technology in agriculture

This picture was taken on Sunday, April 22, 1990 at the Headquarters location of the International Soil and Water Conservation Society. I was serving as the Executive Director at the time and the dedication of the D.E.Hutchinson Prairie was  on Earth Day. "Hutch", as he was known, was a long time SCS conservationist in Nebraska as well as a SWCS Board Member. He was involved in the planting of some 10-12 acres of Native Grass when the Society acquired the 20 acre property near Ankeny, IA several years earlier. Hutch is at the mike in this picture and I am holding the plaque of Dedication with his picture and inscription. His wife Francis is at his right. SWCS Board Members Alice Jones Mielke, Rich Duesterhaus and Bill Brune complete the picture. Rich also spoke as SWCS intl. President. There were some 75 people in attendance. I served as MC and Marlin Edwards with Pioneer Hi Bred, the main speaker. Chuck McLaughlin, President of the Iowa Chapter, spoke and helped Bill Ferris

In visiting with one of my Kiwanis friends this noon, he told me of having recently worked with a lady who is interested in the challenge of seeing Major League Baseball games in each of the 30 ballparks. He gave he my name, told her of having seen my �book� and suggested she may wish to get in touch with me. I was somewhat flattered by the possibility of passing on �my story� to anyone. Then this evening in visiting with Carolyn, she told of having seen a PBS program recently on the very subject. It seems that it has become an interesting challenge for young people. Tour companies have put together packages to help people meet the challenge. Like many goals, though once achieved, old ballparks are demolished and new ones built. I have achieved the goal of seeing games in all 30 of the current parks on 3 occasions only to now be �out-of-date� when the Atlanta Braves moved into their new stadium. Son Tim flew me down to Miami in April of 2015 to see the Marlins new park. I retain my �st

Elaine spent her spare time today doing word search challenges and I continued to work on scanning print pictures in preparation for going on a flash drive. I began with the last packet at the end of 1990 and am working toward the beginning of the year. As shown in the picture, we have 22 packets of pictures, most of which have 25 prints. We did a lot of traveling during the year with my job as Exec. Director of the Soil and Water Conservation Society at Ankeny, IA. Jon's family moved back to Seward that year and Mother passed away in December. I am now working on a packet from mid-August that includes a short trip with Tim's family, Carolyn, Julie and Elaine and me. We left from our Condo in Ankeny for Galena, IL; had a picnic lunch in the park at Amana, saw the Czech Museum in Cedar Rapids and were able to get rooms in Freeport, IL. After a day in Galena, Tim's headed for home and we went on to New Galarus, up to Dodgerville and on to visit The House on the Rock. We went

Carolyn has been helping Julie prepare for a garage sale that was held today out at the Owens place. Sadie was set up with a Lemon Aid Stand as a Welcome to the many nice clothing items for little kids that were displayed on tables in the garage. We drove out to Ridge Run after picking Elaine up from the Beauty Shop at about 10:30 and were surprised at the number of customers. Jack was pleased to see Elaine and ran to meet her with a book for her to read to him. John had laid out a Calaway 5-wood for $5. that I would have bought back in my golfing days. Living in a place like Brookdale certainly limits the appeal of many thing because of storage space, need  and physical ability to utilize them.  Having reached a goal of processing family Digital pictures in preparation for putting them on a large Flash Drive, I moved on today to the challenge of scanning print pictures. My first task was to make an inventory of all such pictures we have to work with. (Our 35mm slides are in another ca

Since moving to Brookdale nearly a year ago, we have reduced our number of Magazine subscriptions, particularly those related to Agriculture since I was able to deduct their cost on income tax because of my activities. We made a decision today to not renew our Smithsonian Magazine after at least 15 years.. As I went through the July-August issue this evening for the 3 rd time, I couldn't find an article that challenged me to read. I suggest to Elaine that she take it out to the vestibule where people read what is available. Then I picked up the July-August, Nebraska Life. We have received it since it's beginning several years ago when they did a story on our Cattle Bank coffee group. It has an entirely different approach than Smithsonian.  The photography, layout, writing and items of interest are all outstanding; even the ads. The page I copied includes part of Lincoln's Sunken Gardens which is one of its Feature articles in addition to �The Oregon Trail�, �Hopes and Drea

