God's Country (1985) - full transcript

[Man]
You have a beautiful garden.

Do you take care of it yourself?

- What?
- Do you take care of the garden yourself?

Oh, yes. Yes.
So far I have done it all myself.

Is it a lot of work?

No, it's fun.
I say God takes care of the gar...

takes care of the garden,
but the devil takes care of the lawn.

- [Man Laughs]
- Don't you think so?

Yeah.

But how do you do in winter?
The winters are tough.

Oh, crochet. Crochet and, uh...



make rugs... braid rugs.

That's how you keep yourselfbusy?

Oh, yes. Uh, keeps me very busy
and cook three meals a day.

- What are you doing now?
- Uh, what am I doing now?

I'm trying to, uh, weed my carrots...

and I'm gonna cultivate the potatoes...

and radishes over there
and onions.

Carrots. And, uh...
Oh, I have a lot of onions.

Everything needs weeding.
It's all weedy.

And the flowers... I can't work in there now
because they're, uh...

high and, uh, I'd break 'em all off.

I see. Do you have a...
Do you have a big family, or are you alone?

Uh, I have, uh, Otto Walters living upstairs.

He, uh, rooms with me.



Yeah. That's my interest...
uh, raising, uh, vegetables and flowers.

It's a lot of fun.

I like it much better
than going out and gossiping.

Do you like it living in Glencoe?

Oh, very much. I wouldn't... Uh, my sisters
wanted me to come to the cities...

but I would not go to the cities.

- [Chuckles]
- No? Why?

Well, it's so nice out here,
seeing all these flowers grow.

I love that, you know.
I don't care much for the city.

- [Chuckles]
- I understand you very well.

When you have such a beautiful garden.

That's what, uh...

[Man Narrating]
Dear old Miss Litzau...

without you and your beautiful garden...

we might have missed
Glencoe altogether.

- ##[Band: Polka]
- Of course, that day there was also the town fair.

##[Continues]

[Man]
Heyl

Whoa!

- [Dings]
- [All Cheer]

- Korea.
- We have 'em all.

- Korea. Laos and Cuban crisis.
- We also have members from World War I.

- [Man] What about you?
- Vietnam.

Vietnam was bad to begin with.

Uh, it was... You didn't have...
The populace was not for it...

so therefore, uh...

they didn't get the respect
that was due them.

I mean, they died just as easy as anybody
else did. They bled just as red a blood.

So, we try to promote, uh...

for God and country.

Okay? That's what it's all about.

We've all been in the armed forces.
We all know what it's all about.

And hopefully some of our younger generation
will take hints from what we're doing.

The high schools or grade schools
around the community...

we donate the flags to them,
and we promote "promotionalism"...

Uh, uh, Americanism. I'm sorry.

- [Malle] What is that...
- Around the community.

- Oh, we... we have with us...
- That's French. You ought to know what that is.

We have some... We have with us
some royalty that was formed in your country.

- You better explain.
- Ah. That? The commander.

The chef de garde.

G-57. Under "G," 57.

##[Continues]

B- 9. Under "B,"9.

- O- 72. Under "O,"72.
- [Woman] Bingol

[Man]
Here's a "bingo."Hang on to your cards. Okay.

Georgette. You've got bingo.
Anybody else?

Okay. B-2.

[No Audible Dialogue]

I grew up in a metropolitan area with the...
the hustle and bustle, and I'd never go back.

- [Malle] Why wouldn't you go back?
- Everything is slower out here.

You... You know people.
You can look across in a celebration like this...

and you can see people that you know.

You look at guys like...

[Malle]
What's your occupation?

- I don't know if I want to say.
- [Malle] Say. Go on.

Okay. I'm... I'm the assistant
chief of police in this community.

But we loosen up,
and we're human too, right? Okay. Okay.

# You know I love you so
How can you leave me blue #

[Malle Narrating]
It was a Saturday ofJune a few years ago.

Here I was in Glencoe
having a good time with the town folks.

For days we traveled around Minnesota
filming school graduations...

shopping malls,
Indians, miners, factories.

It felt good to be on the road again...

camera in hand,
making friends.

"Who are you? What channel is it for?"
They always ask.

"We're French, and this is a documentary
for public television. "

"Oh. Well, we're all Germans here.

Welcome to Glencoe, Minnesota. "

So, we settled down at the Star Motel.

[Bells Ringing]

A very quiet Sunday morning.

Glencoe is a small farming community...

60 miles west of Minneapolis...

with 5,000 inabitants
and a few industries.

There are nine churches in town:

Seven Protestant, two Catholic.

No synagogue.

# Love and purity #

# Holy, holy, holy #

# Lord God almighty ##

- Morning.
- Morning.

- Morning.
- Morning.

- Good morning.
- Morning.

Morning.

- Good morning.
- Hi, Don. Molly, want to shake hands?

Molly, how are you this morning? Oh!

Well, my goodness.

[Malle Narrating] Reverend Chapman, head of
the First Congregational Church of Glencoe...

is an amiable gentlemen,
very open-minded.

[Chapman]
We do it the way we did it, you know.

Change comes slowly...

uh, in a... in an area like ours.

Uh, people like to do it
the way their parents did it...

and the way their grandparents did it.

And yet there's the tension
of the youth group...

or the youth culture...

uh, wanting to change things too.

And, uh, I don't know how
the balance works out...

but, uh, that's there.

I think that's also part of modern life.

The divorce rate in our country's up. And...

- [Malle] And here?
- It's up here too.

Uh...

and I think that's really
a recognition of the fact...

that many marriages, uh, 20 years ago
were in trouble, but they stayed together.

And 50 years ago,
a divorce was almost uneard of.

But the problems within the home
and the marriage were still there.

Uh, you know, I think divorce
is a recognition of the fact...

at least one part of it is
that it's a recognition of the fact...

that there are some marriages
that end in failure.

And they don't hold 'em
together anymore artificially.

[Dog Barking]

[Malle Narrating]
Seen by an outsider...

the Glencoeites are a quiet,
somewhat placid...

extremely friendly group of people.

But they have one devastating passion:

Lawn mowing.

At all hours, men, women, children...

chop furiously
every bit of grass that sticks out.

Maybe a vestige of the pioneer spirit.

[Man]
How many times a week do you mow the lawn?

[Man #2]
Well, it's, uh, once a week for sure.

Once a week, uh... lf we get rain
like we had now in the last few days...

it's, uh... it's, uh, once a week and, uh...

and if we get more rain, we can...
we can expect that, uh...

we'll have to do it probably twice a week.

[Man #1]
Why is that?

[Man #2] Because the, uh...
the grass will grow that fast.

The lawn and your... your property would
start looking pretty shoddy if you didn't, uh...

if you didn't keep the grass cut.

If you move around town,
there's a few places where you can see that.

So, I've got a daughter at home,
and she's just home from college and...

and, uh... so, uh...

and she hasn't
gotten into the routine yet.

- [Malle] Do you like doing it?
- Oh, it's okay.

Nothing else to do,
so I just do this.

[Man]
Is this the worst part of the job?

Not really. I like this better
than push... mowing, you know.

[Malle]
Are you in, uh... in school?

No. We just got out
about a month ago.

