Live post leads to arrest; Caterpillar layoffs; mom, daughter shoplifting team
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Odd and interesting news from the Midwest.
- By ANYA RATH The Times Herald
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FORT GRATIOT, Mich. (AP) — While many people would try to pull up or kill any milkweed they see, Sara Totten has dozens of the green leafy plants in her yard.
Every three to four days starting in early July, she and her children go right outside their Fort Gratiot home to check the undersides of the broad milkweed leaves for monarch butterfly eggs, The Times Herald (http://bwne.ws/2cmCEV6 ) reported.
Once they find the eggs, they snip off the leaves that the sesame seed-sized eggs are on and bring them inside where they raise them from caterpillars up until they are mature butterflies.
Last week, Totten and her neighbors gathered at the beach near their home by Lake Huron to release 45 fully-matured monarch butterflies. They have already released 116 of the orange and black insects this year.
Totten has been raising and releasing monarch butterflies for seven years and has released at least 500. After becoming acquainted with the process through a friend, she became invested as she realized that monarch eggs only have a 1 percent chance of surviving nature.
It takes about a month for a monarch butterfly to develop from an egg to full maturity. Butterflies hatched this time of year are considered the fourth-generation of the year and will immediately begin migrating to Mexico, Totten said. They will live as long as six months.
Over the years, Totten has learned how to share chrysalises with neighbors and even how to fix broken wings.
"I feel passionate about educating people what to do," she said.
Monarch butterflies are pollinators and are an indicator species, said Dave Sheldon, a St. Clair County Community College biology professor. Pollination is a crucial step in the growth of fruits and vegetables.
"When we lose monarchs and other pollinators, we lose food," Sheldon said.
The monarch butterfly population has increasingly dropped over the years due to habitat destruction, Sheldon said. This is because milkweed is regularly destroyed due to either pesticides or property development.
Monarch butterflies exclusively lay their eggs on milkweed. The plant is also the only source of sustenance for monarch caterpillars. As a result, the survival of monarch butterflies as a species relies on this one plant.
Sheldon said since much of St. Clair County is still undeveloped, there is more milkweed and a higher population of monarchs than neighboring Macomb County.
Both Sheldon and Totten have hopes that people will become more aware of the importance of milkweed and will prevent the destruction of the plant.
"If you decide, look, I want my yard to contribute to the environment, don't pull it," Sheldon said. "Let it grow. Let the monarchs do what they need to do."
Totten has registered the spot they released the butterflies as an official monarch way station as it has many of the milkweed plants growing around it.
Though it started as an inexpensive project of passion for Totten and a way to educate her children about the environment, raising butterflies has become a neighborhood collaboration. Totten said their effort is all so the butterflies do not end up on the endangered species list.
"It's not just about me," Totten said. "It's about the whole community."
Totten has taught dozens of people how to care for the insects, including her neighbors Carol Koob and Judy Michaels.
Koob and Michaels have raised 17 butterflies this year.
"Watching them come out of the chrysalis is like magic," Michaels said.
Sheldon said he encourages people to do all they can to help pollinators reach full maturity and that he is thrilled about the neighborhood's efforts.
"If (monarchs) don't do well, the rest of the pollinators don't do well," he said. " And if they don't do well, we're in a world of hurt. I mean they have to - it's our food."
Totten advised those who are interested in raising monarch butterflies to visit monarchwatch.org.
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Information from: Times Herald, http://www.thetimesherald.com
An AP Member Exchange shared by The Times Herald.
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DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Des Moines police believe a stray bullet killed a woman found in her car with a gunshot wound to her head.
Police said Saturday that 55-year-old Barbara Perry, of Des Moines, was hit by a bullet fired from an area west of where she parked her car in the lot of a Family Dollar Store.
Homicide detectives don't believe Perry was the intended target.
Perry was found in her car Friday and taken to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead. No arrests had been made Saturday.
Perry's death is the city's 10th homicide this year. It was the second shooting in Des Moines on Friday after an 18-year-old man was shot in the Highland Park neighborhood around noon. Police say he was hospitalized in stable condition.
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BATTLE CREEK, Mich. (AP) — A southwestern Michigan mother and her teenage daughter are jailed after police say they tried to steal $2,300 worth of merchandise from a mall.
The adult was arrested Friday night in the parking lot of the Lakeview Square Mall in Battle Creek. Her 15-year-old daughter was arrested across the street after running from a mall security guard.
The pair is from Kalamazoo. They are being held on organized retail fraud and other charges. Stolen women's clothing and marijuana were found in the mother's vehicle.
Police say shopping bags were modified to block electronic security tag signals attached to the clothing. The clothing was returned to several stores in the mall.
The security guard was struck by the mother's vehicle, but was not injured.
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EVANSTON, Ill. (AP) — A convicted felon is back in custody after Evanston police say the saw him in a Facebook Live video firing a gun at a shooting range in violation of his parole.
The Evanston Police Department says an investigator with its intelligence unit was monitoring social media Wednesday and recognized an Evanston gang member firing a handgun in a real-time video post.
The investigator recognized the firing range in Winthrop Harbor, 30 miles north, and contacted police there. Officers immediately responded to the shooting range and arrested the man.
Twenty-five-year-old Demarcus Curtis of Des Plaines was charged with aggravated unlawful use of a weapon by a felon.
Police arrested a second convicted felon with him, 25-year-old Nicholas Mayfield of Country Club Hills.
Their public defenders could not be reached for comment.
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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A 44-year-old Topeka woman was sentenced to five years in prison for putting prescription drugs in her daughters' Kool-Aid.
Shakina Dauniel Lawton was sentenced Friday for two counts of attempted second-degree murder in a plea deal. Prosecutors say she gave her daughters, then 14 and 9, the drug-laced Kool-Aid in July 2015.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports (http://bit.ly/2bKnIKz ) prosecutors say Lawton had a history of mental health problems and was not taking her medication at the time of the crime.
The older daughter called 911 to tell dispatchers her mother was trying to poison her and her sister.
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Information from: The Topeka (Kan.) Capital-Journal, http://www.cjonline.com
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MOSSVILLE, Ill. (AP) — Hundreds of employees have received layoff notices at one of the largest Caterpillar facilities in the Peoria area.
The (Peoria) Journal Star reports (http://bit.ly/2ca5J4z ) that 300 support and management employees at two sites in Mossville received job loss notifications this week that included severance packages and 60 days' notice.
The heavy equipment maker did not disclose the number of layoffs this week at other locations in the region. The company said it would work to place some of those employees in new positions within Caterpillar and help others find work elsewhere.
The layoffs largely affected engineers in divisions that Caterpillar plans to consolidate.
The company also just announced thousands of intended job cuts in Northern Ireland and Belgium.
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Information from: Journal Star, http://pjstar.com
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DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) — Davenport police say a 10-year-old boy has died after crashing his bicycle into a tree.
The Quad-City Times reports (http://bit.ly/2bXY2uL ) that the accident happened Friday evening. Police received a call just before 7 p.m. reporting an injured person at Fairmount Cemetery.
When the paramedics and police arrived on the scene, they discovered the child dead.
A preliminary investigation indicates that the boy was riding his bicycle down a hill in the cemetery when he lost control and hit the tree.
Police have not yet released the boy's name.
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Information from: Quad-City Times, http://www.qctimes.com
- By MAGGIE O'BRIEN Omaha World-Herald
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OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The 4-month-old was calm through airport security, staying quiet even as TSA agents patted her down.
She held up the line for a second, though, when she stopped to gobble up a red Life Saver someone dropped on the floor.
She is, after all, a puppy.
"That's just what they do," chuckled her handler, Lynn Schense of Papillion.
But the dog, a black Labrador retriever named Key, is different from her canine counterparts. She's training to become a certified assistance dog recognized by the federal Americans With Disabilities Act.
The Omaha World-Herald (http://bit.ly/2cbAlj7 ) reports that two years from now Key will be living with someone who is blind or disabled, helping that person get from place to place and lead as normal a life as possible.
Service dogs learn basic obedience — sit, stay, come — but also skills specific to their job: how to pull a wheelchair, retrieve medication, open a door, turn on the light.
Service animals are allowed under federal law to accompany their owners in all public areas, including stores, restaurants and airplanes, and should be comfortable in those environments.
"As soon as they are born we get them used to being around all different kinds of people and places," said Schense, a volunteer for KSDS Inc., a nonprofit organization out of Washington, Kansas, that trains Labradors to become service or guide dogs. "You take them shopping with you, to restaurants, to church. All the routine stuff, so they know how to behave."
