75¢ plus tax12 Pages Plus Supplements

wHEAT: $6.76 MilO: $6.06 CORn: $6.51Tuesday MarketsCourtesy of McDougal-Sager, Snodgrass Grain, inc.

email: squaredeal114@sbcglobal.net

SquARE DEAlRAwlinS COunTy

“A Voice for New Frontiers”

VOL. 20, NO. 42 ATWOOD, KS 67730 THURSDAY, JUNE 28, 2012

Summer Blast!

FREE Day at the Pool • July 3Start the 4th of July celebration early with a Summer Blast at the Atwood Swimming Pool! On Tuesday, July 3, all kidskindergarten through 12th grade will be admitted to the pool free of charge during the pool’s regular hours, from 1 to6 p.m. For any youngster who has not yet dipped a toe into the community’s fabulous new swimming pool, this “freeday” is an invitation to check out the new facility. Photo by Kathy Davis-Vrbas

Horinek deems this year ‘best harvest’By Rosalie Ross

It was the best harvest ac-cording to Bernard J.Horinek, a Rawlins Countyfarmer who celebrated his99th birthday last March.“This was by far the best

wheat crop we’ve had,”Horinek said. “It averaged 68bushels and prices aregood.”He recalled being in the

same fields as a 12-year-oldhelping harvest with a teamand barge.“We had an Acme 12-foot

header that was pushed bysix horses,” Horinek said.“The driver guided theheader with a bar betweenhis legs and used his handsto control the horses.”He remembered some

years that the grasshopperswere so bad that they com-pletely lined the sides of theequipment.Harvest in B.J.’s youth in-

volved the whole RudolphHorinek family, which con-sisted of seven boys and twogirls. The operation wouldtake long, sweat-filleddaysand once in awhilelasted clear into September.Wheat was much taller

than the shorter varieties

grown now, so some laborwent into binding the strawand threshing grain for cat-tle feed.B.J. said their first com-

bine was a little Gleaner thathe pulled with a Interna-tional 1020 tractor as a 16-year-old. He rememberedbuying his first self-pro-

pelled used combine in 1943.“It sure didn’t have air

conditioning,” B.J. said witha laugh. Then he told about order-

ing a personal cab air condi-tioner for tractor driving.“It fit over the farmer’s

shoulders and had a fan thatblew over from the back,” he

said. “It really worked.”One post-harvest week in

1928 stands out in B.J.’smemory. His job was to load three

wagons every day withwheat to sell at the elevator.The money was for a newfamily car.“I scooped about 54 bushels

by hand every day that weekand then drove the horsesabout an hour and a half totown with a load to dump atthe elevator,” he said.He pointed out that he

could go home a bit fasterwhen the wagon was empty,but the grade of the road’shills, the present Highway 25,was much steeper than now.“Sometimes going uphill

you’d have to set the brakeon the wagon and let thehorses rest a little bit,” he re-called.Over the years Horineks

have been hailed out a fewtimes, 1970 being the worst.They once got a wheat cropwiped out by Mosaic disease,but B.J. couldn’t rememberever having a fire.“There were two different

periods when rabbitsswarmed in and ate every-thing,” he said. “Grasshop-

CelebrateJuly 4 at Lake Atwood

By Rosalie Ross

What better way to cele-brate our country’s inde-pendence and the end ofharvest than by spendingthe afternoon and eveningof July 4 at Lake Atwoodwith family and friends?Bring your lawn chairs andjoin the traditional goodtime — relax with food,music and fireworks. Food vendors have some

traditional offerings like rootbeer floats, and some newitems, such as rabbit bratsand homemade galushkas.Vendors can pick their

time from lunch right onthrough the evening. CallLeRoy Luedders at 626-5331to reserve a spot. Teams should sign up to

play sand volleyball by call-ing Jenni Melia at 785-694-8089 or register on Facebookby the July 2 deadline. “We are going to limit our

