Stoughton
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Thursday, September 5, 2019 • Vol. 138, No. 7 • Stoughton, WI • ConnectStoughton.com • $1.25
Stoughton Area School District
First day of school MACKENZIE KRUMME Unified Newspaper Group
Students at Kegonsa Elementary avoided the rain and ran toward the entrance on the first day of s c h o o l , Tu e s d a y, Sept. 3. This year the collective focus at Kegonsa is to advance coherent systems of instruction and assessment, foster social/emotional learning, inspire innovation and promote positive school culture, according to the school’s website.
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A century of serving veterans Otis Sampson Post 59 celebrates 100 years next week SCOTT DE LARUELLE Unified Newspaper Group
Still a young, rosy-faced teenager, Stoughton’s Otis Sampson’s brief life ended in the muddy, shell-pocked battlefields around Verdun, France, in the fall of 1918, during the bloody climax of World War I. More than 100 years later, he remains forever young – frozen in time in his olive drab Army uniform, bearing a confident grin – as he welcomes visitors to “his” American Legion Post in Stoughton. And so it has been for 100 years, as next week, the proud post that bears Sampson’s name plans to
Contact Mackenzie at mackenzie.krumme@ wcinet.com.
Inside More photos from the first day of school
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If You Go What: Stoughton American Legion Post 59 100th anniversary celebration When: 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 14 Where: American Legion Post 59, 803 Page St. Info: Visit post59.us or call 205-9090 celebrate in his honor, and that of the hundreds of servicemen and women of the area who also have served their country. The event is set for 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 14, at the post, 803 Page St., with an honor guard presenting the flags,
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Braylin Klingaman and Ella Knoploh wait for the doors to open on the first day of school at Kegonsa Elementary on Tuesday, Sept. 3. Photo by Mackenzie Krumme
Former mayor inducted into Hall of Fame MACKENZIE KRUMME Unified Newspaper Group
In the basement of the Stoughton Opera House, a picture of the man who helped lead the restoration of the iconic building can now be found hanging on the wall.
On Thursday, Aug. 29, Doug Pfundheller’s family members, including his wife, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, watched as Mayor Tim Swadley read the late Pfundheller’s Pfundheller biography and inducted him into the Stoughton Hall of Fame.
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“The first day he became mayor he went up to see (the opera house) and was appalled by the condition — there were broken windows and bats,” Pfundheller’s daughter Marjie Hanssen said. From that point on he was determined to give life back to the building, she said. Shortly after his term started in 1982, Pfundheller appointed the first
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Photo illustration courtesy of Tim Erickson
Stoughton’s Otis Sampson, 19, was the first area soldier killed in World War I, during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive of 1918. The next year, Stoughton’s American Legion post was named after him. The post celebrates 100 years this month.
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Doug Pfundheller fondly remembered as civic leader