Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

Thank you, Mr. Postmaster, for finally hearing the voice of rural America May 14, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:33 PM
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FINALLY, AN IDEA that makes sense for continuing postal service in parts of rural America.

The United States Postal Service revealed a plan last week that could keep thousands of small-town post offices open by reducing hours. That’s certainly better than the alternative for places like Hope, Minnesota, an unincorporated community just off Interstate 35 south of Owatonna in Steele County. Last summer Hope’s 120 residents learned that their post office, like thousands of others across the country, likely would close in a cost-cutting measure.

Under a proposal, the Hope Post Office will remain open with daily window hours cut from eight to two.

Residents of Hope didn’t simply give up and accept their fate.  Instead, they circulated petitions and attended meetings and voiced their opinions and filed an appeal. To no avail. The postal service announced in April that the Hope Post Office would close. But now it appears the Postal Service has had a change of heart about closing thousands of small-town post offices nation-wide.

Postmaster General and CEO Patrick R. Donahoe said in part last week: “…we’ve listened to our customers in rural America and we’ve heard them loud and clear—they want to keep their post office open. We believe today’s announcement will serve our customers’ needs and allow us to achieve real savings to help the Postal Service return to long-term financial stability.”

So what does all that official talk mean? Some 13,000 post offices are now on “a preliminary list (for modified hours) that requires additional review, analysis, and verification and is subject to change.” Of those, 407 are located in Minnesota.

Well, the Postal Service is certainly covering all of its bases with that language, leaving room to tweak proposals and change plans/minds. I suppose one can never be too careful and cautious when one is a government entity. Meetings will be held in the affected communities to review options, which could take more than two years to implement.

Additional alternatives, according to the Postal Service, include mail delivery to affected customers via rural carrier or highway contract route; contracting with a local business for a village post office; and offering service from a nearby post office.

In a news release issued May 9, Postal Service Chief Operating Officer Megan Brennan says: “The post offices in rural America will remain open unless a community has a strong preference for one of the other options. We will not close any of these rural post offices without having provided a viable solution.”

Good.

The post office in Randolph is facing reduced hours, dropping from eight daily to four.

This certainly comes as welcome news to the folks in Hope and in many other Minnesota communities. In my region, post offices in Morristown, Warsaw, Kilkenny, Webster, Nerstrand, Dennison, Hampton, Castle Rock and Randolph are facing possible reduced hours.

My hometown of Vesta 120 miles to the west, along with nearby Wabasso, Wanda and Wood Lake, also made the modified hours list.

In every corner of Minnesota and hundreds of places in between, you’ll find those 407 small-town post offices where window service is likely to be trimmed. The Minnesota list fills slightly more than eight pages on a 260-page document that includes some 13,000 post offices across the U.S. To read that list, click here.

The Mantorville post office, where this photo was taken, is on the preliminary list of southeastern Minnesota post offices slated to have daily hours cut from eight to six.

It’s never a good thing, to reduce service in a small town. But closing the post offices would be worse.

I sometimes wonder if the decision-makers have ever set foot in these small towns, if they grasp the importance of a post office as an integral fiber in the fabric of community. Post offices are more than a place to pick up mail, to purchase stamps, to send a package. In these small towns, they are also community gathering places, a locale to exchange news, a spot to reach out to neighbors and a symbol of community identity.

I’ve witnessed, first-hand, how losing a school, a church, a business, can impact a rural community. In Vesta, for example, the town’s 330 residents can’t even buy a loaf of bread or a gallon of milk; they must travel some 20 miles for those staples. I remember when my hometown’s Main Street was lined with businesses, including a grocery store, two hardware stores and more.

Yes, times have changed. We are a more mobile society. We communicate via cell phones and e-mail and Facebook and other social media. But not everyone. In these small towns—the ones where the Postal Service initially considered shuttering post offices—many elderly residents don’t own computers, relying instead on old-fashioned mail delivery to pay bills and send letters and hear from loved ones. The post office is vital to their system of communication.

That the U.S. Postal Service finally heard the loud and clear voice of rural America, and perhaps understood that voice, pleases me as it should thousands of other Americans.

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Second Faribault jeweler hit in apparent state-wide crime wave April 25, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 2:50 PM
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Chappius Jewelers, photographed several years ago, and the latest target of thieves.

