Tag: watertown

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Say It with Chocolate

By Laura Andrews

Chocolate lovers Vickie and Mike Marotz of the Watertown Confectionery. Photo by John Andrews.

Valentine’s Day is synonymous with bouquets of flowers, sappy cards and red, heart-shaped boxes of chocolates. But what if you want to keep your celebration local? South Dakota doesn’t have many bright blooms to boast of this time of year, and syrupy sentiment isn’t really our style. Luckily, three area chocolatiers can help you pay tribute to your love with handmade flair.

The folks at Mostly Chocolates have been delighting Rapid City palates for over 30 years. They are now working on the people of Pierre, where they opened up a second location in 2012. Try their chocolate roses, amaretto fudge, chocolate-covered cherry clusters — 3 big maraschino cherries dipped in milk chocolate — or sample their many other handmade chocolates. The Rapid City store also has a full espresso bar and a frozen yogurt bar with over 25 toppings available. For a special experience, gather a group of friends together for private chocolate-making classes with owner Peggy Kelly and her staff. Visit Mostly Chocolates at 1919 Mount Rushmore Road in Rapid City or 410 West Sioux Avenue #4 in Pierre.

The Watertown Confectionery covers everything from”I brew” to”I do.” Mike and Vickie Marotz’s Kemp Avenue store houses wine and beer-making facilities and an in-shop chapel for small, intimate weddings in addition to hand-dipped caramels, mint meltaways and other treats. If your sweetie has a sense of humor, hand them a South Dakota Cow Pie. Hopefully the name won’t scare them away from savoring the Marotzes’ concoction of chocolate, crushed English toffee and toasted coconut. You’ll find the Watertown Confectionery at 116 East Kemp Avenue in Watertown.

Mary”Chip” Tautkus’s Chubby Chipmunk has been receiving national attention lately — her Deadwood-made truffles were slipped into the swag bags given to performers and presenters at the Grammy and Country Music Association award ceremonies. Those with exotic tastes turn to the Chipmunk for chocolate made from Fortunato No. 4, a recently rediscovered variety of cacao plant long thought extinct. For a last-minute V-Day surprise, slide your cash in the”Chub-O-Matic” truffle vending machine next to Tautkus’s shop at 420 Cliff Street in Deadwood.

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A Terry Redlin Moment

By Lee Schoenbeck

This past weekend was the in-state opener for pheasant hunters. We now have a preserve opener, a youth opener, an in-state opener and an out-state opener. This is too much red tape for a traditionalist like me, so generally I just wait for the High Holiday of the opener on the third Saturday in October. But I am a traditionalist — not a fool! This year, with all the beans and corn out and the CRP hayed, the in-state opener promised to be an opportunity to hunt virgin birds on public lands in ample numbers, so I was all in.

WHERE TO HUNT

The waterfowl hunters are a good resource. My duck hunting buddies said that all the birds they heard or saw were near water, and one suggested Long Lake. Long Lake is about 4 minutes from the edge of Watertown, the state’s fourth largest city. From my home, it is an equal distance to Long Lake or Wal-Mart! That just didn’t sound like a recipe for a successful hunt. But I checked with another buddy and his advice echoed the first — take the Memorial Park road from town until you hit Long Lake, and then north until you find a place to park. That seemed like odd advice, but I took it.

For the in-state opener you can only hunt public areas, which lends itself to a concentration of hunters. Pick a public spot four miles from the city of Watertown, and you’re asking for something that looks like the Oklahoma Land Rush. As I drove north, there were multiple pickups parked every quarter-mile. This didn’t look promising, but since I mostly just wanted to get a chance to work my three dogs without being shot at, I was flexible. I saw an area with two trucks and room for me to park, so we were in. As I parked, I notice to my right a monument — I was at the Terry Redlin Wetland Area.

