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The Farming Families is distributed free exclusively to the farmers, ranchers and producers in rural Sioux, Plymouth and Lyon Counties. All rights reserved. Content in this magazine should not be copied in any way without the written permission of the publisher. The Farming Families assumes no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts or photographs. Content in articles, editorial and advertisements are not necessarily endorsed by The Farming Families and Age Media & Promotion.
By Bob Fitch
Discussing his family’s legacy in Plymouth County, Ralph Kruse turns philosophical about farm families in rural America. “Our neighborhood is no different than anybody else's neighborhood. If there was a problem, if somebody was sick or if somebody died, it's unbelievable how the people come to help.
It's been that way for as long as I can remember; and I know it was that way back when my great grandfather lived here. I can remember going to plowing bees, threshing bees or combining … there's always people to help. I ain't trying to say that we're special, it's just the way the farming community is.”
Ralph continued the story: “I had an elderly neighbor once and I went to help him with something. He was so grateful he almost cried. He says, ‘I can’t help you back.’ I told him, ‘Did you help somebody else years ago?’ He said, ‘Well, yeah.’ I says, ‘Now I'm going to help you. And guess what, somebody someday is going to help me.’
“Guys might squabble amongst themselves about fencelines. But if their neighbor has a heart attack or other emergency, the guy he’s squabbling with will still show up to help. I believe it really builds a bond.”
Ralph’s great grandfather, Harm Kruse, his fiancé, Antje Schmidt, her brother, Elias Schmidt, and several others from Ostfriesland, Germany, booked passage on a ship bound for the United States in the spring of 1866. It was an arduous three-month journey. After arriving in America, they found their way to Ackley, Iowa. Harm worked as a farm hand and Antje as a hired girl. Harm and Antje were married in October 1866. After they paid for their marriage license and bought some new work clothes, the young German couple had $6 to their name. They farmed rented ground and were in Hardin County for 19 years.
In the 1870s, Harm heard about good land in northwest Iowa. He found 160 acres of undeveloped prairie in section 19 of Grant Township, Plymouth County. After several years, the Kruse family saved enough money to build a home and move here in 1885. The same year, Harm and Antja bought the quarter of land where Ralph and his wife, Charlene, live today. Harm and Antja had nine children, seven of whom lived into adulthood. Over the coming decade, they continued to buy several more quarters of land, helping to ensure there was farm land and space for home sites for the next generation. The Chicago & Northwestern Railroad was selling area land at $2 to $4 an acre.
Everything in the settlers’ social life revolved around church.
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Harm and Antja were first active in what today is known as Christ Lutheran Church at Mammen Town; and then were charter members of what became St. John’s Lutheran Church in Preston Township. While travel distances played a role in new churches popping up, Ralph said his dad used to joke that “one bunch of stubborn Germans couldn't get along with another bunch of stubborn Germans.”
His great grandmother served local families as a midwife. A family history says, “This work afforded her with much joy and satisfaction.”
The Harm and Antje Kruse family also welcomed newcomers to stay with them for months at a time, including the first pastor of St. John’s. In 1894, driving home from Le Mars with a load of lumber, Harm died, most likely from a heart attack. He was only 54. Antje lived to age 93.
Kruse family members kept farming, including Ralph’s grandfather (who was also named Harm). In 1935, he helped Ralph’s dad, Louie, build a house, barn, hog house and chicken house on the home site where Ralph lives today. Louie and and his wife, Maria, were married in 1936 and moved into the new house. In the early years, Louie was still farming with horses and mules.
Maria’s father, Theodore Meyer,
was the pastor at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Preston Township for 40 years. He came from Germany and didn’t have any success finding a wife in Iowa. So he had his father track down a girl in Germany he remembered from catechism class and ask if she would marry Theodore. Amazingly, she said yes. Three of their sons became pastors.
