The movie showed an Army radio telephone operator trying to communicate during a battle. The radioman used the NATO phonetic alphabet, which assigns 26 words, one each to a letter of the English alphabet. The purpose is to eliminate confusion or miscommunication when someone spells words aloud over a phone or radio. It adds clarity to the message by using A: Alpha, B: Bravo, C: … [Read more...]

We had attended a baptism. The baby was the best I'd ever seen at being baptized. My father wore a suit, tie and wingtips. He polished the shoes before taking a step and polished them again before putting them away. As an in-law, his job was chauffeuring, eating and then standing around at a relative's home, sighing deeply until it was time to leave. A fellow in-law told … [Read more...]

Little did I know I was on the brink of an adventure. It happened during a meal. No, it wasn't the one with the granola that had granite in it, and the rice cake with birthday candles on it. Goulash was one of my favorite dishes in our school lunch program, otherwise known as fine dining. We were blessed with talented and caring cooks who also lovingly prepared tater tot … [Read more...]

Ada Sheldon, on a Mound Prairie farm in Houston County, kept a large garden and raised chickens, geese, ducks and canaries as well as children, one of whom was son Sumner (born 1910), who would become a prominent area historian and columnist. “To be sure that she had enough to do, Mama kept about sixty swarms of bees,” quipped Sumner. His mother, while an accomplished … [Read more...]

July 4 had come and gone. There had been fireworks galore, and he still had most of his eyebrows. It had been a splendid summer. He'd never heard of L. P. Hartley, but Hartley had said, "The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there." But one thing remained constant. When summer ends, school begins. On a lifelong journey of self-discovery, he was in junior … [Read more...]

After the hello. That was when we talked about where we hailed from. We were states apart. The idle chatter that followed led to the discovery that we had a friend in common. It was one of those odd coincidences that connect the dots of the universe. "Oh, my word," she said, at that revelation. "Oh, my word" is a mild exclamation of surprise, shock or dismay. It's a polite … [Read more...]

Part two, Portland Prairie, 1850s After Minnesota was organized as a territory in 1849, pioneer settlers arrived in numbers sufficient enough that statehood came nine years later - in 1858. Wisconsin had become a state after 12 years as a territory, Iowa after eight years. Minnesota Territory extended west to the Missouri River, which now crosses both central North Dakota and … [Read more...]