BREAKING NEWS
UPDATED AFTER PRINT DEADLINE
Republican Lori Lalouette-Crawford won the 1st District Marion County Commission seat by one vote over independent Craig Dodd, 676 to 675.
Provisional ballots were counted and results certified this morning (Monday) at the county commission meeting.
Marion County voters stood in line at polling places for upwards of two hours Tuesday to cast their ballots. At the end of the night, 58 percent of Marion County’s 7,760 registered voters cast ballots.
“That is very good for us in Marion County,” said Tina Spencer, Marion County Clerk and election officer. “I’m very excited, but I’m upset that people had to wait. I know that’s made it difficult.”
Charges are pending after one Tabor athlete was hospitalized and another suffered minor injuries in incidents 30 minutes apart in and around Hillsboro last week.
Manuel Michael Pineda, 23, a 5-foot-10, 225-pound senior linebacker on the Tabor football team, suffered a severe laceration and loss of consciousness in an altercation shortly after 3 a.m. Oct. 26 at a rental home at 406 S. Ash St. in Hillsboro, according to a police report.
When Ida French closed the doors to her restaurant, Zimmerman’s Deli and Coffee Shop, Friday afternoon, only she and her two employees knew it was for the last time.
French had already reached an agreement by that point with the building’s owner, DuWayne Suffield, and after a weekend of moving, the Main St. storefront was empty by Sunday evening — no more kitchen, no more tables, no more Zimmerman’s.
Faced with a difficult decision at their Halloween meeting, County Commissioners Dan Holub, Roger Fleming, and Randy Dallke were unable to choose between various decorative pumpkins and deferred declaration of a winner to a democratic vote of county employees.
It came in the midst of a three-hour commission meeting Friday, providing for some good fun for county offices and a reprieve from more serious business for the commissioners.
A cunning posse of mechanically-minded youngsters recently cowboyed up and branded Marion-Florence’s FFA chapter onto the nation’s hide by placing eighth overall in an Agricultural Technology and Mechanical Systems Career Development competition.
Marion High School seniors Raleigh Kroupa and Bret Voth made up the younger half of the fab four, while Kansas State freshmen and MHS graduates Clint Kroupa and Nicholas Meyer, who is also Kansas FFA sentinel, rounded out the team’s elder half.
Emergency services dealt with a challenging week of calls, including the familiar effort of dispatchers to find emergency responders amid a shortage of on-call ambulance workers.
Friday afternoon, a 67-year-old woman fell in Florence, but no one with the Florence Fire Department answered the page from dispatch operators.
At least 60 participants attended the No-till on the Plains whirlwind exposition Monday in Marion County. The 501c3 non-profit educational organization promotes the benefits of no-till, a process in which seed is planted directly into soil that has not been disturbed through plowing or disking.
This was the first time No-till on the Plains has been in Marion County. Many national conservation service employees from throughout the state attended the event as a training seminar.
Norma Lee Riggs is 88 and plays the organ at Marion Christian Church two Sundays a month, sometimes three. Riggs, who is unable to use all her fingers when she plays, hopes another, younger organist takes over for her. However, like other organists in the community, she has been waiting for a replacement but none has come.
“If we could find someone, that would be great,” Riggs said. “But that’s the problem. Being 88-years-old, I’m not going to be able to do it much longer. I love to play, though.”
World War II and Korean War veterans were once the mainstay of Veterans of Foreign Wars posts, but their numbers have dwindled to the point that Vietnam-era veterans now make up the majority of VFW membership nationwide.
Marion Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 6958 Quartermaster Bill Keith, a Vietnam War veteran, wants to increase participation in the local post, but faces another battle common to local VFW posts: few Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have shown interest in joining.
The city of Marion drew praise from the county commissioners at a meeting Friday for the city’s implementation of a curbside recycling program, set to begin in January.
“I’m tickled to death,” Commissioner Randy Dallke said. “I’m gonna make a prediction that the city of Marion people will enjoy it, after they get used to it.”
Though it wasn’t the biggest Toy Run in Marion County’s history, 76 motorcycle riders and nine classic cars filled with passengers braved the cold temperature of the open road Saturday to amass over 150 toys for underprivileged children.
One organizer, Mike Sechler, said that in his 21 years helping the event, 120 riders was the largest Toy Run Marion County has ever seen.
Alice Meysing, 84, of Lincolnville died Monday in Hillsboro.
A funeral mass will be 10 a.m. Saturday, with the Rosary preceding the Mass at 9:30 a.m. Interment at Pilsen Cemetery will follow the Mass.
The chickens arrived in early May. They were three weeks old. They had their own chicken coop that they stayed in at night while the skunk slinked by and the coyotes howled.
Ken and Malinda Stuchlik bought the 14 chickens to make eggs. They knew it was a 16- to 18-week cycle before any chickens produced. So for the first few months there was not any expectation of finding eggs.
Marion County farmers — and farmers across the country — are going to have some choices to make before enrolling their various commodities in protection plans.
Farm Service Agency executive director Sara Morrey recently attended a weekend training program to learn about provisions of the 2014 farm bill, which covers American farmers from this year until 2018.
Dennis Klenda of Pilsen has raised hogs since 1970. The 70-year-old is preparing to leave the business by the end of the year.
“I cried when I moved the last batch of weaning pigs from the little concrete floor to the finishing floor,” he said.
