News Progress

•February 22, 2017•

By Jerry L. Ginther
NP Columnist

Volumes have been written on this topic, not to mention hundreds of ballads. To appreciate the latter, one only needs to remember a few of the old songs praising the brave engineers of steam engine days. Who hasn’t heard the words to “Casey Jones”, “The Wreck of Old 97” and “The Wabash Cannonball” just to mention a few. The engine man was the hero of the rails, and train wrecks were the subjects of much folklore.

The sentiments of crackling caldrons and hobos around a fire in a train yard tugs at our hearts. Some nights the sound of a lonesome train whistle in the distance brings on such heartbreaking loneliness to a fellow pining for a lost love that he wonders if he will survive until the dawn. Oh, if railroad engineers only knew the role they have played in the lives of lonely, hearbroken lovers. The fireman shoveled the coal, the engineer kept his hand on the throttle, his eye on the rail and America moved forward to the age of diesel locomotives.

The rest of the story – Operations - Men who Worked On The Train. Read More

Show Choir Needs Greater Community Support 

In my opinion, there are a handful of community pillars which draw people to the Sullivan Community – Lake Shelbyville, The Little Theater, Agri-Fab and Hydro-Gear, and our school district and community involvement to name a few.  With that said, I am addressing this letter to the Sullivan Community Unit School District #300 School Administration and the Sullivan Community Parents in order to express my observations as a deeply concerned community citizen, parent and fellow Sullivan Redskin Alumnus.

To start off, and in choosing my words carefully, I went on the school district’s website to read their mission statement.  It reads:  “Preparing students for successful lives by inspiring and expecting excellence in ourselves, our community, and in every student, every day!”  This is a great mission statement; however, the words are only as good as the action behind them! Read More

•February 1, 2017•

By Mike Brothers
NP Managing Editor

Ready. Set. Go!

This is the way every visit with grand twins Lyla and Landon begins.

It is a great race game Papa Flower has played with them since they learned to walk. And usually ends up with me crashed on the ground with both kids wrestling to keep me down.

That was during warm weather and while they were younger and slower.

Now they are pushing four years old, and the days of pretending to run after them have turned into the reality of chasing after them. Trouble is they are very quick and definitely the two on one ratio leaves Papa Flower wilted at the end of each stay.

Read More

•January 25, 2017•

By Jim Nowlan
NP Guest Columnist

President Donald Trump faces a real conundrum in trying to meet the expectations of his white, high school-educated supporters. They want a bigger slice of the economic pie while Trump’s fellow one percenters want to see their taxes cut.

The incoming chief executive cannot satisfy both aspirations in our very slow-growth economy where wealth re-allocation is almost a zero-sum game. That is, to provide more for the low-skilled means taking something away from the wealthy to do it.

I am fascinated by this age-old conflict between labor and capital. That is, who should have how much of our overall wealth, and why?

Since the 1970s, more wealth has been going to the one percenters who control the capital and relatively less to those who catapulted Trump’s campaign to the presidency.

As a result, the 16 percent of us with $100,000 or more in income pay 80 percent of income taxes, according to the Pew Research Center. Read More

•January 18, 2017•

By Jerry L. Ginther
NP Columnist

Most of my class of ’64 would be approaching their seventh decade of life at this time. That is to say that we’ve lived quite a long time and are still participating in the game. We have our eyes and ears open and still learning.

Solomon said that the eyes are never full of seeing and the ears never full of hearing; however, the instruments by which we see and hear things have considerably modified.

Most of the news today is seen in vivid, high definition color on TV. However, there was a time in our lives when some of it didn’t arrive via television and none of it by social media.

Back in our day there was the party line telephone system which we all shared with equal contempt. The contempt we shared was for the lack of privacy and ready accessibility to the phone line when we needed it, not for what we gleaned from our neighbor’s conversations.  Read More