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6 – FARM MARKET NEWS JULY 21, 2008<br />
Country Coffee Shops<br />
Kerry Benson and Richard Skalsky, owners and operators of B&S Diner in Dunnell,<br />
serve up pans of piping hot caramel rolls to their customers on a daily basis.<br />
Dunnell’s B & S Diner:<br />
Good for a cup of coffee,<br />
jumbo shrimp supper<br />
By Justin R. Lessman<br />
The B&S Diner in Dunnell is a hometown<br />
favorite with a regional following.<br />
Located right on Main Street in Dunnell — a<br />
small but proud farming community just east<br />
of Jackson — the diner draws everyone from<br />
9 a.m. regulars for coffee and freshly baked<br />
caramel rolls to Friday night out-of-towners for<br />
occasional prime rib and jumbo shrimp supper<br />
specials.<br />
Owners and operators Kerry Benson and<br />
Richard Skalsky say they enjoy catering to both<br />
crowds and everyone in between.<br />
“The folks here, they support their diner,”<br />
Benson, a former employee of the diner when it<br />
was called Mary’s Café, said. “They want a diner<br />
here and they show us that.”<br />
Skalsky, a Jackson native who has spent time<br />
in Faribault and Oklahoma City, agreed, adding<br />
that word is spreading.<br />
“Our customer base is certainly expanding,”<br />
he said. “We have a lot of people drive quite a<br />
ways to get here for a meal or cup of coffee and<br />
roll and we are grateful for that.”<br />
But it was the hometown atmosphere<br />
and welcoming spirit of the locals that drew<br />
Benson and Skalsky to the Dunnell diner. That<br />
atmosphere and spirit are reflected on the walls<br />
of the B&S diner in historical photographs of the<br />
streets of Dunnell and in the faces of the folks<br />
who come in for a bite and get greeted by name.<br />
“It’s a nice, hometown, friendly atmosphere,”<br />
Skalsky said. “It’s like everybody knows everybody<br />
and we all just get along real well.”<br />
Farm Market News<br />
Available at Dunnell’s B&S<br />
Diner, Dunnell, MN, and<br />
95 other coffee shops<br />
across the area.<br />
Doors open at 6 a.m. Monday through<br />
Saturday and there’s usually folks waiting at the<br />
door, Benson said.<br />
“There’s the early crowd and then the 9 a.m.<br />
crowd,” she said.<br />
The diner’s signature breakfast dishes are two<br />
types of hashbrown omelets — one with ham<br />
and mushrooms, the other with taco fixings,<br />
dubbed a “Mexican hashbrown omelet.”<br />
“We really introduced the hashbrown omelet<br />
here,” Skalsky said, adding it quickly became a<br />
breakfast-time favorite.<br />
“You lay hashbrowns down on the griddle,<br />
scramble eggs and put over it and then add the<br />
toppings,” Benson said. “You make it nice and<br />
crispy and fold it all in. Everything’s inside the<br />
hashbrowns.”<br />
While breakfast is the meal of the day for many<br />
at the B&S Diner, Benson and Skalsky say they<br />
draw their largest crowds at lunch time. Diner<br />
hours are 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through<br />
Saturday and 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday — except<br />
those nights when Benson and Skalsky stay open<br />
late for supper specials — though it’s nothing<br />
to leave the diner in the hands of the local card<br />
players if the game runs long, Benson said.<br />
“Every Tuesday, there’s a card club and the<br />
ladies play 500,” she said. “If they’re still going<br />
after we finish up, they just leave the money in<br />
the drawer and lock up after themselves. Unless<br />
I get pulled into the game too.”<br />
“I’ve even sat in once or twice,” Skalsky said.<br />
“That’s the whole meaning of this. It’s an honest,<br />
friendly atmosphere and we love that.”<br />
PickupCopyCoffeeMug<br />
Interns<br />
Continued from page 5<br />
nesting surveys for wood ducks<br />
and mallards, in which they found<br />
good numbers of both species.<br />
Other work the interns have<br />
been or will be doing this summer<br />
include: updating watershed<br />
maps, helping with goose banding<br />
with the DNR, taking water<br />
samples for water quality, testing<br />
on a weekly basis the waters<br />
of Jack Creek, Okabena Creek<br />
and the outlet to Heron Lake,<br />
submitting bi-monthly activity<br />
reports, compiling a detailed<br />
