Rosenberg’s enjoy living in Kasson

Donald Rosenberg grew up on a farm near Lake Crystal, where his father grew up and his grandfather farmed close by. They both milked cows and later they sold the cows and raised and fed cattle, pigs, and sheep.

Don’s grandmother would buy 1,500 pullets each year (1,000 females and 500 males). When the roosters were ready, they would butcher 50 each day and dress them out so they had a lot of chicken meat. She would also have enough eggs and an egg truck would stop by on their route to pick up eggs that were to be sold.

Don participated in football and FFA while in school at Lake Crystal. He was on the FFA Wildlife and Soils judging teams, and he won the State Soil Judging competition one year. (A side note of interest to me was one of Don’s English teachers, Margaret, who is my wife’s aunt, had been a missionary to Africa for over 20 years before teaching at Lake Crystal. She lived to the age of 101 years.)

When Don was in his senior year in high school he would also work an eight-hour shift welding at Year-A-Round cab, a Mankato Shop, Monday and Friday after the football season ended.

After graduation Don attended Bemidji State University in environmental studies his freshman year. He transferred to Mankato State University in his sophomore year but always felt he was defending farmers as many students in his classes did not have a very good grasp of agriculture as they had no farm background.

Don then attended the University of Minnesota, St. Paul, and felt much more at home at the College of Agriculture, where he earned a degree in soil science. His advisor said with the number of biology and chemistry credits he should consider a minor in those fields, but Don did not want to do this as it would take additional time at school.

Don felt the pull back to the farm so he came back home and farmed with his father, and also sold seed corn for the next couple of years. He also worked for the local Behlen steel building contractor where he would construct the base foundations for grain bins and steel machine sheds.

Since there was no additional land to rent, his parents did not encourage him to continue farming. He found a job managing a fertilizer plant at Maynard, Minn. for the 1979 spring season. He then managed the Ready-Mix Concrete plant at Lake Crystal for the next couple of years. He then took a sales job with Huron Cement company, moved to Bloomington, and had a sales area from Anoka, to La Crosse and Eau Claire, Wis.

Brenda lived in the Nerstrand, area with one brother, and when her family moved to their farm shettended Faribault High School, and was involved with 4-H. She then attended Winona State University and received her degree in nursing and became an RN. She then worked at District One Hospital in Faribault.

Brenda’s father was Don’s boss, and they were married in June 1985, six months after they were engaged. When Don got a new job, it meant moving to Muskegon, Mich. Don then sold his Bloomington house and Brenda’s house in Faribault to make the move.

Don managed the Cement distribution terminal there, and he would begin his work with transporting cement throughout the Great Lakes Region. After only being there less than a year, Don was transferred to Duluth-Superior and he worked with the grinding, distribution and transportation of cement by ship, rail and trucks and they lived there for the next six years.

Brenda worked at St. Mary’s Hospital in their Surgical Intensive Care unit in Duluth. Their two children, Eric and Leslie, were born while they lived in Duluth.

With the changes happening in the industry, Huron Cement was sold to Lafarge Corporation in 1987, which was an international construction materials company. In 1992, Don was transferred to Detroit, and in 1998 to Alpena, Mich., for the next 18 years. Don needed to travel to many sites throughout the Great Lakes Region to the terminals, and he also made a couple of trips to Europe for international logistics meetings.

Brenda worked at the Alpena Regional Medical Center for 15 years, where she worked in the Radiology Department and became a Certified Radiology Nurse, a unique accreditation for nurses. In 2007, the Lafarge Corporation was going through many changes, and since Don had worked for them many years, they offered him a retirement package which he accepted. The Rosenberg’s had worked with their Thrivent Financial advisor for several years and he encouraged Don to start working with Thrivent in their financial services in Northern Michigan and the Upper Peninsula region for the next 8 years.

In 2015, Don’s mother was having more health issues, and they started considering moving back to be closer to their roots. The Rosenberg’s would come back to Minnesota forThanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, and summer birthday family gatherings each year. In 2016, Brenda was offered a Mayo position at Saint Marys Hospital as she had worked in the Radiology Department, Interventional Radiology and then CT Body Ablations areas. She needed to be within 30 minutes of Saint Marys Hospital so they looked at Zumbrota, Stewartville, Byron, and Kasson as possible places to live.

Brenda told Don, “I have moved five times with your job transfers, so this time I am going to select the place we are going to live!” She had a friend that had lived in Kasson, and she had heard very positive things about the community from her. They found a house and moved to Kasson in 2016. Brenda retired from Mayo in 2022.

Church has been very important to Don and Brenda throughout their lives. When they moved to a new community, one of the first things they did was become involved with a church as it was a great way to get to know people, and it was also like an extended family. Don’s great-great-grandfather preached in a Calvinist Methodist church in Wales, and immigrated to America due to religious persecution in the late 1850’s. He later started a church in Butternut, Minn., which has now closed. ince Don had grown up attending a country church, when they heard about South Zumbro Lutheran, they checked it out, and found it very much to their liking. Don has been on the church council, and Brenda takes part in the weekly church quilting project and the church women’s organization.

Don likes to shoot trap, skeet, and sporting clays. He has participated at many Regional and National clay pigeon competition contests, and he uses 12, 20, 28, and 410-gauge shotguns. His dad started at him with a BB Gun when he was young to control the pigeons in the barn hayloft, and he also would go pheasant hunting.

They have a Gordon Setter as part of their family. Brenda enjoys quilting and knitting caps, sweaters, baby sweaters and projects for cancer patients. Don said Brenda will often knit when she is riding along in their car while they are traveling.

Brenda’s parents owned a townhouse in Arizona so they would go there for a week or two during the year. Since they couldn’t rent the townhouse to others, rather than let it sit empty, they made it available to family members and friends to stay for a short time when they visited Arizona. They have since purchased a different house in Arizona which they bought sight unseen, and it has worked out well. The last two winters they have spent the winter months there.

The Rosenberg’s took their family and his mother to visit Wales and England and were able to see the area that their ancestors had lived before they immigrated to the U.S. in the 1800’s. Driving on the opposite side of the road and getting used to roundabouts was a new experience for him. They both have ancestors that served in the Civil War.

Don used to be more interested in watching pro football than he is now, but he is a big fan of NASCAR and he has attended various races and follows them on TV very often. He likes to watch programs about agriculture on the RFD TV channel. Brenda really enjoys reading murder mysteries!

Don keeps his connection to agriculture, and helps with the spring and fall field work with the Herbst farm and also does some grain hauling for them. Brenda likes to bake and Don shared his chocolate chip cookie recipe which she uses, and she also bakes desserts for the guys while they are busy with the field work.