Caden Clark has called Chad Greenway a “big brother” and an “uncle.”
What role the former Vikings linebacker actually plays to the Loons midfielder is mentor — someone 20 years his senior who can help guide the 20-year-old soccer player through the ups and downs of professional sports.
Greenway’s thoughtful, probing and consistent approach has helped Clark over the past few years. “I’ve tried to offer him as much perspective as I could,” the 10-year NFL veteran told the Pioneer Press this winter.
Coming out of Wayzata, Clark was a soccer prodigy, but he hit a rough patch playing in Germany at age 19.
As a toddler, Caden’s hands-on father Chris started training him in the sport, and Caden first played in the Plymouth Soccer Association and Minnesota Thunder Academy. When Minnesota United’s academy didn’t include his age group, Clark joined FC Barcelona’s residency program in Arizona. He then went into MLS with New York Red Bulls and scored a handful of highlight-reel goals before joining UEFA Champions League side RB Leipzig in 2022.
He was still only a teenager.
“Germany was a lot of good, a lot of bad,” Clark shared with the Pioneer Press in January. “The bad wasn’t soccer. Just different cultures. German people are different than we are. The culture, the food, the time change was tough. You don’t see your family. My family would come out once every three months for a week or two.
“It was a hard time and you’re not playing (in games),” Clark continued. “The team is so good. I’m training really well. I was doing really well first two months and had a little back (injury. I) made the bench a couple of times. I was thinking I was going to get my chance. … That didn’t happen. That’s part of football, but I think it’s taught me a lot. Now I’m home, so it’s totally flopped now. I’m just happy to be home.”
Clark signed a two-year contract with MNUFC through 2025, with two club options through 2027. The Loons spent a smaller transfer fee to bring their native son home.
Clark was brought back, in part, by Adrian Heath, the club’s former manager, while new head coach Eric Ramsay is intrigued by what Clark can provide the current team.
“He’s packed a lot in in a short space of time,” Ramsay said of Clark’s resume. “… It’s a lot for him to have taken in. I’m hoping that he has a period of stability in front of him where he can really strip away all the stuff that goes with early exposure, the sort of notoriety on a big scale. And he can get his head down and work and develop. If he does that for a couple of years, then obviously he’s got some really nice raw ingredients. He’s a player that I’m really excited to work with.”
Clark contributed to a crucial goal in his Loons debut, a 2-1 season-opening victory at Austin FC on Feb. 24, and he has started the past three games going into Saturday’s match at Philadelphia Union. It’s Clark’s first consistent minutes in a game since September 2022.
Minnesota United midfielder Caden Clark (37) works against Columbus Crew defender Steven Moreira (31) in the first half of a MLS game at Allianz Field in St. Paul on Saturday, March 2, 2024. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
Ramsay can see how Clark’s spell within a Red Bulls system known for its high-pressing style will carry over to what Ramsay is doing at MNUFC.
“He’s very responsive defensively, he’s very reliable and very good presser,” Ramsay reviewed. “Very coachable, I would say in that sense, and that goes with the territory coming through a system like (Red Bulls). That’s not to take away from his qualities on the ball.
“He’s very direct, he’s very purposeful with how he uses the ball. Naturally there are some areas of his game that I’ve spoken to him about and feel like we can improve and will improve as a consequence of him being involved in this program. I think the base of a really good player is there.”
‘Regenerate his love’
Greenway’s wife Jenni works at Chris and Stacie Clark’s Tiger Fit gym in Minnetonka, and Chad started working out with Chris, a performance coach, midway through his Vikings career in 2011 and continued the sessions for three or four years. Clark said he also trained fellow former Vikings players Adrian Peterson, Kyle Rudolph, Adam Thielen and Jerrick McKinnon as well as a handful of former Timberwolves players.
During that time, Greenway could see Caden’s passion for the game. “The one thing I noticed was just an extremely high work ethic,” Greenway said. “The kid loves soccer, the kid loved to have the ball on his foot. Chris, his dad, trained him hard. But Caden really loved the game. I think it really brought a joy to him.”
Greenway took his daughters to watch Chris train Caden and Caden’s sister Addi, who went on to play college soccer at West Virginia.
“When Caden got a little older and more mature, I really saw how crazy skilled he was, just his ability to manipulate the ball and have it on his foot,” Greenway said. “His ability to juggle and control the ball. … Caden was clearly on that trajectory of just being really, really impressive. It was quite honestly one of the more impressive workouts I’ve ever seen. And at that point, Cade was probably 10, 11, 12 years old, in that range. The things he was doing was just so impressive to me.”
As Greenway has become a mentor to Clark, the 41-year-old had to bend his understanding to reach Clark on his level.
Greenway was 24 when he was drafted into the NFL in the first round out of the University of Iowa in 2006. He, of course, never played abroad and didn’t go through the drastically different soccer development landscape.
“I really wanted to challenge him on: What do you want out of this? What are your goals?” Greenway recalled. “If you can understand your goals and what you want to get better at, you can forge a path forward. He really wanted to play, wanted to earn the right to play.”
Clark also wanted to “regenerate his love for the game,” Greenway recalled. So, Greenway’s advice was that being a pro is about more than just playing well.
“There’s got to be more depth to you than that,” Greenway relayed. “You’ve got to be a great teammate, be a great leader and a hard worker. A lot of the things that don’t really take any talent really end up separating you. I think that’s really something that was enlightening to Caden.”