tournament to eight teamsthis year,” Melia said. “Andwe’re going to start at 9 a.m.”There will be the annual

bike races, horseshoe pitch-ing, 3-on-3 basketball andthe favorite blue barrel ridesfor kiddies. Additionalgames are being planned forolder kids.See the ad on page 10 for

the schedule of events.Stop by the shelter box

display. It is a Rotary Clubemergency shelter that istransportable to disasterareas worldwide.Part of Atwood’s July 4

tradition is the patrioticpause about 7:30 p.m., tosalute as the Boy Scoutsraise the flag after it hasbeen on parade. Everyone isencouraged to honor theUSA, as the national anthemis sung and the Pledge of Al-

Councilhearspool report

By Rosalie Ross

City pool manager JenniMelia reported to the AtwoodCity Council during their reg-ular meeting June 21.“Our average attendance

so far this year is up fromlast year,” Melia said. The average is 68 swim-

mers per day. There are 50season passes sold this year,compared to 44 last year. Sofar, nine swimming partieshave been booked.The pool will be closed

after the swim meet July 7.“Atwood will be hosting a

qualifying meet for theleague championship swimmeet,” Tim Colgan said.“There will be a bunch ofteams here and it will takemost of the day.”There will be a free swim

County volunteers respond to blazeBy Mary Holle

By 10 a.m., Tuesday morn-ing, local temperatures werewell on the way to 100-plus. Ablustery south wind blew hotair across the area. Add a car with mechanical

problems igniting alongHighway 36. The results? Awildfire that burned out ofcontrol most of the afternoonand into the evening.The fire started in the

north ditch 6 miles west ofOberlin. Decatur County dispatch

reported receiving the call at12:50 p.m. At 9:10 p.m., crewshad contained the majorityof the blaze, but were stillfighting hot spots flaring upamong the ashes.

Photo by Kathy Davis-Vrbas

The burned-out shell of the car that caught fire rests on the shoulder of Highway 36 withthe out-of-control wildfire raging to the north and east.

Courtesy photo

B.J. Horinek, center, joins his son, Bernard, left, and grand-son, Deone, as they conclude their harvest. B.J., 99, con-tinues to enjoy participating.

See ‘Horinek,” Page 9

See ‘Blaze,’ Page 9

Early copy,

please!

The Square Dealwill be printing a dayearly next week, dueto the 4th of July holi-day. The staff mustreceive all copy forthe July 5 edition bynoon, Monday, July 2and the paper will beprinted and mailedTuesday, July 3.

See ‘Celebration,’ Page 9

RCHC to applyfor tax credit

By Rosalie Ross

The Rawlins CountyHealth Center board votedto proceed with theKansas tax credit applica-tion as presented by JulieBritton during their June25 meeting.Britton explained in

the application that thegrant would be used toprovide an outpatient sur-gical procedure room. Itwould benefit the commu-nity by encouraging itsuse by visiting ophthal-mologists, orthopods, den-tal surgeons and others.The room would be usedfor minor surgeries anddiagnostic procedures likecolonoscopies.Should the RCHC appli-

cation be successful, theroom would be completedin 2014.The hospital’s old sur-

gery is obsolete and wouldrequire a bigger dollar in-vestment to bring it up tocode than the estimated

$661,700 cost for the newroom and equipment.Ari Harvey told the

board she was pleasedwith the progress beingmade by the capital cam-paign, saying that harvesthadn’t slowed the momen-tum as she expected.Pledges one time

through five years are av-eraging $5,259.84.“We are going to make

our big splash of reveal-ing figures during the pa-rade at the county fair,”Harvey said.The board voted to pay

the four construction ap-plications for paymentfrom BD ConstructionCo., as their work is al-most completed.Tara Bowles of the

human resources depart-ment, brought a compari-son review of twoinsurance policies to theboard.The coverage was for

accident and cancer in-See ‘Coverage,’ Page 9

See ‘Pool report,’ Page 9

News at a

Glance