Culture & Community

People with special needs, state conservation officers and others, line the fishing pier at the pond in Sylvan Park in Lanesboro in June. (Photo by John Weiss)

Special Needs + Fishing = Fun

John Weiss met up with special needs people at an annual DNR fishing event in Lanesboro.

Contempo Physical Dance, directed by Marciano Silva dos Santos, performs in the barn at DreamAcres. (Photo by Jeff Brechlin)

DreamAcres, Where Performing Art Meets Agriculture

John Torgrimson visits DreamAcres near Wykoff where art meets agriculture.

Art in the Park draws thousands of visitors from around the area to Lanesboro each June to celebrate art. (Submitted photo)

Art in the Park Festival Celebrates the Arts

Lanesboro’s Art in the Park festival is an annual celebration of art.

Nancie McCormish is pictured with her horse Zekemoouse at her farm near Steamboat Springs, Colorado. (Photo submitted)

Cornucopia | The Birth of the Lanesboro Arts Gallery

Steve Harris visits with Nancie McCormish, one of the founders of Cornucopia Art Center, a forerunner to the Lanesboro Arts Gallery.

The Rutabaga Brothers, with vocalist Mariah Ciangiola (second from left), performed at a spring 2023 concert at the Sons of Norway hall in Lanesboro. (Submitted photo)

Mariah’s Magical Musical Tour

Steve Harris catches up with The Rutabaga Brothers band and their new lead singer

Walker’s route through Fillmore County took him from Pleasant Grove in Olmsted County to Jordan, Fillmore Village, Carimona, Waukokee, Big Springs, Greenfield, and Eliotta, before crossing into Iowa at Burr Oak. Waukokee was a swing station and post office south of Preston and Eliotta was located on the Minnesota – Iowa border in present-day Canton Township. (Map courtesy of Fillmore County Historical Society)

Dubuque-St. Paul Territorial Road Opened Up Area to White Settlement

The Dubuque – St. Paul trail opened up the Minnesota Territory to white settlement. John Torgrimson writes about the role the stagecoach played in that development.

Three horses running in the snow surprised me. They looked like a scene in a Chinese painting. (Photo by John Weiss)

In Search of Golden Eagles

Nature writer John Weiss travels to Houston County in search of Golden Eagles.

Jack and Nancy Bratrud at their home in Preston. They are shown with their scrapbook documenting the media attention Mrs.B’s generated, which helped put Bluff Country on the map as a tourist destination. (Photo by John Torgrimson)

It All Started with Mrs. B’s

Loni Kemp interviews the founders of Mrs. B’s in Lanesboro, which kicked off tourism development in Bluff Country.

Karla Bloem, Executive Director of the International Owl Center in Houston, Minnesota, with Uhu the Eurasian Eagle Owl. (Photo by Alan Stankevitz)

Owl Center Puts Houston on the Map

Steve Harris takes us inside the amazing International Owl Center in Houston

Minnesota law requires that all slow-moving vehicles display a fluorescent orange-red triangular sign. This law was challenged on religious grounds by a group of Amish men in 1988 before the Minnesota Supreme Court. The Supreme Court ruled that the Amish could use white bars on the back of their buggies instead of the “too worldly” triangular sign. (Photo by Renee Bergstrom)

A Slow Moving Vehicle

Henry Hershberger, a 15-year-old Amish boy, was killed on a summer night in 2021 when his buggy was rear-ended by a pickup truck near Preston. Legal proceedings carried into 2023. This is what happened.

Surrounded by Norway Spruce, the Harvey Benson farm south of Harmony is typical of many farmsteads in southeast Minnesota. The farm has been in the family since the late 1800s. (Photo by Renee Bergstrom)

Passing on the Farm

Julie Little reports on a Harmony landowner who struggled over what to do with his land when he passed on. He found the answer just a few miles away in a couple that shared his values.