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Albion native returns to sign her debut novel

By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 9 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Photo by Tom Rivers

ALBION – Kit Lyman was back in her hometown today signing copies of her debut novel at Bindings Bookstore.

Here she greets Pat and Brad Shelp of Albion during a book-signing today at Bindings Bookstore. Lyman attended the First Presbyterian Church with the Shelps. In back, Pete Toenniessen of Albion waits to have his book signed. He was a Girl Scout volunteer when Lyman was active in Girl Scouts.

Several of Lyman’s friends and former teachers stopped by the book-signing to reconnect with Lyman, who lives in Texas.

Lyman has sold more than 1,000 copies so far of her psychological thriller, “Satan’s Garden.” She also was in Albion on Monday to lead a writing workshop at Hoag Library.

Chamber seeks award nominations for businesses, citizens

Staff Reports Posted 9 August 2014 at 12:00 am

ALBION – The Orleans County Chamber of Commerce invites its members to nominate businesses, organizations and individuals who have helped the local business community.

The Chamber has set a Friday deadline for nominations for awards in the following categories:

Business of the Year: This award is presented to a business that has experienced significant overall achievements/success throughout the year. (Must be a Chamber member)

Lifetime Achievement: This award is presented to an individual with a long-term record of outstanding business achievements. (Must be a Chamber member)

Entrepreneurial Excellence: This award is presented to a company demonstrating a unique approach to business that has resulted in a strategic advantage in the marketplace through the use of cutting edge technology or other innovative methods. (Must be a Chamber member)

Phoenix Award: This award is presented to an organization or business that has successfully adapted or re-used an existing facility. (Must be a Chamber member)

New Business of the Year: This award is presented to a business or organization that has opened in the past year. (Does not need to be a Chamber member)

Community Service: This award is presented to a business, organization or individual that has provided meaningful contributions to the community in either professional or non-professional spheres. (Does not need to be a Chamber member)

The honorees will be recognized during an awards program in September. For more on the Chamber, click here.

Last year’s winners include:

Baxter Healthcare Corp. in Medina as Business of the Year, Hojack’s Bar & Grille in Carlton as New Business of the Year, OrleansHub.com for Entrepreneurial Excellence, Roger Andrews of Evans Ace Hardware with the Phoenix Award, GLOW YMCA in Medina for Community Service, Genesee-Orleans Council on Alcoholism and Substance Abuse for Community Service, Jodi Gaines of Claims Recovery Financial Services for Lifetime Achievement, the late Judy Christopher of Albion for Lifetime Achievement, and Orleans County Cornell Cooperative Extension for Agricultural Business of the Year.

Today is deadline for Sandstone Hall of Fame nominations

By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 9 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Photo by Tom Rivers – The St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church in Fillmore is one of many church buildings in the region built more than a century ago from Medina sandstone. This church is at 109 West Main St. in northwest Allegany County.

MEDINA – Today is your last chance to nominate a Medina sandstone structure for the second class of the Medina Sandstone Hall of Fame.

The Medina Sandstone Society last December inducted its first Hall of Fame class with six members.

Nominations are being sought for buildings to qualify for the second annual honor class. People far and wide can send their choices and seek recognition.

“Any building in the world constructed of that great Orleans County stone which we call ‘Medina’ is eligible and can be nominated if it is still standing and is an outstanding piece of work,” said Jim Hancock, chairman of the Hall of Fame committee.

He said typical examples might be churches, homes, monuments and public buildings but could also include special structures like the Brooklyn Bridge and Buckingham Palace.

Medina sandstone has proved durable for St. Patrick’s in Fillmore and many other churches.

“The sky’s the limit, just make ’em good choices,” he said.

The current chairman joined with David Miller and John Slack as the founding committee of the Hall of Fame. They worked for months in late 2013 to make one wall of the Medina City Hall conference chamber into an exhibit space.

In seeking nominations for 2014 the three men still follow the simple formula for proposed sandstone structures. (1) They should be outstanding or unique and significant. (2) They should have beauty. (3) They should be impressive through age and longevity and whether they are still in use. (4) They should be architecturally unique.

Nominations can be emailed to Hancock at hancock_jim@verizon.net or they can be sent to the Medina Sandstone Society, P.O. Box 25, Medina, NY 14103. The committee would like contact information for the nominated site.

Editor’s Note: The Sandstone Society will lead a walking tour today from 2 to 3:30 p.m. in downtown Medina. The tour starts at City Hall.

Flags will be lowered in honor of Marcia Tuohey

Staff Reports Posted 9 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Orleans County will have its flags at half mast today in honor of Marcia Tuohey, a former county legislator who served 10 years as chairwoman of the Legislature. Tuohey died on Thursday.

She was committed to public service following her retirement from the Legislature on Dec. 31, 2005. She was a member of Medina’s Planning Board and was the county’s representative on the board of directors for Western Regional Off-Track Betting Corp.

She was the first woman elected as Medina mayor and also the first woman to serve on the County Legislature.

