Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Sorted by date Results 619 - 643 of 1718
Written by Calvin K. Sunderland My dad was not a braggart. It was rare he would talk or write about his time in the WWII Navy on board the heavy cruiser USS Portland. What follows is one he wrote a few years before he died. I can only try to emulate the bravery it must have taken to weather events such as he experienced during the war. – Michael K. Sunderland “One of the most frightful episodes while I was aboard came late in our North Pacific excursion. A storm at sea is one of nature’s more...
Kathrene and Robert Pinkerton married in 1911. He worked at a newspaper in a big city: long hours, deadlines, and stress. A doctor advised him him to “get out of newspaper offices and out of cities,” if he wanted to preserve his health. He decided he would write fiction — short stories — and sell them. When single, Robert had worked as a logger and fur trader in Ottawa’s woods, that vast wilderness that stretched between Lake Superior and Hudson Bay. He and Kathrene decided that they would build...
A PRAYER: Father God, I thank You and praise You for bringing us through recent, harsh February weather. Come! Heal and restore where our farmers, ranchers, and rural families have suffered loss during this event. Leave no physical, financial or emotional scar, Lord. Challenging weather can yet come. Therefore, Father, allow a Blood Line around every home, especially with school bound children, every calving field, farrowing barn, kidding barn, dog and chicken house, in Jesus’ Name. Should a...
On a trip to Central America several years ago, the group I was with was encouraged to be careful giving money to panhandlers and beggars. A little background. For as dysfunctional as American society is becoming, there are places we are still as a Shangri-la. I remember leaving the airport terminal and being greeted, almost accosted, by children trying to sell what looked like origami from nearby plants. “Only a dollar,” still rings in my memory. One of our group shooed them away like stray dog...
Change, even good chance, can be hard. That’s what Karen and I are learning as we prepare to leave Cheyenne County for our new home in Belle Fourche, SD. This reality has been driven home as good friends we’ve made here share the impact we’ve had in their lives over the years, often impact we may not have known about until it was shared. I arrived in Sidney in October of 2004 as I transitioned from a 25-year career in TV and radio to a new position as a writer for Cabela’s. Karen and the kid...
Warning! This is a true story of a Navy boot camp experience. The language has been toned down to protect the guilty. I stood looking Fear in the face. Fear with a capitol F–E–A-R, complete with a body and personality all it’s horrible own. The name of that particular fear is Water. Looking at it makes me want to run under a hot shower and stay there for the rest of my life. That tower at the deep end of the pool – how high did they say it is? 50 feet? 50 infinite feet above 18 deadly feet of...
My wife and I recently had dinner with a collection of people; most we knew, some more than others. There were the conversations like old friends meeting again, and of newcomers gently entering the conversation.. One common thread went through the room: each person has had to confront loss through death. Death is an unfortunate fact of life. Biblically, biologically, and just the random roll of the dice living on this planet -- we all will face it at some point, on our own and when someone...
Parables and stories cause us to remember valuable life lessons. Jesus’ Disciples asked, “Why do you speak to them in parables?”. Jesus answered, “… Because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. [For if] they understood with their hearts and turned [from wicked ways], I would heal them.” Matthew 13:11-17. All parables are about God the Father, Jesus the Son, the Kingdom of righteousness and you. Stories like my husband, Frank, driving school children in...
Whenever a bill in the Nebraska State Legislature receives no opposition testimony at its public hearing and the committee members all support the bill, it becomes eligible for the consent calendar. The Speaker of the Legislature is the keeper of the consent calendar. Once the Speaker of the Legislature decides to place a bill on the consent calendar, it gets only 15 minutes of debate on the floor of the Legislature. Today I would like to tell you about four bills of mine that I have requested...
Dear Editor, Gun shows bring a lot of revenues into communities where they are held. Attendees rent motel rooms, they dine out at local restaurants, and they shop at local businesses. It is with great disappointment that the High Plains Shooters Supply gun show was turned down for the use of the facilities at your fairgrounds. After visiting with the county sheriff and the county attorney just before Christmas. We talked at length about what we would do and how things would be handled with the security at the show and they endorsed the ideas...
You can’t be blamed if you’ve not heard about the massive demonstrations and protests underway in Canada because most media outlets and social media platforms are doing all they can to block the spread of news about them. In spite of this, the protests continue and are spawning similar actions across the globe from Europe to Australia. It began as a protest involving thousands of truckers when the Canadian government imposed draconian measures it thought would prevent the spread of COV...
Don’t let Nebraska’s location in the middle of America fool you. Our state touches every corner of the globe with the crops we grow, livestock we raise, and products we manufacture. Each year, Nebraska exports around $10 billion of goods and services worldwide. Over 95% of consumers live outside of our borders. To grow Nebraska, we must continue to proactively reach out to international partners and share all the Good Life has to offer. This August 20-28, I am leading a trade mission to the Uni...
