I added the names of "former" students of these classes. Some kids move into Manning and then move away and never graduate here, so providing those names sometimes helps to spark memories of faces of those kids.

Why do I have these names?
Below are some of the School history book volunteers - the ones who transcribed names and information from various school and other books, news print, etc.

Transcribers: (names from school record books, minute books, country school director's books, microfilm) Nadine Ehlers, Velaine & Wayne Curlile, Lue Baker, Marilyn Hansen, Sue Behrens, Judy Joens, Theda Wiese, Julie Hagedorn, Jean Stadtlander, Carol Hagedorn, Gladys Schmidt, Vic & Donna Schwiesow, Donna Arp, Lois Peters, Jan Lahndorf, Phyllis Opperman, Marge Stribe.
Country School: Russ Stribe, Marge Kusel, Dick Clark, Dorothy Knudson, Merlyn Irlbeck, Robert Hansen of Audubon County, Ray Thielen, Gary Schroeder, Melvin Meier, Laverne Meier, Myron Bogatzke, Donna Schwiesow, Ardith Lage, Dennis & Margaret Backhaus, Dale Ehlers, Helene Heithoff, Marlene Siepker, Delores Kuhn, Lorrine Danner.

Here are some pictures of volunteers I took while they were working/transcribing names and information, or proof reading draft material.

Some of these folks spent hundreds of hours helping with the school history book - can't I get at least a few minutes from those of you who are in the class pictures and can ID some of the faces???

Judy Joens, Vic & Donna Schwiesow - 2007 extracting highlights from school record books.

Sue Behrens, Marilyn Hansen, Judy Joens extracting ALL student names from school record books.

Lois Peters working on the country school student names

Jeff Wanninger, Sally Hodne, Tim Kienast proof reading the school sports records

Lue Baker extracting names & highlights from country school record books

Dorothy Kusel proof reading each and every page of the school history book.

Microfilm reader with printer I purchased to find and print school articles from the Manning Monitor and then later scan and OCR and then make MS Word files.

Box 20x20x20 full of sheets of paper - both sides used for proof reading purposes

2008 Every page of the Manning School history book draft stage.
Put on display for anyone interested in helping look for errors one final time.

When you read school notes about someone in one my tributes who has passed away, that information came from all of the countless hours of using the microfilm machine and then OCRing into text.

All of the volunteers were part of a "labor of love" for their community and have tremendous pride in helping preserve Manning's history.

So once again, PLEASE help with IDs for pictures when I post them - you can spend a few minutes to help!

For decades, I've been working with the Ohde family on their history...first with William F. and then later with Ruth.
The last years, Ruth had been digging out stuff that was stored in hidden areas and not looked at for decades. I tried to keep up with scanning things because Ruth had a good handle on the family history and could generally answer most questions I had like IDs, and then like so often happens, the community is shocked when someone passes away suddenly, like with Ruth.

There are so few people who can help me anymore with old Manning/family history, but I keep plugging forward.
The Ohde family has boxed up the old stuff and now I'm going through everything again. I asked to go through everything again because the early stuff I scanned was hit and miss and I didn't have as good a scanners and software. I'm finding a lot of stuff I had scanned previously but also a lot of things I've never seen before so it is exciting to work on this family history for one last time.

Down below are some interesting items of history and some pictures I need help with IDs, so please help out and e-mail me anyone you can identify.

I was excited to find this first image because it is a part of history that is ingrained into my memories, since it was the strongest winter storm since the 1936 snowstorm that the old timers always told me about.
As I recall, we had 13 inches of snow with sustained 80 mph winds and gusts to 100...a three-day blizzard...it began early January 10 - I was heading to school. Even though there was heavy snow coming down they had not yet called off school, but then I heard over the radio that school was cancelled. I was driving my Volkswagon fastback, and by the time I got back home it was getting difficult to see.
During the day the snow got worse and of all things our sows decided it was time to start farrowing. At the time we were using my uncle Melvin Kusel's hoghouse where he lived on the corner. It started getting dark and the blizzard was at full force and there was no way I could drive back to our farm, so Roger Erickson, who helped us farm at that time, took me home on his snowmobile. I have no idea how he could see where he was going but he got me home safely and then also safely got home in Manning.

Once it got dark the power went out for the rural community but fortunately the power stayed on in Manning so my brother was able to see while helping the sows give birth.

This is what I like about history with these first two images - being able to notice and then compare pictures as to the changes that have occurred. As I stated above, I was excited to scan this first picture which is something from my era, and then when I scanned the 2nd picture I immediately noticed something very interesting...it was the same tree, one image in 1975 and the other image taken circa 1936.

January 1975 blizzard - large conifer on the northwest corner of the Ohde Funeral Home property.

Compare the tree above to the tree below.

William Ohde next to the conifer when it was much smaller.

January 28, 2020 new blue spruce tree.

This tree comparison reminded me about the story Clifford "Bud" Johnson told me how he remembered jumping over a small conifer on the property where Janet (Genzen) Smith now resides.
Bud was born in Manning in 1908 so this tree was huge by the time he told me the story.
You say - what's the big deal about a story of jumping over a tree as a kid...it stands out in my mind because I visited with Bud about Manning's history for many years and he told me lots of amazing little tidbits of Manning history.
One interesting fact about Bud is his middle name is "Manning." When his dad first came to Manning he fell in love with the town so much that he gave his son the middle name.

