We have been learning about rural Milroy’s Dorothy (Bossuyt) Swedzinski, whose parents, Irma and Alphonse Bossuyt, emigrated from Belgium; met after their parents settled on farms in Lyon County; and married in January 1930. They welcomed baby Dorothy to the family that November.

Dorothy grew up on a farm northeast of Milroy and attended country school in Redwood County District 68.

The Bossuyt family welcomed their final child in 1940 when Doris (Dori) joined Dorothy and brother, Donnie. Dorothy remembered her mom making dresses for both girls from feed sacks.

“Oh, yeah. My sister, since she was 10 years younger than me, there was always enough (material) left over to make a little dress for her. That’s how I learned to iron, ironing her little dresses.”

Dorothy’s upper elementary and early high school years took place during World War II. She recalls her folks listening to war news on the radio and remembers it as a confusing time.

“I remember the radio being on and talking about Pearl Harbor and stuff. It was hard to understand what the heck that was all about. I know somebody came around picking up scrap iron. Sugar was rationed and tires were rationed. We weren’t completely without sugar. Mom still baked and we had sugar for our cereal.”

The Bossuyt family had always gone to Tracy on Saturday nights for groceries and to socialize with Irma’s Cooreman relatives. Dorothy explained how that practice changed in the 1940’s.

“We ended up going to Marshall on Saturday nights. I don’t know why we changed. I was more or less in my teens because I would run around town with other teen girls. I made friends with other girls my age and we’d run around all night long just goofing off.”

That same time period brought major changes to Dorothy’s education.

“I went through the 8th grade (at Redwood County District 68) and then I went to Milroy to high school on a bus. I was the first one on both sides of the family to go to high school.”

Dorothy shared fond memories from her high school years during the late-1940’s.

“We put on class plays. I was a cook in one of them. (Dorothy laughed) There was a stage in the gym and people sat on the floor of the gym to watch the plays. Then we had — we didn’t call it Prom — but we had suppers. A special supper like a Prom almost because we wore long dresses and everything. It was in the spring.”

Dorothy shared a photo of her in a formal dress, inscribed, “Milroy Homecoming Queen 1947.” She explained the story.

“The classes voted for girls to run for Homecoming – even the seniors. I was only a junior. [The classes] had to sell tickets to the game. Two girls went out selling tickets and they’d come back and see how far we were and they’d go back out again. They’d go to all the business places downtown selling tickets. Our class sold the most tickets and I got to be queen. (Dorothy laughed) We had a parade through the town and I rode on a [convertible]. I rode right up front on the back of the front seat.”

Dorothy remembered teachers who seemed particularly concerned for their students such as Mr. Zwach, Mr. Goblisch, and her high school Home Economics teacher. She graduated as a member of the Milroy High School class of 1949.

The 1940’s also brought major changes to the Bossuyt home.

“My folks moved when I was sixteen to a place that my dad bought two miles north of Milroy and two miles west – right along the Redwood/Lyon County line on the Redwood side. They put in electricity right away in that house.”

For the first time in her life, Dorothy could turn on an electric light in her house at night, rather than having to light a kerosene lamp.

Her folks also installed a party line, dial telephone service — as opposed to the crank phone at their former home. Dorothy explained the party line meant they shared their telephone service with other area farm families.

“I can remember using the phone or listening to the neighbors. (Dorothy laughed) We had a neighbor lady that always liked to listen, too. When the ladies were talking they’d say “hello” [to her] because they could hear her bird in the background.”

Dorothy met her future husband, Casimir “Ron” Swedzinski, at a wedding dance in Ghent while she was in high school.

“I went along with my folks to wedding dances. I was standing in the middle of a bunch of girls and he bet a cousin that I would not dance with him. So he came up; reached in there; and poked me in the ribs. I almost said no because I didn’t like being poked in the ribs. (Dorothy laughed) But I danced with him because he was good looking and he was a young man. We dated for two years and three months.”

Dorothy and Ron married in the fall of 1949 and settled on a farm between Minneota and Ivanhoe. They farmed and raised a family of six children. They continued to indulge their love of dancing for decades. Dorothy lost Ron to a brain aneurism in 2006, but continued living on the farm until 2014, when she moved to Marshall.

I welcome your participation in and ideas about our exploration of prairie lives. You may reach me at prairieview pressllc@gmail.com.