Remember When June 2023

10 years ago (2013)
•Rock County Historical Society volunteers hosted their Buffalo Days Hoe Down at the fairgrounds Sunday afternoon under picture-perfect weather conditions.
After a weekend of rainy blustery weather, Sunday dawned with blue skies, sunshine and light breezes.
The Hoe Down, a fundraiser for the Historical Society, featured live music by Luverne musicians Ron and Jane Cote, a pie and ice cream social and tours of the Fitzer Barn, country school and summer kitchen on the fairgrounds.
A highlight of the event was free rides on antique Luverne firetrucks through Luverne’s historic direct.
One of the trucks, driven by Tanya Light, was built by her grandfather, Fenton Albert Leicher, started Luverne Fire Apparatus, Co. in 1893.
Her father, Jim Leicher, bought back the old firetruck in the early 1950s and had it restored, and it’s been in her family ever since. “We all learned to drive in this,” Light said. “My dad figured if we could drive this, we could drive anything.”
 
25 years ago (1998)
•Call it brave, call it stupid, but Luverne’s Terrie Gulden jumped out of an airplane Saturday at roughly 9,300 feet, with the help of a trained sky diver.
The South Dakota Sky Divers offered “tandem jumps” to members of the public Sunday morning during the annual Buffalo Days Fly-In Breakfast at Quentin Aanenson Field near Luverne.
He said a “tandem master instructor” was strapped to his back, and they both jumped out of a small plane at about 9,300 feet in the air.
 
50 years ago (1973)
•A 16-year-old Rapid City youth, Jeff Thorson, won the Blue Mound 100 bicycle race held here Sunday. He made the three loops, totaling 109 miles in five hours and 55 minutes. This was 23 minutes ahead of the second-place winner, Dr. Bob Barden, Pierre, S.D. Dr. Barden’s time was 6:18. Dr. Barden and Tom Hamilton, Minneapolis, were neck and neck. Hamilton’s time was six hours, 18 minutes and 57 seconds.
The champion is the grandson of Luverne’s veteran cyclist, Ralph Herreid. His parents are formerly from Luverne, his father being Jim Thorson, a Rapid City pharmacist, and his mother is the former Sharon Herreid.
 
75 years ago (1948)
•The 1949 Ford, which reveals a radical departure from traditional Ford styling and engineering, will be on display at the Herman Motor Company here on June 18, Fred Herman announced this week.
“New standards of beauty, comfort, economy and performance in the 1949 Ford passenger cars advance them far ahead of others in the low-priced field”, Mr. Herman said. “Styling of the new Ford definitely establishes it as the car of the year.”
To develop and produce the 1949 Ford passenger cars, Ford Motor Company has expended more than $37,400,000 in tools, dies, jigs and fixtures.
 
100 years ago (1923)
•With the commencement exercises held Friday evening at the Palace theatre, seventeen girls and five boys, constituting the Class of 1923 of the Luverne high school, received their diplomas. Only one regrettable fact entered into the occasion, and this was that the class was the smallest that had been graduated from the Luverne schools in several years.
The graduates: Commercial Course—Merrill Abby, Effie Anderson, Kasper Caveny, Ruth Engelking, Agnes Hanson, Agnes Peterson, Tabea Ristau, Florence Hoime; English Course—Ella Anderson, Emma Anderson, Evelyn Berg, Edna Cragg, Vernon Emerson, Frances Finke, Meredith Hazelton, Vernie Kruse, Lloyd Ohs, Marvyl Parr, Viola Soutar; Katherine Ulrich, Robert Van House; Latin Course—Ella Newberg; Normal Graduates—Leona Hanson, Gleva Nolterieke, Erma Palmer, Angelus LeGros, Nina Plomeson.