United States
I'm a longtime journalist based in Minnesota. Throughout my career, I've covered everything from tornadoes to politics to baseball.
Olga Sagalovsky was born in Odesa on the Black Sea in Ukraine. About half the people there speak Russian, the other half Ukrainian. At 14, Sagalovsky moved to Moscow, when her mother remarried. "I'm just a person who spent most of her life in Russian culture," Sagalovsky said.
In 1995, filmmaker Kevin Smith said Eden Prairie Center mall represented a doorway to his future. The mall was much different when the writer-director came to Eden Prairie to film the comedy "Mallrats." This was long before AMC Theaters, Von Maur, Barnes & Noble, and Scheels opened for business there.
"Mallrats" writer-director Kevin Smith visited his old stomping grounds in Eden Prairie on Friday morning. Smith posted two photos to his Twitter account of him standing in front of the Kohl's exterior building wall and nearby loading dock at Eden Prairie Center mall. Both were used during a chase scene in the 1995 movie he filmed there.
Football brought Ben Roethlisberger fame and fortune at a young age. But, it was rediscovering his faith later in his career that completed him. After becoming the youngest quarterback to start and win a Super Bowl in 2005, the star athlete known as "Big Ben" received many honors and attaboys tossed his way.
Longtime Eden Prairie Cemetery caretaker Mike Rogers takes a few steps between gravestones before stopping in a spot shaded by a tree on a warm afternoon last fall. Established in 1864, the hillside cemetery at 8810 Eden Prairie Road celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2014.
Justin Flom's metamorphosis from magician to social media influencer is no sleight of hand. When the pandemic took hold last March, the Eden Prairie native was home like everyone else. If the Las Vegas-based magician couldn't perform in person, Flom, 34, would broaden his act online.
One look at the front yard of Rick and Jan Farmer's Eden Prairie house reveals the power of a severe storm that ripped through the Twin Cities on Saturday night. A large basswood tree slumps on its side, its gnarled roots torn from the ground in an unwieldy heap.
Bob Lambert wrote in a diary during his yearlong tour of duty in Vietnam. That year, from October of 1967 to October of 1968, in which he served as a U.S. Army helicopter pilot during the Vietnam War, is the only time in his life that he kept a diary.
Eden Prairie resident Reid Johnson serves as an impromptu tour guide as he walks the grounds of the city's new bike park playground he helped shepherd into reality. Located seasonally from May to October in one of the Round Lake Park hockey rinks, the bike skills course has nine features for riders of all ages and levels to explore, including ramps, beams, and rumble strips.
Tom Achartz appreciates a good story. There are many of them to be unearthed among the vintage photographs, videos, news articles and artifacts in the Eden Prairie Historical Society Museum collection. As the Historical Society volunteer curator, Achartz enjoys digging into Eden Prairie's past for interesting yarns and sharing them on social media.
For those who enjoy outdoor walks, February is a cruel month. No matter how much you bundle up, it's never enough. At least that's my experience as a non-native Minnesotan who would rather buy fish at the grocery store than catch one crouched over a hole in the ice.
Aaron Pierce's hooded sweatshirt is emblazoned with the phrase, "Seek Discomfort." The creators of one of his favorite YouTube channels, Yes Theory, use that motto. "I resonated with it personally," Pierce said Thursday, March 10. "Just the idea that I want to take risks and live a life that's not comfortable."
World War II veteran Harlan Riedesel marvels at how much time has passed between his first airplane flight and his most recent one. Riedesel's maiden plane voyage took off on Oct. 6, 1935, his 14th birthday. He traveled from Sioux Falls, S.D., to Kansas City in a Ford Trimotor transport aircraft.
Artist Jerry Carlson hopes a blend of curiosity and delight stops people in their tracks as they come across his Elf House along the Purgatory Creek Park trail in Eden Prairie. There is something whimsical about Carlson's tiny structure that crouches low to the ground across the water from the park.
Eden Prairie Mayor Ron Case sat down last month to discuss what he deems are the city's successes in 2022 and what's in store for 2023. Case thinks the city is in a positive place, noting the progress of several key initiatives, including the adoption of the Eden Prairie Race Equity Report in January 2022.