YOU HAVE TO HAND IT to the owners of Douglas Diamonds & Fine Jewelry. They possess a sense of humor.

Less than two weeks after a Saturday morning break-in netted smash-and-grab thieves $10,000 in merchandise, the Faribault jeweler is running an ad in the Faribault Daily News with this tag:

Even thieves know great jewelry when they see it.

Examined alone, this ad would, indeed, strike you as funny, and creative. The catchy phrase grabs the reader’s attention.

But a few pages back in the same issue (today’s), this headline also draws attention:

Break-in at Chappuis Jewelry

The Faribault newspaper is reporting that a second jewelry store was targeted around 9:45 p.m. Tuesday by smash-and-grab thieves. You can read the complete story about the theft at Chappuis Jewelry, right around the block from the police station in the heart of historic downtown Faribault, by clicking here.

When you read that story, you won’t laugh. Not at all. The newspaper reports a string of jewelry store break-ins state-wide and a growing concern among law enforcement about the brashness of the criminals and the safety of their own, business owners and the public.

After leaving Faribault last night, the same group reportedly continued on to Hastings and hit a jewelry store there around 11 p.m.

The jewelry store crime wave apparently began on April 7 with a theft at Chilson Jewelers in Cambridge. Since then, jewelers in Apple Valley, Farmington and Buffalo have also been hit and investigators are looking into a connection with similar cases in Wayzata and Alexandria.

Let’s hope investigators get a break in these cases soon, before a break-in (and I expect there will be more) escalates into a violent confrontation.

 

In Clintonville: I survived the 1.5 March 28, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 11:52 AM
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The Booms Are Back! Residents of Clintonville Are Reporting Very Loud Noises on Tuesday Night!

So screams the headline scrolling across the Clintonville Chronicle website today as this Wisconsin community northwest of Green Bay experiences yet more unsettling booms following a recent 1.5 magnitude earthquake that rattled residents.

Since my second daughter lives in Appleton about 40 miles to the south, I’ve taken a special interest in Clintonville. Geologists determined that a “swarm” of earthquakes, amplified by Wisconsin’s unique bedrock, caused the shaking and sonic type booms that have awakened and frightened residents in this town of 4,736.

Yes, I would be scared, too, if the earth started rattling and rumbling.

And, just for the record, my daughter has been to the small medical clinic in Clintonville for her job as a Spanish medical interpreter, although not recently.

In perusing the newspaper website, I am happy to see that Clintonville is already embracing the economic opportunities that come with being thrust into the national spotlight. T-shirts emblazoned with “I Survived the 1.5” can be purchased in Clintonville or ordered online. Click here for more information about those shirts.

T-shirt sale profits “will be used to beautify or enhance something in our City as determined by the Mayor at a later date,” promo info reads. “This is not meant to make light of a serious situation but to show that we, as a community, came together to get through the events of this week.”

Let me interject here to applaud the folks of Clintonville. This is one of the attributes I admire in small towns. Togetherness.

I expect that the earthquake marks the biggest news event ever in Clintonville. In a typical week, you’re more likely to read top stories like these from the March 20 Chronicle: “Clintonville Sheep Now Famous,” “Christus to Host Spring Luncheon” and “Sheriffs Seek Evidence of Burglary” rather than “City of Clintonville is Booming.” Click here to access the award-winning Chronicle home page.

All of that booming has also prompted some Clintonville residents to purchase earthquake insurance. (Click here to see a map of  March 19 – 21 quake-related reports from Clintonville.) My daughter mentioned the insurance sales to me yesterday during a noon-time phone conversation, just before she headed out the door to a clinic in New London, some 15 miles south of Clintonville.

WHAT ARE YOUR thoughts on an earthquake in Wisconsin, of all places?

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Same day, same highway 50 miles apart: Plane lands, cattle truck crashes January 7, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 3:57 PM
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KNOWN AS A NOTORIOUSLY DANGEROUS roadway along some stretches, U.S. Highway 14 in southern Minnesota Thursday grabbed headlines again with two separate crashes about 50 miles and 12 hours apart. One involved a cattle truck, the other a small plane.

This time though, only cattle, not people, died.

I know this road, The Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic Highway, well as it’s the route my family travels back to my native southwestern Minnesota.

