Profiling the Minnesota Legislature: Sen. Paul Koering.

Byline: Todd Messelt

For much of his life, Sen. Paul Koering, R-Fort Ripley, has been a dyed-in-the-wool entrepreneur. As a teenager just out of high school, he worked at a horseracing track in Florida. A short while later, he moved back to Minnesota, bought some cows and started a dairy farm. He quit farming after 16 years and has since owned and operated a liquor store and today owns a business that provides hearses and drivers to funeral homes. Koering, 47, is also one of only five Minnesota state senators without a college degree. But he's been through the "school of hard knocks" -- especially since he began pursuing a life in politics in the mid-1990s. "I think it's important for people to know how hard I worked to get here," he says. In 1996, he knocked on more than 16,000 doors in an effort to unseat incumbent DFLer Don Samuelson, who had held the seat for 20 years after serving 12 years in the House. But Koering lost…