During World War II, much of America’s steel was diverted for military use, which made it difficult for farmers to purchase new machinery. In 1943, Louie obtained a permit to purchase a corn picker, provided he promised to help pick his neighbors’ corn. Ralph said, “At first, his neighbors would say, ‘Oh, just make a couple rounds to open the field up and we’ll harvest the rest by hand.’ Most of the time, though, once farmers saw how fast that picker worked, they told my dad to just keep going. I hate to think how many acres my dad and his brother picked those first couple of years.” His dad used that same picker until 1969.
Ralph went to country school (Grant #9) until he was in sixth grade. “When I was in in country school, they graded me on the curve. But I was the only kid in my class, so that meant I was always the best and the worst.”
Ralph was the youngest member of the family and, when he graduated from high school, his father was already 65 years old and had a bad hip. “So I started farming. Growing up, we milked Shorthorn cows for cream, we had hogs, and fed a few cattle and calves out. We had 300 laying hens in the chicken house.” He's been running a combine since he was 15 years old. “My dad had a pull type. I ran that until I burned it up around the time I graduated
high school. Then Dad said, ‘If you want to combine, you go get your own.’ I bought a little 101 International combine without a cab. It had a 2-row corn head and just a 10-foot head for soybeans. In that first year, I finished combining corn on the 23rd of December, without a cab. I had two pairs of coveralls on. I froze my butt off out there.” However, with the help of two uncles and a cousin, he custom-combined so many acres at $5 an acre that he paid off the $1,850 loan the first year. “But that was the biggest mistake that ever happened to me, because I got this dream that I could make money doing custom work. But it never did really pan out,” he laughed.
“When I started farming, I still had stock cows, and I raised hogs. At one time, I was up to 120 sows.” He sold his hogs in the 1990s when the market went south. He fed hogs for someone else for a while, hauled feed and worked in construction. Finally, he got a job with Concrete Products of Sioux City, where he worked for 25 years while still growing corn and soybeans.
Ralph met Charlene (a/k/a Charley) when they were both with friends riding the loop in Sioux City. “We asked the girls if they wanted to ride around together, and they jumped in the car with us. We rode the loop and grabbed something to eat. And the rest is history,” said Ralph.
When they got married in 1973, Ralph and Charley moved into the farmhouse and his parents moved to town. Charley had her own ceramic shop for a while, then worked at Fareway in Le Mars for about 20 years. They have two daughters. Becky has a degree in computer graphics and works at the Wells Enterprises corporate
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office. She and her husband, Levi Kinney, live in Le Mars and have one adult daughter, Naomi. Levi formerly worked as a truck driver and dispatcher. Ralph and Charley’s daughter, Danielle (‘Dani’) has a degree in computer engineering and electrical engineering and works at Daktronics. She and her husband, Mike Scheff, live in Brookings, South Dakota, where he works for Larsen Door. They have two sons, Jonathon, 14, and Zack, 12.
Charley absented herself from the interview process, but her fun outlook on life is reflected in her enjoyment of two Ford Mustangs convertibles, which serve as the couple’s equivalent of a lake home. They spend a lot of time with friends driving the Mustangs. Humorous signs hanging in her kitchen also demonstrate her upbeat view of life: “My husband needs new glasses. He still can’t see things my way;” “My house was clean yesterday. Sorry you missed it;” “There’s no place like home – except Grandma’s;” and “Worry is a waste of imagination.” Ralph’s philosophy on life synchronizes perfectly: “Life is way too short to be too serious.”
By Bob Fitch
In the early 1900s, large, nationally operated phone companies found it too expensive to string telephone lines to far-flung farm homes. In 1906, farmers in the Sioux Center area decided they didn’t want to be left behind. They pooled their resources to create their own phone service to stay connected with each other and the community. Their efforts laid the groundwork for the shareholder-owned Mutual Telephone Company.
From those humble beginnings, the company eventually developed into Premier Communications, a regional powerhouse in the telecommunications industry. Premier Communications provides cutting-edge internet, cable TV, phone and IT services for homes and businesses in 30 communities in northwestern Iowa.
