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Museum Staff. "Lost Cokato: Movie Rental Stores." In The Midst Of Blog. Cokato Historical Society. (March 25, 2023) www.cokatomuseum.org.  Dana Buttenhoff at "Dana's Movies Unlimited, 1984. Photograph is property of the Dassel-Cokato Enterprise Dispatch, used with permission. In the late 1970s, movies were transferred from theatres to homes in Cokato with the invention of a device called the Video Home System (VHS). A black plastic rectangle encasing two white reels wound with magnetic tape, the VHS was projected onto people's televisions using device called a Videocassette Recorder (VCR). The VCR was an innovative system, which allowed a VHS tape to be physically played, rewound, or fast forwarded. There was no jumping from scene to scene like streaming devises allow today. VHS tapes were affected by dust and humidity, and when watched would produce thin lines that would dart across the screen. VHS tapes also had poor audio and fuzzy resolution (at least compared to today's standards). Content on VHS tapes could even be recorded over. In fact, to prevent the risk of someone recording over something important, like your wedding video, there was a special tab on the VHS that had to be removed. As the popularity of VHS tapes and VCRs began to grow in the early 1980s, businesses like Blockbuster emerged in the U.S., providing the public with a variety of movie selections through rental. In Cokato, one of the first movie rental stores was "Dana's Movies Unlimited."1
Mike Worcester, "Lost Cokato: The Cokato Street Fairs." In The Midst Of, Cokato Historical Society (Fall, 1997) vol. 17 no. 4.  Young children trying to eat an apple on a string without the use of their hands. Cokato Street Fair, early 1900s. Early each October, from 1903 to 1915, downtown Cokato was transformed from a retail center into a thriving street fair. People came from miles around to see carnival entertainment, play games, and see huge displays of farm crops and home crafts.
Revised Version: Mike Worcester, "The Silent Policeman." In The Midst Of, Cokato Historical Society (Winter, 1997) vol. 17 no. 1.  By the early 1902s, Cokato had become a village full of automobiles. The recently completed Glacial Highway 10 (now Highway 12) had given area car owners a way to travel further than ever before. And while trains were still the main mode of transport, cars were here to stay.
But with these cars came new problems for city leaders. Parking difficulties, horse owners complaining about the new-fangled machines scaring their animals, and excessive speed, were just some of the hazards that arose. Of particular concern was proper etiquette for cars at intersections. While city ordinances specified that all cars must keep to the right of center and six miles per hour was the maximum speed allowed while making a turn, close calls and fender-benders abounded. |
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