Inside Track: Retiring to focus on labors of love

George Dahlman and Bill Hutmacher were working-class kids who did well in the business world. Now, they are giving retirement a good name.

Dahlman, 62, who grew up on a Minnesota farm and majored in math at Augsburg College, retired from Piper Jaffray in January after 20 years as an award-winning agribusiness analyst and nearly a decade as co-head of investment research at the middle-market investment bank.

"My work ethic came from growing up on a farm north of Cokato," Dahlman said. "It took me years to get over feeling guilty about a meeting at 5 p.m. instead of heading to the dairy barn for chores."

Dahlman never looked back after his financial adviser last year told him and his wife, Jan, that, with the kids grown and gone, they could afford to retire.

"Retirement simply means that I can take expanded roles in my church and community," Dahlman said. "I head up the Global Mission Ministry Team at Faith Lutheran Church in Coon Rapids. I work with the Lutheran Church of Costa Rica as teams travel there annually for cooperative education and work projects."

They also have a partnership with St. Paul's Lutheran, a Latino congregation in south Minneapolis where they work on vacation Bible school programs, neighborhood gardening, and building repair projects.

"A third ministry is Fair Trade Markets, which sells fair trade coffee, chocolate bars, tea, olive oil and soup mixes. We also work to educate our members about what 'fair trade' means to the farmers.

"Our newest ministry … helps people understand the importance of stewardship of our environment. We plant … three-foot-square 'gardens' to give 'wannabe' urban gardeners ideas on growing gardens in limited spaces."

Dahlman spends Wednesday afternoons at Risen Christ Catholic School, which serves working-poor kids in south Minneapolis, tutoring in math.

Most Thursdays, you'll find him at Faith Lutheran with the FROGS (Faith's Retired Old Geezers), working on a service project or preparing suppers. On Friday mornings, FROGS clean the offices and warehouse at Global Health Ministries in Fridley.

"The joy of working with people is embedded in my DNA," Dahlman said. "My father was Sunday School superintendent in our country church for nearly 50 years."

Dahlman's next ambitions include learning Spanish and teaching in the business department of a college.

"Retirement also has allowed me to … get a book read in a week. And my bike gets more use. My 'bucket list' also includes more fishing."

Hutmacher, 67, the majority owner of Sugar Loaf Ford in Winona, Minn., started out working for Chrysler 45 years ago.

He's a classic overachiever who nearly died of a heart attack while playing racquetball in 1989. He was preparing to die of a progressively worse, congenital heart problem at the Mayo Clinic in January 2010.

"I was six hours from being weaned off drugs and being sent home to die," Hutmacher recalled. "Then one of my doctors came in and said that they had an incredible, unusual set of circumstances, and that a heart had become available. Two hours later I was in the operating room."

Hutmacher's donor was Carol Conklin, 51, a Wisconsin lawyer and judicial candidate who was stricken by an aneurysm and died before she reached Mayo.

Last weekend, Hutmacher hosted the Conklin family in Winona -- also the scene of his first fundraiser for organ donations, a new-found focus for Hutmacher. The event included a motorcycle rally. "Brian, Carol's husband, came down here and rode in the lead vehicle and our families spent time together," Hutmacher said. "He was so appreciative. His daughter, Danielle, said, 'My mom would have been so proud to know that you had received her heart.' It was very emotional for me. And for them."

Hutmacher spends three or four hours a day on a dealership business, which his son-in-law manages.

"It's a labor of love," he confided. "But my mission is 'What can I possibly do to give back?' I'm just going to do what I can do to promote donor awareness."

Hutmacher's favorite website: www.donatelifemidwest.org/mn/

What do iconic Ingebretsen's, Warners' Stellian, Electric Fetus, First Tech, Bibelot Shops and Midwest Mountaineering have in common?

They are charter members of the MetroIBA, an association of local, independently owned small businesses who are using the July 4th holiday and entire month to celebrate their "Independents." More information is at www.metroiba.org.

These and dozens of sister businesses are offering special deals and gift-card drawings to call attention to their shops and promote their view that a buck spent at local, independent businesses, on average, generates more than three times the economic bang of one spent at a chain operation.