Dec. 21, 1985: Traditions then meant more work, but also more joy

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on December 21, 1985.

Traditions then meant more work, but also more joy

By Elizabeth Cloyd

Staff writer

PORTER ー Resting before a blazing fire in a cabin nestled in the snow-covered Indiana Dunes seems like a cozy way to celebrate Christmas.

Melissa Brooks portrays the eldest girl in the house during a Swedish celebration of St. Lucia’s Day. As the eldest girl, she serves coffee and rolls to Paul and Connie White. St. Lucia’s Day, Dec. 13, opened the Christmas season for the early Swedish settlers.

Maybe it wouldn’t seem so comfy if you had to chop the wood for the blazing fire, slaughter a duck or goose for Christmas dinner and settle down to finally relax in a home you built yourself.

For the early Swedish and French settlers in the Dunes area, Christmas was a long season that required much preparation, but resulted in much joy.

Swedish settlers, like Anders Chellberg, celebrated the holidays from Dec. 13 to Jan. 13. Joseph Bailly, and other French settlers in the area, celebrated from Christmas Eve through Jan. 6.

Both groups of settlers enjoyed a holiday season brimming with food, merriment and song, according to Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore ranger Jude Rakowski.

Rakowski is coordinating a look at Christmas in the mid-1800s that will begin at 1 p.m. today at the Bailly Homestead and Chellberg Farm.

Visitors will be able to tour the homestead and farm and take a peek at what Christmas was like in the 18th century, the times when the pioneers of Porter County settled here. Call 926-7561 to make sure space is available.

The program is just one event scheduled during the winter months to encourage people to visit and use the park, Rakowski said.

“Yesteryear’s Traditions'' programs began at the farm and homestead in 1981. Rakowski said park rangers and volunteers sought information about the Christmas traditions and events families like the Chellbergs and Baillys may have enjoyed during the holidays.

Authentic Swedish wreaths and a tree will decorate the Chellberg farm and straw sheaves and sorghum branches will decorate the trees outside. At Bailly, trees and carolers will inspire Christmas spirit.

Recreating a pioneer Christmas isn’t easy.

Rangers and volunteers had the information about what everyday life was like for the early settlers, but had to dig around to find out what a typical holiday might be like, Rakowski said.

Much of the information came from northwest Indiana residents who were from Sweden or France, or were descendents of persons from those countries.

“It’s a rich area as far as customs go,” Rakowski said. “There are not as many French people in the area but a lot of people who live here are right from Sweden.”

Many Swedish residents are recruited to serve as guides for the program, to share their knowledge as well as their accents. Rakowski said she tries to find former Sweden residents because their accents add charm and realism to the presentations, but it isn’t always possible to find transplanted Swedes.

One year Rakowski served as “Jude Johannsen” for the day, complete with a practiced Swedish accident.

Rakowski said to learn about Swedish customs, she and other rangers conducted interviews with area residents and leafed through books. Visits to area museums also provided insight into the holidays. Finding out more about how the Baillys welcomed the holidays was another matter. Students enrolled in French classes at Chesterton High School researched customs and will serve as guides during the program. “Yesteryear’s Traditions'' visitors will be greeted by guides in authentic Swedish and French costumes. The guides will divide visitors into two groups, one that will visit Bailly first, the other viewing Christmas at Chellberg first.

The Christmas season at the Chellberg Farm, and other Swedish homesteads, began on St. Lucia’s Day, Dec. 13. On that morning, the eldest girl in the home donned a crown with five candles and beckoned her family to come down for a breakfast she prepared, Rakowski said.

Anders and Johanna Chellberg and their family probably enjoyed a light breakfast of rolls and coffee, and hung wreaths of lingonberries or whortleberries on their doors and walls, according to the ranger.

On Christmas Eve the Chellbergs probably bathed and washed their hair in large wooden or metal tubs. Christmas crowns of straw were hung on the walls of the Chellberg Farm, adn straw was strewn on the clean floor to represent the straw in the manager.

Straw will also represent the manager and wreaths will be hung today, just as they were when the Chellbwehs celebrated Christmas in their home in the 1880s.

A half-moon of evergreens was spread outside the house door, so visitors could wipe their feet before entering. The Christmas tree was hidden from the children as parents decorated it with white candles, flags, woven hearts, fruits and nuts. When the tree was decorated, the Jul-bock, or goat, rang a bell, beckoning the children into the room.

Even the animals celebrated the holiday. Rakowski said wheat and sorghum sheaves were tied with a red ribbon to feed the birds, and the farm animals were given a special Christmas Eve meal.