report of the activities and projects<br />
they have completed along with a<br />
photographic record of each and<br />
compiling a daily journal of all<br />
their work activities.<br />
Additionally, they have<br />
conducted sago pondweed<br />
studies on Heron and Duck lakes,<br />
conducted vegetative transects<br />
with the Heron Lake and DNR<br />
staff and have been contacting<br />
landowners regarding their best<br />
management practices via site<br />
inspections of their conservation<br />
projects for compliance and<br />
they have both been installing<br />
promotional signs at those same<br />
locales.<br />
The two interns are also<br />
required to provide articles to the<br />
district’s newsletter periodically,<br />
answer the telephone and are<br />
to provide an overview of their<br />
summer activities evaluating<br />
themselves and the program<br />
as well as the people they have<br />
worked in partnership with to the<br />
August board meeting of both the<br />
Heron Lake Watershed District<br />
and the North Heron Lake Game<br />
Producers Association.<br />
“We also helped the Natural<br />
Resources Conservation Service<br />
plant 7,000 trees on a farm north<br />
of Worthington; that was a big<br />
project,” Johnson said. “And we<br />
Interns<br />
Continued on page 7<br />
AUCTION<br />
CALENDAR<br />
TUESDAY, July 22, 9 a.m., Comfrey, MN. Farmer consignment<br />
equipment auction. Dan Pike Auction Co.<br />
WEDNESDAY, July 23, 11 a.m., Marion, S.D. David Carter Estate,<br />
owners. Tractors, machinery, Model A’s, tools, antiques, primitives.<br />
Wieman Auction Service.<br />
WEDNESDAY, July 23, 2 p.m., Lewisville, MN. Elliot & Vickie<br />
Dewar, owners. Farm equipment, vehicles & collectibles. Kahler &<br />
Hall Auction Service.<br />
WEDNESDAY, July 23, 4 p.m., Beaver Creek, MN. Consignments.<br />
Appliances, glassware, furniture, antiques & collectibles, shop items.<br />
Duane Mulder Auction Service.<br />
FRIDAY-SATURDAY, July 25-26, 9 a.m., Fairmont, MN. Vincent<br />
& Jeanne Celander, owners. Tractors, gas engines, farm equipment,<br />
signs, farm-related antiques, cast-iron seats, tools, toys & more.<br />
Wedels, Kahlers & Pike Auction Service.<br />
MONDAY, July 28, 6:30 p.m., Windom, MN. Naeve Family Trust,<br />
owners. 240-acre bare farmland, Jackson <strong>County</strong>. Dan Pike Auction<br />
Service.<br />
TUESDAY, August 5, 9:30 a.m., Rock Rapids, IA. James C. Lora,<br />
owner. Land. Clark Anders Auction Service.<br />
WEDNESDAY, August 6, 8:30 a.m., Marion, S.D. Consignments.<br />
All types machinery, attachments, vehicles, trucks, riding mowers.<br />
Wieman Auction Service.<br />
WEDNESDAY, August 6, 6 p.m., Rowena, S.D. Brian & Lynne<br />
Hunter & Snowy Bluff, LLC, owners. Red Rock Lounge, Skitzo’s & 4<br />
bdrm. home. Goeman Auction Service.<br />
THURSDAY, August 7, 6:30 p.m., Hartford, S.D. Roger Sletten,<br />
owner. 40 acres. Merle Miller Auction Service.<br />
TUESDAY, August 12, 9 a.m., Armstrong, Iowa. Annual farm<br />
machinery consignment. Rooney Auction Co.<br />
SATURDAY, August 16, 10 a.m., Ruthton, MN. Waneta Shriver,<br />
owner. Acreage, tractor, van, mowers, antiques, household. Mike<br />
Carpenter Auction Service.<br />
SATURDAY, August 16, 10:30 a.m., Jackson, MN. Don & Carol<br />
Zebedee, Harold Skow, owners. Livestock & farm equipment. Dan<br />
Pike Auction Service.<br />
SATURDAY, September 6, 9:30 a.m., Lakefield, MN. Annual Fall<br />
Consignments. Farm equipment, trucks, trailers, construction. Dan<br />
Pike Auction Service.<br />
SATURDAY, September 6. Annual fall equipment consignment<br />
auction. Pike Auction Service.<br />
THE FOLLOWING AUCTIONS ARE HELD WEEKLY:<br />
TUESDAYS, 8:00 A.M.: Slaughter hogs, 11:00 A.M. hay/straw;<br />
12:30 P.M. slaughter cattle; 2:00 P.M. dairy or stock cows, baby & started<br />
calves, feeder cattle. Special dairy sales, 1st & 3rd Thurs. of each<br />
month at <strong>Pipestone</strong> Livestock Auction Market, Inc., <strong>Pipestone</strong>, Minn.<br />
507-825-3306.<br />
WEDNESDAYS, 12:30 p.m.: Hay and straw sales at Jackson Livestock<br />
Exchange, Jackson, Minn., 507-847-5679.<br />
THURSDAYS, 10 a.m.: Weekly sale of cattle at Sheldon Livestock<br />
Sales, Inc., Sheldon, Iowa.<br />
TO LIST YOUR AUCTION CALL<br />
PIPESTONE PUBLISHING at 1-800-325-6440 or<br />
LIVEWIRE PRINTING at 1-800-658-2393