At the regular February meeting, the Union County Commission continued to prepare for the next fiscal year. Each spring the County Commission approves the appointment of a tax attorney to carry out the procedure for collecting delinquent property taxes in arrears by more than two years.
Teachers and all certified personnel paid on the teacher scale will receive a salary bonus this spring due to action at the regular February meeting of the Union County Board of Education. Director Jimmy Carter explained that Governor Lee had proposed a starting teacher salary of $40,000 for the state teacher pay scale.
The Union County Farmers Market is getting ready for a new season. Thanks to recent grants, they will hire staff to help improve the market. Here are the three new positions:
Market Manager
This top-level staff position is a year-round part-time job. The position requires a dependable person who can plan, organize and promote events and communicate well with the public.
The HMMS Boy's Basketball Team ended their season with a 48-46 loss to #1 seed Alcoa in the Elite Eight of the AAA Sectional Tournament on February 2 at John Sevier Middle School in Kingsport. The Red Devils advanced to the Sectional Tournament with a third place game win over Maryville in the District Tournament.
Horace Maynard baseball season opened with the First Pitch Tournament at CAK Feb, 26 and 27 and the Red Devils return March 1 against Claiborne Middle Schools at 5 p.m. for their home opener.
As far back as he can remember, Alva Cunningham always wanted to be a train engineer.
He was fascinated by trains, particularly steam-powered locomotives, and has collected steam whistles since the age of 15. He says it’s been “in his blood” his whole life.
One of Plainview Chief of Police Eddie Muncey’s favorite activities as a young boy was playing baseball and, like many young boys, he dreamed of being a professional baseball player.
Muncey also had a great admiration for police officers and was enthralled with the lights, the sirens, and the dignity of the uniform. Growing up in Union County Muncey played baseball until high school when his priorities changed and his new passion was to get a set of wheels. He got his first job at Hensley’s IGA and with his earnings bought his first pickup truck.
Several years ago, when painted furniture rose in popularity, Jeannie Cox just had to try it. Her first project was a small side table that she found a delight to do and it turned out great. She laughs and says, “Of course there were many disasters along the way!”
The best-kept secret of success is that failure is part of the formula.
A drug increasingly being prescribed for treating sciatica has been revealed to be no better than placebo, in research recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The researchers also found that people taking the drug pregabalin reported nearly twice as many adverse effects as those receiving the placebo reported.
Country Connections by James and Ellen Perry
Circa 1954: Rose Hill School, five miles north of Maynardville, Tennessee, on Highway 33
Jerald, Johnny Milton, Howard, Dan, Jerry, and Larry, let me tell you what I heard the teachers talking about. I just heard the big room teacher tell the little room teacher that Frank Carter will be here Monday in the big room ’til he gets all the big boys straightened out. I heard that he has three or four boys beginning with Ken to get a lesson in humility by his paddle Monday morning.