A bowl of porridge was set in the barn for the Jultomten, friendly gnome that supposedly lived under the barn floor.

Julotta, a church service, opened Christmas Day for the Swedes. Families traveled to church in sleighs and carried candles during the service.

Dec. 28 was St. Stephen's Day, a day of feasting and visiting. Families strolled from home, singing carols at each open door.

The Christmas season ended between Jan. 6 and 13, when the Christmas tree candles were lit for the last time.

When Joseph Bailly and his family established their homestead in Westchester Township in 1822, they probably began their first Christmas there on Dec. 24 with a yule log-burning party. Each family saved part of each year’s yule log for the following year’s Christmas.

A bundle of wheat and sorghum tied to a tree provides a Christmas treat for the birds at Chellberg farm. Trying the bundles to trees during the holidays is a Swedish custom observed by early settlers in the area.

Christmas was a solemn, religious day when the settlers celebrated Christ’s birth with a high mass.

The settlers’ celebrated New Year’s Eve with caroling and a feast. During the festivities, families brought out food, clothing and money for the poor, which masqueraded carolers collected on carts.

New Year’s Day was also filled with caroling and skits, and families exchanged gifts. The French settlers visited their neighbors on the first day of the year, and the gentlemen of each family lined up in order of age to kiss the hostess on the cheek.

The Feasts of Kings, a formal ball, ended the Christmas festivities Jan. 6.

The King of the ball was chosen by pure coincidence.

The oldest woman in the village baked a cake with four beans hidden in it. The first unmarried man to find a bean in his slice of cake was chosen king, and reigned over the festivities for the evening.

Several of these traditions will be re-enacting during the Bailly-Chellberg Christmas. Children will be invited to decorate the tree at the Chellberg Farm, Rakowski said, and carolers will fill the area with music at both locations.

A woman will sing French Christmas carols at Bailly, and Swedish music will be provided at Chellberg. A wood-burning water heater to keep animals warm will also be stoked up and operating at Chellberg.

Volunteers and park rangers will explain the Swedish and French holiday customs and will answer questions about those early Porter County Christmas celebrations and about the first residents.

Nov. 23, 1985: Hobart student barred because of AIDS

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 23, 1985.

Hobart student barred because of AIDS

HOBART (AP) ー A Hobart Schools student diagnosed as having AIDS has been barred from attending class and is completing assignments at home, Superintendent Richard Abel said Friday.

Abel would not name the male high school student with acquired immune deficiency syndrome, but said the student has been ill and out of school since Oct. 30.

The student is a hemophiliac, as is 13-year-old Ryan White of Kokomo, who contracted AIDS through a blood transfusion. Ryan was barred from attending classes in the Western Hills schools system and has been taking instruction at home via a telephone hookup.

The Hobart school board adopted a policy Thursday night which also barrs students with AIDS from attending school.

Under the policy, Abel said, any student with AIDS “will be offered a continuation of their education only through a homebound teaching program.”

Abel said he believes the policy to be one of the first in the country.

“Now that the policy is official and the administration is charged with the responsibility of carrying it out, our next move will be to solicit volunteers from the teaching staff to go to the home and do what I will call the normal home-bound teaching assignment,” said Abel.

Abel, however, said he did not anticipate any teachers volunteering because of all the unknowns about AIDS. If there are no volunteers, he will go to the next step, he said.

Since the policy was adopted only Thursday, he has not yet asked for volunteers, said Abel, and the student has been completing assignments at home since he was diagnosed as having AIDS on Oct. 30.

“The student is not being denied an education,” said Abel. “It is continuing, but in a different form.”

Abel said the student’s parents have been cooperative and school staff members also have been supportive.

He also said he has received no negative reaction from other parents ー “just concern. There has been no panic,  none at all.”

Ryan White was discharged from Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis two weeks ago after being hospitalized more than six weeks with a respiratory problem.

Ryan’s mother, Jeanne White, is fighting the decision by school officials to keep her son out of class.

The Indiana Department of Education is expected to announce a decision Wednesday on whether Ryan, a seventh-grader, will be allowed to return to his school.

Nov. 15, 1985: Kouts church to celebrate 100th anniversary

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 15, 1985.

Kouts church to celebrate 100th anniversary

by Carolyn Matthews

Staff writer

KOUTS ー A Founder’s Day will be observed Sunday when the Kouts Christian Church celebrates its 100th anniversary.

A Founders’ Day coffee hour with a slide presentation will be held at 9 a.m. Sunday followed by a special worship service at 10 a.m. Members will be dressed in the 1885-era clothing and a Founders’ Day dinner will follow.

