Tallitha Reese

Jerry was interviewed by his daughter, Julie Spilde

Jerry Aulwes has been a friendly face in downtown Decorah for many years. You may see him walking home from errands downtown and visiting with everyone as he strolls down the sidewalks. One of his favorite stops is Decorah Bank and Trust. It was a daily stop for most of his life and he still enjoys stopping in, being greeted by the staff, and visiting with bank employees. Jerry also makes sure to get to coffee at the Landing Market as often as possible so he and the coffee club members can “Solve all of the world’s problems over a cup of coffee.” Jerry has spent many years of his life in Decorah doing all things Decorah…  running a small business, raising his family with his wife, JoAnn, volunteering his time on several different boards including Decorah Chamber, Decorah Betterment, Decorah Jaycees (he was one of the Nordic Fest Founders on that board), Decorah City Council, Luren Singers, and Decorah Rotary just to name a few.  Decorah was not Jerry’s birthplace, but it is the community that he cherishes, loves, and wants to see thrive. 

What’s the best advice anyone ever gave you? 

Lyle Kelly, a neighbor and friend, told me, “Calm down, live for today and tomorrow will take care of itself.”

What did you want to be when you grew up? 

In that time, I knew I had to enlist in the service, and I knew I wanted to be Navy. I thought I would figure the rest out after that. 

What do you/ did you do? 

Many different things, I was a soda jerk, an usher in a theater, then joined the Navy. After the Navy, I did go to college at Upper Iowa University and the University of Wisconsin La Crosse. After college, I worked as an Assistant Manager at Jack and Jill and then for Altfillisch, Olson, Gray, and Thompson Architects.  A job at the Office of Economic Opportunity led to working as a Director for the Chambers of Commerce in Tomah Wisconsin, Wausau, Wisconsin, and Marshall, Minnesota. 

During those years away, contact was kept with friends in Decorah and, in particular, Leo Teikkpe, the owner of Coast to Coast, who sold us the Hardware store in 1975. I owned the store until 2003 when I sold it to my daughter Julie and her husband Steve. I did help at the hardware store after that for a few years, but one of my favorite jobs came after that when I volunteered for Oneota Food Coop and I got to give food, beer, and wine samples and visit with people. (He also likes to joke that Julie fired him so he had to get the volunteer job…..but to this very day he still stops in at Ace Hardware to oversee that things are still getting done.)

If you were stranded on a desert island what three things would you want with you?  Water, food, and company so I would have someone to visit with.

Try to describe yourself in one sentence. Kind of a nice old guy.

If you could eat anything every day for the rest of your life, what would it be? Black licorice

Name one thing you could not live without.  My brain and it’s not the greatest anymore.

Tell us about …

A. Your wedding day to JoAnn: I only really remember being very concerned about not using a movie camera that day because my light bar at my sister’s wedding caused all of the electricity to go out in the whole church and I didn’t want that to happen. 

 B. Your first job: My first job was being a soda jerk and movie theatre usher, I used to seat the naughty kids at the back of the theatre so that I didn’t have to clean up the jujubes that they threw at the movie screen. 

C. Your favorite memory: One that I can remember was when a neighbor, Scott Lang, came over with the new Nordic Fest Brochure, and my granddaughters were on the front cover, that made me especially proud since I was one of the Nordic Fest founders. 

As the sun covers itself with a starry blanket, a fluttering frenzy unfolds. Evening aviators emerge to navigate sweet-scented currents drifting through your yard. Mere molecules of fragrance send them reeling in the shadows. You see, for moths, life is all about odors.

Moths have been wind-scenting forests and wetlands since the dawn of flowering plants. Fossil fragments bearing evidence of “early” moths date back to the Jurassic Period, about 200 million years ago. Did T-rex have moths in its sock drawer? Since the reign of dinosaurs, the ancestral moth has radiated into nearly 160,000 species worldwide, including a staggering variety of shapes and colors.

While our nocturnal friends are typically stigmatized as washed out white, gray, and brown – as dull in coloring as an old sweater – members of the silk moth family take the prize for dazzling. The rosy maple moth, a Driftless denizen, looks like fruity sherbet, bedecked in alternating bands of banana yellow and cotton candy pink. The closely related luna moth is an emerald stunner. The luna is so beautiful, it has the distinction of being the only moth featured on a United States postage stamp, an honor conferred to more than two dozen of its day-flying cousins, the butterflies. Adult luna moths are adorned with large, lime green wings with a maroon trim package. Long tails on hind wings conjure regal images. While beautiful, those trailing tails serve to confuse hungry bats, reducing the moth’s likelihood of ending up a snack. 

Yet despite their best efforts at evasion, their sheer abundance makes them a wildlife food staple. Thus, moths play critical roles in nature. For countless baby birds, moth caterpillars are “what’s for dinner.” Adult sphinx moths are preferred prey for night flying Whip-poor-wills. Bats and Common Nighthawks, large, swallow-like birds active during twilight (a crepuscular lifestyle), also eat flying insects, including an abundance of somber-toned moths. 

There’s more to moths than landing on the proverbial menu, though. After bees, beetles, and butterflies punch out for the day, moths begin the nightshift to continue the important work of pollination. Their keen sense of smell enables them to find flowers that chemically shout “pick me” by emitting pungent nocturnal scents. Moths navigate the botanical potpourri with antennae specially designed to detect the slightest whiff of flowers. Because they have a metaphorical sweet tooth, it’s possible to attract them for observation by using a fermented concoction of brown sugar and bananas. Mix the ingredients, let the sweet slurry ripen for a couple days, apply it to tree bark with a brush and stand back to watch the late-night extravaganza. Approaching slowly with a flashlight will allow you to illuminate our night-flying neighbors for a better look. 

