September 2, 1970 Afton Village, Town Merger Hearing is Quiet and Friendly By Jean Haskell The hearing last Wednesday on a proposed merger of Afton Village and Afton Township could hardly have been friendlier. Not a single objection to the merger was heard during the one-hour session at the Afton Village Hall.

Attended by about 30 area residents—including several barefoot and swim-suit clad children, housewives in shorts and a farmer in coveralls and a straw hat – the hearing was conducted by the Minnesota Municipal Commission (MMC) at the request of the village and township governments.

BOTH COMMUNITIES ARE eager to consolidate, and MMC members appeared impressed by their willingness to cooperate. A decision by the MMC on the merger will come Oct. 9 at a continuation of last week’s hearing… Afton Town Board Chairman Robert Chisholm said he agrees that a six-community merger would be good, but “I believe that the first step is that the township must join up with one village.”

Chisolm and Afton Village Mayor Glen Ickler said a strong “community of interest” exists between the village and the township, making the merger both logical and amicable. If it were not for street signs, Ickler said, most residents would not know where the village stops and the township begins.

Gene O’Brien speaks!

Mr. Rice on the War So far, all the candidates for United States Senator, Governor and the House of Representatives appearing before the Sun’s “Sanhedrin” (editorial board) have almost without exception, placed the Vietnam War third or fourth among the issues being faced by the American people. Either the voters of Minnesota or the candidates are out of step with the rest of the country as the latest Gallop Poll showed the Indochina involvement as the number one concern of the Nation’s citizens.

George Rice, DFL Third District Congressional candidate,

Asian bloodletting second in priorities. Actually first, in our judgement as he contends his concern and that of the majority of people with whom he has talked is disquietude over the state of the American nation. In other words, the present drift, according to Rice, has the people worried about saving the democratic system.

WE WERE SHOCKED the other day when an intelligent, respected friend, who incidentally heads one of the community’s most substantial businesses, stated during a discussion over current events, “What’s the use?”

In other words, what’s the point in endless discussion when at every turn it just ends up with frustration? More alarming was the fact that most of the others present agreed with him.

Well, frankly, it’s a hell of a job to do something about it but there is a way to start. The system will never be saved by sitting back and wringing our hands. The first place to initiate restoration and salvation of the democratic system is to make it work. And the place to start is the U.S. Congress.

It must be reformed, especially the House, which is supposed to reflect the will of the people but doesn’t… “Few institutions in our national life,” declares John W. Gardner, chairman of the Urban Coalition and former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, “are as gravely in need of renewal as the Congress of the United States.”

Measures that he deems essential (and so does George Rice) are the abolishment of the seniority system and curbing the entrenched power of committee chairmen. (need for more meritocratic as opposed to custom-bound appointment to committee

60 Years Ago THE REPORTER Serving St. Paul Park, Newport, Thompson Grove, Woodbury Hts.

June 30, 1961 Climbers They Are But Boys Can Learn (photo) ST. PAUL PARK— There may be no Sir Edmund Hillary or Maurice Herzog in the group but these Park Boys know how to shimmy.

They think. They may learn otherwise by the end of the summer.

There is, it seems, a right way and a wrong way to shimmy up a tree—or anything else that’s vertical.

And there are certain correct techniques involved in jumping from limbs and sliding down trunks.

These things some 45 Park youths began learning when they signed into the village recreation department’s mountain climbing club.

The climbing classes began Tuesday for the boys, at the same time that a number of village girls—members of the dramatics club—got their first taste of acting and public speaking.

Work ON CG Sewer To Start Next Week COTTAGE GROVE – The only sewer system in the state (and possibly in the country) owned by a township is about to become a reality.

Next week, winning bidders on four projects to put the Cottage Grove sanitary sewage disposal plant on the map will move in and start breaking ground.

Bids were expected to be awarded last Wednesday on the plant itself, sanitary trunk lines, an outflow line and street lateral lines.

Apparent low bidder on the sanitary trunk system, expected to be completed in early October, was the Lometti and Sons Construction company with a figure of $212,950.80.

The next lowest of nine bidders was Johnson Brothers Construction company with $225,537.40 Other bidders on the trunk line included Barbaross and Sons, the R. W. Moore company, T. Martini, Austin Keller, Nodlan Construction, Ascbach Construction and the L. J. McNulty company.

Lowest of six bidders on the treatment plant itself was the Acton Construction company of St. Paul, with bids of $192,941 and $192,524.

The double bids were called for in the specifications put out by the town board, not yet certain which of two types of drying beds are best.

The first bid calls for a gas lifter-mixer and drying bed set up as opposed to a sludge drying method in the lower figure.

Next lowest bidder on the treatment plant was the Barbaross and Sons construction company with bids of $203,100 and $200,600.

