Friday, February 9, 2018

Area deaths

Vicki Taylor, 54, of Ledbetter died Monday. Boyd Funeral Directors and Cremation Services was in charge of arrangements.

Veronica Gilland, 68, of Sturgis died Thursday. Boyd Funeral Directors and Cremation Services in Salem is in charge of arrangements.


Scammers have sheriff's number

Crittenden County Sheriff Wayne Agent wants to alert the public to a possible scam that could have pirated his office phone number.

Agent said he has received a complaint from a local citizen who took a phone call soliciting personal information. Agent said the caller was alleging to try to help the local resident avoid tax penalties.

The phone number that appeared on the Caller ID was (270) 965-3400. That is especially alarming, Agent said, because that is the phone number to the sheriff’s department at the courthouse.

“We are not allowing our number to be used to solicit anything,” the sheriff said.

If you receive a similar call or any call where the sheriff’s number appears in Caller ID, he would like to know about it.

The sheriff said an investigation has been opened into this matter.

LHHS employment opportunities

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Lorenzen visits Family Fitness Night


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Wednesday, February 7, 2018

Murder Mystery Breaking News

Start Following the Clues to be Ahead in the Game
to Solve the Chamber's Murder Mystery March 9.


What's news this week in Crittenden County...

The Internet has changed the way people communicate, form meaningful relationships and even fall in love and get married. Not even in her wildest dreams did Ann Moore, a first-grade teacher at Crittenden County Elementary School, imagine Christian Mingle would be the way she would meet her husband Matt. But, love has its own way of conquering all, and surprisingly to everyone – even to the ones involved – to work out perfectly.

Read the rest of the story and the following headlines in this week's issue of The Crittenden Press:
  • Crittenden instances of student misbehavior relatively low
  • Preschool screening appointments taken
  • Tolu rallies again to help one of its own
  • Outdoor fire limits start next Thursday
  • Flu has killed more than 100 in Kentucky
  • Local woman seriously injured in wreck
  • Lorenzen brings weight loss journey to Crittenden Schools
  • 2018 basketball homecoming king, queen crowned
  • Winter yielding high energy bills
  • MY 2¢ WORTH: Breadwinners tired of breadlines
  • SENATE REVIEW: Governor’s budget proposal 'train wreck’
  • HOUSE REVEIW: Financial bills pass House
  • CHS receives three stars from measure
  • Kentucky grocery prices continue dip
  • K3, K8, K12 chess teams win 1st
  • VAUGHT'S VIEWS: Olympics ‘icing on cake’ for UK cheerleaders
  • SPORTS: Flipping district leaves Rockets up in air STAFF REPORT
  • SPORTS: Champ’s big night is just not enough
  • OUTDOORS: Brown earns fishing berth in Nation, angling toward bid in Bassmasters
  • FORGOTTEN PASSAGES: Marion businesses flourished in 1894

Plus find our For the Love of Pets special, including:
  • Coping with passing of pet not easy
  • What’s in a name? Bella, Max, Lucy favorites for both dogs, cats
  • Dogs in more homes, but cats outnumber canines
  • Track 2017 Crittenden County Animal Shelter activity

Roads in northern part of county treacherous

For those who are forced to venture out onto the roads this morning, be especially careful in the northeast section of Crittenden County.

There have been a couple of accidents on US 60 E near Sullivan and Ky. 365 toward Sturgis.

Roads in that area are icy and slick.

From all accounts, the southern part of the county is not as bad, but there are slick spots on overpasses, bridges and where water has run into the roadways.

PACS public transportation in Crittenden County was delayed until 8 a.m., today with safety discretion after that. Anyone needing to cancel their transportation can call 270-498-9332 and leave a message.

No school today

No school in Crittenden County today, Wednesday, Feb. 4. It will be an NTI day (Rocket Way Snow Day #4.).

Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Area Death

Margaret Tinsley, 66, of Salem died Tuesday. Gilbert Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.

Weather cancels tonight's hoops action

The Rockets and Lady Rockets were each scheduled to play on the road tonight – the boys at Caldwell and girls at Webster County. However, due to the anticipated icy weather, those games are cancelled.

No makeup date was immediately announced.