Key and another puppy-in-training, Milo, were taken to Eppley Airfield recently as part of their education. There are few busy public places with more distractions than an airport. There's security, escalators, food court, luggage, other people milling about. Navigating the airport is a step above day-to-day service dog training, and helps their handlers determine if the animals are cut out to be assistance dogs. Plus, there is a chance the dogs will have to fly when taken to their permanent owner's home state.
"The dogs have to be OK with everyone — including people in uniforms, people of different races, everyone. Because you never know who and what their owner will encounter," said Milo's handler, Debbie VanZee of Omaha. Milo will be a year old in September.
Donner, an 8-year-old KSDS-trained black Lab, is a guide dog for Daniel Kurtz of O'Neill, Nebraska. Kurtz, 25, has been completely blind for five years; his vision diminished as he was growing up, due to a birth defect.
Donner is now Kurtz's eyes and safety net. The dog makes sure Kurtz stops at crosswalks and obeys traffic signals. He pauses before steps so Kurtz can take them without tripping and obeys commands: Left, right, forward, find, stop.
"He definitely keeps me safe," Kurtz said. "He knows where I can and cannot go. We are a team."
Kurtz can even say "Donner, toilet," and his friend guides him there by putting his nose on the rim.
But when Donner is home, and his harness is off, "his mood completely changes and he's, like, 'Hey, I'm a dog.'
"I'm able to pet him and play with him and talk to him and stuff," Kurtz said.
It was a busy day at the airport when Key and Milo arrived. The training was approved in advance by Transportation Security Administration officials. The puppies, wearing blue vests that identified them as assistance dogs in training, attracted a lot of stares and oohs and aahs as they walked past the United Airlines ticket counter.
A few people asked to pet the dogs. Key was a no-no. She was there to work, Schense said, and petting her might cause the pup to get so excited she'd urinate on the airport floor. But for Milo, who is older and has more training under his belt, petting is OK.
Milo is so well-trained that he seems older than 10 months. He doesn't run, jump, bark or chew on things. Milo is so calm that he barely notices when people reach out to pet him. And after he is petted by a stranger, he looks immediately to VanZee to let her know that his focus is still on her.
But like Donner, once Milo is done working, he's a playful puppy again.
Key went first through security, following cues from junior trainer Marie Brousek. The puppy had to sit still while the TSA agent patted down her chest, then torso and legs. She can't pay attention to the people in line around her — there were at least 100 — she can't stray and she can't have an accident. Of course, she can't turn to nip at the security officer, either. Key made it through.
"She got an A," said Brousek, a local fourth-grader who started volunteering with Schense because she loves dogs. "I made a report card for her when she learns things, like sitting under a table, stay and shake. Today, she didn't quite get an A-plus, but she did good."
The training is treat-based and the dogs learn commands that any family pet might, but it gets more intense by the time the dogs are Key's age; that's when a dog starts to learn commands specific to the needs of his future owner.
There are about 200,000 assistance dogs nationwide, according to Service Dog Central, a national group that advocates for the rights of people with assistance animals.
They might guide the blind, alert the deaf, pull a wheelchair, remind a person to take medications and perform other duties someone might need help with. Most are Labs or golden retrievers because the breeds are devoted companions by nature.
Before they can graduate from training and become a service animal under the guidelines of the Americans With Disabilities Act, dogs need to perform three tasks their owners are unable to do on their own. For example, VanZee said, an assistance dog can carry a plastic wallet, remove a credit card and give it to a store clerk.
Neither VanZee nor Schense is paid to train the dogs, although they are educated in how to train them. Neither woman is disabled or has relatives who are. They say they're just dog lovers who wanted to help others.
The dogs live and train with them until they are close to 2 years old. Then they are sent to KSDS headquarters in Kansas to go through testing and health screens that will help determine if they are a better guide dog, suited to lead, or service dog, who is heavily relied on to perform tasks. Then the dogs are placed in their forever homes.
"We call it going to college," said Deb Tegethoff, director of canine development at KSDS. "It's like they choose what they want to focus on."
About 50 KSDS dogs trained in Nebraska and Iowa have been placed in homes across the country, Tegethoff said.
The dogs have to have the right demeanor for the job, and they cannot have any health issues or emotional limitations. Schense has a family pet named Avalon who started out as a training dog but stayed with her trainer permanently because she gets carsick.
"If they have a predisposition to cataracts, allergies or hip problems, they can't do it," Schense said, explaining that the dogs can't care for people if they have their own health problems.
There's a small part of the local trainers who wouldn't mind too much if Key and Milo ended up staying. They are attached to the dogs, but have to let them go.
"It's hard, but it's so worthwhile," VanZee said.
Added Schense: "You bawl like a baby."
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Information from: Omaha World-Herald, http://www.omaha.com
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WAUCONDA, Ill. (AP) — Native American bones and funerary objects that have been in a suburban Chicago museum collection for decades are on track to be returned to a Michigan-based tribe.
Lake County Forest Preserve District officials said most of the remains and other objects were unearthed at sites in Lake County, and one set came from McHenry County. They'll be turned over to the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi, which has lived in the Great Lakes region for centuries.
The artifacts have been in storage at the district's Lake County Discovery Museum, and were donated in the late 1950s or early 1960s by the Lake County Museum of History, the (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald (http://bit.ly/2ccKrDG ) reported.
The remains were on display in the Discovery Museum until the 1990 adoption of a law requiring federally funded agencies and institutions to return Native American cultural items to lineal descendants or culturally affiliated tribes.
Officials spent more than 15 years looking for a tribe willing to take the artifacts, district collections coordinator Diana Dretske said. That search eventually led to Michigan's Pokagon Band tribe.
"It's been a great responsibility to look after these remains all these years," Dretske said. "But now we're doing the right thing for the tribes and their ancestors."
Pokagon official Marcus Winchester said his tribe is committed to restoring the reverence owed to Native American ancestors. He said the remains will be ceremoniously reburied.
The forest service's full board is expected to approve the transfer plan Sept. 13.
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Information from: Daily Herald, http://www.dailyherald.com
- By DAVE ORRICK Pioneer Press
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CONOVER, Wis. (AP) — The studio of Lax Reproductions is walled with trophy fish, mostly muskies, that are still swimming in the lakes where they were caught.
While they appear as natural as any traditional piece of taxidermy — scales, eyes, teeth like X-Acto knives — the mounts aren't the actual fish but plastic replicas, based on measurements and photographs taken during the few adrenaline-injected minutes spent with a fish of a lifetime. The fish was released; months later, the replica was completed.
This is the norm today in muskie fishing, a realm of strict possession limits (54 inches is the statewide minimum keeper size in Minnesota) and a pervasive culture of catch-and-release intended to protect the larger but less-common cousins of northern pike. The result is a time-consuming, often pricey passion where the goal is not a fish fry, but the thrill of a rod-and-reel battle with an acrobatic, 50-pound torpedo which they will — following high-fives, measurements and photos — promptly release back into the water whence it came.
With the approach of fall — trophy muskie season — anglers casting big lures for big fish will be heading out on lakes from the metro to northwest Ontario knowing that if they want a keepsake muskellunge, they'll have to commission someone to make a replica.
One of the choice craftsman-artists for muskie mounts is Rick Lax, who runs Lax Reproductions, where 20 years of making replicas hasn't merely led to becoming a leader in the niche market of freshwater fish replicas. The quality and convincing realism of replicas also has aided the entire catch-and-release movement, which is widely recognized as a primary reason why fish exceeding 60 pounds are once again being caught in Minnesota after disappearing for much of the past century.
So, it might surprise many muskie fanatics that a procession of dead muskies — 120 and counting — have been crucial to the success of Lax.
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FATHER-SON PIONEERS
Lax has run Lax Reproductions (formerly Lax Taxidermy) since 2003, when his father Ron retired.
The father-son duo had been operating the business together since the early 1990s. Traditional skin-over-Styrofoam taxidermists by training, the Laxes were early adopters of muskie replicas, a technology that previously had been practiced only on saltwater species. Early examples of replica muskellunge — a fish that is native only to a portion of North America centered around the Great Lakes — were weak, with body shapes and teeth looking more like those of a barracuda than a muskie.
"When it came to muskie reproductions, we putzed around ourselves until we figured it out," said Ron Lax, 68, who still takes on a few traditional mounts from deer and moose each hunting seasons but no longer creates fish replicas. "We never learned nothing from nobody."
In the early 1990s the pair saw the catch-and-release movement taking off, but replicas were pricey and sub-standard, so most anglers who caught a trophy that could be legally kept (minimum sizes were lower throughout the muskie range) killed the fish and opted for a traditional mount. That process involves using the actual head and fins from the fish, but only the skin of the torso, which is tanned and wrapped around a form, often foam or wood.
