“36 years ago, Jim Thomas and his family were going to leave and go out of town for Thanksgiving, and a snowstorm happened, so they weren’t able to go,” Les Schultz, a current board member of Community Friends, said. 

Thomas and his family decided to stay in town and celebrate with other families in the same predicament. That started the tradition that has now branched into an event that now hosts around 1,300 people every Turkey Day. 

“It grew and it grew and it grew, and now we’re at St. Mary’s, which has the largest church basement in town,” Schultz said.

One significant change that the event has seen is who runs and organizes it. Thomas and Bill Koeckeritz, who helped organize the meal after the first year, decided to step down 11 years ago, opening the path for Schultz and Mary Ellen Schanus to take over.

Lynn Rowley of Searles holds a large butternut squash plant in her garage. The squash stored in her garage will be used for the 35th annual New Ulm Community Friends Thanksgiving Dinner held in 2023.

“We had a board meeting after 25 years,” Schultz said. “And Bill and Jim said, ‘You know, it’s been 25 years, it’s been a good run, but we’re done. We want to do other things, we want to do some traveling, that kind of stuff.’ I was sitting there in the room like, ‘Gosh, I don’t want this to end. This is such a great thing, it’s been so wonderful for our community.’ But I didn’t want to be on the chair by myself. And there sat Mary Ellen Schanus, kind of across from me. I didn’t really know her very well.”

Schultz mentioned to Schanus that he thought it would be great if the event kept going. Schanus agreed but held similar reservations as Schultz.

“Mary Ellen said, ‘My husband told me to not come home as the chair of this event,'” Schultz said.

The two agreed to co-chair the event for the next five years. Now, 11 years later, both are still on the board for Community Friends, along with Josh Luneburg and Andrea Boettger.

Luneburg, along with his mother and father, have helped at the Thanksgiving dinner for over 30 years, always making the mashed potatoes. There are many such volunteers at the event every year, with one family always doing the gravy, another bringing the same dressing, and another that makes cranberry sauce every year. A retired 3M group always prepares the squash, which is planted by a Sentence to Service work crew every spring. Others, like Don Brand, always volunteer to wash dishes.

A large crowd at the 2017 New Ulm Community Friends Thanksgiving Dinner is pictured. Typically, about 1,000 guests are served a Thanksgiving meal

“He was the head dishwasher for like 30 years,” Schultz said. “And then he said, ‘I can’t come any more, I can’t come anymore, I’m too old. I’m 92,’ or something like that. And then here he took a year or two off, and he showed up again last year. It was so fun to see him come back here.”

Everything is made from scratch, and cooking starts the Monday before Thanksgiving to get everything ready for the day. 

“It takes about 130 volunteers to pull this off,” Schultz said. “We start on Monday, the 3M guys come in, and, for as far back as I can remember, they do the squash. Then on Tuesday we start cooking forty-two 24-pound turkeys. We cook 30 turkeys on Tuesday, then we cook the last 12 on Wednesday. We do a lot of heating up, we have about 40 roaster pans full of food.”

Community Friends prepares about 240 takeout meals and 150 delivery meals that get sent to the police department, the sheriff’s department, detox and KNUJ. The rest is served in the basement of St. Mary’s

“We can serve about 260 or so at a time in the church,” Schultz said. “We start serving at 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.”

The event is funded by free-will donations every year, never charging for its meals. Despite that, Schultz said they often see a small profit from the generous donations from those attending.

“People are so generous in this community,” Schultz said. “For the past three years since we’ve taken over, we’ve always turned a bit of a profit. We don’t need to make money, we just need to bring in enough money to put it on the following year.”

With the massive amount of food that the meal requires, Community Friends makes sure to spread out the shopping to different local stores. The turkeys come from Hy-Vee, the butter from AMPI, and other items come from New Ulm Wholesale and Cashwise. Along with the 42 turkeys, volunteers prepare 450 pounds of potatoes, 400 pounds of squash, 125 pies, 1,200 dinner rolls, 60 pounds of dried bread crumbs, 60 pounds of onions, 50 pounds of flour, 50 pounds of sugar, 45 pounds of cranberries, 20 gallons of milk, 2 pounds of powdered sugar for 10 quarts of whipping cream, 3 gallons of canola oil and 70 celery bunches.

One change that recently was enacted was the serving style was changed to buffet style.

“That was since Covid,” Schultz said. “We always used to serve family style, where we’d bring you a platter of turkey and a bowl of mashed potatoes. But since Covid we went buffet style, and what we found is there’s a lot less waste. So we stuck with buffet style even though we thought we’d return to family style. It goes faster and people can take what they want and there’s less waste. That’s really been a benefit, so we’re going to continue to do the buffet style.” 

At each seat every year are colored placemats, which are made by different schools every year. This year, the placemats will be done by the Washington Elementary Kindergarten kids.

“We serve eight people to a table,” Schultz said. “And maybe a couple is here, and you may not know the other people at the table. But everybody will have a cute placemat colored by kids. They put their first name and how old they are, and they’re always so fun.”

Community Friends also switched to paper cups and plates during COVID-19, which they have found reduces time spent on dishes.

The event always needs more volunteers, and this year there has been a squash shortage due to warm weather. Those wishing to volunteer or donate squash can contact Schultz at 507-766-5466 or sign up at SignUpGenius under New Ulm Community Friends.