Monday, February 5, 2018

Seminary Loop Road work rescheduled

Due to a forecast of rain,  Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KyTC) plans to close a section of Ky.1901/Seminary Loop Road near the Mattoon Community in Crittenden County has been moved to Friday. It was originally slated for Wednesday.

Ky. 1901 will be closed to through traffic at mile-point 1.4 near the Mattoon community to allow a cross drain to be replaced. This is along Ky. 1901 about halfway between U.S. 60 and Ky. 654 North near the Pleasant View Greenhouse.

Ky. 1901 will close at approximately 7:30 a.m. Firday. The roadway at this site is expected to reopen to traffic around 2:30 p.m.

There will be no marked detour. However, local residents will have access from each end of Ky. 1901.

This project is scheduled on a weather permitting basis.

Approximately 60 vehicles travel this section of Ky. 1901 in an average day.

Marion's Branch Market President

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Sunday, February 4, 2018

Crittenden Springs Road closing for work

A contractor for the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet plans to close a section of Ky. 1668/Crittenden Springs Road in Crittenden County next Thursday.

Ky. 1668 will be closed to through traffic at mile-point 2.2 to make base repairs.  This is along Ky. 1668 between the Rogers Group quarry entrance and the intersection with Ky. 2123/Glendale Church Road.

The road will close at approximately 7:30 a.m. next Thursday. It is expected to reopen to traffic by about 2:30 p.m.

There will be no marked detour. Local residents may access Ky. 1668 from the U.S. 60 end or via Ky. 2123/Glendale Church Road or Ky. 135.

This project is scheduled on a weather permitting basis.

Approximately 300 vehicles travel this section of Ky. 1668 in an average day.

Saturday, February 3, 2018

Area Death

Paul Stinnett, 72, of Dycusburg died Friday. Lakeland Funeral Home and Cremation Services in Eddyville is in charge of arrangements.

The Amish: 40 years in Crittenden County

Copyright/The Crittenden Press

Forty winters have come and gone since a handful of Amish men and their families migrated to rural Crittenden County.

They initially settled on an 1,800-acre tract of property that had one small clapboard house, then systematically populated a greater portion of the landscape in the northern section of the county.
Today, John Detweiler says that by his count, there are more than 30 Amish homes on that original farm where the Christian group’s settlement began in December 1977.

This article first appeared in the Feb. 1, 2018
issue of The Crittenden Press printed edition.
For a printed copy, contact us at (270) 965-3191.
Detweiler, 90, peers through a set of strikingly blue eyes centered beneath his long white locks and a snowy beard and tells how things have changed over the last four decades of Amish occupation in the area of the county near Mattoon.

“There’s not much farming being done here anymore,” said Detwiler.

These days, many of the working age men are carpenters, loggers, mill operators, cabinet makers, butchers, grocers or producers of fruit, flowers and berries. The days of each household raising a few acres of corn and hay are about gone.

The community has, in some ways, evolved into a cottage economy of retail services and goods that serves the greater Crittenden County area, and it has also blossomed from about a half-dozen families to almost 100.

Faith a constantThrough it all, there’s one thing that has remained constant. Their faith.

The Amish – although they worship in a similar manner as other Christian denominations – do not build brick and mortar churches in which to congregate on Sundays. Instead, their faith is the church, and they meet regularly in the homes of members. Attendance is compulsory unless there’s ample reason for missing Sunday services.

The Amish community in Crittenden County is divided into four church districts and each is served by a bishop, two ministers and one deacon. Every Sunday there are worship services at two different homes, generally, for about three hours, ending around noon.

The host families typically move out all of the furniture and replace it with pew-like benches to accommodate churchgoers. Oftentimes, a family will have a large shed or outbuilding more spacious and suitable for such a gathering. Funerals sometimes attract 500 to 600 people.

Detweiler was bishop for almost 30 years until 2008 when he passed the mantle to a younger man.

Home away from homeSimon Beachy, a minister in one of the districts, was one of the very first men to arrive in Kentucky. He came in the fall of 1977 from Pennsylvania.

“I thought we’d come south, but we got snowed in the first winter,” said the soft-spoken man who describes himself as a farmer.

At age 79, he’s among the last of the earliest men to bring their families here. Elmer and Jonas Yoder were early migrants. They both passed away in the last few months. The two were known far and wide in the broader community. Elmer was a farmer who raised beef cattle, operated a sewing shop and made baskets. Jonas operated an offset printing shop in the community.