Imagine a high school student walking for the first time into a convention center where the population of your entire town could sit in one small section of the arena.
What would you expect from an event in its 87th year, an event that drew 60,000 likeminded strangers to Louisville, Kentucky, from all over the United States into a nexus of agricultural related activities known as the National FFA Convention?
Marion County extension agent Ricky Roberts characterized next year’s wheat crop as “coming up good” and the soybeans as “OK.”
“That’s what we can tell right now,” Roberts said. “For the most part we have enough moisture and the wheat is coming up real good.”
Jane Johnson voted. I cannot describe the song in my heart as I type those words. Shut out by a quirk of Kansas’ voter registration law, a call Friday from the Kansas Secretary of State’s office said the problem was near a solution, and Monday the county clerk’s office confirmed it. Jane’s precious right to vote was restored.
Shortly after our article about Jane’s predicament appeared, she received a phone call. On the line was the same person from the Secretary of State’s office she talked to at the Kansas State Fair in early September, who at the time did little more than apologize for her slipping through the cracks. Suddenly, he was calling to offer assistance. He told Jane someone in his office brought our article to his attention.
ANOTHER DAY IN THE COUNTRY:
Something about those boots
The public is invited to attend a Veterans Day service Tuesday at St. John’s Nepomucene Catholic Church in Pilsen.
A new woodcarving honoring Father Emil Kapaun will be unveiled and dedicated in the church following the 11 a.m. Mass. The woodcarving is sponsored by John Moore of Gallup, New Mexico, and carved by his friend, Mark Chavez. Both men will be present for the ceremony.
Retired professor Max Terman will present his research about the Civil War and his family’s connection to it at Tabor College’s second Lifelong Learning session at 9:45 a.m. Friday in Wohlgemuth Music Education Center.
Terman will mark the war’s 150th anniversary by discussing his two Civil War books, “Hiram’s Honor” and its new sequel, “Hiram’s Hope,” along with images and songs from the era.
The family of Douglas Fisher requests a card shower to honor him on his 60th birthday Nov. 16.
Fisher lived in rural Marion for 30 years and in Hillsboro for 25 years before moving to Newton.
Connie Weber will share recipes and demonstrate techniques for making holiday appetizers and desserts from noon to 1 p.m. Nov. 12 at Marion City Library.
Lunch is included in the $5 cost of the event, reservations for which are being accepted until Friday at (620) 382-2442.
USDA commodities will arrive at Marion County senior centers Nov. 12.
Each site will distribute them according to its own schedule and may not distribute on the same day. Check the local site for a schedule.
Marion VFW Post 6958 Ladies Auxiliary will host a Veterans Day soup supper from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday at the VFW post, 420 W. Santa Fe St.
The public is invited to have supper and visit with war veterans.
BIRTHS:
Claire GoodMEMORIES:
10,
25,
35,
50,
60,
100,
125 years ago
A yet-to-be determined number of Marion Elementary School students will caravan to Wichita Nov. 22 to sing the National Anthem at a Wichita Thunder hockey game, after which they are encouraged to stay and watch the game for free.
Principal Justin Wasmuth announced the news to his faculty first but elected not to inform the entire student body at once to curb any mass displays of excitement.
The traditional Veterans Day program will be at 9 a.m. Tuesday at Centre schools.
The elementary music classes, choir, and band will perform.
Centre High School scholars’ bowl team competed Oct. 28 in the first meet of the season at Salina Central.
Nellie Kassebaum far outpaced her teammates in scoring with 120 points. Other scorers were Ally Basore, 30; Kristin Vinduska, 20; Abigail Svoboda, 10; Brenna Shields, 10; and Carissa Shields, 10.
Centre Parents and Teachers Organization and the wellness committee have planned a Family Fun Night from 6 to 8 p.m. Friday for kindergarten through sixth grade students and their families.
The evening will consist of a “healthy” meal and several fruit and vegetable snack stations. Fitness stations will be set up around the school, where students and parents can complete challenges together.
Marion High School will put on a performance of “Oklahoma!” — a time-honored musical written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II.
Students will take the stage at 7 p.m. Nov. 15 and 2 p.m. Nov. 16 at USD 408 Performing Arts Center.
The records were the same. The records were deceiving.
In a battle of two 5-3 teams touting undefeated district runs, Marion scored early, often, and more than they have in decades in a 72-14 win over Mission Valley to secure the district crown and a home game in the first round of the playoffs.
After rocking over 300 high-fives, attending an exuberant pep rally, and receiving a police escort in a fanfare and sendoff to the 321A state cross-country meet, Marion High School junior runner McKenzee Remmers suffered an unfortunate surprise within the first mile of the race Friday at Rim Rock Farm near Lawrence.
It was a leg cramp; not the kind runners can typically shake off, but a cramp more akin to a proverbial thorn in a lion’s paw, only it couldn’t be pulled out.
After one of the most successful seasons in recent memory for the Marion Warriors volleyball team, head coach Brady Hudson has resigned after one season as head coach.
The Warriors under Hudson went 28-9, losing in the first round of sub-state to finish the season.
High school senior Nellie Kassebaum was the only competitor from Centre Saturday at the state 1A cross-country meet at Wamego.
She finished 55th with a time of 19 minutes and 49 seconds.