We had a noon Dinner at Brookdale that would have made any Chief proud to serve. It began with a good sized salad of cold peas in a cheese dressing. Coffee was served as we sat down. Then we were served a plate with half of a large baked potato with sour cream, a large, thick piece of cured ham, and, an extremely large roasting ear with a slice of bread. Our dessert was a root beer float. We were given the option of eating the corn off the cob or letting them cut it off. Eating it off the cob was too big a temptation to pass up, however I haven't done so in years without "handles". Elaine went back to our unit to get them but didn't find them at the time. (She found them later for the picture.) Eating that big ear without handles reminded me of days as a kid when we ate field corn that way. I knew it would be impossible to eat it all at one setting so wrapped up most of the ham for an evening lunch. I did get away with the rest of it and even enjoyed the float with my

We missed Julie and John's Wedding Anniversary yesterday so will acknowledge the 2010 event today. I pulled out my Journal and read every word of the 23rd and 24th. It was a great event and a very emotional time. All of our immediate family were here to first enjoy the Rehearsal Dinner under a big tent set up in the Owenses back yard on Friday evening. Prior to the wedding at St. Vincents, the photographer had us pose for this picture in the Church yard.  Father Randall Langhorst and Mother Helen Goltl as Reader, performed the ceremony. Allison put together a wonderful album of the entire event. The Wedding Party left for Lincoln in a long black limousine while we rode with Janice and Larry Sorge in their Lincoln. The Reception was held in the Green Cato's "Stables" with an excellent meal, short speeches, Toasts and cake cutting followed by dancing. Ben did a lot of dancing, after having given the Bride away earlier, he also danced with her. Elaine and I even danced. 

Jackie Armstrong, a long time friend from the days of our youth, came in to visit with us this evening. She lives in Mosquite, Nevada, and drove back with a daughter. Jackie graduated from Seward High School in 1949 and married Don Armstrong in the fall of '50. The first years of their marriage were out on an Armstrong farm north of Garland. It was where Ted Kooser's live today. Don and I were in the same HS class at Garland and continued to be close friends over the years. They had a park model in Donna, Texas next door to my sister and her husband's back in the 90's where we also spent a month or so each winter. Don died some 5 years ago and Jackie hasn't been back to Seward for some time. It was great to get caught up on our families and we had a great visit.

I continue to work on pictures and am now into the years after the turn of the Century in 2000. This one came from '05 and is a nice view of Elaine and Carolyn with the old Black Butcher Kettle. Carolyn sold it to friends in the process of clearing out things that were not appropriate to have on our Auction. While we have memories of things that were part of our earlier lives, the pictures of such items help to focus the memories. And, as is so often the case, some of the things shown in the edges also bring back memories. We were also pleased to have Carolyn take us down for an appointment with Dr. Mousolf, our "eye Doctor". Elaine had a pressure check for Glaucoma and I had some preliminary checking for getting new glasses. It is always a lengthy time to get through the procedure since he works on several patients at the same time. While he has a couple capable assistants, we were in the Office today for three hours. This took Carolyn out of town when the floor of the b

I continue to work with old pictures toward the goal of being able to pass them on to family in an organized manner. I went through a few hundred from the early 90's today and couldn't resist putting a couple on my blog page this evening. This is Tony and Deb Vrana's Wedding picture. We certainly had a nice visit with them this past Thursday as they were here and had supper with us. Carolyn came up, too. We all went for a car ride during which they were able to get out to see Julie, John and the kids. Tony and Deb have matured nicely since this picture was taken but their appearance has changed very little.  This next picture of Ben, Carolyn, and Julie was taken in the Denton area while they enjoyed doing some native camping.  Ben was a "seasoned camper" and Carolyn seemed to adapt to it very well. It was another one of the great experiences that Julie experienced that contributed to her well rounded childhood.  I rooted for 42 year old Tiger Woods as he competed

Elaine had a 9:00am Beauty Shop appointment this morning. We had left the car in the parking lot near our patio door to aid in getting there on time. I picked up a couple things from Pack n Sav and went to the Schweitzer auction at the 4-H building. This was the first auction in Seward for some time so their was a good-sized crowd. The "merchandise" came from several sources with no names mentioned. #15, Tommy Schlueter (front row left) got his share of bargains. He does a lot of EBay selling as a hobby and has an occasional garage sale. I didn't buy anything and left the auction after a short while to be out front when Elaine was finished. I took this picture of "Shear Reflections"; her beauty shop through the windshield of my car while waiting for her. Some of the reflections are interesting. For many years this was a Barber Shop and then became a Shoe Repair place that also sold men's work shoes. I believe it was the last place in Seward where you could g

