Local Girl Scout Earns Silver Award for Dog Park Project B.P. Pool Opener
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Celebrate B.P. German Days this Weekend
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ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-FIFTH YEAR
BELLE PLAINE, MINNESOTA, JUNE 15, 2016
75¢ SINGLE COPY
NUMBER 25
German Days Starts Cookin’ Friday Activities galore will take place on Belle Plaine’s downtown streets this Friday evening through Saturday as the community holds its 34th annual German Days festivities. Up first will be Friday’s Downtown Community Cookout starting at 5 p.m. Free food samples will be provided by a number of merchants. Also Friday evening will be the Classic Car Roll-In downtown. For more information or to register, call R/T Garage at 952-356-4969. There will also be Bounce Houses, Pony Rides and Face Painting for the kids and more Friday and Saturday. Also Friday night there will Belle Plaine High School’s 111th commencement exercise Sunday saw 123 seniors receive their diplomas. The graduates, along be live music in six bars. Each bar will have punch cards availwith family, friends and supporters, filled the high school’s South Gymnasium. able (one per person) that will
BPHS’s Class of 2016 Says a ‘Temporary’ Farewell
qualify you to win $500, $200 and $100 prizes. Your card must be punched at all six bars of the “Kraut Krawl” to be entered in the midnight drawing. You must be present to win. No purchases are necessary to participate.
Saturday’s Events
Saturday’s downtown events will start with the Kids Pedal Pull at 11 a.m. The Parade will start at 1 p.m., the grand marshal for which is Darlene Hogeboom (see separate article). The parade will be followed by the Queen Coronation. This year’s candidates are:
German Days
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being duct-taped to the pole at the edge of the dance floor. We thought that was the most hilarious thing in the entire world and kept us entertained for hours,” Koepp said. Koepp recalled the transition from junior to senior high school. The activities, the class spirit and the costumes all intensified during special events that were part of homecoming week and throughout the years. For all the fun the senior class enjoyed this year, the group enjoyed plenty of success in its activities. The volleyball team won a state championship, a first for Belle Plaine. The foot- Belle Plaine’s 2016 Miss German Days candidates are, from left, Hannah Burmeister, Allison ball team returned to the state Hennes, Teresa Wentworth and Caitlyn Schoon. tournament for the first time in over 20 years. The wrestling team returned to state and finished third. There were plenty of other successful moments the seniors will long remember. The one-act Play group earned a ter of attention, if only for an She’s never seen Belle Plaine’s afternoon, wouldn’t be so bad, German Days Parade. Saturday Class of 2016 she figured. (June 18), everybody at the an(continued on page 8) The parade begins at the innual parade will see Darlene tersection of West Prairie and Hogeboom, the parade’s grand South Elk streets at 1 p.m. marshal. Heading north on Elk Street, Hogeboom was the overit turns east on Main Street to whelming choice of the GerMeridian and then north on man Days committee to lead the Meridian Street into downtown parade. She’s being honored for Belle Plaine. many years of service to Belle Hogeboom prefers to go about Plaine. Her strong German heron a chance to support Belle community -- former teachers, itage also makes Hogeboom an her business quietly, without a community members who gave easy selection. Plaine Schools. lot of fanfare. As a child, she His longtime commitment to their time to schools, car deal- Christine Panning, one of the recalls telling an elementary the school district earned Mey- ers who donated vehicles for a owners of Andy’s Bar & Grill, school teacher her goal was to er the school district’s annual scholarship raffle, even the lo- has asked Hogeboom of her inbe a farmer’s wife. She’s done “Friend of Education Award.” cal food shelf. terest to serve as German Days It’s a request Hogeboom an- that and more. The award was first presented grand marshal several times, nually declines graciously. It She has served the Belle Plaine It was presented during the He didn’t teach a math class, awards ceremony Wednesday in 1989. Meyers is the 16th Hogeboom said. wasn’t until this past winter, didn’t