One of the museum's vintage Valentines now on display.

(Click on photos to enlarge)

The LaPorte County Historical Society will host its first-ever Valentine’s Day Tea on Saturday, Feb. 11, in the meeting room of the museum. The tea will begin at 1 p.m. and is open to anyone wishing to experience a little elegance along with a little fun. This event is open to family members of all ages and is especially perfect to share with your child or grandchild, or for your child and her best pals, which may include dolls.

This event is appropriate for ages 6 and up. Children under the age of 12 must be accompanied by an adult.

Get out your nicest hat and your prettiest gloves and come and learn the history of Valentine’s Day, presented by County Historian Fern Eddy Schultz, while you share some cookies, finger sandwiches, lemonade and, of course, tea. A craft project will also be on the agenda.

Please reserve your spot at the table by calling 219-324-6767. The Valentine’s Day Tea is free, however regular museum admissions apply.

Please give advance notice of any food allergies.

While at the museum, don’t forget to visit the vintage Valentines on display in the period rooms. They will be on exhibit till the end of February.

The museum is located at 2405 Indiana Ave. in LaPorte. Its three floors include a recreated log cabin and 13 period rooms, the W.A. Jones Antique Firearms Collection, and the Kesling Automobile Collection of over 35 antique and classic cars. For more information, call (219) 324-6767 or visit www.laportecountyhistory.org.

Another vintage Valentine at the museum.

Feb. 3, 1912 — Last night the mercury went to 20 degrees below zero in LaPorte.

Feb. 3, 1962 — Freight trains collide at Walkerton and four are hurt.

Feb. 3, 1987 — The LaPorte school system announces it has its first case of AIDS.

Feb. 3, 2002 — LaPorte crossings are still blocked after two trains crashed and created 10 blocks of trouble.

Feb. 2, 1912 — Peter Schmidt, an insane man at the asylum, is placed in a padded cell at the jail.

Feb. 2, 1962 — The Defense Department issues an Army draft call for 6,000 men in April, while enlistments spurt by 20 percent.

Feb. 2, 1987 — The prosecution claims that passion between Shaylene Harris and her boyfriend caused the death of Grace Hock.

Feb. 2, 2002 — President Bush is ordered to preserve Enron papers.

Feb 1, 1912 – There was a continuous period of zero temperatures for 13 days in January.

Feb. 1, 1962 – The decision on all-machine voting is left to the county attorney.

Feb. 1, 1987 – The first weekend of the Winter Festival was a grand success.

Feb. 1, 2002 – Judge Paul Baldoni, a26-year veteran in Superior Court 3, seeks re-election to the bench.

The "three amigos" -- Don Tonsoni, Steve King and Greg Fruth -- stand outside the LaCrosse High School Gymnasium.

Story and photos by Mike Kellems

(Click on photos to enlarge)

The Jan. 27, 2012, south-county rivalry between South Central and LaCrosse not only delivered an exciting basketball game in a backdrop that was made for Hoosier basketball, it was the scene of a reunion of former LaCrosse teachers, a couple of D.A.R.E. officers, and an alumnus.

For those who have never been, the LaCrosse gymnasium — and the school, for that matter — look like they’re straight out of “Hoosiers.” The LaCrosse gym is a twin to the gym used in the movie. Legend has it that the LaCrosse gym was scouted for the movie, but wasn’t used because it didn’t have a parquet floor. (It does now!)

Walk through these doors and you'll step back in time ...

When you walk in the front door of the gym, take six tiny steps and you’re under the basket. The basket on the opposite side is just a few steps from a stage. The seating consists of six rows on each side. The capacity is just over 700; at Friday night’s game, the crowd was estimated at over 900. Not bad for a town whose population is around 600.

When you walk through those double doors, you take a step back in time. The place reeks of nostalgia. Until this school year, the school was still run by the township trustee, one of only two in Indiana not incorporated. The other unincorporated school in Indiana? Wanatah.

For the past few years a group of LaPorteans with ties to the tiny town near the southern tip of LaPorte County have talked about going to see a ballgame. The biannual game on Jan. 27 offered the opportunity. Greg Fruth, a longtime LaPorte High teacher (now retired), taught at LaCrosse in the 1970s and coordinated the reunion along with Norm Kleist, LaCrosse’s superintendent. Greg was joined by former 1970s LaCrosse teachers Don Tonsoni (currently LaPorte’s attendance officer) and retired LaPorte County Judge Steve King. Myself and John Boyd, both veteran officers of the LaPorte County Sheriff’s Department, taught elementary and high school Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) programs in the 1990s. To round out the group, Judge Richard Stalbrink, who replaced Judge King in LaPorte County Superior Court 2 and is a 1986 LaCrosse graduate, came along.

Not only did we have an opportunity to see a great ballgame, the prinicipal left the school doors unlocked — which afforded us a great chance to take a walk down memory lane. Judge King and Don Tonsoni walked us through their old classroom on the second floor; they joked that while at LaCrosse they were the “co-chairs” of the social studies department. (The inside joke was that they were also the only two teachers in that department!) Up on the fourth floor, better known as the Crow’s Nest, Judge Stalbrink discovered a box full of old record books and found the score book from his senior year on the basketball team.

