"Newsies" was super at Minnewaska

("Showstoppers" image)

So there's nothing going on at this time of the summer? Are we just marking time leading up to the county fair? Leading up to the wrestling French fries? Well, we can set our standards higher than that. And I'm not putting down the wrestling French fries. I'll just refer you to our neighbors to the east. I'm talking about Minnewaska Area, Glenwood-Starbuck. 

Over the past few days the "Minnewaska Showstoppers" thespian group has given us the unforgettable musical performance. I gush superlatives. This was a performance of Disney's "Newsies." Glorious theatre and music. Pit orchestra included. Shakes us out of our slumbering summertime. 

I wonder if Morris might develop an organization like "Showstoppers." It's something to ponder. By the same token, might we promote formation of something like the Swift County Band, directed incidentally by our own high school band director, Wanda Dagen? They give an annual performance at the Appleton park which is quite nice. However, I have stopped going because I disapprove of how they "pass the hat" for $ contributions. At the same time they brag about "sponsors" for the event, they feel they have to pass the hat too. 

Appleton can swing an event like this but Morris can't. There is a lot that Morris cannot do. We once proved we could have a gala midsummer event, Prairie Pioneer Days, and it felt like quite the achievement when it first got going. A triumph as it were. I had my own role reporting progress for the Morris newspaper. Many years later the community just unceremoniously dropped it. No more PPD, at least the version that was meaningful. 

Has it now turned into a car dealer promo? In the fall? But look at what Minnewaska Area can do! 

The Minnewaska school

Lake Minnewaska looks so picturesque as you depart from the Waska school. I noticed that last night (Saturday) after I took in the glorious production of "Newsies." 

Superlatives don't often flow easily from me. But it was "fab." And my interest was high mainly because of a Morris connection. There was more than one actually but the one that stands out is this Odello lass. She is a pure performing prodigy. She had a top role. The audience gave a vocal acclamation for her when she and a male counterpart came out at show's end. A much-earned ovation. 

I tell friends that Ms. Odello is so talented, it gives me an inferiority complex. I guess watching such talented young people makes me feel old too! 

I overheard some people talking about how long the Minnewaska Area school has been established. So it's over 30 years now? Can we start describing the school as "old?" For every "old" school there was a time when it was shiny new and the object of pride. Think of that when remembering our old art deco auditorium that was part of our now-razed school in Morris. Hard to imagine that the site once had our school. And the football field. Completely re-purposed now. 

The Morris "Pylin" drive-in

East 7th Street was a real "hopping:" place back when the school was there, even with a drive-in restaurant, the "Pylin." East 7th Street has looked borderline blighted over the recent past. The Dairy Queen was along there in the street's "glory days." 

Man, the elementary kids in their free time would "run down the hill" to the neighborhood grocery store, "Stark's" when I was young. Get an ice cream sandwich or a comic book. And baseball cards! A nickel a pack! 

  

58-4? Really?

Morris has to be careful how it gets compared to Minnewaska. I assume the schools have comparable enrollment. And last winter our girls basketball team trailed 'Waska 58-4 at halftime of a game. I have always been the kind of person to express some dismay over that. And then a lot of people who fashion themselves as important in Morris get upset with me. So I was so often an outlier. 

That status may have caught up with me in the end, cost me my newspaper career. I wonder about that all the time. I always hated the teachers union. But really I think it was just one paranoid element of the teaching staff that got under my skin, while others were rather exemplary. So sad. 

I'm old enough to have covered high school sports in Glenwood, not Minnewaska but Glenwood. Throw in a football game or two at Starbuck too. Let's see, they had a fellow named Bailey as football coach. That was in the days of the really intense and emotional small town high school sports rivalries. Imagine the gang at the barbershop in the movie "Hoosiers." 

Most of that is gone now. We have a well-developed class system in sports now for school enrollment. Many of the real small schools no longer exist. Mostly this has been a very positive development. 

But when the teams get into post-season play now, they might have to travel a long way, even at the very start. One nice thing is that the competing teams are so far apart from each other, they don't attract the pettiness of the old small town sports rivalries. Sigh of relief. Forget the barbershop. 

Kudos 100 percent to the "Minnewaska Showstoppers." And it would appear the Minnewaska school is doing very well. Morris needs to get more fired-up about such things.

Rousing spirit for Showstoppers' "Newsies!"

Addendum: The "Newsies" story promotes the union movement and that could be a problem with our prevailing political environment. The politicians who are ruling today are of a stripe that are not receptive to unions at all. DJT has been described as a "naked capitalist." And our congressperson out here in western Minnesota is like a (female) clone of DJT. That's who we are now. Forget collectivism of any kind. Every man for himself.

  

- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com