Moose Lake Star Gazette - Serving Carlton and Pine Counties since 1895

If the spring of 2012 was proof of global warming, then spring 2013 style was the antithesis. Rewind to March 1, 2012, and check out the pond in my backyard in Eagan. Not only had the ice disappeared,...

Across Minnesota, communities have been facing a rash of robberies. But these thieves aren’t your common thugs stealing TVs or computers — instead they’re going after high-priced metal from businesses, homes and even veterans’ graves, and...

Well, a new box of bees was obtained Saturday. My oh my, they are busy little bees. By the time Donald and I arrived back home and it was time to introduce the bees to their new hive, they were quite...

In 1957 my father had just finished building our new house. The Big Bend Dam would necessitate the acquisition of our old house down by the banks of the Missouri River where I had spent my childhood....

Jack and Jill went to bed. They sired a cat named Motorhead. Last week I shared the tales of Jack the travelling cat. What I didn’t tell you is that Jack eventually settled down and married a cute...

Moose Lake is going to be changing in the next few years. With the proposal for a new McDonald's on former school district property along Highway 73 near the south entrance/exit of I-35, and the...

In the spring all our senses are tuned for the wonderful changes in our surroundings. And this spring we are desperate for colors, sounds and smells (of flowers and earth). Since the snow just melted...

The 1970s in Vermillion, South Dakota found plenty of abandoned farm houses surrounding the small town. The University of South Dakota student’s dominated the area and renting a farmhouse was quite...

I bellied up to the bar at Whimp’s in beautiful downtown Burbank, South Dakota. “Hey Ken, we named our kid after your dog.” The guy sitting next to Ken slowly slithered toward the corner. “Con...

After the hit Minnesota took in the Great Recession of 2008, we were promised that lawmakers would “focus like a laser” on creating jobs. That didn’t work out so well. They lost focus, and two years went by with no action on jobs. We were...

It seems like all I have been doing lately is talking about the school bond election that is coming up on May 21. However, what I have found is that people still do not know about our attempts to build a new school building. I want to invite the...

Saturday marked the end of a 42-year reign of Siamese cats in our household, although we never did own one. Early on, we learned that Siamese do not have owners; they have staff. Similar to the long...

I am a walker and I love my pedometers. Buy me a pedometer for Christmas or my birthday and you cannot go wrong. I will never have too many. A pedometer gives me an incentive to walk as it accumulates...

I know, spring is taking it’s time to arrive this year. It reminds me of many other springs, though we have forgotten those in the past few milder years. We get our hopes up with a rise of the red o...

Distance has always been a tough economic challenge for rural Minnesota. Cars and highways have gone a long way toward shortening that distance. Now, modern communications are bringing the world even closer. With interactive video, a patient in Lac...

“Good Lord! This tastes like warm dishwater. It can’t be chicken soup,” I exclaimed. Ironically, I had no one to blame but myself. I was the one who made this homemade batch of sodium-free...

Anyone who knows an animal lover, knows just how attached they are to their pets. I have concluded that after you adopt an animal, they become the owner and give the directives to be followed. I just...

What would any of us do without our ancestors? Sometimes I think most of what I learned that was really important, I learned from parents, grandparents, and aunts and uncles. Sometimes, they were...

As we pulled in the yard Friday evening, my first reaction was, “Holy Cow! There’s a lot of snow here.” The driveway was plowed and the sidewalks were shoveled, thanks to our friendly neighbors....

Life threatening situations don’t have to be all bad. It sure can be a quick way to find out who your friends are. In 1997, a very ambitious, creative woman from here in the Twin Cities named Sona...

I know I shouldn’t be asking these kinds of questions, but it keeps rolling around in my mind — the idea that saving is good, overspending is not. The other night, while watching the news, one of...

At the January Moose Lake School Board meeting, the board voted to bring back child care. We are looking at providing before and after school care as well as all day care for 3- to 5-year-old children. After doing surveys and hearing from parents at...

Clearly more warning signs than a summer drive down road construction on I-35 were not enough to make this blockhead aware that he may have a heart problem. The information coming from a patient can...

I have worked very hard to stay on top of things for the upcoming spring. By nature, I am somewhat of a procrastinator, but this year I’ve started a new trend. I am keeping up with my various jobs,...

This is sterility at its best. A germ couldn’t possibly be hanging around here. I’m surrounded by shiny aluminum and chrome and spotless white paint. I’m strapped to a clean, crisp starched bed...