The Southwest Angle                                                                           

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Incredulous Rob
Welcome to the Southwest Angle, the more or less imaginary place on the southwest shore of the Lake of the Woods. The Southwest Angle is made possible by the existence of the Northwest Angle, that unique chunk of land, the most northern piece of the continental United States, that is accessed by land through our neighbor Canada. When I was asked to take the writing job with the Warroad Pioneer, the name Southwest Angle was the first to come to mind when I need a name for my regular column.. I haven't regretted it.  

Time passed, and when a new owner of the Pioneer didn't appreciate the uniqueness of the view from the Southwest Angle, I
 was encouraged to start up a new publication, the Southwest Angle News and Views. I did, and we have been publishing it for three years. I started publishing it in print about once a week, but now our goal is once a month. An online version generally follows the print version by a few days.  Sometimes other things take precedence, since this is a part time endeavor, so the publishing schedule isn't written in stone, you know what I mean.

For the tech guys, it's taken a few months to find a time-effective way to make up the web version, but I'm able to copy the Publisher pages, paste them into PhotoImpact, save as a jpeg file and publish to the web. The only real quirk with this is that linked text boxes on different pages need to be unlinked before being copied so the text will show up in the graphics files. If you are looking to copy text from the later issues, it won't work since they are graphics files. If you want a copy of an article to re-publish, send me an e-mail.
Use the buttons below to navigate the site. The lexicon is below that to help on definitions...                                                                                                                                                                                                                       The Shed Opens!
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Home About Rob Contact Rob Southwest Angle Column Related (or not so) Links

Click on the picture to see the newspaper...

2-10-12











New Issue!
2-10-12










Sno-Cats galore!!!

2-10-12








2-10-12









David Johnson Vintage Sno Cat Spectacular...

2-10-12










Fall 2012

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Summer 2012

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2-10-12





Last USCC Race Photo Essay...                                                                                             

2-10-12





cat2012



Lots of Sleds, old and new...

2-10-12

                                                                                                

snip and snap






Soo I-500 Winner comes to Town...
4-10-11









See Carbon Steel Art in Roseau...

4-10-11










Fall events in the Nothland...

4-10-11








Lots and Lots of Tractors...

4-10-11










Visiting Old Faithful...

4-10-11













Tapp Dancers in the Great North...

4-10-11













A great Memorial Service...

4-10-11














Firewood cutting at the Koebernicks'

4-10-11











Warroad 100...
3-10-11











Winter in the Southwest Angle...

1-10-11











I-500 and other snowmobile stuff!

1-10-11












Toy Truck Wars...
10-10-10

















Pioneer Farm Christmas!

10-10-10













Management's 50th!


10-10-10











See the Horseman's new horse!

9-10-10














Lake of the Woods Northern (and some walleye)...

7-10-10











Art in the Prk, the County Fair and the First Threshing show of the season...
7-10-10
















See the summer car shows and the Scandahovian Festival!


6-10-10












Visit to Honker Flats!


5-18-10









Tea Party in the Northland!
4-22-10
newfest pull 09









Hit P
arade Girls at the Roseau Theater!
3-14-10

goosefest tractor pull










Brian Dick wins USCC Pro 600 Championship!
3-14-10









The annual snowmobile trip to the Northwest
Angle with De Kapten and Trapper
2-28-10











All kinds of outdoor activities in the Southwest
Angle featured in this issue
2-14-10











Gabe Bunke, Roseau native and Polaris racer,
is featured as well as the 2010 Red Lake I-500
1-23-10

The 1-10-10 Issue is a special about Bob Eastman,
Legendary Snowmobile Racer and also has
a story on the Shooting Star, his high speed racer.

1-10-10

12-24-09 button

12-10-09

12-3-09


11-17-09

November 10, 2009
11-10-09 button


10-31-09 swangle


august archives


archives


Lexicon




brik house

The Southwest Angle newspaper started out an  old brick house at Roseen's Corner, seven miles south of Salol on County 13 in Roseau County,on December 23, 2008. The Crowe family lived there for four years. This was where all the stories were written, usually in the wee hours of the morning just before the deadline. Our firiend, the iconic Trapper Roseen, lives in a log house a few feet away. Much of the material for the fine stories oriinates around Trapper's kitchen table, where he starts having coffee guests before 6 AM, usually Ms Toyota is the first and the rest straggle in throughoutnew house the morning. The Southwest Angle reporter is usually the last, a sparotic visitor now since the Blue Star powers that be assigned him to work 12 hour night shifts, 3 days one week and four the next. The family also bought a farm five miles to the southeast, and moved there in October, 2011.  
          Southwest Angle Lexicon

          Abby the dog - a pudgy, 8 year old yellow lab - terrier cross that spends every minute possible with the columnist.Abby

Big Kids - Travis, Heidi and Erin, columnist's oldest kids, grown up and moved out of the nest.

