News for those who live, work and play in North Santiam Canyon
By Mary Owen
Did you know that only 140 of Stayton High School’s 800 students can sit in the cafeteria at one time? So where do the others eat?
“Check out the hallways, the auditorium foyer, outside along the wall, and on the stairway to the upper science classrooms,” said Superintendent Jack Adams. “That’s where you’ll find them.”
As a new mom, Michelle Armstrong found so many poorly made, high-priced baby-and-mommy items that she decided she needed to do something about it.
Armstrong joined with her sister, Christina McDaniel of Scio, to open Mango & Mint, an Internet business.
“I wasted my money on so many things and when I looked at the products, I knew I could make them with the high quality I expected,” said Armstrong, a trained doula and self-taught seamstress from Virginia. For her own handmade items, “The price was fair, with beautiful fabrics, and I knew other mothers would want those as well.”
We are often told, if we are in the habit of getting our news from the television set, that the news they are presently reporting will be updated in the next half-hour or so.
Years ago in L.A., I used to see this phenomenon in the newspapers sold downtown. Many a commuter bought the same paper that was delivered to his house every day because he could see a special edition being sold with large headlines of very recent news. There would be a half-dozen editions a day, which meant the presses were always rolling and the front pages always changing.
My best friend in the world is one of the coolest people I’ve ever known. She’s super smart, super fun, really considerate and a great cook.
She’s been all over the world and is never afraid to venture into the unknown.
Author Jane Kirkpatrick has a grasp of how to blend Oregon’s history with fiction that grabs the interest of readers.
More than 50 people came out in June to hear Kirkpatrick talk about the power of stories in everyday life as part of the Stayton Public Library’s seniors program, said librarian Pam Pugsley. The popular author also talked about living and ranching in Eastern Oregon, Pugsley said.
“Jane is a superior speaker,” she added. “I’m still getting comments on how good the talk was.”
Who’s it going to be?
By the time the Democrats meet for their national convention in Denver at the end of this month, and the Republicans meet in Minneapolis during the first part of September; speculation over who Barack Obama and John McCain will choose as running mates will have reached a crescendo.
Will it be some young up-and-comer or some old-line party operative? Will it be a breath of fresh air or the same-old same-old, as they say in politics?
At the Stayton Relay for Life on July 11, Peggy Wilson walked the survivor lap, ate a burger, and then joined teammates for another hour around the Regis High School track.
“Everyone was so energetic,” said Wilson, a cancer-survivor with the Stayton Cooperative Telephone Company team.
Wilson’s team was the top money-raising team for the third consecutive year, earning more than $7,000 for the American Cancer Association, a nationwide community-based voluntary health organization dedicated to eliminating cancer.
To me, before I began searching my family roots, my great-great-grandfather, Charles “Charley” Herb, was just another name on a tombstone. One of his grandsons remembered hearing that “he was sick a lot.” My dad, Charley’s great-grandson, never heard even that much.
Then a cousin located and shared statistics of Charley’s military service.
In 1862, 17-year old Private Charles Herb enlisted in Company D, 21st Wisconsin Volunteers. A veteran of three major Civil War battles, he was shot in the leg and face and taken prisoner at Chickamauga, then endured 17 months and five days in various Southern prisons.
Thurman Smith is one lucky dog!
“That’s what they called me when I came close to being bombed out of the air,” said Smith, a 90-year-old veteran of three wars with the U.S. Army Air Corps, which became the U.S. Air Force after World War II.
Smith, who has lived in Lyons for the past 35 years, still has plenty of stories to tell about his fighting days, his love of horses and his childhood on his family’s northeast Texas farm.
With gas topping $4 a gallon, the local bus system is bursting with new riders.
“We have been picking up regularly,” said Frank Brown, interim road supervisor for Chemeketa Area Regional Transportation System, also known as CARTS.
Brown said April statistics showed ridership up throughout CARTS’ service area by 18 percent, an amount he expects to jump another 3 percent with the next count.