Summer 2011

Cover Story – Monsignor William O’Connell: Good and Faithful Servant

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By Jim Maher

On the south side of Chicago, just a couple of miles from the great Chicago Stockyards, on Friday evenings Billy O’Connell would see his grandmother cross the street to the neighbors. There, she would light the stove and cook supper for them. Labors prohibited to their Orthodox Jewish friends on the Sabbath. For an Irish Catholic boy...

Corey Brost: Coffee Grounds to Fishing Grounds

By Heidi Bell Gease

It’s lunchtime at Common Grounds coffeehouse in Spearfish, the last day of May. And as usual, it’s busy. Owner Corey Brost chats with customers, takes orders, fields phone calls, and delivers a smoked salmon sandwich to my table near the window – but really, he’s only half here. His mind is 2,516 miles away on the cold waters of Bristol Bay, Alaska, where he himself (or one of his crew) caught the delicious sockeye that’s now nestled on a warm...

Learning Curve: Auto Mechanics 101

By James Van Nuys

We were sitting in a nationally franchised coffee shop trying to come up with another idea for a “Learning Curve” article. Faces publishers Beth Palmer and Ann Henrichsen were in a “toldja so” mood because my heart surgery idea hadn’t worked out. I had spoken to a middle-management guy at the hospital, asking if I could help out with an operation—nothing drastic, something fairly routine, like a triple bypass, or even a double.

“I don’t...

Andrew Jones and Jacqueline Egeraat: Home Away from Homes

by Kayla Gahagan

Their home is so deeply tucked away into the Black Hills, it doesn’t have an address. Their friends and the fire department know where it is, and that’s enough.

Andrew Jones and his wife Jacqueline van Egeraat have put down roots in this area for the same reasons many of their coworkers, friends and neighbors have – they fell in love with the scenery, the quiet, the friendliness of the people--and they knew they wanted to stay.

The drive to...

Sarah Riley: Super 8 Sarah

By Chris Pelczarski

Have you ever heard of film? It's this strip of plastic covered with an emulsion of silver halide salts that is sensitive to light. Artists used to use small black boxes sealed light tight, concave shaped glass pieces, and a complicated mathematical system of timing to expose light onto the emulsion that would allow an image to be captured on it. Yes, some of you are laughing, but our youngest readers actually may not know what film is. I've seen a few...

Amy and Art Kirk: Home on the Range

By Judy Love

When the gate of their pen swings open six small black calves warily eye the nearly 20 men and boys who crowd the open area at the end of the barn. Another cowpoke shooes the calves toward them. Two men grab a calf and wrestle it to the ground, laying it on its side. Clad in a heavy jacket and wool cap, one man straddles the animal's neck and firmly grasps its top front leg so that it can't struggle. The other pulls back on the calf's top hind leg while pushing...

Sharon Stevens: Soul Provisions

By Beth Palmer

Growing up on the prairie of western South Dakota, I couldn’t have been more insulated from the various cuisines of other parts of the United States, or the world, for that matter. Like most young girls, I learned my way around the kitchen by watching my mother, a home economics teacher’s daughter, who had an almost magical way of effortlessly delivering three delicious and nutritious meals a day throughout my entire childhood with very little repetition...