Without special care, skin mounts become brittle, and oils leech from the head, leading to slow but inevitable decomposition. Ron and Rick Lax knew replicas could last decades longer and require little care, but they had few reliable ways to make the replica mounts, which were then fiberglass, match the shape of real fish.
"We maybe did 50 fish in a year, and most people didn't want the reproductions because they cost more and didn't look as good," Rick Lax recalled.
But there was no shortage in the supply of dead muskies.
"They were still killing a lot of fish back then," Ron Lax said. "People were bringing us all sort of dead muskies, so we decided to start making our own molds from those fish, instead of buying these blanks from a third party. That's when things started changing."
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120 DEAD MUSKIES
Take the dead fish, give it a pose — flared gills, arched back, etc. — and then create a mold of that fish, right down to its teeth. Then you can reproduce that form by injecting plastic into the mold. Make separate molds for enough heads, jaws, teeth, fins, torsos and you've got the ability to match the basic dimensions of almost any fish out there. The father-son team kept making molds as new shapes and sizes of dead muskies rolled in.
Costs evened out, although it's not cheap. The basic rate for Lax is $14.95 per inch, so a 50-inch muskie will be around $750.
"Today we have molds from about 120 muskies," Rick Lax said. "If you have a 44-inch muskie, we've got eight molds for that. I haven't gotten a request for anything that I don't have. I have molds up to 59 inches and 60 pounds."
That fish, from the St. Lawrence River, was taken 15 years ago. Even though killing a muskie is taboo today, an occasional carcass still arrives at Lax's shop, located along U.S. 45 in northeast Wisconsin.
"Sometimes one will die on someone, despite their best efforts to revive it," Rick Lax said. "If the fish is legal, they might do a skin mount. We'll make a mold if it's something we don't have."
Recent example: Last year, an Atlanta angler brought in a 57-inch muskie caught with a guide on Lake Minnetonka.
Increasingly, he recognizes the fish in the photo as one he's done before.
"The markings on a muskie, they're like a fingerprint," he said, referring to the fish's vertical bars or spots, or combination thereof. "Every fish is different. So if you've seen those exact markings before, you've seen that exact fish before."
Photographs can confirm such happenings. "I've done a replica of the same fish three times in one year. I got three jobs out of that fish and it was still swimming! It's proof that catch-and-release works."
Lax does other fish, as well. Walleye, northern pike, largemouth and smallmouth bass, and trout and salmon are the most frequent, as well as perch, crappie and sunfish. Because reproductions can last a lifetime and need little more than a damp cloth for cleaning, reproductions are becoming the norm, also from plastic injected into molds he has created.
But there are still challenges. He has had to turn down business. "Sometimes, every now and then with a big trout, someone will have a fish that I don't have a mold for," he said. "I'll tell them that either I can do a skin mount if they kept the fish, or I just can't help them."
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TRADE SECRETS
Lax isn't the only acclaimed shop making reproductions. Artistic Anglers in Duluth and Jim Fittante in Antigo, Wis., are among those often listed.
The small industry — Lax does between 200 and 250 mounts per year, each with a roughly eight- to 10-month turnaround — is nonetheless competitive. On my recent visit, for example, Rick Lax was skittish about letting me photograph or shoot video of his actual production process.
"I guess we have a few trade secrets," he chuckled.
Lax does all the work himself with occasional extra manpower conscripted from his brother Chris and high school-age son. He said the techniques he and his father fine-tuned over the years change little now. Instead of large still photographs, he works off a computer tablet, allowing him to zoom in to a examine fish's markings.
As for those distinctive markings on a fish, they're less craft and more art. While some taxidermists use a brush, Lax prefers to exclusively airbrush his mounts, employing mesh or other stencil-type tools to achieve certain mottling or the look of scales. That final step is as crucial as any, he said.
"It's an artist who does the finished products, and you're only as good as your paint jobs."
Lax was at the forefront of a minor revolution in fish taxidermy, and I asked him what he thought the next revolution might be. For example: Could the combination of smartphones and 3-D printing render even the replica-making taxidermist irrelevant?
"That's an interesting idea, but I'm not worried and I don't see the need to change. I'm 50, and I think there will be enough business around to take me into retirement."
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Information from: St. Paul Pioneer Press, http://www.twincities.com
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MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Minnesota remains among the top states for refugee resettlement, new figures from the U.S. State Department show.
In the past year, Minnesota took in nearly 1,100 Somalis, 166 Ethiopians and 66 Congolese. That's a large increase from last year through August, the Star Tribune reported (http://strib.mn/2bQrp3y ).
Twenty-five Syrian refugees also resettled in Minnesota in the past year, mostly in Rochester and Minneapolis.
Last year, President Barack Obama launched a Syrian resettlement program as millions fled to escape the country's civil war and persecution. The U.S. recently reached its goal of resettling 10,000 Syrian refugees.
Concerned that government screenings did not have enough safeguards to stop Islamic State terrorists from entering the U.S. as refugees, some governors resisted letting Syrian refugees settle in their states. But some members of Congress wanted the U.S. to take in even more Syrians to help ease the flow of refugees into Europe.
Ben Walen, of the Minnesota Council of Churches, said the debate over Syrian refugees has made more people want to help them.
"The sentiment, the public sphere, social media, all of that which was very negative about refugees has more than been countered with positive reactions," Walen said. He said he has more than enough volunteers to help drive the new arrivals to English classes or job interviews.
A total of 2,335 refugees have settled in Minnesota since last year, the most since 2007. Minnesota ranks 13th nationally for the number of refugees living in the state.
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Information from: Star Tribune, http://www.startribune.com
- By BEN STRAND Winona Daily News
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WINONA, Minn. (AP) — In 2000, Winona resident Dan Swartling had an idea: A motorcycle ministry.
The plan was to spread the vision of Christ by riding bikes. He got together with relatives and friends, and soon a nonprofit was born.
The group started with about seven or eight people and branded themselves with a name - Faith Riders of Winona. Chapters also started in Tennessee and Texas during that time. But it took a while for the group to gain traction. In 2006 Swartling moved to Tennessee, and by 2010, the Winona chapter was the only surviving chapter.
Enter Chris Parker.
In January 2014, after Parker became president, he and other members of the group worked with Swartling to come up with a new vision and plan for the group. They designed a new patch and realigned the direction of the organization with hopes of growth.
In fall 2014, the Winona Faith Riders became an official chapter, and in 2015 Chippewa Falls became an officially recognized chapter of the Faith Riders ministry. There are also satellite members in Ashland, Sparta, Rochester and Mankato — all of which are on the verge of becoming official chapters.
"Our biggest goal with the refresh was getting more visibility and getting out on the road with the patch," Parker said.
Parker said the group is centered on brotherhood and fellowship, promoting the visibility of faith and Christ through rides and hosting or volunteering for events.
"We believe that fellowship is built on witnessing and serving (the community) where we're located," Parker said.
He said serving includes anything from helping with something that highlights or promotes Jesus, simply reaching out a hand and listening to someone in need, or going around and doing something that benefits the community.
They've done work with youth groups and prison ministries, speaking and sharing personal testimonies, hoping to lead more people to Christ.
Other work includes pay-it-forward events, like one they did at Midtown Foods before Christmas last year. Members stood at the end of checkout lines, picked people, and paid for their groceries.
"It was as enriching for our own souls as much as it was the people we helped," he said.
They also bought out all the turkeys at the store and handed out to people at random leaving the store.
The feedback they received after the event, Parker said, was unbelievable.
People reached out via Facebook and sent uplifting messages on how their act of kindness impacted them. Parker said a couple they purchased groceries for asked to pray with them before leaving the store, and a lot of people gave them hugs for their generous act.
"It was funny, in a good way, to watch and see how those people's days were changed by what we did," Parker said — noting that it's not often you see people dressed in biker attire standing at the end of grocery checkouts offering to pay for groceries.
"It's definitely something we'd like to do again."
An obligation each official chapter has is organizing and hosting one major event per year. This year the Winona chapter is hosting Faithfest, a day-long event full of live music, food, art and activities on Sept. 11 at the Lake Park bandshell. It's the first event of the motorcycle ministry's kind, and Parker said he hopes it's a success.
"We want people who come to have a good time . hopefully it's something we can do again next year."
Parker said they're just a tool of Christ, and their bikes are the vehicle, the gift, that enhances the visibility.
"It's all for Him and possible through Him, we're just the vehicle," he said.
One of the key Bible verses that represents the motorcycle ministry group, Parker said, is Luke 14:23:
"And the Lord said to the servant, 'go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled."
