Loren Paulsson

Sunset over Lake Michigan, Douglas Beach Park. “Due to an extremely difficult economic environment, CertifiChecks, Inc., has ceased operations, effective immediately.”  When this announcement appeared on the CertifiChecks website February 26, it left chambers of commerce across the country and even the Department of Defense with a huge problem. Jane Clark, president of the Holland Area Chamber of Commerce, got the news on Friday, February 27. The Holland chamber used Certifi-Checks to manage a “buy local” gift certificate program since 2001. Clark said individuals purchased $350,000 in “HollanDollars” between January 2008 and January 2009. Recipients could walk into participating businesses and buy whatever they wanted. The merchant would deposit the certificate like any other check, and the chamber earned a slight commission. CertifiChecks administrated the program, issued certificates, reaped interest on the money they held, and kept the funds from certificates nobody redeemed. A...

In order to avoid unnecessary injuries, Boulder County Jail Chief Larry Hank asked training officers Doug Caven and Ron Kaundart to reduce the extra-curricular “horseplay” during in-service defense tactics training. So Caven and Kaundart opened the next training by explaining the new guidelines. Not long thereafter, Hank visited the classroom as he often does, but in the course of his visit, he put an officer in a headlock. “He messes around with the people he likes,” Caven said, but the chief’s actions still undermined the new guidelines, and during a break, Caven and Kaundart headed down the hall to Hank’s office. At first, Hank said his reaction was to avoid making too big a deal about it, but he listened, and after Caven and Kaundart left, he asked himself, “What would I do if it were someone other than me?” Then he drafted a letter suspending himself for 8 hours without pay, and he sent copies to Sheriff Joe Pelle and to officers Caven and Kaundart. Kaundart had not expected Hank ...

Claude and Clyde Miller remember 1931 as the year their family’s 500 acres of spring wheat blew away. The last of may, the wind blew hard for several days. It “started in the northeast and turned to the west,” Clyde said. Claude remembers sitting in the house and not being able to see the person across the room. That year the family lived on the money they made selling eggs and cream in Coulee City. Claude and Clyde were born to Reuben and Mrytle Miller on December 11, 1913, joining older sisters Mayme and Nellie. Last Saturday, December 13, 2003, they celebrated their ninetieth birthday with family and friends at the Coulee City First Presbyterian Church. In 1918 the Millers temporarily moved to Wenatchee for Frank’s birth. During this time the armistice was signed at the end of World War I and Clyde remembers the jubilation: including some folks dragging a dummy of the Kaiser down the street. The twins attended most of the first eight grades at the Rock Rose School, but they also we...

When Mildred Scheibner moved into Coulee City in September 1989, her daughter Marilyn Tanneberg was running the Tanneberg Insurance Agency by herself. So Mildred started stopping by what is now the Main Street Center where Tanneberg Insurance is located to pick up and deliver the day’s mail. Someone meets her at the bottom of the stairs now, but she still treks past the fire station to the Center nearly every day on her appointed rounds. The Scheibners raised five girls: Nancy, June, twins Marilyn and Carolyn, and Janet. Mildred now has 14 grandchildren and 28 great grandchildren with number 29 due in the next two weeks. Wendell and Ida Bogart had their first child, Mildred, on August 29, 1909. A nurse traveled from Coulee City to the family’s home near Saint Andrews to assist the new mother and child seven years before the Bogarts became the first family in the area to have indoor plumbing. Mildred was eventually joined by a brother, Maurice, and two sisters, Doris and Winifred. The...

Don and Linda Rushton celebrate thirty years of service at Steamboat Rock Restaurant since the late, longtime Coulee City resident Boyd Jenkin was their first customer November 19, 1973. “Hello,” Linda greets four of the “Presbyterian ladies” as they walk into the Steamboat on a rainy November Sunday shortly after noon. The ladies seat themselves near their accustomed spot as Linda follows with four menus. “They have the best steak in town,” Joyce Jones said to general agreement around the table, though today her diet called for soup and a salad.   The only other diners at the moment are waitress Darlene Luedke’s husband Lew, son Ryan Slahtasky, daughter-in-law Farah and grandson Camryn, but Bob and Pauline Dingman soon seated themselves at a nearby table. “I Think we’re entertaining to look at,” Pauline Dingman said as 8-month-old Camryn checked them out from behind his “I love Grandma” bib.  “The food is excellent. It’s really clean. It feels like home to us,” Claudine Davis...