www.ottumwacourier.com Southeast Iowa’s Best Newspaper Saturday, August 5, 2017$1.50

TWO-DAYFORECAST INDEX

Today ... A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after 1 p.m. Increasing clouds with a high near 79. Tonight ... 70 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly after 10 p.m. Cloudy with a low around 60. New rainfall amounts between a half and three quarters of an inch. Sunday ... A 50 percent chance of showers, with thunderstorms also possible after 1 p.m. Cloudy with a high near 73. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch, except higher amounts possible in thunderstorms. Sunday night ... A 20 percent chance of showers before 1 a.m. Mostly cloudy with a low around 59.

Weather, Page A6

Mark Prevo purchased his family’s historic farm in Davis County, but he does not consider

himself the boss. It’s a story, he said, that historical farms may see every generation.

“I’m 63 and I’ve transitioned it to my boys. Each one of my sons took over a different area of the farm, and they’re in charge of that. One does hogs, one cattle, one handles crops. They did all three go to college. One came back, then two, then three. I’ve got all three of them working for me now.”

The key is “working,” because this is a working farm. Mark said though the equipment is different, you’d have seen the same jobs being done 100 years ago on that property by his great-grandfather. One big difference: the farm is a corpo-ration now, with Mark and his sons as equal shareholders.

The original farm in 1916 was 360 acres. Now, it’s 1,500. Century farms tend to grow, Mark said, because they often have to move from providing for the original owner’s single household to multi-generation families.

“The house was built in 1917. We’ve added on a little bit, but it’s the house built by Sam Randolph, my great-grandfa-ther, my mother’s grandfather. Sam died the same year I was born. His son Vern was born in 1900 — that’s my grandfa-ther.”

All lived in the same house at one time or another. The farmhouse, at 100 years old, is perfectly maintained and spotless-ly clean. However, Cindy Prevo, Mark’s wife, says she and Mark aren’t the type

to make the grandkids sit quietly, hands folded in their laps. This is a warm, fun place when everyone is there.

IN SPORTS, B1

TUMBLERS TAKE HOME MEDALS

IN OPINION, A5

HELP SHAPE OTTUMWA SCHOOLS’ FUTURE

IN LOCAL, A3

REVERSE ENGINEERINGBY KIDS

INDEX

A2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . FeaturesA3. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . LocalA4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .ObituariesA5. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .BusinessA6. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . WeatherB1-B3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sports

B4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Business

B5. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Religion

B6. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Nation

C1-C4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Classifieds

C5. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Comics

OTTUMWA — One of baseball’s classic rivalries is providing an example of how to support a good cause with creative think-ing.

“I challenged our die-hard Car-dinals fan, CEO Greg Hanshaw, that if C1st could raise $1,600 and get 60 employees to sign up for the [Kidney] Walk, he would wear a Cubs jersey for the day,” said Jami Kaelin, a loan manager for Community 1st Credit Union.

The response was immediate — and a little unexpected.

“Right now we have raised $1,700 and have 57 people signed up,” said Kaelin. “Interestingly enough, we have also had an uprising.”

The counter-revolution con-sists of Hanshaw’s fellow Cardi-nals fans trying to raise money so the CEO can instead wear a Cardinals jersey.

“There are Cardinals fans we didn’t know were Cardinals fans,” said Kaelin. “They started raising money on the side this morning; in one day, they’ve raised $300.”

By MARK NEWMANCourier staff writer

CEO risks bitter pill for charityKidney walk will take place Oct. 8

Greg Hanshaw

Winona Whitaker/The Courier

Trenton Fowler makes music at Bridge View Center’s Harmony Park Friday. The park’s outdoor musical instruments, located along the Ottumwa trail system, distracted the college student from his daily bike ride.

OTTUMWA — Situated along the Ottumwa Levee Trail between the scenic Des Moines River and Bridge View Center sits a musical park where visitors can compose harmonies. The park recently interrupted the daily 10-mile bike ride of Ottumwa resident Trenton Fowler.

A second-year college student at Kirkwood Community College’s Iowa City campus, Fowler likes to ride the trail when he’s back home in Ottumwa. “I try to ride every day,” Fowler said. “I do the

whole levee.”But Friday, the musical instru-

ments caught Fowler’s eye, so he dismounted, leaned his bike against a bench and let fly his in-ner musician.

