As Steam Engine Days quickly approaches, six young women from the Mabel and Hesper area have chosen to be candidates for the 2017-2018 Steam Engine Days Queen.

These young ladies will be participating in their judging and banquet events on Wednesday evening, Sept. 6, at the St. Olaf Church in Mabel. The girls will be in the Steam Engine Days parade on Saturday, Sept. 9, and coronation will be held immediately following the parade on the stage in the Steam Engine Grounds.

Laura Perez, Just for Kix dance instructor for the past seven years in Spring Valley and three in Grand Meadow, has added adaptive dance to her lineup of dance classes this fall to allow Joy Peterson and others to shine in a class of their own.

The Fillmore County Soil and Water Conservation District had some hot stuff on the prairie.

“Fire has been part of the landscape here…fire has been as important to nature here as rain and sun,” stated Forestville-Mystery Cave State Park’s manager, Mark White. He was addressing a gathering of landowners at the park’s picnic shelter during the Fillmore County Soil and Water Conservation District’s (SWCD) Forestry Field Day, held last Wednesday, July 26.

At first glance, the Sweet 16 Farm looks like many area farms, with a tidy house at its center and outbuildings on all sides.

 On closer inspection, however, it’s clear this is no typical operation. There are no visible corn and soybean fields, there’s a noticeable lack of livestock, and just off the farmyard, strange-looking green vines snake their way up towering ropes and poles. 

While the Sweet 16 Farm may not look like others in the neighborhood, it’s very much a working farm. It’s also the realization of a dream by owners Sarah Joy Wexler-Mann and her husband, Daniel Drazkowski, who bought the property in 2010.

Get to know your police officers, neighbors with night of free food, games