Stories from Friday, March 20, 2015

The Osage Prairie YMCA Tridents swim team participated in Heartland Area Championships, March 13-15 at the Chuck Fruit Aquatic Center in Edwardsville, Ill. Tre Tridents finished with 50 team points, all of which were accumulated by Cody Leung, placing them 24th out of 26 teams. The top prize went to the host Edwardsville YMCA Breakers, who finished with 4,747 team points. A grand total of 683 swimmers attended the event...

The Cottey Comets softball team fell to 0-4 on the young season, after dropping a pair of games to the Stephens College Stars, Tuesday afternoon at American Legion Park in Columbia. The Comets were toppled in the first game of the twinbill 11-4, and were blanked in the second game 10-0...

Cecil Raymond Painter, 82, Nevada, Mo., passed from this life on March 17, 2015, at his home in Nevada. Cecil was born on Dec. 30, 1932, in Nevada, to Claude R. and Lela May (Massie) Painter. He was united in marriage to Betty Marie Blakeman on Sept. 1, 1973, and she preceded him in death in 2001...

In my library I have a very old edition of Charles Dickens' novel, "David Copperfield." Dickens did not write this classic as a novel, but rather as a regular weekly "serial" installment for a newspaper. It is a tried and true style of entertainment that has existed for a very long time...

One of the lucky things about my place at the end of eight children was to have siblings of every age to provide a role model for me when I reached that age. With Ellen, it was to show me how to make the most of the experiences just around the corner for me. She knew. She was in the midst of it...

Nevada Daily Mail The Hume R-8 School Board approved a new salary schedule with an increase in base salary. The board also voted to increase substitute teacher pay and offered contracts to teachers for the next school. The new salary schedule will increase base pay to $26,500 and includes a provision that allows a full-time certified teacher to accumulate 40 days of sick leave, with a plan to buy back unused sick days at the rate of pay that the district pays a substitute teacher -- not to exceed nine days.. ...

Nevada Daily Mail This summer, five students from First Christian Church's youth group and about four adult sponsors will travel to Crow Creek Sioux Reservation in South Dakota to help with a camp for first through third grade girls, June 22-28. Youth minister Jeremiah Howze participated in the camp hosted by Diamond Willow Ministries for Native Americans last summer with three high school boys from a church in Ferguson, where he worked before he became the full-time youth minister at First Christian in July.. ...

Nevada Daily Mail A Nevada tradition returns March 20-21 with the 29th Annual Nevada Home & Leisure Show. Produced by KNEM/KNMO Radio in Nevada, the Nevada Home & Leisure Show annually features products and services from businesses in southwest Missouri and southeast Kansas...