DHA XCIV
(12/16/2004)

Calendar

DHA meeting December 15, noon, Kountry Kookin' Cafe. Welcome.

Museum open: Sundays and legal holidays (Christmas and New Years Day): 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Taste of Denmark day, Community Center, January 2, 2005: Christmas Tree contest at museum 2 to 5 p.m.; museum open 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. or later as interest dictates.

*Your regular museum host plans to have some popped corn and Christmas candy for snacking by viewers Christmas Day, as long as it lasts, with any left over available on Sunday. (It is all from the stores. Water from the cooler is the only beverage furnished.)

Mange Tak

For donation of artifacts and archival materials and for funds contributed that keeps DHA's museum work going.

For visitors to the museum. Sunday, December 5 Ervin Andersen visited with this host a while after viewing recent additions. Visiting with viewers is both interesting, and often helpful to the host at the time.

Visitors "slipped through the cracks"

Richard Skola reported that a couple from Denmark, staying in a hotel in Sioux Falls, had seen "Viborg" somewhere, and curious about a Viborg in the middle of the United States and in South Dakota, had driven down. They had toured the town, and had seen the museum building. Apparently this had been after the museum was closed at 4 p.m. Sunday. They had driven up the hill to Rose Hill Cemetery, and had seen the monuments of the many early Danish settlers buried there.

Apparently they had not noticed the "on-call" numbers posted in the museum window. (Richard 766-5675; Lester 563-2732). Neither had received a call. DHA is disappointed that they missed seeing our modest little museum. It would have been a great pleasure for Richard or Lester (or any other DHAer) to host them.

Alphie (Toots) Peterson, Palmer Peterson, Melanie Parsons, Grant Petersen, Sr. also have keys and will open in an emergency. If readers have, see, or talk to visitors to Viborg or vicinity, please bring the museum to their attention, and make them feel free to ask to visit the museum.

Accessions

A second hand-crank cream separator has been given to the DHA museum, along with a non-mechanical gravity cream-separator, by Mrs. Mary Rist (1924-2003) and moved onto the farm in 1951. The hand-crank separator had ceased to be used the then. This equipment was the property of Donald's parents, J.F. and Emma (Exkstein) Rist. The 3-generation Rist farm is in the northeast of the intersection 5 miles east of Viborg.

Among other items, Richard Skola brought in some 1950's monthly newspapers of the Turner Hutchinson REA (Now Southeastern Electric). These showed the power line routes, and then residents of several townships in the TH area.

(Please note: DHA News does not know of every item that arrives in the museum, and cannot report them all. Mention of some items herein is for the purpose of informing potential museum visitors of interesting items, and does not suggest that those used are more important that items not noted here. Everything of historical value is welcome for preservation. And, items of current usage will be historically important in fifty or a hundred years.)

"Book" Review

The nine REA papers (above) were all addressed to Ole Skonhovd. Mange Tak for having preserved them. They are for the months of April-May 1952, June-July 1952, Sept.-Oct. 1952, Dec. 1952, Jan. 1953, Feb.-Mar. 1953, April-May 1953, Feb.-March 1954 and June-July 1955.

In addition to news and promoting of T-H activities, they carry on the front a map of the T-H area in Hutchinson, Turner and a bit of northeast Yankton Counties. On other pages, each carries a larger map of one of the townships, showing T-H lines, and rural residents location in that township. Starting with the Dec. 1952 issue, they list the then directors, officers and Marion and Viborg office and line crew employees. They also carried operating statistics, including number of customers, miles, power usage, etc. The May 1952 issue stated that they expected to have contractor line-building completed that year, with small additional lines to be built by REA crews.

April-May 1952 carried a map of Swan Lake Twp. including Viborg. A photo showed Viborg's main street looking south, with (2004) Viborg Amoco in the right foreground. June-July 1952, showed Daneville Twp. and two photos: 1) looking east, showing most of the east side of Main Street north from 4-way stop, plus east from there on Park Ave., and 2) looking south from the 4-way stop including the 4th (south) elevator, about where Pump ŒN Stuff is in 2004.

Sept.-Oct. 1952, has a front-page sketch of a rural school with electric service from a nearby pole and transformer. The map is of Hurley Twp. This issue also had a full page devoted to urging people to "join the clothes dryer parade"! The Dec. 1952 issue contained a page with six photos of housewives that had "joined the clothes dryer parade". (Come to the museum to see who, from where!) The back page map is of Spring Valley Township.

Jan. 1953 issue has a year calendar, to show the 20th being circled as"meter reading day." (Remember when we were still trusted and permitted to read them for ourselves?) The map is of Turner Twp., with a separate plat of Hooker below. The Turner Twp. map also shows the crossing of the G.N. and the C&NW railroads a mile north of Hooker, and the Turner Twp. road overpass over G.N. two miles north of Hooker. Inside, there are three photos of Davis with a nice coating of snow.

Feb.-Mar. 1953 has three photos of Irene, and a map of Turkey Valley Twp. (in NE Yankton Co.) including the T-H lines serving the east two north-south rows of section in that township. April-May 1953 has a map of Centerville Twp. The photo is of the Vermillion River, north from the bridge at the northwest corner of the town of Centerville looking north towards Gunderson Park, better known as "The Beach."

Feb.-March 1954's map on the back is of Salem Twp. Five photos inside are of the Viborg area of T-H operations, including the substation two miles north of Viborg, a service truck at the office (where the east end of the drug store is in 2004), a lineman Arlo Andersen and cashier Opal (Loe Kaarup) Berenger in the office, and Arlo Andersen and Kermit Nelson at the substation.

June-July 1955 maps Norway Twp. Page three exaggerates an octopus of connecting many plugs and cords to wall receptical. The front page photo shows eight young ladies and girls in apparently some queen contest of some kind. Come to the museum and identify these people, the location and the time and date.

Readers are encouraged to come in when the museum is open and view these items, along with everything else. Please leave information on scratch paper, or inform the host. Tape recording is sometimes available. Can anyone provide additional issues of this publication for the historical information they contain?