The Bear Facts
October 7, 2017

Good morning! I’m Megan Wadle!

I’m Caitlin Thilges!

 And I’m Sam Trainer! Thanks for joining us for the “Bear Facts”, the weekly radio show from Bishop Garrigan High School.

This week KLGA moved into its new studios in downtown Algona, and the week also marks a milestone for us here at the “Bear Facts”. Today we’re proud to be airing our 1,000th episode on KLGA. The “Bear Facts” first started in September 1992, when Matt Erpelding, Nick Becker, and Dawn Bormann first said “Good morning” on the radio. Matt went into music, and Nick became a priest, but Dawn was one of several “Bear Facts” announcers who went on to become professional journalists.

More than four hundred Garrigan students have announced on our show over the past quarter century. In the early days “Bear Facts” announcers went out to KLGA and recorded the show on-site. We even did one live broadcast on Saturday morning. After the first year we got our own recording equipment. We’re on the third generation of that equipment today, and we recently switched to delivering the show to the station in digital form.

We’ve covered a lot of big events over the years. The first really big event was the Golden Bears’ first trip to the state basketball tournament back in 1993. Since they we’ve covered state appearances in football, basketball, track, golf, and baseball, all-state appearances in music and speech, and we’ve even done on-location reports from national quiz bowl. We hope to continue covering lots of Garrigan success stories well into the future.

You can read every “Bear Facts” script since 1998 on the Garrigan student website: bggoldenbears.org. Also archived there are recordings of every show we’ve broadcast since 2006, as well as a handful of special earlier episodes. So if you miss the show one week or you want to take a trip through school history, you can find us online at bggoldenbears.org.

Last Tuesday we had the awards ceremony for the recent Garrigan calendar drive. This year’s sales tied past records. We sold 2,381 calendars. After expenses and prizes, that will allow a contribution of more than $40,000 to the school’s transportation budget. We bought a bus this past year, and we’ve updated a number of other vehicles in recent years.

Abbie Capesius got credit for being this year’s top seller, with 148 calendars sold. Others at the top of the list were Riley Rosenmeyer, Amanda Thilges, Mackenzie Meister, Talia Book, Owen Murphy, Sam Trainer, Megan Bronk, Colby Grraves, John Capesius, Whitney Hovey, and Jackson Rosenmeyer. Thanks to everyone who helped out—buying or selling—with this year’s calendar drive!

The Solid Gold Marching Band took first place honors in both the parade and field competitions at last weekend’s Algona Band Day. They’re hoping to continue that success today as they compete in the state marching band contest down in Ft. Dodge. Miss Katherine Simpson is in charge of the band, and this year’s drum majors are seniors Caitlin Thilges and Gianna Byrkeland.

This week’s Senior Spotlight for Episode 1000 shines on Whitney Hovey. Here with the scoop on her is Ben Degen.

Whitney Hovey has lettered in volleyball, softball, and basketball, and she’s also a National Honor Society member. She’s also in Christian Leadership, she announces here on the “Bear Facts”, and she’s done lots of service projects in the school and community. Whitney works at the Market in Algona. She’ll be off to college next year, and she plans to pursue a career in nursing. Good luck, Whitney!

On this week’s Golden Bear calendar, the band will be competing today at the state marching contest in Ft. Dodge. Also today is the Real Men Sing event at Wartburg College in Waverly.

Tomorrow Bishop Nickless will be in town for the confirmation mass for area students. Monday is the state math conference in Des Moines, and Garrigan teacher David Burrow will be receiving a special award.

Also on Monday there’s cross-country at Forest City, and the JV football team will be hosting North Union. Tuesday area schools will do service projects as part of Giving Back Day, and that night the volleyball team plays at Humboldt.

Students from St. Mary’s in Humboldt will be attending our student mass on Wednesday. Juniors will take the PSAT that day. We’ll dismiss early, and that night there’s a special faith formation inservice for the Garrigan staff.

Next Thursday the sophomores will participate in the Wildhaven Field Day. The cross-country team runs that night in the Top of Iowa Conference meet at NIACC in Mason City. Then on Friday the football team travels to Hartley Melvin Sanborn.

That’s our 1,000th “Bear Facts”. Thanks for joining us, and be sure to tune in again next week for more news from Bishop Garrigan High School.