So, what are you going to do now?

Oh, I might get a job
at a high school or something, you know...

find some job to do... anything.

- [Crowd Cheering]
- Okay. She got lucky. She threw one in there.

She's gotta think about it.
Yeah, she's gotta think about it.

She's gotta work.

[Malle Narrating]
On the outskirts of town...

a battle is raging
between the local softball team...

and their archrivals,
the Valkyries of Hamburg, Minnesota.

Nice pitch. All right.
One more now. One more.

[Chattering]

[Malle Narrating]
I will not get into an argument with those girls.

- [Girl] There it is.
- [Man] First basel

[Cheering, Shouting]

Let's go now. We're not done yet, Sherri.
Don't leave 'em out here.

- Let's try for a double play.
- [Woman] Talk it over out there.

Help each other out!

- There's only one down, though, right?
- Yeah.

Okay, Paula, let's take this one now.

You got a big range.
She's tall.

[Malle]
Aaahl Merde!

Good cut. Good cut. Way to go, Roberta.
You're ready. You're ready.

- [Girl] Whool
- [Cheering]

- Bring her in now.
- [All Shouting]

[Cheering, Shouting]

[Girl]
Whool

- Way to gol
- [Cheering]

[All Shouting]

- [Woman] All rightl
- [Girl] You got nothirI

[All Shouting]

[Man]
Out.

[Cheering]

- Sherri. Way to hang on to that ball.
- I thought I was gonna drop it.

Sherri.

[Girl]
Pizza Ranchl

[Chattering]

- We're going to the Pizza Ranch.
- [Girl #2] Going to the Pizza Ranch.

- [Man] Excuse me. You happy you won?
- Yes.

- Happy? Are you kidding?
- [All Chattering]

- I'm very happy.
- [Girl] Second game we won.

- Second game we won all year.
- [Malle] You don't normally win?

[Girl]
No.

- We never win.
- We always win.

- [Boy] Oh, we always almost win.
- Where we going?

- [Girl] Pizza Ranch.
- [Girl #2] We tried hard.

- We did. We worked for the win.
- [Malle] Is this part of a championship?

- No.
- [Girl] This is just league play.

- We won't get very far.
- We have six more games to go.

- And then we play a tournament.
- [Laughing]

[Malle Narrating]
The town Dairy Queen...

is one of the few
gastronomic resources of Glencoe.

We eat here twice a day.

[Malle]
All your family works here?

Quite a few. Yeah.

There's my wife...

and myself and a daughter and a son.

And an older daughter helping out.

- Yeah.
- [Malle] So there's five of you.

[Man]
Yeah. Right. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

[Boy]
Okay. Thank you.

[Malle]
And it's doing well?

Yeah. Can't complain.
Real good business.

I sold beer for 23 years.
I like this better.

- [Malle] You're Mr. Barnum.
- I'm Mr. Barnum. Junior.

And Mr. Barnum Senior is back there.

And you have no connection
with the circus family?

- Not that we know of.
- So, how do you explain...

We were here before the P.T. Barnum.

[Barnum]
It is, uh, done on the circus theme. Yes.

The Medicine Wagon... I don't know if that's gonna
give you a good shot of that up on top there.

- [Malle] Uh-huh. That's where...
- [Barnum] Prescriptions are filled. Yes.

That's your prescription drugs.

And the patent medicines
are all along this aisle over here.

I better keep my finger out of your...

We have our gift section
in the back and cards.

[Malle]
"Carousel Shop."

The horse may be of interest
up above there.

This is Mrs. Barnum Junior over here.

She's doing inventory.

For an order.
She does a lot of the gift buying and that.

Practically all of it.

- [Malle] Hello.
- Hi.

- What part of France are you from?
- Paris.

- Paris.
- Uh-huh.

Every Frenchman will tell you
he comes from Paris.

[Mrs. Barnum]
Oh, I suppose. [Laughs]

My granddad...

settled, uh, there in '69.

1869.

And my grandma settled, uh...

in 1854, when she was two years old.

[Malle Narrating] The population of Glencoe
is remarkably homogenous:

80% of German origin.

A few miles north,
Silver Lake is almost entirely Polish.

- [Malle] Where do they come from?
- They come from, uh, Germany.

Hannover.
That's Lower Saxon.

- [Malle] And there were Indians around?
- Oh, yeah. They, uh...

They lived, uh, say, 10 years with the Indians.

They come there every fall to hunt.

And, uh...

- [Malle] Did they get along well?
- Oh, yeah. They was really friendly.

Yeah. They was friendly.

And what happened
with the, uh, Indians after...

Well, that...
Well, the Indian outbreak was in '62, I think.

Then, uh, the Indian war
started here, and, uh...

ever since then
there were no Indians around here.

[Siren Wailing]

[Malle Narrating] This is our friend Rod Petticourt,
the assistant chief of police.

- They have a silent alarm on here,
and it went off. So...
- [Siren Stops]

It was a false alarm,
but nevertheless, we check 'em out.

[Malle Narrating]
Could we get mugged in Glencoe?

No. We don't have
many major crimes in this community...

and that's the way we like to keep it.

[Malle Narrating]
Rod was a little loose yesterday at the fair.

Today he's all business.

We're only a six man department,
but we have about 14 reserve officers.

And, uh, needless to say, in a small community,
with six men, they don't go very far.

So, the, uh, uh,
reserve rides along.

They ride along free.
They just donate their time...

and, uh, they help us out
in whatever way they can.

Real... Real good bunch of guys.

In fact, I shouldn't say guys.
We got a couple women on the reserve also. So...

- Oh, yeah?
- Yeah. It... It's good P.R. Too...

to show the public
that we're not too chauvinistic...

that we can have women
work with us too.

Of course, uh, the one...
the one reserve is my wife...

and she also works for the sheriff's department,
so there's no problem there at all.

[Malle Narrating]
Rod's favorite topic is drug abuse.

[Rod]
Uh, I came out here in 1971.

And a lot of the drug use would be
alcohol and the diet pills at that time.

And, of course,
they take a few diet pills...

and load up a little bit on the beer,
they got pretty snaky.

Uh, then the trend kind of
switched over to the marijuana...

and that pretty much stayed with that.

Then it switched now where it's...
it's the booze and the marijuana.

And that's the reason
that display was made up.

I carry it with me to the schools.

I'm originally from Minneapolis-St. Paul,
and I've got nieces and nephews up there...

and you've got kids that are eight, nine,
10 years old that are smoking dope.

You don't see it out here. You know,
if you'd find somebody that age doing it...

it would be just... just a... a...

you know, a long shot, we'll say,
because the kids aren't doing it.

You might find an eight-, nine-year-old
that might be drinking a beer...

but he don't go out and get drunk
or get high on a regular basis.

It's just uneard of.

[Malle]
How many horsepower?

280 horsepower.

And what is it made for basically?

For working up the fields,
uh, like in the spring and fall...

for doing all the, um,
tillage work, you can say.

It doesn't do any of the planting
or anything.

It's one of the biggest I've seen.

It's the biggest thatJohn Deere...
this brand name... makes.

[Engine Starts]

[Malle Narrating]
Brian Thalmann is 10 years old.

He doesn't drink beer,
but he drives a big toy.