We got down to Walmart this afternoon and shopped for some groceries, office supplies, pharmaceuticals, etc. I rode in the last one of the 4 electric carts they have available for customers. We took our purchases right on out to the car where a lady in the handicapped stall next to ours, asked if she could use the cart. It worked out great for both of us. Elaine walked through the whole venture but we put things she picked up in the carts basket. We stopped at the Library and picked up this Windows 10 book which I had borrowed before. I have already learned something from it on playing DVDs. I've asked at out local book store and they don't carry computer books so may have to have Carolyn check on Amazon. She and Ben were here when we got home and helped carry in our purchases. Ben had even swept off the Patio after the lawn had been mowed. It was a good afternoon and we had a great supper with Butter Pecan Ice Cream for Dessert. It would have been nice if the Supper last nig

Deb and Tony Vrana from Tomah, WI got here this afternoon. We had a good visit with a little refreshment, before going to Supper at 4:30.  We continued to get "caught up" on their activities after having covered the family earlier. Tony does very few drywall jobs anymore but spends time with their 20 rental apartments in 3 buildings and some 200 storage units. We visited about Sondra, Jim, Cindy, Chad, Cody and his wife, Carley , Tanya and Christian's moving back to Denver with their  daughter Harper. Tony and Deb's son Ethan is 18 and is in the Twin Cities for motorcycle activities ths weekend. Their daughter Kacey is visiting a friend in Beatrice, NE which helped prompt their visit of Don's family in Syracuse and ours here in Seward. Carolyn came up and we went out to see her new house under construction, we drove past the old Turner house, out to Julie and John's home and then "signed in" at the "Parade of Flags". It was a short but very

Carolyn and Ben took us up on Columbia Ave. this afternoon to see the progress on their new house under construction. Dan the Digger was there with his equipment doing some plumbing and gas line installation. Julie, Sadie and Jack came up too. Jack enjoyed seeing the tractor and playing in the rock pile.This is the first time we or any of our immediate family have ever had a house built. It is an interesting experience that we have always shied away from but Carolyn is up to it. Their lot butts up to the new addition to the City's North Cemetery. Sadie and Jack have the interesting experience of having both sets of Grandparents building new house next to each other. The Owens house is about a month ahead of the Hughes. It is anticipated that both houses we be finished by Christmas.

The 1952 Christmas Season was our first back in the Washington D.C. area. We lived in the Fairlington Apartments in southern Arlington, VA. According to my records, "We got a nice 6' Scotch Pine Christmas tree for $2.99." There was "spirited" competition in the agency for what was judged to be the best decorated office door. Prizes were awarded at the Agency Christmas party. Administrator Don Williams gave me a Papermate pen for my 3rd place prize. We were delayed in leaving to drive back to Nebraska for Christmas because of heavy snow. We got away at noon on the 22nd and planned to drive straight-through to Seward. We got to the Pennsylvania Turnpike before dark but had to wait an hour to get through the first tunnel. We used sleeping bags to make a bed in the back of the station wagon. We had generator problems in Gary, IN and it took from 2:00am till 5:00 am to get back on the road. We got to Seward about 7:00pm after being on the road for 31 hours. We had a

This was taken out in Seward during the summer of 1974 as we celebrated our 25th Wedding Anniversary. June had been a busy month. Jon and I had been down to Warsaw, VA where he was working as a Soil Scientist trainee,  Carolyn was back at the Pentagon for her summer job. Tim had gotten "beat up" playing playground basketball in Louisville, KY where he was stationed with Social Security Adm. Verlon met us in Chicago while flying out to Seward. He was doing carpenter work up on Cape Cod. We enjoyed visiting while staying with our folks and family. We went out to Branched Oak Lake where some of the kids tried to water ski. We adults went to The Flying V Dance Hall in Utica where the Paul Morehead Orchestra played. It was a short but good trip. 

