June 24, 2022
My son Erik is the “Rural Rebound Initiative Coordinator” for Otter Tail County. According to an article in last Sunday’s Star Tribune Variety section, “presumably the only person in the United States with that title”.
I know that Erik has traveled to Maine and North Dakota accompanying Ben Winchester, a sociologist with the University of Minnesota Extension, giving presentations titled “Rewriting the Rural Narrative: Speak Softly and Carry Statistics”. Erik has also gone on the road with his “Inner Otter” hand puppet to promote the county with 1,048 lakes. More lakes than any other county in the country. Once he even made a trip to Omaha and Des Moines. A big huge thank you to Star Tribune reporter Rachel Hutton for writing a full two page spread worthy of being laminated for the Osberg family archive.
Then, on Tuesday, I picked up the latest Minnesota Monthly magazine and read another story about Otter Tail County written by Ashlea Halpern and Andrew Parks. Their mission is to promote the great State of Minnesota. In that article I read about Erik’s son Willie, aka “Walleye Willie”, age 12, hosting Ashlea and Andrew during the 2021 Governor’s Fishing Opener which Erik and his staff produced last May in Otter Tail County. Willie and his grandparents Kathy and Lee took the reporters out on a pontoon. You can read the entire story by simply going to your favorite news stand. You may also find it at www.minnevangelist.com
“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with success unexpected in common hours.” Henry David Thoreau
Category : General 