THE DIGITAL DIVIDE
Regulatory changes in the telecommunications field in the
1990s set the stage for Premier to move into a rapid growth mode beginning in 2002. Many companies, including Premier, entered new municipal markets. But Premier has stayed true to its roots by also connecting with rural households, even though running fiber communication lines to rural homes can easily cost four to five times as much as a customer in town. “These are 25-30 year investments. Installing fiber in a rural area can cost $15,000 for just one mile; and there might be only two or three customers in that mile. With that significant upfront cost, it may take a decade or two just to pay for that initial investment,” said Ryan Boone, CEO of Premier Communications. The state's broadband grant program
also helps to offset the high cost of bringing fiber to historically unserved or under-served localities. A grant is currently helping Premier Communications fill in a gap in the hilly, sparsely-populated corner of southwestern Plymouth County.
“We’ve made the conscious decision to help close the digital divide,” Boone said. “For example, not only do we strive for students in town to have great access to broadband, but
we also want their rural classmates to the have same access. Likewise, farmers and other rural businesses deserve excellent broadband service just like the businesses we serve in cities. That’s not always the most profitable decision, but our board of directors and shareholders are committed to this course.”
This commitment synchronizes with their company’s core values:
Community-based
Family-friendly
Customer-driven
Growth mindset
As part of being customer-driven and having a growth mindset, Premier builds multiple redundancies into its systems. “The recent floods showed the resiliency of our network,” said Scott TeStroete, Premier’s chief customer officer. “You saw a lot of bridges out and a lot of times fiber is attached to bridges. But the ‘rings’ in our system helped re-route service. If something gets cut, it flips to another feed.” Because of the redundancies and because the network is built to handle peak usage and not just average loads, the system performed at a level of excellence. Only one of its 30 communities
saw an extended service outage (because flood waters damaged lines coming from two different directions). Service personnel went above and beyond to restore service and put in place new redundant fiber routes as quickly as possible in the event more flooding occurred.
Another reason service was maintained so well is that the company has boots on the ground throughout its footprint. “We’ve found that we’re able to meet our core value of being community-based by having local team members in the locations we serve,” said Boone. “Even as we continue to grow, we will stay communitybased by making sure we have team members in our new locations.” Locally-based personnel also help the company stay supportive of economic development and local nonprofit organizations. “Growth is important because we always need more economies of scale to provide the service and cutting-edge technologies our customers expect. At the same time, we’re always striving to grow in a way that doesn’t let us lose our focus on community.”
TeStroete added, “Our customer are our friends. They are the people we sit next to in church or at school events. When Covid hit in 2020 and all the schools sent their kids home and everybody was scrambling,
we wanted kids and teachers to be able to get digital access as quickly as possible. I was on so many email threads throughout the country trying to get solutions in place. We did a lot of very unique things in those first couple weeks of Covid to get people access. We were handing equipment through windows and talking people through it over the phone. We helped people who weren’t our customers yet. It proved to be one of the most rewarding times for a lot of us.”
Staying community-based means the company encourages employees to be active in community events and organizations such as youth sports, churches, schools and scouts. Likewise, Premier’s growth and innovation mindset includes ongoing technical and customer service training plus internal leadership development. TeStroete said a number of employees have risen through the ranks. In fact, both he and Boone started as part-time “spade men” on cable installation crews.
Boone said the board of directors continues to double down on the value of being community-based because this approach ensures local dollars recycle through the local economy. “We're building a new retail space in Okoboji, and one of the very first things that we
Through the state’s broadband grant program, Premier Communications is helping to “bridge the digital divide” in sparsely-populated areas such as the recent addition of southwestern Plymouth County.
committed to was using local contractors whenever possible. We have a local general contractor, local cement crews and local building crews. We could have hired someone out of Sioux City or Sioux Falls and maybe that would have been a little cheaper. But that's not who we are. We understand the economic benefit – hiring local is good for the communities. And what's good for the communities is good for a Premier in the long run, too.”
Boone said Premier Communications aims to emulate other businesses and individuals in northwestern Iowa who made decisions to stay here, to re-invest here and to take calculated risks. “Like other area leaders and business owners, we strive for a can-do attitude with a bent towards collaboration.”
By Bob Fitch
Privacy + nature + spacious, comfortable surroundings = a beautiful hideaway in the woods on the western edge of Lyon County.