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Information from: Winona Daily News, http://www.winonadailynews.com
- By PAUL SWIECH The (Bloomington) Pantagraph
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PAXTON, Ill. (AP) — Nicole O'Dell did incline walking pushups on bleachers outside Paxton-Buckley-Loda High School as her 7-year-old triplets did regular pushups beside her.
Then they ran up and down the bleacher stairs several times before one of her triplets asked "Mom, can we run around the track?"
"That is the greatest reward of all this," O'Dell, 43, said of her embracing a healthier lifestyle.
"Natalie (O'Dell's 18-year-old daughter) had health issues but she saw how my choices were benefiting me" so she improved her nutrition and exercise and lost weight, O'Dell said.
"Now, I'm seeing these guys get off to a good start," she said of triplets Logan, Megan and Ryleigh. Then they scampered down the bleachers and ran around the track.
In the past year since O'Dell began her healthier eating and exercise, she has lost 106 pounds. She weighed 150 pounds as she ran around the track with her children late afternoon on Aug. 3.
A Paxton mother of six children — ages 24, 18, 15 and the 7-year-old triplets — O'Dell is training for two triathlons during the next month as she works full time as marketing manager at Human Kinetics, a Champaign-based publisher of books for the fitness industry and as she continues her graduate studies.
"I'm 10 weeks from finishing my master's degree in English from Southern New Hampshire University," she said.
She maintains a website — www.fitandbusylife.com — to hold herself accountable to her fitness goals while helping other busy parents to reach their goals through her posting of stories, recipes and tips.
"I'm honest about my struggles," she said.
Writing is not new to her. She has written 27 books — some Christian young adult fiction books and some nonfiction resources for parents.
"I think she's amazing. She's super mom," daughter Emily, 15, said between color guard practice and play rehearsal. "I have no clue how she does it."
'It's incredible," Natalie said before she ran off to work.
Natalie will be a freshman at Illinois State University in Normal later this month. Oldest child Erik is serving overseas in the Air Force.
"It's good," Megan said of her mom's exercise. "I like that she gets more skinnier every time she exercises."
"It's really good because when you exercise your blood pumps," said Logan.
"It makes you healthy," said Ryleigh.
All three children love to exercise with their mom, including in a July 5K race in Paxton.
"I feel really healthy and sweaty," Ryleigh said after exercising on Aug. 3.
All this is paramount to O'Dell, who said fitness is her third life priority. Her first are faith and family.
"My faith is a big part of this," she said. "God made a day 24 hours long and, if you can't get everything you need to get done in a day, maybe you're doing something you're not supposed to be doing."
"I was busy before I started doing this" nutrition and exercise program, she said. "It's just a shift in priorities."
"I used to think that it would be selfish to carve time out for exercise," she said. "Now I think it would be selfish for me to stop."
That's because her healthy eating and exercise give her energy, peace of mind and personal pride that help her as a mother, employee, graduate student, person of faith and friend.
She is helping to organize a walking group through her church and invites friends to join her in exercise.
"I used to do social time, getting together with friends for coffee," she said. "Now, my exercise time is my social time. If friends want to get together, I invite them to jump on board."
O'Dell already was busy as a mother, employee, writer and student a year ago when she decided that she needed to do something about her weight and sluggishness. She weighed 256 pounds and felt drained.
"I knew that I was letting myself suffer physically," she said. While she exercised from time to time, she'd stop when she didn't achieve desired results or when she became injured.
"The missing component was diet," O'Dell said. She bought and ate a lot of convenience foods.
"I thought, 'The best thing I can give my kids is a healthy mom.' I realized that I'm not too busy to take time to exercise."
O'Dell knew she was allergic and sensitive to many foods but she would eat them anyway, sometimes resulting in hives, stomach distress, burning throat, inflammation and weight gain.
Beginning a year ago and over time, she determined those foods (including wheat, eggs, corn, nuts, seeds, fish and sugar) and gradually eliminated them from her diet.
She replaced them with Greek yogurt, fruit, mixed greens, vegetables and lean meats.
"I don't feel deprived," she said. "What helps me is to plan (meals) ahead."
Healthy eating was quickly accompanied by exercise. O'Dell started by doing cardio work at a 24-hour fitness center in Paxton and at work.
"We're lucky to have a fitness facility at work and I took advantage of it," she said. Gradually, she ramped up her cardio workouts and added pushups.
In January, Natalie was motivated by her mother's success to begin her own healthy eating and exercise routine.
"I had unattended food allergies and once I got gluten and sugar out of my diet, everything else fell into place," she said. Soon, she added cardio work and weight lifting at night after work.
Natalie felt better, her school work improved, her skin cleared up and she lost 45 pounds.
"Now, it's routine," Natalie said of the family's healthier lifestyle.
O'Dell and her friend, Stacy Morse, decided to begin training for a triathlon.
During most weeks, O'Dell exercises six days a week, generally beginning at 5 a.m. — before her children are awake — to minimize the impact on her family.
Her Monday workout consists of running, pushups, planks, triceps dips and burpees at the school track. During the other five days, she fits in two runs, two bike rides and two swimming workouts at the Urbana Aquatics Center. Distances vary.
In the spring, she competed in a Naperville sprint triathlon and swam a half mile, biked 13.1 miles and ran 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) in 1 hour and 53 minutes.
"It was awesome," she said of her feelings afterward. "It was quite an emotional moment."
Now, she and Morse are training for a sprint triathlon in Chicago on Aug. 28 and an Olympic-distance triathlon in Litchfield on Sept. 11. The Olympic distance is a 1-mile swim, 25-mile bike ride and 10-kilometer run.
O'Dell admitted what she's doing isn't easy so she tries not to get anxious about it.
"The biggest thing for me is focusing on making the next right choice," she said.
But she enjoys what she's doing.
"I get invigorated. It's a huge reward to see how much all of this has change my life."
Her next fitness goal may be a half Ironman — 1.5 mile swim, 56-mile bike ride and 13.1 mile run — in a year.
Meanwhile, she wants to continue to grow as a mother and writer.
"The message of my story is you can be fit in a busy life," O'Dell said. "Make good choices and put one foot in front of the other. Your body and mind will follow."
Emily agreed.
"You can do anything you set your heart to."
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Source: The (Bloomington) Pantagraph, http://bit.ly/2bsxXZ7
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Information from: The Pantagraph, http://www.pantagraph.com
This is an AP-Illinois Exchange story offered by The (Bloomington) Pantagraph.
- By DAMIAN RICO The (Northwest Indiana) Times
- Updated
MUNSTER, Ind. (AP) — Ceil Noworyta, of Munster, never dreamed of getting a tattoo, let alone getting one at the age of 63. But her mind would quickly change.
Noworyta's dream came true when Sir Paul McCartney pulled her and friend Toni Johnson on stage during his recent One On One Tour show in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
"I couldn't believe it," Noworyta said. "I was not prepared for it. When he called me up there I had nothing to sign so I had him sign my arm."
Her girlfriend held up a sign that read please sign my arm so I can get a tattoo. Sticking to her word, just a couple of short days after the performance, Noworyta headed to The Tattoo Lady in Hammond, to get her Sir Paul's signature permanently on her arm.
"I'm so scared," Noworyta said. "I've never done something like this before. My husband teased that I don't even have his name on my arm, but I told him I did love Paul 10 years before I even met you."
Noworyta, a retired recovery nurse at East Chicago's St. Catherine Hospital and the mother of her own "Fab Four boys," is thankful for her husband, Don, who "is tolerable" of her appreciation for McCartney and his music.
"He says I'm crazy because I'm a 60-year-old chasing, acting like 16-year-old, while chasing a 70-year-old," Noworyta said. "It's all in fun. Paul's the best."
Noworyta recalls her father asking her if she would like to see The Beatles as a young girl. When she said "of course," he took bought four tickets for their entire family to see them at Comiskey Park in August 1965.
"That's what started it all," Noworyta said.
Noworyta took a break from the shows during the late '70s when McCartney was with Wings "because they got too big and were selling out these gigantic stadiums and I wanted to see him up close and not from the rafters."
But she learned the ins and outs of getting better seats.
Noworyta has been to more than 20 shows and takes great pride in belonging to his fan club, often getting premium seats and various opportunities.
On one occasion, her friend Toni and her hopped a flight to New York and saw him at Virgin Records after waiting days in the rain.
"That's the first time I talked to him," Noworyta said. "He is just a kind person and a musical treasure. He held my arm for what felt like an hour."
That's before her arm read "Paul McCartney."
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Source: The (Northwest Indiana) Times, http://bit.ly/2bUpxJa
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Information from: The Times, http://www.nwitimes.com
This is an Indiana Exchange story shared by The (Northwest Indiana) Times.
