Sky is falling?
Skylab
The coffee drinkers at the Friendship Room at Otoe County National Bank were jolted at the Wednesday morning session when what appeared to be a flash from space interrupted their calm.
An object whizzed through the stairwell and bounced, rattled and banged on the floor.
"Behold!" exclaimed Dr. J. H. Wilmes. "It's a piece of Skylab."
Ex-Air Force Colonel Ellsworth "Merk" Merkel, president of the bank, looked up from his coffee cup, glanced at the object and said.
"Looks like a beer can to me."
It was.
Paul Knoll will probably get the blame.
Good ole' Dunk
The American Legion saluted J. Ray Duncan the other day when Legion Baseball Coach Carl Abbott presented him with a baseball autographed by the players.
It was an appropriate gift to Dunk. He loves his Legion and for all it stands.
It was also appropriate that Coach Abbott made the presentation. It doesn't seem that long ago that "Abbie" was running bases as a member of the Legion team.
The caps
Thanks to Keith Krecklow, Beatrice, for the sackful of caps to add to my small collection on top of the shelf in the hall closet.
Keith read an item in this space awhile back about the cap I hornswaggled out of his father-in-law, Bill Whipple of Union.
The follow-up was after a meeting of the Advisory Council for senior citizens, Bill and Jewell said they had something for me from their son-in-law.
They explained the caps came from a collection of the late Dr. R. Brown, a prominent Beatrice doctor and longtime friend of Mr. Krecklow.
Mrs. Krecklow, the former Pat Whipple, was society editor of the News-Press about 30 years ago. The Krecklows live in Beatrice where he is a realtor.
Congratulations
to City Clerk Gladys Wenzel on being awarded the designation of Certified Municipal Clerk, one of 18 in the state. Hope-you-keep-busy on your retirement, Clarence Schmadeke, Cass county agent. We think your successor is great — John Miyoshi of Nebraska City.
to Greg Mann, son of Dr. and Mrs. G. E. Mann, for receiving a Regents and the Broady scholarships at the University.
Fair time
It must be getting fair time. Orville Koch, Gary Garey and Elmer Gellerman have been recent or regular visitors at the News-Press.
Elmer is always working on the 100 year farm families, one of the jobs he does so well as the secretary of the county fair. President Orville and County Agent Gary have been working with us on the county fair book.
The book will be 128 pages. There will be 1600 copies of the green-covered books and they will be printed in a few days and distributed.
Chuck Johnson, our plant superintendent, has been directing the typesetting and printing and just about everyone in the production department has been helping on it from the darkroom, to proofreading, typesetting, correcting, layout and pasteup to platemaking for the press.
Back to work
When they closed Nebraska Outerwear for two weeks, a number of people took vacations, some took voyages.
Manager George Scalise vacationed in Hawaii, his son, Robert, went to Spain and office clerk Mrs. Carl Reed vacationed in Puerto Rico with her daughter, son-in-law and family, Mr. and Mrs. Milton Bond. Milt is a former circulation manager at the News-Press.
Little Bucks
The talk is still running heavy that shopping centers will be built on the north and south ends of town. So far it's all talk. Good luck to the Richard Johnsons on their move to West Point and welcome to the new NCHS guidance director, Dennis Curtis. Everyone seems to agree a wider bridge is needed, but there will be some ill feelings if a sincere attempt is not made to SAVE THE OLD BRIDGE. If not, consider the possibility of a four-lane Minersville bridge with Henry Schemmel as toll-master. Oh my!