50 Years Ago

By Staff
GOOD MORNING FRANKLIN COUNTY
Today is Friday, April 8, 2005. Expect a chance of morning showers today with a high of around 65 degrees. On this day in history:
1460-Explorer Ponce de Leon, the founder of Florida, is born.
1578-William Harvey of England discovers the reality of blood circulation.
1789-The House of Representatives has its first full meeting in New York City.
1873-American Alfred Paraf patents oleomargarine.
1927-A new invention, the automatic record changer, is introduced to the American public.
1954-The first Army helicopter battalion is formed at Fort Bragg in North Carolina.
1974-Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves breaks Babe Ruth's home run record.
EVERY PENNY COUNTS
Dennis Nielsen has filed a law suit against Nash County in North Carolina over charges he incurred when he copied some documents at the courthouse. Nielsen says that the charges are too high at twenty-five cents per copy and that some people are charged while others are not. The dispute is due to Nielsen being charged $1.50 for copying six pages. Would that go to small claims court or be tried at a Dollar General store?
RELIGIOUS OR
LITERATURE?
Shawn Byrne of Rutledge, Vermont, has hired a lawyer to try and get the state to allow him to put what he wants on a personalized license plate. The state does not allow religious references but maybe Byrne could argue that his wording is great literature. He wants to put JOHN316 on his vanity plate.
CITY POLITICS
The mayor of Frederica, Delaware, has been arrested for the fourth time in twelve months. It seems that Mayor Chick Glanden has been battling, literally, Police Chief Christopher Langley after the mayor tried to get rid of the chief due to budgetary reasons. Last week Glanden tried to run over Langley with his car. I wonder if that is a city-owned vehicle.
MORE THAN ZERO
TOLERANCE
Two nine-year-old boys in Wichita, Kansas, talked about trading an Xbox gaming system for a loaded hand gun. When one mother found out about the deal she alerted authorities. Now, the boy who offered the gun in the trade has been suspended from school pending an investigation. Even though the gun was never even on school property, officials say their zero tolerance policy allows them to suspend the child because he could have brought the gun to school. Isn't that a bit frightening when probability and possibility are as important as actuality?
GETTING THE RED OUT
More and more schools are banning teachers from using red ink to mark papers because red is "just a very stressful, negative color." Joseph Foriska, principal of Thaddeus Stevens Elementary School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, has told his teachers to use colors with more pleasant-feeling tones. Purple is the color of choice for many educators. A teacher in Alaska said that the whole color thing is just a shift from pointing out what students are doing wrong to encouraging what is done right.
In related news, jurors are now banned from using the word "guilty" in verdicts and instead must say, "The jury finds the defendant almost used good judgment."
PARTING SHOTS
Late one night Eddie Hall walked into a K-Mart store in Kingsland, Georgia. He picked up a Coleman lantern along with various items from the pharmacy then went into the restroom. This act alone made security officers suspicious, not to mention the fact that the store was about to close. After quite a bit of time passed by the security guard went in the restroom and found Eddie not shoplifting but trying to set up a temporary methamphetamine lab. He was arrested and his trial is pending. I just hope they don't add to his troubles by using red markers on his rap sheet.
Richard Parker is Minister of Students and Education at First Baptist Church in Russellville. You can e-mail him your comments at RParker@russellvilleFBC.org.