Just outside Glencoe...

his father runs Thalmann Seeds...

a 2,000-acre operation...

that doesn't fit
my European notion of a farm.

[Man]
Farmers'machinery has always gotten bigger.

Now it's a question
do they have to buy more land...

in order to use
that farm machinery efficiently?

Well, for instance,
our Federal Land Bank...

will not make a loan to a farmer
who has only 80 acres...

because they know that he cannot
raise a family on 80 acres...

and still pay off the mortgage.

And so, uh,
there are very few 80-acre farms...

whereas back in the '50s, that was
the average size farm in this community.

And now, as I say,
there are very few of them...

but the farms have
gotten larger and larger...

and fewer and fewer farmers
as a result.

[Man #2]
Since '76, we had the opportunity to buy...

uh, several farms that were within
a two-mile radius of, uh, where we're standing.

Because of our location...

here in this part of Minnesota...

we're within 40 miles of the river points,
uh, near Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Uh, therefore, that is where most
of the grain in this particular area goes.

Uh, and, of course, most of the grain
that goes to the river points...

uh, therefore goes down
to the Gulf of Mexico...

and, uh, gets shipped to
other countries throughout the world.

Uh, we live, uh...

as good as the businessmen in town...

uh, because of the size of the operation.

Uh, for the amount of risk we're taking...

uh, we're probably not as well paid
as what we'd like to be.

Uh, the risk is quite high
because of the variability of weather...

and... and, uh, prices.

But, uh, we're comfortable
with what we're doing.

[Chattering]

[Man] This is the Security State Bank
of Glencoe, Minnesota.

It's a privately independent bank...

owned by local, uh,
individuals right in the town here.

- [Malle] Who started this bank?
- My father did...

in 19, uh, 3...

1935.

- So you're at the same time a banker and a farmer?
- Right.

So the people can't... can't fool us
when it comes to agriculture loans.

What are you doing exactly at the bank?
What's your job?

I'm a cashier,
and I'm a ag and loan officer.

[Malle Narrating]
Clayton Hoese has five sons.

One of them, Gale, works at the bank.

But after hours, back at the farm,
he's got some homework to do.

[Cows Mooing]

[Mooing]

[Malle]
What are you doing now?

[Malle Narrating]
Claytors eldest son runs a neighboring farm.

He was a champion wrestler in high school.

Running about 50% moisture.

- You got a lot of rain this weekend.
- You're right. A lot of rain.

I should be chopping
by the neighbors, but, uh...

we've got so much water
standing in the field, it, uh...

- [Clayton] You get stuck.
- We get... Yeah.

We'd mud up the hayfield, so...

I could come over here and work today.

[Malle Narrating] Claytors wife also splits her time
between the farm and her job in town.

Then when the boys got old enough...

they became involved in 4-H...

and they decided they liked farming also.

So we started in with the dairy cattle...

and... and now,
last year, I think, they...

David started in with the hog operation.

[Laughs]
This is my son David.

- Hello.
- [Clayton] These are the fellas from France...

and they want to
look at this operation here.

[Malle]
So you're working at the farm full-time?

Yeah.

Take care of the pigs part of it mostly.

Take care of the calves too.

Other than that...

- Are you still a student or...
- No.

I graduated two years ago
from high school.

Glencoe here.

And you're not interested in banking?

Ah, not really.
I like what I'm doing right now. So...

It doesn't bother me
that I'd be working there or anything.

Ah, I just like this,
so that's what I do.

It's what I do best,
so that's what I'm gonna do.

But you graduated in, uh, agriculture or...

took a degree in, uh, farming?

No. I just go...
I got a degree in hard knocks, and that's it.

I learned from what...
from the experiences I had.

That's all I do.

It... You learn... You learn a lot...
In pigs you learn a lot every day.

It's a new experience every day,
what goes on.

They're, uh...
They're sort of a weird breed of animals.

- [Snorting]
- And it's...

It's not... You got some hard days
in the winter and stuff...

but otherwise,
it's not a bad occupation at all.

[Malle]
Yeah.

[Snorting]

Come on.

Come on.

[Squeals]

[Chattering]

[Malle Narrating] David's pigs will appear
eventually on your breakfast table.

They end up their short lives
at the Hormel plant in Austin, Minnesota...

a hundred miles from Glencoe.

[Squealing]

I can remember,
ever since I was...

you know, old enough to think,
it was farming.

That's all I ever wanted to do.

I'm my own boss. I don't have to go
and punch a time clock, you know, and...

have somebody get mad at me
and stuff like that.

I can just... I get up in the morning,
I know what I gotta do. I'm my boss.

If I don't want to do too much on a certain day,
I don't, if I don't feel like it.

But usually it's... You gotta keep on
working, working, working.

- [Malle] It's a lot of work, you know.
- Oh, yeah. But you get it back in the long run.

Just, like, when the crops look good, you...

you know, it makes you feel good
when the crops look good and stuff like that.

You make a good living?

Fair. Manage, you know.
It is... It's not like, uh...

some people would like to have it,
but it's a living.

You gotta give up things to have
your peace of mind, I guess.

[Malle Narrating]
Jim Mclntern, at 28...

is the youngest farmer we've met so far.

He runs a middle-size farm
that belonged to his grandfather.

His father lives next door,
and they are business partners.

[Pigs Snorting]

[Mclntern] And you don't see
very many young farmers either like me.

I only know three of them
right around the area right here, and that's...

like, about a 20-mile radius.

So, uh, there's a lot of them
that like to farm...

want to get started,
but they just haven't got the... the capital.

Nobody will... The bank won't give 'em the money
they want because it just takes too much.

- Do you think of yourself
as being lucky in a way?
- Yeah.

I think so. Very lucky.

So this is your house.
Could you show me around?

This is the kitchen right here.

[Malle]
Dining...

This is our kitchen table
where we eat all our meals.

- Hello.
- Hi.

This is the dining room,
which really doesn't get used for much besides...

when we have a lot of company,
and the company will come and sit in here.

Friends and neighbors or whatever.

Do you often entertain neighbors or...

Well, birthdays. Whenever there's a birthday
around and one of the minor...

one of the kids' birthdays,
we'll have a little birthday party.

- And this is your...
- This is what's called a living room in here.

This is where we watch our TV,
if there's any TV to watch...

or just to sit and read the paper.

We got a couple hours
to read the paper at night.

Do you watch a lot of TVor...

Just in the winter.
In the summer I don't watch much at all.

I haven't got much time for that.
I'm too busy.

In winter there's more slack,
more free time.

There's no field work or anything like that.
Just the chores...

taking care of the pigs and the cattle.

- How many children do you have?
- We have three.

One's gonna be five, and one's a year and a half,
and one's gonna be five months.

- Are you going to make farmers out of them?
- I hope.

- Hope so.
- [Chuckles]

- I hope somebody plans on staying.
- Yeah. Probably not the girl.

- And you married very young.
- Yeah.

- I was 18?
- You were 18 and a half.

- Eighteen and a half.
- Is that young to get married here or...

- Not for a woman. For a girl.
- It is now.

Back seven years ago it was...

but now you find out more girls
are waiting till they're 20, 21, 22.

Even older than that.

