Five

Jessica Stö[email protected]

For some time, Doug Bengtson of Wood Lake has considered how to honor the writing of the late Wood Lake News publisher Curtis Warnke. Doug had known Curt, and had visited him in his gun and tackle shop in downtown Wood Lake. “He always had a story to tell,” he says. “People asked me to write about him, but I thought, how could I? People knew him better than I did. Kids would visit him at the newspaper and when he had the gun and tackle shop, and hear his stories. So I thought about it for a long time.”

What he settled on was a set of five books containing all the writings from Warnke’s column published in the Wood Lake News over the years. The columns are stored in old volumes at Minnesota’s Machinery Museum in Hanley Falls. Bengtson approached Warnke’s brother and sister first to be sure he had permission to move ahead with the plan. “When I told Butch I wanted to use the proceeds for scholarships for journalism students, he said that’s perfect,” Doug says.

With the permission, Doug then worked with Dave Rupp, who published Bengtson’s other five books of poetry to help with the project. The two worked together for days spending time at the museum using a phone app to scan all of the columns, and sorting through the many years of the newspaper stored there to decide which ones to print.

In the beginning, they printed ten sets of books, but soon realized they would need many more. They added another 75 sets, printing with Lakeland Press who could better handle the volume. Those sets are almost sold out, with just two remaining currently, but the Bengtsons are taking orders for more.

The books have been ordered by people so far with Wood Lake connections, but not only by those who knew Curt themselves. Some of the orders included people who grew up hearing stories about Curt from their parents. “The parents have passed on and the kids had heard the stories or they used to go to Curt’s with their parents,” says Doug. “We had some people start to read and say to me right away – I can’t believe what that guy did in a wheelchair. Nothing stopped him.”

Some of Doug’s favorite finds among the columns written by Warnke over the years were the stories about his fishing trips deep in the woods in Canada.

The columns were written between the years of 1964 and 1997, and give insight into what life was like in the Wood Lake area from the 1930s through the 90s. Curtis B. Warnke was born in 1932 in Wood Lake. In high school, he was a football player with a love of fishing and hunting, and he would say years ago that he believed he could do whatever he set his mind to [quoted in a photography display by David Morano in 2005].At the age of 16, Curt played his last football game, scoring six touch-downs and two extra points. The next day he woke up in extreme pain and would spend the next year and a half in a Twin Cities hospital in an iron lung, having been struck with polio. The illness left Curt paralyzed for life.

Being in a wheelchair never prevented Curt from doing what he loved most – hunting and fishing, often venturing to the most remote fishing waters he could find. In 1957, Curt led a group of friends to Canada for a fishing trip for the first time. He took that same trip over 100 times in his life, venturing as far as 800 miles north to find trophy-size northern pike or “jacks” as the Canadians referred to them. The trips were fodder for many of his columns.

Some of Curt’s favorite hunting trips took place close to home. In a 2004 interview he was quoted saying “Nothing matches the drama of nature that a bow hunter’s blind or stand provides along the Yellow Medicine River.”

At the age of just 24, Curt was elected to state Legislature, staying at the job for five terms until he decided he had accomplished the goals he felt most important. During those years, Curt authored and helped arrange the agreements that made possible municipal nursing homes, the creation of the Upper Sioux Agency State Park, the start of the state college that is now Southwest Minnesota State University and the concept of daycare centers. After leaving Legislature, he stayed active in politics by representing the state party at national conventions in both Atlanta and Chicago.

Besides polio, Curt overcame a number of other challenges. A fire swept through the offices of the Wood Lake News on October 5, 1993, destroying the century-old news office building, the contents a total loss. He restarted the community’s newspaper while overcoming the kind of losses that can never be replaced, including a lifetime collection of antique fishing gear and personal memorabilia. Personal letters from Gov. Ronald Reagan of California, John Kennedy, and Hubert Humphrey, along with a manuscript of his nearly completed book, “In Pursuit of Jack” based on his many hunting trips to northern Canada were destroyed in the flame.

On April 1, 1994, Curt retired from the newspaper business and opened Curt’s Guns & Tackle in Wood Lake, where he would advertise watermelons for sale – a free box of ammo with every purchase in the summer (the watermelon carried a cost the same as the box of free ammo). In his last years of life, he resumed writing a weekly column from 2003-2006 for the Wood Lake newspaper.

The proceeds from the book sets will go towards the Lakeview Dollars for Scholars progam, which the Bengtson’s hope goes towards scholarships for journalism students. Those interested in ordering the books can contact Doug and Sharla Bengtson at [email protected].