Clark remembers Greenway encouraging him to join RB Leipzig.
“He’s like a big brother or uncle or something; he’s great. He just helped me,” Clark said. “He went through his career and the decisions he had to make. I think that was, like, really cool to see someone similar, maybe not go to Europe, but similar stuff. He just said basically, you’d regret it if you didn’t go, and see what it’s like. Don’t have any regrets. You can always come back home and figure it out.”
Fork in the road
Clark’s story could be completely different if Minnesota United had a full youth academy when the Loons joined MLS in 2017.
Instead, the first phase of the MNUFC development academy focused on boys born from 2004-05. Clark was born in 2003.
The Clarks were upset about how they felt Caden was left out in the cold.
“Obviously, you’re from here, you want to play here,” Clark said. “Who wants to leave home at 13? I left home at 13 (to go the Barcelona academy in Arizona). … You don’t want to leave home. My friends who were (born in 2004), they had an academy for them and they are playing there. It sucked.”
Two years later in 2019, the Clarks met with Heath and MNUFC owner Bill McGuire. The Loons were exploring signing of Caden but didn’t think he was ready for a first-team contract. And the Loons still didn’t have a developmental team, now MNUFC2, so Clark couldn’t go that route. They suggested Clark sign with Minnesota and play for Forward Madison (Wis.) in the USL, but that was a non-starter for the Clarks. The Loons also couldn’t sign Clark to a homegrown contract because, again, he didn’t meet the prerequisite of having played in its academy.
“We talked our differences,” Chris said about meeting Heath and McGuire. “And kind of came to a very admirable, responsible conclusion. It’s like: ‘Well, we missed one.’ ”
In 2020, the Loons announced Clark’s MLS rights would be traded to New York Red Bulls for $75,000 in General Allocation Money.
The slow initial build-out of MNUFC’s academy (and its lack of a second team a few years later) cost MNUFC a prime success story in Clark. The club has had so few players climb from its academy to MLS, and Clark could have become a poster child and proof of concept for the Loons.
Clark went on to New York where he had eight combined goals and assists with Red Bulls II in USL Championship in 2020, plus two goals in MLS in 2020. He then had four goals and three assists in 1,502 MLS minutes in 2021. Some of his goals made social media highlight reels, twisting the knife for MNUFC.
“The way I came out (at New York) set some expectations,” Clark said. “And then with the announcement of Leipzig, the bar was raised high. But I wouldn’t want it any other way. I think having the expectation is a privilege. … So I hope the pressure is high here as well. And I hope I can deliver that.”
While things didn’t work out at Leipzig, Clark believes he became a smarter player. “If you can change and adapt, you’re golden,” he reflected.
Heath and former Loons technical director Mark Watson did not give up on signing Clark. Heath had advocated for Clark when he didn’t sign with Minnesota and the pair would go out to dinner when Clark was back home. They finalized the move last summer, and Clark joined the team for preseason at the start of January.
Clark’s current run of four consecutive games played is his most consistent stretch in 18 months and his confidence is growing. After the international friendly match against Irish club St. Patrick’s last week, Clark caught up with Greenway and could show his mentor he’s starting to meet his goals.
“This is everything I’ve wanted in the last year,” Clark said. “To be back here, to start some games and hopefully build myself into the team a lot more and be an important player going forward. I think keeping that mentality of you are comfortable in a way: You are home. It’s very good for you, but it also can turn very bad. It’s making sure you stay very focused and keep distractions out of your life. Just showing up every day and act like you have earned nothing. I think that is the perspective he has given me.”
Clark, his girlfriend and his parents were on a walk near Caden’s new place in the North Loop neighborhood of Minneapolis when they ran into Ramsay and new assistant coach Dennis Lawrence this week. Clark said it was good for everyone in his circle to meet each other.
“(Ramsay has) been brilliant, to be honest, probably the favorite manager I’ve worked with,” Clark said Thursday. “Just the details he pays attention to and the style of play he wants to play really suits me. I get to play inverted (winger) and have the freedom to come inside and stay in that tight net. It couldn’t be a better fit for me.”
“Bad things happen, but everything will work out in the end,” Clark said. “I hope to keep giving him and the team 100 percent. And they trust me; I think that is the biggest thing.”
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Louis Gossett Jr., the first Black man to win a supporting actor Oscar and an Emmy winner for his role in the seminal TV miniseries “Roots,” has died. He was 87.
Gossett’s first cousin Neal L. Gossett told The Associated Press that the actor died Thursday night in Santa Monica, California. No cause of death was revealed.
Gossett’s cousin remembered a man who walked with Nelson Mandela and who also was a great joke teller, a relative who faced and fought racism with dignity and humor.
“Never mind the awards, never mind the glitz and glamor, the Rolls-Royces and the big houses in Malibu. It’s about the humanity of the people that he stood for,” his cousin said.
Louis Gossett always thought of his early career as a reverse Cinderella story, with success finding him from an early age and propelling him forward, toward his Academy Award for “An Officer and a Gentleman.”
He earned his first acting credit in his Brooklyn high school’s production of “You Can’t Take It with You” while he was sidelined from the basketball team with an injury.
“I was hooked — and so was my audience,” he wrote in his 2010 memoir “An Actor and a Gentleman.”
His English teacher urged him to go into Manhattan to try out for “Take a Giant Step.” He got the part and made his Broadway debut in 1953 at age 16.
