A birthday and early Christmas dinner

Cousin Dan and his sons, Marty and Nick, came over to the scrapblog editor's Robbinsdale house last week to celebrate Dan's 49th birthday and an early Christmas. Some snapshots: Dan blows out his candles as Marty watches warily, his phone nearby in case he needs to text 911 about a big fire.

Used to be, Dan could talk down to son Nick, but not anymore! Both his sons are way taller than Dan is, and Dan's not short by any means.

Nick created eerie music on his goblet. We took a video of this concert, but can't seem to get the darn thing to upload.

Nick, Dan and Marty. The scrapblog editor is old enough to remember when these people -- ALL of them -- were short tots.

Congrats to Noah's cousin, Erica, upon her marriage

Warm congrats to Noah's first cousin on his dad's side, Erica Johnson, upon her November 2010 marriage to Kris Lott in Florida, where they live. Erica is the daughter of Betsy and Gary Johnson, the eldest brother of Noah's dad, Steve Johnson. Kris is a deputy sheriff; Erica is a teacher.

Some Johnsons are on the left side of this photo. They include Bob and Barbara (in wheelchair) Johnson, Noah's paternal grandparents; David Johnson, Noah's uncle; Gary and Betsy Johnson, and their other children, sons Ross and Kyle.

The boy and the horse: A story by Uncle Joe

Usually we post these longer family essays on our auxiliary archives blog, http://www.thesprickfamilypapers.blogspot.com/. But to mark this Christmas weekend, we'll put an especially nice one on this more frequently accessed blog. It was written some years back by Uncle Joe. Though it's not about Christmas, specifically, it evokes the spirit of gratitude, acceptance and relishing of the cards one has been dealt that we've come to associate with our finest forebears. Merry Christmas, everyone! THE OLD GRAY MARE By ELMER "JOE" SPRICK Auction! Four miles north of Theilman, Minn., off County Road 4, Saturday, Sept. 27, 1941. Owner, Claus Sprick. Among the nine head of horses listed for sale on that 1941 auction bill was a 12-year-old gray mare. I was 14 that fall, and that auction day marked a turning point in my life. It, and our family's subsequent move from our farm near West Albany, Minn., into the small town of Lake City, Minn., meant I would have the opportunity to attend high school, a privilege that not all of my older siblings had received. Although it should have been one of the happiest days of my life, it was a sad one, too, because it meant giving up the small team of riding and work horses that I had grown up with. Babe was listed on the auction bill as a gray mare, but she was almost white except for her legs, which were dark gray, almost black. She was born out on the open range of the Dakotas in the 1930s. A brand was burned into her left front shoulder, a cross covered by an inverted V. The yearling range horses were rounded up and shipped east, where horse traders sold them to farmers for use as draft horses. It was during the Depression, and many farmers could not afford the price of a good Percheron draft horse. Very few farmers had tractors. My father, Claus Sprick, purchased three of the range horses, all yearlings. Babe was the first; two young stallions were purchased a year later. It wasn't until nearly 40 years later that one of my older brothers admitted to doing some matchmaking that had resulted in Babe's foal. I played with that foal, Topsy, almost from the day she was born. By the time she was a yearling, I could ride her around the farmyard without a halter or bridle. When Topsy was 2, my older brother tried to train her with a saddle and bridle. Topsy promptly threw him off, and he never tried to ride her again. To my knowledge, no one else did, either. She was a one-person horse. When Topsy was 3, she was harnessed and trained to work alongside her mother, Babe. I drove them as a team, doing a variety of chores on the farm when I was 12. The summer of my 13th birthday, my dad let me take the team with the crew on the threshing ring. Every horse has its own personality, but the range horses, or broncos as we called them, all had something in common: They were tough! They would work all day alongside the big Percherons pulling a binder or hay wagon and loader. At night, after our evening meal, we would ride them to round up the milk cows. Given a choice, the broncos didn't walk, they ran. The moment your foot reached the stirrup or you got a leg over a bareback, the horse was on the run. The old harnesses worn by the team of Babe and Topsy were patched and riveted time and time again. Any time there was an unexpected noise and the team was not tied securely, the horses would take off running. It was usually me who they escaped from until I became older and strong enough to hold them. One day they ran away from my dad. He had them hitched to a stoneboat loaded with a large box that he was filling with freshly dug potatoes. By the time the team reached the barn and stopped running, there were potatoes scattered for a distance of over one-quarter mile. Recently, I dug out the receipts from the farm auction. They had been buried in an old cardboard box for 54 years. The team of Babe and Topsy sold for $120. Today I have the means to buy the team back, something I always dreamed of doing. But Babe would be 66 years old! She has long since gone to greener pastures. The farm auction grossed $5,625.41, enough to purchase an old two-bedroom house at 201 N. Washington St. in Lake City and install a modern bathroom in it. That house would be shared by my folks and three of us Sprick kids who were still in school. Although I have never again owned a horse, I still like to ride occasionally. There is still a bit of cowboy in some of us that cannot be displaced by a new set of wheels.

