By DON POGGENSEE FAIRBANKS, Alaska, April 15, 2014 – Iowa photograhers John Schmidt of Ocheyedan, Bob Gillespie of Sioux City and I flew here March 4-12 for a fantastic few days of photographing Northern lights, an international ice carving contest and a dog sled competition. Two of us were here last year and enjoyed it so much that a return…
By CHUCK OFFENBURGER COOPER, Iowa, April 2, 2014 – The Iowa State Cyclones did not win their NCAA Sweet 16 basketball game against the University of Connecticut in Madison Square Garden in New York City last weekend. But Iowa State’s strong showing there surely must have pleased the spirit of John Crawford, who in 1954…
By CARLA OFFENBURGER COOPER, Iowa, March 11, 2014 – When the winter weather starts to break every year, I always think back to a poem I learned about 40 years ago from Lillian Hildreth, my English teacher at Lincoln High School in Des Moines. She had the poem written on her blackboard. I memorized it,…
By CARLA OFFENBURGER COOPER, Iowa, Jan. 11, 2014 – I was so excited on the recent New Year’s Eve when I had finally reached – and topped – my 5-year-old goal of reading 52 or more books in one year. I finished 2013 with 54! I read a lot, and it would seem that this…
By CHUCK OFFENBURGER ATLANTIC, Iowa, April 9, 2014 – Along life’s way, my wife Carla Offenburger and I have been, among other things, college teachers. We loved being around college students back then – well, most of the time. And we’ve really loved it years later when we’ve been able to watch some of our former students doing some…
By DOUGLAS T. BATES III CENTERVILLE, Tenn., April 14, 2014 – Everyone needs a Gene Sand in their life. Every town needs a Gene Sand in its midst. Every college needs a supporter like Gene Sand. So it was that I, the city of Dubuque and Loras College had not just someone like him, but the…
By CHUCK OFFENBURGER WATERLOO, Iowa, March 17, 2014 — For my farm neighbor and pal Doug Lawton, it was certainly a career highlight. But heck, for any Iowan, watching a John Deere tractor being made at what’s always been known as Deere’s “Waterloo Works” factory should be a thrill. It sure was for me one…
By CHUCK OFFENBURGER JEFFERSON, Iowa, March 19, 2014 — So there we were, on March 6, a group of about 60 of us from Greene County, all dressed nicely and wearing green carnations. We were sitting in a much larger crowd, a lot of them men in suits, filling a beautiful meeting room at The Meadows…
By CHUCK OFFENBURGER COOPER, Iowa, March 25, 2014 – All Iowans must have felt the same pride I did Tuesday morning when the new statue of our Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug was unveiled and dedicated in “National Statuary Hall” of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. The grand ceremony, which was attended by top…
By CHUCK OFFENBURGER COOPER, Iowa, March 3, 2014 –The Iowa girls high school state basketball tournament happens this week at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines, and that brought Iowa Public Television to Greene County last week to talk some history. Why here? One reason is that I’m here, and I wrote the 2002 book…