Save your money,
'cause everything's so expensive.

- Yeah. They want to work first.
- Yeah. They'd like to work first so they have...

so they can buy nice things for the house.

But you decided immediately
to get married or...

Well, we waited.
About a year and a half...

we were going together...

and then we married after that.

We waited six months after I gave her
her engagement ring.

Then we got married six months after.

- And two years...
- It was just the right one, so I just...

And two years after that,
then our little girl was born.

- Yeah.
- One day after our wedding anniversary.

[Malle Narrating]
Jim and Bev's hospitality is so gracious...

I feel I have known them all my life.

We're back the next morning.

Jim is riding his tractor.

Cultivating corn. About one of
the easiest jobs on the farm right now, I'd say.

Gives you time to think.

Gotta do a lot of that nowadays.

[Chattering On Radio]

[Malle Narrating]
Meanwhile, Bev prepares lunch.

It means opening tin cans.

The Mclnterns don't even drink
their own milk.

[Malle] Do you think of yourself
more like as a housewife or... or...

I don't want to be
thought of as a housewife.

- But you help a lot at the farm, no?
- Yeah. I'd rather be thought of that way...

as, like, a homemaker and, um...

partner with Jim.

Put it that way.

I... I like helping outside.
I like helping a lot outside.

Driving tractor and things like that.

[Malle]
Did you do it when you were younger?

[Bev]
Mm-hmm. I did it a lot when I was younger.

[Malle] Did you think of any other life,
any other things that you would like to do?

I...

I suppose every girl wants... you know,
has different things she'd like to do with her life.

I sometimes dreamed of being an airline...
being an airline hostess.

But after I metJim, that all...
I forgot about it.

[Malle]
Us again. [Chuckles]

[Baby Crying]

- Did you wash already?
- [Girl] No.

[Chattering On Radio]

Okay.

- This is hot.
- Can John pray?

John, pray.

Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest.
Let these gifts to us be blessed. Amen.

[Jim]
It's hot.

[Man On Radio] We'd love to get him
to think about a computer for your company.

Maybe we can help.

I BM small computer seminars are designed for
people who know little or nothing about computers.

- [Coughing]
- [Malle] How do you explain
there is no blacks in this community?

Practically... not one, I would say.

- Well...
- In Glencoe.

I don't know. It's hard to say. It's...

People just seem to...

not really get along
with blacks around here.

It's...

Of course, there never really was any...
any blacks that really came here.

One or two,
and then they just kept on going.

I know Hutchinson over there,
northwest of here 20 miles...

they have a few blacks over there.

But it's just
no place for blacks around here, I guess.

Just don't like it.

You mean people don't like them,
or they don't like staying here?

- Well, I suppose it's...
- [Baby Coos]

A little of both, I think.

People are very prejudiced
against blacks out here.

It's... It's hard to say why.

Although you talk to anybody
that was in the service...

and you don't find too many servicemen
that care about blacks.

I don't know.

So you could have gone to Vietnam.
You were the right age.

Yeah. Just that my draft number was
a bit higher than what they drafted that year.

I know my brother...
his number was quite low...

and he... he managed to get a draft deferment
because I was still in school...

and, uh, as long as he was the only son
at home, they... they couldn't take him.

They could have taken him,
but my dad worked at it to get a draft...

a farm deferment for him, so...

And that was right in '68 when my brother was...
could have got drafted.

That was just at about the peak
of the war out there.

Or what do they call that? Scrimmage?
It wasrt a war.

That's what they call it.
It's kind of funny.

Enough men died, and it wasrt a war.

[Malle Narrating] Vietnam was coming back
more than once in our Glencoe conversations.

There was something else:

An unsung hero of the antiwar movement
of the '60s was from Glencoe.

- You mean Brad Beneke?
- Yes.

- That's my son.
- And...

- He was... You're talking about the Minnesota Eight.
- Yes.

- Yes.
- What happened to him? He was on trial?

[Beneke] Well, they had a trial
in federal district court... Minneapolis.

And he was sentenced to prison
for several years.

- [Malle] What's happened to him?
- He's in California now.

He, uh...

He has a band out there.

Oh, yes? He's playing music or...

Oh, yeah. He's a good musician.
Very good.

[Woman]
Brad grew up in a conservative...

pretty conservative
middle-class background.

[Malle Narrating] I ask Millie Beneke what exactly
were the charges against her son.

[Millie]
Uh, oh, dear. I wish you hadrt asked me that.

I think it was burglarizing with...
I don't know the technical, uh, uh, wording...

but with intent to destroy, uh,
public property.

But I don't know what
the technical name would be.

[Malle] But actually, the action was
to burn the, uh, draft cards.

Right. They had, uh...

There were actually four different groups...

who entered, uh, different
draft offices simultaneously...

with the intent
of destroying the draft records.

Uh, they werert successful.

I think only in one, uh, place
were they successful.

And, uh, those young men
were not caught.

But, um, uh...

Brad was one of the unfortunate ones.

And did you know about it
when he did it?

No, no. Absolutely not.
And... And, uh, it was a great shock...

because we've always been
very law-abiding people...

and with Arnold being a lawyer...

I think we were probably more conscious
of obeying the law than a lot of families.

I think, uh, maybe from a selfish point of view,
to begin with, I was distressed.

But as time went on,
and I could see how important it was to him...

and how important it was
that we understand what he was doing...

uh, I became more supportive of him.

As I say, Arnold was supportive
almost from the beginning.

Not supportive of breaking the law...

but, uh, supportive... uh, supportive of doing
whatever he could, you know, to end the war.

Talk about a fraud
on the young men of America...

that was it.

I'll tell ya.

And I couldn't blame
these young men for protesting...

even though I spent all the years
in the war that I did.

And I believed in that war, you know.
It was right, but...

there was so much wrong in this that...

I hope this country never has to
go through this again. I'll tell ya.

It, uh... It was pretty well torn apart.

I was very supportive of Mr. Nixon
his first term, and, uh...

When I was Republican chairwoman...

and Mr. Nixon was up for election
the second term...

I'm probably one of the few Republicans
in the state who voted for Mr. McGovern.

[Chattering]

Get started. Go on.

[Millie]
Now I'm, uh, just involved with city politics.

Uh, just on the city council.

...1979, the difference
between unit revenue...

[Malle Narrating]
But Millie's new interest is not politics.

It is show business.

[Millie] It's something I've wanted to do
all my life, and I've just found time to do it.

Uh, had five children,
and they're all gone from home now.

Something I've always wanted to do, and I decided
to do my own thing, and this is the result.

I've written two plays.

How would you define
your play Much Ado About Corn ?

[Chuckles]
I don't know. It was really corny.

[French Accent]
It is my pleasure...

er, um, duty...

to announce the arrival of the Count...

oh l? l? l?...

Otto von Contemptuous.

I've come to evict you.

The mortgage on your
corn kingdom is due today.

You haven't paid.

Out you go.
Off my land.

Zounds! It'll be mine!

All mine!
I'll be king villain!

You know, Corny,
we could trick him, poison him...

give him some of Granny's corn liquor.

We must... We must prevail, Earthy dear.

We're the only royal kingdom left
in this vast country...

and we're surrounded by... by people...
individual people... farmers, they're called.