Dr. Kingery Clingenpeel, who has served as pastor for the past 11 years, said the Christian Church finds its heritage as the “melting pot” of many other denominations.

A significant portion of the membership claims little or no church background, he said. Baptists, Catholics, independent Christians, Mennonites, Disciples of Christ, Nazarenes, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, and Presbyterians worship at his church.

According to church history, in the spring of 1885 the Lyman Adkins family and a night marshal, turned evangelist, helped to start the church.

Adkins was the town physician and druggist. Ellis B. Cross was a young night marshal in the mining town of Leadville, Colo. during the years of the lawless West.

Since there were no ministers in Leadville when Cross served as marshal, it was his duty to notify the next of kin when someone was killed in a gunfight. It was also his responsibility to arrange and conduct funeral services. As a result of this experience Scott decided he wanted to become a minister.

A native of Lowell, Scott, 20 years old, returned to Indiana where he attended Garrett Biblical Institute and Valparaiso University. According to VU records he was enrolled in the department of elocution and orator.

It was during Scott’s student days that he teamed with Adkins to launch the Kouts Church. The population of Kouts at that time was 215.

In June of 1885 the first baptismal services for what was to become the Christian Church was held in the waters of the Kankakee River.

The first church was constructed and dedicated in 1887 on land donated by Mrs. Rose Yoder.

In May of 1917 a tornado hit Kouts and the little church, along with the Kouts Catholic church, was destroyed.

Members salvaged what materials they could and built a new building, completed in March of 1919.

A few years later a belfry was added and the bell from the original 1887 frame church was installed. The same bell is mounted in a tower in front of the present church on Poland Street.

The Rev. John Whitt served as pastor for the next nine years until his death in the summer of 1928. Following Whitt’s death, the Christian Church suffered a period of decline and was forced to close its doors for 14 years.

The building was rented to the Kouts School for graduation services in 1936. The Reformed Mennonite congregation also rented the church for portions of the next several years.

In 1943, with less than $250 in the treasury, the Christian Church reopened its doors. Arthur Brewer was paid $5 per week for his sermons.

A decade later, Mrs. Loey Unruh willed the current parsonage to the church.

A new church was completed and dedicated in April of 1971.

Nov. 14, 1985: Christmas shopping blues Popular toys disappearing, causing headaches for parents

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 14, 1985.

Christmas shopping blues

Popular toys disappearing, causing headaches for parents

by Elizabeth Cloyd

Staff writer

It may already be too late to make your children’s Christmas wishes come true.

The toys popping up on many kids’ Christmas lists have already disappeared from many stores.

Parents hoping to beat the crowds and meet gift requirements are buying out local supplies of the Optimus Prime Transformer, the She-Ra doll and Pound Puppies.

Last year’s biggest seller, the Cabbage Patch Kid, is not enjoying its former popularity and still sits on area store shelves while the Optimus Prime and She-Ra are sold-out and back-ordered in stores all over the county.

“We don’t have either of them at the present,” Rose Schwinkendorf of the Valparaiso K-Mart store said. “It’s not a matter of running out, it’s a matter of not getting the toys in.”

She-Ra is the animated star of the She-Ra: Princess of Power show and Optimus Prime, a cartoon character on the Transformers, is the newest of a line of toys that change from everyday forms of transportation to destructive robot-like fighters.

Other early toy favorites appear to be the Wuzzles, animated crew of creatures that are half one animal, and half another (for example, half-lion, half-bumblebee.) The Hug-A-Bunch dolls, stuffed dolls holding stuffed animals, and G.I. Joe and Masters of The Universe (featuring She-Ra’s brother He-Man) are also selling briskly at local stores.

The Pound Puppies are stuffed dogs that can be adopted, much like the Cabbage Patch Kids, and carried home in little dog carriers.

The similarities between the toys do not end with the adoption papers.

“The Pound Puppies are what the Cabbage Patch Kid was two years ago,” according to Yvonne Vanover of the 3-D toy department. “We had a shelf-full and they sold out. We are running a sale on them now, but they’re back-ordered and not in stock.”

Pound Puppies also are selling briskly at Harvey’s in Valparaiso.

“We just can’t get enough of them,” Maryanne Alyea said. “People are calling and coming in like crazy looking for them.”

Pound Puppies, however, seem to replenish as soon as they are sold out. Stores that are sold out of the stuffed dogs are expecting new shipments soon.

Although parents are also looking for She-Ra and Optimus Prime, they are not having much luck. Only one local store contacted had She-Ra dolls, and all reported that Optimus Prime and the Princess of Power are on order.