“The Sanctuary” is a vacation-rentalby-owner (VRBO) situated above the Big Sioux River valley off 140th Street west of Larchwood and near Spring Creek Country Club. The 100 acres is largely forested by old oak trees dropping down a slope from the Iowa prairie to the river.
The owners of The Sanctuary are Kevin and Garneth Kuiper, who live and work in Sioux Falls. Garn grew up on a farm in the Rock Valley area and Kevin grew up in Sioux Center. Kevin is the owner and a real estate broker at Bridges Real Estate & Consulting and Garn is a psychiatric nurse practitioner at Avera Behavioral Health Center.
They bought the 100 acres more than 20 years ago. Initially, the couple thought they might someday sub-divide and develop the land for homes. For 10 years, their family took advantage of the largely untouched land for personal recreation, creating hiking trails through the woods with their fourwheelers, and enjoying fireworks on the banks of the river.
In the late ‘00s, instead of subdividing the property, they decided to build a getaway for their own family. “The intention was to build it for ourselves,” said Kevin. However, as the idea progressed, they chose to make it large enough to rent out as a VRBO. “We thought we’d rent it out a few months of the year and a few weekends to help pay the taxes. But since we finished it in 2012, its popularity is beyond our expectations. It’s usually booked almost every day during the spring, summer, fall, and in December.”
“It's a really joyful place, because most of our guests are a big family or classmates celebrating a holiday or a milestone, or simply celebrating being together,” he said. The sunsets are “huge, beautiful and gorgeous.” There is abundant wildlife, including birds, deer, turkey and bald eagles. Coyotes can be heard howling at night.
Their guests are often families from various parts of the country who use the Sioux Falls area as a mid-point. Parents and siblings and cousins gather in one spot to spend time together, using The Sanctuary as their private bungalow. The schedule in November and December is full of families gathering for Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s.
The Sanctuary serves as an ideal
location for intimate weddings. “We've had some beautiful weddings out here. We try to limit it to less than 100 people, because this is a house and there isn’t parking for more than that,” Kevin said. A large tent can be set up for the wedding and reception with the home serving the bridal party. There’s plenty of room outside for a band and dancing. Some families who have a wedding in Sioux Falls use The Sanctuary as headquarters for the groom’s family and the groom’s dinner.
Frequently, local high school and college classmates hold reunions at the site. Church leadership groups or corporate executive planning sessions regularly use The Sanctuary as a retreat site.
“Online reviews have been overwhelmingly positive and we have a lot of repeat customers, which is very nice,” Kevin said. Garn added that they donate the use of the site or donate to many charitable silent auctions for groups such Mission Haiti, Sioux Falls Christian School, churches and McCrossan Boys Ranch.
Built in 2012, the home is outfitted with appliances, beds, furniture, gas grill and linens. It has an open floor plan with a 25-foot ceiling in the great room, which includes a 17-foot high fireplace, living/gathering space, and full kitchen. A large deck adjacent to the great room overlooks the forested valley.
The home includes five total beds. The open balcony above the great room has two bedrooms and a full bathroom. The balcony also has a small loft, a great spot for youngsters to play or sleep. The main floor
master bedroom has a kingsized bed. The two basement bedrooms each have a queensized bed.
The walkout basement level is finished and has three couches, a pool table, a foosball table and television. The walk-out patio has a hot tub. According to Garn, “As a rule, people take really good care of it, and they're polite. They leave it clean when they check out.”
The Kuiper’s two daughters, their husbands and six grandchildren live just a few minutes away. The Kuiper’s adult son lives with them in Sioux Falls. “Normally we spend time together doing campfires, riding four-wheelers, hiking and hanging out by the river,” said Garn. (Insurance considerations do not allow paying guests to use four-wheelers on the property.) “We didn’t get out here this summer as much as we usually do. We didn't even do fireworks this summer, which we always do. Our oldest grandson just got engaged and our other grandkids are busy with sports and activities.”
She continued, “We have Sunday gatherings with our extended family a few times a year. When our whole family is here, we ride four-wheelers or sometimes they bring horses.”
