Well, this week Friday and Saturday during the Rockin’ The Park celebration in the Cloud you can get a bit of guidance and take the ride between the Rotary Park launching area and the inimitable flowing well. It’s a great way to spend an hour  or so basking in the beauty of June before maybe taking some time to check out the action at the Park.
And as a huge bonus the aforementioned Charles Chandler as well as the equally watercraft wise  Dianne Taylor Chandler will be your guides for the 10am and noon departures to help make the ride a memorable one. 
Grab your kayak and come join the fun on the White. If it’s your first time you’ll not be disappointed.
If you’ve already been down this scintillating stretch?
We needn’t say another word.
For more info….
https://www.nearnorthnow.com/features-and-fun/is-this-wheatland-no-its-white-cloud

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​“Independent Bank believes in giving back to the community and investing in it’s future leaders,” said Rhonda Buter AVP Bank Manager.”These programs are a fun, interactive way for us to help educate students about the importance of money and how to set themselves up for success.”
“Programs like Teach Kids to Save are designed to help inform students about finances; the importance of savings, how interest works and, properly managing their funds. Students are also encouraged to share what they learned with their families and to establish a savings account to start working toward their savings goals.”
We asked Ms. Buter how the lessons have been received from the kids schools and parents.
“The schools are incredibly welcoming and accommodating; often changing their lesson plans to incorporate our presentations.  Kids have been excited to explain how they earn money and what they are saving for. They are often astonished to hear how they can come into the bank, open an account, and do transactions just like adults can.  Parents are incredibly responsive; bringing their child into the bank to see their “what are you saving for” colored picture that is displayed, asking additional questions and thanking us for taking the time to talk at the schools.”
The ‘What are you saving for?” colored pages have filled the walls of the Newaygo branch and the winner of the random drawing, Addison Elder was honored with a visit to the classroom  by IB’s eagle-eyed (and finely feathered) mascot Swift who flew in to help present Addison with a $25 deposit certificate.
Kudos to Independent Bank for providing this money management initiative and double kudos to Swift who braved the day’s boiling temperatures while fully feathered and managed to maintain his legendary good humor.

​Story and photos by Charles Chandler

In the retail world, there are establishments called anchor stores.  The places guaranteed to bring shoppers to downtown or to those trendy urban shopping areas.  They are the ones that we depend on being open when we want to buy certain brands or items or just browse to see the latest stuff.  In smaller cities like White Cloud, those stores are more than a retail venue and can be a vital anchor for the community. Such is Rosenberg’s Hardware.  
On November 15th, 1900, Mr. George Robert Rosenberg purchased the Hardware Store from Mr. A. Q. Adams. A good day it was because a wonderful family made White Cloud their permanent home and now, 118 years later, Rosenberg’s Hardware is still a shopping destination.
During the depression, the Store came close to folding, however, the people of White Cloud were determined to not let that happen and scraped together enough to pay the property tax to help the Rosenberg’s keep the doors open.  Today the store has about 1200 feet of floor space, an incredible inventory, and a well-stocked tool and equipment rental section. The faithful have a saying that “if you can’t find it in Rosenberg’s then you didn’t need it anyway.”
The store is currently operated by Bob Rosenberg, son Eric, and with occasional assistance from his Grandson Isaac. His primary job is to oversee the activities of Susie the familiar English setter that often can be found napping behind the service counter.  The Store is open seven days a week and customers are served by a staff of 14 and most with roughly 25 to 30 years of service. These 14 helpful folks can only be described as the Store family.
If the Store and the Rosenberg’s are the anchors in White Cloud then the staff is certainly the links in that anchor chain.  Staff members like Burt Jackson, Pat, and Jeanette are unbelievably dedicated to the customers and the Store. When asked why he has stayed with Rosenberg’s for almost 40 years Burt Jackson replied “I like working here, it is interesting work and I like helping our customers.”
The next question was predictable, ‘Burt are the fish biting?’