“I knew too little to be nervous,” Gossett wrote. “In retrospect, I should have been scared to death as I walked onto that stage, but I wasn’t.”
Gossett attended New York University on a basketball and drama scholarship. He was soon acting and singing on TV shows hosted by David Susskind, Ed Sullivan, Red Buttons, Merv Griffin, Jack Paar and Steve Allen.
Gossett became friendly with James Dean and studied acting with Marilyn Monroe, Martin Landau and Steve McQueen at an offshoot of the Actors Studio taught by Frank Silvera.
In 1959, Gossett received critical acclaim for his role in the Broadway production of “A Raisin in the Sun” along with Sidney Poitier,Ruby Dee and Diana Sands.
He went on to become a star on Broadway, replacing Billy Daniels in “Golden Boy” with Sammy Davis Jr. in 1964.
Gossett went to Hollywood for the first time in 1961 to make the film version of “A Raisin in the Sun.” He had bitter memories of that trip, staying in a cockroach-infested motel that was one of the few places to allow Black people.
In 1968, he returned to Hollywood for a major role in “Companions in Nightmare,” NBC’s first made-for-TV movie that starred Melvyn Douglas, Anne Baxter and Patrick O’Neal.
This time, Gossett was booked into the Beverly Hills Hotel and Universal Studios had rented him a convertible. Driving back to the hotel after picking up the car, he was stopped by a Los Angeles County sheriff’s officer who ordered him to turn down the radio and put up the car’s roof before letting him go.
Within minutes, he was stopped by eight sheriff’s officers, who had him lean against the car and made him open the trunk while they called the car rental agency before letting him go.
“Though I understood that I had no choice but to put up with this abuse, it was a terrible way to be treated, a humiliating way to feel,” Gossett wrote in his memoir. “I realized this was happening because I was Black and had been showing off with a fancy car — which, in their view, I had no right to be driving.”
After dinner at the hotel, he went for a walk and was stopped a block away by a police officer, who told him he broke a law prohibiting walking around residential Beverly Hills after 9 p.m. Two other officers arrived and Gossett said he was chained to a tree and handcuffed for three hours. He was eventually freed when the original police car returned.
“Now I had come face-to-face with racism, and it was an ugly sight,” he wrote. “But it was not going to destroy me.”
In the late 1990s, Gossett said he was pulled over by police on the Pacific Coast Highway while driving his restored 1986 Rolls Royce Corniche II. The officer told him he looked like someone they were searching for, but the officer recognized Gossett and left.
He founded the Eracism Foundation to help create a world where racism doesn’t exist.
Gossett made a series of guest appearances on such shows as “Bonanza,” “The Rockford Files,” “The Mod Squad,” “McCloud” and a memorable turn with Richard Pryor on “The Partridge Family.”
In August 1969, Gossett had been partying with members of the Mamas and the Papas when they were invited to actor Sharon Tate’s house. He headed home first to shower and change clothes. As he was getting ready to leave, he caught a news flash on TV about Tate’s murder. She and others were killed by Charles Manson’s associates that night.
“There had to be a reason for my escaping this bullet,” he wrote.
Louis Cameron Gossett was born on May 27, 1936, in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn, New York, to Louis Sr., a porter, and Hellen, a nurse. He later added Jr. to his name to honor his father.
Gossett broke through on the small screen as Fiddler in the groundbreaking 1977 miniseries “Roots,” which depicted the atrocities of slavery on TV. The sprawling cast included Ben Vereen, LeVar Burton and John Amos.
Gossett became the third Black Oscar nominee in the supporting actor category in 1983. He won for his performance as the intimidating Marine drill instructor in “An Officer and a Gentleman” opposite Richard Gere and Debra Winger. He also won a Golden Globe for the same role.
“More than anything, it was a huge affirmation of my position as a Black actor,” he wrote in his memoir.
“The Oscar gave me the ability of being able to choose good parts in movies like ‘Enemy Mine,’ ‘Sadat’ and ‘Iron Eagle,’” Gossett said in Dave Karger’s 2024 book “50 Oscar Nights.”
He said his statue was in storage.
“I’m going to donate it to a library so I don’t have to keep an eye on it,” he said in the book. “I need to be free of it.”
Gossett appeared in such TV movies as “The Story of Satchel Paige,” “Backstairs at the White House, “The Josephine Baker Story,” for which he won another Golden Globe, and “Roots Revisited.”
But he said winning an Oscar didn’t change the fact that all his roles were supporting ones.
He played an obstinate patriarch in the 2023 remake of “The Color Purple.”
Gossett struggled with alcohol and cocaine addiction for years after his Oscar win. He went to rehab, where he was diagnosed with toxic mold syndrome, which he attributed to his house in Malibu.
In 2010, Gossett announced he had prostate cancer, which he said was caught in the early stages. In 2020, he was hospitalized with COVID-19.
He also is survived by sons Satie, a producer-director from his second marriage, and Sharron, a chef whom he adopted after seeing the 7-year-old in a TV segment on children in desperate situations. His first cousin is actor Robert Gossett.
Gossett’s first marriage to Hattie Glascoe was annulled. His second, to Christina Mangosing, ended in divorce in 1975 as did his third to actor Cyndi James-Reese in 1992.
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Associated Press journalists Mark Kennedy in New York and Kristin M. Hall in Nashville, Tennessee, contributed reporting.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A measure of inflation that is closely tracked by the Federal Reserve slipped last month in a sign that price pressures continue to ease.
