Before we tiptoe too much further into 2009, let's take a look back at some of the more memorable folks who graced this space in 2008.
● January: The photo brought tears to my eyes, as did the subsequent story I was able to write about Lost Boy Chris Garang. A Tucsonan since 2001, Garang had no idea if his family was still alive when he went back to Sudan for a visit. There, he was miraculously reunited with the mother and father he hadn't seen in 17 years.
● February: Though dealing with fibromyalgia after a traffic accident, Sirena Dufault decided early last year that over the span of several months she was going to raise awareness of the disease by hiking all 800 miles of the Arizona Trail. As of Dec. 15, she had all but 170 miles completed.
● March: All of us were surprised when Fourth Avenue stalwarts Mike and Mimi Haggerty put their Piney Hollow jewelry shop up for sale to travel and visit with other family members. Daughter Shannon Harrison says the store sold in May and is now a clothing shop. Meanwhile, Harrison is still in the bead business, at pineyho35@yahoo.com.
People are also reading…
● April: Stereotypes shattered when I met Kerry Riden, co-chair of last spring's Junior League rummage sale. Riden is a Border Patrol agent.
● May: Recycling hit a new zenith with Mel Frisch's old satellite dish, which he'd reassembled into a metallic cowboy-riding-a-horse piece of art.
● June: Lots of us may know about the Soviet Union's 11-month Berlin blockade, and the U.S. airlift that broke it in 1949, but how many know that its famed "Candy Bomber" lives in Amado? Ret. Col. Gail Halvorsen spearheaded an effort that dropped 20 tons of candy over the heads of German kids.
● July: Linda West, the child of a Vietnamese bar girl and an American serviceman, donated the royalties from "Beyond the Rice Paddies," a book on her childhood in Vietnam, to veterans groups and the rebuilding of a Vietnam school.
● August: We teed it up with former crop-duster Jerry McWane, who at age 96 was still playing a mean game of golf several times a week.
● September: Ernie Gabrielson, 78, captivated readers who learned how he regularly buys and gives away books to Tucson youngsters. After the story appeared, folks started donating books to Gabrielson, who's also been invited to several classrooms to talk about reading. In November, Gabrielson was awarded a Ben's Bell for making our town a better place.
● October: We had a swinging time with The Band, the Blonde and the Baritone, also known as jazz pianist Jeff Haskell, singer Betty Craig, and baritone Jack Neubeck. The threesome's latest gig: "It Might As Well Be Swing," celebrating the music from 1935 to 1945.
● November: Evelyn George, Tucson's first inductee into the Arizona Quilters Hall of Fame, showed off her handiwork. George is also a founder of Quilts for a Cause, which auctions off handmade quilts for cancer research.
● December: We did a little fa-la-la-la-la with the male chorus, Sons of Orpheus, and students from the Arizona State Schools for the Deaf and the Blind, whose annual concert raises oodles of cash and food for the Community Food Bank.
Speaking of food, of all the stories I wrote in 2008, the one that got the most response was my lament over the dearth of Karo pancake syrup. Folks contacted me for weeks after, all with false sightings. But, hark, Albertsons has brought the sticky stuff back to its shelves.
All is well.