In the late 40’s and early 50’s dust storms (and this was before climate change, too!) roared through the plains and I remember one in particular. I was spending some time with grandma and grandpa Sunderland in Kiowa, Kansas, where they operated a cafe near the railroad station. While there a duster blew in and all but closed things down for several days. Sheets, towels and anything else that could be crammed into the cracks and crevices around doors and windows proved useless in keeping out the...
Did I heart it right? If I choose to not get the vaccine, the powers that be (local, state or federal) can come to my home and arrest me by gunpoint and put me in lockdown? Some state far-left legislators are threatening and apparently doing just that to the unvaccinated. I’ve also heard that some city officials are confining the unvaccinated in their cities to their homes. Really? On what authority? As far as I have heard or know there is no law (local, state or federal) that makes it a c...
One of the bills that I have co-signed this year is LB 773. This bill would authorize private citizens to carry a concealed weapon without a permit. Currently, the Concealed Handgun Permit Act allows cities to restrict the concealing of a handgun only to authorized permit holders. LB 773 would allow all Nebraskans to conceal their weapons anywhere in the state without having to carry such a permit. However, the bill would not apply to those who have already been prohibited from carrying a handgu...
Initiative sparked by incentive reaches for such deep desires as we are willing to strive toward. Humility cries out to the ‘unseen puller of our plow’; the Source of life, guidance, understanding, even peace. Humility in our leadership is paramount. James 4:6-7: “He says, ‘God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble’. Therefore, submit yourself under the mighty hand of God.” Men who placed themselves “under the mighty hand of God.” include some 250 Founding Fathers who constructed a C...
After reading Mr. Bensons’ recent column on his take on the events at the US Capitol on January 6th, 2021 I feel I must write a response. He starts his column by stating Donald Trump lost the 2020 Presidential election. I think it would be more accurate to say former Senator and Vice President Joe Biden appeared to be the winner as the votes were tabulated. Trump received 74.2 million votes and Biden 81.2 million votes nationwide. Both are unusually high numbers. Barack Obama received 69.5 m...
Immigration is not for the faint of heart. With high school diploma in hand, a young African from Ghana named Robert Kosi Tette came to the United States in 1998, leaving behind family, friends, and “a simple life of blissful innocence.” Ten years later, he described his decade in America, in an article that appeared in the March 1, 2008 issue of Newsweek, that he entitled “An Immigrant’s Silent Struggle.” In it, he said, “It was as though I had run ten consecutive marathons, one for each ye...
Humility is no one’s favorite word. Its opposite, ‘arrogance’ is detested! Humility may be defined as “acknowledging that achievement results from the investment others make into my life.” Young adults often report, “The older I get, the smarter Dad and Mom get to be.”. Humility is, also, associated with “submission”. Dislike of this word may come when Organizer precepts of leadership are misapplied. Very organized leaders may become bossy, persnickety and territorial when visualizing the o...
I’m not optimistic about America’s future. It pains me to say that. But with $30 trillion in debt, gains made by China, a belligerent Russia, an incompetent government, complicit media and a rising generation of Americans more concerned about gender issues than any of the aforementioned challenges, you can see why I’m concerned. Add to that increasingly open voices on both the political right and political left calling for the other side to be silenced, and it’s hard to see how we avoid bloodsh...
A coincidence: a remarkable occurrence of events at the same time. A coincidence? The start up and spread of covid 19 and the 2020 presidential election. A coincidence? The necessity of mail-in votes and the last minute effect it had on the election. A coincidence? The 1st year of Biden’s presidency and the worst inflation in America in many years. A coincidence? The 1st year of Biden’s presidency and the worst influx of illegal immigrants, drug cartels and crime in America A coincidence? The 1s...
The Bill of Rights, the first 10 Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, outline basic rights of citizens and most importantly limits of the government. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. (First Amendment)” It is clearly written what the government, Congress spe...
Here in the Good Life, we must not take our public safety for granted. We’ve seen other states fail to support law enforcement and underinvest in their corrections. News stories with video footage of rampant theft and outbreaks of violence have become the unfortunate norm in cities like San Francisco and Washington, DC. Residents of these areas feel unsafe, and they’re fleeing to find a better place for their families. More than half of the San Francisco Bay area population plans to leave per...
Last Thursday the Legislature’s Revenue Committee held a public hearing at the Capitol on LR264CA, which is my resolution for a constitutional amendment for the consumption tax. The resolution would put an initiative for the consumption tax on the ballot for the November 8 election. The time has come for the citizens of Nebraska to be given the opportunity to decide how they should be taxed. I would like to begin by saying thank you to all those who drove to Lincoln to testify in person at t...
A favorite Lincoln biographer of mine is Carl Sandburg. In 1926, he published a two-volume work, Abraham Lincoln, The Prairie Years, and then in 1939, he published a four-volume work, Abraham Lincoln, The War Years. This latter work won Sandburg the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1940. Although fellow historians have pointed out that Sandburg did a poor job citing his sources, his readers find his biography “exhaustively researched, and magnificently illuminating.” One reviewer called the six...