The government reported Friday that prices rose 0.3% from January to February, decelerating from a 0.4% increase the previous month in a potentially encouraging trend for President Joe Biden’s re-election bid. Compared with 12 months earlier, though, prices rose 2.5% in February, up slightly from a 2.4% year-over-year gain in January.
Excluding volatile food and energy costs, last month’s “core” prices suggested lower inflation pressures. These prices rose 0.3% from January to February, down from 0.5% the previous month. And core prices rose just 2.8% from 12 months earlier — the lowest such figure in nearly three years — down from 2.9% in January. Economists consider core prices to be a better gauge of the likely path of future inflation.
Friday’s report showed that a sizable jump in energy prices — up 2.3% — boosted the overall prices of goods by 0.5% in February. By contrast, inflation in services — a vast range of items ranging from hotel rooms and restaurant meals to healthcare and concert tickets — slowed to a 0.3% increase, from a 0.6% rise in January.
The figures also revealed that consumers, whose purchases drive most of the nation’s economic growth, surged 0.8% last month, up from a 0.2% gain in January. Some of that increase, though, reflected higher gasoline prices.
Annual inflation, as measured by the Fed’s preferred gauge, tumbled in 2023 after having peaked at 7.1% in mid-2022. Supply chain bottlenecks eased, reducing the costs of materials, and an influx of job seekers made it easier for employers to keep a lid on wage growth, one of the drivers of inflation.
Still, inflation remains stubbornly above the Fed’s 2% annual target, and opinion surveys have revealed public discontent that high prices are squeezing America’s households despite a sharp pickup in average wages.
The acceleration of inflation began in the spring of 2021 as the economy roared back from the pandemic recession, overwhelming factories, ports and freight yards with orders. In March 2022, the Fed began raising its benchmark interest rate to try to slow borrowing and spending and cool inflation, eventually boosting its rate 11 times to a 23-year high. Those sharply higher rates worked as expected in helping tame inflation.
The jump in borrowing costs for companies and households was also expected, though, to cause widespread layoffs and tip the economy into a recession. That didn’t happen. The economy has grown at a healthy annual rate of 2% or more for six straight quarters. Job growth has been solid. And the unemployment rate has remained below 4% for 25 straight months, the longest such streak since the 1960s.
The combination of easing inflation and sturdy growth and hiring has raised expectations that the Fed will achieve a difficult “soft landing″ — taming inflation without causing a recession. If inflation continues to ease, the Fed will likely begin cutting its key rate in the coming months. Rate cuts would, over time, lead to lower costs for home and auto loans, credit card borrowing and business loans. They might also aid Biden’s re-election prospects.
Michael Pearce, economist at Oxford Economics, said that even a 0.3% January-to-February uptick in consumer prices was probably still too hot for the Fed’s inflation fighters. The central bank has signaled that it expects to cut rates three times this year, and Wall Street investors have been eagerly awaiting the move. Pearce wrote that a June rate cut now looks more likely than the May cut that he and his Oxford colleagues had previously expected.
The Fed tends to favor the inflation gauge that the government issued Friday — the personal consumption expenditures price index — over the better-known consumer price index. The PCE index tries to account for changes in how people shop when inflation jumps. It can capture, for example, when consumers switch from pricier national brands to cheaper store brands.
In general, the PCE index tends to show a lower inflation level than CPI. In part, that’s because rents, which have been high, carry double the weight in the CPI that they do in the PCE.
Friday’s government report showed that Americans’ incomes rose 0.3% in February, down sharply from a 1% gain in January, which had been boosted by once-a-year cost-of-living increases in Social Security and other government benefits.
Our community of diorama artists were at it again this year, creating with Peeps as has been our Easter tradition since 2004.
Yep, 20 years now.
Happy anniversary, Peeple!
“Thank you, Pioneer Press, for offering kids (and adults) a fun and creative way to celebrate the holidays and springtime,” wrote Katherine Englund of Rosemount.
You are welcome!
This year, some of the artists of the 91 dioramas reflected on our lack of winter — except for that weekend in February when the Peeps version of Jessie Diggins went skiing. There was Barbie, modeling a dress created from Peeps; there was a Peeps coronation for His Majesty, King Peep (Charles); Peeps playing peepleball (pickleball) and Peeps at the beach or on vacation; Peeps running a doughnut shop and much more.
Thanks to all of our Peeps who make our contest an annual tradition; it means a lot to us. You can download a participation certificate at the bottom of this article.
Happy Easter!
First place: “Lake Supeepior!”
Sometimes it pays to miss a deadline.
For Stephanie Ratanas King, it is paying (via a $100 gift card) for her diorama of a “Lake Supeepior” camping spot.
“I actually made this last year to enter,” Ratanas King wrote in her submission. “I have always wanted to do this and I got way way into it and making miniature, not-quite-to-Peep scale things. They don’t have arms anyway so I’m sure they have their methods of picking up slightly-too-large-for-them items. Anyway, I got so deep into it last year that I actually MISSED the deadline, so I have been storing this in my basement for the last year for it to show its glory finally.
“Yet still, submitting it at the last minute this year.”
(She made it, though, emailing us her entry before the cutoff.)
The judges love this entry for its Minnesota themes of camping, parks and our great lake.
Ratanas King walked us through her process:
“Lake Supeepior is modeled after one of the cart-in campsites at Temperance River State Park, right on the north shore of Lake Superior,” she wrote. “It’s one of my favorite places, to camp, right on the edge of the lake.”