None of the stores knew when, or if, the toy orders would be in before Christmas.

Part of the early Christmas rush is because many parents were burned by Cabbage Patch fever last year and wanted to make sure they would get the toys their children want, Alyea of Harvey’s said.

Many parents are also putting gifts on layaway and emptying store shelves early. Vanover, of 3-D, said the store’s layaway room is filled to capacity and that stock would have to be moved to provide space for more layaway merchandise.

Regardless of the reasons, some parents may have to break the bad news to their kids that Santa Claus might not deliver Optimus Prime or She-Ra under the Christmas tree this year.

The She-Ra doll and her brother He-Man are vanishing in the crush of early Christmas shoppers.

My Little Pony is also enjoying popularity again this year.

Area parents who are hunting for Rainbow Brites will have a little more luck. The colorful doll and her furry relatives still populate several stores locally, but they are selling quickly, too.

Nov. 6, 1985: Lewis' painting larger than life

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 6, 1985.

Lewis’ painting larger than life

Lake of the Four Seasons artist Eleanor Lewis’s work is being featured at The Art Barn Gallery, County Road 400E.

Lewis’s paintings include realistic paintings of people and scenes, abstracts, and impressionistic works.

Her Art Barn show features many of her award-winning paintings.

The 216-painting show also focuses on some of Lewis’s larger works.

Over half of the paintings are 3-by-7-feet or 4-by-6-feet. Many of the people in the paintings are life-size and even larger than life.

“I like to bring to people’s attention things they might ordinarily just give a glance,” Lewis said.

So her show includes larger-than-life abstractions of Indian corn and brightly-colored pasteboard boxes, among other things.

It also includes several realistic paintings of people, such as “x and y,” a painting of two of the children at her church.

“An artist is always on the lookout for things of beauty. I saw these children at my church one Sunday, and decided I wanted to paint them.

“But I didn’t want to do a studio portrait. I really like outdoor color, and I wanted the challenge of painting the sunlight, and the way the lights reflected off the children.”

Lewis has won a number of awards. Her work has been featured in one-person shows throughout the state of Indiana, including the Matrix Gallery at Point Library, Indiana University, and the Hoosier Salon of Indianapolis.

Locally, she has been featured in one-person shows at the Chesterton Art League, Porter County Arts League, Porter County Arts Commission, the Northern Indiana Arts Association, and at the gallery at Methodist Hospital.

Her education includes training at the Fort Wayne Art Institute, and a doctorate from Indiana University.

She teaches art and is head of the art department at Merrillville High School, and she has taught children and college students as well.

Lewis’s interest in art started when she was a child. “My father was interested in drawing, and I learned it from him. I guess my interest in art started in my father’s lap.”

That’s the best way for young people to gain a knowledge and appreciation of art, artist and teacher, Lewis said.

“I really think it starts at home. I love to see parents taking their children to art fairs, or galleries, or art demonstrations. The children love it.”

一 by Pat Randle

Painter Eleanor Lewis checks out the painting in her shoe at The Art Barn. Lewis, who lives in Lakes of the Four Seasons, has won numerous awards for her paintings, including winning best of show at the 1981 Porter County Art Fair. The show runs through Nov. 18. (V-M: Rick Taylor)

Oct. 31, 1985: Halloween fright 1985 - Dujmoviches transform garage into custom haunted house

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on October 31, 1985.

Halloween fright 1985

Dujmoviches transform garage into custom haunted house

By Elizabeth Cloyd

Staff writer

The garage at 732 Governor looks a lot like any other garage in South Haven.

Once inside, however, the differences are frighteningly apparent.

Inside the garage is the fifth haunted house members of the Dujmovich family have constructed. Randy, John and Scott Dujmovich and cousin Tony Dujmovich have made creating haunted houses an annual family affair.

This year’s edition features Frankenstein’s laboratory, Dracula in his coffin, an automated witch stirring a cauldron and a scene from The Exorcist, complete with Regan screeching and spinning her head around.

According to its creators, the haunted house is guaranteed to spook.

Randy, Tony and John Dujmovich made their first haunted house when they were in the sixth grade. The following year they also made a haunted house, but they took a break from scaring people until three years ago, when the haunted house became an annual family event.

To make the most of the limited garage space, the Dujmovich clan and their friends build an intricate maze with plywood, rails and cardboard to baffle visitors.

Constructing the haunted house took about a month.

The steps, turns and twists of the haunted house make visitors lose their sense of direction, making them more susceptible to the surprises the haunted house offers.

