Recent Articles

Democratic candidate for Secretary of State Heather French Henry was in the Purchase this week visiting courthouses and restaurants.

As Miss America, (September 1999-October 2000) her focus was on homeless veterans. After her reign, she continued her interest in veterans' issues. Henry was Commissioner of Veteran Affairs in 2014 by Governor Steve Beshear. Henry stresses that her experience working across party lines for veterans' issues is a major asset for a secretary of state working with a legislature run by Republicans.

In 1917, a tornado swept through Clinton. Among other structures, the local high school was destroyed. The bricks from that school were used to build the new Kane School which opened in 1919. The school would educate African American children until its final closing in 1966.

Kane School was remembered as part of Black History Month on Saturday February 16^th at a program at the Historical & Genealogical Society on North Washington Street in Clinton...

Kentucky Court of Appeals Judge Shea Nickell is running for the seat vacated by First District Supreme Court Justice Bill Cunningham.

...Judges Cunningham and Nickell tour the River Counties (Ballard, Carlisle, Fulton and Hickman) every year, visiting schools, courthouses and meeting members of the bar...

FRANKFORT, Ky. (April 22, 2019) - Gov. Matt Bevin today recognized the sacrifice of a Kentucky soldier who died in Iraq while supporting Operation Inherent Resolve.

According to the Department of Defense, Spc. Ryan Dennis Orin Riley, 22, of Richmond, Kentucky, died April 20 in Ninawa Province, Iraq, in a non-combat-related incident. The incident is under investigation.

Tilghman juniors Katherine Peck and Mark Taylor and sophomores Jenna Price and Mason Romanak have been selected as participants for the 2019 Kentucky Governor's School for the Arts (GSA) program.

...Retired Justice Cunningham had lunch with some members of the First District Bar at The Meadows, Fulton's newest hotel. The Meadows, restored to its former glory, currently has nineteen bedrooms. There are plans to add more rooms in buildings acquired next door. The lunch group was treated to tours of the rooms and lunched in the tin ceilinged dining room. The Judge told stories, reminisced about shared acquaintances and talked cheerfully of a future in retirement...

PADUCAH, KY (04/10/2019) An articulation agreement between Murray State University and West Kentucky Community and Technical College was signed April 9 that will provide WKCTC students who have earned an associate's degree a seamless transfer process into Murray State's nonprofit leadership studies program...

The USDA highlights their web ability to provide data by zip code and refinements which take into account more weather controlling elements such as mountains and bodies of water. This should allow more precision in plant hardiness decisions.

Seth Borenstein of the Associated Press points to zone changes indicative of global warming whereas USDA denies the soundness of using temperature lows as a predictor of change. He points out that "nearly entire states, such as Ohio, Nebraska, and Texas are in warmer zones."

FRANKFORT, Ky. (April 9, 2019) - Gov. Matt Bevin last week sent a letter to President Donald Trump, requesting a Presidential Disaster Declaration for 58 Kentucky counties that were impacted during a severe weather event in February and March. The system produced extended episodes of strong winds and torrential rain which caused flooding, flash flooding, landslides, and mudslides.

The weather system caused over $41 million in damages statewide. Nine counties in the Purchase are among those in the request. Follow the jump for the full list.

MURRAY, Ky. -- Murray State University senior Autumn "Grace" Anderson has earned an English Teaching Assistant award from the Fulbright Program to teach English in Estonia

(Murray KY April 6, 2019) - Candidate Adam Edelen was on Murray State's campus this sunny Saturday afternoon for a "Politics and Pizza" campaign stop. Stacked boxes of pizza and bottled water greeted those who came out to hear Edelen in Faculty Hall on the MSU campus.

The crowd was divided along age lines with a third college students, a third out of school adults and a third retirees. Edelen knew several there, greeting them by name and working them into his remarks.

Speaking without notes, Edelen spoke for twenty five minutes on issues dear to the hearts of progressives, students and environmental activists. Then he took lots of questions from those in attendance.

....the KFTC Steering Committee voted at its March meeting for KFTC's New Power PAC to endorse Adam Edelen for governor in the Democratic primary...

Richard "Rick" Justice will speak on "Tennessee Blitz: Nathan Bedford Forrest's Lighting Raids in Western Tennessee" at the Hickman County Historical Society, 107 S. Washington St. in Clinton on Saturday, May 18th at 10:30 a.m.

The program is a presentation of the Jackson Purchase Historical Society.

