Stories from Thursday, March 16, 2006

Managing wetlands is one of the key points that the Missouri Wildlifer program institutes as part of its curricula. The program is broadcast statewide at participating sites in Reeds Spring, Park Hills, Salem, Mexico, Poplar Bluff, Nevada and Portageville, all located in Missouri. ...

Police are looking for two suspects in a reported forced entry at a Nevada home on Tuesday. According to a press release from the Nevada Police Department, at 11:22 p.m., Tuesday, officers were called to the home of James A. Harper, in the 100 block of West Garfield. ...

Sunday's storms damaged a number of Vernon County homes, but unlike some other parts of Missouri no one was killed or seriously injured. "Overall, we were very lucky. We were lucky we didn‚t have any fatalities and only one injury," Dennis Kimrey, Vernon County emergency manager, told the members of the Vernon County Local Emergency Planning Committee Wednesday...

Paul Johannes Junker, 67, Liberal, Mo., died Wednesday, March 15, 2006, at the Veterans Hospital in Kansas City, Mo. Family information and funeral arrangements will be announced later by Ferry Funeral Home.

Ralph L. Spencer, 88, Walker, Mo., died Wednesday, March 15, 2006, at Christian Health Care in Nevada. Family information and funeral arrangements will be announced later by Ferry Funeral Home, Nevada.

Cody Wayne Clark, 21, Walker, Mo., died Wednesday, March 15, 2006, following an automobile accident. He was born Oct. 21, 1984, in Joplin, Mo., to George Loran Clark and Mary Ann Lewis Clark. Cody was born in Joplin and lived there until the age of 10. The family moved to Walker and has resided there since. Cody attended Northeast Vernon County High School where he participated in basketball and baseball, he was also a Baptist...

The children who are growing up in Vernon County have a handicap that some of us hadn't realized in earlier days. They grow up with very few friends of different races or ethnic origins. When I was a child I only saw one or two African American men in Nevada. They were at the barber shop and at Richardson's filling station. (Now, that is a word we don't use very often anymore -- a filling station. I guess that preceded the word service station...

Dear editor and citizens of Nevada: Governing is about setting priorities and making hard choices. The hope is that by gathering information from experts the policy makers can make wise decisions that benefit the most people. That is the hope. In July 2004, a committee of fire fighters submitted a proposal to the city manager for a new rescue truck to replace the 24-year-old one that they run now. April 2005, the city council approved a revised plan for the truck...

Forty killed in railway wreck KANSAS CITY, Mo., -- A Pueblo dispatch says that a headend collision between the Utah and California express No. 3, and a local passenger train No. 16, from Florence, Colo., took place this morning at a curving. Forty persons are reported killed and a large number of others were injured...

The World Baseball Classic has earned my respect. Going in, I was pessimistic (even though I'm an optimistic guy by nature). I thought it was a lame attempt by the world's worst major professional sports commissioner to replace baseball's future lack of involvement in the Olympics. Instead, this might have been Bud Selig's best idea yet...