The Walnut Tree Rosary Story

By Virginia Vaplon Goerger

On November 12^th 1907 Frank Vaplon and Ida Fischer were the first couple to be married in the new St. Boniface Catholic Church of Lidgerwood. They lived on a farm NW of Lidgerwood by Grass Lake in Grant Township. Frank planted a tree line around the farmstead and some special trees closer the house area. One of the special trees was a walnut tree. These trees were especially important to son Conrad, who helped his Father plant the trees.

In July 1, 1924 Frank died of Tuberculosis and leaving a young family of five. The youngest child was Anne (Breker) at age two and the oldest child was Lawrence at the age of fifteen. The family had just moved into the new home Frank bad built in 1919 for his family. As the family struggled during the dry 1930's to keep the trees alive, they would carry many pails of water to them. It was quite a task because the well in the center of the farm yard was a long way from the tree grove. Conrad felt an importance to keep the trees alive as he and his Rather had planted them together.

Conrad Vaplon and Irene Gully married in St. Boniface Catholic Church on October 2^nd 1939. They took over the farm to raise their family. Conrad loved trees and added rows of evergreens and ash and elm trees to the interior area of the tree grove in 1946. Virginia was the oldest of six helped her Father plant these trees. Virginia would spend many hours hoeing and caring for the trees and developed a love of trees. As the new trees grew larger and the old trees got weaker, Conrad and Virginia would replace them.

In the fall of 1950 the walnut tree that Grandpa Frank planted had looked very poor. It had produced a large crop of walnuts and Conrad worried it would die soon. They picked up the walnuts and later that fall planted them between

evergreens in the lower area of the inner tree grove. The following Spring Conrad and daughter Virginia had checked the planted nuts. They were so surprised each nut sprouted and started to grow. As they watched them grow taller and closer together, Conrad became very concern that he would lose the trees. In the fall of 1959 he cut out the trees to make room for the walnut trees left to grow well. The walnut wood was stored in the shed to be used for something special.

Lawrence Vaplon and his son Paul had gotten some new wood working saws. In the winter of 1961 in preparation for the Lidgerwood 75^th anniversary, Irene Vaplon, president of the St. Boniface Christian Mothers, had gotten the idea to

make a rosary from the walnut trees. The rosary was to be large and used on the St. Boniface Church float with the first Communion Class of Helen Vaplon, Loretta Vaplon, David Breker, Shirley Prachal, Steve Ehli, and Betty Podliska holding the rosary on float.

Lawrence, Conrad and Paul worked many hours in the winter of 1961 making the rosary and finishing it for the float. Their cousin Elizabeth Vaplon Garad was asked to design and handcrafted the center tin medallion. The rosary was used for several year floats following 1961 for St. Boniface Church.

In 1981 the rosary was given to Virginia Vaplon Goerger to decorate the reception area for her daughter Ida and Jeff Volesky wedding. The Most Rev. Bishop Justin Driscoll of Fargo was the minister of the wedding and gave the rosary a special blessing on June 13^, 1981.

The rosary was used as a special symbol of the month of the rosary in May and October to pray the rosary from 1981-2006 at the St. John the Baptist Catholic Church of Wyndmere.

On the 100^th anniversary of St. Boniface Catholic Church in November 2006, the rosary was donated back by Virginia Vaplon Goerger as a symbol of faith and craftsmanship of the Vaplon Family to the new St. Boniface Church.