I shot this image along U.S. Highway 14 east of Lamberton several weeks ago.

Around midnight Thursday, January 5, a semi truck pulling a cattle trailer left Highway 14 just east of the Nicollet County Road 37 intersection near New Ulm and rolled onto its side in the ditch, according to news reports. The driver suffered only minor injuries, but some of the 35 cattle were killed in the crash or had to be euthanized.

About 50 miles west and some 12 hours earlier, Highway 14 east of Revere in Redwood County became a runway for a Lakeville pilot who was forced to make an emergency landing, according to news sources. He managed to land his plane on the road before it went into a ditch and flipped.

As in the cattle truck accident, the pilot escaped with only minor injuries.

When I first heard and read about these accidents, I was simply thankful that the truck driver and pilot survived. I was thankful, too, that others traveling along Highway 14 were not involved.

Then I started wondering exactly how many vehicles travel along these sections of Highway 14 each day and how those counts and the timing and locations of the incidents affected the outcomes.

According to the most recent statistics I could find from the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s Office of Transportation Data and Analysis, the 2009 annual average daily traffic count was 8,000 for the Highway 14 area where the cattle truck crashed.

See how the outcome could have been so much different had this occurred during peak daylight travel hours? Anyone who’s driven Highway 14 between New Ulm and Mankato realizes just how unsafe this narrow, arterial road is with its heavy traffic, county and other roads intersecting the highway and few opportunities to safely pass.

Fortunately, 50 miles west, the traffic count drops considerably as the population decreases and the land stretches flat and wide into acres of fields punctuated by farm sites and small towns.

Near Revere, where the pilot landed his plane on Highway 14 before noon on Thursday, MnDOT lists the 2007 annual average daily traffic count as 1,550. Odds of putting a plane down without hitting a vehicle were definitely in the pilot’s favor.

And given trees are sparse on the prairie, luck was in the aviator’s favor there, too.

Fortunately, the emergency landing also occurred outside of Revere, in the 3.5 miles between the town of 100 residents and Highwater Ethanol and not too dangerously close to either. The ethanol plant, of which my middle brother is the CEO/GM, is situated along Highway 14 between the crash site and Lamberton.

Viewing a 1994 plat of the area, I spotted a landing strip just to the north and east of Revere. I could not verify whether that still exists and it really doesn’t matter given the pilot claims he had to make a snap decision to put his failing aircraft down Thursday on Highway 14 at a speed of 90 mph.

I’m thankful that on January 5, 2012, U.S. Highway 14 in southern Minnesota didn’t rack up more fatal statistics. It’s already had too many.

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

The generous gift of a St. Paul woman to a rural Minnesota food shelf January 6, 2012

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 1:38 PM
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TODAY I’M TREATING YOU to a gem of a story published yesterday in a weekly community newspaper, The Gaylord Hub.

It’s an inspiring and uplifting story of a St. Paul woman who purposely sought out a rural food shelf as the recipient of a Christmas gift. And a mighty generous one from someone with apparently no connection to Gaylord, a southern Minnesota Sibley County seat town of around 2,300.

Hub officer manager and bookkeeper Elizabeth Reishus shares the tale of generosity in her January 5 “The Word From High Avenue” column as shared with her by Yvonne O’Brien of Sibley County Food Share, Inc.

Writes Reishus:

A woman from St. Paul had called Second Harvest food bank to ask for a list of rural food shelves. Second Harvest was not able to give her that information, but did give her O’Brien’s phone number.

The woman then called O’Brien and asked questions about the food shelf. What percent of families served were minorities? Is the need higher in the summer? What kinds of resources does your food shelf have to rely on for donations?

O’Brien explained that about 40 percent of clients at the food shelf are people of a minority. The need for help increases in the summer when seasonal workers arrive to work at area farms and other agriculture-related jobs. She also explained that unlike bigger towns and cities, we do not have the big chain stores such as Wal-Mart, Target, Cub or Cash Wise that donate food. The Sibley County Food Shelf is maintained through the generosity of area people and some grant money, O’Brien explained.

The St. Paul woman said she would like to send a donation to the food shelf. O’Brien gave the woman the mailing address for donations and expected to receive a check for about $50. She was pleasantly surprised to find that the donation check was for 10 times that amount. The generous mystery woman gave $500 to the Sibley County Food Shelf.