Calista Swensen's garden is thriving in what seems like an improbable setting. Tucked away on the side of a large industrial building at 7550 Corporate Way in Eden Prairie, the 4,800-square-foot garden is hard to spot from the road. The 16-year-old Eden Prairie High School junior joked that she has a connection with the building owner.
Gerry Beckmann readily admits she "can talk forever" about PROP, the non-profit food shelf she helped found 50 years ago. For PROP's first 30 years, Beckmann served as its executive director, shepherding its all-volunteer efforts to help residents in need with food, money and time.
Alex Arredondo was in search of an old house. Finding the right one would be pivotal to setting the stage for the short horror movie "The Doll" that he wrote and hoped to direct there.
Sydney Raley's hero moment is making quite an impression on America. The story of how the 15-year-old Edina teen jumped out of a drive-through window at the Eden Prairie McDonald's where she works to save a woman choking on a chicken nugget has gone viral in a big way.
Two days after what would have been his 40th birthday, Mike Elhard's family, friends and some strangers, too, honored him on Saturday, Nov. 20, with a run around Purgatory Creek Park. The crisp fall morning was warmed considerably by a bright sun and fond memories of Elhard's love of his family, passion for running and sense of humor.
A blustery, frigid wind could not discourage John Mallo from telling the origin story of the Eden Prairie Veterans Memorial. Mallo was in Purgatory Creek Park on Veterans Day, Nov. 11, to give an impromptu tour of the memorial that he shepherded from idea to reality.
From Adisa Preston's perspective, racial injustices involving police can happen anywhere. As an African-American, the 18-year-old Eden Prairie High School senior said that's "something you automatically know." From afar, Preston saw it happen in Louisville when plainclothes officers killed Breonna Taylor in March 2020 and Atlanta when police killed Rayshard Brooks in June 2020.
Albrecht uses mantra to stay motivated both on and off his bicycle Greg Albrecht pushes the limits of his body one thoughtful step at a time. The longtime Eden Prairie marathoner and triathlete motivates himself using positive thoughts to grind out mile after mile.
Wildfire, a sled dog, injured last weekend in a hit-and-run snowmobile collision in northwestern Wisconsin, is on the mend after having surgery Jan. 11 in Eden Prairie. The Alaskan husky who turns 3 in April has a long road to recovery after his badly broken left rear leg was repaired at Mission Animal Hospital, 10100 Viking Drive.
Seven-year-old Adam Christopher Scott is your typical Eden Prairie kid. The first grader at Oak Point Elementary School plays basketball and video games, collects sports cards, roots for the Vikings and the Wild, and likes to trek outside on snowy days with his brothers, Ryan, 13, and Matt, 10.
Christopher Ferguson, Metropolitan Council member for District 3, stands near the Southwest Light-Rail Transit extension project taking shape in Eden Prairie. The extension will run about 14.5 miles from Target Field Station in Minneapolis to Southwest Station in Eden Prairie.
As one of the pioneering women to serve in the U.S. Marine Corps during World War II, June Fremont chatted with Eleanor Roosevelt, met Harry Truman and marched with other servicewomen behind the casket during President Franklin D. Roosevelt's funeral procession.
Bladesmith Jason Kraus suspects that each knife he's forged has some of his blood in it. "They're razor sharp, and they'll cut you when you don't even know it," Kraus says. "I'm getting better at not cutting myself, but you will get burned in knife making, and you will get cut.
David Schuster's glass artistry hides along trails around Eagle and Pike Lakes near his Maple Grove home. Consider it sort of a scavenger hunt, says his son Jordan Maxymek. Small pendants and marbles hang from branches or are tucked between tree trunks.
One look at the walls of Dan McAvey's Champlin house, and it's evident that artistry runs in the family. Decorating them are paintings created by McAvey, a painter and educator, and the whimsical, improvisational handiwork of the daughters he shares with his wife, Laura.
No matter how muddy, harebrained or precarious the obstacle, Charles Haupert rarely flinches at the chance to run, crawl, jump and climb over or-under-it. The 35-year-old avid obstacle-course runner/ultra-marathoner has leaped 35 feet off a platform into Lake Las Vegas, ran a sandlot marathon around a baseball diamond (384.5 trips around the bases) and once competed in a Tough Mudder dressed as the Gingerbread Man-which also happens to be the name of his running blog.