create policies guiding night (June 8). Meyer joins a honoree (it was not presented “She knows I’m 100 percent while recovering from a stroke Hogeboom curriculum or school activities. list that includes movers and in 1993 and 1996-’98). German,” she said. “I’ve never that Hogeboom, 79, finally de(continued on page 12) He was surprised and humbled given it much thought.” But Gerry Meyer never passed shakers in the Belle Plaine cided to accept. Being the cenby the honor. A lifelong Belle Plaine resident, Meyer said he would “forever cherish” the award, especially in light of “the dedicated work of many persons and organizations that love and support BPHS. I am honored to be part of this group.” Meyer’s support for the district boils down to one simple The 2016 Belle Plaine High to capturing the Minnesota unseeded Pine Island (18-7) in position. If Belle Plaine schools School baseball team made his- River Conference and section the first round 10 a.m. Thursday needed help, he found a way to tory Thursday when it rallied championships and state tour- at Dick Putz Field in St. Cloud. The Other first-round games chip in. When the district want- to defeat Fairmont 6-5 for the nament berth. ed to build an electronic sign in section championship and the The season could get even (in order after the Belle Plaine front of the junior-senior high school’s first-ever entry into the more dreamier if the Tigers game) Thursday are No. 5 seed school, Meyers was among the state baseball tournament. can win their first two state Proctor (18-5) vs. No. 4 Maple leaders of a fund-raising effort. The Tigers completed the Sec- tournament games in St. Cloud Lake (22-6), unseeded East He has helped secure funding tion 2AA Tournament (double- this week and advance to next Grand Forks (15-8) vs. No. 2 elimination) with a record of Monday’s state Class 2A cham- Minnehaha Academy (24-3) Meyer 4-0, outscoring its opponents pionship game at Target Field and unseeded Paynesville Area (continued on page 4) (17-8) vs. No. 3 Pierz (21-4). by a combined 27-5. That feat in downtown Minneapolis. was a continuation of what has That possibility is definitely been a dream season for Belle within reach. Belle Plaine has H.S. Baseball Gerry Meyer is the 2016 recipient of the Belle Plaine School Plaine, which has compiled an received the No. 1 seed for the (continued on page 17) District’s Friend of Education award. overall record of 23-1 en route state tournament and will face The 111th graduating class of Belle Plaine High School saw 123 seniors say a temporary farewell to their classmates and community on a sunny afternoon in Belle Plaine Senior High School’s South gymnasium Sunday (June 12). They started as young children, wide-eyed and freshfaced at Chatfield Elementary. They moved on to Oak Crest, then the junior and senior high schools. McKenzie Koepp, the senior class speaker and noted each new level offered new opportunities, new memories to be made and revisited during the spontaneous class reunions that inevitably occur around St. Patrick’s Day, German Days and Bar-B-Q Days community festivities. The farewells they shared on graduation day, she said, are only temporary. “Growing up here has not only been a privilege, but a lesson. This is the place where we made friends and learned how to be good,” Koepp said to the class and a large crowd of the
graduates’ families and friends. “This is proof that the people we walked the hallways with for the past 12 years are not only our friends now, but will be for years to come.” Koepp took the class of 2016 on a brief trip down memory lane, revisiting fifth grade gym class, where boys and girls learned how to dance. The pictures remind the graduates how very sweet the children were and how far they’ve come, she said. “We were taking baby steps since our parents attended,” Koepp said. Trips to Wolf Ridge and the rain that fell the night of the big night hike was one of many sixth-grade highlights. The hike took place indoors. As junior high students, members of the class of 2016 began to figure out they were not in elementary school anymore. They could begin to make their own fun, their own memories. The dances were guided by themes. “I can still picture Mr. Foust
Darlene Hogeboom Will Lead Annual German Days Parade
Meyer’s Support for B.P. Schools Earns Him ‘Friend’ Award
‘Always a Tiger,’ Honoree Backed School District in Many Ways
H.S. Baseball
Tigers Land No. 1 Seed for State; Will Face Pine Island in Opener