In the diorama, the Peeps are enjoying their time at the North Shore, just like the person who created this world for them:
Stephanie Ratanas King of St. Paul recreates one of her favorite place to camp, at Temperance River State Park, in “Lake Supeepior!” First place, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Stephanie Ratanas King)
Stephanie Ratanas King of St. Paul recreates one of her favorite place to camp, at Temperance River State Park, in “Lake Supeepior!” First place, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Stephanie Ratanas King)
“My family and I love camping so I included us as Peeps and all the things we like to do: reading, looking for rocks, making SPAMwiches for breakfast!” she wrote. “My Peep son here is into maps so he’s studying the state park map. We also have two dogs, Spooky and Skelly, and they love camping too so they are here as the little bird Peeps. I’m not usually one for the chick Peep form but it works for being Peep pets.
“I replicated our Kodiak canvas tent, and my trusty Coleman water jug. Lake Supeepior water is made with resin and there are a lot of rocks and sand in this diorama so it’s very heavy.”
As judges, we appreciate all the detail work that went into creating this diorama, work that was also fun, fun that illustrates the best of life here in Minnesota.
“I had so much fun making this!” Ratanas King wrote. “I hope it brings people joy!”
You know what else brings joy? Camping! Just do it, people.
Second place: “Just Peep-ing Over”
One of our judges described this contender as “true cinematography.” Even though it’s not a movie — but maybe it should be!
Katherine Rose of St. Paul did manage this diorama like a director, down to the photo’s fuzzy viewpoint, the same view you would get by looking through the peephole of your door to see two Peeps waiting to celebrate Easter with you.
We love how these Peeps are bringing offerings that are classic Midwestern fare:
“Had to include the Midwest deviled eggs (nothing too spicy) too and an (Easter) basket of buns that the peeps are bringing over for dinner,” Rose wrote in her entry.
Her attention to detail is impressive. In her entry, Rose walked us through her process.
Katherine Rose of St. Paul shows how she captured the visual effect of looking through a door’s peephole for her diorama, “Just Peep-ing Over.” Second place, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Katherine Rose)
In this diorama by Katherine Rose of St. Paul, we are looking through a door’s peephole to see two Peeps who are “Just Peep-ing Over” for Easter, with buns and deviled eggs to share. Second place, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Katherine Rose)
“I knew I wanted to make a ‘peep hole’ pun, so I envisioned what a hallway in a Peeps apartment might look like,” she wrote. “The materials I used were a mishmash of ‘art scraps’ including paper, paint, beads, buttons, and clay. I had a great time gathering some of the supplies from the Art Scraps store in St. Paul. It’s the perfect store for any little project.
“With a tiny light from a miniature set, I strung together some beads and buttons to create a sconce light for the hallway that actually lit up.
“To achieve the peep hole effect without relying on a filter, I had a friend stand in a hallway, took photos of them through the peephole and then tried to replicate the perspective. Hope it’s convincing! ”
It is!
“The photo was a bit difficult to get, I had to blur the background a bit to really feature the Peeps but I think you can still read the decoration puns,” Rose wrote.
(Those details include an Easter-themed wreath on a neighbor’s door across the hall that proclaims, “Hoppy Easter.”)
“The fun part is that to fully appreciate the scene, you have to close one eye and peer through the little hole, just like you would with a real peephole,” Rose wrote.
Third place: “Peril on Peep Mountain”
Do you ever stop and realize that you haven’t done anything creative in awhile?
That’s kind of what happened to Matt Peick of Eagan.
Matt Peick, an engineer from Eagan, went all out for his Peeps diorma, including building a frame for a paper blue sky. (Courtesy of Matt Peick)
Matt Peick of Eagan created “Peril on Peep Mountain” with the help of his teenagers and the patience of his wife. Third place, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Matt Peick)
“While sitting in a local café back in mid-February I was taking an inventory of the home improvement and various engineering projects I had on my to-do list, and it occurred to me that not one of these projects contained any redeeming artistic expression,” Peick wrote in his entry. “Fate intervened as I glanced at the pages of the Pioneer Press that an earlier patron had left behind and saw an ad for the Peeps Diorama Contest. ‘Well,’ I thought, ‘there it is then, I had better act quickly before I change my mind.’”
We’re so glad he did.
He started by creating a mountain out of Rice Krispies. Along the way, he pulled his family into the project: His 18-year-old son, Wyatt, helped shape Peick’s storyline (the Grinch saves a Peep dangling off the mountain) while his 20-year-old daughter, Madeline, shaped the Grinch out of modeling chocolate. Most impressively, his wife, Stephanie Peick, agreed to keep the thermostat at 60 degrees to prevent a second avalanche of melting Rice Krispies on Peep Mountain.
It was chilly but … fun! And creative. Exactly what they needed.
“The project got away from us a bit and took on a life of its own for a week,” Peick wrote.
The family fun ended when Peick took the diorama outside and got on a ladder with it. Together, the artist and his art made a run for the summit — the roof — where Peick thought the sky would make a better backdrop for a photo than the paper version he had set up indoors.
You know what happened next, right?
“As I watched Peep Mountain crash back to earth in slow motion from my perch on the ladder, I decided that all the pictures gathered in the kitchen studio were pretty great after all,” Peick wrote.
(Please don’t climb onto roofs with dioramas, Peeple!)
