May 2, 2018 News

Birthdays: May 2, Bill Baus, Brenda Legleiter; May 3, Lauren Sewell; May 4, Carolyn Davenport, Edgar Schadel, Susan Walker, Reese Higgins, Quade Keener; May 5, Michelle Yohe, Janice McCloy, Kate Rues, Brani LaFond; May 6, Rianne Showalter; May 7, Reed Blackwell, Maggie Showalter; May 9, Hung Pham, Peggy Smith, Erin Pfeifer, Johanna Pfeifer, Allen McCloy, Lane Sekavec

Anniversary: May 8, Robert and Mary Beth Higgins.

Kansas Fun Facts

The State Capitol stand on 20 acres of ground donated to the state by Cyrus K. Holliday. The Legislature accepted the block of land by a joint resolution approved February 7, 1862.

Brick factories were once common in Kansas. (There was a brick plant on the Big Timber just north of McCracken. A sample of the bricks is at the McCracken Public Library. The first firing of bricks by L. A. Hicks were considered as “good as can be burned anywhere”. W. F. Grumbein purchased the first firing to be used for a bakery oven. The large two story school was built of brick while many of the other buildings were built of native stone.)

The Great Seal of the State of Kansas was adopted on May 25, 1861 and represents elements of Kansas life on a prairie landscape, buffalo are pursued by Indian hunters, representing the history of the state. Commerce is represented by a steamboat on a river. A farm plowing and a settler's cabin represent agriculture and future prosperity. The train of ox-wagons represents westward expansion. A banner bearing the state moto flies above a cluster of 34 stars representing Kansas' admittance as the 34th state of the Union.

Kansas means “People of the South Wind”.

Those who wish to donate a memorial in the name of Martin Shapiro,( Cathie Ryan’s husband) these two were listed: Shriners' Hospital for Children, 2900 Rocky Point Dr., Tampa, FL 33607: American River Parkway Foundation, 5700 Arden Way, Carmichael, CA 95608.

Please join the McCracken Public Library and help celebrate Cinco de Mayo with a delicious taco bar on Saturday, May 5th at the McCracken city building from 6-8 p.m. All proceeds benefit the Library. For more information call Anita 785-452-8526.

Friday evening the Eisenhour clan gathered to celebrate Larry's birthday. In keeping with the tradition of enjoying a unique Kansas establishment we enjoyed MO's Brewery in Beaver. Would highly recommend it. Those present were Larry and Joyce Eisenhour, Frank and Elaine Littler, Dwight Eisenhour, Arlyn and Jan North, Melissa Eisenhour McDowell, and Brenda Littler Rosenlund.

Roy Langdon, Clarence Morris, John Brown, Marty Stover and Les Rogers joined Shirley and Chuck Friday evening for a bar-b-que at Shirley’s. It was payback time for all the meals Shirley eats at Roy’s.

Granddaughter Nicole called Monday evening, she was all excited as she noticed a NS car tag in Columbia.

Jean Oelkers joined Shirley for the Sons of the American Legion roast beef dinner Saturday evening at the McCracken American Legion. A very nice crowd attended and the food was excellent.

McCracken Golf Club hosted a golf tournament this past weekend. Results will be posted next week.

Saturday Lynnette Doornbos, John and Taylor attended the Relay for Life Events in Salina. Harlee Donavan, Russell was their guest speaker.

If you haven’t bought eggs from Clay North, you must. His eggs are so fresh even the hens don’t know they are missing!!
Ellis FFA held their annual Chapter Banquet last Saturday night. Logan North was awarded the Star Member award and Clay North was awarded the Star Greenhand award. Both boys will represent their chapter in the NW Kansas competition. Clay was installed as the Chapter Chaplain for the upcoming year.

SUNDAY, MAY 27th 9:00 a.m .Sons of the American Legion Memorial Weekend Tournament. 4 person scramble. All proceeds (after prizes) go to Sons of the American Legion. $100 per team.

Arlyn and Jan North spent the week with Laura Martin in Elkhart completing her "dad-to-do" list. That may be a bit of "fake news" as he is going back next week to carry on. Just saying.....