When Mark and Pam Braunwarth's only child, Jedd, went off to college about 15 years ago, Mark decided he needed a new hobby. Back in high school, Mark liked working on the pottery wheel. "We got him a wheel," Pam says. "But, I couldn't tell anybody because he is a well driller, and well drillers don't do pottery."
Draped over the walls and ceiling in the corner of artist Justin Hammer's studio are sheets paint-splattered with a clamor of quotes, handprints, drawings and brush strokes. It looks like graffiti from afar, but up close details emerge. A quote scrawled at the top of the most prominent stretch (once a bedsheet; the rest are dropcloths), simply says, "Rising."
Andy Spence-Parsons hasn't always been a seafaring man. It wasn't until his mid-30s in his native England that he discovered a sailor's life was for him. "We were living about the furthest possible distance from the coast," says Spence-Parsons, (who moved to the U.S. in 2002).
Woodworker Erika Jarnes lugs a giant tool bag filled with her trusty nail gun, sanders and drills. This way, Jarnes is always at-the-ready to ply her craft, whether it's in a woodshop she uses not far from Mankato or her residence near Maple Grove.
Larry and Kathy Welliver only need to walk a few steps from the front door of their Maple Grove home to immerse themselves in a garden oasis. Hostas-big and small in size; green to yellow in color; and curly to quilted in texture-play a starring role in this bucolic setting, blanketing much of the grounds around the house.
When passing over a heaping plate of barbecue goodness to customers, The Rib Cage manager Victor Florell jokingly tells them they might need a nap after eating so much. Though its menu might only fit in one hand, The Rib Cage's barbecue offerings are mighty on taste and portions.
As Solome Tibebu wandered through the corridors of Eden Prairie High School (EPHS) for the first time in more than a decade, a torrent of memories flickered in her mind like old home movies. "It was surreal being back," says Tibebu, a 2008 EPHS graduate, who lives in San Francisco.
For aspiring authors, getting their work published is a quest that can elicit as many goosebumps as reading a Stephen King novel. Many dream of being the next J.K. Rowling, but realize after a few rejections that writing a happy ending is much easier than scoring one in real life.
Sitting in the lounge of Life Time Sport at Winter Park, Kimberly Smith grades papers between glances at a TV monitor. Her children are among the fleet-footed soccer players running around on the screen. They are actually on the turf of a cavernous indoor field just behind a nearby door from where Smith sits.
Velen Ambalam never tires of repeating this one-liner to his customers at Idly Dosai International Market in Chanhassen: "I always hear people talking about Taco Tuesday, but how about Indian Friday?" he tells them. Ambalam punctuates what he refers to as a joke with a laugh, though it's clear there's a morsel of truth to his words.
Once the building they plan to call home for their golden years is finished later this year, residents of a Maple Grove senior citizen cooperative won't have far to venture outside their front doors to find something fun to explore.
You could say the people of Cuba were drawn to Deb Zeller. During a week last March, Zeller sat in a shady spot for many hours in Old Havana, sketching face after face on an easel.
As far back as high school, Johnny Range dreamed of hooking a walleye from his own dock. Walleye is a coveted and tasty catch among anglers like Range, but especially in Minnesota, where it is the state's official fish. "I would always say, 'I'll know I'm successful when I can do that,'" remembers Range.
Family who lost father, husband to cancer in 2012 lean on faith, memories.
Writer Stuart Sudak finds his balance on a log-one baby step at a time.
Lake Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists in Shorewood celebrate their unique setting and church at a half-century.
It's a steep climb to the Harkin Store from the road nestled along the Minnesota River below. But, the folksy melodies echoing from high above compel feet to bound up the stairs.Once there, the music's source is easy to spot.
Tim Triplett has a plaque with a quote from the Greek philosopher Heraclitus hanging near his desk. It says "a man's character is his fate." Triplett interprets that as this: How you live your life and the decisions you make are going to impact your success and how you're going to be remembered.
Caleb Truax pulls no punches on the secret to his boxing success. The 34-year-old Osseo native calls this his mantra-cut no corners. It's one of the hashtags he uses on social media. That simple phrase, he tells youngsters when speaking at schools, is hard-hitting advice in and out of the ring.