How’s that for Minnesota Nice and for thinking beyond the metro?

Consider the effort this mystery woman took to find just the right place for her $500 donation. What motivated her to seek out a rural food shelf, to ask those specific questions about minorities, to give that much money to a single food shelf?

I’d never really thought, prior to reading Reishus’ column, how small-town food banks typically don’t receive food donations from chain stores, relying instead primarily on the generosity of locals.

So thank you to that woman from St. Paul for thinking beyond the metro area of the need in rural Minnesota and for blessing Sibley County Food Share with $500.

She offers us much food for thought.

FOR MORE INFORMATION about Sibley County Food Share, click here.

 

Farewell to the Swany White Flour Mill of Freeport December 28, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:48 PM
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Freeport promotes itself as "The city with a smile!" That's the smiling water tower to the right and the Swany White Flour Mill to the left in front of the church steeple in this June 2011 image. Freeport is among the communities after which Garrison Keillor's fictional Lake Wobegon is fashioned.

CROSSING THE OVERPASS into Freeport last June, I snapped a quick landscape photo with the town’s charming water tower smiling at travelers along Interstate 94 in central Minnesota.

I should have focused, though, on the old-fashioned grain elevator-style flour mill to the left in my framed image.

Late Tuesday afternoon this historic icon, the Swany White Four Mill, built in 1897 and owned by the Thelen family since 1903, burned. Minnesota has lost an important part of her history, a still-functioning mill of yesteryear that specialized in producing commercial grade and organic flour and was known for its famous Swany White Buttercake Pancake and Waffle Mix.

That I never realized the importance of this towering, aged building on that June afternoon saddens me for I am typically drawn to small-town elevators. But when my husband and I swung into Freeport late on that Saturday afternoon 6 ½ months ago, we were more interested in finding Charlie’s Café, a popular dining spot in this town of 450. We were hungry. Charlie’s was packed, so we left town without eating there, but not until I snapped photos of the café and Sacred Heart Church and School.

Popular Charlie's Cafe is noted for its tasty homemade food including caramel rolls, meringue pies and hot beef commercials. To the right is the Pioneer Inn, after which Garrison Keillor modeled The Sidetrack Tap in his fictional Lake Wobegon. Keillor and his family lived near Freeport in the early 1970s.

Sacred Heart Church, Freeport, described by Garrison Keillor as "a fine tall yellow-brick edifice with a high steep roof."

Sacred Heart School in Freeport, a lovely old building that caught my eye.

I totally missed out on the Swany White Flour Mill, simply because I was unaware of its important existence.

Eleven years ago, though, the historic mill, Charlie’s and other central Minnesota scenes were photographed by National Geographic photographer Richard Olsenius, illustrating a story, “In Search of Lake Wobegon,” by Garrison Keillor, expanded in 2001 as a book. A sister-in-law gave me her copy of the December 2000 National Geographic recently, knowing how much I would appreciate Keillor’s writing and the black-and-white images by Olsenius. I do.

Keillor rented a farmhouse south of Freeport some 40 years ago. He and his family weren’t exactly embraced by the community during the three years they lived there. Keillor writes about his experiences in the magazine piece, where he reveals that his fictional Lake Wobegon is based on life in central Minnesota, including Freeport.

I wonder if Keillor is reflecting on those years in Freeport as news of the Swany White Flour Mill’s demise reaches him. A eulogy or a tribute to this historic mill would seem fitting for Keillor’s radio show, “A Prairie Home Companion,” broadcasting from Honolulu, Hawaii, on New Year’s Eve, far from Lake Wobegon “where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.”

It hasn’t exactly been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon.

 

Another fire in my Faribault neighborhood September 30, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 1:49 PM
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THERE’S BEEN ANOTHER fire in my neighborhood, this one two blocks away instead of directly across the street.

And this one happened at 1 a.m. in a vacant, foreclosed house in the 700 block of Willow Street instead of in the late afternoon in an occupied dwelling. (Click here to read about the September 10 fire at my neighbor’s house.)