Lieuwen Construction built the home and Mike Ostby built the fireplace with stone quarried in the Black Hills. The interior design was inspired by Penny Klinedinst of Simply Perfect in Sioux Falls. Marva Haak of Rock Valley does seasonal decorating in the spring and for holidays. Google “The Sanctuary, Larchwood, Iowa” to find the home’s listing on www.vrbo.com.
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By Bob Fitch
Take a step back into yesteryear at the Remsen Heritage Museum during the city’s Oktoberfest celebration on Saturday, October 26. The museum will be open from 9 a.m.-noon. It is located at 231 South Washington Street in the heart of downtown Remsen. The museum includes a substantial amount of town memorabilia and many photos, along with other novel items that help showcase the story of Remsen. The goal of the museum is to preserve the memories of the town and to share that history with current and future generations. Regular tours by school classes help accomplish this goal.
A few settlers may have been in the Remsen area as early as the 1860s. The township was platted in 1876 and permanent settlement began to accelerate in the late 1870s and
into the 1880s. The first school classes were taught in the R.E. McCaustland residence in section 34 in 1880. Remsen Township was created in 1881.
According to museum board member Donna Kendall, the township and later the town were named for Dr. William Remsen Smith, a pioneer physician in Sioux City. He was an extensive landowner in the area and a friend of John I. Blair, the man in charge of construction of the Dubuque & Sioux City Railway Co. Blair suggested the townsite be called Smithville in his honor, but Dr. Smith thought the world had enough
towns named Smithville and that Remsen would be better. The railway established a station in section six of the township and that’s where the town began to form.
The early settlers were from multiple ethnic groups, including Germans, Luxembourgers, Danes, Irish, Swedes and Swiss. The Luxembourgers and Germans were the largest groups. Museum board member Karen Harnack, “No matter their background, the people liked to have fun with good food and music.” Donna said Remsen was known for its beer parlors for many years. “There were 12 or 14 here at one time. Today, there’s only three.”
Karen and Donna said immigrants often had a sponsoring family member and a job lined up before they moved to the United States. After getting their feet on the ground, then many would start a farm of their own or enter another trade; and send for the families from the old country.
North of the town site, the first business in the area was Winchel & Alline, a farm with scales where grain was purchased and shipped. A Le Mars businessman bought and shipped cattle and hogs from this site, too. Frank Miller opened the first general store in the town in 1881, followed that same year by a hotel called The Blake House. Economic development occurred quickly then with the addition of a farm implement dealership, hardware store, grocery store and lumber yard. The first bank opened in 1887.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church and Roman Catholic Church were the first two religious institutions in Remsen. The Catholic Church’s first building and the town’s first schoolhouse were both destroyed by a cyclone in 1885. The second building
of St. Mary’s Catholic Church was used as an opera house, roller rink, auction house and VFW post after St. Mary’s moved to a third building. The first school classes in town were taught by Miss Mary Alline and held in the depot and later in a room above the hardware store.
Town bands were formed as early as 1880. At one point, Remsen had a “clown band” that toured and played in the area. Some of their uniforms can be seen at the museum. Town team baseball was an extremely popular pastime. Beginning in the 1930s, the Avalon Ballroom became a popular spot – many couples met their future spouse at the Thursday or Saturday night dances. The ballroom was playing host to performers into the 1960s and the building is still used for events such as wedding receptions and funeral dinners today. The museum also includes a projector which was used in Remsen’s Vogue movie theatre until the 1970s.
Remsen’s most famous mile marker in time is the great fire of July 4, 1936. The fire destroyed six blocks in town, including 15 homes and 38 businesses (in 18 structures). The fire’s start was blamed on fireworks. This incident was part of the impetus for the state law which banned fireworks in Iowa from 1938 until 2017. While many Iowa municipalities now allow the discharge of fireworks inside city limits, the practice is still prohibited in Remsen.
