YCGL - Wednesday, July 5-9...., 2023 - Ketchup!!! (Well, kinda)

Wow, so much to Catsup on... Maybe I can make it short and sweet or maybe a little spicy....  well, maybe not.  Julie, maybe I should have taken some of those vegetables this morning....

Oh, and I know now, I'll be home and maybe ready for business on Saturday afternoon, or evening, or Sunday sometime for sure.  I'm pretty positive, I think.....

Wed, June 5th.  From Watson, MN to Herm's house/farmette in Sanborn, MN. What can I say about Herm?

First, Herm is not his name.  It's James Meier.  There was a naming spree in maybe freshman or sophomore year in high school (or maybe earlier) when many of the boys got nicknames.  Mallard, Barney, Nelly, Elmer, Swifty, etc., and Herm.  They still call each other those on occasion, but Herm stuck and he's been known as Herm ever since.  Many in Windom still think that is his name.   

If Sally had had an "older brother" in high school, it would have been Herm.  And he certainly was so after HS.  He's also a great resource.  He remembers people in the class and tries to keep up with where they are and what they're doing.

Going back in history, Sally and I attended her first reunion at the 15th or 20th, 1983 or 1988.   At the 20th, one of the classmates got a little inebriated (read sloppy, stinking drunk.)  He was following girls around, being loud and obnoxious, followed Sally into the Women's bathroom, and it was agreed among the group that he should be taken home.  Well, Herm and I and one other loaded him into a car (not his!) and drove him home and got him inside.  Weelll, he wasn't terribly pleased about that, so he got a rifle and started walking back to the reunion.  He got picked up along the way and was able to spend the night in a secure place at the public expense.  That incident, being jointly hunted, sealed our friendship over the many years.   

After being single for many years, he met Tracy and they hit it off right away.  They got married about five years ago now, and they are a great couple.  She has a great, fast sense of humor very similar to Herm's, and they are a gas to be around.  

One of the things that Tracy has enjoyed about being in the country (they live in an old house on about six acres out in the country north of Windom) is mowing the lawn.  She loves the riding lawnmower and looks forward to the days when she can ride!  (Hint:  turn down the volume!)

Look at the smile on that lady's face.  (Like the old joke, How can you tell a happy motorcycler?  By the bugs on his teeth!)  Totally!

She has been on a mad planting fest, planting something called Hotchkiss, or Hotspur, or HopSkipandaJumpa.  I can't remember the name (obviously!)  And did I get a good picture of it?  Noooo. So here is a blowup from the flowerbed in front of the mower when the video starts. 

Hosta!!

I remembered and looked it up.  That's it. Or Plantain Lilies.  What ever this is, she's been planting them like wild.  She had 80 of them in one bed alone.  They are supposed to be ground cover, kind of, I just hope they don't take over the yard.  

Thursday, June 6th - I went over to the next Harvest Host, a winery, the Painted Prairie Vineyard.  I got there early, about 2:00, which was a good thing, because I was going to meet Herm and Tracy at a restaurant in Revere, MN called Brusier's Place.  They had about 10 different wines listed, so I ordered a glass of a light white wine while looking at the listing.  Then I decided to get a flight of them to try several and they let me take the flight back to the trailer.  So, here is my setup, my computer working on a blog, the flight of wine and looking out over the green cornfield across the road.  This is true Minnesota sophistication! 👍😊  I ordered two bottles and my "free" night at the Harvest Host cost me $75!  (Don't worry, it gets worse.)

Long after I finished the wine, I left for the restaurant about 25 miles away an hour early.  In between was Walnut Grove, the community near the dugout "On the Banks of Plum Creek", by Laura Ingall Wilder.  We were there many years ago, I think Liz would have been about four to six years old.  Ann Nelson, one of Sally's classmates and dear friend, sent the kids one of the Wilder books every year for Christmas.  It was one of those things that the kids looked forward to.  The structure collapsed many years ago, but the dugout hole is still there.  

You can see the depression under the corded area.  

The view from the dugout down to the creek.                 From the creek looking up.  You can just see the The dugout is about 20 feet above the creek.          square top of the sign behind the tree on the horizon.

There is something special about seeing a site like this, it really puts a place and meaning to the book and books.  

Friday, June 7th.  From the Painted Prairie Vineyard in Currie, MN to the Little Swan Lake Winery in Esterville, IA is about 80 miles, about an hour and a half.  But there was an important stop half way, Duffy's Bar and Grill in Windom.  After the 50th reunion in 2018, a group of about six of the local guys started meeting at Duffy's on the 2nd Friday of the month.  When I came through last year, they met on the third Friday so I could be there.  This year, Herm called Ed on Wednesday evening and asked if it would be possible to meet on Friday.  Ed said he would get the word out, but he thought it would be possible.  When I got there, there were six of the guys and four of the women classmates and two spouses were there.  They all shifted there time schedules on one day's notice to meet with me.  I still feel humbled.  They probably don't know how honored I felt that they would do that.  I just love this class.  We are planning to have a 75th birthday party for everyone in two years.  I think we'll have as many people at that as we had at the 55th reunion this year, when 40% of the class showed up.  It's remarkable.  