The Dujmoviches, and friends Jim Stewart, Brett Homann, Floyd Vestal and Jay Walker planned, built and staff the house. Members of the group take turns performing the different jobs in the house, from serving as haunted house, from serving as haunted house tour guides to donning masks and scaring people from under bridges and from behind windows in the house.

Randy Dujmovich said the group gets a lot of inspiration from horror movies, although an idea for the haunted house can strike at any time even while he’s at class at Purdue North Central.

“We’ll see something in a movie and try to adapt it to work in the haunted house,” he said. 

“Sometimes we’ll be sitting there in school and get an idea and just start drawing.”

Although they charge admission for entry to the haunted house (50 cents for those 12 and under, 75 cents for those 12 and over) the haunted house has never made any money.

“We usually end up $50 or $75 in the hole,” Tony Dujmovich admitted. He said he and his crew continued to create the haunted houses because of popular demand.

“The public seems to like a lot and people were asking about it, so we did it again,” Ton said. “We just do it for fun.”

Randy Dujmovich could not predict how long they would continue to produce the haunted houses, but said they would probably continue.

“We’ll probably still be doing this when we’re 40.”

Brett Homann comes to life as Frankenstein at the Dujmovich Haunted House.

A ghoulish Dracula peers out from his coffin at visitors to the Dujmovich Haunted House in South Haven. Jim Stewart, in monster garb, is one of eight South Haven residents who staff the annual homemade haunted house.

An automated version of Regan, the waif possessed by the devil in The Exorcist, spins her head and screeches while Tony Dujmovich, in the werewolf mask, appears from behind her bed.

(V-M: Kathy Woodward)

Oct. 24, 1985: Friends harvest ailing farmer’s crop

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on October 24, 1985.

Friends harvest ailing farmer’s crop

by Charles Knebl

Staff Writer

PLEASANT TWP. 一 Kouts-area farmer Joe Jarnecke had open-heart surgery Saturday to replace a valve.

Wednesday, his friends got together and harvested Jarnecke’s 55 acres of soybeans from fields just off County Road 700S.

“There’s none of us that is indestructible,” said Jarnecke, 59, who began working the 150-acre farm at 753 S. CR 300 E with his father in 1936.

Neighbors Tom Heiniger, Vic Martin, Keith King and Craig Birky spent most of harvesting Jarnecke’s beans. And farmers Ed Freyenberger, Ed Whitmore and Harley Birky (Craig’s father) loaded beans into storage bins and helped out around the farm.

“Definitely it (their help) takes some pressure off. I always figured you never had your crop until you had it in the bin,” said Jarnecke.

“I’m really thankful they can take the time to help me.”

The Kouts-area farmers were helping Jarnecke because he needed help and his friends were there to give it, said Heiniger, who farms about 232 acres of his own. He’s been handling chores for both farms for about a week.

“It’s just a matter of helping a fella that needs help. It’s tough times (for farmers) and we’re doing the best we can,”said Heiniger.

Heiniger’s father, Walter, also was helping in the fields Wednesday; he came from Tempe, Ariz. two weeks ago to visit.

“We thought we’d get this (group) together and get this crop out and it’d give Joe a little lift,” said Walter, who is Jarnecke’s brother-in-law. Walter’s wife, Mary, is Jarnecke’s sister.

Jarnecke said it was important to get his beans “in as soon as possible because you never know the variables.” a heavy rain or an early snow could damage the beans.

Another unknown for Jarnecke was the condition of his heart.

“What started out as the flu turned out being the heart,” he said.

On Oct. 10 Jarnecke suffered a pain in his chest that “felt like somebody grabbed me.” and although fluids had built up in his lungs that kept him coughing most of the night, Jarnecke thought the ailments were flu symptoms.

But by Oct. 13 he was having trouble breathing and went to a local medical clinic. A couple days later he went to Porter Memorial Hospital’s emergency room because his lungs were filled with fluids.

Doctors discovered his heart was not functioning properly.

“They thought I probably had a bad valve,” he said.

The operation was performed at St. Catherine’s Hospital in East Chicago. Surgeons inserted a port valve to replace Jarnecke’s dysfunctioning valve.

Jarnecke will be recovering for about five weeks. And he’ll be doing it with the knowledge that his neighbors care about him.

“I appreciate their help,” he said.

Joe Jarnecke’s soybean field was harvested by (from left) Vic Martin, Tom Heinger, Keith King and Craig Birky. Lined up side-by-side the combines cover 72 feet of field. One farmer said the machines’ combined worth is about $180,000.

(V-M: Kathy Woodward)