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William Cramer was a carpenter who came here with the original group. His wife died soon thereafter, the first Amish death after the families had moved to Crittenden County. He died several years ago and his son-in-law, Jacob Stutzman, who was also among the earliest arrivals, moved to Ohio years ago. He’s still living there. Samuel Hertzler came to Crittenden County in the early wave of migration, too, but he is no longer living.

Hertzler and Detweiler came to Kentucky from South America where land, at the time, was even less expensive than Kentucky.

“We purchased some for $2.50 an acre and the rest was $7 an acre,” Detweiler said about Paraguay, a country in central South America below the equator where the climate is very hot. Property became so expensive in Pennsylvania it made expansion of the Amish community there difficult.

He remembers making some inquiries in the 1970s about the type of land available in Kentucky. He wrote a letter to his friend, Elmer Yoder, who was already here. Detweiler said he was told that the land was rolling, but when he got here, he found it a bit more hilly and perhaps more suitable to cattle farming than row cropping.

“I’d still like to be out there on the farm with the horses, churning the dirt,” he said. “Nowadays, about all I can do is look at it.”

Although he walks with two canes to urge along a couple of bad knees, Detweiler still can be found in his harness shop; however, he says there’s a whole lot of competition in the market.

The community has two saddle shops, a second harness shop and many more hand-crafted artisans who have found new ways to make a living beyond farming.

Settling inStretching from U.S. 60 East to Ky. 91 North, the Amish community is 13 miles in diameter and includes almost 500 or more people. There are five schools – Twin Oaks, Daniel’s Ridge, Happy Hollow, Crooked Creek and Meadow Ridge. The teachers are homegrown, and on warm days, you might catch one taking students to a nearby home where they sing a song to brighten someone’s day. They are taught to speak fluent German in their schools.

Most of the families who have settled here have Delaware roots. Beachy grew up there, and he and his wife Sarah moved to Pennsylvania to begin raising their family. After a short period, they decided to head further south in hope of finding a longer growing season.

Marion Welcome Center has maps, information and
personal assistance available to help you find the Amish

and other attractions in Marion, Kentucky.
Those first few winters were rough. In fact, the winter of 1977-78 was the snowiest on record in western Kentucky.

“But we enjoyed them because we didn’t have so many chores to do,” said Beachy, who was troubled by a nagging cough last week as he talked about those early days. “We didn’t have any frozen water pipes.”

Before long, their homes had running water, but they’ve never had electricity. They heat with wood and light their homes with kerosene lamps or Naptha lights. They power refrigerators and stoves with kerosene, too. In earlier years, they purchased 100-pound blocks of ice in Morganfield to keep their food cool.

It's a simple lifeThe Amish have come to embrace some power tools that run off compressed air, and they use heavy equipment likes tractors, usually on metal or hard rubber tires. Those types of wheels slow down the vehicles and make them impracticable for any type of general transportation. They move around mostly in horse-drawn buggies, but you see many walking, and the kids ride skates on paved roads.
“It’s a simple life,” said Beachy.

And that’s the way they like it. Tourists and curiosity-seekers bring commerce to the community, but it has its pitfalls. Sometimes, the traffic can be a little vexing.

When they get sick, home and natural remedies are common treatment. However, they do see doctors in town and take prescription medication when warranted. There are no doctors in the Amish community, but there are providers for massage treatments and plenty of places to get herbs and vitamins.

There are three groceries and a farm store in the community. There’s little reason for a family to venture into town, but most do from time to time.

“I’d prefer to take my horse into to town,” said Detweiler, “but I’m getting too old for that stuff. Now we get a ride. We were there yesterday, but it had been six weeks, I guess, since the last time.”

Good neighborsThe broader community has been largely receptive to the Amish. Former county magistrate Helen McConnell, whose late husband was a magistrate before her, has developed strong relationships with her neighbors, the Amish. She lives on the same road as many of them just west of the tiny village of Mattoon. The Amish, she said, have taken many farms that were grown over and out of production and made them into something again.

“They’ve cleaned a lot of these places up and done a whole lot for the countryside,” McConnell said.
She calls the Amish caring neighbors who are quick to lend a hand.

“They dress a little different, but they’re really good people. I have never heard anyone fussing about them.”

