Breaking News

Editorial

Safe Haven Baby Box is product of vision, volunteer effort

Walk past the north side of the Fort Dodge firehouse and you may well spot a kind of hatch or doorway built into the side of the building. That little doorway may be the path to safety and a full happy life for a baby. Inside that doorway is a bassinet in which a desperate parent who feels that they cannot properly care for their baby can place the child. One minute after the door is closed again, an alarm will go off and the firefighters and paramedics will get the baby, beginning a process that will eventually result in that child being adopted by a new, loving family. This ...

Thursday is National Farmer’s Day

Thursday has been designated as National Farmer’s Day. It’s the contemporary event to honor the hard work of America’s farmers and to reflect on their important contribution to not only the success of our nation, but to helping feed the world far beyond America’s borders. The commemoration grew out of an event that began long ago called Old Farmer’s Day. That observance began at a time when many more Americans were directly working in agriculture. The selection of Oct. 12 for National Farmer’s Day is a reflection that by then the annual harvest is done or nearly done. With ...

Keep Iowa’s roads safe during harvest

A nasty crash happened on U.S. Highway 169 in Webster County a week ago when a van hit the back of a grain truck that was turning into a soybean field. It demonstrated graphically why everyone needs to stay alert on the road, and perhaps especially so during harvest season. This is the time of the year when big, slow-moving farm vehicles rumble out onto roadways dominated by faster-paced traffic. That shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who lives in farm country. Even so, all of us should pay special heed to safety considerations as we share the roads with agricultural vehicles. In ...

4-H is about helping youths achieve

National 4-H Week, which began Sunday and concludes Saturday, is a good time to celebrate the enormous contributions 4-H makes to our community and nation. It’s hard to imagine anyone in Iowa who doesn’t know a bit about 4-H, but this week is an appropriate occasion to reflect on the important contribution this organization makes by helping young people develop skills and values that will serve them well for a lifetime. It has been more than a century since 4-H got its start in Iowa in 1901. Today it is the largest youth-development program in the state. About one-quarter of the ...

Region shows how to come together in the face of tragedy

The Algona community - and the wider north central Iowa region - were hit with a stunning tragedy on Sept. 13. The response of that community was equally stunning in a positive, uplifting way. The tragedy, of course, was the line of duty death of Algona Police Officer Kevin Cram, who was shot to death by a suspect he was trying to arrest on a warrant for harassment. A sudden, violent death of a young man is a shock anytime it happens. The fact that the young man was a police officer protecting the rest of us from the worst among us makes it even worse. Everyone struggles to know ...

Soybeans are big business in Iowa

Nobody knows exactly how long humans have cultivated the soybean, but agricultural historians seem quite certain its domestication as a crop in China dates back three millennia. There are actually Chinese records documenting soybean growth as far back as the 11th century. There is some disagreement about who first introduced soybeans into North America, but researchers seem to agree that by the 1760s, soybean seed had reached Georgia. Whatever the origin, few would dispute that in the 21st century soybean cultivation is important to the world as a food source and a great deal more. ...