“I’m just interested in new things,” said Fowler. “I’m a big supporter [of the town]. I really like Ottumwa a lot.”

Having taken piano lessons and drum lessons, Fowler was com-fortable picking up the mallets to create a tune on the percussion instruments at Harmony Park.

The instruments have been installed in the last 30 days, said

Scott Hallgren, executive direc-tor of VenuWorks at Bridge View Center. “It came from kind of a conglomerate at a board meeting.”

Hallgren has seen harmony parks before. Okoboji has one. “My kids have played on those instruments at Okoboji,” he said.

The outdoor instruments are durable, sustainable and can withstand the elements. They are based on a pentatonic scale, a five-note scale that is the basis for much of the folk music in the world, according to a BVC press release.

By WINONA WHITAKERCourier staff writer

Harmony Park, along trail, hits the right notes

Please see MUSIC, Page A4

Photos provided

Above: A family portrait with the Prevo family in front of one of their barns. Mark and Cindy as well as their sons, Kevin, Jason, Kyle and their wives and children. Left: An older photo, between 60 and 100 years old, of the Prevo home. While much of a Century Farm has documentation, some stories and some photos have to have their origin estimated.

Supporting several generations simultaneously

By MARK NEWMANCourier staff writer

Stories presented by: Al Martin Real Estate & Auction

Please see KIDNEY, Page A4Please see PREVO, Page A6

As I’m retiring after 53 years in the automobile business I want to thank everyone that bought thousands of vehicles from us over the years.

Thanks again Martz Auto, Gale Martz

Many Thanks...

Saturday

www.ottumwacourier.com A6, Saturday, August 5, 2017

Weather

NATIONAL WEATHER SUMMARY

LOCAL10-DAY FORECAST

ThursdayMostly sunny

High: 84

Low: 60

MondaySunny

High: 82

Low: 61

SundaySunny

High: 82

Low: 60

SaturdayRain, t-storms

High: 79

Low: 57

FridayPartly cloudy

High: 82

Low: 61

SaturdayRain, t-storms

High: 79

Low: 60

WednesdayMostly sunny

High: 84

Low: 60

TuesdayMostly sunny

High: 82

Low: 59

MondayPartly sunny

High: 79

Low: 56

SundayRain, t-storms

High: 73

Low: 59

Less humid, September-like air will pour over the mid-Atlantic and Ohio and Tennessee valleys tomorrow. Showers and thunderstorms will erupt along the leading edge of cooler air across New England. Downpours will continue near the Gulf and Southeast coasts with travel disruptions and localized fl ooding possible. Parts of the interior Southeast will begin to dry out. A new storm is expected to emerge from the Rockies and

trigger stormy conditions over the Central states. Heavy and locally severe thunderstorms will drench parts of the northern and central Plains, while storms continue to riddle the Intermountain West. Heat will throttle back slightly across the Northeast, but temperatures will remain unseasonably high for this time of year.

RecordsFriday

High: 79

Low: 52

Record high: 109 in 1918

Record low: 50 in 1912

TodayRecord high: 101 in 1934

Record low: 50 in 1994

PrecipitationFriday: 0.00

Sunrise/

SunsetToday

Rise: 6:10

Sunset: 8:20

SundayRise: 6:11

Sunset: 8:19

Rivers/LakesFriday

Lake Red RockLevel: 742.09

Inflow: 1,500 cfs

Outflow: 1,450 cfs

Des Moines RiverLevel: 639.4

Stage: 1.94 ft.

Outflow: 1,790 cfs

Fronts

Pressure

Cold

Showers Rain T-storms Flurries Snow Ice

HHigh

LLow

Warm Stationary

<-10 10s 20s 30s 40s 50s 60s 70s 80s 90s 100s 110+-0s 0s

H

H

HL

National weather

Forecast for Saturday, August 5, 2017

NATIONAL SUMMARY: As cooler and less humid air expands its coverage

over the Midwest, locally strong storms will develop in New England today.

Downpours will continue to drench parts of the Deep South. The heat wave

will go on in the Northwest with slightly lower temperatures. Storms are in

store from the Rockies to the central Plains and interior Southwest.

©2017 AccuWeather, Inc.

Bands separate high temperature zones for the day.

PREVO: Centennial farm supporting several generations simultaneously

“And there were a lot of children raised here,” Cindy said.

