Sheriff James C. Sulsberger, Clay County Sheriff, announced that the Illinois Sheriffs’ Association is extremely proud to once again be named as a principal sponsor for the annual Illinois Teenage Institute on Substance Abuse.
Illinois Wesleyan University will host this program. The dates are from July 22-26, 2012.
The Illinois Teenage Institute is open to anyone who meets the following qualifications:
Flora Public Library has designated April as Flora Public Library Month.
There will be several activities to celebrate the library and its services. Among the activities will be a raffle for a Kindle Fire, drawings for a free non-resident card and other door prizes, National Library Week from April 8-14, and the launch of the Adopt-A-Book or DVD program.
More information about these and other events will be forthcoming.
During the month of April, Flora Public Library will again be conducting a raffle for a Kindle Fire tablet e-reader. The library will be selling raffle tickets for $1.00 each or 6/$5.00.
United States Army Staff Sergeant Nathan Fair, originally of Louisville, son of Edward Fair and Charlene Lehr; married to Andrea Fair, daughter of Mark and Karen Shehorn; is an Infantry Squad Leader with the 2-508 Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division.
While Nathan is a soldier, and has been for much of the last decade, what might not be so obvious is that he is a singer/songwriter too.
They say that the best songs are written from personal experiences and Fair's "Fallen Soldier" springs from the loss he has experienced during the ongoing Global War on Terror.
On March 18, 1925, a storm like no other took to the sky.
Later known as the Tri-State Tornado, this twister killed 695 people and injured 2,027 in its 219-uninterrupted-mile path of destruction through Missouri, Illinois and Indiana.
Author Angela Mason, 49, of Richland County, was at the Flora Public Library, on Saturday, January 28, to promote and sign her book, “Death Rides the Sky: The Story of the 1925 Tri-State Tornado.”
Christmas cheer began the day after Thanksgiving in Flora with the opening of the Flora Rotary’s annual “Festival of Trees,” held at the Flora Depot in the Community Room.
The Festival was open On Friday, Saturday and Sunday and will be open again this weekend, on Friday and Saturday from noon until 8 p.m.
Also featured is live entertainment, including music from 6 to 7 p.m. on these nights.
September is Library Card Sign-Up Month! Since school has started, September would be an excellent time to visit Flora Public Library to get a library card if you don’t have one or renew a card that is expired!!
Materials that cardholders may check out include bestsellers, popular fiction and non-fiction, children’s books, large-print books, books-on-CD, videos, DVDs, CDs, magazines and newspapers. One privilege that accompanies the card is interlibrary loan service. Materials not available at this library can often be borrowed from one of over 80 other online libraries. Cardholders also get Internet access (with a signed Internet Use Agreement) to the library’s six public Internet computers. Library computers have programs such as Word and Excel too. A new service that your library card provides (with a PIN) is free downloadable e-books, audiobooks, videos and music through OverDrive!
To get a library card, simply come in and fill out an application. Patrons must bring some form of identification, which displays their (or their parent’s if applicant is a child) name and current address, such as a driver’s license or recently postmarked letter. For legal reasons, a parent’s signature is now required for anyone under 18 years of age.
One of the only monuments in the world specifically dedicated to women veterans was unveiled this weekend in Mount Vernon. This monument features statues of two prominent female veterans, Sergeant Molly Pitcher of the Revolutionary War and Major Tammy Duckworth of the Iraq War and was created by Xenia born sculptor Don Morris.
Duckworth, an Army helicopter pilot, was injured after her helicopter was hit by rocket fire, losing both of her legs and injuring her right arm.
Since then, Duckworth established the Intrepid Foundation to help other veterans with debilitating injuries. She was appointed in 2006 to serve as the Illinois Director of Veterans’ Affairs and in 2009, she was tapped by President Obama to serve as the Department of Veterans Affairs Assistant Secretary for Public and Intergovernmental Affairs.
Wabash Telephone Cooperative held its fourteenth annual Directory Cover Photo Contest.
This year WTCI received 110 outstanding photos taken by Wabash Telephone members throughout the nine exchanges. The selection committee viewed all photos and voted on their top 3 favorite photos.
It wasn’t an easy task to pick only three winners, but results were tallied and our three winners were chosen.
ABOUT 150 attendees came to see Yogi Bear at Library Park last week.
Everyone had a great time.
