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La Conner students showed they can walk their talk on Friday. The local teens, walking in shifts, kept pace with a nationwide student movement that served as a vigil for those killed in school shootings as well as a plea for more strict gun laws. The key word above being movement. Students here managed to sustain their part of the National School Walkout Protest for more than five hours, repeatedly circling the La Conner campus, though some ventured off at one point to bring the message to Town...
WHY WE LIVE HERE – It rained on April 10, but by 7 p.m. at Roozengaarde it was as pretty as a picture. Farmer Dave Hedlin says he is at least two weeks behind in getting his chard, kale and lettuce out of the greenhouse and into the ground. He hardly “turned a wheel in April,” he said. The first half, that is. He’s guessing he will have enough greenhouse cherry tomatoes and lettuces to open his farm stand by Mother’s Day. – Photo by Nancy Crowell...
Poets have been frequent faces in the LaConner schools during the 2017-2018 school year thanks to the school district’s partnership with the Skagit River Poetry Foundation. Poets are in classrooms during one-week residencies in all three district schools, providing students with professional mentoring and important opportunities for self-expression and exposure to diverse voices. Terri Bakke-Schultz, coordinator for the Skagit River Poetry Foundation, says that she has “seen firsthand how empowering poetry can be for students. What an imp...
Eight years of MoNA’s Education Program’s accomplishments, under the leadership of Jasmine Valandani, were celebrated with Mimosas and cake at the Museum of Northwest Art April 16th with a reception for educators, volunteers, stakeholders and friends after work. The event also ushered in a new era of education program leadership with current Education Assistant Kyra Arnett taking the helm this week. Valandani thanked the support of so many who make MoNA’s education programs possible, from museum...
Zerma Louise Pierson was born April 15, 1928 in Fayette County, Kentucky to Mark Mynear and Ella Mae Ivy (Mynear). She passed away on April 16, 2018 at Skagit Valley Hospital. Zerma had a busy childhood, helping care for six other siblings and other extended family members. She met Chester (Chet) R. Pierson in 1944 while he was in the US Army stationed at Fort Knox, Kentucky. They married on October 2, 1944 in Ohio. Their first son, Chester Andrew joined them six months before they moved back to Chet’s hometown of La Conner, Washington in e...
National Poetry month ends Monday. In La Conner, lucky us: consider it spring training, the warm up for the Skagit River Poetry Festival arriving in three weeks, starting May 17. Full disclosure and transparency: I am on this Poetry Foundation’s board of directors. A poetry festival in La Conner. Actually, the 10th biennial Skagit River Poetry Festival. Starting in 2000, hardworking English teachers (primarily, with many other dedicated volunteers) have insisted upon bringing the nation’s and the region’s best poets to La Conner to read, discu...
I was 20 in April 1975, in San Francisco working as a houseman in a residential hotel for old people. If I read the news, it was one of the San Francisco dailies. The last American helicopter left Saigon April 30, 1975 as the city fell to the North Vietnamese. Those images are iconic. The greatest nation on earth lost to a rag tag army of peasants wearing funny hats and sandals. The clearest, strongest message I received from the news media, after the war news of battles and deaths, was that the South Vietnamese government was corrupt. Corrupt...
Poetry is a vital part of many communities in our state, and the art draws diverse audiences to the power of words, the power of expression and the power of introspection. I am confident in this claim because I attended or participated in over hundreds of gatherings involving poetry – open mics, magazine launches, school celebrations of spoken word (to name only a few). The Skagit River Poetry Festival is, of course, a glorious example of this enthusiasm for the art in Washington – probably our highest profile gathering of poets fro...
Are you feeling the impact of the increasing polarization and incivility in our country? Has it influenced relationships with friends, family or co-workers here in our Valley? I know that my fellow Skagitonians are people who would absolutely come to my aid if my family or neighborhood were to experience a crisis or disaster. And yet, it can be challenging to have “certain conversations” with some of these same people who hold perspectives that differ from mine. What is it about disasters that can bring us together – and yet solving mor...
Swinomish Indian Tribal Community staff were at the U.S. Supreme Court April 18 to hear oral arguments that will decide whether the state of Washington’s treaty obligations require removing state-owned barrier culverts to preserve fish runs and habitats. Swinomish joined with 20 other Washington tribes and the United States against the state of Washington in litigation that started in 2001. The Court will decide if a district court injunction ordering the state to remove and replace 2,030 state-owned barrier culverts must be followed. S...
