I could spot him halfway across the big box store. The trademark bib overalls and plaid flannel shirt — it had to be Ebeneezer Griper, my irascible old friend. Eb was surveying the candy inventory as I approached and stuck out my hand. “Howdy, Eb!” I said with a smile. “You and that ...

Hi! I am Alex H. Pruismann, your newly-elected Hamilton County sheriff. Thank you for taking a few moments to read a brief message from myself. The month of January for myself was one packed with change, learning, budgets, quick responses, press releases, and so much more. But none of that ...

Having heard it was about to be demolished, one Sunday afternoon in the late 1950s my father drove by his old one-room country school. While his young sons watched from the car, Dad parked along the gravel road, climbed a fence and walked into the dilapidated structure. He spent several ...

There may be a solution to the complaint some Republican legislators have about the University of Iowa’s plan to close a tranche of departments and programs and create a School of Social and Cultural Analysis. The lawmakers object to merging African American Studies; American Studies; ...

Once my reading skills advanced beyond the Alice and Jerry primers I became a newspaper reader. My parents’ nerdy first born devoured newspapers, often not understanding everything I read. More than 50 years ago I discovered a nationally syndicated newspaper columnist, L.M. Boyd, who wrote ...

When I was a kid I observed that old men enjoyed telling stories of harrowing storms they had survived when they were younger. I didn’t understand it all back then, but I do now. So let me tell you about one of the nastiest blizzards in my memory. It happened 50 years ago this month. In ...