Blue Star - Where the Publisher spends his afternoons melting pieces of steel together. More commonly called Polaris, this company builds toys. Guy's toys. 4-wheelers of divers sorts and snowmobiles. 

Crusty old Norsk - Orlin Ostby, Norwegian, who works at the Blue Star. You never know quite what he is saying because much of his speech is in the old country tongue. He took his huge ox Pum and a Red River oxcart to Pembina, ND, then down much of the old Pembina Trail in the summer of '08. What started out as Walking the Trail ended up being Trailering the Trail when the incompatibilities of an ox traveling at 2 mph and retired suburbanites aiming massive RV's down the road at 70+mph overcame the mission of the expedition. He made it past Little Falls, exhibited the ox and cart at several big functions, trailered to the St. Paul and walked the last several blocks into the '08 State Fair, then was a participant in the Fair Parade and called it a success, which it was.

De Kapten - One of the Blue Star founders, David Johnson, who built the first snowmobile sold by the Blue Star. Waiting until partner Edgar Hetteen was away on a trip, he crafted the machine and the rest, as they say, is history. For this feat, he is defined as the capatian of the industry, and in good Scandahovian tradition, has earned the Swedish name for the Captain. De Kapten yearly takes the Publisher and  Trapper on a memorable snowmobile trips to his log cabin on the Angle.

Dick's Buick - An early '90's Park Avenue that Trapper's buddy Dick had in the shed. Pawned it off on the columnist for the extravagant sum of $300. Came with a 5/50 Warranty - 5 seconds or 50 ft, whichever comes first. Two years later, the venerable 3.8 is still hitting on all six at 248,000 miles.

Hard Driving Editor - The former editor at the Warroad Pioneer. Had a Pontiac GTO, thus the hard driving moniker.

The Horseman - Clayton Skoien, who regularly farms and logs with his Percheron Draft horses. Never knows how many horses he hs since the number chsnges frequently with new additions, usually "gifts" from other local breeders who have to get rid of extra horses. The oly fellow I know who will watch movie with Penelope Cruz and Selma Hayak riding along and comment on the type of tack the horse is wearing. His latest big job was building a custom semi trailer to haul around the Pecherons. There are many who would like the title of horseman, but only one so far in the Southwest Angle that wears it...    

The Marksman - Layton Oslund, a Wannaska area deer hunter who bagged a Taurus with 2 shots one year.

Little Girls - Alyssa, Katelyn and Valeri, the three youngest of the columnist's family.

managementManagement - No explanation necessary

Missus - the woman that more or less keeps Trapper in line, pretty much a full time job.

Ms Toyota - Trapper's oldest daughter. Also a trapper, she has become a rabid Toyota afficianado even though she was raised to be a devoted Chevy lover. She is well on her way to destroying her second Toyota pickup.

 Old Rocket - Chuck Lindner, Warroad entrepreneur, named the Old Rocket for his high placing in the 2007 Yellow rose 5-K run. Also does winter ultra-marathons on his bike.

 Pronunciations: There are some unique names in Roseau county. This bit of verse will help you remember the pronunciations of a couple of them.

         After moving up the rung in Malung,

        I had to lay low in Salol, to avoid the fallen women of Falun. 


Rolling Playhouse - RP for short, it is the old, rusty Econoline conversion van the little girls used for a playhouse before Management totaled two vehicles, pressed into use as the primary vehicle for the family.. Now retired, replaced by the Aerostar, its components to be used for one of the columnist's endelss projects.

SOTY - Slob of the Year, one entry this year is the individual that cut down the "Hanging Tree" near Bemis Hill. Another is whoever cut the top out of  a spruce tree at the Point.

Southwest Angle - Imaginary location off the southwest corner of the Lake of the Woods. Lots of things happen here, mostly in the mind of the columnist.

 Trapper - Tough as nails Landlord/Philosopher. He farms, traps and holds court at the breakfast table at Roseen's Corner for whoever stops in for morning coffee. Normally pretty clear thinking except that he adores Chevrolets. His most regular customer is the free-loading newspaper columnist.

Yellow Rose - where Management works. Company makes windows; on the company logo is a big yellow rose.

uncle bill

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