All your favorite weekly columns and letters to the editor- online!

Editor's Notebook by Bill Blauvelt

A Different Slant by Chuck Mittan

Country Roads by Gloria Garman-Schlaefli

Letters to the Editor and other columns

Editor's Notebook by Bill Blauvelt
Rita's been in Osborne County for most of a week helping her father with the wheat harvest. As our only nephew, Garrett, and his wife were to be at the farm for a few hours Sunday and the fact I was missing a cook in residence at 500 Commercial, I went to the farm.
Before supper, Rita took Garrett and Sarah to the wheat field. We will soon be sending them a picture they can show their Virginia friends to prove they actually were in Kansas when the wheat was being harvested-perhaps the very wheat that someday will be used in the baking of their bread.
After the trip to the wheat field, Garrett took Sarah into the hills to look at the pond which supplies water for the cattle and his grandparents' garden. The pond is full and an a clear stream of water was flowing in the creek which runs between his grandparents' home and their garden.
At the dinner table we talked about how much fun it would be to play in the creek but unless it happened after I left, everybody stayed out of the creek. Garrett did take Sarah to look at the creek (it was fitting excursion for a young man trained as a marine biologist). Perhaps he told Sarah about the pre-teen when he played in and by the creek.
Sunday I wished horses were like ATV's. Just get one from the machine shed, start it up and go for a ride.
If left idle for long periods an ATV may need a new spark plug, fresh fuel and a recharged battery but horses are much more particular. They need to be cared for daily and ridden regularly. Once or twice a year isn't adequate.
The hills were a deep green, the sky deep blue with puffy white clouds, temperature in the low 80s and following Thursday's cloud burst, all the ponds were full and the creeks flowing. It would have been great fun to explore the hills.
I bought a motorcyle once with that in mind but found it wasn't much fun. When I was a youngster and went exploring with a horse, I let the horse watch the trail while I took in all the sights that surrounded us. But with a motorcycle, I was so busy watching where the cycle was going, I didn't have time to enjoy where I'd been.
Some of my horses enjoyed the exploration trips as much as I did. A rider and his horse can build strong bonds. This week the Nebraska State Historical Society distributed a story about such a bond developed about 140 years ago in Omaha.
Dr. Enos Lowe (1804-1880) was one of Omaha's pioneer settlers. He helped lay out the city in 1853 and served as the community's first mayor.
A letter from Lowe to the editor of the Omaha Daily Herald published on July 27, 1875, eulogized one of Lowe's horses.
He wrote, "In 1855 I purchased of Gid Robertson a matched team of grey horses which Judge James brought from Dixon, Ill. The horses were then six or seven years old, their tails nicked skillfully, and nicely set up. They were dappled then, and as much alike as two back-eyed peas out of the same pod. At the first and second Douglas county fair, they took the premium for the best span. There are a few early settlers who will recollect the perfect and unequalled style and appearance of George and Jim as an attractive street ornament during the first 15 years of Omaha. They were as kind and affectionate to each other as the best of brothers. If separated for a moment, manifested deep distress. For a quarter of a century they traveled, ate and slept side by side.
"But less than two years ago, Jim's left fore ankle was wrenched severely, producing great suffering and swelling, and for months it was almost impossible for him to get up. But instead of subjecting him to the usual in such cases, on penetrating the brain with a bullet, he was treated in the kindest, but less economical manner, and thus his life was prolonged until Saturday afternoon. July 24, 1875, when at the age of 27 years he breathed his last, and now, rests, decently buried, and will be affectionately remembered by those he served so well, in connection with the idea of a pastures ever green, awaiting the coming of his companion and mate as indispensable to his perfect happiness in the better land.
"In the burial it was arranged for George to take his old place again on the near side of his mate, and by and by. Notwithstanding his great age, 27 or 28, George has never learned to speak the English language, but if you could see him as I have seen him since his bereavement, rapidly moving his ears, looking with evident anxiety across into the pasture where he was taken away from his dying companion, and hear his calls of distress, I think you would agree with me that horse talk can easily be understood. I never shall own their like again."

