The last couple of weeks I have noticed a pattern in conversations that I have been a part of. I call it ‘remembering the way things used to be.’

Yes, I guess you could call it remembering the good old days, but it is more like just remembering the way things were. Not necessarily wishing things were still like they were in the olden days.

Our story by Kevin Mertens in the Car Care section in this issue of the Faribault County Register is a prime example of that. I remember being told by many people that there once were an incredible number of gas stations in the city of Blue Earth. So Kevin did a bit of research to find out more about it, and by golly, people were right. There were a lot of gas stations here.

At a meeting I was at, the subject became what old buildings used to be in Blue Earth and now are gone. And are there going to be more that disappear. The answer is probably.

Even for me, having lived here for nearly 20 years, I remember some buildings that were here and now are gone. Two were on Main Street, on both sides of the Register office building. A gas station on the northwest corner of Main and Fifth, and the old Avalon theater building next door to the Register on the south side. There are several others that have gone away.

Then in Elmore, when I did the interview for the Car Care story about Jerry’s Tire and Service. A few folks there got to talking about how many businesses have disappeared in Elmore, and how many buildings are now gone. They seemed to think that Jerry’s Tire shop is one of the few remaining businesses there.

When the started naming them all, it was pretty amazing. Elmore once had a lot of businesses.

That sad tale is pretty much true in many, many small towns across Minnesota and the rest of rural America.

That leads me to a list of trivia questions I recently created for the Kiwanis Club Pub Trivia Sunday at the Lost Saint Brewery. The Kiwanis help sponsor and run this once a month trivia afternoon.

There is a halftime break between the two rounds of trivia, when there is some interesting “entertainment.”

Last week there were two trivia questions. They had to do with the fact that once upon a time, every town in Faribault County had a high school. And, also, every town in Faribault County once had a newspaper.

Yes, every town. So the trivia question was to name all of the team mascots for all of the towns. The second question was to name the newspapers in each of the towns in the county.

How about you? Can you do it?

If you are a newcomer to the Faribault County area you probably can’t name many at all. Even if you are an old timer you might know the name of the mascot for your town, but not all of them. Same thing goes for the newspapers in the county. Many of those papers ceased to exist long ago, some not so long ago. All of the towns had newspapers start in the town between 1860 and 1900.

There are now only three newspapers in the county and three high schools. The newspapers are the Faribault County Register in Blue Earth, the South Central News in Wells and the Minnesota Lake Tribune published just twice a year, I believe. High schools are Blue Earth Area, United South Central and Genesis Classical Academy.

So are you itching to hear the answers to the mascot and newspaper trivia? OK, here you go. We will start with the school mascots.

Blue Earth – Maroons (really) then the Buccaneers; Winnebago – Indians; Delavan – Panthers; Easton – (could someone let me know the name of this one); Wells – Wildcats; Kiester – Bulldogs; Bricelyn – Braves; Frost – Vikings; Elmore – Wildcats; Minnesota Lake – Lakers.

Now for the newspapers. The original names as well as some of their other names. Blue Earth – Blue Earth City News (1861) and the Blue Earth Post and Faribault County Register; Winnebago – The Whig of ’73 (1863) and then the Winnebago Enterprise; Wells – The Prairie Bugle (1869) and then the Wells Mirror; Delavan – The Delavan Bee (1872); Minnesota Lake – The Minnesota Lake Tribune (1894); Easton – The Easton Times (1898); Elmore – The Elmore Eye (1899); Bricelyn – The Bricelyn Sentinel (1899); Frost – The Frost Record (1899); Kiester – The Kiester Courier (1900) and then Bricelyn and Kiester combined into the Bricelyn-Kiester Sentinel-Courier, before becoming part of the South Central News.

So it was a different time for sure. At least 10 high schools and 10 newspapers in our county. Hard to believe. The only thing that doesn’t change is that things are going to change. Also, it is always a bit better to look forward than backward.