We really enjoyed Peick’s delightful essay on the making of his diorama — as well as Wyatt’s Seuss-like poem — and we think you will, too. Peeple can read it and check out more photos of the mountain making. We hope the saga will inspire you to create something just for fun like this Peep did.
Peep-ager category (ages 13 to 17): “Peep Crocheting”
“Peep Crocheting” by Abby Mewis, 13, of Glenwood City, Wis. Winner of the Peep-ager category of the 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Peder Mewis)
We loved Abby Mewis’ work so much that we were inspired to create a teen category after seeing it. Thanks to Abby’s diorama, future teens can feel inspired to pull out the Peeps and compete with their peers.
This is not the first year that Abby has entered; last year, we were also impressed with her diorama, “Peeps Royal Ballet School.” Actually, we are impressed with all the dioramas that the Mewis family enters!
“As tradition, here is Abby’s 2024 Peep submission,” Abby’s father, Peder Mewis, wrote in an email for this year’s submission. “Abby (13) hails from Glenwood City, Wisconsin. Title: ‘Peep Crocheting.’ Context: Abby is a self-taught crochet enthusiast and was inspired to incorporate her skills into this year’s diorama contest.”
What did we like? Well, the room the bunny is crocheting in has got such a classic feel to it, reminiscent of the room in “Goodnight Moon” — we are sure we will use it as stock Peeps art for years to come. The crocheting is also a nice touch, especially as it represents the trending hobby of handiwork such as crocheting and knitting among today’s teens (our future subscribers!).
Bonus: We also liked the beachy feel of the Mewis’ family entry, “Peep Beach!,” featuring a trip to North Captiva island, “where shelling is extra special!” See the work of the family (Peder, Anna, Abby and Michael) in our online slideshow.
Little Peeple category (ages 7 to 12): “Peeps Skiing at Hip-Hop Hill”
Callan Englund, age 10, of Rosemount, used a recent snowfall to create this diorama, “Peeps Skiing at Hip-Hop Hill.” It is the 2024 Little Peeple winner in the 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Katherine Englund)
As our diorama deadline approached, 10-year-old Callan Englund of Rosemount was still considering what materials to use.
Then, Mother Nature intervened.
It was time for Callan’s Peeps to go skiing!
“His masterpiece came to full fruition hours before the deadline,” wrote Callan’s mother, Katherine Englund. “Finally a scene to help you remember one of Minnesota’s favorite winter pastimes! This delightful image is one that all Minnesotans can identify with, from the huddled chicks waiting to get into the chalet to the adventurous bunnies cruising the hills.”
Bonus: Props also to Callan’s siblings: Garrett, age 6, created a diorama in which Team Yellow faces off with Team Pink in a basketball game while Asher, age 8, details a hockey game between Team Rabbit and Team Chick. See both dioramas in our online slideshow.
Chick category (6 and under): “Kiss Kiss Fish” and “Solar Eclipse” (tie)
We have two winning dioramas in this category, Peeps: “Solar Eclipse” by Gloria Foley, 6, of Mounds View and “Kiss Kiss Fish” by Cecelia Gutzmann, 4, and June Gutzmann, 5, of Bloomington.
Here’s more about each diorama:
“Solar Eclipse”
Gloria Foley, 6, of Mounds View, used the upcoming solar eclipse as a theme for her diorama. It is one of the winners of this year’s Chick category (for children six and under) in the 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest.
One of our judges is a former Girl Scout and, as such, appreciates the initiative shown by this Girl Scout Daisy when it comes to not only creating a diorama related to the coming solar eclipse, but educating others as well.
“Gloria of Mounds View will turn seven on the day of the solar eclipse and this upcoming event has become her passion as shown in the diorama she made for her Girl Scout Daisy troop,” wrote Gloria’s mother, Wendee Foley.
It all started with a troop activity.
“Gloria’s Girl Scout Daisy troop decided to build Peep dioramas from Girl Scout cookie boxes to spark curiosity and creativity while utilizing art scraps and upcycled items,” Foley wrote. “When she heard about the Peeps project from her leaders, she immediately wanted to include the upcoming solar eclipse in her theme. What else would peeps do after Easter?! Well, they’ll be “peeping” at the sun during the total eclipse, obviously! You see, Gloria’s birthday is April 1st, and her birthday wish is to see the total solar eclipse on April 8th, 2024.
“While Minnesota will experience a partial solar eclipse, Gloria will tell you that if you travel just a few states over, you, my friend, can actually see a real total solar eclipse on April 8th! So after several exciting trips to the library, an educational star watch class with (retired) WCCO Radio meteorologist Mike Lynch (our Skywatch columnist!) and lots of searching for facts about the total eclipse online, she has become quite the expert on this celestial event.
“She is educating her entire first-grade class on the 2024 total solar eclipse just days before she goes to see it herself — with her protective eyewear ready, just like her Peeps! She wanted to make sure all the Peep bunnies had solar-safe glasses — so no Peep eyes were injured in the production of this diorama.
“And if you look closely, the bunny Peeps in her recycled cookie box wait patiently in their chairs as the temperature drops, the sky darkens, all shadows cast have a crescent shape and then the moon slowly covers the sun, an awe-inspiring moment of nature for all Peeps in the path of totality!”
“Kiss-Kiss Fish”
Cecelia Gutzmann, 4, left, and June Gutzmann, 5, of Bloomington, created an underwater scene for their diorama that is based on Deborah Diesen’s book, “The Pout-Pout Fish.” It tied as the “Chick” category winner (for children six and under) in the 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Amy Gutzmann.)