Photo above: Alverna Sprick rode Babe in the 1930s on the Sprick family farm. Photos further above, from top: Babe at the auction; the auction bill; Ed and Joe Sprick in the field; Elmer, Florence, Alverna and Katie with Babe.

Friends as good as family

Your scrapblog editor enjoyed her annual Christmas meal and drinks by the fire (her Robbinsdale fireplace is the real thing) Saturday night with two dear old pals -- Michie T. and Colleen S. We may have had a glass of wine or two by the time this photo was taken. Pam, Colleen and Christmas lasagna.

Flapjacks for friends

Your scrapblog editor found this photo on her little camera today. It was taken, unbeknownst to me, by friend Chris Welsch one morning last week from my Robbinsdale dining room as I cooked whole-wheat pancakes for myself, Chris and his wife, Silke Schroeder, sitting in the kitchen chair. The breakfast for Chris and Silke, who I was welcoming back from a few months of life and work in Paris, prominently featured maple syrup harvested in Old Frontenac, Minn., by cousin Dan Broberg. Thanks, Dan! I'm posting this photo because it features PRICELESS BLUE PLATES! Cousins, you have some in your kitchens too, yes? And yes, my Robbinsdale kitchen ceiling really IS pink. And my living room is bright green, and other rooms are bright blue and yellow. Your scrapblog editor likes bright colors! (Though the primary color in my Lake City place is beige, which conventional wisdom says is the color you want in a place for sale. I'm not so sure that conventional wisdom is sound.)

"All I want for Christmas is ...

... my two front teeth." Teeth or no, 7-year-old Maria C., daughter of Tanya and Levi, grandchild of Cyndi Sprick O'Donahoe, great-grandchild of Elmer and Mavis Sprick, is a remarkably beautiful and intelligent child, as is her older sister, Sonya, at left. By the way, we wish Maria, Sonya, brother Perrin, mom Tanya and dad Levi the best of luck as they pursue new adventures in Denver, Colo., in 2011.

A literary evening

Noah and I went to a reading and book signing by our friend Laurie Hertzel, author of "News to Me: Adventures of an Accidental Journalist" at Common Good Books in St. Paul on Wednesday night. Laurie spoke to a small, friendly crowd.

Laurie and Noah after she signed books. You can see an old photo of Garrison Keillor, the St. Paul bookstore's proprietor, behind them. Back when Laurie lived in Duluth, Noah, then a little kid, and I used to meet her and her awesome dog, Toby, at Kettle River State Park, halfway between Duluth and Minneapolis, for hikes and picnics.

Laurie and her very fine husband, Doug Iverson, at W.A. Frost after the reading. F. Scott Fitzgerald's ghost lurks somewhere in the background of this elegant old St. Paul bar.