Yet the French doors, the interesting glass details, the wood, has lasted genera-tion after generation. It’s a house, Cindy said, that is meant to be lived in.

Mark does remember Grandma calling for him and the other little ones to slow down as they charged through the house. Cindy said she’s called out the same thing. Both grandpar-ents admit they’re softies when it comes to spoiling the grandkids.

Cindy Prevo knows a lot about the historical aspects of the place. She helped with the research required by the Iowa Department of Agriculture to certify a century farm, as the Prevo family — Mark, Cindy, Kevin, Jason and Kyle — did in 2016.

“We had these made up,” Cindy said of a wall hanging with a very old picture of the original farmhouse. The decorative pieces marked the date of the award pre-sentation at the Iowa State Fair.

Watching Mark and Cindy work on dating a photo-graph is like watching a pair of TV detectives.

Asked when one photo was from, they pointed out that they’d spotted fresh lumber still laying there; could that have been from when the house was first built? What about the size of this tree? It’s the same tree as in another photo but in the other photograph, they know the date it was taken. So if the tree is smaller, it was newer than in the other picture; that means the unknown picture is older.

“For Mark, this is about family,” Cindy said about the historical documenta-tion.

In fact, as important as the historical pictures are, they are secondary on the wall in front of Mark’s work desk; most photos taped up there are family — espe-cially the grandchildren.

“Tell him about the fireplace,” Cindy said to Mark before explaining, “We couldn’t find anything we liked.”

It was the only time dur-

ing the phone calls and the in-person visit that Mark seemed a bit shy; this piece of the house blends in with the rest, yet it’s not original.

“All these stones came

from the farm,” he said. “The grandkids went around and collected all the rocks, and I split them.”

They’re now incorporated into the family hearth.

That raises the question of rules: Is there a Register of Historic Places kind of contract when it comes to owning a century farm? Maybe not written down,

and probably more flexible, but Mark Prevo feels a sense of responsibility to take care of the place.

“I suppose there was a certain amount of pressure

to maintain it, because you’d never want to sell it. You may not take as much risk as someone else might; I’ve never borrowed against it.”

It wasn’t always easy, be-ing a farmer. Great-grandfa-ther Sam was farming near Centerville, and his wife was from the Davis County area. They moved here.

“They struggled through the Depression, then my grandmother and grand-father took over after the Depression. They talked about it: Most people don’t [comprehend] it like my grandparents did.”

Owning a farm, wouldn’t they at least have had food?

“A farm is where you raise a commodity, and you’ve got to sell it. They just couldn’t sell the commodity because people didn’t have money,” Mark said.

People who have no money can’t buy produce, especially at normal prices.

“Your commodity wasn’t worth much.”

Things are more ef-ficient now. An old photo shows how hogs used to be raised. A more recent photo shows how it’s done these days. But at it’s core, Mark believes farming is still farming.

“There’s a certain amount of history. Things don’t change very much on a farm, not really; it’s been go-ing on forever, somewhere. We plant in the spring and harvest in the fall; we calve — the calves are born — in the spring.”

His hope for the farm’s future is pretty straight forward.

“I hope it stays in the family, and I hope it can be a living, a decent living, for a couple members of my fam-ily for a long time.”

Staff writer Mark New-man can be contacted at mnewman@ottumwacou-rier.com and followed on Twitter @couriermark.

Continued from Page A1

Photo provided

Above: The Prevo family is seen at the Iowa

State Fair in 2016. They met Iowa Secretary of

Agriculture Bill Northey.

Photo of a photo by Mark Newman

Right: This 1978 aerial photo is in the Prevo

family’s office. It shows what the family will tell

you. Though it’s changed, this is a working farm.

Mark Newman photos/The Courier

Above left: The original farmhouse is 100 years old. The grandchildren’s colorful toys are a reminder, as Cindy Prevo said, of a house that is a home. Above right: It may blend into the century-old farmhouse perfectly, but Mark Prevo — with help from his grandchildren — put in this fireplace.

“I hope it stays in the family, and I hope it can be a living, a decent living, for a couple members of my family for a long

time.”

MARK PREVO

Thank you to our band sponsors for making Live After Five a huge success.

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Wapello County Farm Bureau, Vaughn Automotive, Jeremy Weller of D&D Bail Bonds, Hite Trucking, Bridge City T.V. and Appliance, and John

Deere. We look forward to giving back to our community and hope to see you next year.