This time I didn’t race to the scene, allow I certainly could have. The contingent of fire and police vehicles, with sirens screaming, woke me with a jolt early this morning. Typically I don’t think much of sirens in the middle of the night. Living along a busy street, I hear them all too often.

But when multiple emergency vehicles just keep racing by and sirens shut off near my home, I take note.

So I pulled myself out of bed, grabbed my glasses, peered out the window, failed to see anything and slid back under the covers.

At 1:19 a.m., when another fire truck—this time the ladder truck—roared past, I slipped barefoot out the front door, descended the steps to the end of the sidewalk and peered down the street toward emergency lights flashing in the blackness of the night.

I couldn’t see flames, didn’t smell smoke. But, still, I pondered whether I should change into street clothes, grab my camera and go.

I didn’t. While I’m a blogger, I’m no longer a newspaper reporter and photographer. My days of chasing fire trucks ended decades ago. Yet, that urge, that desire, that curiosity, remain.

I crawled back into bed, wide awake, the adrenaline still pumping, wondering how my husband could seem so disinterested in the drama unfolding nearby. He’s calm like that and able to shut out distractions once his head hits the pillow. He wanted to sleep.

Me? Surprisingly, I fell asleep relatively easily. But I slept fitfully, dreamed about firemen and police and a tarp covering bodies on a flat bed trailer.

And when I awoke six hours later, contacted the editor of The Faribault Daily News about the fire and read the story posted online around noon, I was relieved to know that my nightmare was only that, a nightmare, with no truth to it.

Click here to read The Daily News article.

Then click here to read The Daily News article about a fire at the same house during the early morning hours of May 19. That first suspicious fire caused only minimal damage to the home, owned by Wells Fargo.

Compare the two photos in the separate stories. You’ll see significantly more damage done during the second fire.

It’s pretty clear to me that someone is determined to burn down this house.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Found: Citizen firefighter Ted Leon from Owatonna September 13, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 4:07 AM
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READERS, WE’VE FOUND “Ted from Owatonna,” the passerby who Saturday afternoon stopped to extinguish a quickly-spreading fire on my neighbor’s deck.

Thanks to the quick action of Ted Leon, 47, an attorney at Federated Insurance in Owatonna, Kristin and Kevin Klocek’s Faribault house was saved from what both Ted and I believe could have been a devastating fire. (Click here to read my first blog post about the fire.)

Up until late Monday afternoon, I did not know Ted’s last name because he identified himself only as “Ted from Owatonna” when he left the scene, telling me he had to get going. He told me that much only because I asked. He was the first to arrive at the fire, to grab a garden hose.

But before I get into details about Ted’s firefighting, let me first tell you how we found Ted. And I say “we” because this was a joint effort that initially involved my blogging about the fire, followed up by Minnesota Public Radio’s Bob Collins linking to my story in his News Cut column, Faribault Daily News Managing Editor Jaci Smith learning of my post via Collins’ post and then the Faribault newspaper and its sister paper, The Owatonna People’s Press, publishing a “Do you know this man?” community alert on their websites that included a photo I shot once the fire was under control.

This photo was posted on the newspaper websites in an effort to locate "Ted from Owatonna."

A friend of Ted’s saw the online photo and contacted the Owatonna paper with Ted’s name and number. This I learned from Jaci Smith, who had called me earlier Monday for permission to use my photos and to ask me about the whole event.

Early Monday evening Ted called me, before I had an opportunity to phone him.

So, how then did Ted end up on Willow Street in Faribault at the precise moment the smoldering fire flared up on Kevin and Kristin’s deck?

He, his wife Kathe and their three youngest sons were on their way from The Defeat of Jesse James Days re-enactment in Northfield to 4 p.m. Mass at Divine Mercy Catholic Church. They are not members of the Faribault parish—they attend Sacred Heart in Owatonna—but because Kathe was participating in a St. Paul bike ride Sunday morning, they opted to attend the Saturday afternoon service in Faribault en route home. Their Owatonna church does not have a Saturday Mass.

Kathe told her husband she knew how to get to Divine Mercy and, says Ted, “That put us right in the path of the fire.”

It was nearing 4 p.m. when the Leons were driving in the 400 block of Willow Street. “I looked to the right and saw the fire pretty much engulfing the front deck,” Ted recalls.