I asked Bob how the Rosenberg’s had been able to stay in business for all these years and compete with the big box stores in nearby Fremont and Big Rapids.  I mentioned that most American Companies and many countries have not lasted as long as Rosenberg’s Hardware. His answer was surprisingly simple, “it is stocking items that customers need and the consistently friendly and professional service that our employees provide.  The good Lord just keeps bringing us wonderful people to help run the Store. As for competition, we will always have that, first, it was Sears, then Kmart, then Wal-Mart and now Amazon. We don’t chase price points with these big box stores because they will drop their prices on certain items for a week or so and then the price will creep back up to about where we are on the same items. Asked about his future strategy, (with a smile and quick laugh) he said well Eric is here now and putting in over 40 hours a week, and Grandson Isaac is out there running around somewhere and we will keep doing what we are doing now and hope our customers keep shopping with us.” 
A couple days after the photo I was back in the store for bar oil for the chainsaw and asked a familiar customer if he thought Rosenberg’s was an anchor store?  He said something like, I don’t know much about anchor stores, but I shop here because they are always open, have what I need and I like the people I meet here. 
That depression era change we invested with you guys really paid off and we in the Cloud do appreciate the Rosenberg Family and the Hardware Store even if we don’t say it very often.
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Retired Gerber Memorial physician shares a glimpse of hospital in first half of its century
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Jess DeYoung, MD, helped moms relieve pain during childbirth not with epidurals, but with nitrous oxide. “Laughing gas,” the 93-year-old retired general practice doctor explains. “You know they’d had enough when their arm would fall to the side and cut off the supply. Things were a lot simpler then.”
“Then” was the 1950s.
“Simpler” meant doctors used a stethoscope to find the baby’s heartbeat, and check mom and baby’s wellbeing by the color of the blood. Ultrasound machines used for diagnostic imaging wouldn’t appear in U.S. hospitals until the mid-1960s.
And as a general practitioner in Fremont, DeYoung performed a range of surgeries, from C-sections and hysterectomies to the removal of gall bladders, tonsils and varicose veins.
“We did everything,” he says. “We referred very little. We set fractures, we did surgeries, we delivered babies. That was normal for its day.”
When DeYoung began working at what was then called Gerber Memorial Hospital in 1954, the world was, in many ways, a smaller place. DeYoung was born on his 20-cow family dairy about 5 miles outside Fremont in Newaygo County.
“The best place to grow up is on a farm,” DeYoung recalls. “Any place where you have to work hard is a good place to grow up.”
After graduating from Fremont High School and working on the farm for four years, DeYoung went to the University of Michigan and graduated with his medical degree in 1953. He returned to Fremont because, as he puts it, coming home provided the “stream of last resistance.” He’d become acquainted with Brooker Masters, MD, who ran a general medical practice in town. (Masters needed a partner and talked DeYoung into coming back. Masters also became the hospital chief of staff and the official masters of ceremonies when Gerber Memorial unveiled its new $700,000 hospital in 1954 on what is now its current location on Sullivan Street in Fremont.)
DeYoung recalls the area had about five doctors when he started. They had privileges at Gerber Memorial, what would become Spectrum Health Gerber Memorial, as it’s now called in 2018, 100 years after the hospital itself was born as a philanthropic gift in 1918 from the children of Joseph and Agnes Gerber of the Gerber baby food family fame. 
When DeYoung began working at Gerber Memorial, doctors would be informally screened during their first year. At the end of that year, the rest of the staff – from administrator and nurses to the part-time janitor – would vote on whether the doctor stayed or, using a 21st-century pop culture metaphor, got kicked off the island.
DeYoung stayed, for another 35 years.

​DeYoung marvels at how the medical profession has evolved in his 35-year career at Gerber Memorial – especially the cost of care.
In the 1950s, a doctor’s visit was $3.
“Didn’t matter whether you stayed for 2 minutes of 2 hours talking to the doctor, it was $3,” he says. That’s the equivalent of about $28 today.
Surgery for appendicitis, $150, and that included a 1-week stay at the hospital to recuperate. Baby deliveries were $75, also inclusive of a week-long stay at the hospital – equal to around $700 today.
While costs for similar medical services today may vary depending on the patient, they are considerably higher, even adjusted for inflation.
After retiring in 1989, DeYoung took a refurbished motor home that was converted into a doctor’s office, and roamed the countryside around Newaygo County. He swung by Holton, Bitely and Croton. He’d park by the local fire station or the school, and wait for patients who didn’t have the time or the means to get to the nearest clinic or the hospital itself. They got their blood pressure screened and underwent a basic checkup. A fridge in the motor home held injections and vaccines. The patients almost always paid in cash. DeYoung says the idea was to bring healthcare to rural communities, something the modern incarnation of Gerber Memorial still does to this day, hosting health screenings in hard-to-get communities served by one road in, one road out.
In retirement, DeYoung plays a lot of Sudoku and tinkers around on his iPad, when he’s not spending time with his four children, 13 grand kids and 5 great-grandchildren.
DeYoung is grateful for his career in medicine, and considers himself fortunate to have been able to serve so many people over a 35-year career in a community that has always been home to him.
Describing his decision to drive the motor home around rural Newaygo County, parking at fire stations and waiting for patients to walk in for a blood pressure screening, well past his official retirement, DeYoung says: “If you do something you like to do, do it till you die.”
NOTE: As Spectrum Health Gerber Memorial turns 100 this year, please share any photos or memories, by emailingSHGMinfo@spectrumhealth.org.