A Dry Year, But Good One

BY: Edwin B. Petersen

HELLO FOLKS! — The year 1963 will go down in history as one of the driest years on record, as well as one of the biggest in harvest. The hay crop was not the biggest but our rains came at the right time to make corn and soybeans.

According to my records we have had 19.5 inches of moisture this year. What the rest of December will bring we of course don't know, but had the rains came at any other time than when they did we would not have had nearly as big a crop.

Had the bulk of the 19 inches of precipitation come early in the spring, with more this fall there would have been a near crop failure.

The 19 1/2 inches of moisture this year is a real contrast with the precipitation of last year. During 1962 we had nearly double what we have had this year. My records indicate that we had 37.4 inches of rain and snow that year, most of it coming in the form of rain; with only about one inch as snow.

We went into the spring with an abundance of subsoil moisture which complemented the timely rains. For next year we will have to depend on rain or snow entirely as the subsoil is negligible, except where there have been fall rains.

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The RUN-DOWN by moth read like this:
April—3.3 inches.
May—2.9
June—3.1
July—5.3
August—1.6
September—1.7
October—0.2
November—1.4

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THIS JOSEPHUS whom I mentioned the other week gave us an insight of many things that the Bible barley mentions. For instance he describes what the tower of Babel was made of and how the people were able to build such a tower.

He also enlarges our knowledge on a man whom the Bible barely mentions. This man is Nimrod. Today's hunters are call nimrods. This is in reference to the man whom scripture refers to in Genesis as a mighty one in the earth, and a mighty hunter before the Lord.

It seems that Nimrod, who was a grandson of Noah, was one of the greatest politicians the earth has had. He did not hold the priesthood, therefore could not legally lead the people. However, he had personality and persuasiveness and he gathered around him a tremendous majority of people. This put him in direct conflict with the Prophets. The prophets tried to get the people to spread out and settle in the low valleys where there was an abundance of food and water. However, Nimrod, seeing a chance to gain from the natural fear the people had of low places, due to the memories their grand-parents had of the great flood, encouraged them to build the tower. This they did with great zeal; thus the tower became very tall, very quickly. It was built of brick and porter and sealed with bitumen.

So, as with all politicians, Nimrod's empire came to an abrupt end, and he ended up just a poor man anyway. As I recall, Josephus says that the bitumen eventually caught fire and destroyed the tower.

UPDATE

Minnesota WeatherTalk Newsletter for Friday, October 28, 2011

On a statewide basis this has been a very warm October, warmest since 1963 and probably 4th warmest in history.

Grandpa was right, 1963 is a threshold for weather Minnesota still uses today!

Oh It's Only A Dog's Life!

By - Edwin B. Petersen

HELLO FOLKS! — If you growl all day, it's no wonder you're dog-tired at night.

Employe: "You promised us more money for less work. We've given you less work. Now how about more money?"

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NEARLY FIVE years ago I received a letter from Margo Cairns of Minneapolis asking me to think over the idea of having the corn tassel for our national emblem. At the time I reported the idea to you in this column. I suppose that most of you have forgotten about it by this time, or have been approached about it through other organizations.

I have had it pretty much in mind ever since and have given it considerable thought. At first the idea did not appeal to me but the more I thought about it the more I came to the conclusion that the corn tassel is the ideal emblem. Especially when I consider the alternative that is being considered, which is the rose.

I love roses as well as anybody, but not as a national emblem. It is true that the rose grows in nearly every state and that it is a thing of beauty; besides being perhaps the most common of all flowers.

I so vividly remember when I was but a boy, my sister Ruth and I planted a flower garden. We had to plant it on the north side of the house to keep the hot summer winds of the Dakotas from burning it up. Right in the middle of it we planted a rose bush that we had dug up out on the prairies. It didn't look like too much of a thing then but by 'taming' it, it grew into a beautiful bush and each year it doubled in size until we left there and the land went back into range.

Corn on the other hand is the most widely diversified crop in the U. S. It grows in every state, it is of American origin, born in the western world and found nowhere else. No other country can claim it. What can be more beautiful that a forest of symmetrical corn. It sustained the pioneers in the precarious existence on the continent since the landing of the Puritans.

It was used as a medium of exchange before the coin was established.

Today it is the most widely used crop for our livestock feeding programs.

Me? I am all for the corn tassel as our national emblem. How about you?