[Malle Narrating] Meet Steve, leading man
of the Buffalo Creek Players...

one of Glencoe's most eligible bachelors...

who inseminates cows for a living.

Okay. This is bull sperm.

It's, uh, color-dyed green
to signify that it's Holstein.

Okay. I have to...

In order to ensure the best sperm quality,
I have to get it into the cow as soon as I can.

Okay. You're okay.

I'm inserting my hand into the anus...

so I can...

Right beneath my hand is the cervix.

My destination is to
thread the... the pipette...

through the cervix...

and then deposit the semen
into each horn of the uterus.

Okay.

That's what you get
for your money right there.

So, now...

In about two hours,
she'll release an egg...

and hopefully the sperm
will unite with the egg...

and then we'll have conception.

Then the gestation is nine months.

My company has their bulls
in De Forest, Wisconsin.

The semen is processed
and frozen there...

and I pick up monthly shipments.

It is frozen and stored
in liquid nitrogen.

Uh, the sperm life is indefinite.

They've... They've, uh...

They started in 1953.

They have used ampoules from that time period
and have still settled cows.

That's a period of 26 years.

[Moos]

Some of these cows produce
80 or 90 pounds of milk per day.

They need... They run into problems
if their udder does not stay up where it belongs.

They generally let 'em have
about two months rest period...

before they come in
with their next calf...

because there's a lot of strain put on 'em
when they're producing this much milk.

This is a heavily
cow-populated area...

so I can make a good living
within that area.

[Malle Narrating]
Steve inseminates about 5,000 cows a year.

He loves his job...

but he also enjoys
the singles life.

[Malle] And you're still a bachelor.
Could you tell us why?

Well, when I had the money,
I didn't have the time.

When I had the time,
I didn't have the money.

[Laughs]
Uh, I enjoy the lifestyle.

I enjoy the independence
ofbeing a bachelor.

I live my life. I do.

My... I...

I... My job comes first.

But when that's done...

I have to...
To keep my mind clear...

I have to do other things too.

I could put 20 hours a day in
on my job if I wanted to...

but my mind
would not be able to handle it.

Would you eventually consider...

getting married and having children
at some point?

Or is it, uh...

My target date is 35 years...
Uh, when I'm 35.

So I've got four years to go yet
to find the right one.

Would it be possible for you to have
a relationship with a girl without being married?

I've done it several times.
It's no problem.

- No problem at all?
- Not to me.

I don't let it bother me, no.

I'm sure some people would get
a little uptight about it.

I'm sure some people would think
people were spying on them.

Doesrt make any difference to me.

But would you say...
Is divorce completely accepted?

But it... From...

That varies from person to person.

Some of the older people
accept it as the way things are.

Some look at their own marriage...

and they've made their marriage
work for 30 years.

They wonder why
the kids aren't able to.

But I think a lot of people realize
that the times are changing...

and pressures are different.

Economic situations are much different
than they were even 10 years ago.

But it's still
a very religious community, no?

Yes, there are factions
that are quite religious.

I'm not affiliated with any church at this time.
I haven't been for a while.

It's just... That's just my lifestyle.
That's my ch... my own choice.

Has there been any situation where people
couldn't cope with the public opinion...

or anything like that?

Well...

there are factions that don't
think much of the theater group...

because they think we're too progressive,
that we're trying to do too much too fast.

But...

anytime, I don't care where you are...

if you try to be progressive...

there are people
that are trying to...

keep things at a status quo.

That's...
That's just the human nature.

What impresses me a lot
about this town...

People don't try to...

make you think their way.

I mean, they'll allow you
to think your way.

They might not agree with it,
but they'll allow you to do it...

which I think is very good.

[Man]
Have you been working here long?

About three weeks.

What made you decide to be
a gas station attendant?

Sick of being a waitress.
[Chuckles]

[Malle] Have you considered
not getting married, or is it...

Yeah.

Up to about a year ago,
I decided I wasrt gonna get married.

But I decided this year
it's a very good idea.

Why?

I'm tired of being alone.

[People Chattering]

[Malle Narrating] Jean, a Social Security employee
at the county seat...

is a member of the theater group.

[Malle]
What are you doing?

I am writing a note
to our accountant.

What's in the note?

Well, I have to...

[Paper Tears]

Tell her to hold a payment
on someone...

because it's in a halfway house...

up in... in, uh, Kandiyohi County...

because the other county
issued the payment for us...

and I just found out about it today.

So we have to reimburse
the other county directly.

So, um...

- This way.
- ##[Classical]

- [Malle] Kitchen.
- It's small. Kitchen.

And this is...

my bedroom.

It's a mess, as you can tell.

I have too much stuff
and no place to put it.

- Okay.
- Okay.

My roommate's name is Grace.

And...

this is her room through there.

##[Continues]

The living room.

Do you spend much time here?

No. No.

I'm gone most of the time.
I work two jobs.

And then with the theater,
I'm not home very much at all.

Job number two, for extra money...

is bartending on weekends.

I usually work
every Friday and Saturday night...

at a little, uh, municipal liquor store...

that's between Glencoe and Hutchinson.

There are good things
and bad things about it.

You see a lot of...
I get tired of seeing, um...

the people that have drinking problems
come in there, that drink too much.

[Malle]
Seems to be natural in this area.

I think it's boredom.

I think people don't have
anything better to do with their time.

And it starts at a very early age.

When I was in high school,
that was, you know...

Well, it was illegal, so that was
what was exciting about it.

You'd go out and drink.

- Um...
- Including women?

Sure. Sure.

[Malle Narrating]
Jean is a free spirit.

She'd mentioned previously
having renounced her Catholic faith.

- [Jean] Do you really want to know?
- [Malle] I'm curious, yes.

Well, the hypocrisy within the church,
just from personal experience.

When I was... Well, when I first moved
away from home when I was 18...

I moved in with a boyfriend...

and, uh, it probably was not
a very wise thing to do.

I wasrt ready for it.

I lived with him for three months...

and the whole thing fell apart,
and I moved back to Hutchinson...

and I discovered that I was pregnant.

Well, I didn't have a whole lot
of choices at that time.

Abortion wasrt legal. I didn't even know
that there was such a thing as an abortion.

I don't think, at that time,
I could have...

that my conscience would have let me
have gone through with something like that.

I knew, um...
I knew that I was...

too young to care for a child.

I felt I was too much of a child myself
and it wouldn't be fair.

So I decided to
give the child up for adoption.

Well, here I was in Hutchinson. I had no place
to go. I didn't have a boyfriend anymore.

And I was pregnant, and I had to
tell my parents... it was inevitable.

And of course they were upset.

The first thing my mother said was,
"You've got to talk to a priest. This is awful."

The priest called my mother in
and he laid this big guilt trip on her.

He told her it was all her fault
that this had happened to her daughters...

and it was because
we wore our skirts too short.

[Laughs]
And, uh, which is...

The only time we wore dresses
is when we went to church, so...

Um, you know,
and he made her feel terrible...

like she was entirely to blame.

And there was no...

I know it's not fair to judge a whole church
on the basis of one individual...

but there was just, uh...

I don't know.
There was just no humanity there.

I feel that that's really lacking
in the church.