Other bidders included the Seehy Construction company, Lundholm company, the Phelps-Drake company and Steinburg Construction.

Contracts call for completion of the treatment plant by July of next year. The plant will include primary and final settling tanks, an aeration tank, digester and control building, drying beds, grading, and piping.

There were five bidders on the construction of an outflow line from the plant to the Mississippi River. Low bidder was the R. W. Moore company, but the firm specified its bid would stand only if it was awarded the sanitary trunk work.

Next lowest bidder on the outfall line was Lametti and Sons with a $67,860 figure.

The treatment system is expected to service about 1500 homes now under construction in the Thompson Estates area of the township and will be financed through area assessment.

The system will be designed for expansion, with an eye toward possible future service to the entire area of new homes in Cottage Grove township.

A petition from residents of the Thompson Grove area, just across Highway 61 from the Estates, is expected to be submitted to the town board in the near future, asking that the Grove be included in the sanitary sewer system.

There are about 60 homes now occupied in the Thompson

Next County Over 105 Years Ago THE CATHOLIC BULLETIN St. Paul, Minnesota July 3, 1915 CATHOLIC SCHOOLS FOR CATHOLIC YOUTH Sermon preached by the most reverend archbishop in the Cathedral of St. Paul before the delegates to the National Convention of the Catholic Educational Association of America on Tuesday, June 29, 1915 “Going therefore teach ye all nations: baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.”

(Matthew 28:19-20) I tell, in His own words, the injunction (command) of the Saviour to His Church, even to the consummation of the world. I tell the reason of the proclamation which today is that of the Catholic Church in the United States of America: Catholic schools for Catholic youth.

That the Church was ever mindful of the injunction to teach all nations, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever the Saviour had commanded, the facts in the story of her life and activities provide abundant proof…` .I have before my eyes the Catholic schools of America, primary and secondary, so numerous and so efficient today, to be yet more numerous and more efficient tomorrow.

I take the secularized school under its most favorable impressions, such as its fair-minded advocates would have it—absolute neutrality with regard to religion, to each and every form of relation, to each and every church or religious association.

I might argue in the interests of the human mind, and on its behalf protest against the secularized school. Secular knowledge itself forbids the shortcomings of the secularized school. Science is led to roam through the universe, investigate its happenings, discover its processes and law. But to the surging interrogations—whence and whither—silence is interposed. The cause of the universe, the guidance of its movements, the purpose of its cravings and aspirations must not be mentioned…(heroes and motivations investigated)… One, however, there is, the mightiest in word and work who escapes inquiry— Jesus of Nazareth. Who He is—no one may ask, no one must answer. It were sectarianism whether the reply were affirmation or negation… But my present contention is with Catholics: The Catholic school for the Catholic child…(speech continues on).

$700,000 To Religion The late Mr. and Mrs. Campbell-Johnstone, of Pasadena, Cal., who perished with the ill-fated steamer “Lusitania,” left the bulk of a $700,000 estate to the Church of our Lady of Angels, better known as the old Plaza Church, Los Angeles. The will was made only two weeks before they sailed.

(Note: The “plaza” in Spanish settlements of the New World such as Los Angeles, was planned with a church as being central to the community, at its very nucleus. The apparent church and plaza in question has a website address of www.olacathedral. org).

Territorial Dispatch Almost 170 Years Ago THE MINNESOTIAN October 1, 1851 Over in Washington County, old Billy Holcombe is putting in the “big licks” to come to the Council next winter. In one part of the County he is for the Rice organization— in another, he is for a mixed ticket. But he goes all the time for the “sage of Crescent Hill” for the “Float” to get him out of the way. Quite an expert horseman as well as a politician, is old Billy. He has an old grey stallion, which may be seen, these days, with his master seated in the saddle, charging from Marine to Point Douglass, and from the Point to Marine, night and day – forcibly reminding one of “Death on a pale horse” (Revelation 6).

Jim Davis, a farmer in the Cottage Grove neighborhood, is a keen whit as well as a good Whig. One day last week, old Billy charged up and down the road, past where Davis was at work in his field, two or three times, on the “keen run.”—At last, suspecting that Davis might “smoke” his business in that quarter, he rode up to the fence and inquired if he could borrow a thrashing machine in that neighborhood.

“Well, Captain,” replied Davis, “I don’t know of any about here just now, but if you will drop down this way on the 14th day of October, we will show you one of the most infernal thrashing machines in operation you ever did see!

Elsewhere in the county: The prison then rising at Stillwater described, “above McKusick’s mill.”

The “outer walls” begin to make considerable show above the ground. The enclosure is 288 feet by 200—wall four feet thick. The location is a much better one than we had supposed—plenty of good spring water on the spot, and a fine view down the lake.

We are under many obligations to our friends of Willow River and Stillwater for their encouragement of our new enterprise.