As his mind computed the situation, he didn’t quite believe what he was seeing until he realized, “Oh, my goodness, that thing is on fire.” He pulled over, asked Kathe to call 911. Concerned that a grill and propane tank might be involved (they weren’t), Ted told his family to remain inside their van while he raced toward the fire.

He remembers only, in those initial moments, being “really focused in” on the fire and worried that people were inside the house. Ted had reason for concern. Kristin and her daughter Kaylee were inside, unaware of the blaze. As Ted ran up the steps and onto the deck toward the front door, he felt the intense heat of the actively-spreading fire.

He pounded on the screen door, peered through the screen and saw a little girl with her back to him. He ripped the screen and pounded again on the interior door and hollered “Fire, get out!” (or something like that; he doesn’t recall his exact words) until she noticed him.

In this photo you can see how the heat of the fire melted the vinyl siding.

“Once I knew they were aware of the fire, I ran around the house looking for a hose,” Ted continues.

He found two hoses connected to a single water spigot and grabbed one. As he pulled the hose toward the burning deck and the burning wood chips below the deck, the hose jerked from his hand. It was too short. He ran back to the spigot, flipped a lever that sent water to the second hose and “said a prayer it would be long enough.”

It was. The fire responded quickly to the water.

Days after the fire, Ted seems humbly surprised at the media attention. “I didn’t feel like it was a big deal,” he says of his actions.

Anyone would have done what he did, Ted claims. “It was my turn (to help someone).”

I agree with Ted, to a point. I’m not sure I could have gone onto that deck with the actively spreading fire. I saw those intense flames when I arrived just as Ted was grabbing that second hose.

“It’s nice to be able to put your faith into practice and help someone,” this Good Samaritan says.

Later, while worshipping at Divine Mercy, he offered prayers of thanksgiving. His clothes reeked of smoke, he says, and his legs felt sunburned from the intense heat of the fire.

Ted doesn’t remember me several times screaming, “Kristin and Kevin, get out!” He was, as he says, totally focused on extinguishing the fire and making sure everyone was out of the house.

I remain convinced, and so does Ted, that the entire house soon would have been engulfed in flames had he not spotted the deck fire and taken immediate action.

While on the scene of the fire, I spoke with Faribault firefighter Joel Hansen, who was very much interested in finding “Ted from Owatonna” and possibly presenting him with an award for his actions.

I told Ted Monday evening that I would see him at the awards ceremony.

FYI, A LITTLE BACKGROUND if you have not yet read my first post: I was working in my home office Saturday afternoon when my 17-year-old son, who was sitting on the couch working on his laptop, heard a car horn, looked up and saw the fire directly across the street. “The neighbor’s house is on fire!” he shouted.

I grabbed my camera, which was right next to my desk and raced out the front door, not even stopping to slip on shoes. Because of my background as a former newspaper reporter and now a current freelance writer, it was simply a natural instinct for me to grab my camera.

My first concern was for the safety of my neighbors, not photographing the fire. By the time I got to the front yard, Ted was pulling the second hose toward the fire. At that point flames were shooting up from the wood chips and from the deck.

Because there was nothing I could do at this point to help Ted fight the fire, I remained focused on my neighbors getting out. I was unaware that Ted had already pounded on the door and that the family knew about the fire.

When Kristin and Kaylee rounded the corner of the house after exiting via a door into the garage, I comforted them and made sure they were OK. By then the fire was under control and nearly out. Only then did I begin photographing the scene. At one point I also spoke on the phone with Kristin’s husband. She had called him earlier, but I wanted to assure him that his family was alright and update him on the situation.

A smoldering cigarette butt under the deck has been indicated by fire officials as the likely, as-yet unofficial, cause of the fire.

FOR THE LOCAL news story by Jaci Smith, click here to an article in The Faribault Daily News.

 

TO READ BOB COLLINS News Cut column, click here and check his Monday morning 5×8 entry.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

“The neighbor’s house is on fire!” September 10, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:55 PM
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TED FROM OWATONNA, you are our Willow Street neighborhood hero. This afternoon you saved my neighbor’s house from what could have been a devastating fire. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

You were in a hurry to leave after you put out the fire on Kristin and Kevin’s deck with a garden hose around 4 p.m. today. You didn’t give me your last name—I was the one with the camera, the across-the-street-neighbor.