I think that there's too much emphasis
on the doctrine and the rules...

and the, um...

you know, the...
the black and white sorts of things...

and just not enough caring.

- Uh...
- Tell me, so what did you do with the child?

I gave it up for adoption.

Are you sorry about that?

No.

No.

Do you intend to get married
at some point?

I don't really care if I do or not.

I think it would be nice. At some time
it would be nice to have a family.

I guess I feel secure enough in myself
that if I would never get married...

um...

that it wouldn't ruin my life...

or I wouldn't
consider myself a failure.

Uh, if I ever do get married...

I'd like to feel that I was marrying for love,
not out of necessity...

or not just because
it's something that I ought to do.

But I... I enjoy men.

I enjoy meeting men.

And, um...

And so I guess I have
a lot of short-term relationships...

or just friendships.

And that's... that's sufficient for me.

Um...

I know women, though,
that are very...

single women who are, you know,
very frustrated just living here...

because they would like to... to find
the right person, settle down in the area...

and, um...

The availability of single men
is just limited.

It depends on the age group too.

Like, I'm... I'm 26.
I'll be 27 this month.

So I'm getting up there,
as far as age, as far as being...

I'm not considered young anymore.
[Laughs]

In this area, young is maybe 21, 22.

[Malle]
What happens if you're gay in Glencoe?

You don't tell anyone.
[Laughs]

Um, you probably don't
make a pass at anyone.

I don't... You'd probably have to carry out
your private life in Minneapolis or someplace...

if you were going to live
in a small town.

It's not...
It... It wouldn't be accepted.

I mean, that's one area that...

that there's a lot of prejudice against.

A lot of jokes made
about homosexuality.

Um, people don't want...
people don't want to talk about it.

So it'd be very difficult for someone to live...
a gay person to live openly here.

[Malle]
Do you find men very macho here?

Yeah!
[Laughs]

Um...

I think so.

I think, uh...

most of the men I meet...

It depends. I mean, it, uh...

A lo...
[Sighs]

You know, there... there are a lot of...
there are some, like, single, professional men...

you know, that have...

have been in different areas
and they've come back here.

And they are...
they are a little more open...

and they can carry on a friendship with a woman
or just accept her at an equal level.

Uh, but most of the men around here
are, um...

into dominance.

They, uh... They have a hard time relating to me
because they've never had...

usually they never have
a serious conversation with a woman.

Um, the only thing they can comment on
is, you know, how you look.

Um, or the sexual thing.

It gets... It gets to be...

hard to put up with.

- [Malle] I suppose so.
- Yeah.

Is sex very important for you?

Um...

[Laughing]
I don't know how to answer that!

Yeah, I guess it's important.

It's something that I end up shutting off,
you know, I've put in the back of my head.

I get busy with all these other things
so I don't have to think about it.

Um...

bu...

but I...

I don't know.

But if I meet somebody that I really like,
I don't have any hesitation.

If I want to sleep with that person,
I will.

Um, but there's a lot...
there's a lot more involved, I think, in that...

than just...

I don't go out and look for sex
just because I'm horny.

That's not...
[Giggles]

That's not what turns me on.

But if... if... I don't know.
If I meet someone I like, I...

I can't even talk about this.
I'm sorry.

[Laughs]

I haven't thought about it that much.
I guess it's important.

Isn't it to everyone?

- [Malle] Are you part of the hospital, sir?
- What?

- Are you with the hospital?
- No, with the Glenaven over there.

You just walking around, or...

I'm taking my exercise.

I've lived there at Glenaven
for three and a half years.

You're retired now, of course.

- Retired?
- Yeah.

I wouldn't call that retired,
being in there.

Glenaven, that's where all the people go
without a place to go.

You don't like it?

No, I'm tired of it.

And wh... How did you get there?

Well, I didn't...
no place to home no more.

My wife died...

and the boys are all
working for themselves.

Where would you like to be?

In the graveyard.

Well...

you have plenty of time for that.

[Scoffs] You don't know
what a fella all's gotta go through...

when you're healthy.

- Do they take good care of you?
- Oh, yes. Yeah, they do.

[Man] We take care of residents
that need 24-hour nursing care.

- [TV: Woman Speaking]
- We provide many aspects to that care.

Not only nursing care,
but also social activities.

We have an activities department that, uh,
the residents that are capable, are able...

spend time there
doing various crafts.

Uh, that is the main purpose
of Glenaven...

to serve and... serving the elderly
and those that need 24-hour care.

[TVContinues:
Man Speaking, Indistinct]

[TV: Announcer]
It's a brand-new carl

[Audience Cheering, Applauding]

[Woman] Strawberries this month.
That's what we're waiting for.

Takes two and a half gallons
of crushed strawberries...

for the birthday party.

I think that's gonna be really great.

- [Malle] For each birthday party?
- Yeah, for this birthday party forJune.

The Congregational Church from Glencoe
is serving it.

- And...
- [Man] Each church does a little different.

This time, like I said, we're gonna...
we're waitir for strawberries.

[TV: Announcer] Straight talk
from presidential hopeful Howard Baker.

All this and more on 20/20,
tonight on ABC.

- ##[Theme]
- Alice, as long as I'm paying his dental bills...

he's using a fluoride paste.

Mom, I need a gel for fresh breath.

Relax. You'll get fluoride
and fresh breath with Aquafresh.

[Announcer]
Introducing new double-protection Aquafresh.

All the cavity-fighting fluoride
of the leading paste...

and all the breath freshener
of the leading gel...

concentrated in one toothpaste.

New double-protection Aquafresh.
Fights cavities and freshens breath.

[Man #1] It is not easy for Pedro... his favorite
Mexican snack does not come from Mexico.

- [Man #2] Mexicol
- [Man #1] Tostitos brand
crispy round tortilla chips.

- [Man #2] Mexicol
- [Man #1] They have an authentic tortilla taste.

[Man #2]
Mexicol

##[TV: Suspense]

##[Organ]

[Woman]
# We've only just begun #

# To live #

# White lace and promises #

# Before the rising sun #

#We fly #

# So many roads to choose #

#We start out walking
and learn to run #

#We've only just begun ##

##[Continues]

[Malle Narrating] At the Immanuel
Lutheran Church of New Auburn...

a few miles from Glencoe...

Tammy and Robert
are getting married this morning.

Tammy is 17.

[Minister]
For as much as Robert Mark Schvonke...

and TammyJean Schilling...

have consented together
in holy wedlock...

and have declared the same before God
and in the presence of this company...

I pronounce them husband and wife.

[Woman]
# We've only just begun #

# To live ##

[Chattering]

[Woman]
Okay. [Laughs]

[Man]
Hi, Herb.

Best wishes, Tammy.
You're just beautiful.

Thank you.

- Congratulations.
- Hi!

- [Woman] Congratulations.
- Thank you.

- Congratulations.
- [Man] You look great.

- [Tammy Giggles]
- Thank you.

- [Man] You look great too, Bob.
- Thank you.

[Chattering Continues]

- [Woman] Congratulations.
- [Robert] Thank you.

[Woman]
Congratulations.