History walk and talk draws crowd to Medina

Staff Reports Posted 9 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Photos by Sue Cook
MEDINA – Todd Bensley, the village of Medina historian, talks about the cold storage building on Main Street and why its stone is gray. Bensley was one of the speakers of the downtown historical walk today set up by the Medina Sandstone Society.

Orleans County Historian Bill Lattin explains the cornerstone location on the Medina City Hall.

Todd Bensley discusses some of the downtown buildings, including O’Brien’s Tavern. Today’s tour followed 11 interpretive panels about Medina history that were recently installed as part of a project by the Orleans Renaissance Group.

Bill Lattin tells the group about the hose-drying tower used by the firemen.

Bensley talks about the variety of downtown buildings and why so many are made of different materials.

School playground finds a new home in Lyndonville

Staff Reports Posted 9 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Photos by Sue Cook

LYNDONVILLE – A team of volunteers installed a playground by the Lyndonville school campus on Housel Avenue today. The playground used to be used by the elementary school on Main Street, but that building was closed about two years ago.

About 30 volunteers worked with the school district, PTA, town and village to move the playground. The district also worked with Parkitects on the project. Ben Frasier, a Lyndonville graduate, headed up the effort for Parkitects.

“We do community builds like this all the time, but normally the stuff is new,” he said. “This is the first time where we had to rip out the equipment like yesterday.”

A team of volunteers spent today assembling a playground.

“What was great was the village, the town, the county, the school district all helped out,” he said. “Everybody pitched in to make this happen, and then seeing all the community volunteers was great. It’s great to have everybody involved in my hometown.”

Volunteers spread out wood chips on a finished portion of the playground. They finished putting up the equipment by 2 p.m. and spent the afternoon moving stone and woodchips.

Old and new technologies at Amish-owned business

By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 8 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Photos by Tom Rivers
YATES – J.C. Miller Co., a general store on Millers Road in the town of Yates, has an array of solar panels on the roof of the business in the northwest corner of the town.

The property also has a hitching post made of Medina sandstone as well as a hitching rack.

Jonas Miller runs the store with his wife. He put up the historic hitching post last year. He acquired it from a customer as part of the payment towards new gutters in another business venture headed by Mr. Miller.

He said some of his customers with horse and buggies at the general store will use the hitching post that was originally made more than a century ago.

He put up the solar panels in December 2012, the first member of the local Amish community to embrace the technology. Solar energy is popular in many other Amish settlements.

Hoag Library releases butterflies

Contributed Story Posted 8 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Provided photos
ALBION – Michelle Watt, the children’s librarian, lets out butterflies that emerged from caterpillars over about a month at the Hoag Library.

Charlie Warren lets a butterfly rest on his finger on Thursday at the Hoag Library when butterflies were released after spending a month inside the library. They arrived as caterpillars in mid-July and hatched on Aug. 2.

Gianna Hyde has a butterfly on her head.

Hub set a new record for pageviews in July

By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 8 August 2014 at 12:00 am

Photo by Tom Rivers – Albion firefighter Carmen Quatro is pictured on top of a fire truck while watching the fireworks on July 5 at Bullard Park.

Orleans Hub set a new record for overall pageviews in July with 444,389. That topped the previous record of set in June when there was 438,579.

The on-line news site started on April 2, 2013 and keeps growing. When we launched, my personal goal was to reach an average of 3,000 unique visitors each day. That was about the combined Orleans County circulation of the Medina Journal-Register and The Daily News.

But we’re well past 3,000. In July we averaged 4,641 unique visitors each day. That was down slightly from the June record 4,757, but a little drop-off was expected with less school news and high school sports. (Mike Wertman still finds a lot of local sports to write about even in the summer.)

Here are our Top 5 stories for July in terms of “clicks,” people who clicked on the headline or followed the story through Facebook or Twitter.

1. Man arrested after manhunt in Holley (July 14)

Photo by Tom Rivers – Emmeritt Massey sits in a chair in front of her garden on South Main Street on July 18 after a bullet just missed her earlier that day while she was tending to her flowers and vegetables.

2. Handgun recovered after shot fired in Medina (July 18)

3. Holley mourns Carmelo Rivera, who starred on the football team (July 8)

4. Medina police looking for assailant (July 19)

5. Police make arrest in July 18 gunshot in Medina (July 28)

Lyndonville playground will move from one school to another

Staff Reports Posted 8 August 2014 at 12:00 am

LYNDONVILLE – The playground from the now-closed elementary school on Main Street will be moved today and reinstalled by the school playground on Housel Avenue on Saturday.

The school district, re-established Lyndonville PTA and other community members will dissemble the playground beginning at 8:30 a.m. today. The volunteers expect they will be reassemble the playground from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday.

Lyndonville is working with Parkitects, Inc. on the project. The project manager for that company is Ben Frasier, a Lyndonville graduate. The Lyndonville Area Foundation provided $7,500 for the project.

Construction materials were donated by local businesses, including Orleans Construction Company (geo-textile fabric), Shelby Crushed Stone (stone), Evan’s Ace Hardware (concrete) and Medina Hardware and Lumber (concrete). The Village of Lyndonville and Town of Yates also will provide manpower and equipment.