- By ANYA RATH The Times Herald
FORT GRATIOT, Mich. (AP) — While many people would try to pull up or kill any milkweed they see, Sara Totten has dozens of the green leafy plants in her yard.
Every three to four days starting in early July, she and her children go right outside their Fort Gratiot home to check the undersides of the broad milkweed leaves for monarch butterfly eggs, The Times Herald (http://bwne.ws/2cmCEV6 ) reported.
Once they find the eggs, they snip off the leaves that the sesame seed-sized eggs are on and bring them inside where they raise them from caterpillars up until they are mature butterflies.
Last week, Totten and her neighbors gathered at the beach near their home by Lake Huron to release 45 fully-matured monarch butterflies. They have already released 116 of the orange and black insects this year.
Totten has been raising and releasing monarch butterflies for seven years and has released at least 500. After becoming acquainted with the process through a friend, she became invested as she realized that monarch eggs only have a 1 percent chance of surviving nature.
It takes about a month for a monarch butterfly to develop from an egg to full maturity. Butterflies hatched this time of year are considered the fourth-generation of the year and will immediately begin migrating to Mexico, Totten said. They will live as long as six months.
Over the years, Totten has learned how to share chrysalises with neighbors and even how to fix broken wings.
"I feel passionate about educating people what to do," she said.
Monarch butterflies are pollinators and are an indicator species, said Dave Sheldon, a St. Clair County Community College biology professor. Pollination is a crucial step in the growth of fruits and vegetables.
"When we lose monarchs and other pollinators, we lose food," Sheldon said.
The monarch butterfly population has increasingly dropped over the years due to habitat destruction, Sheldon said. This is because milkweed is regularly destroyed due to either pesticides or property development.
Monarch butterflies exclusively lay their eggs on milkweed. The plant is also the only source of sustenance for monarch caterpillars. As a result, the survival of monarch butterflies as a species relies on this one plant.
Sheldon said since much of St. Clair County is still undeveloped, there is more milkweed and a higher population of monarchs than neighboring Macomb County.
Both Sheldon and Totten have hopes that people will become more aware of the importance of milkweed and will prevent the destruction of the plant.
"If you decide, look, I want my yard to contribute to the environment, don't pull it," Sheldon said. "Let it grow. Let the monarchs do what they need to do."
Totten has registered the spot they released the butterflies as an official monarch way station as it has many of the milkweed plants growing around it.
Though it started as an inexpensive project of passion for Totten and a way to educate her children about the environment, raising butterflies has become a neighborhood collaboration. Totten said their effort is all so the butterflies do not end up on the endangered species list.
"It's not just about me," Totten said. "It's about the whole community."
Totten has taught dozens of people how to care for the insects, including her neighbors Carol Koob and Judy Michaels.
Koob and Michaels have raised 17 butterflies this year.
"Watching them come out of the chrysalis is like magic," Michaels said.
Sheldon said he encourages people to do all they can to help pollinators reach full maturity and that he is thrilled about the neighborhood's efforts.
"If (monarchs) don't do well, the rest of the pollinators don't do well," he said. " And if they don't do well, we're in a world of hurt. I mean they have to - it's our food."
Totten advised those who are interested in raising monarch butterflies to visit monarchwatch.org.
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Information from: Times Herald, http://www.thetimesherald.com
An AP Member Exchange shared by The Times Herald.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Des Moines police believe a stray bullet killed a woman found in her car with a gunshot wound to her head.
Police said Saturday that 55-year-old Barbara Perry, of Des Moines, was hit by a bullet fired from an area west of where she parked her car in the lot of a Family Dollar Store.
Homicide detectives don't believe Perry was the intended target.
Perry was found in her car Friday and taken to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead. No arrests had been made Saturday.
Perry's death is the city's 10th homicide this year. It was the second shooting in Des Moines on Friday after an 18-year-old man was shot in the Highland Park neighborhood around noon. Police say he was hospitalized in stable condition.
BATTLE CREEK, Mich. (AP) — A southwestern Michigan mother and her teenage daughter are jailed after police say they tried to steal $2,300 worth of merchandise from a mall.
The adult was arrested Friday night in the parking lot of the Lakeview Square Mall in Battle Creek. Her 15-year-old daughter was arrested across the street after running from a mall security guard.
The pair is from Kalamazoo. They are being held on organized retail fraud and other charges. Stolen women's clothing and marijuana were found in the mother's vehicle.
Police say shopping bags were modified to block electronic security tag signals attached to the clothing. The clothing was returned to several stores in the mall.
The security guard was struck by the mother's vehicle, but was not injured.
EVANSTON, Ill. (AP) — A convicted felon is back in custody after Evanston police say the saw him in a Facebook Live video firing a gun at a shooting range in violation of his parole.
The Evanston Police Department says an investigator with its intelligence unit was monitoring social media Wednesday and recognized an Evanston gang member firing a handgun in a real-time video post.
The investigator recognized the firing range in Winthrop Harbor, 30 miles north, and contacted police there. Officers immediately responded to the shooting range and arrested the man.
Twenty-five-year-old Demarcus Curtis of Des Plaines was charged with aggravated unlawful use of a weapon by a felon.
Police arrested a second convicted felon with him, 25-year-old Nicholas Mayfield of Country Club Hills.
Their public defenders could not be reached for comment.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A 44-year-old Topeka woman was sentenced to five years in prison for putting prescription drugs in her daughters' Kool-Aid.
Shakina Dauniel Lawton was sentenced Friday for two counts of attempted second-degree murder in a plea deal. Prosecutors say she gave her daughters, then 14 and 9, the drug-laced Kool-Aid in July 2015.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports (http://bit.ly/2bKnIKz ) prosecutors say Lawton had a history of mental health problems and was not taking her medication at the time of the crime.
The older daughter called 911 to tell dispatchers her mother was trying to poison her and her sister.
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Information from: The Topeka (Kan.) Capital-Journal, http://www.cjonline.com
MOSSVILLE, Ill. (AP) — Hundreds of employees have received layoff notices at one of the largest Caterpillar facilities in the Peoria area.
The (Peoria) Journal Star reports (http://bit.ly/2ca5J4z ) that 300 support and management employees at two sites in Mossville received job loss notifications this week that included severance packages and 60 days' notice.
The heavy equipment maker did not disclose the number of layoffs this week at other locations in the region. The company said it would work to place some of those employees in new positions within Caterpillar and help others find work elsewhere.
The layoffs largely affected engineers in divisions that Caterpillar plans to consolidate.
The company also just announced thousands of intended job cuts in Northern Ireland and Belgium.
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Information from: Journal Star, http://pjstar.com
DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) — Davenport police say a 10-year-old boy has died after crashing his bicycle into a tree.
The Quad-City Times reports (http://bit.ly/2bXY2uL ) that the accident happened Friday evening. Police received a call just before 7 p.m. reporting an injured person at Fairmount Cemetery.
When the paramedics and police arrived on the scene, they discovered the child dead.
A preliminary investigation indicates that the boy was riding his bicycle down a hill in the cemetery when he lost control and hit the tree.
Police have not yet released the boy's name.
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Information from: Quad-City Times, http://www.qctimes.com
- By MAGGIE O'BRIEN Omaha World-Herald
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The 4-month-old was calm through airport security, staying quiet even as TSA agents patted her down.
She held up the line for a second, though, when she stopped to gobble up a red Life Saver someone dropped on the floor.
She is, after all, a puppy.
"That's just what they do," chuckled her handler, Lynn Schense of Papillion.
But the dog, a black Labrador retriever named Key, is different from her canine counterparts. She's training to become a certified assistance dog recognized by the federal Americans With Disabilities Act.
The Omaha World-Herald (http://bit.ly/2cbAlj7 ) reports that two years from now Key will be living with someone who is blind or disabled, helping that person get from place to place and lead as normal a life as possible.
Service dogs learn basic obedience — sit, stay, come — but also skills specific to their job: how to pull a wheelchair, retrieve medication, open a door, turn on the light.
Service animals are allowed under federal law to accompany their owners in all public areas, including stores, restaurants and airplanes, and should be comfortable in those environments.
"As soon as they are born we get them used to being around all different kinds of people and places," said Schense, a volunteer for KSDS Inc., a nonprofit organization out of Washington, Kansas, that trains Labradors to become service or guide dogs. "You take them shopping with you, to restaurants, to church. All the routine stuff, so they know how to behave."