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OUR LITTLE girls are always coming up with something cute. They are of course in that age (2 to 4) and most of the time they are not aware of their own cuteness.

The other day Zina said, "See Daddy, I got some of mother's lick stip on."

This morning she came running to me as I came into the house from chores and said, "Daddy, do with me as you do an accordion" I had a few bad moments figuring that one out, but finally got the idea, "Squeeze me."

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House Vote Crowns Rose as National Flower

LAWRENCE L. KNUTSON

AP NEWS ARCHIVE  Sep. 23, 1986 10:37 PM ET

WASHINGTON (AP) _ The House, brushing aside the claims of marigolds and dogwood blossoms, corn tassels and columbines, ended decades of indecision Tuesday and crowned the rose, that thorny beauty, America's national flower.

The voice-vote decision completed congressional action on the rose resolution, ending a debate over an appropriate ''national floral emblem'' for the United States that had flickered off and on since the late 19th century.

A Day For All To Remember

By Edwin B. Petersen

HELLO FOLKS – Attended Grandma Hansen's 100th birthday celebration at Trinity Lutheran Church on Mother's Day. I consider it a real honor to be considered one of her friends and to have known her for the past 23 years, not alone for the fact that she lived to be 100 but for the example she has set in positive living.

There are too many of us today who probably because we are afraid of being criticized, fail to be positive in our thinking and living. As a consequence we fall far short of our abilities and end up in a rut.

Not so with Grandma Hansen; if she has a view she expresses it, and it is pretty apt to be a good one.

I am sure that there was not another person who enjoyed the day more than Grandma did and I don't believe she was too weary at the end of the day either. I don't know if she had another meeting that evening but if she did have I'll wager she attended it.

I hope she has many more birthdays and from as active as she is she is pretty apt to have them too.

The program for the occasion was M.Ced by Dr. Ted Hansen, Which was very appropriate. The talk given by Pastor Jacobsen was right to the point with the right blend of wit, humor and spiritual- (missing text).

I don't know how many there were there that day but I believe it probably passed the 500 mark.

It is kind of nice to know that there will always be a little family tie with Grandma Hansen as my brother Clarence is married to a granddaughter. (Delona Romer).

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IT IS ABOUT four or five years ago that I bemoaned the fact that there was not a course in our high schools teaching Family Relations.

It is a great satisfaction to me now to find a real good course of study in that field. My daughter Karen is taking it and I'll say it is a good one. She gets it in home management class.

One other course that I have been plugging for is a course in American Economics. It is sorely needed, if we are to successfully counteract the influence of the communist world. I doubt that one student in 100 knows what it takes to create a job, or how our economy operates and if he or she learns it is not in our high schools it is learned, unless of couse there is a new course in it that I am not aware of.

A Confusing Situation

By Edwin B. Petersen

HELLO FOLKS – John and Jim are twin brothers. John is also Jim's uncle, which makes John Jim's nephew. On the distaff side, John's wife is blood niece of Jim's wife, the two women are sisters-in-law. And that is just the beginning. You see, twin brothers married niece and aunt.

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THERE IS a big difference between telling a woman the her hat is "real cool" and telling her that it is "not so hot."

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IN THIS DAY and age, when books can be bought for an hour's work or less, it is easy to forget that through the ages books have been precious possessions. Before the printing press was invented in the 16th century, books were few and highly revered because they were handwritten.

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WRITINGS WERE not always in books as we have them today. "Sticks" of scrolls were the more common forms of recording; but there were others. Hieroglyphics were carved on stone, metal and any other durable material.

While books are very easy to come by today, there are still many selling for great prices. For instance, a gilt edge copy of Samuel Clemens' "Tom Sawyer" recently sold for $1,500. A rare copy of Huckleberry Finn sold for $925. A presentation copy of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," printed in 1850, went for $7,500. In Hamburg, Germany, a first folio edition of the works of William Shakespeare brought $83,965.

Think these are high prices? Consider what was paid for a receipt for the country of Palestine signed on June 30, 1920, by Major General Louis Bolz and Sir Herber Samuel — $5,500.

Then, too, one of Thomas Edison's note books brought $2,700. And a wealthy New Yorker paid $182,000 for an early copy of the "Apoclypse."

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Foil The Freeze
Have you ever discovered, a short while before dinner, that you've forgotten to take the food out of the freezer? If you stand it in front of an electric fan, it will defrost in half the usual time.

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Cones of a fir stand erect: cones of a spruce hang down.