Hannah Hallahan knows that grimace well. It's the look many people give her when she first tells them of her fascination with honey bees. "They act sort of like they have the heebie-jeebies," Hallahan says. "I'm thinking, 'It's not that bad, people. It's more in your head than anything else.'"
Dave St. Peter is still having a ball.Sitting high above the left-field corner of Target Field, St. Peter is reminiscing about his long tenure with the Minnesota Twins-from an intern in 1990 to the president and chief executive officer today.
After all these years of forecasting the good, the bad and the ugly in Minnesota, Paul Douglas is still thunderstruck by the weather. "It's different every day," says the Twin Cities meteorologist and media personality. "No two days, no two storms are identical. Every day is a new creation.
Jennifer Kaeding admits her dog, Rooney, is spoiled. The easygoing Bernese mountain dog spends lots of time tagging along with Kaeding and her family. "We take him to as many places as we can," says Kaeding.Rooney is a frequent visitor to her office-Kaeding Architecture-located above the Waconia Brewing Company.
Irene Stemmer, sharp as ever at age 92, is leafing through her book, The Trapper's Cabin of Wayzata: A Journey to Preservation, when she stops on a page near the back. Stemmer points to three photographs of children frolicking outside the refurbished 1800s-era trapper's cabin in Wayzata's Shaver Park.
These days, pilots Kathy Rauth and her daughter Sarah Polovitz spend most of their time on the ground.The longtime Excelsior residents travel the Twin Cities as co-captains of a real estate business that has taken off since they teamed up more than four years ago.
Instead of lining up as a linebacker on Sundays in the National Football League (NFL), the 25-year-old Westerhaus is an investment banking analyst and founder of a nonprofit foundation."My life has gone in a different direction," says Westerhaus, who now lives in Minneapolis.
Stan Tekiela is ready to hit the road to Albert Lea. It's a 100-plus-mile drive from his Victoria home, but he doesn't mind. After all, his destination is a coveted hummingbird nest he wants to photograph. He asks people on his website, naturesmart.com, to email him about any interesting wildlife living in their backyards, and this certainly interests Tekiela.
For Ben Husaby, the path to cross-country skiing in two Olympics began as a boy growing up in Eden Prairie. "I would go out near the old high school (now Central Middle School) and pack down trails," says Husaby, now living in Bend, Ore.
Hovering above two desks on opposite sides of a wall are two faux neon pictures-one of the letter X, the other a Z.This is no coincidence. David Stillman, the 49-year-old Generation Xer, sits at the desk under the X. His son, Jonah, the 18-year-old Generation Zer, sits under the Z.
Two Maple Grove couples are fusing business with pleasure, one bowl of chili at a time. Greg and Jamie Miller and Mark Smail and Linda Goodvin have been friends for years, first meeting when their daughters started dance classes.
For many of us, our attention turns to the Olympics only after its advertisements start popping up on television. But for a select number of elite athletes, their focus on Olympic games is laser sharp. Always. Pat Smith's "ultimate goal" of Olympic gold as a Greco-Roman wrestler looms over him.
Lowell Campbell remembers driving around the "middle of nowhere" as a boy with his parents, looking for a bucolic spot for a cabin. After they bought some land in the 1950s, Campbell helped his parents build their northern Minnesota getaway. He's been tinkering with it ever since.
Kyle Wegner doesn't have to trudge far to get to his favorite winter stomping ground. His family lives near the top of the Power Hill Park sledding hill in Chanhassen. The sophomore at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities has been gliding down it for most of his life."It started with my family when I was 3," Wegner says.
Editor's note: The following is a reprint of a story that first appeared in the Eden Prairie News on June 5, 2003. The color-tinted photograph has a tale to tell. Its lovely hues depict two well-scrubbed, doe-eyed sisters donning their Sunday best. The older one stands fencepost straight, her taut features full of might.
A lemonade stand appears each Sept. 11 at the end of Sue Donkersgoed's driveway in the Olympic Hills neighborhood of Eden Prairie. Many of the faces of those selling the lemonade beside Donkersgoed have changed, but the promise made years ago to annually remember those affected by the Sept.
