After several years of living south of the Mason-Dixon Line, my wife and I were enamored with the thunder boomers, lightning crashes and the wall clouds that moved through the area last week. It reminded us of the severe weather we experienced while living in Arkansas and Missouri, the heart of Tornado Alley.

Ralph Kenneth Marquardt, 89, of Dodge Center passed away at his home on Tuesday, May 26, 2020. 
Ralph was born on Oct. 23, 1930, the son of August and Anna (Maass) Marquardt in Wasioja.
Ralph attended Wasioja grade school and graduated from Dodge Center High School. He was united in marriage to Ardis Christiansen on Feb. 15, 1953, at the Trinity Lutheran Church in Owatonna.  

Sylvia Antonia Wells, 83, of Kasson passed away on Tuesday, May 26, at the Seasons Hospice House in Rochester.
Sylvia was born on Feb. 26, 1937 in Wrangell, Alaska to Burton and Ruby (Everson) Brouillard.

With everything going on in the world, good news is needed now more than ever and Kasson-Mantorville rising senior Jakob Aarsvold received some good news when he learned that he’d been selected to play in the Hawaii Tiki Bowl, a nearly weeklong event held in Honolulu, Hawaii Dec. 30 – Jan. 4, 2021.

After competing for the blue and white KoMets for the past two years, right-handed pitcher and third baseman Kaleb Thiesse has decided to compete for another blue and white team, the Norse of Luther College, next year.
            He chose Luther because, “I loved the campus, loved the facilities and the people on campus seemed very welcoming.”
He also liked that Luther was just a little less than 90 miles away.

Each year about 500 high school sophomores and juniors apply to make it into the following year’s All-State band, mixed choir or orchestra, but only about 140 are accepted. Despite those odds, Kasson-Mantorville High School will be well represented next year as Ethan Barnum (clarinet) and Sayer Flynn (flute) made the All-State band while Olivia Smith made the All-State mixed choir.

Two former Steele County commissioners who lost their spots on the county board in the 2016 election are staging a comeback in this year’s election.
On Tuesday, James “Corky” Ebeling and Mark Schultz filed to get their old seats back on the Steele County Board. They will go up against the two incumbents that beat them in 2016—Jim Abbe and Rick Gnemi. 

Nathan Davidson has made the half hour trip to Kasson from Grand Meadow area hundreds of times in all types of weather conditions in the last 30 years driving a yellow VW.   

A last minute filing has produced a race for state representative in Minnesota’s District 24A, which covers Steele and Waseca counties.
Former Steele County commissioner and county administrator Tom Shea of Owatonna has filed for District 24A to challenge incumbent John Petersburg in November’s general election.
Petersburg, of Waseca, has been in office since 2013.