By Deb Moldaschel
60 years ago – July 16, 1964
Sleepy Eye FFA competed with 45 teams from Central and Southeastern Minnesota in the 10th annual Hubbards Sunshine swine judging contest at the Hubbards Research Farm near Mankato. Individuals who represented Sleepy Eye were Paul Krienke who placed as second high individual, Pat Krenz, James Paulson, and Gary Peterson. Sleepy Eye tied for first place team with Jackson and Lakefield.
Flames late this morning destroyed a barn filled with hay on the Stanley Sobocinski farm, five miles south of Sleepy Eye. The place for many years was known as the farm with the eight-cornered barn. A number of pigs were hustled out of the barn and were saved.
45 years ago – July 19, 1979
Darrell (Butch) Skunes has two unique hobbies, both of which allow him to “catch a buzz.” Throughout the school year, Skunes is employed as a teacher, but during the summer months, he turns into an apiarist (bee keeper) and a zymologist (a person who experiments with wine fermentation).
The Lookout by Mark W. Beito, Publisher: This has been a pretty busy week around here. Sandy and I bought a house here in town, and also got in some new typesetting equipment which had to be nursed along until we got it working properly. As a result this column, which is never usually done until the last minute anyway, never got written at all.
30 years ago – July 21, 1994
The filing date for county commissioner for District 4, which includes Sleepy Eye, pass Tuesday with three people running for that office. Andy Lochner, Wayne Novotny and Jerome Trebesch have all entered their names as candidates for the job. They are vying for the position being vacated by Paul Rasmussen who began his 15 years as a commissioner in 1979 when he was elected to replace the late Leo Hoffmann who had suffered a heart attack.
A crowd of people gathered for a ribbon cutting ceremony for the new Heartland Express transportation service Monday afternoon in the Erickson’s parking lot. Legislators Denny Frederickson and Barb Vickerman [among others] gave brief messages praising the efforts of everyone involved with making the new service available to Brown County residents.
15 years ago – July 16, 2009
By plane, train, bus, boat, taxi and “tube” the four members of the Brown County 4-H Dairy Judging Team recently made their way through several countries in Europe. Chris Seifert, Angela Sellner and Laura Rosenhammer of Sleepy Eye and Val Mohr of New Ulm returned home after a two-week trip, one earned after the team placed third in the National 4-H contest at the World Dairy Expo last fall. The team participated in two judging events, one in Scotland and one in Luxembourg.
In recognition of Sleepy Eye’s first Farmer’s Market, the Inquiring Photographer asked kindergarten students “What is your favorite vegetable?” Ana Gomez and Trisha Ludewig said carrots, Luisa Garcia and Stephanie Fernandez said potatoes, Chris Hernandez said corn on the cob and Osiel Carrera said tomatoes.
