South Dakotans have always known how to make Christmas special. In 1881 the people of Aberdeen decided to celebrate the holiday season by putting up a community Christmas tree. The locals thought the tree would be a nice way to commemorate their first Christmas as a community. All was going according to plan until the railroad agent who had been commissioned to supply the community’s Christmas tree showed up with a disappointing delivery. He arrived with a tree that was a measly five feet tall.
Determined to build a more extravagant display, the people of the town gathered in a local store at the corner of Third and Main. They found a large piece of timber and nailed it to the floor and ceiling. Then they attached narrow strips of wood and pieces of evergreen from the real tree to the large piece of timber. They topped off their clever construction with strings of popcorn and cranberries. Thanks to their imagination, the Aberdeen community ended up with a much larger, grander tree than the original.
One hundred thirty-four years later, another group of South Dakotans has been using their creativity to build a special Christmas display. The decorations are slightly more elaborate than the ones in that Aberdeen store. The Capitol display consists of nearly 100 trees – the tallest of which is 29 feet – and the theme for the decorations this year is “Christmas around the World.”
Many volunteers have devoted precious hours to decorate the Capitol building for the holidays. As always, they have done a great job.
When I walk into the Capitol building each morning from now until after Christmas Day, I’ll be greeted by the rich aroma of pine trees and the sparkling reflection of Christmas lights on the ornaments that decorate those trees. Just walking down the hallway puts me in the Christmas spirit.
I hope you will find time this holiday season to come to Pierre to experience Christmas at the Capitol. The display is open from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day of the week through Saturday, Dec. 26.
I hope to see you there!

I was growing up and becoming more worldly wise. I was a 13-year-old freshman getting a head start in high school, having skipped the second grade. Compared to nine students from four families in Floyd Township’s Center School, Forestburg High School was the big time. I had never gone to a school with two stories and about 30 to 35 students. After a grade school lifetime of bib overalls and flannel shirts, I went with my mother to Huron, where I picked out two sets of corduroy trousers and polo shirts. Now I could dress like the town kids, although I recall that some 90 percent of all my fellow students lived on surrounding farms.
I was just emerging from adolescent days when girls were goofy nuisances and good mainly for doing dishes and being a dad’s favorite child. But in FHS, my perspective was gradually changing. Girls were coming to look quite human. When Donna Burrill, two years ahead of me, actually looked at me and spoke to me between classes, I was first astounded, then flattered and then bewildered. Older girls, especially popular town girls, simply didn’t stoop to recognize mere freshmen boys scarcely beyond rug-rat days. But Donna was just that way—a friendly, down-to-earth young lady who overlooked the falsity of the social barriers others imposed. Her simple, honest recognition of an insecure country boy placed her on a pedestal considerably higher than that unfairly given to the beautiful, the poised, the self-centered and the overrated.
But what brought my kid-stuff tomfoolery to a real-time awakening was when the Olson/Pearson saga unfolded right in front of my innocent eyes. I remind any readers that I was only 13 or possibly 14 with miles yet to go. Participants in my education were Eunice Pearson, living some two miles from me, and a young buck from outside of town named Art Olson. Seated alphabetically next to each other in either the sophomore or the junior rows in the study hall, they had ample opportunities to get acquainted. Here’s what I observed, but it didn’t seem to make much sense, since girls were generally strange and unpredictable creatures. And boys were, well, just boys.
That part of my education generally took place in the study hall where all 30 or so high schoolers had assigned seats. During the noon hour, the male brown-baggers and the lunch boxers lined up along the north windows, having pulled senior desks from their row to better watch the outside traffic heading downtown while they ate. Town residents Margie Hinde and Donna and Wally Burrill went home for lunch. The girls migrated to the English room in the northeast corner of the building to eat and do whatever it was that they talk about when boys aren’t around.
I began to notice the strangest thing, which seemed to simply evolve out of thin air with no announcement and no fanfare. Eunice seemed to be the first one back in the study hall. Why was she always first, I wondered? Then, just as though it was planned, Art would get up from his temporary lunch seat by the window and stroll over to his desk. But wait, he didn’t sit in his own desk but stopped at the one next to his when that early arrival from the girls’ lunch area had seated herself. Things were getting complicated. Why did the two of them end up at her desk almost every day? And he always did the same quite unnecessary thing. He would pull out Eunice’s desk drawer beneath her seat. Then, with no consideration as to whether he might collapse the desk drawer or whether he might be smashing her books, he would sit on her books facing her. Completely invading her personal space, he would place his right arm on the top of her backrest and his left on the writing surface of her desk. How could a guy be so inconsiderate? And right there in public he was practically hugging her!!
All of this activity was in plain sight of those of us young males uninitiated in the mushy stuff of life. It had not yet appeared to me why a 16-year-old girl would want just any young guy getting that close and personal. Strong farm girl that she was, one quick, forceful jab of her left elbow would have landed the young fellow flat on his back on the floor. But it was a crazy thing—she didn’t seem to mind a bit. And it actually was her fault, for she was always the first girl back in the study hall after lunch. On top of the weird happenings, Art and Eunice talked in such low tones that none of us young males could hear a word they said. Since they chose such a public place to distract us, shouldn’t their conversation have been more public?
Well, the world of personal realities was setting in for me, but a kid might wonder why the mushy stuff had to start so early! The reality seemed to be that Art and Eunice wanted to turn his desk-drawer sitting into a more permanent life investment. If they married perhaps in 1945, they may have had 60-65 good years together. Way to go, guys! And you have the fine legacy of three boys and three girls to prove that a desk-sitting pastime can develop into a real and lasting deal—even if observant pipsqueaks didn’t understand what’s going on!
Now Eunice, what is your version? Do my 70-year-old memories need some touching up? You, Bernita, Jesse Bonney, Wally Burrill, my Wisconsin brother, Camden, and I are the known few who remain from that particular high school crowd.
More up-to-date—yesterday, Nov. 7, I stopped by Brady Nursing Home in Mitchell to say “hello” to Eunice. Lo and behold, I got two for the price of one! There in two wheelchairs having an after lunch chat were an 89-year-old and an almost 88-year-old, bodies frail but minds sharp. Bernita LaBreche Hinker, 1942 Forestburg High School junior, and Eunice, Forestburg High School 1942 sophomore, were being visited by 86-year-old 1942 Forestburg High School freshman, Warren Thomas! We had an interesting half hour doing what most oldies do when two or three get together—reminiscing!
Among other things, Bernita, long-time mother of six, told me that she was the sole survivor of her 1944 graduation class. Eunice Olson, not to be outdone, also is mother of six and claimed the same longevity distinction in her 1954 class. In my own class, my sister and I left after our junior year, leaving four boys to graduate in 1946. As far as I know, from our freshman class of nine, later joined by Bill Irving and Merle Nurnberg, only Jesse Bonney in Oregon, Wally Burrill in California and I on the old Jim Howe farm north of Forestburg continue in good health and spirits. Those four freshman boys graduating in 1946 were Ralph Rhoads, Wally Burrill and Robert Ellingson. The fourth male graduate was either Bill or Vic. The other one either dropped out or transferred for his last year. Bonnie, Eleanor, Merle, Jesse, Ramona and I either finished high school elsewhere or dropped out to work or to marry.
The best is yet to come!