On to the second winery.  I got there, set up the trailer and went inside.  The proprietor looked like an aging hippie (though my guess he is 10 years younger than me).  They have 20 something different wines, which I wasn't even going to start into.  I explained I wanted a nice light white and a heavy beef red. So, he gave me tastes of two of each, I liked one of each, so got those. I also saw he had a port, which Sally and I drank for a while.  (I won't go into that story because there may be children (like Erik and Liz) reading.)  I tasted it, liked it a lot, and got two of those.  Then, as I was walking out, I saw he had bison meat from his herd.  I got two of those T-Bones, so my free night there cost me over $100 dollars.  It's quite a money saver.....  

That night, I went in to Spirit Lake, IA for fuel, and since it got late, I ate at the Okoboji Store, an old establishment on the shore of East Lake Okoboji.  You'll hear more about Okoboji in a couple of days.  

Hmmm, three days review in five hours.  At this rate, if I write without driving until I get home, I might catch up.  I think this is the same efficiency writing as my saving money at the Harvest Hosts......

Saturday, June 8th - I guess I should explain why I'm sticking around Windom and going to wineries and such.  Ever since we met, Sally used to talk about going to Okoboji and Arnold's Park.  Arnold's Park is an amusement park located in the towns of Okoboji and Spirit Lake.  It is a very popular tourist and vacation destination.  There are three large lakes, Big Spirit Lake and West Lake Okoboji (which are the two largest natural lakes in Iowa) and East Lake Okoboji.  The towns are interspersed between the lakes.  I had never been there, and I was able to get a campground on Big Spirit Lake for three nights, but the earliest I could get it was starting June 9-12.  So I wanted to make up time between the 5th and 6th in Windom and the 9th on the lake.  So, three nights at Harvest Hosts.... Easy.

I stayed around the winery and the bison herd until noon or so.  Since I had been collecting paper bags for wine bottles, I left a stack with him.  Recycle what you can.  They don't make good garbage bags.  (Wyoming hasn't outlawed plastic grocery bags yet.  We have used them for garbage bags ever since the stores switched from paper bags.  That is primary recycling to me.  Erik and Liz thought that was crazy, that I should be using "real" garbage bags from a roll.  Ha! Mine are cheaper.  End of that rant.  Oh, not quite.  The left over bags that I don't use go to our Interfaith/Good Samaritan chapter to use for food distribution to shut-ins.  Thanks Mary! Now end of rant.)

So, Saturday I went to Fort Belmont in Jackson, MN.  The area around Jackson and Windom was starting to be settled in the late 1850's.  Of course, the settlers were displacing the natives who had used that area for centuries.  On August 24, 1862, a group of settlers were attacked by a large party of Sioux Indians in which 13 people were killed.  This was known as the Belmont Massacre.  As a consequence, the settlers decided to build a fort consisting of a 18'x26' two story cabin surrounded by a stockade.  Eleven families, between 60 to 70 people, lived in that stockade and cabin for most of two years.  Because it was built by citizens and not the military, it is classified as a civilian fort and was one of only two built in the mid-west in the 1800s.  The original fort was located about four miles north of Jackson, but it no long exists and this is a replica.  

Summer living quarters for 60-70 people, though the men probably slept out in the yard.

A corner from the old cabin.                        A loom, though not likely to have been in the crowded quarters.

A bellows in the blacksmith shop.  

There are seven buildings across the 30 acres, the fort and smithy, a watchtower, a soddy, a grist mill, a Lutheran church, a pioneer house that had been added onto twice, and an apothecary.  Mary, these may look familiar.

There are some pretty scary bottles on those shelves!

A prescription book with 1000's of prescriptions filled over decades.  

The old house was "typical", but like any old house, it held a lot of stories.  The center section was the original building, built in 1873 after they had lived in a soddy for three years after coming from Norway.  The closest section is the kitchen, which was added in 1895.  There was no running water.  The home was occupied until 1958.  

The bedroom was in the original section.

Skipping ahead a week, I listened to Willa Cather's book about settling in Nebraska, O Pioneers, while I was driving through.  Yes, this was the settler's experience, whether Minnesota like my great-grandparents or Iowa or Nebraska.  

The grist mill was a lesson in itself.  The overshot wheel was feed by spring water flowing through the trough.  They only run it a short time to allow the water level to build up to get the flow they need.  

Inside the building, the shaft of the waterwheel (outside on the right) is supported by block bearings and drives a cog wheel (called a pit wheel) on the right.  (Unfortunately, the picture is shot through a Plexiglas shield.  

The cog or pit wheel drives the wallower on the vertical shaft.  (I'd hate to tell you how long it took to find the name of the wallower, dang curiosity).  The vertical shaft then drives the runner stone on top of the bed stone.  (You'd better believe this will be on the exam after how long that took!)  

               A nice picture of the grind stones.

In all, it was a really interesting place to visit.  I learned a lot.  She took just me on the tour for about an hour and a half, and another half hour in the museum.  All for just a donation.  I gave a good one.  Highly recommended.