I have to admit, it was a great history lesson as the tour came to a stop on the second floor and the group started rehashing memories of the old days; the names of the principals, teachers and staff, where they were now, how they came to teach at LaCrosse. And boy, has the world changed. We spent the better part of an hour touring and chatting; it turned out to be one of the best lessons I’ve ever had in a school building.

The basketball season is winding down, with only a few more weeks before the sectionals start. If you are any kind of fan of the game … if you have any love for history … if you want a great night of nostalgia and Hoosier Hysteria … don’t waste any time. Get to the LaCrosse Gym soon.

MIKE KELLEMS is a sergeant in the LaPorte County Sheriff’s Department, liaison officer at LaPorte High School, and a LaPorte School Board member.

Superintendent of Schools Norm Kleist (left) stands with Don Tonsoni, Steve King and Greg Fruth in LaCrosse High School.

Judge Richard Stalbrink (yellow shirt) shows Judge Steve King the basketball scorebook from his senior year at LaCrosse.

]]> http://www.whatsnewlaporte.com/2012/01/31/alums-thrive-on-hoosier-hysteria-lacrosse-style/feed/ 2 http://www.whatsnewlaporte.com/2012/01/27/learn-about-newly-released-1940-census-data-at-feb-14-meeting/ http://www.whatsnewlaporte.com/2012/01/27/learn-about-newly-released-1940-census-data-at-feb-14-meeting/#comments Fri, 27 Jan 2012 19:28:25 +0000 Staff http://www.whatsnewlaporte.com/?p=29185 Seventy-two years and one day after the 1940 U.S. census was taken, its handwritten house-by-house returns will be made public online April 2, 2012.

What questions were asked — and answered — by the 132 million Americans then living? How can today’s researchers find their families when there is no name index yet?

The LaPorte County Genealogical Society will meet at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 14, weather permitting, at the Swanson Activity Center for Older Adults, 910 State St., LaPorte. Following a short business meeting, Alan Zeller and Harold Henderson will answer these questions and more.

The society meets there on the second Tuesday of each month at 7 p.m. The public is welcome at all meetings. Membership dues are $10 individual, $12 family.

For more information, visit http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~inlcigs/.

This kitchen scene is just one of the museum areas displaying vintage Valentines, which will be featured through February.

The LaPorte County Historical Society has its extensive collection of vintage Valentines on display through February. The Valentines are featured in the various period rooms at the museum. In the Victorian dining room, the table is covered with Valentine greetings of the time. The 1920s kitchen has a young girl getting fitted for a party dress while surrounded by Valentine greetings from all her classmates. In the 1920s living room, a woman sits at her desk surrounded by romantic Valentines while dreaming of her soldier husband.

Paper lace cutouts with romantic sayings, three-dimensional stand-up cards, and many colorful, nostalgic images grace these long-ago works of art.

In the museum gift shop, Valentine reproductions are now for sale. Some of the images were copied from those in the archives of the LaPorte County Historical Society.

The museum consists of three floors with over 80,000 items on display, including over 30 antique and classic cars, 14 period rooms ranging from a pioneer cabin to a 1950s living room, and the famed W.A. Jones antique gun collection of over a thousand pieces. Permanent exhibits of Native American artifacts, antique toys, a working model train layout, and a recreated barn are just a few examples of the many other items on exhibit.

The LaPorte County Historical Society Museum, 2405 Indiana Ave., LaPorte, is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Call ahead for admission prices at 219-324-6767 or visit www.laportecountyhistory.org. The facility is accessible to those with disabilities.

"This photo was during the height of the storm," Howes wrote. "My neighbor, Terry Bowman, was in his father’s (Art Bowman's) Jeep and thought he could make it through the ever-increasing snow drifts. Wrong!" This photo, looking north down Holton Road from Waverly Road, shows the Jeep mired in drifts not far from the Howes and Bowman residences on Waverly.

Photos by Ralph F. Howes

(CLICK ON PHOTOS TO ENLARGE)

Ralph F. Howes

Jan. 26, 1967, started out ordinarily enough. The day before, LaPorte County had enjoyed a balmy 65 degrees. As the 26th dawned, it was colder but still quite mild, and not much snow was falling.

Then Mother Nature decided to have some fun.

By midday, the snow was really coming down — thick and heavy — accompanied by wind. It didn’t stop for 36 hours. The storm ultimately dumped 28 inches of snow — 22.5 inches of that total on Jan. 26. LaPorte, and the entire region, were at a virtual standstill for several days. Workers were stranded at their jobs, school kids were taken in by residents in the vicinity where their buses got stuck, cars disappeared beneath drifts.

Many have vivid memories of the storm, but LaPorte attorney Ralph F. Howes has something better than that. He has color slides he took at the time, when he was a teenager. Howes recently acquired a slide-to-computer scanner and sent copies of the images to WNLP. We’re excited to share these glimpses of local history along with his recollections.