I am forever grateful to you for noticing the flames (as you drove by with your family), stopping, grabbing a garden hose, banging on the house and yelling for my neighbors to “Get out!”

This is a view from my yard looking directly across the street at Kevin and Kristin's house on the corner of Tower Place and Willow Street. The fire was extinguished before firefighters arrived.

I did not get many actual fire photos as I was more focused on making sure my neighbors were out of the house than in photographing the scene. But here you see wood chips burning under the deck.

Ted from Owatonna uses water from a garden hose to put out the deck fire.

That's my neighbor Kristin on the right, with Ted still working to assure the fire is out.

You deserve an award, Ted. Faribault firefighter Joel Hansen says the fire department gives awards for efforts like yours. I expect you wouldn’t want one. But you need to be recognized and publicly thanked.

If not for your quick action, I am convinced the fire would have caused severe damage to Kristin and Kevin’s home.

By the time my 17-year-old son noticed the flames (which was almost immediately) and hollered, “The neighbor’s house is on fire!” you were already there grabbing the hose.

Flames were shooting from under and around the deck in the mere seconds it took for my husband and me to race across Tower Place. I didn’t even slip on shoes, just grabbed my camera and ran.

All I could think of was that my neighbors were in their house; their car was in the driveway. I screamed, “Kevin, Kristin, get out of the house!” Several times.

My eyes focused on those flames blocking the front door. The flames that kept shooting up until Ted extinguished them with water from that garden hose.

Then Kristin and her daughter, Kaylee, rounded the corner from the garage, having safely exited through a back door.

Kristin told me she heard the banging, but, because some neighborhood kids have been banging on her house recently, didn’t think much of it. But then she got up to check, saw the fire and got out. Her husband and son were not home.

I am relieved, thankful, grateful that the fire was contained to the deck area, that it did not happen at night, that my neighbors got safely out. The deck and siding are damaged. That is minor compared to what could have been.

The fire damaged the deck and siding.

Faribault firefighter Joel Hansen continued spraying down the area after Ted left.

It could have been worse, much worse, if not for the quick actions of Ted from Owatonna.

If anyone knows the identity of Ted, please submit a comment and I will pass this information along to the Faribault Fire Department. My husband also got Ted’s license plate number, so we are confident that officials can track him down that way. We want Ted to get the public recognition he deserves.

Today, Ted, let me give you your first public, “Thank you!”

Readers, if you would also like to comment on Ted’s actions, I welcome you to do so.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

The $50K decision and what we can all learn September 1, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 8:15 AM
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ODDS ON PROMOTIONS made the right call Wednesday when it failed to award $50,000 to an 11-year-old Owatonna boy who sunk a hockey puck into a 1.5 by 3.5-inch hole during an August 11 charity hockey event in Faribault.

Nate Smith, who made the shot from 89 feet, wasn’t even supposed to be on the ice. It was his twin brother Nick’s name that was drawn to attempt the shot. But Nick had stepped outside the hockey arena, so Nate subbed for Nick.

Not until the next day did the Smith family reveal to officials that Nate, not Nick, sunk the puck.

That ignited a firestorm of controversy with the story going national. Should the Smiths get the $50,000?

The Reno, Nevada, group insuring the event ruled yesterday that because of legal and contractual issues, the Smiths will not get the $50,000.

That was the right decision, in my opinion, given Nate obviously is not Nick and, although the family told officials the truth the following day, they did not do so initially.

Yet, despite the decision, there are still winners in this story. Odds On Promotions is donating $20,000 in the brothers’ names to youth hockey programs in Owatonna—where the Smith boys play hockey—and in Faribault.

That’s a smart move on Odds On Promotions part. You can’t buy that kind of positive publicity for $20,000. Plus, the substantial gift will calm the ire of those who may disagree with the company’s decision.

The Smiths aren’t complete losers here either. Friday morning they’ll appear on “The Today Show,” according to an article in The Faribault Daily News. Shortly after Nate made the shot and the controversy started, the family was in New York making the talk show rounds.

In summary, we could all learn a lesson from this story about rules, honesty and compromise.

WHAT’S YOUR OPINION on the decision made by Odds On Promotions not to award the Smith family $50,000? Do you agree or disagree? Why or why not?