Stories from Thursday, March 25, 2010

HASTINGS -- McCook Community College head baseball coach Jon Olsen has an epidemic running through his team. Olsen is probably elated that his team has been 'hit' by the disease. The MCC bats have came alive this week, as the Indians claimed a pair of victories over the host Hastings College junior varsity Wednesday afternoon. McCook won the opener, 7-4, followed by an 18-0 romp in the nightcap...

McCook area youth boys basketball players in grades 8-9 have an opportunity to try out for the 2010 Nebraska Basketball Development Association's 8th & 9th grade McCook area all-star team. Tryouts will be held Sunday, March 28, at the McCook Senior High School gym starting at 2 p.m. All McCook area boys basketball players currently in 8th and 9th grade ar eeligible to participate in the tryouts...

March 16, 1935 - March 22, 2010 BEAVER CITY -- Marvis Ann (Bowen-Kinsman) Darling, 75, of Hays, Kan., formerly of Beaver City, Republican City and Alma area, died Monday (March 22, 2010) at Hays Medical Center in Hays, Kan. She was born March 16, 1935, at Oxford to Charles Wilmur and Mabel Ann (Zike) Bowen. Until the age of 3, she lived northeast of Beaver City on the Carl Modlin farm. In 1938 she moved into Beaver City. She graduated from Beaver City High School with the class of 1952...

NORTH PLATTE -- The Mid-Plains Community College Board of Governors approved Wednesday night $750,000 worth of improvements at McCook Community College and North Platte Community College. This is a three-year plan capital improvement plan and includes ADA/Hazmat projects, for handicapped accessibility and security features...

Feb. 2, 1929 - March 19, 2010 BEAVER CITY -- Charles Willard Vandruff, 81, formerly of Arapahoe, died Friday (March 19, 2010) at the Beaver Manor in Beaver City. He was born on Feb. 2, 1929, at Holbrook to Charles A. and Esther M. (Grannis) Vandruff. ...

By locking in a "Guaranteed Maximum Price" after bids were let, Community Hospital of McCook saved $2.3 million on an expansion and renovation project estimated initially at more than $31 million. Community Hospital president and CEO Jim Ulrich said Wednesday morning, following a hospital association board meeting March 17, that general contractor J.E. ...

Nebraska lawmakers passed a bill on first round approval Tuesday that will effectively allow all natural resource districts in the state to levy an occupation tax on irrigators. LB 862, introduced by State Sen. Mark Christensen and a priority bill of the Natural Resources Committee, passed by 44-3...

June 6, 1938 - March 22, 2010 ST. FRANCIS -- Robert Allen Modrell, 71, died Monday (March 22, 2010) at Cheyenne County Hospital in St. Francis, Kan. He was born June 6, 1938, in McCook. He was a retired computer program specialist for the Bureau of Reclamation...

The 3rd District is safe for now, but Adrian Smith and challengers for his congressional seat will still put in plenty of miles in search of votes. The latest U.S. Census figures show the sprawling district has lost about 18,500 people since 2000, while Douglas and Sarpy Counties in the 2nd District have gained about 77,500 residents...

I wonder if your readers would be interested to hear of a voyage made by my great-grandparents from England to McCook in 1885? They were an unusual couple who had already had quite a dramatic life. It started in 1858 when young Henry Ellison, who had grown up in a farm near Swindon, Wiltshire, England, ran away with his childhood sweetheart Martha Duck who lived on a neighbouring farm. They gave false ages to the Registrar in order to marry without their parents' permission...

In human affairs, ideas precede events. In fact, ideas are ideas that are made by the ideas that go before them. The pendulum swung too fast in Iraq. That is why Saddam H. was hanged. Only democratic capitalistic imperialists should be allowed to have the correct ideologies...

With the change in seasons we are going to have a change in kings of the sky. Orion, the Hunter, the king of winter, is moving off stage right. He will be replaced by Leo, the Lion, the king of the springtime skies. Leo is one of the few of the 88 recognized constellations to actually look like what it is supposed to be...

VICTORY BASE COMPLEX, Iraq -- Soldiers from the 1195th Transportation Company, 41st Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 13th Sustainment Command (Expeditionary) performed a convoy security mission March 2 to Contingency Operating Location Shield to deliver much-needed supplies to the base...