Photocast: Barack Obama in Roanoke

Chris Graham

Photos by Mark Miller Barack Obama addresses 10,000 Virginia Democrats today at the Roanoke Civic Center. U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., serves up some red meat. Ninth District Congressman Rick Boucher warms up the crowd. Handmade signs relayed a variety of progressive messages. NBC29 Shenandoah Valley bureau chief Ken Slack reports live from Roanoke.   …

Harrisonburg: Annual relief sale a big success

Chris Graham

Story by Jim Bishop Economic woes apparently took a back seat to spectacular weather that helped draw an enthusiastic crowd of nearly 10,000 to the 42nd annual Virginia Mennonite Relief Sale held Oct. 3-4 at the Rockingham County Fairgrounds. This year’s sale raised approximately $307,638 in total receipts for Mennonite Central Committee. This does not…

David Cox: Mean time

David Cox

Column by David Cox It happened in Buena Vista. Then Minneapolis. I guess it was inevitable that 2008 political races would get downright mean. On Labor Day, when each year our very own BV becomes the political capital of Virginia, senatorial candidates Jim Gilmore and Mark Warner wasted no time in trying to flatten the…

Augusta, Staunton, Waynesboro Dems Paint the Valley Blue

Chris Graham

Story by Chris Graham [email protected] Creigh Deeds remembered being asked to save the date on his schedule. “David Bottenfield said we needed to mark off this date, the 16th of August, for Paint the Valley Blue, that we were going to have a little picnic at the Frontier Culture Museum,” Deeds said at last night’s…

Photocast: Barack the Vote at Nissan Pavilion

Chris Graham

Photos by Crystal Graham [email protected] A capacity crowd helped presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee Barack Obama kick off his general-election campaign Thursday at the Nissan Pavilion in Northern Virginia. Obama addressed his campaign theme of “Change We Can Believe In” with U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., and Gov. Tim Kaine, D-Va., at his side.

A ‘special child’ responds to special care

Jim Bishop

Column by Jim Bishop Jenny Hummel of Weyers Cave, our daughter, won’t forget the time and place when she was told for certain – son Jacob, our grandson, has autism. She and husband Dallas knew for some time that “something was wrong” with their youngest son. He had difficulty responding to voices, seldom maintained eye…

Isetta Mouthful 2: When You Wish Upon a Car . . .

Jim Bishop

Column by Jim Bishop “Spontaneity is the quality of being able to do something just because you feel like it at the moment, of trusting your instincts, of taking yourself by surprise and snatching from the clutches of your well-organized routine, a bit of unscheduled plea.” – Samuel Langhorne Clemens, aka Mark Twain The other…

Mad About U Hall

Chris Graham

Mad About U: Four Decades of Basketball at University Hall By Chris Graham and Patrick Hite The following is an excerpt from Mad About U: Four Decades of Basketball at University Hall, a book on the history of University of Virginia basketball at University Hall, which closed in 2006. The book was published in 2006…