Hill-Topics
Every week we find more to like about the Hillsboro High School sports teams.
I was behind schedule last week getting photos for the annual Endzone sports section appearing in this edition, so I needed to ask a lot of favors from coaches and athletes, most of whom I'd never met before.
Not to worry, they said. What do you need? How can we help? Yes, we can do that, no problem.
With winning attitudes like that off the field, it's no surprise the Trojans have been so successful in competition, and in other areas of life.
I look forward to reporting your successes this season, and all year long.
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I was allowed to walk the sidelines at the Hillsboro football game this past Friday evening.
I was impressed with the calm, focused, positive attitude of head coach Len Coryea and his staff, who found a lot of things to encourage their players about en route to a 40-0 victory over Nickerson.
It was great to see so many people at the game, sitting in lawn chairs and enjoying one of the most beautiful evenings ever.
And wasn't the band grand?
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The whole family was in town this past weekend, the first time all five of us have been together in Hillsboro at the same time.
Our oldest daughter, Bethany, a senior at Nebraska Wesleyan University, in Lincoln, who is engaged to be married in March, came down to shop for a wedding dress in Wichita.
She asked her younger sister, Jillian, and mom, Claire, grandmother, Betty, and aunt, Vicki to join her on Saturday.
The posse went to three or four bridal shops, then backtracked to pick the dress she liked best, back at the first stop.
On Monday, Bethany helped me put out the newspaper, by writing the Hillsboro High School cross country story, from information provided by the coach.
In an effort to encourage her to help me out more often, I gave her a byline on the story, and this rave review.
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After last week's plea, we received two additional responses from pastors, volunteering their time and talent to produce occasional faith-based articles for this paper.
If there are other clergy members who would like to participate from time to time, please let us know.
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Last week's story about seniors at Parkview going for motorcycle rides revved up lots of people. In fact, someone came in and bought 14 copies of the paper, which sets a new single-issue record since I've been here.
In addition to meeting so many truly great people in all walks of life, another thing that makes this job so rewarding is writing about special things that ordinary people do.
I call these stories "keepers" because they get put on bulletin boards, refrigerator doors, glued into scrapbooks, and mailed to relatives in Timbuktu.
Many of you have shared your lives with me in interviews for stories, and I want to let you know how much I appreciate it.
Hopefully you feel I've been fair and accurate in my reporting; and if you really do have relatives in Timbuktu, you'll let me write the story.
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We are looking for writers and photographers who would like to submit occasional articles for this newspaper, particularly if you are passionate about something that interests you and others in the community.
To work most effectively, a community newspaper needs to have a network of "deputized correspondents" who can keep the rest of us in the know about what's going on in your area of interest.
If you have access to the Internet, you can e-mail me at grant@starj.com, or drop me a note at Box 10, Hillsboro.
I'd really like to hear from you about your interests, or anything special that you think we should be covering or writing about.
— GRANT OVERSTAKE