OK, we’ll admit it, this cute photo of these two Peeps artists — 4-year-old Cecelia Gutzmann and 5-year-old June Gutzmann — standing by their diorama influenced the judges. We also like their coloring work. And the theme is based on a children’s picture book, which is nice. Finally, we appreciate that they incorporated nature that is meaningful to them into their diorama.
In an email, their mother, Amy Gutzmann, told us more about this diorama:
‘Black Citizenship in the Age of Jim Crow’ opens at Minnesota History Center
“Based on the story ‘The Pout-Pout Fish’ by Deborah Diesen, my girls created an ocean scene when the fish transforms into a Kiss-Kiss Fish: ‘I’m a kiss-kiss fish with a kiss-kiss face for spreading cheery-cherries all over the place!’”
The sisters used a variety of mediums as they worked.
“They enjoyed coloring different sea creatures with Tempera paint sticks and crushing graham crackers for the sand,” Gutzmann wrote. “Seashells were collected from Bush Lake Beach.”
Bonus: Check out our online slideshow to see the diorama of a Gophers vs. Vikings football game that their 7-year-old brother, Gil, created with the neighbor kids.
“They were all pretty excited to use the glue gun,” Gutzmann wrote.
Honorable mentions
Marlis Schmidt of St. Paul made Barbie a dress out of Peeps in “Pretty in Peep: Barbie in the Spotlight.” Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Marlis Schmidt)
“No-Snow Snow Globe ” by Cynthia Kleist of Shoreview, honorable mention in the 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Cynthia Kleist)
This diorama, “Peep Wave” by the Schomburg family and friends, addresses how this winter in the Twin Cities was the warmest on record. Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Photo courtesy of Aaron Schomburg)
Jill Schaefer of Minnetonka offers up her commentary on the 2024 presidential election through “Peep Groundhog Day.” Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Jill Schaefer)
“Roadside Distraction,” a diorama by Teresa Lai of St. Paul, is a wink at that omnipresent billboard by Kris Lindahl of Kris Lindahl Real Estate. Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest.(Courtesy of Teresa Lai)
A group of neighborhood friends from St. Paul — Bridget McGreevy, Deborah Saul, Waverly Booth, Kelli Cox, Shona Docter and Jolene Olson — created “HRH King Charles Peep of Wales.” Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy photo)
A Peep gets sunburned during a “Peepnic”at the Beach by Martha Sohn of St. Paul. (Courtesy of Martha Sohn.)
As usual, there were many standouts. Here are some that the judges liked.
Barbie
While we did not receive any “Oppenheimer” dioramas, we did get a few “Barbie” ones, including this couture confection by Marlis Schmidt of St. Paul.
We asked Schmidt about the making of “Pretty in Peep: Barbie in the Spotlight.”
“I had never bought or eaten a Peeps in my life; for some reason they had eluded me until I moved to Minnesota from Texas,” she replied. ” I didn’t even know they were made of marshmallows. This whimsical Peeps obsession during the Easter season seems to be more of a Midwestern thing — and this year mine.”
Barbie was a natural theme for 2024 after the 2023 movie.
“The Barbie movie rekindled my love for Barbie and it has long been an art muse for me,” Schmidt writes. “I covered one in seeds for the Minnesota State Fair one year. But I really wanted to see if I could make clothes out of Peeps, which wasn’t easy … it was challenging to figure out how to connect these spongy Peeps and keep them all together and in place while working.
At times, Schmidt said, she wished she had “real” seamstress skills. It was only after her masterpiece was complete did she learn the secret of many a Peep artist:
A glue gun!
Next year.
Our missing winter
This diorama, “Peep Wave” by the Schomburg family and friends, addresses how this winter in the Twin Cities was the warmest on record. Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Photo courtesy of Aaron Schomburg)
We recently reported that it was our warmest meteorological winter on record in the Twin Cities. This local weather history was addressed in several dioramas, including “No-Snow Snow Globe” by Cynthia Kleist of Shoreview and “Peep Wave” by the Schomburg family and friends.
The Little Peeple also tackled this topic. One of our favorites showed Peeps looking at the melted ice sculptures in “2024 ‘Winter’ Carnival” by Susannah Jahnke,10, and Arthur Jahnke, 8, of Roseville. In this diorama, an ice palace has been replaced with a sand version (good idea).
Of course, we had some snow this winter — some of it just in time for Afton native Jessie Diggins’ triumph at Loppet Cup, a World Cup cross-country skiing event race that debuted in February at Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis. Our famous athlete crossed the finish line in entries by Patty Kohls of St. Paul and Carol Wiessner of Afton.
We liked Kohls’ entry because you can see all those fall leaves and dead grasses next to a strip of snow, symbolic of our winter that wasn’t. And we appreciate Wiessner’s support of this hometown gal.
“I’ve been entering for a number of years now just for the fun of it and this year at the last minute I changed up what I was originally going to do so I could make a diorama to give Jessie Diggins from Afton a Peep Tribute!” Wiessner wrote. “Our youngest daughter was on the Stillwater Nordic team with her for a year and we’ve been following her amazing Nordic career since. I think what she has done for Nordic skiing (and girls and women athletes in general) has been phenomenal.
“I’m not in this for the ‘big prize money’ (lol). And maybe there are already a few entries re: Jessie, I don’t know? I sure hope she gets a shout out though.”
We are shouting: Go, Jessie!