Key and another puppy-in-training, Milo, were taken to Eppley Airfield recently as part of their education. There are few busy public places with more distractions than an airport. There's security, escalators, food court, luggage, other people milling about. Navigating the airport is a step above day-to-day service dog training, and helps their handlers determine if the animals are cut out to be assistance dogs. Plus, there is a chance the dogs will have to fly when taken to their permanent owner's home state.
"The dogs have to be OK with everyone — including people in uniforms, people of different races, everyone. Because you never know who and what their owner will encounter," said Milo's handler, Debbie VanZee of Omaha. Milo will be a year old in September.
Donner, an 8-year-old KSDS-trained black Lab, is a guide dog for Daniel Kurtz of O'Neill, Nebraska. Kurtz, 25, has been completely blind for five years; his vision diminished as he was growing up, due to a birth defect.
Donner is now Kurtz's eyes and safety net. The dog makes sure Kurtz stops at crosswalks and obeys traffic signals. He pauses before steps so Kurtz can take them without tripping and obeys commands: Left, right, forward, find, stop.
"He definitely keeps me safe," Kurtz said. "He knows where I can and cannot go. We are a team."
Kurtz can even say "Donner, toilet," and his friend guides him there by putting his nose on the rim.
But when Donner is home, and his harness is off, "his mood completely changes and he's, like, 'Hey, I'm a dog.'
"I'm able to pet him and play with him and talk to him and stuff," Kurtz said.
It was a busy day at the airport when Key and Milo arrived. The training was approved in advance by Transportation Security Administration officials. The puppies, wearing blue vests that identified them as assistance dogs in training, attracted a lot of stares and oohs and aahs as they walked past the United Airlines ticket counter.
A few people asked to pet the dogs. Key was a no-no. She was there to work, Schense said, and petting her might cause the pup to get so excited she'd urinate on the airport floor. But for Milo, who is older and has more training under his belt, petting is OK.
Milo is so well-trained that he seems older than 10 months. He doesn't run, jump, bark or chew on things. Milo is so calm that he barely notices when people reach out to pet him. And after he is petted by a stranger, he looks immediately to VanZee to let her know that his focus is still on her.
But like Donner, once Milo is done working, he's a playful puppy again.
Key went first through security, following cues from junior trainer Marie Brousek. The puppy had to sit still while the TSA agent patted down her chest, then torso and legs. She can't pay attention to the people in line around her — there were at least 100 — she can't stray and she can't have an accident. Of course, she can't turn to nip at the security officer, either. Key made it through.
"She got an A," said Brousek, a local fourth-grader who started volunteering with Schense because she loves dogs. "I made a report card for her when she learns things, like sitting under a table, stay and shake. Today, she didn't quite get an A-plus, but she did good."
The training is treat-based and the dogs learn commands that any family pet might, but it gets more intense by the time the dogs are Key's age; that's when a dog starts to learn commands specific to the needs of his future owner.
There are about 200,000 assistance dogs nationwide, according to Service Dog Central, a national group that advocates for the rights of people with assistance animals.
They might guide the blind, alert the deaf, pull a wheelchair, remind a person to take medications and perform other duties someone might need help with. Most are Labs or golden retrievers because the breeds are devoted companions by nature.
Before they can graduate from training and become a service animal under the guidelines of the Americans With Disabilities Act, dogs need to perform three tasks their owners are unable to do on their own. For example, VanZee said, an assistance dog can carry a plastic wallet, remove a credit card and give it to a store clerk.
Neither VanZee nor Schense is paid to train the dogs, although they are educated in how to train them. Neither woman is disabled or has relatives who are. They say they're just dog lovers who wanted to help others.
The dogs live and train with them until they are close to 2 years old. Then they are sent to KSDS headquarters in Kansas to go through testing and health screens that will help determine if they are a better guide dog, suited to lead, or service dog, who is heavily relied on to perform tasks. Then the dogs are placed in their forever homes.
"We call it going to college," said Deb Tegethoff, director of canine development at KSDS. "It's like they choose what they want to focus on."
About 50 KSDS dogs trained in Nebraska and Iowa have been placed in homes across the country, Tegethoff said.
The dogs have to have the right demeanor for the job, and they cannot have any health issues or emotional limitations. Schense has a family pet named Avalon who started out as a training dog but stayed with her trainer permanently because she gets carsick.
"If they have a predisposition to cataracts, allergies or hip problems, they can't do it," Schense said, explaining that the dogs can't care for people if they have their own health problems.
There's a small part of the local trainers who wouldn't mind too much if Key and Milo ended up staying. They are attached to the dogs, but have to let them go.
"It's hard, but it's so worthwhile," VanZee said.
Added Schense: "You bawl like a baby."
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Information from: Omaha World-Herald, http://www.omaha.com
WAUCONDA, Ill. (AP) — Native American bones and funerary objects that have been in a suburban Chicago museum collection for decades are on track to be returned to a Michigan-based tribe.
Lake County Forest Preserve District officials said most of the remains and other objects were unearthed at sites in Lake County, and one set came from McHenry County. They'll be turned over to the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi, which has lived in the Great Lakes region for centuries.
The artifacts have been in storage at the district's Lake County Discovery Museum, and were donated in the late 1950s or early 1960s by the Lake County Museum of History, the (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald (http://bit.ly/2ccKrDG ) reported.
The remains were on display in the Discovery Museum until the 1990 adoption of a law requiring federally funded agencies and institutions to return Native American cultural items to lineal descendants or culturally affiliated tribes.
Officials spent more than 15 years looking for a tribe willing to take the artifacts, district collections coordinator Diana Dretske said. That search eventually led to Michigan's Pokagon Band tribe.
"It's been a great responsibility to look after these remains all these years," Dretske said. "But now we're doing the right thing for the tribes and their ancestors."
Pokagon official Marcus Winchester said his tribe is committed to restoring the reverence owed to Native American ancestors. He said the remains will be ceremoniously reburied.
The forest service's full board is expected to approve the transfer plan Sept. 13.
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Information from: Daily Herald, http://www.dailyherald.com
- By DAVE ORRICK Pioneer Press
CONOVER, Wis. (AP) — The studio of Lax Reproductions is walled with trophy fish, mostly muskies, that are still swimming in the lakes where they were caught.
While they appear as natural as any traditional piece of taxidermy — scales, eyes, teeth like X-Acto knives — the mounts aren't the actual fish but plastic replicas, based on measurements and photographs taken during the few adrenaline-injected minutes spent with a fish of a lifetime. The fish was released; months later, the replica was completed.
This is the norm today in muskie fishing, a realm of strict possession limits (54 inches is the statewide minimum keeper size in Minnesota) and a pervasive culture of catch-and-release intended to protect the larger but less-common cousins of northern pike. The result is a time-consuming, often pricey passion where the goal is not a fish fry, but the thrill of a rod-and-reel battle with an acrobatic, 50-pound torpedo which they will — following high-fives, measurements and photos — promptly release back into the water whence it came.
With the approach of fall — trophy muskie season — anglers casting big lures for big fish will be heading out on lakes from the metro to northwest Ontario knowing that if they want a keepsake muskellunge, they'll have to commission someone to make a replica.
One of the choice craftsman-artists for muskie mounts is Rick Lax, who runs Lax Reproductions, where 20 years of making replicas hasn't merely led to becoming a leader in the niche market of freshwater fish replicas. The quality and convincing realism of replicas also has aided the entire catch-and-release movement, which is widely recognized as a primary reason why fish exceeding 60 pounds are once again being caught in Minnesota after disappearing for much of the past century.
So, it might surprise many muskie fanatics that a procession of dead muskies — 120 and counting — have been crucial to the success of Lax.
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FATHER-SON PIONEERS
Lax has run Lax Reproductions (formerly Lax Taxidermy) since 2003, when his father Ron retired.
The father-son duo had been operating the business together since the early 1990s. Traditional skin-over-Styrofoam taxidermists by training, the Laxes were early adopters of muskie replicas, a technology that previously had been practiced only on saltwater species. Early examples of replica muskellunge — a fish that is native only to a portion of North America centered around the Great Lakes — were weak, with body shapes and teeth looking more like those of a barracuda than a muskie.
"When it came to muskie reproductions, we putzed around ourselves until we figured it out," said Ron Lax, 68, who still takes on a few traditional mounts from deer and moose each hunting seasons but no longer creates fish replicas. "We never learned nothing from nobody."
In the early 1990s the pair saw the catch-and-release movement taking off, but replicas were pricey and sub-standard, so most anglers who caught a trophy that could be legally kept (minimum sizes were lower throughout the muskie range) killed the fish and opted for a traditional mount. That process involves using the actual head and fins from the fish, but only the skin of the torso, which is tanned and wrapped around a form, often foam or wood.