A Different Slant by Chuck Mittan
My 12-year-old daughter, Kateri, had her aura cleansed on Saturday.
No kidding.
Now if she would only have her bedroom similarly cleansed, that would really speak to me.
My wife came home from our favorite bookstore and coffee house one day last week and told us there would be a woman cleansing auras there on Saturday, if any of us were interested.
I told her I was pretty sure my aura had disappeared with my advanced age, however on the off-chance I was wrong, my aura could just remain cloudy, or foggy, or dusty, or however auras get after time without proper cleansing.
My wife was interested, though, and so was Kateri. My youngest daughter, Molly, is apparently comfortable with her shabby, uncleansed aura just the way it is.
The reactions by customers at the store varied upon finding out they could have their auras cleansed in the back room. Here are few I remember:
"Oh, thank goodness! It's been months, where do I sign?"
"What's an aura?"
Uncontrollable laughter.
The woman, who I didn't meet or even see, was practicing her trade in the back room of the book store, which had been tidied and straightened earlier in the week in preparation for Saturday. She was taking appointments in half-hour increments. I don't know if there was special music involved, but I did smell incense. It smelled more like the incense from my college dormitory days than that which is typically burned in our Catholic church, which I believe to be patchouli.
Also offered for sale in the front of the store were a variety of beautiful feathers, tips wrapped in leather and pretty stones, crystals or other trinkets dangling from the leather end. I believe these feathers were related to the aura cleansing, but I didn't ask.
The brochure offered by the woman said her price for the cleansing would be $11, however in order to become certified, or licensed, or affiliated, or whatever aura cleansers become, she was first required to do 100 cleansings at no cost to the cleansees. That's what she was doing on Saturday. Working on her 100 freebies. Each client was asked to fill out a survey after the session, to document the 100 freebies as well as provide feedback to the budding spiritualist healer, I imagine.
Now, I'm sure it seems like I'm poking more than a little fun at this practice, but I'm really not. I would have to know much more about it than I do before I would feel comfortable making fun of it. Besides, each of the cleansees I talked to said they felt much better afterward, Kateri included.
Guess I missed the boat.

Country Roads by Gloria Garman-Schlaefli
It looks like this Fourth of July will be celebrated, as usual, in the wheat harvest fields at the Schlaefli farm. I have celebrated more Independence Holidays in the harvest fields as not. Whether in the harvest fields, watching a public fireworks display, or attending a family celebration, Friday is the time to celebrate the 232th anniversary of the signing Declaration of Independence.
The way Americans celebrate July 4 has changed but the meaning remains the same. We are proud to be Americans and thankful for our country's independence.
In looking through old Jewell County newspaper files I've decided in the days gone by the July 4th celebrations were more elaborate than they are today. Patriotic parades were often a favorite activity.
One such patriotic parade planned for July 4, 1883, was announced in the June 29, 1883, issue of the Jewell Republican. The parade was to be hosted by G.A.R. Post No. 58 (a popular organization made up of civil war veterans.) The celebration was to begin in Jewell City at sunrise with a 13-gun salute near the public square. Officers and officials of the local and neighboring G.A.R. units were to participate. Included were officers from Omio, Mankato and Jewell City. A procession of G.A.R. members would form in Jewell City at 9:30 a.m. They were to march to the "grove." The newspaper reported members of the Grand Army in regulation uniform were to form on Custer Street, "right resting on Delaware Street." Jim Lane Post of Mankato was to take position on the right. "Straggling comrades and old soldiers not members of any post were to take position in the centre, and S.R. Deach Post on the left." The Jewell City Cornet Band and Martial Band were then to take their positions on the right of the column in order named.
"The ragamuffins and horsemen will form on Washington Street, east side of square, right resting on Delaware Street." All vehicles were to assemble on the streets east of and running parallel with Washington Street and north of Delaware Street, "keeping the latter street entirely clear." The procession was then to file down Delaware Street and as the left of the column reached Washington Street, the ragamuffins and horsemen were to file out. As each succeeding street was passed, the vehicles were to form on the rear of the moving procession. It went on to inform that this procession was to be strictly obeyed.
The march was to continue out of Jewell City to the grove but the location of the grove was not mentioned in the article. At the grove, the program began with a prayer and patriotic music (including several vocal solos). The Declaration of Independence was read. After a picnic dinner, there was another program consisting of readings, music, oration and toasts. There was also a time for volunteer and "impromptu speeches."
At dusk, the G.A.R. was to give a "fine" display of hand fireworks, to be followed by the "largest general display of fireworks ever seen in Jewell County." Later that night it was stated, "the doors of J.D. Robertson's old store room will be thrown open for the merry dancers at early candle light." Music will be provided by the "famous" Caldwell string band of Omio.
The announcement predicted "A well supplied sutlers' stand will be conducted by the G.A.R. boys in the same building."
I didn't know what a sutler's stand was and probably didn't want to know but I set in search of the meaning. In a dictionary published in the early years of the last 20th century I learned a sutler was a person who follows an army and sells to the troops provisions, liquors or the like.
Perhaps, it would have been best that I did not know about the sutler's stand.