• News tips, submissions
• Questions, comments
• Contact webmaster

• Hudson's Engebreth debuts at Kennedy Center
• Rare disorder affects Hudson mom
• Dairy farmer loses feed for his herd in Baldwin elevator fire

Hudson High School graduate Aaron Engebreth will make his Kennedy Center debut as the baritone soloist with the Washington Chorus on April 27 in Washington D.C.

Engebreth will sing the baritone solos in Gabriel Faure's Requiem and Carlyle Sharpe's Proud Music of the Storm.

A 1992 graduate of Hudson High School, Engebreth received his music degree from Viterbo College (LaCrosse) in in 1996 and his Masters Degree from Boston University in 1999.

While on the music faculty of Tufts University, he was twice awarded faculty development grants to study music of the French baroque in Paris. Engebreth has also served on the music faculty of the Boston Conservatory and is an artistic director of the Florestan Recital Project.

Engebreth lives in Portland, Maine with his wife, Katherine and their two daughters.

For more information see the April 10 edition of the Star-Observer.

By Margaret Ontl, RiverTown Staff

When Jennipher (O'Meara) Derrick came home from work one day in December 2007, the objects in her living room appeared to be blinking and her family's faces looked distorted. She thought it was her contact lenses.

Those symptoms launched the 2000 Hudson High School grad and Pepper Fest princess, and her family, on what amounted to a medical research mission.

Her eye doctor gave her a clean bill of health, but the symptoms persisted so she went to her regular doctor, who ordered an MRI. The results of that test led Derrick to a neurosurgeon, who gave her a diagnosis of Chiari malformations.

"My jaw dropped and I looked at my parents and husband Mike in disbelief when she told me," said Derrick. "I have always had it but did not know it."

According to the National Institutes of Health Web site, Chiari malformations are structural defects in the cerebellum, the part of the brain that controls balance. <br>

When the indented bony space at the lower rear of the skull is smaller than normal, the cerebellum and brainstem can be pushed downward.

The resulting pressure on the cerebellum can block the flow of cerebrospinal fluid (the liquid that surrounds and protects the brain and spinal cord) and can cause a range of symptoms including dizziness, muscle weakness, numbness, vision problems, headache and problems with balance and coordination. The condition can be present from birth.

Derrick's particular type of CM is extremely rare, according to her surgeon. However, the surgeon could not guarantee the symptoms would subside with surgery or if they were even related.

"Dr. Dunn said we had to put the symptoms aside and deal with the CM issue," said Derrick. "Surgery was a must." Before that, however, the family consulted a neuro-ophthalomologist.

"He called the symptoms a visual phenomenon and added that it may indicate the early signs of something we don't know about yet," said Derrick.

So Derrick underwent surgery March 14 to have a C1 laminectomy and to decompress the Chiari malformations.

"Basically my brain stem was bent so it was preventing the proper flow of spinal fluid," said Derrick, who returned home March 17.

"It is kind of scary, but I have to give it time," said Derrick, whose symptoms persist after surgery. "I am light sensitive and now I have headaches, which I did not have before surgery."

"I think God gave me this for a reason," said Derrick. "I have been really upbeat and positive. I don't know what I am going to do next or where I'm going to go as a result of this.

"It's been stressful. I don't want to have it, but it is OK; many people have a lot worse things than this."

She returns for a recheck in April and cannot lift more than five pounds for the next 10 weeks, a challenge for a mother of a 2 ½-year-old. Derrick hopes the symptoms will disappear with time.

Derrick, who is 26, is the daughter of Patrick and Patricia O'Meara and is currently employed at Best Chiropractic.

For more information about Chiari malformations, visit www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/chiari/chiari.htm.

Lee Seim stood on Main Street in Baldwin watching firefighters spray water on the old grain elevator where much of the feed for his 150 dairy cows was stored.

"Not a good day," he said ruefully.

At about 4:15 p.m. Thursday, people at east end of the village's Main Street heard an explosion, and then saw flames coming from the office of the former Baldwin Feed & Seed building. Within minutes, the tall wooden structure, which Seim now owns, was engulfed in flames.

Fire departments from neighboring Spring Valley, Glenwood City, River Falls and Hudson were called to assist the local United Fire & Rescue Department in fighting the blaze.

Excess water from the effort was running down the gutters on both sides of Main Street when news reporters arrived on the scene about half an hour after the blaze started.

A crowd of at least one hundred onlookers watched from the periphery.

Seim said he had between 2,000 and 3,000 bushels of corn stored in the old elevator, along with a couple of thousand bushels of oats and other grain. He was using the grain as feed for his dairy herd.

He was afraid that the soybeans and corn in three adjacent metal grain silos also would be ruined by the heat.

Seim said his son had been to the elevator building earlier in the day to grind feed, and had shut off the gas to an overhead heater in the office because they wouldn't be needing it this summer.

He suspected that the fire was somehow related to a heater malfunction or gas leak.

He indicated that someone had seen smoke coming out of the office "and then it was kaboom."

The "kicker" to it all, Seim said, was that he didn't have the old elevator insured.

His farm is northeast of Baldwin, about halfway between Baldwin and Glenwood City.

Les Rens, an 83-year-old Baldwin resident who was among those watching the fire, said he couldn't remember when the elevator wasn't there. He used to grind feed there when he was a young man, he said.