Without special care, skin mounts become brittle, and oils leech from the head, leading to slow but inevitable decomposition. Ron and Rick Lax knew replicas could last decades longer and require little care, but they had few reliable ways to make the replica mounts, which were then fiberglass, match the shape of real fish.
"We maybe did 50 fish in a year, and most people didn't want the reproductions because they cost more and didn't look as good," Rick Lax recalled.
But there was no shortage in the supply of dead muskies.
"They were still killing a lot of fish back then," Ron Lax said. "People were bringing us all sort of dead muskies, so we decided to start making our own molds from those fish, instead of buying these blanks from a third party. That's when things started changing."
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120 DEAD MUSKIES
Take the dead fish, give it a pose — flared gills, arched back, etc. — and then create a mold of that fish, right down to its teeth. Then you can reproduce that form by injecting plastic into the mold. Make separate molds for enough heads, jaws, teeth, fins, torsos and you've got the ability to match the basic dimensions of almost any fish out there. The father-son team kept making molds as new shapes and sizes of dead muskies rolled in.
Costs evened out, although it's not cheap. The basic rate for Lax is $14.95 per inch, so a 50-inch muskie will be around $750.
"Today we have molds from about 120 muskies," Rick Lax said. "If you have a 44-inch muskie, we've got eight molds for that. I haven't gotten a request for anything that I don't have. I have molds up to 59 inches and 60 pounds."
That fish, from the St. Lawrence River, was taken 15 years ago. Even though killing a muskie is taboo today, an occasional carcass still arrives at Lax's shop, located along U.S. 45 in northeast Wisconsin.
"Sometimes one will die on someone, despite their best efforts to revive it," Rick Lax said. "If the fish is legal, they might do a skin mount. We'll make a mold if it's something we don't have."
Recent example: Last year, an Atlanta angler brought in a 57-inch muskie caught with a guide on Lake Minnetonka.
Increasingly, he recognizes the fish in the photo as one he's done before.
"The markings on a muskie, they're like a fingerprint," he said, referring to the fish's vertical bars or spots, or combination thereof. "Every fish is different. So if you've seen those exact markings before, you've seen that exact fish before."
Photographs can confirm such happenings. "I've done a replica of the same fish three times in one year. I got three jobs out of that fish and it was still swimming! It's proof that catch-and-release works."
Lax does other fish, as well. Walleye, northern pike, largemouth and smallmouth bass, and trout and salmon are the most frequent, as well as perch, crappie and sunfish. Because reproductions can last a lifetime and need little more than a damp cloth for cleaning, reproductions are becoming the norm, also from plastic injected into molds he has created.
But there are still challenges. He has had to turn down business. "Sometimes, every now and then with a big trout, someone will have a fish that I don't have a mold for," he said. "I'll tell them that either I can do a skin mount if they kept the fish, or I just can't help them."
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TRADE SECRETS
Lax isn't the only acclaimed shop making reproductions. Artistic Anglers in Duluth and Jim Fittante in Antigo, Wis., are among those often listed.
The small industry — Lax does between 200 and 250 mounts per year, each with a roughly eight- to 10-month turnaround — is nonetheless competitive. On my recent visit, for example, Rick Lax was skittish about letting me photograph or shoot video of his actual production process.
"I guess we have a few trade secrets," he chuckled.
Lax does all the work himself with occasional extra manpower conscripted from his brother Chris and high school-age son. He said the techniques he and his father fine-tuned over the years change little now. Instead of large still photographs, he works off a computer tablet, allowing him to zoom in to a examine fish's markings.
As for those distinctive markings on a fish, they're less craft and more art. While some taxidermists use a brush, Lax prefers to exclusively airbrush his mounts, employing mesh or other stencil-type tools to achieve certain mottling or the look of scales. That final step is as crucial as any, he said.
"It's an artist who does the finished products, and you're only as good as your paint jobs."
Lax was at the forefront of a minor revolution in fish taxidermy, and I asked him what he thought the next revolution might be. For example: Could the combination of smartphones and 3-D printing render even the replica-making taxidermist irrelevant?
"That's an interesting idea, but I'm not worried and I don't see the need to change. I'm 50, and I think there will be enough business around to take me into retirement."
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Information from: St. Paul Pioneer Press, http://www.twincities.com
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Minnesota remains among the top states for refugee resettlement, new figures from the U.S. State Department show.
In the past year, Minnesota took in nearly 1,100 Somalis, 166 Ethiopians and 66 Congolese. That's a large increase from last year through August, the Star Tribune reported (http://strib.mn/2bQrp3y ).
Twenty-five Syrian refugees also resettled in Minnesota in the past year, mostly in Rochester and Minneapolis.
Last year, President Barack Obama launched a Syrian resettlement program as millions fled to escape the country's civil war and persecution. The U.S. recently reached its goal of resettling 10,000 Syrian refugees.
Concerned that government screenings did not have enough safeguards to stop Islamic State terrorists from entering the U.S. as refugees, some governors resisted letting Syrian refugees settle in their states. But some members of Congress wanted the U.S. to take in even more Syrians to help ease the flow of refugees into Europe.
Ben Walen, of the Minnesota Council of Churches, said the debate over Syrian refugees has made more people want to help them.
"The sentiment, the public sphere, social media, all of that which was very negative about refugees has more than been countered with positive reactions," Walen said. He said he has more than enough volunteers to help drive the new arrivals to English classes or job interviews.
A total of 2,335 refugees have settled in Minnesota since last year, the most since 2007. Minnesota ranks 13th nationally for the number of refugees living in the state.
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Information from: Star Tribune, http://www.startribune.com
- By BEN STRAND Winona Daily News
WINONA, Minn. (AP) — In 2000, Winona resident Dan Swartling had an idea: A motorcycle ministry.
The plan was to spread the vision of Christ by riding bikes. He got together with relatives and friends, and soon a nonprofit was born.
The group started with about seven or eight people and branded themselves with a name - Faith Riders of Winona. Chapters also started in Tennessee and Texas during that time. But it took a while for the group to gain traction. In 2006 Swartling moved to Tennessee, and by 2010, the Winona chapter was the only surviving chapter.
Enter Chris Parker.
In January 2014, after Parker became president, he and other members of the group worked with Swartling to come up with a new vision and plan for the group. They designed a new patch and realigned the direction of the organization with hopes of growth.
In fall 2014, the Winona Faith Riders became an official chapter, and in 2015 Chippewa Falls became an officially recognized chapter of the Faith Riders ministry. There are also satellite members in Ashland, Sparta, Rochester and Mankato — all of which are on the verge of becoming official chapters.
"Our biggest goal with the refresh was getting more visibility and getting out on the road with the patch," Parker said.
Parker said the group is centered on brotherhood and fellowship, promoting the visibility of faith and Christ through rides and hosting or volunteering for events.
"We believe that fellowship is built on witnessing and serving (the community) where we're located," Parker said.
He said serving includes anything from helping with something that highlights or promotes Jesus, simply reaching out a hand and listening to someone in need, or going around and doing something that benefits the community.
They've done work with youth groups and prison ministries, speaking and sharing personal testimonies, hoping to lead more people to Christ.
Other work includes pay-it-forward events, like one they did at Midtown Foods before Christmas last year. Members stood at the end of checkout lines, picked people, and paid for their groceries.
"It was as enriching for our own souls as much as it was the people we helped," he said.
They also bought out all the turkeys at the store and handed out to people at random leaving the store.
The feedback they received after the event, Parker said, was unbelievable.
People reached out via Facebook and sent uplifting messages on how their act of kindness impacted them. Parker said a couple they purchased groceries for asked to pray with them before leaving the store, and a lot of people gave them hugs for their generous act.
"It was funny, in a good way, to watch and see how those people's days were changed by what we did," Parker said — noting that it's not often you see people dressed in biker attire standing at the end of grocery checkouts offering to pay for groceries.
"It's definitely something we'd like to do again."
An obligation each official chapter has is organizing and hosting one major event per year. This year the Winona chapter is hosting Faithfest, a day-long event full of live music, food, art and activities on Sept. 11 at the Lake Park bandshell. It's the first event of the motorcycle ministry's kind, and Parker said he hopes it's a success.
"We want people who come to have a good time . hopefully it's something we can do again next year."
Parker said they're just a tool of Christ, and their bikes are the vehicle, the gift, that enhances the visibility.
"It's all for Him and possible through Him, we're just the vehicle," he said.
One of the key Bible verses that represents the motorcycle ministry group, Parker said, is Luke 14:23:
"And the Lord said to the servant, 'go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled."