The Grandkids decorate a tree for Grandma Gay

Generally, advertisements on television and in magazines display a happy gathering of a table of six to 10 people surrounding a perfect (unsliced) turkey. I have yet to attend any holiday where the host or hostess carved the turkey right at the table and hand delivered the juicy slices (false advertisement). Yet, even I had to sit down and fan myself when Mama Gay informed me she was expecting 45 people! My old self would have checked into the nearest hotel to avoid the chaos.
Now I decided I would step up to the plate (no pun intended). I related the number of the crowd to Jim Baysinger and invited him to attend. He became quite pale and politely declined. I also related the formidable amount of cooking we would be doing on Wednesday night and he naively asked why we were doing it the night before when Thanksgiving was not until Thursday. Do men truly believe a meal of that magnitude every year magically appears on the table with 10 minutes of preparation?
I can never make it to mealtime without nibbling beforehand. Nibbling, hell, it’s called “grazing”! Julie Baysinger came up with that lovely phrase years ago and it has stuck. TV reports say the average person consumes 5,500 calories on this day. I like to get a good head start on my count. I really do think it would be a grand idea just to wear a pair of maternity pants for the day with an oversized sweater for extra coverage.
I am waiting for a Thanksgiving where our children take over the cooking and Gay and I would only bring a salad and we can sit and watch the Macy’s Day parade in it’s entirety with a glass of wine. I’m trying to visualize Heather and Cole in the kitchen and I almost start laughing out loud, although I was proud of Cole that he took a store-bought cheesecake to his gathering of friends.
Our families are loud when we get together. We do not sit quietly and make polite conversation. It’s a dull roar and it’s nothing to see a tea biscuit flying through the air to the person who asks for one to be passed. Gay even sat a card table up in the laundry room. I commented that it would really suck to be the person stuck eating in there. Gay got a big laugh out of that ‘cuz she told me it was where she puts the pies.
Sunday morning found Gay and I having our coffee, relaxing and chatting. We were talking about Christmas coming and what to buy. Gay had finally decided to downsize her watermelon collection, so I suggested Hobby Lobby and she agreed she loved that idea and Hobby Lobby. That led me to text cousin Janet and say, “Gay and I want you to say Hobby Lobby out loud five times ‘cuz we think it’s fun.”
She replied, “You two need to get a life.” (That always makes me give her a phone call.) Ah, family and Thanksgiving, it goes so well together!
On To Christmas,
Dee Baby