Gallatin High School in Bozeman, Mont., was quite a progressive school in 1936. We had classes that few high schools had. We had a shop class that taught us manual skills and a print shop that taught us how newspapers were printed at that time. We had two ex-thespians. One was the head of the History Department and the other […]
By Nancy Jennings Vern Holmquist loves to dance. Never mind that the voice of Our Town’s “The Ol’ Curmudgeon” column turned 96 years young in May. One recent column “Dancing…together” (May 1 edition), proved he could “cut a rug” like no other. How the Silverton resident secured his own newspaper column 13 years ago is quite a story. A very […]
The celebration of the start of the Christmas season in Silverton was a huge success, especially for the kids. They were jumping, shouting, some tugging at their mothers’ arms waiting for the switch to be flipped, promising everything their hearts wished for … Santa’s arrival and the lighting of the city park Christmas tree. Thanks to the fire department folks […]
Well, the time is almost here and we are about to vote for a new president. He or she will decide the direction our country will take. Certainly a big decision. Not a job for the inexperienced. In the last election, we were asked to vote for a man who was smart enough to know the loopholes in our tax […]
Oh, what a night to remember. It was a night New York would be proud to claim and it happened right here in the Wine Cellar. Yes, it was that good – the music of Cole Porter and Hoagy Carmichael, the great and remembered one. Marilyn Keller sang each song as if it belonged to her, no note too high […]
By Vern Holmquist Trying to figure out what is going on in our political world is beyond me. Sometimes it seems we are to chose a candidate who is only slightly better than the other candidate. There is no knight in shining armor waiting for a chance to shatter a few windmills or at least show us the way to […]
By Vern Holmquist I can remember when you wanted to talk to someone for business or pleasure, you just walked up to this sort of oblong box hanging on the wall, gave the crank a whirl and when an operator answered, you asked the operator to put you in touch with whomever you wanted to talk with. And you always […]
By Vern Holmquist Whoah…. Hold on there. I haven’t gone anyplace. I just needed to kick some of the old stuff I have crammed into this small brain of mine, sort of clean it up so that only the good thoughts remain. I think the doctors call it a stroke. The problem is, all those thoughts don’t come back all […]
By Vern Holmquist Wow! As I am writing this, I realize 2016 is almost here and I am still sitting at this infernal machine trying to make sense of what is going on in our world. Our world has gone a little crazy. While I can no longer quote it accurately, I remember something from a Mark Twain Tonight CD. […]
By Vern Holmquist The amazing Lawrence Stone along with his devoted crew Gregg Sheesley, Ron Nelson and Greg Hart have done it again. The 2015 Sidewalk Shindig gave the residents of our beloved Silverton a great day of entertainment. Thanks, guys. I personally had a very special happening. Some of you may remember that last year I wrote about the […]
I love Silverton. It is the best town I have lived in and I have lived in quite a few towns. Silverton is tolerant, friendly, loving and full of great talent, and well run. Oh, well, one can always blame the city council for something, but that goes with the territory. I don’t see an armed revolution on the way, […]
By Vern Holmquist It must have been in 1998 that I drove a friend to Mount Angel from Albany where Velva and I were living at the time. We were helping our friend pick up a car which had been repaired in Mount Angel. It just so happened that Oktoberfest was in full swing when we arrived. Until that day, […]
Vern Holmquist teamed up with managing editor Kristine Thomas for this interview and story. It was during a long conversation with Cyndi Hickman, owner of the Main Street Bistro & Coffee that I discovered how we both have a deep and endearing love for Silverton, good music and great food. I have been so taken by how Cyndi and her […]
By Vern Holmquist I must have been about 15 when I first learned of the great joy of pipe smoking. I had tried cigarettes, but it was the aroma and taste of tobacco smoked in a pipe that really turned me on. There was a pool hall in my home town of Bozeman, Montana that sold fine English pipe tobacco […]
By Vern Holmquist Old age, I don’t recommend it to any one. Oh, we all want to live long lives, but I believe there is a big difference between survival and living. Survival by itself is not that desirable. Living to me is when you can look at a flower and see the beauty in it. That’s what it is […]
By Vern Holmquist I always am happy to hear from my readers. Even if their thinking differs from mine, it means they are thinking, which in the case of politics is somewhat rare. Frankly, I don’t think much about politics either, but once in awhile I sit back to take a good look at what’s happening. It appears that these […]
By Vern Holmquist Sometimes life is like a boomerang, it has a way of coming back to you. I took up wood carving as something to do to fill my idle hands. Carving all those little projects that most carvers start with looked a bit boring, so I tried carving a cane handle in a female form, a subject artists […]
By Vern Holmquist Silverton, thank you, thank you, I had a great week. I had made it a point to go to the Silverton Senior Center every day of the week. Oh, I’m well aware of this beautiful facility – I had delivered Meals on Wheels for years – but having given up my car, I thought it a difficult […]
By Vern Holmquist The next big event is Oct. 4 with the Sidewalk Shindig. It’s a love-of-our-city event. It’s a way to show how proud we are of Silverton and how we know how to have fun in our city. There will be music throughout the historic downtown district, in the stores, on the sidewalks, in the alley ways – […]
By Vern Holmquist Our economy is bothering me, still a lot of unemployed and failing businesses, our President has had a rough time getting projects through our do-nothing Congress. Money is more and more piling up in the pockets of the ultra rich. I’m afraid that if something is not done to redistribute the great wealth of our world we […]
By Vern Holmquist On the inside of The A-H Factor’s latest CD case, I read “Oregon is a place of great beauty and wonderful people, we trust this album reflects that. Thanks for the inspiration.” My recent visit with A-H Factor made me realize these words could not have been spoken more sincerely. The A stands for August, Stefanie August […]
By Vern Holmquist I like to write about all the good things I find in Silverton and Mount Angel. I can’t get around to them all, but I must tell you what I found at Mac’s Place on a recent Saturday night. The entertainment was billed as Twisted Whistle. Never heard of them and the name sort of told me […]
By Vern Holmquist One of these days, yes, one of these days, the good people of Silverton are going to get tired of picking me up off the sidewalk, I know it. It has happened three times now. Once on my Yamaha scooter. It got too fast and heavy, so I got a two-wheeled electric scooter. But my weight and […]
By Vern Holmquist Last First Friday I joined with friends to listen to the music of the A-H Factor band at the Old Stone Coffee House in Mount Angel, a very charming shop serving the tastiest coffee and showing interesting collectibles. Stephanie August and Mike Husser are very professional entertainers who recently left Southern California for an easier life style […]
By Vern Holmquist Baby, it was cold Friday night, but it was Frist Friday and not cold enough to keep people from going downtown to taste, to see, and to listen to the music – and to see Santa Claus light up Silverton’s Christmas tree, a wonderful and hospitable way for our merchants to show us what they offer to […]