Ashleigh Allen, daughter of Neil and Rhonda Allen, granddaughter of Roy and Phyllis Conrad, attended the State Music Festival in Topeka, over the weekend. Ashleigh played a cello solo and received a 1, also in an orchestra ensemble and received a 1. She received a 2 in the cello trio and a 1 in the women’s choir. She loves her cello. She attends Northwest High in Wichita.We heard some very sad news this past week, a dear friend, Harold (Curly) Juvenal passed at his home in Doltham, Alabama. He was a 1953 graduate of McCracken High School. After graduation Curly joined the service, stationed at Ft. Hood, Texas. Unbeknown to Vic Higgins, Floyd Thompson, Guy Conner, Diz Washaliski when some of them attended a movie they heard Curly’s laugh and discovered he was stationed there with them. After service Curly married, he and his wife Roberta were residents of Alabama for many years. Curly never forgot his McCracken roots and remained in contact with his friends and attended the McCracken Rodeo for many years. He will be missed.

History Notes:

November 1929 – McCracken loses to Wakeeney when Cramer is thrown behind his own goal line 2-0. The Town Boys have fine material and most are good individual players, but when on the offensive they are entirely lost—they do not know what to do with the ball. All they can do is kick and pass. Just a small amount of practice would develop this team into a machine that would win from any team in Western Kansas. Arrangements will have to be made for a few practice sessions.

November 1929: The high school boys went to Ransom last Friday and it was just a case of too much Horchem. This big boy plunged the line or skirted the ends at will and the Mc boys were helpless against him, losing 18-0. The Mc town team started to Wakeeney with six regular players, picked up a couple at Brownell then put in their manager, Dr. J.J. Moeller to fill the squad.

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Patricia Petz:

WOW!  What an awesome week!  Just when you think the days can't get any better they do!  I had substituted at the La Crosse Elementary on Monday for the fifth and sixth graders.  I had an awesome time revisiting the Roman Empire.  When I attended Mc Cracken High School (many years ago) I had taken two years of Latin.  It was never meant to be a spoken language, but I thoroughly enjoyed learning about the Gods and Goddesses.

La Crosse High School has to be so proud of their students!  Tuesday evening, mom and I attended the annual Spring Concert at the High School which was followed by the Awards Convocation.  The students at LHS received so many outstanding awards.  Five years ago, I established the Danny J. Petz FFA Memorial in honor of my husband.  The recipient must be a LHS senior enrolled in FFA and is going to be attending a two or four year college and receiving a degree in agriculture. The recipient for this year went to Jacob Showalter who will be majoring in Feedlot Management at Colby Community College.  His parents are Adam and Janice Showalter.  

When I retired, I decided that I wanted to offer a scholarship to a LHS student that wanted to go into the field of education. I wanted to enjoy knowing the student that received the scholarship, so this year I announced the new scholarship called: The Patricia Petz Teacher Education Scholarship.  The first recipient went to Zachery Peach, who will be attending Fort Hays State University.  He will be majoring in Applied Technology Education.  His parents are Mike and Mary Beth Peach. I am so proud of these two individuals.  They have completed their high school years with much success and I look forward to seeing how they become our next generation of farmers and teachers. Congratulations to Jacob and Zachery! 

Wednesday was a very busy day as I subbed for the fifth and sixth graders again.  After school, mom and I headed for Hays and attended the last FHSU Encore performance for the year.  It was held at the Beach-Schmidt Performing Arts Center. The group from San Francisco presented "Cinema Vivant" with their beautiful guitar and violin gypsy style music used with the stop-action animation of movies created by two different artists after World War I.  

Thursday was an exciting day for me at the High School. Many of the students were busy completing their projects for the year in Mr. Shepker's classes.  There are going to be so many families with new furniture in their homes. Many students had completed projects of bedroom furniture, dining room tables and chairs, end tables, and cedar chests, just to name a few.  Mr. Shepker has to be proud of the accomplishments of his students this year and throughout the many years that he has taught at LHS.  Congratulations for the many achievements from your students, Mr. Shepker!

Friday evening I drove to Hays to the National Guard Armory and set up for the show that was going to be held on Saturday.  The Poppy Patch Arts and Gifts Show had a very nice attendance.  I had my display of Pat's Magnetic Jewelry.  It was nice to see Amy Barton, formerly from La Crosse, who was displaying her new business of handmade soaps and other products.  Anna Mae Kreutzer also had a very nice display of her home furnishings.  

I attended mass on Sunday at St. Michael's and then mom and I ate out for lunch.  Afterwards, I decided to head home and get some things done at home.  My new puppy has decided that he doesn't like staying inside his three foot high fence while I'm gone, so my son, Kelly, had to help me find a new fence.  We put up a new fenced in area that is now 6 foot tall.  Hopefully, he likes it and will stay inside this area.  This new puppy is costing me a lot of money.  I'm sure hoping that he'll earn his wages by keeping all of the "critters" away from the farm this summer!