From Around the Prairie

By Tracy Sayler

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Prairie Grains is the
official publication of
the Minnesota
Association of
Wheat Growers,
North Dakota Grain Growers Association,
South Dakota Wheat,
Inc., and the
Minnesota Barley
Growers Association

Hymn Lag: Church Equivalency To The 10-ft Chisel Plow

I believe it’s my journalistic duty to bring forth a problem that has not been discussed publically, yet affects thousands in churches across the nation on any given Sunday: Hymn Lag.

This syndrome, which has affected each one of us, usually starts during the pipe organ prelude. You feel an inner anticipation for a quick, two-verse, polka-like ditty, a yearning that becomes more intense with every flip of the hymnal page, but abruptly turns to a sinking feeling as you reach your song destination, page 543: Yes. It’s a five-verser. And this hymn not only scrolls across the whole page, but has a refrain that continues ON THE NEXT PAGE. Your fear of a marathon hymn is confirmed by that little tempo description below the song title which admonishes: (Slowly, with wistful reverence). You double check the bulletin in the faint hope for words of respite: "only verses 1& 3." No. It is not there.

I’ve heard that some preachers may string three to four hymns like that in a row, each with four, five, as many as eight verses. The REALLY mean preachers do this when there’s also communion, a baptism, and a "short congregational meeting" all in the same service, with, for crying out loud, not even an abbreviated sermon.

Sure, you could simply stand there and mouth the words. But then you would feel like a half-hearted hymn-cheater, and Lord knows you need the heaven points. You could be really brash and stop singing altogether, close the hymn book and stage a sit-down protest. But this may only bring ostracism from other church members, and the humiliating consequence of your family’s tuna noodle hotdish going untouched at the next church potluck. So in the end you labor through, methodically, trudging from one verse to the next, like making rounds on a 50-acre field with a 10-foot chisel plow.

End the suffering. Write your church today, and urge a three-verse limit. Hymn Lag is indeed a rural problem, because although city folks may only miss the kickoff, rural people may lose out on one, even two quarters of Vikings football action.

Speaking Of Vikings

Harlon Barnett, No. 42 who plays safety for the Minnesota Vikings, is the son-in-law of Gerald Theus, a Detroit native, who is the assistant regional director for U.S. Wheat Associates’ regional office in Cape Town, South Africa.

Bread Of Life Supermarket

Richie Gerber felt so strongly about a bakery’s appeal to customers that he named the new supermarket he built last year in Plantation, Fla, "Bread of Life." In-store bakery sales of the Bread of Life supermarket are $25,000 weekly. "You usually see customers pick up a loaf of bread, no matter what they’re buying," he said, in a Modern Baking article. "Nothing gets the notion of fresh products across better than bread. Our customers can buy a can of soup anywhere, but they can’t get bread like this anywhere else."

Gerber has the dubious distinction of being cousin to New York City radio shock jock Howard Stern, who mentions the store on-air (and who, NDSU researchers believe, is the genetic link to ergot). Gerber was worried at first that the Stern connection would do him as much harm as good, but so far it hasn’t.

You Won’t See This In The Metro Area

Albert and Delores Olson of Sentinel Butte, N.D., have attracted attention from the New York Times, CBS, the British Broadcasting Corp, and Oprah Winfrey for the gas station that they run on the honor system. Local residents have keys to the pumps, keep track of the gas they take and are trusted to pay their bills. You won’t see that in Fargo or Minneapolis soon.

Too, in the Forum and Star-Tribune, you’ll never find a news item like the following, which was printed in my hometown newspaper, The Hebron (N.D.) Herald:

Thank you -- To whoever left the peach kuchen on my kitchen counter—I dare you to do it again! Sally Vogle

Case of the cereal box mystery grain

True story: Mark and Linnae Enge of Thief River Falls, MN, were having breakfast one morning when they took notice of the three wheat stalks on the front of their cereal box: they looked strange; exotic. Might those heads even be barley, something that would be darned ironic for a cereal billed as Shredded Wheat? They thought about writing the company (the Shredded Wheat cereal line, formerly owned by Nabisco, now under Post) on the matter, but decided to get an agronomist’s opinion first. University of Minnesota wheat breeder Bob Busch was eager for a research challenge on the lighter side.

Judging only by the photo of the grain heads on the cereal box, Busch is sure it’s not barley; the separation between the kernel rows would be more distinct, and the awns would be longer. There would be fuzziness at the base of the heads if the grain in question was rye or triticale, and there’s none. That leaves one conclusion: "wheat of some nature," says Busch, likely heads of a soft wheat variety that are immature. Using immature grain for cereal box modeling would make sense, says Busch, in that the heads will be brighter and shinier, and wouldn’t shatter when it’s being arranged for a photo-shoot.

I guess any which way you put it on the box, grain is grain to the average breakfast cereal consumer. Unless you’re a sharp-eyed farm couple from Thief River Falls, MN.

December 1995