[Woman]
Yes, Dorothyl That's rightl

[Woman Giggling]
Watch the hair therel

[Malle Narrating]
After the ceremony...

a banquet takes place at Play Manor...

a vast ballroom
Glencoe is most proud of.

Family and neighbors...

there are almost 300
eating and drinking heartily.

- [Man] Laterl Much laterl
- [Woman Laughs]

- [Woman Shouts] Robert's drunkl
- [Man] Laterl Laterl

[Tammy]
You guys get to move.

- [Girls Laughing]
- Somebody's gettir in the camera.

- They'll go wild!
- [All Giggling]

- [Malle] What did you think of the wedding?
- It was nice. Pretty nice.

My feet are tired.

- It was hot.
- [Laughs]

No, I don't think I'll get married.

[Malle Narrating]
After the meal...

bride, groom,
bridesmaids and ushers...

spend the rest of the afternoon
barhopping.

[Girls Hooting]

[All Chattering]

[Woman]
Welcome!

- [Robert] Everybody.
- It's a long ways over there.

[Man]
Yuckl

[Laughing, Chattering]

[Man]
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kidl

- All right, to, um...
- [Man Shouts] There they arel

[Chattering, Laughing]

##[Ballad]

## [Man Sings Lyric, Indistinct]

## [Band Continues]

[Tammy Laughing]
Well!

[Robert]
Yeah.

##[Ends]

- I got it. I got it.
- You sure?

- Yeah.
- It's tipping. Look out.

Oh, shut up!

- You're gonna spill that.
- No, I'm not.

Randy, are these coming out?

I got that!

- Can I have a glass of beer?
- Huh? You want a glass ofbeer?

- Yeah. It's for my mom.
- See your I.D.?

[Bartender Chattering, Laughing]

It was my mom's idea. Ma!

##[Band: Polka]

[Singer]
Ah-ha-ha!

[Singer]
Oh-ho-ho!

[Singer]
Yee-hee-hee!

## [Continues]

## [Ends]

- [Cheering, Applause]
- [Singer] Oh, yeahl Thank youl

- Little "Roll Out the Barrel."
- Great! [Laughs]

- Do our thing, shall we say.
- Yep.

We enjoy just doing
what we happen to feel...

because every band gives us
something just a little bit different.

And every band will play a little bit different
in the modern and their polkas...

and we respond to the music
that they happen to be playing.

##[Rock]

- [Cheering, Shouting, Clapping]
- ##[Continues]

# Take good care #

#Of my business #

# While I'm away #

#Every day ##

[Malle Narrating]
I am nervous driving into Glencoe.

Six years have passed.
It is a long time in America.

This garden.

Isn't it Miss Litzau,
right where we left her?

Miss Litzau, it is such
a great pleasure to see youl

- [Laughing] Yeah?
- How have you been?

- What?
- How have you been all these years?

Oh, just wonderful.
Just wonderful.

- How old are you now?
- Ninety-one.

- Still going strong, huh?
- I should say!

- And you still don't...
- I don't care to have anybody help me.

- You still...
- But I don't get down just...

It don't run away.

You're still taking care of it
all by yourself.

Everything by myself.

Household.
I can. I can pickles.

So far I haven't canned tomatoes yet.

They aren't quite ripe enough.

But they're coming.

[Malle Narrating]
Well, well. Maybe nothing has changed after all.

- [Man] Good morning, John.
- [People Chattering]

[Car Horn Honks]

[Man]
Come in.

- Well, hi, Louis!
- Hello, Arnold.

- It's good to see you again.
- Long time no see, huh?

- So, you're still in the same office?
- Same office. Same office.

- Still working?
- Every day. [Chuckles]

[Malle Narrating] My first visit
is with Arnold Beneke, the town lawyer.

His wife, Millie, has written
five new plays.

To answer the challenge,
Arnold has taken up acting.

She lived about 300 miles away.

- Hi, Rod.
- Hi.

Nice to see you again.

How much time do you spend
in this car?

Last night I spent
about nine hours in it.

[Malle Narrating]
Glencoe has lost Rod Petticourt.

He is now a deputy sheriff
of the neighboring county.

He has put on weight.
He misses Glencoe.

[Man]
He got it almost as high as the trailer...

in some spots.

[Malle Narrating]
Remember Tammy and Robert Schvonke?

We married them six years ago.

A spacious six-room trailer,
two children, two steady jobs.

In a happy family,
there's never a plot.

## [Dramatic]

[Grunting, Yelling]

You're okay.

[Mooing]

[Malle] So, Steve, we come back
a few years later...

and we find you are... still busy.

Yes. I'm still enjoying the job.

This is probably about
the fifty or sixty-thousandth cow...

I've inseminated in my career.

So, starting to
get the hang of it finally.

[Malle Laughs]

And, uh, last time we talked to you...

you were thinking of
possibly getting married.

- What's happened of your plans?
- [Laughs]

I'm still thinking about it.
I'm on a five-year plan.

I made it by 35.
Now we're looking at 40.

Then we'll think about it again.
So, uh...

- [Mooing]
- Opportunity hasn't knocked yet, I guess.

You're too busy with your cow.

[Laughing]

I want to ask you, do you develop
a personal relationship with the cows?

Uh, not, uh...
[Chuckles]

On a one-to-one basis, no.
There's too many.

I inseminate about 7,000 a year,
so it's a little bit difficult...

to get on a one-to-one relationship
with them, but...

I'm on a one-to-one relationship
with their owners.

That's part of the business.

Uh, there are always a few cows
that stand out in your mind...

for one reason or another...

if they're ornery or whatever.

- But as far as...
- What about your swinging life?

My swinging life?
[Laughing]

Uh, I'm getting a little older.
It doesn't swing quite as quickly as it used to.

But I still try to participate
when I can.

Uh, play a lot of softball
in the summer.

[Malle Narrating] Glencoe farmers
are having their best crop in two decades.

They think it's a disaster.

We're back toJim and Bev Mclntern,
the young farmers I liked so much.

[Bev]
Let's all pray.

[Jim]
Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest.

Let this food to us be blessed.
Amen.

[Malle Narrating]
Apparently, nothing has changed.

Oh, yes.
Bev works at the post office.

And Jim worries.

Ayear ago
a hundred pounds of milk...

was $13.20.

And today it's only $11.60.

So it's... it's dropped close to
two dollars a hundredweight in a year.

And, uh, you gotta make it up.

So what you do is,
you milk more cows.

And by doing that, you create a problem
by putting more milk on the market...

which, the price is gonna
go down some more yet.

But a dairy farmer
is forced to do that.

And, uh, there's just no place
to put the milk no more.

That's why the price is gonna
keep on comir down...

until enough of us go out of business...

so there's less cattle.

But let me ask you...

do you want your children
to go into farming?

When I... Ten years ago... Or seven years,
when my first boy was born, yes.

But now...

I'm kinda hoping he can find something else
that he's interested in to do instead of farming...

because, uh...

I don't see no future in it no more.

It's...

It's... It's sad to me...

because I like to farm.

But I'm wondering if I'm gonna be here
10 years from now.

Am I gonna be farming 10 years from now?
I don't know.

There's a lot of people probably won't,
and it's just a matter of elimination.

Who's gonna come next?
Who's gonna...

