Victoria MN Newspaper-From the Editor

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Notes and

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The Scoop

at City Hall

I smile inside whenever I see or hear residents talk about Victoria's "small town feel" or "small town charm." The context is usually related to retaining it, despite the growth of the city and its various projects as it looks toward the future.

I usually hear the "small town" phrase when I'm interviewing candidates who are running for Victoria City Council. Invariably, most of them speak of their goal to "retain the small town feel of Victoria." In his column this month, Mayor Tom O'Connor speaks once again of the challenge and goal to maintain "the small town feel."

My smile is in the wonderment of how Victoria could have anything but a small town feel. Victoria has been a small town with a small town feel for over 150 years. I believe it will have a small town feel for the next 150 years.

Victoria has a small downtown business district, perfectly confined and delineated on all sides. It doesn't sprawl and spill all over the place. There is no room for a big box store or a big commercial or industrial enterprise within sight of our downtown. That tells me we don't have a choice. It is Victoria's good fortune to be a small town even as it grows to become the city with the largest population in Carver County.

We will also retain the small town feel because Victoria is a home of neighborhoods. People come here not to find big jobs or big malls and entertainment centers or big commerce, but to be a family and support families.

I also smile because nobody has ever knocked on Victoria's door to build a skyscraper or domed stadium or large hotel complex or giant shopping center. It's difficult enough to get small businesses to locate here. We have a small town and a small town feel whether we like it or not. It's here to stay. The goal is to thrive.

***

In regard to my December 2015 issue of the Gazette, in which I told you, shamelessly, that I've written the most comprehensive history of Victoria on the face of the planet, I realize that yet another of my Gazette columnists over the years was a book author. As a mater of fact, Dr. Leon Snyder authored several books.

Some of you know that Dr. Snyder was a founder of the University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. The Snyder Building there is named after him. Dr. Snyder was the head of the Department of Horticulture and the Arboretum's first full time director. He and his wife Vera were also residents of Victoria. They lived across Schutz Lake from us, on the east side.

In 1977 my neighbors and I on the west side of the lake formed the Shoots Lake Garden Club. "Shoots" is more or less how to pronounce "Schutz," and the name also fit well with garden things shooting up.

Vera Snyder was a member of that club and since we took turns meeting at the homes of our members, we got to spend time at the Snyder home, too, and visit their personal flower and vegetable gardens. I recall their huge, shade-loving hosta beds.

It might not surprise you today, but it surprises me that I was the Historian of the Shoots Lake Garden Club. As the Historian, I took pictures and wrote an article every month for the Chaska paper. There was no such thing as the Victoria Gazette until June of 1979. I would never have guessed in 1977 that I would come to chronicle and publish the history of Victoria.

In any case, I've saved my "book" on the garden club, which contains the history, the membership, the officers, the pictures, and the newspaper columns. I'm thinking I should "bequeath" some of these things to the Carver County Historical Society or the Minnesota State Historical Society.

***

I know that I'm also shameless in printing notes and letter to the editor, over all these many years. It was some time ago I asked Father Elstan about that very concern and he told me it was okay. In reading between the lines, I suspect he meant it's okay as long as I'm able to set it aside, go on, take some to heart but none to head.

With that in mind, I'm not going to print the many notes and letters I received from members of the St. Victoria Choir in regard to my recent notice that I quit the piano at church. I haven't personally responded to any of them. I've taken their letters to heart and the heart doesn't have words at times like this. I've gathered those letters in a special collection, and when I start reading them en masse, I get choked up and so I'm keeping them just for me. They're a treasure, just for me.

I am including in the Gazette at this time, however, some letters that I received from others in response to the January 2016 feature story about my quitting the St. Victoria Choir. Maybe you recall that my story was entitled, "An Amazing Grace." Thank you to everyone, choir and others, for your kind, kind words.

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

My heart ♥ is full

When I think of you.