News Progress

•April 2, 2025•

Combining brain power and teamwork, the Sullivan High School Scholastic Bowl Team’s competitive season comes to a successful end. Scholastic Bowl is a fast-paced, quiz-based competition where teams of five students from different schools compete by answering trivia questions on a variety of academic subjects. The team that correctly answers a toss-up gets control of the bonus set. There are 24 toss-ups in each match, and each bonus set has three questions. All correct answers are worth 10 points. 

In conference matches, the Varsity’s record was 11-1, and the JV’s record was 7-3. The Varsity team placed at every tournament, earning third place at the Turnabout Tournament and the Illinois Masonic Academic Bowl. They had a second-place finish in the Lincoln Prairie Conference, losing to Cumberland. During the Regional Championship against Marshall, Sullivan was down by 110 points at the half, but made a comeback to win Regionals with a final score of 380-330. At Sectionals, they won against Dieterich and Cisne but lost to Cumberland. 

•April 2, 2025•

Sports card and memorabilia dealers and collectors will be at the Decatur Civic Center, 1 Gary Anderson Plaza, Decatur.  on April 12 from 9am-3pm for the second annual “Play ball!  Sports card and memorabilia show.”  History of the Heartland is sponsoring the event. Admission is free.

Scholarships for students in 10-county region

Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Foundation raised nearly $30,000 at the 41st annual Cheers! event to support the SBL Volunteer Guild Scholarship Program.

Cheers!, a high-energy cocktail party, was held March 1st at the Foxmore in Shelbyville featuring the band 8South to nearly 300 in attendance. The event also hosted a Texas Hold‘em style Poker Tournament which had 31 participants. This year’s grand prize winner, Eric Hutchinson, who won 4 Green seat Cardinals Baseball tickets valued at $1,500, donated by Roy Schmidt Honda. Winner of the raffle prizes were: Jenna Vogel, who won a pair of diamond earrings valued at $2,000, donated by Towne Square Jewelers; and Adam Lehman who won a Nashville, TN package including a two-night stay at the Graduate Hotel, valued at $650. 

•April 2, 2025•

HSHS St. Mary’s Hospital is expanding its out-patient laboratory hours to provide greater convenience and accessibility for patients. The new hours, now in effect, offer early morning, extended evening, and weekend availability, making St. Mary’s the only facility in Decatur to provide after-hours outpatient laboratory services. The new outpatient laboratory service hours are Monday - Friday from 5:30 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. and Saturday from 7:00 to 11:00 a.m. 

Online auction runs through April 6th 

•April 2, 2025•

An 1881 U.S. $10 gold coin, an 18-karat yellow gold chain link bracelet, and a baseball card with a piece of Joe DiMaggio’s bat are among the unclaimed property items being auctioned online through April 6. The spring online auc-tion includes vintage pocket watches, currency notes from various countries, and (25) 1 oz., .999 fine silver rounds.

“Our online auction is open to everyone, not just collectors. It’s a convenient way for people to shop for their personal collection or find a one-of-a-kind gift, like a piece of a Joe DiMaggio baseball bat,” said Illinois State Treasurer Michael Frerichs, whose office oversees unclaimed property in Illinois.

A total of 100 lots will be auctioned, some featuring multiple items. To view auction items, go to the catalog on the HiBid website: https://hibid.com/catalog/627601/lincoln-auction--illinois-state-treasurer-unclaimed-property .