Saturday, September 3, 2022 | Country Acres South • Page 1 PRSRT STD ECR U.S. POSTAGE PAID PERMIT #278 Madelia, MN 522 Sinclair Lewis Ave Sauk Centre MN 56378
SOUTH S O OUTH UTH Saturday, September 3,, 2022
V Vo Volu Volume olume 1, Edition 7
Focusing on Today’s Rural Environment
A goodly heritage Grabaus cherish life on family farm BY DIANE LEUKAM | STAFF WRITER
SPRING VALLEY – Randy and Wendy Grabau farm east of Spring Valley, where generations of Grabaus before them have worked the land. For the Grabaus, the life they share on the farm is, more than anything else, a heritage. When they purchased the farm in the 1980s from Randy’s parents, they even chose to name it after their philosophy: Heritage Farm. As the fifth generation of Grabaus to run the land, both value the farm’s heritage. As people of faith, they have a favorite Bible verse that has always seemed like the truest expression of their lives. “The Lord is my portion and my cup, thou holdest my lot. The lines have fallen
for me in pleasant places;Yea, I have a goodly heritage,” Randy said. “Psalm 16: 5-6. That verse, plus the heritage, gave us the name.” The two sat in their yard swing on a pleasant Sunday afternoon Aug. 21, the 49th anniversary of the day they met. That was in 1973, and Randy was a farm boy who had gone to school in Mankato to become a math teacher. He also belonged to a well-established Christian ministry called The Navigators. Wendy grew up in northern Wisconsin and had moved to Oshkosh where she was attending school. “We were starting a new ministry,” she said. “Our Navigator representative was recruiting for the men’s ministry and Randy was invited to come.” Later, after four years in Chicago, Randy as a teacher and W Wendy working in downtown Chicago in the Sears Tower, they decided it was time to come home. They had been married two years by then. From their perch perc on the swing swi Aug. 21, they could
PHOTOS BY DIANE LEUKAM
Randy and Wendy Grabau sit on their swing Aug. 21 at Heritage Farm in Spring Valley, where the Grabau family has farmed since 1856. The couple named the look over the beautiful place on a hill- farm in appreciation of the contributions side they have called home for so long from their family lineage and of their fanow. Nostalgia glistened in Randy’s vorite verses from scripture.
eyes as he described what the place means to him. “It’s always been home, no matter if I was living in Mankato, Oshkosh, Chicago … this is always home for me,” he said. “Our kids feel the same way; they’re coming home when they come here.” Preserving that family history has been a way of life for the Grabaus. On one of the farm’s traditional red buildings, a large sign depicts the farm’s Grabau lineage: John and Anna 1856-1916; Dan and Emma 1916-1927; Ernest and Selma 1927-1952; Norman and Judy 1952-1989; Randy and Wendy 198920… Ryan, Crystal, Deena, Bretta are listed at the end, Randy and Wendy’s four children. Randy told the story of his great-great-grandparents, John and Anna, coming from West Prussia near Gdansk in what is now Poland and settling on the farm in 1856, when Minnesota was still a territory. He looks around the farm and can see the connections, the history of family, visible in the buildings. “People go to Europe to find out what their great-great-grandparents
were doing and all they see is a graveyard with tombstones,” he said. “Here, we can see what our ancestors did.” The house is a good example of the succession of generations. From the low side of the hill where it rests, it begins with the oldest portion built in the 1800s by John and Anna with a foundation of laid-up limestone. Two generations later, Ernest and Selma made changes. “In 1941, my grandfather tore off the summer kitchen and dug a basement and built the two-story east-west addition,” Randy said. “We added the west end in 1994, so all the generations are recorded in the foundations of this house.” He pointed to the barn down the hill with sections that were built by his great-great-grandfather and, later, his grandfather. A tour of the now-empty dairy barn revealed more of the story. Originally built in the 1800s with timber from clearing the land, some of those hand-hewn timbers can still be seen inside. An addition with a hip roof was built in 1926 by his grandfather, Ernest, and in 1990, Randy remodeled the barn.
Ea generation of the Grabau family is listed on one Each of the farm’s characteristic red buildings.
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COUNTRY: Watch for the next edition of Country Acres on September 17, 2022
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