The Remsen Heritage Museum is located in one of the town’s earliest buildings, a survivor of the 1936 fire. In the past, the building was home to a restaurant and bar, plumbing and heating company and a travel agency. The desire for a museum was first put forth by the city council in 2008. Eventually, it was chartered as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization governed by a board of local community volunteers.
The Remsen community celebrates its ties to Germany, Luxembourg and other central European countries during its annual Oktoberfest, held on Saturday, October 26th this year.
Remsen Heritage Museum board member Kurtis Kroeger is also a volunteer active in the planning and implementation of Oktoberfest. He said the event requires a tremendous multimonth volunteer effort. People are needed to manage the prince and princess event and the polka band entertainment; haul/peel/ bake/slice/mix 400-500 pounds of potatoes for the mounds of old-style German potato salad; coordinate and work in the dining room and kitchen; direct food lines and seating arrangements; serve in the beer garden; and many other tasks. Kurtis said volunteering is fun, but he joked it can turn into a lifetime commitment because you have to find and train your own replacement.
The full-day event kicks off with a craft and vendor fair at the MMCRU Middle School. Both gyms are full of vendors. Breakfast and lunch are served onsite.
In the afternoon, the action shifts over to St. Mary’s School. The Luxembourg Heritage Society of Northwest Iowa is there to help people with ancestry questions.
As
The society does in-depth research each year on one northwest Iowa family of Luxembourg descent and those findings are shared. “There’s a prince and princess contest where the kids have to do a polka dance and tell why Oktoberfest is important to them. The kids wear
Germanic-style clothing,” said Kurtis. A polka band performance begins about 2:30 p.m. after the contest is done. A second polka band performs at 7 p.m. For this one day of the year, St. Mary’s is designated by the priest as a community hall and consequently there is special
permission to serve beer.
A traditional meal is served buffet style in the St. Mary’s cafeteria beginning at 4:00 p.m. The meal includes roast beef, broasted chicken and dressing, potatoes and gravy, hot or warm potato salad, head cheese, brats, treipen, cole slaw, sauerkraut riblets, and egg
coffee. A lot of carryout business is done, especially because many farmers are in the field for harvest.
The Remsen Oktoberfest Men's Choir performs at the town’s two Lutheran churches on the Sunday before the festival. The group also performs at the nursing home in Remsen. There’s a “polka mass” at
St. Mary’s on the Sunday before the event and on Saturday, October 26.
For schedule updates and other information, see the Remsen Oktoberfest page on Facebook. Any profits derived from Oktoberfest are used to support local churches, schools or other charitable organizations.
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INGREDIENTS FOR THE CRISP:
3 large crisp red apples (about 3 lbs), peeled and cut into ¾-inch pieces
1/2 c. salted butter, cubed, at room temperature
1/3 c. granulated sugar
2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. kosher salt, divided 3/4 c. all-purpose flour
1/4 c. packed light brown sugar
1 1/2 c. cornflakes
INGREDIENTS FOR THE BUTTERSCOTCH SAUCE:
4 Tbsp. salted butter
1/2 c. packed dark brown sugar
1/2 c. heavy cream
1 tsp. vanilla extract
Butter pecan ice cream, for serving
DIRECTIONS:
1. For the crisp: Preheat the oven to 375°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil. In a large bowl, toss the apples with the granulated sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon, and ¼ teaspoon salt. Scrape the apples and juices into a 2-quart baking dish.
2. In the same bowl, combine the flour, brown sugar, and remaining ¼ teaspoon salt. Add the butter and mash with your fingers until the butter is incorporated and crumbs form. Add the cornflakes and use your hands to fold the cornflakes into the mixture. Squeeze into clumps and sprinkle over the apples in the baking dish.
3. Place the baking dish on the prepared baking sheet and bake until the crisp is golden and bubbling, 55 to 60 minutes. (Cover loosely with foil for the last 15 minutes if the top is getting too brown.) Let cool about 10 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, make the butterscotch sauce: In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the brown sugar, heavy cream, and vanilla and stir to combine. Bring to a boil and cook until thickened, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool about 10 minutes.
5. Drizzle the apple crisp with some of the butterscotch sauce. Serve with ice cream and the remaining sauce.
