood products and lumber. Extensive damage was done to the machinery in the plant and the building itself. The concern, operated by Fred Goebel and his two sons — Harvey and Virgil — had just started working on a large contract for the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co. consisting of 20,000 Scotch tape display cabinets.
50 YEARS AGO: 1973
Bruce Ellig, Cedar Mills, and Dennis Grotto, Litchfield, were the only area racers who managed to avoid mechanical trouble and end up among the finishers in the fog-shortened St. Paul Winter Carnival International 500 snowmobile race. The race, which began Jan. 23 in Winnipeg, Canada, was called off in Alexandria because of dense fog, which blanketed the race course. Alexandria was the last stopover in the race originally scheduled to end Jan. 26 in St. Paul.
25 YEARS AGO: 1998
Hutchinson Park Supervisor John Arlt has accepted an offer from the Glencoe-Silver Lake School District to become its community education director. “We are really going to feel the impact,” said Dolf Moon, director of Hutchinson Parks, Recreation and Community Education. “There were a lot of things I didn’t have to worry about because John made it easy for me because he didn’t need a lot of direction.”
Hutchinson Area Health Care has added another key link in the delivery of emergency health care services: Ambulances that are staffed by paramedics trained with advanced medical skills. Six of the 19-member HAHC ambulance staff have completed training that elevates them to the status of paramedic.
The second annual Strike Out the Violence fundraiser to benefit McLeod Alliance for Victims of Domestic Violence is noon to 5 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 8, at Pla-Mor Lanes in Glencoe. The community-based nonprofit program was established in 1993. Since then, staff has worked with about 600 people, averaging about 25 to 35 people per month, and those numbers have remained fairly steady over the years.
McLeod County Sheriff Duane Kopesky has announced that he will retire at the end of 1998. Kopesky has been working in law enforcement for 30 years, and has served as the McLeod County Sheriff for five consecutive terms.