Lorene Brown has discovered her "happy place"-The Langdon, a 501C3 consignment-for-charity resale shop located in an elongated, rustic log cabin in Mound. Operated by volunteers like Brown, The Langdon touts itself as being different from traditional thrift stores. Donated used wares are sold at the shop to raise money for a cause of the donor's choosing.
In her well-traveled 1995 Toyota Camry, Brianna Pezon, 26, navigated the Twin Cities doing what she enjoys most-serving as a mental health practitioner, providing in-home therapy for people living with such serious mental health issues as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
When it comes to baseball, Dale Welter has all Chaska's bases covered. For more than 50 years, Welter has stepped up to the plate in a variety of mostly voluntary positions to pitch the virtues of the Chaska Cubs and the amateur baseball team's longtime home, Athletic Park."At my age, I've kind of been through it all," the 74-year-old Chaska native says.
Thanks to new knees, the spring in Howard Young's tennis game has returned. His days of holding court are far from over, even at age 88. And he's not alone. Tennis pros and amateur players alike laud it as a lifetime sport, perfect from childhood to the golden years.
A large framed world map stretches across a wall in Bill Foudray's office. The map hangs several feet directly across from his chair, perched behind two large computers on his desk. By raising his eyes, Foudray can contemplate the map's detailed expanse.
Rita Andrescik has been wowing them ever since kindergarten. "I would sing anytime someone would listen," she says. "Music has been my whole life. I can't remember when it wasn't."Over the years, Andrescik's voice has led her on a mellifluous journey of high notes, including a stint on an early Twin Cities television show.
John Oman spends hours working in his Chaska yard-it doesn't require a green thumb but a deft touch at toppling awkward-shaped wooden blocks. Winter or summer, Oman is outside by himself or with friends, perfecting his aim in the old Nordic lawn game with the peculiar-sounding name: Kubb.
After years of traveling for their jobs, Scott Kaldenberg and Brandon Thornton were on the hunt for a new adventure, one near their Eden Prairie homes. "I traveled Monday through Friday for the majority of my career," explains Kaldenberg, a retired management consultant. "I didn't want to be in any [commercial] airplanes.
Joseph Martin cruises Lake Minnetonka to help keep boaters safe. Equipped with binoculars and a hand-held radar gun, Martin motors through the lake's maze of channels and bays in one of the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office Water Patrol Unit boats."When we see someone acting foolishly, running through the channels at high speeds, we don't always need binoculars for that," Martin says.
Reeling in a whopper of a paddling opportunity is an easy catch. With its many waterways, the southwest metro abounds with padding possibilities for all ages and levels. Kayaks, stand-up paddleboards, paddleboats, canoes and rowboats for rent are plentiful. Classes can get you seaworthy for a yoga class or a moonlight paddle.
Sonja Anderson enjoys hiking the natural wonderland in southwestern Eden Prairie that honors her late husband's land preservation efforts. As she grows older, these journeys to the Richard T. Anderson Conservation Area are less frequent-seesawing through the 130 acres of woodlands and prairies can be challenging, especially the steep trek to its peak, overlooking the Minnesota River Valley.
I profiled pioneering wrestler Verne Gagne, who died in 2015, while he lived in Eden Prairie, Minn., a suburb of Minneapolis, in 2003. It was very hot the day I returned to take some more photos, and Verne wasn't wearing a shirt. I believe he was working out. He put on the first thing handy, a very heavy sweater. It didn't seem to bother him.
Jack Kelly gingerly patted the side of the barn-red wooden caboose, boasting of his role in bringing the 2 1/2-ton antique "home" to Lisle. Well, not exactly home, but close. Chicago Burlington & Quincy caboose No. 14584 was built in May 1881 in Aurora, and, according to Kelly, spent decades chugging past Lisle on the railroad line.
It was a definite for the kind, silver-haired gentlemen helping to detangle reels during the Eden Prairie Optimists' Fishing Derby on a sun kissed Saturday morning. Our conversation took place on the dock overlooking the fathers and mothers helping their children cast lines into the cold but clear water of Round Lake.
Legendary wrestler and promoter Verne Gagne died at age 89 on April 27. The following article I wrote a dozen or so years ago for the Eden Prairie News after discovering that the legendary wrestler was retired and living in a townhouse in Eden Prairie, Minn.