February 28, 2001 - MPR commentator Dale Connelly with his humorous Robert Frost inspired poem "Stopping by the Links on a Snowy Evening."
March 6, 2001 - The Peace Corps is celebrating its 40th anniversary this week. More than seven-thousand volunteers currently serve in 76 countries around the world. President Kennedy first established the Peace Corps as a challenge to young people to spend two years serving in developing countries. But you don't have to be fresh out of college to sign up. Sixty-Seven year old Prudence Perry of Milwaukee is in the first few months of a Peace Corp assignment in Tonga, an island chain in the South Pacific. She says the most difficult aspect of daily life is the weather:
March 6, 2001 - Snow drifts are piled high in western Minnesota reminding many people of the winter four years ago when the spring melt lead to record flooding. But the snow is not quite as deep as 1997, and that has most hoping this year's high water will be more a nuisance than a threat. As the snow begins to melt, residents of the Minnesota River valley are preparing; hoping for a slow, controlled melt, but ready just in case March brings more heavy snow or rain. Mainstreet Radio's Mark Steil reports:
March 7, 2001 - Spring in the Red River Valley is often a mixed blessing. Residents welcome the warmer temperatures, but shudder at the inevitability of at least some flooding along the Red River of the North. Now after years of discussion, planning and testing, the national Weather Service has developed a new system for issuing flood forecasts. As Minnesota Public Radio's Bob Reha reports the Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Services or A-H-P-S is getting mixed reviews. (22) {
March 9, 2001 - Mark Seeley, with this week's weather.
March 12, 2001 - Today's big snowstorm was a reminder that it is still winter, despite the few signs of spring we've seen lately. This storm dumped as much as 8 inches of new snow in extreme southern Minnesota, with lesser snowfall amounts throughout the rest of the region. Bill Togstad is a forecaster with the National Weather Service in Chanhassen.
March 13, 2001 - Minnesota's boom and bust taconite industry enjoyed a long healthy period in the 1990's. But by 1998, steel makers began to feel the full of effects of open trade on the global market. The struggle ended for Minnesota's second largest taconite producer in January, when LTV Steel Corporation closed it's Hoyt Lakes mine and taconite pellet plant. Now, as Minnesota Public Radio's Bob Kelleher reports, other producers are fighting to stay open.
March 14, 2001 -
March 20, 2001 - At 7:31 this morning we mark the passing of the vernal equinox, one of two times each year when the amount of daylight and darkness are equal. Though it would be hard to tell by our still snow-covered landscape, the vernal equinox marks the official beginning of spring. I visited the Lowry Nature Center and took a hike through the woods with Interpretive Naturalist Dianne Rowse, to see if we could find any signs of spring. She says LAST year, those signs came early.
March 21, 2001 -