Howland, Lakeview collect for needy

November 18, 2015

BAZETTA - Students from Howland and Lakeview school districts teamed up with Thomas Shortreed and Associates Ameriprise Financial for the National Day of Service recently by collecting food items to feed families in the Mahoning Valley.Last week, the two school districts spent time placing boxes of canned goods and non-perishables on school buses with items to be given to local food pantries in Cortland and Howland.Lindsay Wolf of Ameriprise Financial Shortreed and Associates said the agency selected Second Harvest's mobile pantry and backpack program in Trumbull County to benefit from ...

Primary deadline approaching, consider running for an office

November 13, 2015

Now that Tuesday's general election is finished, congratulations are in order.Not just to the winners. Congratulations, and thank you, should be extended to everybody who ran.I congratulate everybody who ran because they conquered the apathy that seems to prevail throughout the community. The apathy that leads to so many good people deciding against running for political office leaves us with a vacuum where ideas should flourish and stagnation in areas where our community needs to advance.A lack of competition in political races reached an astounding level in March 2012. In that primary, ...

Autumn — A strange name for Fall

November 10, 2015

Fall. My first involvement with autumn leaves that I remember was when two of the York Avenue neighbor boys, Roger and Stacy, buried two giggling boys I didn't know in a huge pile of leaves. I screamed bloody murder when Roger struck a match and started toward the occupied pile of leaves. At age four, I couldn't tell whether somebody was kidding or not - on second thought, no one at any age can tell when somebody is kidding in a situation like that. The two kids in the pile exploded out of the pile and ran off.Ahh, autumn! What an odd name to call fall - sounds a little uppity. So, each ...

West Farmington revisited

October 20, 2015

I had read a prepublication draft of the column (Oct. 6) I had written about the West Farmington farm experience to my sister, who had been there with me back then. We both wondered how that place would look after 70 years, although I had seen many changes when I had driven by about ten years ago. Why not drive out there and see? My sister wouldn't be able to get out of the car when we got there, but we could probably see enough from the car.I pulled into the driveway to look around, but I got out when I saw a figure in the backyard. I was followed by a friendly little beagle. I waved to ...

City boy spends time on a farm

October 6, 2015

WEST FARMINGTON - The farmhouse is still there, albeit without its front porch. The barn, the chicken coop, the pig sty, the outhouse and the corn crib are gone.It was 70 years ago, in the summer of 1945, when my sister and I were literally farmed out to this place in West Farmington while our parents went to Washington, D.C., on a business / vacation trip.Dad was negotiating with the War Production Board for the allocation of eight new GM diesel buses for the bus company he managed. World War II was winding down, and prospects for getting approval were very bright.I had never been ...

Hitting 80 no big deal anymore

September 22, 2015

It was June of 1939. It was my grandmother's birthday. I was nearly four years old and my sister would be nine years old soon. I was out playing and accumulating the usual dirt when a Warren Tribune Chronicle photographer with a huge flash camera arrived at our house on York Avenue. Mom wasn't home. The photographer said he was there because my grandmother was turning 80 and he wanted to take her picture for the newspaper.Grandma slipped on her Sunday best green velvet dress. My sister hurriedly dressed me (over the dirt) in my good short-panted jumper and she put on a print dress. It ...