Entertainment
Entertainment themes ranged from Taylor Swift on stage for “The Eras Tour” and Travis Kelce at the Super Bowl to Prince’s 1991 performance at the Grammys — check them out in our online slideshow.
We were also impressed with recycling efforts showcased in “Peep Busters: Ecto 2.0 Saves the Day” by Michael Mewis, age 10, of Glenwood City, Wis. (brother of Peep-ager winner, Abby Mewis).
“In celebration of the 40th anniversary, Michael’s diorama is to honor the Ghostbusters legendary film franchise,” his father, Peder Mewis, wrote. “Michael used lots of recycled material as well as pipe cleaners, hot glue, air-dry clay and an old plastic truck. He constructed his diorama entirely on his own.”
Estella Shelton’s entry has a subtle message for the judges in the puzzle board. (Courtesy of Ashley Anderson)
Applause also to Estella Shelton, 10, of Inver Grove Heights, for her “Wheel of Fortune” diorama that came with a message for the judges.
“I like watching game shows with my family and trying to shout out the answers, even if I’m wrong!” Estella wrote. “My favorite part was adding hair to my Peeps! I cut some hair off my Barbie and my Nana, it was so funny!! I would like to solve the puzzle … ‘PICK MY PEEPS!!’”
Finally, just like us, Peeps have trouble staying off their devices, even at the beach. In Martha Sohn’s diorama, “The Peeps ‘Peepnic’ at the Beach,” one poor Peep gets sunburned after zoning out with a Corona in one hand and their phone in the other. A cautionary tale!
2024 presidential election
Jill Schaefer of Minnetonka offers up her commentary on the 2024 presidential election through “Peep Groundhog Day.” Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Jill Schaefer)
It’s a U.S. presidential election year, so we did receive a handful of dioramas that provided political commentary on everything from the candidates to hot topics. Jill Schaefer of Minnetonka offered up her perspective on Joe Biden and Donald Trump through the vantage point of “Peep Groundhog Day.”
“Sigh, we are all seeing two shadows this spring … maybe time to retreat to our dens for 6 months with groundhog Peep?” she wrote in her entry.
Interestingly, this groundhog is a Dr. Pepper-flavored Peep; it was the “closest to brown I could find,” Schaefer wrote.
Has Kris Lindahl seen this?
“Roadside Distraction,” a diorama by Teresa Lai of St. Paul, is a wink at that omnipresent billboard by Kris Lindahl of Kris Lindahl Real Estate. Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy of Teresa Lai)
If you have ever driven around the Twin Cities, you’ve probably spotted Kris Lindahl stretching his arms out on billboards.
Teresa Lai of St. Paul sure has as you can see in her diorama, “Roadside Distraction.”
“My diorama was inspired by the omnipresent muse of the Twin Cities: realtor extraordinaire and marketing guru, Kris Lindahl,” Lai wrote. “As someone who has traveled by a road in the metro area, I am haunted day and night by Mr. Lindahl’s outstretched arms and terrifying smile. I transformed his image into Peep form in the hopes that finally, my mind will be freed from his open-palmed command, my house no longer under the threat of his guaranteed cash offer.
“The most challenging part of this piece was being brave enough to walk into the UPS Store and ask them to print off several copies of my modified Kris Lindahl billboard background.”
At press time, Lai told us she remains haunted.
Time to create — together
We love how families and friends use our annual contest as a tradition to get together and create art. This includes Japs Lee and her kids. While 4-year-old Abby Letcher made a “Sprinkle Pool Party” for her Peeps and 7-year-old Jake Letcher embraced a rural theme with “On the Peeps Farm,” their mom has Peeps celebrating another tradition in “Hmong New Year.”
“We enjoy celebrating our cultural background at the Hmong New Year,” Lee wrote.
The Stillwater family also enjoys the process of our newspaper tradition.
“This is our second year and the kids love it!” Lee wrote.
Someone should send this to King Charles
A group of neighborhood friends from St. Paul — Bridget McGreevy, Deborah Saul, Waverly Booth, Kelli Cox, Shona Docter and Jolene Olson — created “HRH King Charles Peep of Wales.” Honorable mention, 2024 Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest. (Courtesy photo)
We love the story behind the creation of “HRH King Charles Peep of Wales.”
(Although Prince William is now the “Peep” of Wales.)
“We are a group of neighborhood friends from St Paul who hang out every week to create art, laugh, and support each other,” Jolene Olson wrote.
“We gathered all of our mothers’ and grandmothers’ old jewelry and fabric to create the costume and fascinators for the grand King Coronation Peep extravaganza,” Olson wrote. “We tore apart our childhood dolls’ outfits to create the clothing for the Queen and King. The King’s mighty cape is made from a vintage doll’s attire. The crowns are articulated from old jewelry. Pieces of jewelry were taken apart and reconstructed for the perfect fascinators and details of attire and crowns. We had a ball doing this!!! Flags were also handmade with love.”
Doughnuts!
Peeps are running a doughnut shop in Kim Spear of St. Paul’s diorama. (Courtesy of Kim Spear)
Photos of past Pioneer Press Peeps Diorama Contest winners and favorites
We love it when our Peeps get into creating the tiniest details for their dioramas, and that was certainly the case for Kim Spear of St. Paul. She sent us photos showing how she baked and “frosted” tiny clay pastries for the doughnut shop her Peeps are running.
“I believe I’ve entered this contest every year except two since it started,” Spears added in her entry. “It’s the highlight of spring!”