She said the children walk by her house every morning going to school about 30 minutes before the big yellow buses start rolling by to collect children heading into town for their public education.

“I live in two worlds out here,” she says with a laugh. “I see their world go by my house, then I see my world go by. There’s a big difference,” McConnell said. “Their children are all very well behaved.”

Accepted and respectedTrouble very rarely spills from the Amish community. They tend to take care of behavioral matters either within the family or within the church.

“Their discipline seems to be a little tougher than ours a lot of the times,” said David Travis, who also lives nearby and has served the county in various capacities, including emergency management director. He knows many of the Amish by name, knows where they live and, to a great extent, their family trees.

He and McConnell both say the Amish are among first responders in times of crises. When a tornado ripped through the area about 10 years ago, they provided meals for those cleaning up the debris and helped make repairs to damaged property.

Travis doesn’t think most people in Marion realize the vast number of tourists attracted to the Amish community for cultural tourism and shopping.

“During certain tourists seasons, it’s a solid line of traffic in front of my house,” he said. “They come by the bus loads. A lot of church buses go by.”

Travis was a teenager when the Amish first moved to the area. Over the years, he’s developed strong bonds with some, and so has his son.

“They’re accepted, and they’re respected. And that respect goes both ways. They want a good rapport with the outside world,” Travis said.

There is a good bit of misinformation about the Amish. They pay taxes – including the local school tax – on their property and sales tax on goods sold at their shops. They are not registered to vote in government elections, and their schools are not regulated by the Commonwealth of the Kentucky.

There are indeed many differences in their ways when compared to mainstream culture, and that simplicity of life is arguably as instrumental to their faith as is the church.

“They’re people just like we are, they just live a little differently,” McConnell said.


Visit Marion Welcome Center
On Main Street next to City Hall and Police Dept. 

Friday, February 2, 2018

Bookmobiles part of Kentucky landscape

Hardly able to climb aboard without the help of an adult, Denise Guess’ preschoolers at Crittenden County Elementary School know their way around the bookmobile when their short gate gets them up the final step.

“They sure love their books,” said Susan Smith, bookmobile librarian with Crittenden County Public Library (CCPL).

That kind of enthusiasm has helped keep the largest fleet of bookmobiles in the nation operating in rural Kentucky, delivering books to people who often can’t get to county-seat libraries.

Supporters say bookmobiles play an important role in promoting reading at all ages, but especially among children, helping them do better in school. But it’s not just the children served by the mobile libraries.

“I get to run the gamut from Headstart to 90-plus years old,” Smith said of her patrons, most of whom are homebound adults.

In the most recent national count in 2014, 75 Kentucky counties had traditional bookmobiles, said Michael Swendrowski, a board member with the Association of Bookmobiles & Outreach Services.

The next closest states were Ohio and California with just more than 50 each, he said. Several states reported having only a handful of bookmobiles — six in Texas, for instance, three in Kansas and two in Oklahoma.

Health problems keep people homebound. Many people don’t have a car to get to a public library that can be as far as 18 miles away from the far reaches of Crittenden County, and there is little public transportation in much of the state. Work schedules often don’t match library hours.
Smith said she has patrons with a variety of health issues, including a woman in her 90s who is legally blind. She relies on audio and large print books for enjoyment. Another, a man who suffered a debilitating stroke, looks forward to a new science-fiction title each visit from the bookmobile.

The bookmobile doesn’t run every day, but it makes its way around the county on a regular schedule, returning every two weeks. Smith visits the county’s preschool children and daycares, which are her busiest stops. Daycare kids account for as many as 50 checkouts per visit. And Smith invites home daycares and home-schools to join her route.

To Order Call (270) 965-7070
She goes to the nursing home and the senior center, and even makes a regular stop at the post office in Dycusburg for area residents.

Summer visits to homes help keep kids reading while school is out, countering the “summer slide” in reading skills.

If the weather is good enough for school to be in session, the bookmobile will go just about anywhere a delivery truck can make it up a drive. It does not stop at every house, but rather where people have requested service.

Smith would like to expand her rounds... For more of this article, which first appeared in the Jan. 25, 2018 printed edition of The Crittenden Press, is available in its entirety from archived issues of that paper. You can get one at The Crittenden Press newspaper office in Marion.