Driftless prairies and woodlands provide essential habitat for more than 1,000 species of moths. Your yard has a role to play, too. Even a small native plant garden can support dozens of moth species. Don’t be too fastidious. Dead leaves and old plant stems provide important cover for caterpillars, cocoons, and adults. Eliminating pesticide use will make your yard moth friendly. When possible, turn off outside lights so moths don’t flutter themselves to illuminated exhaustion.

This summer, as the full moon rises and stars begin twinkling their ancient morse code, head out and settle in for a glimpse of garden night life. You’ll witness one of earth’s oldest spectacles, an eclipse – the term for a group of moths – of lovely night-flyers, dancing in the dark. 

Craig Thompson
Mary Thompson

Mary and Craig Thompson live in the bluffs north of La Crosse. They confess to staking out their oriole (jelly) feeder at night to watch for winged cameos from nocturnal neighbors.

It was three pigs that went missing from farmer Phil Tod’s barnyard in 1924 that led to the discovery of one of Southeast Minnesota’s greatest natural treasures: Niagara Cave!

“After a quick look around, Phil sent his nephews and a hired hand to look for them. Their search led to a large sinkhole on the property where lo and behold, a two-foot-by-four-foot hole in the bottom of the sinkhole seemed telling. With the help of ropes, lanterns, and several men from Harmony, one of the gents was lowered over 60 feet down where he found all three pigs still alive on a muddy rock ledge. Tied one-by-one to ropes, the pigs were hauled back up through the hole – and Niagara Cave was ‘Discovered!’” says Aaron Bishop, one of the current owners of Niagara Cave.

Back then, word got out about the sinkhole excitement, and three caving friends from the Decorah area, Joe Flynn, Leo Tekippe, and Al Cramer, spent many hours exploring the newly discovered cave system. They acquired a lease from the property owner and proceeded to develop the cave, making it more accessible. “By June 1934 it was opened for tours, with the same sinkhole entrance having now led hundreds of thousands of visitors into Niagara Cave,” Aaron says. 

Thus begins the story of Niagara Cave, a true geological gem of the Driftless, and one of the top ten show caves in the United States. In 1995, Mark Bishop and his family became “caretakers” of Niagara Cave, with sons Ryan and Aaron taking over operations in recent years. 

Mark remembers the spark that led to this new family venture. “While perusing the business opportunities section of the Rochester Post Bulletin, I noticed that a commercial cave operation was for sale in Southeast Minnesota,” Mark says. “Since I was a resident of the area for most of my life, I knew that it must be Niagara Cave. I was immediately intrigued by this. I told my wife, Jenny, that I was going to check it out, and asked my brother and a friend to accompany me on my first visit as a prospective buyer in the fall of 1994. I had already visited the cave a couple of times over the years because of my interest in geology. After reviewing the business, I came home and told my wife, ‘I think we’re buying a cave.’”

After getting the family’s stamp of approval, they negotiated the purchase, and started their era as caretakers and custodians of Niagara Cave, Mark says. And now, after 30 years, they are happy their sons will continue the business into the next generation.

Caves are incredibly unique natural environments – and thus, unique work environments for the Bishops. Take, for instance, the steady 48 degrees year-round.  

“Although we are not open in the winter, I personally enjoy working on the various projects and upgrades in the off-season,” says Aaron. “Forty-eight degrees feels pretty warm compared to the negative temperatures – plus windchill – that can be found above. A natural heated space!” 

The belowground world is, of course, still affected by what happens weather-wise up above. 

“If a person were to visit the cave in the springtime after some heavy rains or the seasonal snowmelt, they would experience a louder and more powerful waterfall,” says Aaron. “Additionally, in the late spring visitors can experience a more active ‘living’ cave in terms of water dripping from or flowing along formations.”

 The stalactites and flowstone are more actively growing in the springtime, Aaron says, giving many a glossy appearance. As the season morphs into the drier summertime, then the 48-degree cave becomes a haven from the intense heat outside. 

“A naturally air-conditioned space!” says Aaron. “The noises in the last room of the cave will reflect whether we’ve had dry or wet weather recently. When it’s wet, the room echoes with the splashing sound of the intermittent ‘shower,’ as we call it. But when it’s dry, you can hear the individual drops of water from the stalactites falling into pools of water or onto rocks.”

When Aaron gets the opportunity – and consent from the tour guests – he likes to turn off all the lights so everyone can listen, without making a sound themselves, to the sound of nature. Drips and splashes from various sized water droplets are amplified by the complete darkness, Aaron says, which even allows people to register the depths of the room based on the echoes from the drips. “This is probably my favorite experience in the cave: listening to the sound of water,” he says. 

But no matter what is happening above ground, the Southeast Minnesota cave will continue to showcase the ever-changing rock formations and sights down below. Visitors can tour Niagara Cave from April to October to see the underground waterfall, 450-million-year-old fossils, and cave formations both delicate and massive. 

The cave tours start and finish in a geologically packed gift store full of fossils, gems, and more, with a gem-panning sluice and mini golf course available for additional fun, as well as lovely picnicking grounds, and a concessions stand that runs Memorial Day to Labor Day. Plan ahead, pack a picnic – along with your sense of fun and adventure – and make it a day trip to Niagara Cave! Your underground adventure awaits!

Learn more at niagaracave.com

Benji Nichols

Benji Nichols has long been a fan of the accessible subterranean parts of our region. He enjoys the magic and  incredible views into the watersheds, geography, and natural wonders that caves offer. Make the trip to Niagara cave this summer – and tell them we sent you!