Donoso’s prize winds up in museum, others at Star Eagle
(Editor’s note: Part seven of a seven-part series about local, area, and state amateur and professional boxing.)
By RODNEY HATLE
Contributing Writer
Raul Donoso’s Upper Midwest Golden Gloves Welterweight Champion trophy was found a few years ago as part of several dozen NRHS overflow awards stored in boxes at NRHEG High School and passed on to the historical society by Dennis Prescher.
It’s now on display at the Minnesota State Public School Orphanage Museum in Owatonna. Harvey Ronglien was informed of the discovery and, being in touch with Rev. Raul J. Donoso in Washington state, he spread the news.
Ronglien participates in the well-being of the museum, especially located in a building which is one of many that houses Owatonna city government and other activities at West Hills Circle. Contents of the displays tell the story of a place where his and Donoso’s formative years were spent.
“Originally housed on 160 acres, the grounds grew to 329 acres by 1937 with 42 acres for campus and 287 for cultivation to feed all the livestock, and fruits/vegetables for its inhabitants.” (www.orphanagemuseum.com)
When New Richland High School combined with Hartland in 1953-54, the school district didn’t require a new designation number. But when Ellendale-Geneva entered in further combination in 1992, the result is School District 2168, NRHEG. As such, new colors and a mascot name were adopted. And a new athletics trophy collection was begun.The boxing prize that Donoso hadn’t taken with him when he graduated in 1948 was among the old which remained. It had been in the 10-feet long, floor-to-ceiling glass display case at the entrance to the first gymnasium which was replaced in 1955 by the present one. That huge glass case had been made to show a collection of nature.
With that wildlife collection were very few sports trophies, the first of which was 1938 for basketball. Then were added a few in football and basketball for the great Cardinal teams up to 1945-46 which was when the Gopher Conference formed.
In those decades athletic trophies at any high school were not plentiful. The traditional three sports were football, basketball, and baseball. With the additions of wrestling and track in the early 1950s, more could be won by more participants.
The series of excellent Cardinal football and basketball teams for half a dozen years from the early 1950s to 1957 also included awards for baseball and track. Eventually, a few years of great cross-country runners would add the new taller kinds of trophies.
Girls of New Richland-Hartland High School were winning trophiess after Title IX finally got around to awarding them the athletic opportunities starting in the early 1970s.
This was previous to the wonderful girls’ basketball teams that won 62 straight and two consecutive Class AA Minnesota State Championships in three tries during 2012 through 2014 as New Richland-Hartland-Ellendale-Geneva Panthers. Previous to that, in 2003, the girls were awarded the Sportsmanship Award at the state tourney.
The Competitive Cheerleading squad has also taken consecutive state titles.
These trophies are dominant in the present display cases. The current gymnasium lobby now contains only the awards won as NRHEG since the early 1990s.
Previous to being NRHEG, two talented and powerful football teams of the late 1970s came home as NRHS was Minnesota state champion in Class C and Class B. These trophies and others are housed in the Star Eagle office in New Richland in a case donated by the late Herb Prescher.
It should be made clear that the original 10-foot-long, floor-to-ceiling glass case where the first athletic awards of the 1930s, ‘40s, and early ‘50s were displayed was originally built for a collection of stuffed birds and small animals which spread top to bottom and side to side.
Those beautiful but deteriorating representations of wild creatures competed for a viewer’s attention. They surrounded the few short but well-crafted wood and plastic athletic trophies with metal figurines.
Donoso’s boxing statuette was there, where he let it remain.
Now, with a summarized story of his 1948 successes, Raul Donoso’s trophy is on display in the State School Museum at West Hills Circle, Owatonna, “on spacious grounds of the former Minnesota State Public School for Dependent and Neglected Children. The acreage and buildings are on the National Register of Historic Places.” Located here are city government offices and community programs.
Donoso lives in Bellingham, Washington.