Rep. Rocky Adkins was back in Paducah on Monday April 1^st for a candidates' forum sponsored by the McCracken County Democratic Executive Committee...

In his remarks to the fifty plus attending the event in Laborer's Hall, Adkins pitch was that he has the "experience and proven leadership" to defeat Matt Bevin. He vowed to bring "common sense" back to Kentucky government...

PADUCAH, KY (03/30/2019) Author Michelle Cox will share about her award-winning mystery, romance book A Girl Like You: A Henrietta and Inspector Howard Novel, at West Kentucky Community and Technical College Wednesday, April 10 at 11 a.m. in Matheson Library. Her presentation is free and open to the public.

The issue for Dem candidates courting college students for the 2019 May primary vote is the college calendar isn't conducive to students going to the polls. The University of Kentucky is holding graduation on May 6^th, the earliest of the state universities. The other schools we checked - Morehead State University, University of Louisville and Murray State - all have graduation on May 11^th. That's a full ten days before the primary.

Traditionally, undergrads are long gone before graduation day. They will be back home before the primary. The push to register college students in their college town is a plan for the general election, but leaves students trying to figure out absentee balloting (if they are not "townies") to vote in the primary. The 4% turn out in the primary is a reflection of how many make an effort.

Paducah, KY - March 27, 2019 - Paducah Public Schools has been honored with the Best Communities for Music Education designation from The NAMM Foundation for its outstanding commitment to music education.

...Research into music education continues to demonstrate educational/cognitive and social skill benefits for children who make music. After two years of music education, research found that participants showed more substantial improvements in how the brain processes speech and reading scores that their less-involved peers and that students who are involved in music are not only more likely to graduate high school, but also to attend college as well.

Yes, Virginia, there is a governor's race in Kentucky this year.

I know sightings of the Jolly Olde Elf are more common right now than candidates (unless they have captured your email address and are filling your inbox with "asks" for campaign donations)...

If one goes by past elections, predicting whether our fictional Virginia votes in the May primary and again in November will have a great deal to do with her education, location, age and gender...

MURRAY, Ky. -- The Murray State University Paducah Regional Campus will hold its inaugural Career Fair on April 9 from 3-5 p.m. on campus, providing students a chance to connect with area businesses and explore internship and career opportunities...

With the 2019 General Assembly moving toward adjournment, lobbying spending in Kentucky continues to hit all-time highs, as a record $5.02 million was spent in the first two months of the 30-day, odd-year session.

The robust lobbying spending follows last year's record $23.17 million, spent by lobbying groups pursuing their interests with the General Assembly.

So far in 2019, the top-spending lobbying organization is....

Future Shock at The Walmart

(Tales of living at the edge of American Civilization)

It was a Wednesday, like most Wednesdays, quiet and normal.... It didn't take long for trouble to find me. Just as I was preparing to leave the soup section for the checkout area, my path was blocked as I turned the corner to leave the soup behind.

Wham! I came face to face with what passes in West Kentucky as Future Shock.

Standing cart to cart, toe to toe, face to face was a six foot tall robot directly in my path.

This quarter's survey assessed the economic and financial conditions in the District's agricultural industry from the perspective of agricultural bankers. For the 20^th (5 years) consecutive quarter, a majority of agricultural bankers in the Eighth Federal Reserve District reported that farm income had declined in the fourth quarter of 2018 compared with a year earlier.

Next to and along the roaring waters of the Mississippi River that border the counties of Ballard, Carlisle, Hickman and Fulton Kentucky are new signs of extreme changes in local and regional weather...

Temperature and rainfall are increasing and changing the shape of the region.

During Women's History Month - remembering Susan Clayton, activist, philanthropist.

...Ms. Susan attended Marvin College here in Clinton and was a classmate of and at one point engaged to Alben W. Barkley, who later became the senior U.S. Senator from Kentucky and then Vice President of the United States...

...Ms. Susan willed twenty-five million dollars "to [her] beloved country, the United States of America, to be used in retirement of the national debt."

Rep. Attica Scott, (D-KY House 41) was the keynote speaker at "Black Women in Politics" a celebration of Black History Month in Mayfield last Sunday, February 24^th . Scott was one of six legislators who ran in 2018 unopposed. It's her second term in the Legislature...

...Rep. Scott is especially interested in restoration of civil rights to former felons. She firmly believes that "People deserve a second chance." The statistics are disheartening: One in four black men doesn't have their rights back after incarceration...