Thursday, September 09, 2010

Fall means back to school, musical performance

Welcome to Minnesota’s perfect season, friends and neighbors. Fall colors are just around the corner. Those of you who love to grow things are harvesting the results of your summer’s hard work. School is beginning. “School” as defined by www.yourdictionary.com is “…any situation, set of circumstances, or experience through which one gains knowledge, training, or discipline…” This one of many definitions of the word would seem to include programs presented by our wonderful Pine River Public Library and the Kitchigami Regional Library System. On Tuesday, September 21st at 6:00PM at The Warehouse in Pine River, Loretta Simonet and Curtis Teague will present just such a “schooling”.

It is a program of traditional songs, period instruments and 1800’s costumes depicting the history of our Minnesota. A history lesson, as it was, presented in such a way as to make our past history come alive in a really entertaining manner.

History, after all, is about all of us. About our pasts. Sometimes, however, it can be presented in such a dry way that the eyes close and the earmuffs formerly used to keep us warm act as insulation against an endless parade of facts and dates. This is way more fun! Since School [note the capital “S”] has begun for our young people, and since many of our teenagers will soon be asked to write about our state of Minnesota, why not bring them to this program? It is a testament to the premise that history lessons can be fun.

As an aside, remember that our library has numerous books on the history of Minnesota as well as use of computers for research. Please call in advance to reserve your computer time. It will make things simpler for you and for your librarians. Your young people will need a library card in order to take books home for research and reading. This is easy. Just come with them to the library and sign them up! We are a public library. There is no fee for a card.

I remain,


Browser, the library cat

PS Free tickets for the Curtis & Loretta performance are available at the Pine River Public Library

Printed in the Pine River Journal 9 September 2010