Laurie's camera somehow made a dark bar on a cold night look like a summer garden party. Nice trick!

A scrapblog chestnut

Yes, it's that time of year again, when you're wracking your brain to figure out what to get your cousins for Christmas. Here's a helpful chestnut from the scrapblog archives.

A dear ol' Lake City friend

Your scrapblog editor is blessed not just with awesome relatives (yourselves, that is), but great friends. One of my oldest and dearest is Karen "Swanie" Swanson, fellow Lincoln High School (Lake City, Minn.) Class of '74 graduate and Lincoln Torch coeditor. Yesterday (11/30/2010), Swanie, who is now an Episcopalian priest in California, arrived in Minnesota to visit her parents, Henning and Ruth Swanson, in Lake City. We had a great visit on the drive from the airport and over dinner at Bronk's Bar in Lake City. Along the way, we stopped at the Red Wing grocery store to pick up some treats for her Norwegian-American parents -- lutefisk and lefse. Her cart also contained pickled herring and rosettes. Some photos from an earlier visit this summer, when Swanie and I went hiking (and got pleasantly lost) on the steep trails at Kruger Park south of Lake City.

It poured down rain, but we didn't let that stop us!

The view from the top of one hill of the greener-than-green Zumbro River Valley (or, as residents call it, "the bottoms").

Happy Birthday to cousin Tanya!

Happy Birthday to lovely and brilliant cousin Tanya Cook, daughter of cousin Cindi O'Donohoe, granddaughter of Elmer and Mavis Sprick, and mom to Perrin, Sonya and Maria (show here in her Harry Potter-themed Halloween costume).

Thanksgiving traditions

It's becoming something of a Miller family tradition for Auntie Pam and the Miller nieces to visit a Twin Cities museum on the day before Thanksgiving. This year we went to the Minneapolis Institute of Art, which was almost deserted because of a snowstorm. Some snapshots: Many beautiful things were born in China, including this sand mandala (crafted by Buddhist monks) and Elizabeth Miller, age 7.

Hannah liked this 1909 painting by Robert Delauney, "Church of Saint-Sevens, Paris."

Hannah and Moriah by a Frank Stella painting.

Dang, forgot to write down the artist on this one.

Moriah, Hannah and Elizabeth by the great museum window that showcases downtown Minneapolis, our lovely city.

Hannah, Elizabeth and Moriah tossed pennies into the museum fountain. Not pictured were several security guards, who seemed to follow us through the museum, perhaps because we were among the very few patrons that snowy day. Or maybe they were just fascinated by the Miller girls!

Afterwards, we ate pizza and played hot games of Memory and Scrabble at my house in Robbinsdale. Hannah beat us all in Scrabble. I've forgotten who won the Memory game, except that it wasn't me. (Ha!)

Hannah used a dictionary, which helped her score on complicated X, Q, Z and J words.

The next day was Thanksgiving. Hope you all had a good one! Your scrapblog editor went up to the Millers' lovely place in Centerville, where Lavone Broberg and Dan Broberg were also guests. Here they dished up healthy salad.

Hannah took photos, Moriah texted and dad Chris looked on, proud of his awesome teenage girls. P.S.: Those glasses of wine weren't QUITE as large as the camera made them appear.

Hannah cradled little sis Avamarie during her afternoon nap. Awwwww.

Miller girrrrrls! Moriah, Avamarie and Hannah.

Mary Miller, the architect of our grand Thanksgiving feast, with daughters Elizabeth, Avamarie and Hannah and guest Lavone Broberg.

Cousin Dan with Avamarie and Hannah.

Congrats to a young Eagle Scout

Congratulations to cousin Marty Broberg, who worked hard to master the difficult skills needed to become an Eagle Scout. Marty, 18, the son of Dan Broberg and Cathy Broberg and brother of Nick, is a recent graduate of Hopkins High School. His late grandparents, Wally and Marion Broberg, would be very proud of his achievement.

