Community News

Friday, October 2, a group of individual staff members from the Good Samaritan Society-Waukon and Veterans Memorial Hospital in Waukon were able to reach out to five senior citizens living in the local community through the Good Samaritan Society's annual Founder's Day Service Project. The staff members made changes within the homes of those senior citizens to help prevent them from falling, and those interventions ranged from night lights to ramps.
The service project was a new initiative taken on by Good Samaritan Society-Waukon and Veterans Memorial Hospital, and the goal of the project is to keep senior citizens living in their homes longer and prevent them from a costly hospital visit or nursing home stay.

The Allamakee Community Players will be presenting the Pat Cook comedy "Backstage" on the stage in the St. John’s Lutheran Church Fellowship Hall in Waukon.  Performances are Friday and Saturday, October 23 and 24 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, October 25 at 2 p.m. Tickets are available from any cast member or by calling Karla Lubahn at 563-568-4640 or Kris Larson at 563-864-7766.
Everyone who takes to the stage knows that the real drama in a theatre takes place backstage and can create quite a comedy to watch all by itself. This has never been more true than at Theatre Baroque, where the star, one-time matinee idol Burton Cavendish, suddenly dies an hour before the premiere of “Don Juan in Cleveland.”

The Waukon Area Fire Protection District responded to a report of a barn fully engulfed in flames at 641 Eighth Avenue NW on the northwest edge of Waukon shortly after 5 a.m. Friday morning, October 2. Fire Chief Dave Martin reported that four calves were lost in the blaze, which destroyed the building, as evident in the above photo. Lyle Dee, who was living in a portion of the barn at the time of fire, was transported to the University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics in Iowa City for treatment of burns he suffered during the incident. Chief Martin reported that the cause of the fire currently remains under investigation. Firefighters were on the scene of the blaze for approximately four hours Friday morning and returned to the scene on several occasions throughout the weekend to extinguish "hot spots" of smoldering hay and building materials stirred up by breezy weekend conditions. Standard photo by Bob Beach.
 

by Bob Beach

by Brianne Eilers

The first of many free community meals was served September 29, 2014 at First Presbyterian Church in Waukon. One year later, what started with a single conversation that led to an idea, which led to more conversations about free, no-strings attached community meals, has now experienced a full year of success. Throughout the growth of the project, nearly 300 people have now been consistently attending the meals, which continue to be served the last Monday of each month at First Presbyterian Church in Waukon from 5-7 p.m.
While First Presbyterian Church has served as the meal site for the past year, many other area churches and community organizations have contributed to the success of the meals. Karen Carlton, a member of the core group that started the community meals program in Waukon, said that First Presbyterian was chosen for the meal site not because it is a church, but because it is well suited to the purpose.

The Intertribal House of Frybread will open for business at 32 West Main Street in downtown Waukon this Saturday, October 3. Owners John and Turesa Miller got started by operating a small booth at Native American pow-wows for two years before upgrading to a food truck, and now their own restaurant. “Our love for the food we serve brought us to where we are,” they said. “We love the town and the people in this town. They have been so receptive to us.”
The Millers say there are many things that make their business unique, including the decor, their business philosophy and their food that they say is unique to this area. They serve a unique mixture of Native American and American dishes.

With Veterans Day approaching, the Allamakee County Veterans Memorial Committee would like to remind those interested that orders for individual memorial bricks to be placed in the Memorial at the Allamakee County Courthouse are still being taken. This year, those interested in ordering a memorial brick should place their order no later than October 15.
Every effort will be made to have the bricks ordered by that date in place by Veterans Day. If possible, orders received after October 15 will be placed prior to Veterans Day, but most likely will be put in place at a later date.
Order forms are available at the Veterans Affairs Office in Waukon. For questions or assistance with filling out an application, call Maury Gallagher at 563-864-7843 or e-mail mjgallagher@acrec.com, or Carl Christianson at 563-568-4453 or e-mail bj1@rconnect.com.
 

Members of the Waukon Area Fire Protection District held a ceremony during their Monday, September 14 meeting to dedicate the new fire station. Among other items, the ceremony included the reciting of the names of members of the volunteer firefighting crew who have passed away, with the bell in the new station's meeting room  being rung after those names were read. The new station also had a new sign hung on its front exterior this past week (pictured). Waukon artist Steve Oden having created the sign.
 

by Bob Beach