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It’s hard to believe in this mobile society, but when my wife went off to college in the fall of 1963, she didn’t expect to be home until Christmas break.
Nancy earned her nursing degree at the College of St. Catherine’s in St. Paul, Minn. St. Kate’s was an all-female college at the time, and St. Paul was an all-day drive from Chamberlain in the days before interstate highways. St. Kate’s was a long way from family and friends for a homesick freshman who used a black pen to mark off each day on the calendar between her and Christmas break. Continue Reading

When I think of upheavals in the South Dakota Legislature caused by elections, I usually think first of the 1972 vote that put Democrats in charge (sort of) of both houses and the 1976 vote that put Republicans firmly back in command of both chambers.
As I looked through old legislative history to compare some past elections to this month’s GOP victories in legislative races, I was reminded that the Democrats’ surge really started in the 1970 election and the first hints of the Republican resurgence came in 1974. Continue Reading

Way back when Harding Hall was a men’s dormitory at South Dakota State, my roommate and I subscribed to a daily newspaper and a weekly newsmagazine.
Guys in at least two other rooms on our floor had newspapers delivered, and at least one other room got a newsmagazine. We used to trade issues around, and during some of the bull sessions in the evenings we’d talk about current events. I lived in Harding my junior year, 1964-65, and more and more often as the year went by, the current events involved a growing United States military presence in Vietnam. Continue Reading

I wrote the other day about my aversion to scary movies, but after Sunday evening, I have a new definition of scary.
None of those movies that used to have me running down the dark streets for home as a kid in Chamberlain comes close to the terror that strikes when you sit on your front porch at 7:12 p.m. on Halloween evening holding a huge candy bowl and watch a 6-year-old dressed as a princess (or maybe a fairy or an angel) politely dip her small hand into the bowl and take the last miniature Snickers bar and drop it into her plastic jack-olantern. Continue Reading

This has not been an October for complaints.

I’m like every other South Dakotan, I suppose. I really enjoy fall weather, but I usually find myself thinking things turned way too quickly from summer to winter. This year, while I still cringe at the cold weather that’s starting to show itself, I really can’t gripe much about the first 23 or 24 days of October, or the last few days of September, for that matter. Continue Reading

I’m no expert on small jet aircraft, but the one dropping gently from the west over the Missouri River toward the Chamberlain airport last Sunday afternoon looked like a Cessna Citation. Continue Reading

My wife would tell you I’m a little crazy about distracted driving, whether the distraction is a text message, a phone to the ear, a newspaper open across the steering wheel or a driver fishing for something on the floor mat on the passenger side of the vehicle.
I’ll admit I pay attention to those things maybe more attention than is good for my mental well-being.
I’ve read too many crash stories that involve distractions. Continue Reading

From our bedroom window, we have a decent view of the dome of the state Capitol building.
The view is better after the leaves drop in the fall, but it isn’t bad right now. It would be perfect if I could lop off one huge branch from an elm tree in the yard across the street. I’ve been tempted to sneak over some night and do that. So far, I haven’t given in to that foolish act of vandalism, and for the moment I accept the tree and its place in my view of the Capitol dome. Continue Reading

Had you offered me 30 points and the Jackrabbits against Nebraska before last Saturday’s kickoff in Lincoln, I probably would have turned you down.
I’m a loyal SDSU guy, sure enough, but I’m also old enough to have been in college with some of the fellows who played for State the last time the Jacks and the Cornhuskers collided. Continue Reading

Hey, I watched the season premiere of “Hawaii Five-O” the other night on the television.
I didn’t want to, but I had to. I was a huge fan of the original “Five-0″ show back in the late 1960s and through most of the 1970s, and I needed to see what a remake might look like. It wasn’t so bad. It wasn’t so good, but it could have been worse. I don’t know that I’d watch another episode, but I sat through one. Continue Reading