A special thank you to all those who have participated in our “I Remember Rippey” series. Your remembrances have allowed readers to share in our town’s history, activities, sports, school, church and daily life covering 150 years. We will continue collecting your stories through April 30. Phyllis McElheney Lepke is serving as our volunteer coordinator and stories may be sent to her at Rippey150@gmail.com.
There are many more wonderful articles to enjoy if you click on this link to reach the Rippey Library website: https://www.rippey.lib.ia.us . Then from the home page, click on Rippey History/Genealogy and you’ll be taken to a wealth of articles and news clippings, many provided by Rippey historian Jean Borgeson. Jean is a tireless researcher and great story teller, so you can continue to read about Rippey into the future.
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Summer In Rippey by Mary Fry Liebich
When I was in high school, I ran a summer program for the city at the skating rink every week day afternoon. We would skate, of course, and have organized games. We had arts and crafts, and competitions. Students would get the ribbons they’d won at a ceremony at the end of the summer. I remember Dan Brubaker and siblings being dropped off every day by his parents. Dan was probably five or six. And to this day when I see Dan, which is almost every day, I think of him coming those summers when he was a tiny guy compared to the town mayor he is now.
Speaking of the park, we had a horse show every summer, organized by I. J. Burk and Pink Grow and some others. It was in the area between the bleachers along the third base line and the cornfield at the ball park. It was well attended.
They had a competition that called for each rider to do whatever the announcer said, immediately. When a rider made a mistake, that person was out. Well, it got down to me and Ginger and one other rider – I have no idea who. By the way,
Ginger worked off of voice commands, so did what the announcer asked immediately. Finally we were asked to dismount, which I did. And then get on again. Well, I couldn’t get on from the ground. So I led Ginger out of the arena and onto the baseball field to the pitcher’s mound which was high enough that I could get on there. And I won!