“My uncle, William Fleck, had always had the finest in photography equipment,” Howes told WNLP. “When I was about 15, he gave a Zeiss Ikon 35mm camera to me along with a wide assortment of lenses. It was an excellent camera but old technology. I had to use an external hand-held light meter and then had to adjust focus and f settings, but it took really good pictures. At the time I had a job after school that paid about $1 per hour, so taking slides was more within my very limited budget as opposed to negatives and prints.

“The storm was quite an event. I remember looking out the windows at LaPorte High School and seeing snow coming down like I’d never seen it before. I believe we were at lunch when they announced school would be closing and we needed to gather our stuff and go to our buses. My bus route went out to Orchard Avenue and then on Garden Street. The bus got bogged down in heavy snow about 100 yards from Waverly Road. The bus driver couldn’t go any farther so a group of us bailed out and made it to my parents’ home at Waverly and Holton roads. One of those in the group was my good friend, Norman Garwood, who ended up staying with us for maybe five or six days.”

A few days after the storm, “I remember my sister, Barbara, myself and Norman, not having much else to do, walking down Waverly Road and offering to shovel out driveways. Sometimes folks were so grateful for the service they would pay us as much as $5 or so!”

If you have memories and/or photos of the ‘67 blizzard, feel free to send them to wnlp@whatsnewlaporte.com and we will post them in future days.

A few days after the storm, as the digging out ensued, "we needed to go to Hinton’s grocery store (later Hickman’s, which stood where Taco Bell is now on Pine Lake Avenue) to get some food," Ralph recalled. He shot this scene at the corner of Pine Lake Avenue and Weller Avenue, looking east across Pine Lake Avenue. At left is the Bastian-Morley showroom (the LaPorte company made boilers and water heaters) and in the background toward the right is Allis-Chalmers.

Days after the storm, cars remained buried in the LaPorte High School parking lot.

Another shot of the LPHS lot.

Ralph removing snow from the roof of his parents' home on Waverly Road. The snow was so heavy that it collapsed some roofs.

The Plymouth Valiant belonging to Ralph's father, Ralph E. Howes, sits mired in the Crichfield School (then Johnson Road School) lot. The elder Mr. Howes was principal of the school at the time.

Ralph's friend Norman Garwood, his sister Barbara and himself outside the Howes home on Waverly. Norman stayed with the Howes family for several days until he could get home.

Photo by Mike Kellems

(Click on photo to enlarge)

Members of the Patriot Guard stand with their American flags in Oak Grove Cemetery near LaCrosse, IN, during the burial service for U.S. Army Spc. Robert Tauteris Jr. on Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012. Tauteris, of Hamlet, was killed in action along with three other Indiana soldiers on Jan. 5 in Afghanistan.

According to a report from WKVI-FM, among the hundreds in attendance at Tauteris’ services were Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels and Congressman Joe Donnelly. Daniels assisted in presenting the Purple Heart and Bronze Star to Tauteris’ family.

LaPorte Lions Club President Tom Ruda presents a check for $5,000 to Unity Foundation of LaPorte County President Maggi Spartz at the 2-acre site at 1010 Pine Lake Ave. in LaPorte. The money will be used to fund planning for the site. (Click on photo to enlarge)

Information by Sandra Provan

So how did the Unity Foundation of LaPorte County and its supporters seize a piece of prime Pine Lake property to restore?

Maggi Spartz, president of the Unity Foundation, explained how at a November 2011 LaPorte Lions Club meeting. Spartz described the almost 2-acre lakefront property at 1010 Pine Lake Ave., between the Blue Heron Inn and Fay’s Marina, the former site of Roskoe’s Restaurant.

According to the foundation, it all started when someone noticed the “For Sale” sign at the property and asked Unity what was going to happen there. Would it be something positive for the community?

The property, just under 2 acres with 400 feet of seawall and several easements and egresses, includes access from Pine Lake Avenue, a launch ramp, and the cinder-block “Lynda’s Landing” building with bathrooms.

Spartz showed the Lions Club a video of the property. It was the first presentation about the project that the Unity Foundation had made.

At the December 2011 LaPorte Lions Club board meeting, the board decided to give $5,000 toward plans for the property.

“The LaPorte Lions Club is proud to support the Unity Foundation of LaPorte County in its effort to promote access to Pine Lake and to preserve its natural beauty through the ‘Love Our Lakes’ program,” said Tom Ruda, president of LaPorte Lions. “As Lions, our mission is ‘To Serve.’ We strongly support efforts that enhance the quality of life in our community and that provide open space for all residents to enjoy.”

“Everyone wants this project to be awesome and we know professional design help is important,” said Spartz. “We are so grateful for the LaPorte Lions Club’s generous donation.”

The Unity Foundation plans a permanent endowment to maintain the property. “Development plans will influence future maintenance costs and Unity has already established a separate fund for this purpose,” according to the foundation’s website.

Susan Aaron is chairman of the committee for the project, joined by members Liz Bernel, Kim Sauers, Marti Swanson and Michele Thompson. For more information, visit www.uflc.net or call 219-879-0327. To see a video of the Pine Lake project, view http://uflc.net/2011/11/help-us-love-our-lakes-video/.

For more information about LaPorte Lions, visit www.laportelions.org or call Ruda at 324-0603.