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Information from: Winona Daily News, http://www.winonadailynews.com
- By PAUL SWIECH The (Bloomington) Pantagraph
PAXTON, Ill. (AP) — Nicole O'Dell did incline walking pushups on bleachers outside Paxton-Buckley-Loda High School as her 7-year-old triplets did regular pushups beside her.
Then they ran up and down the bleacher stairs several times before one of her triplets asked "Mom, can we run around the track?"
"That is the greatest reward of all this," O'Dell, 43, said of her embracing a healthier lifestyle.
"Natalie (O'Dell's 18-year-old daughter) had health issues but she saw how my choices were benefiting me" so she improved her nutrition and exercise and lost weight, O'Dell said.
"Now, I'm seeing these guys get off to a good start," she said of triplets Logan, Megan and Ryleigh. Then they scampered down the bleachers and ran around the track.
In the past year since O'Dell began her healthier eating and exercise, she has lost 106 pounds. She weighed 150 pounds as she ran around the track with her children late afternoon on Aug. 3.
A Paxton mother of six children — ages 24, 18, 15 and the 7-year-old triplets — O'Dell is training for two triathlons during the next month as she works full time as marketing manager at Human Kinetics, a Champaign-based publisher of books for the fitness industry and as she continues her graduate studies.
"I'm 10 weeks from finishing my master's degree in English from Southern New Hampshire University," she said.
She maintains a website — www.fitandbusylife.com — to hold herself accountable to her fitness goals while helping other busy parents to reach their goals through her posting of stories, recipes and tips.
"I'm honest about my struggles," she said.
Writing is not new to her. She has written 27 books — some Christian young adult fiction books and some nonfiction resources for parents.
"I think she's amazing. She's super mom," daughter Emily, 15, said between color guard practice and play rehearsal. "I have no clue how she does it."
'It's incredible," Natalie said before she ran off to work.
Natalie will be a freshman at Illinois State University in Normal later this month. Oldest child Erik is serving overseas in the Air Force.
"It's good," Megan said of her mom's exercise. "I like that she gets more skinnier every time she exercises."
"It's really good because when you exercise your blood pumps," said Logan.
"It makes you healthy," said Ryleigh.
All three children love to exercise with their mom, including in a July 5K race in Paxton.
"I feel really healthy and sweaty," Ryleigh said after exercising on Aug. 3.
All this is paramount to O'Dell, who said fitness is her third life priority. Her first are faith and family.
"My faith is a big part of this," she said. "God made a day 24 hours long and, if you can't get everything you need to get done in a day, maybe you're doing something you're not supposed to be doing."
"I was busy before I started doing this" nutrition and exercise program, she said. "It's just a shift in priorities."
"I used to think that it would be selfish to carve time out for exercise," she said. "Now I think it would be selfish for me to stop."
That's because her healthy eating and exercise give her energy, peace of mind and personal pride that help her as a mother, employee, graduate student, person of faith and friend.
She is helping to organize a walking group through her church and invites friends to join her in exercise.
"I used to do social time, getting together with friends for coffee," she said. "Now, my exercise time is my social time. If friends want to get together, I invite them to jump on board."
O'Dell already was busy as a mother, employee, writer and student a year ago when she decided that she needed to do something about her weight and sluggishness. She weighed 256 pounds and felt drained.
"I knew that I was letting myself suffer physically," she said. While she exercised from time to time, she'd stop when she didn't achieve desired results or when she became injured.
"The missing component was diet," O'Dell said. She bought and ate a lot of convenience foods.
"I thought, 'The best thing I can give my kids is a healthy mom.' I realized that I'm not too busy to take time to exercise."
O'Dell knew she was allergic and sensitive to many foods but she would eat them anyway, sometimes resulting in hives, stomach distress, burning throat, inflammation and weight gain.
Beginning a year ago and over time, she determined those foods (including wheat, eggs, corn, nuts, seeds, fish and sugar) and gradually eliminated them from her diet.
She replaced them with Greek yogurt, fruit, mixed greens, vegetables and lean meats.
"I don't feel deprived," she said. "What helps me is to plan (meals) ahead."
Healthy eating was quickly accompanied by exercise. O'Dell started by doing cardio work at a 24-hour fitness center in Paxton and at work.
"We're lucky to have a fitness facility at work and I took advantage of it," she said. Gradually, she ramped up her cardio workouts and added pushups.
In January, Natalie was motivated by her mother's success to begin her own healthy eating and exercise routine.
"I had unattended food allergies and once I got gluten and sugar out of my diet, everything else fell into place," she said. Soon, she added cardio work and weight lifting at night after work.
Natalie felt better, her school work improved, her skin cleared up and she lost 45 pounds.
"Now, it's routine," Natalie said of the family's healthier lifestyle.
O'Dell and her friend, Stacy Morse, decided to begin training for a triathlon.
During most weeks, O'Dell exercises six days a week, generally beginning at 5 a.m. — before her children are awake — to minimize the impact on her family.
Her Monday workout consists of running, pushups, planks, triceps dips and burpees at the school track. During the other five days, she fits in two runs, two bike rides and two swimming workouts at the Urbana Aquatics Center. Distances vary.
In the spring, she competed in a Naperville sprint triathlon and swam a half mile, biked 13.1 miles and ran 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) in 1 hour and 53 minutes.
"It was awesome," she said of her feelings afterward. "It was quite an emotional moment."
Now, she and Morse are training for a sprint triathlon in Chicago on Aug. 28 and an Olympic-distance triathlon in Litchfield on Sept. 11. The Olympic distance is a 1-mile swim, 25-mile bike ride and 10-kilometer run.
O'Dell admitted what she's doing isn't easy so she tries not to get anxious about it.
"The biggest thing for me is focusing on making the next right choice," she said.
But she enjoys what she's doing.
"I get invigorated. It's a huge reward to see how much all of this has change my life."
Her next fitness goal may be a half Ironman — 1.5 mile swim, 56-mile bike ride and 13.1 mile run — in a year.
Meanwhile, she wants to continue to grow as a mother and writer.
"The message of my story is you can be fit in a busy life," O'Dell said. "Make good choices and put one foot in front of the other. Your body and mind will follow."
Emily agreed.
"You can do anything you set your heart to."
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Source: The (Bloomington) Pantagraph, http://bit.ly/2bsxXZ7
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Information from: The Pantagraph, http://www.pantagraph.com
This is an AP-Illinois Exchange story offered by The (Bloomington) Pantagraph.
- By DAMIAN RICO The (Northwest Indiana) Times
MUNSTER, Ind. (AP) — Ceil Noworyta, of Munster, never dreamed of getting a tattoo, let alone getting one at the age of 63. But her mind would quickly change.
Noworyta's dream came true when Sir Paul McCartney pulled her and friend Toni Johnson on stage during his recent One On One Tour show in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
"I couldn't believe it," Noworyta said. "I was not prepared for it. When he called me up there I had nothing to sign so I had him sign my arm."
Her girlfriend held up a sign that read please sign my arm so I can get a tattoo. Sticking to her word, just a couple of short days after the performance, Noworyta headed to The Tattoo Lady in Hammond, to get her Sir Paul's signature permanently on her arm.
"I'm so scared," Noworyta said. "I've never done something like this before. My husband teased that I don't even have his name on my arm, but I told him I did love Paul 10 years before I even met you."
Noworyta, a retired recovery nurse at East Chicago's St. Catherine Hospital and the mother of her own "Fab Four boys," is thankful for her husband, Don, who "is tolerable" of her appreciation for McCartney and his music.
"He says I'm crazy because I'm a 60-year-old chasing, acting like 16-year-old, while chasing a 70-year-old," Noworyta said. "It's all in fun. Paul's the best."
Noworyta recalls her father asking her if she would like to see The Beatles as a young girl. When she said "of course," he took bought four tickets for their entire family to see them at Comiskey Park in August 1965.
"That's what started it all," Noworyta said.
Noworyta took a break from the shows during the late '70s when McCartney was with Wings "because they got too big and were selling out these gigantic stadiums and I wanted to see him up close and not from the rafters."
But she learned the ins and outs of getting better seats.
Noworyta has been to more than 20 shows and takes great pride in belonging to his fan club, often getting premium seats and various opportunities.
On one occasion, her friend Toni and her hopped a flight to New York and saw him at Virgin Records after waiting days in the rain.
"That's the first time I talked to him," Noworyta said. "He is just a kind person and a musical treasure. He held my arm for what felt like an hour."
That's before her arm read "Paul McCartney."
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Source: The (Northwest Indiana) Times, http://bit.ly/2bUpxJa
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Information from: The Times, http://www.nwitimes.com
This is an Indiana Exchange story shared by The (Northwest Indiana) Times.
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