That's one of the reasons
I took the job is because...

putting the money in a bank...

and when the kids get college age...

if they wanna go to college,
I wanna give them that option.

I would love to see all three of my kids
go to college.

And then if the boys do want to farm, or if
Laurie marries someone that would like to farm...

and the boys don't want to...

at least they have
that college education to fall back on.

Yeah. I...

I want them to have something
besides farming.

[Jim]
It's... It's sad.

I don't know if you can realize
what it feels like to live on a farm...

and to love the land.

It's like loving your kids or your wife,
to love the land.

It's, uh... It's a different feeling
inside of you.

Maybe... Maybe you don't know
what I'm talking about...

but it's just a feeling... it just grabs you
right inside, right in the middle of ya.

I went through a feeling of guilt where...
What did I do wrong?

Should I have made changes earlier?

Should I have tried different things?

And yet we're tr... we're traditionalists.
It's hard to change.

You've done things a certain way.

Just like planting in spring
and harvesting in fall.

[Malle Narrating]
Terry Wagner we'd not met before.

He almost went under last spring.

His future is cloudy.

We're in a transition period, perhaps.

[Malle] But still, do you think
a lot of people sort ofblame it on...

Oh, very much so.

You see...
You see lots of depression...

and guilt amongst farmers.

I guess you can
compare it to, uh, dying...

or someone telling you
you have a terminal illness.

First you're angry.
Then, you know, "Why me?"

And finally you come to the realization
it's not anything I personally did.

You can only work so many hours a day
and so many days a week.

And when the return isn't there,
it's just not gonna...

benefit you at all.

And once you've dropped out,
once you've quit...

you'll never get back
to the farm again.

It's virtually impossible.

[Terry]
My grandfather almost lost...

[Malle Narrating]
Terry has two sons.

The eldest one is in Minneapolis
studying to be a mechanic.

No matter how depressed I get,
the final question I ask myself is...

what would I like to do different?

And I still can't come up
with anything except...

I love to farm,
I love to watch things grow and produce...

and reproduce...

and that's what I hope
to continue to do.

[Man]
It's gone extremely downill.

Uh, tremendously.
It's just turned sour.

[Malle Narrating]
Remember Thalmann Seeds...

one of the largest farming operations
in the county?

Remember little Brian
driving the giant tractor?

Well, last year they took a loss
of $ 100,000.

Randall Thalmann predicts trouble.

When organizations... they refer to the...
if I say it right... posse comitatus...

uh, various...

reactionaries, uh,
right-wing individuals...

uh, anti-Jew...

uh, their feeling...

And I happen to agree that theJewish people
control much of our markets.

Uh, and I've got evidence
to back that up.

Um, they're listening...

to this right-wing faction...

and, uh, they're...
they're picking up arms.

They're buying semiautomatic weapons.

And, uh, I'm afraid that
there is going to be some violence.

My guess is, that'll come this winter,
because it'll be much, much worse this winter.

- This coming winter?
- Yes.

- How do you feel personally?
- Am I ready to pick up arms? No.

But am I ready to talk to other farmers
and make a stand? Yes.

The only way we can change
this county tax...

that we're currently living under...

is to simply refuse to pay it.

Although we, as farmers,
are only 10 percent of the population...

we pay half the tax.

And if the farmers get together and say,
I won't pay my taxes...

we will stop county government,
we will stop the schools from operating.

And that is the only way...

that we can draw the attention
to the problem.

And basically that's what
George Washington and his cohorts did...

was tax protest.

[Malle] What do you think
of the present administration?

[Thalmann] I'm part of the same party,
but I don't agree in his philosophy.

If myself, as a seedsman...

had a plan of attack...

how I was gonna approach the future...

and the economy kept changing...

so that I had to
change my plans with it...

In other words,
if I had a plan that worked, good.

But if the plan didn't work,
you had to change.

President Reagars attitude is...

this is the way we're gonna solve the problem,
come hell or high water.

And he refused to change
his approach and his plan...

over the past four or five years.

Consequently, it takes a...

a very stupid man not to be able to see
that when he took office...

the national deficit was, what...

around $300 billion,
maybe 400 billion...

and by the end of this year
it's two trillion.

So... I happen to think that
we've got a movie star president...

and he can convince a lot of the people
a lot of the time.

If any other president
would have been in office...

and had have left office with
a national debt that was five times...

they would have crucified the man.

But Reagan, for whatever reason,
he can tell the world that...

"Yes, the national deficit
is five times higher than it ever was...

"but it's all right!

It's all right."

[Chuckling]
Uh, I don't...

[Sizzling]

[Arnold] I use about a pound and a half
ofbutter, I'll have you know.

We keep the dairy farmers going here.

[Malle Narrating] Tonight we dine
at Millie and Arnold Beneke's.

Millie is a great cook.

Melissa, will you come and help me
with the salad, please?

He felt they were right.

[Malle Narrating]
We talk and talk...

gossip, Glencoe news.

Clayton Hoese, the banker,
just died of a heart attack.

Jean Tyson has moved to Florida.

I ask about their son Brad,
the Vietnam protester.

Pretty much within the system now
in the sense that, uh...

he's a businessperson.

He did... did great...

in the sales of software...
computer software...

in New York
and the surrounding states.

And, uh, let's put it this way...
he's a little milder than he was before.

[All Laughing]

- Little more subdued.
- Not quite the angry young man that he was.

Now, Arnold,
you're now a lawyer-actor...

or an actor-lawyer.

How would you define yourself?

Well, let me put it this way.

I learned a lot about acting
while being a lawyer.

[All Laughing]

- So the company is doing well, huh?
- But it seems to depend upon the show.

If we have a large cast, we fill the house.
If we have a small cast...

Of course, like today,
it was a small cast.

But it was a pretty good house
for a Sunday afternoon.

Arnold, do you feel that, uh...

this town has changed considerably
since we were here?

Um, physically I don't think it has.

There isn't any great amount of
new construction, except new homes.

But, uh, spiritually...

I think it's down.

I think this... this, uh, depression
that the farmers are in...

has affected the community...

or infected it,
whichever way it should be put.

But I don't think there is the spirit here
that there was six years ago.

Obviously, there was a lot of confidence
in President Reagan...

because I think the community...

I... I know the community voted,
uh, for Mr. Reagan.

But, uh, after the election...

I mean, we get this feeling
or this signal from Washington...

that everything is going so well...

and I don't feel that it is...

because, uh, I'm judging from the food bank
that we have in Glencoe.

There are many more people
using the food bank than before...

and we're one of the most
prosperous counties in Minnesota.

Financially,
I think that our generation...

um, had it much better...

than the generation since then.

Well, I think our Brad
pointed that out very well to us.

[Malle Narrating] Millie and Arnold,
I'm proud to have become your friend.

For me, you represent
the best of this country...

generous, smart,
dedicated, unpretentious.

Great Americans.

Well, I have high hopes
for this country because...

the things that are going on right now
can only be characterized in my mind...

as an obsession with greed.

And a nation doesn't live long
with that obsession.

And particularly a democracy that...

There's good... There's good...
A lot of good in this country...

and a lot of good people...

and they aren't gonna...
they aren't gonna...

subscribe to this philosophy of greed
that's going on now.

It's horrible.