Marty with his dad, cousin Dan Broberg, and his first cousin, Zachary Broberg, himself a Scout, at the Nov. 27 ceremony. At Marty's request, Zack carried the troop colors flag in and out of the event.

Congrats, Marty!

One heckuva storm, 70 years ago today

Our senior aunts and uncles are old enough to remember Minnesota's storm of the past century, the Armistice Day blizzard of Nov. 11, 1940, 70 years ago today. Minneapolis Star Tribune reporter Bill McAuliffe has written a great story about that whopper in today's paper. Aunt Annette and Uncle Hart Kulseth, pictured below, had an especially vivid memory of it because it came just a couple of weeks before their Nov. 30, 1940, wedding. (Earlier, your scrapblog editor had written that they were married on the day of the big storm, an assertion that caused a certain astute uncle of ours to raise one serene, skeptical, Sprick eyebrow, then do some research that proved their wedding was actually Nov. 30. Can a Coveted Burnt Wienie Award be far in the scrapblog editor's future?) We like Bill's story so much we'll include it here in its entirety, since Strib links go away in a couple-three weeks: Remembering a storm for the ages By BILL McAULIFFE mcaul@startribune.com There have been storms with more snow. There have been storms with cruel temperature drops, screaming winds and freakish barometer readings, and storms that have killed people and paralyzed the region for days.

But 70 years later, the 1940 Armistice Day blizzard still has a firm hold on the Minnesota imagination, perhaps because it was the last truly old-fashioned blizzard.

"I'm old enough to remember it," said weather historian Tom St. Martin of Woodbury, who recalled snow blowing under the doors and into the kitchen of his family's farmhouse in western Minnesota. "The forecasts of the day were just not good. People were unprepared for it.

"My guess is, like most historical events, it will fade a bit as time goes on," he said. "But as far as I know, it was one of the last ones with significant casualties."

In all, 49 people died in Minnesota in the three-day storm. Most weather watchers believe it's unlikely to happen again, due to factors ranging from better forecasting to better cars and clothing.

No one saw it coming

In 1940, weather forecasting was approaching significant breakthroughs. World War II would bring the discovery of the jet stream and an understanding that radar could find precipitation in the sky. But U.S. entry into the war was still 13 months away. The first computers, well-suited to the vast amount of data involved in tracking weather and building forecast models, wouldn't be built until just after the war. Forecasting in 1940 was still a vague and primitive exercise, centralized in a few government offices around the United States -- not including the Twin Cities.

Somehow, the fact that a storm approaching from the west had already snapped the Tacoma Narrows bridge in Washington wasn't reflected in forecasts for Nov. 11, 1940, for the Midwest. The forecast for Armistice Day called for only colder temperatures and a chance of snow flurries. The Chicago office of the National Weather Service, which issued forecasts for the Upper Midwest, actually had no one on duty the night of Nov. 10.

Hunters all over Minnesota awoke on what was a holiday Monday to find temperatures around 40 degrees and ducks (who many later thought probably knew what was coming) flying thick and fast over the prairies and sloughs.

Soon, of course, a misty rain turned to a driving snow, trapping hundreds of hunters on islands in the Mississippi River, where many died. The storm dropped 26 inches of snow at Collegeville and 16.8 inches in the Twin Cities and formed concrete-like drifts that cars could drive on afterward. Some drifts at Willmar were measured at 20 feet tall.

Ralph Nistler, a 6-year-old then who grew up to be a meteorologist, recalls riding in his dad's car through the storm south of St. Cloud, while his older brother stood on the running boards, shouting to his dad to tell him where the edge of the road was.

