January 2024

October 18, 2014 Coming to town on a Saturday afternoon was a treat for everyone including these four young ladies pictured at Fitzgerald Drug Store in 1953. Lola Brewer (Holyfield), Betty Brewer (Stevens), Eula Brewer (Higgins) and Margaret Ruff (Brewer) were enjoying an ice cream treat when this photo was taken (probably with a Brownie Hawkeye camera).

last week and told the men working there, “I am still very upset about this but since it is obvious that it is soon going to be a thing of the past, could I possibly have a couple bricks as keepsakes?” They gave me two clean brisk and I took them home, dated them 19091990, and will use them as door stops. I still can’t figure out how other towns can repair and have businesses in some buildings just as old as what we are tearing down, but we can’t, no siree, we have to start from the ground up… Remember the condition of the Fourth street school not too many years ago… they were about to tear it down… we came out of that repair job in beautiful shape.

Activities to Teach Active Listening How many times have you met someone, and while they were introducing themselves, you were planning your own response, and as a result, completely missed their name? Or have you ever been in a heated conflict with someone, spent the entire interaction thinking about how you could defend yourself and win, and never actually heard anything they said? Listening is hard. Whether you are facilitating conflict remediation, a brainstorming meeting, or an intentional discussion, one of your primary goals is to get your participants to actually listen to each other.

I had the opportunity to be the guest reader at the January Park Family Book Club event this past week. I thoroughly enjoyed reading Axle Annie to the kids and watching as families took part in creating snow and eating refreshments.

The Clay County Fair Association is looking forward to the upcoming year. Monday, Jan.

The rain that arrived on Friday, January 12 prior to the snowfall last week, presented the customary flooding issues at the Corning High School. Per usual, the auditorium flooded and custodians spent hours cleaning and dry vacuuming the floor. Superintendent Jennifer Woolard said during the recent clean up, “Once we get most of the water up, we will put fans on the floors. I’m not sure what we are going to do with the wood on the stage. In addition to the auditorium we have about five classrooms with “seepage”, water running through the walls and baseboards. We also have multiple leaks in the gym roof and at Park.” The district has had difficulties in the past few years in maintaining the high school structures. According to the superintendent, Corning High School built in 1967 has outlived its life expectancy to the point that it is more expensive to fix all the problems than it is to rebuild. Woolard said last week that the flooding issue has to be addressed each time it rains. Last year, the district got an estimate for a new gym roof that came in at $450,000.

The Fayetteville Police Department has announced the promotion of Sergeant Cameron Crafton to the rank of Lieutenant. Lieutenant Crafton began his career with the Fayetteville Police Department in 2002 after graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Criminal Justice from the University of Arkansas. After completing field training, he was assigned to night shift patrol and a few years later moved to afternoon shift patrol. While on patrol he became a certified general police instructor, a field training officer, and achieved the rank of Corporal. In 2007, he was assigned to the 4th Judicial Drug Task Force as an investigator. In 2011, he rejoined the patrol division, and in 2014 he was promoted to the rank of Sergeant. As a Sergeant, Lieutenant Crafton has been assigned to supervise night shift patrol, day shift patrol, the Special Operations Division, and the Special Investigations Unit of the Criminal Investigations Division. Crafton is an instructor in Taser and the lead instructor for the department’s defensive tactics training. He holds a Senior Law Enforcement Officer Certificate from the State of Arkansas and attended the Criminal Justice Institute’s School of Law Enforcement Supervision.