January 28, 2020 White Pine tree that Bud jumped over as a little kid.
White Pines grow around 1.5 to 2 feet per year.

Bud Johnson 1926 in front of Chris Johnson Shoe Store

Bud next to his home at 703 Third Street.

Bud's wife, Letha

Letha (Boysen) Johnson

Letha Johnson - MHS school teacher

I think it is fitting to start with John Ohde. Many of you may know that John has now retired and his last day working for Manning was at the Manning Rec Center where renovation is going on.

January 23, 2020
This is an unusual scene - John Ohde actually sitting down during work!

January 24, 2020 - gift to John for his 43 years of service to the Manning community.

PLEASE help me with IDs
e-mail Dave Kusel

To make it easier for me - simply copy the names for a picture and paste it into an e-mail. Then fill in the names/corrections and send it to me.

Here are the list of students who were with 1972 but didn't graduate or maybe held back so I also included 1973...sometimes seeing the names will spark a memory when looking at the student pictures.
1972 FORMER members: Kaylyn Betterton, Randy Borkowski, Melissa Eschenbacher, Kaelyn Farrell, Colleen Green, Cheryl Hansen, Kurt Hass, Norman Heithoff, Mary Kay Holst, Peggy Hupp, Michael Joens, Robin Knapp, Jim Kunkel, Sharlene Mathisen, Barbara McKinley, Randal Mohr, Madonna Nepple, David Nissen, Allan Otto, Michael Pearson, Laurel Porsch, David Reinke, Jeff Rinehart, Donna Schwaller, Ann Weiskircher, James Weiss, Douglas Wiese, James Wittrock, Jerome Wuebker, John Zekan

1973 FORMER members: Mark Aiken, Mary Lou Bauer, Debra Espenhover, Steven Espenhover, Robert Fuller, Jeff Grimm, Randy Hargens, Deborah Hass, Colette Himley, Francis Hummer, Deana Hupp, Sharon Irlmeier, Kevin Jahn, Richard Klemme, Susan Kloewer, Carol Knudsen, Jane Moore, Jean Muhlbauer, Jamie Murray, Richard Musfeldt, Eugene Nepple, Cynthia Parkinson, Jennifer Pearson, Sherry Petersen, Bruce Pohlberg, Terry Saunders, Kathleen Shiltz, Arnold Shipps, Terry Shoemaker, Doyle Thompson, Rosemarie Wittrock, Peggy Wuebker

Kindergarten class - MHS 1972

Kindergarten class - MHS 1972

Kindergarten class - MHS 1972

If you have school class pictures like this, please contact me so I can get them to scan and then add to my Manning historical database.

John Ohde's grandfather in the back row 1904

John Ohde's grandfather

1916 Three Mile House Schuetzen Verein

If you have any pictures of the outside of the Three Mile House building - PLEASE e-mail me!!!

Thanks to the wonders of e-mail I'm able to communicate with William G. Ohde who lives out of state to get information and IDs for some of the pictures not identified.
Bill confirmed this is his great-grandfather, Jurgen George Ohde and helped me figure out where the picture was taken.

Jurgen "George" Ohde 1846 - 1919

1898 History book
FIRST DWELLING HOUSE ERECTED IN MANNING.
The house was built where it now stands by John Ferguson in the autumn of 1881.
The property is now owned and occupied by H.G.A. Brunnier.­

Some of you may remember this as the home of Ed & Delores (Ohm) Ramsey.
This picture taken in 1957 gives a better view of what the old Brunnier home looked like.

There is so much history connected to the Ohde/Brunnier family.
Martin Brunnier's son, Henry helped design the Manning water tower and later helped design the Oakland Bay Bridge in San Francisco.
Henry, a 1900 MHS graduate, was a first cousin to Frances (Brunnier) Ohde.

William & Frances (Brunnier) Ohde

When the water tower was first built - picture from the Amanda (Mundt) Puck collection

I have never run across any pictures of the erection of the water tower...
If you have any please e-mail me!!!

1952 Manning Rotary Charter

probably from Carroll, Henry J. Brunnier, William F. Ohde, probably from Carroll

Manning Officers with President Henry Brunnier

In 2017, I scanned the blueprints for the water tower that was erected in 1903.

I made super high resolution scans of the blueprints (1 gigabyte files), touched them up and then the city had some new prints made, which are on display in city hall.
Here are 2 of those prints.

William Franklin Ohde

Ida (Roggendorf) Dethlefs memories
Klean Klose Shop & Crystal Theater

Click to read the history

1996 renovation of First National Bank

As I was digging through one of the boxes of Ohde stuff I ran across a rolled up document. Now in order to scan items like this I have to first lay them out flat and put some extra weight on the lid for several days. That way, when I start scanning, it won't want to roll right back up and fight me, especially with items I have to split-scan.

Once I got it in place on my large format scanner I scanned the top part and was greatly surprised to see what it actually is - an official document for the "Ohde addition" from 1905.
It is getting brittle but still in good shape and not falling apart or cracking, BUT it won't be long before this starts happening and now is the time to get it digitized.

Below you can see the Ohde Addition on the middle right side