Jon Kruse drove the Seward County Shuttle today and took 10 of us Brookdale residents on a tour of Beaver Crossing. It is one of our several small towns in the county, some 18 miles from Seward, with just over 400 residents. I have written about early Childhood memories of the Earle Smiley Water Gardens there and was very familiar with the town during my baseball & early SCS days. We even had reason to go there for Grange and other things after returning to Nebraska in 1980. However, our visits have been very infrequent during the past 20 years. A tornado did considerable damage to the town in 2004 and we have been back only a few times until today. We were fortunate in having several people along today who had lived there and were very familiar with the town. When we approached the "Gate" shown in the picture, I commented that it was something I remembered but was reminded of its change from having an Arch over the big post before tornado damage. Passing through the &quo

Getting back into some on the old pictures taken when our kids were growing up in Virginia, makes me realize how much "they were on their own".  While we did what we could to provide Parental Guidance and got them to Church activities etc., Elaine and I were both busy with our jobs. In addition, I spent many years taking College Classes and had a very limited amount of time to spend with them.The boys all had paper routes and various "jobs" along the way. We had many "family outings" down along the Potomic, various  places of interest, ball parks and vacations. As demonstrated by Verlon's vest, they all had sufficient personal time to develop their individual talents. All were involved in Music lessons to some degree. One of Tim's disappointments was his Freshman year in College out here in Nebraska. He was much happier after transfering to Duke. Jon probably had the most successful Boy Scout experience. It along with his long time news

As I finished putting digital pictures on my 32 GB Flash Drive, I came across an old Picasa Backup from '05 that had pictures of the 2003 SWCS and ARSCSE meetings in Spokane, WA. Elaine and I drove out to Seattle to visit Safco Field, home of the Mariners baseball team. We went on a 2-hour tour in the morning and saw everything from the Press Box to the Dugout. Then saw the Mariners beat the Rangers 11-5. We drove through the Moses Lake region to Spokane and checked in to the Doubletree Hotel for the Society Meeting. The picture shows the Nebraska Delegation with Steve Chick, State Conservationist. We met son Jon in the Exhibit Hall where he had a Poster and then he introduced Norm Berg at the Fellows meeting. As outgoing President of the Retiree's Ass'n, I chaired a meeting of the Board of Directors consisting of: Neil Bogner, Bob Eddleman (incoming President), Linda dePeteris & Mike Nethery. At the Dinner Meeting that evening, I had the pleasure of presenting the Pres

The Tritones from Fremont, NE - Pam, Cindy and Rosie entertained us at Brookdale this afternoon. They pattered their "act" after the WWII Andrews Sisters and even sang some of their old songs. They invited the audience to sing along with them which some of us enjoyed. There was a good turnout and those that didn't make it missed a "great show".  "Count your Blessings" was one of their outstanding numbers. Cindy from Anselmo, NE learned "The Auctioneers Song" as a youngster after going with her Dad to the local Livestock Sale Barn, and sang it as a solo. We were setting in the front row where she apparently heard me singing along with her. When their program was finished, she came over to ask me about it. I told her of learning it from my Brother Don who was a professional auctioneer. We later sang it as a Kitone number but never quite as well as just Don and me.

I continue to work on organizing pictures and putting them on a 32GB Flash Drive. This evening I added the Pictures and Activities for the 5 years of 2017-2013. This Model A Ford Delivery Truck was one of my "prized" models that I no longer have. I bought it in 2013 when Ed Pollak's collection was being dispersed and have no idea where it went. It may have been sold on our Auction or given to someone. The interesting thing is that as I work with pictures, like I did today, and come across one like this, I can enjoy it just about as much as if I still had it.  I did keep several and there is a story that goes with each of them The same story goes with a picture.

These 3 binders hold "My Life Story". It was started many years ago as an Autobiography and morphed into its current title. It currently contains 29 chapters ranging from "The Early Years"  which took me through High School to the present time in Chapter 29. The Chapters are subdivided into Sections with each of the past 14 calender years designated as a section within the last 5 Chapters. What were Chapters in the earlier version became sections in the current organization. Each section contains a Narrative, Collages of pictures and Captions for those Collages. The narratives typically contain an average of 15 pages of single spaced written material. Some of this information has been readily available and much of it has recently been scanned. I have now placed all 29 Chapters covering a period of over 90 years, on a 32 GB Flash Drive. In addition I put "My Career in SCS" on the flash drive. It covers my 32 year career in the USDA Soil Conservation Service

We were pleased to have Julie, John, Sadie and Jack Owens come up to visit this evening. The kids enjoyed playing outdoors by running through the freshly mowed lawn and we had a good visit inside. Our discussion led me in to pulling out my copies of "Seward County Nebraska Atlas" compiled and published by the "Title Atlas Co." Minneapolis 40, MN. I have the copies from 1962, 1977, 1986 and 1996. It is amazing the amount of personal information contained therein. I also have a copy of "1990 Plat Maps of Seward County NE" compiled and published by R. C. Booth Enterprises of Harlan, Iowa. (It has no personal information). Julie told of a lady my age working with her and others in teaching them how to make Kolaches. This lady grew up neighbors to Elaine so we had to explain where it was from Bee. We are learning that young people can't relate to some of our old benchmarks since most of them were gone before they were born. 