TERRY REDLIN — ONE OF THE GREATEST

Terry is a Watertown native that lost one leg as a high schooler in a motorcycle accident. The state agreed to send him to art school as part of a vocational retraining program, and at first blush, the rest is history. He learned to paint wildlife scenes that captured the beauty of the upper Midwest like nobody had previously imagined. He became so popular that more people bought copies of his work than almost any other artist to ever walk the face of the earth –seriously. But Terry Redlin was different. He never forgot what the people of South Dakota did for him, and he was determined to repay the debt he felt. He returned home. The Redlin Art Center, and many other charitable contributions, are monuments to his commitment.

Not surprisingly, Ducks Unlimited and the South Dakota Game, Fish & Parks recognized his support of the outdoors with a monument and the dedication of a public hunting area near his hometown of Watertown.

THIS CAN’T ACTUALLY WORK

So I got out with my three dogs — with two hunters and their sons and dogs to my left and another group a quarter mile to my right. On the first pass towards the water, the only scent the dogs picked up was towards the dads — and no good hunter will crowd a dad taking his kids on a hunt. After a swim for the dogs in Long Lake, three quick flushes yielded two roosters, two shots and a pretty good day. On the swing back to the pickup, about 40 yards from the Terry Redlin marker, one more rooster decided to give it a go, and a quick bark from the over-and-under finished the day. According to the satellite time on the iPhone, my anticipated two-hour walk with my dogs lasted all of 31 minutes!

ASSESSING THE HUNT

My hunting buddy Yseth had to go out later, hunt longer and had less success. When I told him about my hunt, his quick retort was,”You got lucky!”

Personally, I think he missed another obvious answer. Terry Redlin painted the beautiful and multi-colored pheasant like nobody before or since. Maybe, just maybe, the birds hang around his monument because they appreciate his work too?

Lee Schoenbeck grew up in Webster, practices law in Watertown, and is a freelance writer for the South Dakota Magazine website.


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We Weren’t First?

By Bernie Hunhoff

We started publishing this magazine before several of our staff members went to school, so it’s getting old — especially by South Dakota publishing standards.

Lots of magazines have come and gone. The earliest we’ve tracked was started by the legendary historian Doane Robinson right here in Yankton in 1898. He called it the Monthly South Dakotan. It lasted for eight years.

We have single copies of many other attempts. There was a Dacotah Magazine that began in Watertown shortly after Robinson’s Monthly failed. The state Chamber of Commerce tried a Sunshine Magazine in the 1920s.

Another startup failed shortly before we started in 1985. As I recall, the advertising sales director went to prison on a murder charge.

South Dakota isn’t the easist place to publish a magazine, but it has been fertile ground for us. Our advertising directors have stayed out of jail and our writers and photographers have shown great passion for the art of publishing a prairie and mountain magazine.

We are constantly on the lookout for other publishing brethren who may have preceded us, and today a reader sent us this image of a front cover of a publication. My guess is that it is a state agriculture department yearbook from the 1920s, but we would welcome any further input.

We would also be interested in identifying the pretty young model on the cover. Any leads?

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You Have To Earn Your Pumpkin Pie Around Here

By Lee Schoenbeck

Now the perfectly good warmth of a Thanksgiving morn in front of a roaring fire with Snoopy and Bullwinkle and the rest of the Macy’s Parade ensemble is no more for many in our community, due to the Hiedeman family. As first impressions go, Steve and Patty seem like a normal couple, blessed with four beautiful and accomplished daughters, but there’s something a little unusual about the Hiedeman household. A few years ago they decided that the excesses of Thanksgiving dinner should be preceded by a family run — taking in the late November beauty that a northeastern South Dakota community has to offer. Over time, the little family run grew to an annual community event — the Hiedeman Turkey Day 5k. Until last year, the event was staged from the family garage in Northeast Watertown, plus a porta potty in the driveway. The awards ceremony took place in the two-stall garage, with the premium spots located near the space heaters. Awards are — of course — pumpkin pies. The good news — everybody that is there at the end gets hot apple cider and a piece of pumpkin pie.