The crowd expressed their excitement about the upcoming movie dates: June 17th :"Daddy Day Care", August 19th "Despicable Me and September 16th TBA.
In 1941, it was Bing Crosby who set out to only work on holidays in the classic movie ‘Holiday Inn.’ Seventy years later Flora’s finest took to the stage in an homage to the various holidays in the 2011 Depot Variety Show, ‘Stocking Stuffers.’
While holidays are a joyful time, this year’s Depot Show started off on a somber note as the Depot Players remembered last year’s leader, Bill Oliver, who passed away suddenly last fall.
“For a while we thought we were lost,” said Jack Thatcher of the loss of Oliver who had directed last years show and was going to write this year’s.
Final rehearsals are underway for this spring’s annual Depot Variety Show, to be performed Friday and Saturday, May 13-14, at Flora High School’s auditorium. Curtain time is 7 p.m. both nights. The script for “Stocking Stuffers” was written by Geff Moyer.
Honored at this year’s show will be retired railroaders who worked over the years at Flora’s historic depot. In fact, several of them have volunteered to work as ticket takers at this year’s show.
Many performers featured in this year’s production are veterans of past shows, but some new faces will join the cast, including three Flora High School students.
This Memorial Day, Flora Public Library will again host displays to pay tribute to and remember veterans of World War II and other wars/conflicts.
The public is invited to submit photos to exhibit during this time. Ideally, photos brought to the library should be scanned copies in frames as space in cases that are locked is limited. Photos are needed by Saturday, May 14, if possible.
Jean McDaniel and Medley Gatewood have worked diligently for several years to get hundreds of Clay County WWII veterans added to the online World War II Memorial Registry. They have completed the project and all known Clay County veterans have been submitted.
This week Geno sears up your favorite succulent cuts in Cook Like A Pro.
We've got tequila steak, pork steak and pork chops with kraut.
Enjoy!
Send us your photos of students dressed up for prom, and we will run some in the newspaper and some at advocatepress.com.
Send with your name and a daytime phone number to editor@advocatepress.com by May 10.
Don Morris, Rock Falls resident, Xenia native and sculptor of the statue of George Rogers Clark in front of Flora’s Old Depot was recently presented with an award for Arts Exemplar from the Illinois Alliance for Art Education.
This was the 28th annual awards ceremony by the Alliance and was held at the Governor’s Executive Mansion in Springfield on March 17, 2011.
The awards are to identify those individuals and organizations in Illinois who have shown excellence in the fine arts areas of visual arts, theater, dance or music.
Morris was presented with the Arts Exemplar Award for Visual Arts, an award for lifetime achievement of more than 20 years, for his work in carving and for his sculptures in both wood and bronze.
This one has been a staple in my home for years. My father is Irish and my mother is Italian. For St Patrick’s Day mom always fixed corned beef and cabbage. Here is my take on it. As you will see, the brine is the key. Enjoy!
Mrs. Jean Pittman hosted the annual Clay City Elementary Christmas Program. Students sang, danced, and played musical instruments to celebrate the holiday spirit.
Gracie Warren was Mrs. Claus; Trenton Buerster was Santa Claus, and Blake Noll was Elfis.
As the B-Jay Travelers boarded the motorcoach for their trip the Myers Theatre in Hillsboro, Ind. they were excited.
For some of them it was their first time to go to this theatre and for those who had been there before it was exciting to be returning to it.
After a short stop in Marshall they arrived at the theatre and were greeted by Donna Myers.
A very merry Christmas has already come to Clay County in the form of the annual festival of trees, put on by the Flora Rotary Club and held at the Flora Depot.
The Festival of Trees allows individuals from the community to design and decorate their own Christmas trees, wreaths and other decorations and have those who see the display vote on which they like best.
This year, there were 29 entries into the Festival. Of these, 20 were trees, eight were wreaths and one was an ornament.
The Flora Public Library has a new way of viewing books, photos and other written items. It’s a ClearView magnifier and with it, the tiniest type can be made huge enough for almost any eye to see.
“It’s very useful, primarily the use is for people with low vision, so if they need to read or have a letter or pictures, they can put it under there and it will magnify it and put it up onto the monitor.”
There are a number of levels of magnification that can be used and, “Different ways of viewing it,” says Corry, “There’s a white print on black option, just regular print, black on white...There’s three different options for ways to view.”