This 1931 picture was taken at the Smiley Water Gardens in Beaver Crossing. Earle Smiley was an aviator in WW I and continued to Barnstorm after the war. When I was about the age as shown in the picture, he flew his small plane over our home in Seward and it was the first airplane I'd ever seen in flight. He developed the Water Gardens in Beaver Crossing with Flowing Well water. And, produced and sold Water Lilies all over the world. Some years ago, I was able to buy one of his  Catalogues on E-bay which I passed on to his daughter Marilyn. His family has financed a tribute display for him in the Nebraska National Guard Museum in Seward.  Brookdale has scheduled a bus ride to Beaver Crossing this coming Saturday afternoon. We plan to participate. I hope some of the folks from Beaver Crossing that live here will be going too. They may know a lot more about the Smiley Water Gardens than I do.

Some years ago I bought a Lexar 256 MB flash drive and have 62 items on it. When I started doing Blog pages in 2010, I got a Verbatim 2 GB unit on which I have saved over 2,500 pages during 2010-2017. Next was a SanDisk Curser Glide 8GB. During the last few days, I have deleted some items from it and put on my 2010-2017 "Pictures & Activities" Folders. Shown is a 2011 example of what each of the 8 year Folders contain. The "selected pictures" are < 10% of the total number and are what I used in making 2 or 3 collages each year. This effort is more detailed than "My Life Story" with considerable duplication. I plan to go to Walmart tomorrow and get a larger flash drive. I will have "Activities" along with pictures going back a few years with pictures going back to 1980. I hope to get a flash drive large enough to hold all of them. 5

With our company gone home, my birthday and the 4th of July "in the books", this was a day to put things back in place. Among them was the VCR tapes that we brought out of storage and sent some home with Tim. The rest have been put in the closet. Julie's little old RCA TV  has worked great for playing them. The scene shown here is of Vivian, Don, Janice, Jerry, and me singing "The Lost Cord" etc. for our Dad's 90th birthday at the farm in 1986. It was pretty emotional when Carolyn helped get it set-up and playing recently. I'm anxious for Don and Janice to hear it. We went down to Walmart this afternoon for some supplies and a battery for my watch. I took advantage of their electric riding shopping carts and "buzzed" around the store. Elaine had a hard time keeping up.

Between the Seward 4th of July celebration as shown by Lincoln TV and the Seward paper, I felt like I'd seen quite a bit of it. It has become one of Nebraska's major summer events with vendors coming from miles to display their wares. Sadie came in 2nd in the trycycle race this morning near where the water fight was going on. The dedication of a new exhibit at the Nebraska National Guard Museum drew a large crowd this morning with record breaking numbers touring the facility. Part of the Parade coverage was taken at the intersection of 1st and Seward street. Our former house is just up the street a half block on the left side of the picture. Carolyn and Ben came up to visit while the parade was going on. I'm sure we enjoyed their visit more than we might have the parade with heat index over 100. We will step out on our Patio tonight to see some of the fireworks. We have been "enjoying" the sound of them all week and tonight they can be shot-off until midnight. We

We were treated this evening by the Seward HS Marching Band coming up to Brookdale. They may have been practicing for the Big 4th of July Parade at 4:00pm tomorrow, but they sounded very good. The Ridgewood and Greenhouse facilities are just across the street from the school ground and our facility is just about a block north. Residents at all 3 facilities enjoyed the benefit of their marching music. Rosellen had announced that they would be coming up soon after 7:00 but there was some question of their route. We went out the front door and I took the pictures from there, but we also learned that they marched around the parking area near our Patio. We have pretty well decided to not participate in any of the activities downtown tomorrow. This will be the first time for many years that we haven't sat on our driveway with old friends to watch the parade. It will be interesting to see how many of the "regulars" that set on the grass, show-up to ask permission of the new owne