But, this is no ordinary little run. In 2008 over 190 runners participated. Runners are encouraged to share their bounty, by bringing food stuffs for a local church food bank.

The field includes several NCAA Division I distance runners. The Heidemans’ daughter Caitlin married former SDSU standout quarterback, Ryan Berry, and Caitlin made her mark on the college running scene. Besides Caitlin’s friends and teammates, NDSU cross country coach Ryun Godfrey is a Watertown native, who apparently brings his team from Fargo to Watertown for the Heideman run, with the additional lure of a turkey feed at the home of Watertown running coach and father, Vic Godfrey.

In addition to the D-I caliber athletes, there are also the Very-Not-D-Anything “athletes” that heavily populate the 5k run and 2 mile walk — as well as the many family and friends there to cheer on the field. A buddy of mine dutifully trains for this event each year, always wondering if the first aid crew will be good enough to assure him survival to at least one last turkey dinner. It is ominous that the course routes the wheezing, frost-bitten participants through the local cemetery — seriously. To date, the Hiedemans’ web site reports no fatalities, and precious few egos injured in this festive community event.

Last year the infectious nature of the whole affair was tested by forecasts of deep sub-zero wind chills. Due to the growth of the event, prior to the forecast it had been relocated to the local Cornerstone Methodist Church Hall. As the weatherman predicted, the wind chill for the 2010 event was 28 degrees below zero, which made moving the start closer to the local cemetery seem even more fortuitous.

At this point, in more temperate climates, the Macy’s parade would have won out and the sane crowd would stay home. But up here on the Coteau, the rules are different. In true homesteader bloodline fashion, 107 South Dakotans (there were also a few North Dakota athletes looking for free turkey at the Godfrey house, and a guy and two gals from St. Joe, Missouri!) still competed. The crowd included housewives, children, whole families — and of course some not-exactly-D-Anything Athletes. You couldn’t help but wonder if the local mental health counseling program wasn’t a little under-promoted as these hardy souls raced in slightly clad running gear, at temperatures that cause perfectly good engines to seize up. But, the event was a frozen and smashing success.

A few years ago I started participating in this foolishness, and last year one of my college age children joined me in the race. Having cleared a half century and possessing two bad hips, I don’t train for these things. At my age, nothing good happens to your body from all that extra running, so. I focus on power-walking for the cardio endurance, and Aleve for the hips. Plus, because there is a farmer in my age group with nothing better to do all year than run down his township road like a bounding deer — I can’t win anyway.

But in the deep freeze of 2010 two special things happened. First, I beat my daughter to the finish line. Ok, I’m a realist. These are pyrrhic victories — eventually math and the calendar will change the placing in those finishes, so I take my victories while I can. But even more importantly, we’d left before the awards ceremony. Later that day a victor’s pumpkin pie was delivered to our home. Immediately realizing that the speeding farmer was surely the rightful owner of the over-50 pie, I did what any AARP-eligible athlete does when faced with the prospect of having to return a mistaken trophy — I took a bite out of it. There’s no chance they’d make me give back a pie that was missing a piece. Besides, all those calories wouldn’t affect my form, but surely would throw his lean frame off.

So now we approach 2011. The weather is forecast to be in the 40s, the kind of temps that even the folks south of the Mason-Dixon Line would run in. Having already won a pie, there’s little left to prove, almost. BOTH of my college age kids have now been training for this race. Dad’s time on top of the family running victor’s stand is probably numbered. Sure, I’ve already started my regiment of Aleve, and paced myself with a 5k warm up run last May (the hospital’s Heart Attack Hill Run is a story for another day). But the real power of writing is being able to pick when an epic ends.

Thursday is Thanksgiving. While I can’t predict the finish for tomorrow’s race (I’m just hoping they don’t have reason to leave me out in that cemetery) Today, I still feel good enough to share the Thanksgiving prayer from 1:Thessalonians:”In all things give thanks…”

Lee Schoenbeck grew up in Webster, practices law in Watertown, and is a freelance writer for the South Dakota Magazine website.