Stories from Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Patricia Jane (Chapman) Lafferty Feb. 21, 1937 - Nov. 8, 2015 LINCOLN, Neb. --Patricia Jane (Chapman) Lafferty, 78, of Lincoln, passed away on Nov. 8, 2015, in Lincoln. Pat was born in Trenton, Nebraska, to Harvey and Florence (Blue) Chapman on Feb. ...

LaVern M. Chvatal Dec. 12, 1926 - Nov. 9, 2015 ATWOOD, Kan. -- LaVern M. Chvatal, 89, of Atwood passed away Monday, Nov. 9, 2015, at Rawlins County Hospital. He was born Dec. 12, 1926, in Atwood, to Frank J. and Matilda Chvatal, the third of ten children...

Earle Donald 'Dusty' Rhoades Sept. 8, 1920 - Nov. 1, 2015 AMARILLO, Texas -- Earle Donald "Dusty" Rhoades, 95, died Nov. 1, 2015, in Amarillo. He was born Sept. 8, 1920, in Culbertson, Nebraska, to Ernest and Fairy (Seybold) Rhoades. At 21, he moved to Kansas City and married Catherine Carr. ...

McCOOK, Neb. -- Merit/honor roll students at McCook High School include: 12th MERIT Elisha Bair Bret Baumbach Corinne Bortner Dustin Bredvick Dawson Brunswick Logan Bunger Josiane Dominguez Erik Eiler Mackenzie Esch Ahria Golden Kasey Hahn Trae Heathers...

McCOOK, Neb. -- In recognition of the need for timely lab screenings, Red Willow County Health Department has started monthly screenings at its offices at 1400 West 5th Street on the Red Willow County Fairgrounds. The next regular screening will be Thursday...

McCOOK, Neb. -- The McCook Work Ethic Camp is drawing attention as one of several expansion projects being considered and area community leaders are praising local staff for what could be an economic boon for the region. The McCook facility was listed at the top of the list of seven Department of Corrections expansion projects included in Director Scott Frakes strategic plan released last week. The projects were slated for consideration in fiscal year 2018 through 2021...

Wild turkeys use the front door -- not the drive-through -- at AmFirst Bank in McCook Tuesday morning. Posing on top of a car and stopped in front of a tree in the parking lot, one of the turkeys appears to be having a "bad hair day."

McCOOK, Neb. --Community individuals and businesses who gave their time anonymously restoring the football field at Weiland Field were acknowledged by members of the McCook School Board Monday night. A recent rain during a football game tore up the sod at Weiland Field and community members helped to restore it, said board member Brian Esch during "Positive Comments" Monday night at the regular school board meeting. ...

NPPD crews and contractors wait for Tuesday's fog to clear so a new, 200 mWatt 203-ton transformer can be moved from Perry Grain west of McCook on a dirt road to the substation next to the old McCook Army Airbase north of McCook. The device arrived Sunday after a 45-day, 6,500-mile trip from Korea via ship, truck and rail. ...

McCOOK, Neb. -- A North Platte man was sent to state prison last week for the sexual assault of an 11-year-old Danbury girl this summer. The offender, 32-year-old Jeremy Lewis Wilcox, was ordered to serve a maximum of five years but could be out in out in less than seven months, when considering time-served and Nebraska's "good-time" laws...

Ben Anderson and JoHanna Scott represent AmFirst Bank, AmFirst Insurance and their customers as they unload food donated to the McCook Pantry in the institutions' annual fall can drive. The donation included approximately 400 cans of nonperishable food items and 50 boxes of saltine crackers. The bank also made a $100 cash donation to the Pantry...

We continue our tour of the Celestial Ocean this week with the last three -- and the most difficult to locate -- of the constellations located there. We left off with a dim and rather nondescript constellation Piscis Austrinus, the Southern Fish with its very bright Fomalhaut, often called the "lonliest star in the sky" because there are no other stars visible around it, including the stars of its own constellation...

Del was a farmboy who grew up in the 1930s, his family taking in a few relatives during the Depression and later years. There was alway work to do and meat, butter and milk to consume despite any shortage of cash. He had dreams of becoming a veterinarian, but was told he would be attending a college in Missouri to become a teacher...