Visibility in downtown Minneapolis was zero for seven hours straight during the storm. Metro area streets were choked by cars abandoned in snow that drifted to the rooftops. Streetcars and buses that managed to keep running often needed hours to navigate a few blocks; some residents brought hot meals to commuters stuck on them. Those whose streetcars didn't show up at all, or who got off to start walking, were blown into building walls or reduced to crawling. Hundreds stayed in downtown hotels, bars and even gas stations. In Watkins, two people were killed when a passenger train and a freight train collided after an engineer had missed a signal in the heavy snow. Winds in Duluth blew at 63 mph. In the Twin Cities, the temperature fell from 38 to 10 on Nov. 11, and rose only to 11 the next day.

Could it ever happen again?

Minnesota was a far different place then. A greater share of the population lived on farms and in small cities. All telephones were land lines, and not everybody had those. There was no Twitter. There wasn't even television.

There were no interstate highways. Most cars weren't as capable in snow as they are now. Even prepared hunters and travelers wore water-absorbent wool, not the lightweight, waterproof, insulating fabrics of today's outerwear.

A classic November storm like the Armistice Day blizzard could still develop, said University of Minnesota Extension meteorologist Mark Seeley. The increasing strength might be hard to estimate ahead of time, Seeley said, but the public would be prepared. Radar and the broad network of forecast agencies and the public would spot it coming. Meteorologists understand storm dynamics much better today. National Weather Service offices now communicate with one another continually, covering what were huge gaps in awareness 70 years ago.

Forecasts for regions of Minnesota are now issued by offices in the Twin Cities; Sioux Falls, S.D.; Grand Forks, N.D.; Duluth. Minn.; and La Crosse, Wis. That is an indirect result of the Armistice Day blizzard.

The 1940 blizzard gave Minnesotans bragging rights, Seeley said. But after another blizzard the following March killed 32 people in Minnesota, "that just really got people up in arms," he said. "And the Minnesota congressional delegation went berserk. They humiliated the weather service on the floor of the House." Soon, the Twin Cities had a forecast office of its own, operating round-the-clock.

The number of survivors of the Armistice Day blizzard is dwindling. But, unlike the great prairie blizzards that preceded it, it met a people who were eager to write the stories down and take loads of pictures. Bigger snows may come along -- and get plowed away -- but the volumes of written and oral narratives and stacks of still-breathtaking photos from Nov. 11-13, 1940, are likely to keep it high in Minnesota's weather memory.

Nistler, meanwhile, said he doesn't tire of being asked about it.

"After you've gone through it and refreshed memory every year, it still seems vivid."

Bill McAuliffe • 612-673-7646

Marking Veterans' Day

U.S. Navy WAVES veteran Anna Sprick Smith, 90, was among those marking Veterans' Day this week at a Lake City Nursing Home program. Preparing to sing patriotic songs along with the residents were Uncle John Kirkwood (himself a veteran of the military police), Aunt Mavis Sprick (Uncle Joe, a Navy veteran, was out in a deer stand) and Aunt Katie Kirkwood. Anna proudly wore her U.S. Navy hat, a gift from Aunt Florence. Katie explained the proceedings to Anna and lovingly helped her with her root beer float. It's hard to say how much Anna takes in these days; she doesn't say much, but retains her sweet smile and gracious manners. To read about Anna's military career, go here.

3 generations

Some Sprick cousins recently got together in Wisconsin. A few of them posed nicely: Tanya Cook; Cindi O'Donohoe, Mavis Sprick and Monty Leiser.

Tyler's homecoming

A belated Happy 18th Birthday to cousin Tyler Broberg, son of Sam and Bridget. Tyler, a senior, is a star with Eagan High School's football Wildcats. A couple photos from Eagan's homecoming:

With his homecoming date. With proud younger brothers Alex and Zachary.

Tyler excels in sports, academics and kindness to others. We're proud to claim him as a cousin!

The chain-saw gang

Cousin Dave and his dad, Elmer "Joe" Sprick, sure know how to have a good time. These zany madcap loggerheads like to get together on weekends and cut out culls. Here they are at Dave's Eau Claire estate after a hard morning's work.