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This will drive you nuts! |
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Now, concentrate on the black "+" in the center
of the picture.
This should be proof enough, we don't always see
what we think we see! |
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RED SKELTON-HOW DID HE KNOW?
Many of us remember him but he passed away.
Red Skelton was a good & funny man.
He also ended every show by saying:
"GOOD NIGHT AND MAY GOD BLESS".
Listen to the end of this. It is something he said 38 years ago.
Take a moment and listen to it (from 1969).
How would he have known what would be happening today?
Comedian yes, was he also a prophet?
Click on the link , and turn your sound on.
http://patriotfiles.org/Pledge.htm
http://patriotfiles.org/Pledge.htm
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Recreation Part of Duke's Plan
Courtesy Chester News & Reporter
By Nancy F. Parsons / Great Falls Editor
Duke Energy Customer Relations Manager Rick Jiran addressed council briefly to
conclude a presentation by Great Falls Home Town Executive Director Glinda
Coleman on Duke’s re-licensing effort. Also shown are Barry Beasley of the S.C.
Department of Natural Resources and Jen Huff of Duke. The agreement will provide
increased recreational opportunities in Great Falls.
Duke Energy is finalizing details of its relicensing agreement for the
Catawba/Wateree area this week.
Included in the agreement is a 20-year recreation plan that will have
significant impact on the Great Falls area.
Glinda Coleman, executive director of the Great Falls Home Town Association,
said the agreement covers the Catawba River Water System starting with Lake
James in North Carolina and continues below Lake Wateree.
More than 160 stakeholders representing 82 entities have been involved in the
relicensing process, Coleman said.
The Home Town Association, Coleman added, has also been involved as part of an
advisory team for the Lower Catawba advisory group.
The Catawba Indian nation, federal and state agencies, local governments,
landowners, water dependent businesses, non-government organizations and local
citizens have also worked on the agreement since 2003.
“Recreation is a big part of the relicensing agreement,” Coleman said. “Focus is
changing from motor boating on the lakes to land-based recreation on lakes and
recreation on river reaches.”
The plan, Coleman pointed out, calls for 22 scheduled flows in the long area of
the dry river bed and 28 scheduled flows in the short river bed area each year
to allow kayaking.
The recreation plan for the first 20 years of the new license calls for $21
million in Duke-funded facilities improvements, 500 acres of Duke-owned land
provided for new/expanding access areas, the conveyance of more than 2,000 acres
of Duke-owned land at no cost to state agencies for recreation, the provision of
opportunities to purchase more than 3,400 acres of additional recreation land at
discounts and the addition of $13 million more in facilities improvements by
partnerships.
“The focus of the plan,” Coleman said, “will be the recreational aspect. There
will be continuous flows so there will no longer be dry beds. It is recreating
the Great Falls of the Catawba.”
“The river gives Great Falls so much potential,” said Rick Jiran, Duke Energy's
customer relations manager. “I really look forward to watching and participating
in the town's progress.”
The agreement calls for relocation of an access area, development of two
trailered boat ramps, a courtesy dock, paved and lighted parking, a fishing pier
and bank fishing trail at the old Springs Park.
At the Fishing Creek access area, plans include a fishing pier, paved parking, a
picnic area, a restroom and swimming beach, if a suitable area is found.
A public fishing area, pier or bank fishing trail and paved parking is planned
for the Fishing Creek Tailrace fishing area also.
The recreation plan includes acquisition of 1 to 5 acres near the S.C. Highway
200, U.S. Highway 21 and Fishing Creek intersection for canoe/kayak launch,
restrooms and a parking area.
As part of the plan, acquisition of 1 to 7 acres will allow for the construction
of a canoe/kayak launch site on the Great Falls reservoir downstream of the
Great Falls headworks.
Plans are to develop a portage trail on the north end of Mountain Island to
provide better boater access to the Great Falls long bypassed reach. A portage
trail is also planned around the headworks on Mountain Island to provide boater
access to the short bypassed reach and a portage trail along the short bypassed
reach to Cedar Creek reservoir.
Duke plans to lease to the S.C. Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism the
islands in the Great Falls Cedar Creek Island complex including the Dearborn
Armory site for state park development. Duke also plans to provide up to $1
million to the the parks department for island complex development and
management and construction of a pedestrian bridge from the lower Great Falls
reservoir canoe/kayak launch to Dearborn Island.
At the Mudcat Inn access area, Duke hopes to acquire 1 to 5 acres and build a
canoe/kayak access facility with gravel parking spaces. It also plans to offer
site lease to the Town of Great Falls.
Other improvements are also planned for the Wateree Creek access area, Molly
Creek Park, the Lake Wateree State Park management zone, east Wateree access
area, Lake Wateree recreation lands, Colonel's Creek, Taylor's Creek and Lugoff
access areas.
Many of the improvements are dependent on a partnership with Duke, the plan
stipulates.
Other enhancements planned include better information on recreation facilities,
improved signage, monetary support for initiatives at numerous historic sites,
habitat programs, formal species protection, land conservation, aquatic weed and
debris management and Lake Wateree flood management improvements.
Barry Beasley of the S.C. Department of Natural Resources said Duke negotiated
three years with various agencies to develop the plan.
“We spent longer than three years with some agencies,” Beasley said.
“A new state park on Dearborn Island, trails and new access areas will bring a
lot of change in term of recreational opportunities for Great Falls,” Beasley
said. “It's a very positive thing for Great Falls.” White water boating will be
available every weekend from Spring to Fall, according to Beasley.
“It's difficult to sit and talk about something that is going to exist 40 to 50
years down the road,” Beasley added. “And although very difficult at times, we
feel very positive about it.”
“It will trigger the start of recreational opportunities,” added Jen Huff of
Duke Energy.
Huff said the recreational opportunities will occur in five-year windows.
Jiran said Duke Energy is very appreciative of the partnership with the Home
Town Association, Mayor H.C. Starnes Jr., town council members and the citizens
of Great Falls.
“More than three years of work have got us to this point,” Jiran said, “but
signing the agreement is really the start for Great Falls. I look forward to
representing Duke Energy in Great Falls and Chester County as we begin the next
phase of this monumental project.”
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Great Falls Flow Study Completed (SC)
On October 23 and 24, roughly 35 paddlers attended a Controlled
Recreational Flow Study on the Great Falls reach of the Catawba River in the
heart of South Carolina's Piedmont.
American Whitewater and other organizations requested this study that
sought to determine the flow preferences, access needs, and desirability
associated with paddling the Great Falls. AW collaborated with Duke
Power, and consultant Bunny Johns in the design and implementation of this
landmark study. Paddlers boated two parallel channels separated by a large
island at 3 different flows. Our plan to boat a fourth (and highest) flow
was thwarted by the failure of flashboards atop a diversion weir associated with
the project. This study marks the culmination of almost 2 years of
preparation.
The Great Falls of the Catawba was once an 8 mile series of roaring rapids
that cut through a granite fall line deep in the heart of South Carolina.
Shad and other fish migrated through the area and visitors enjoyed the beauty
and power of the the river. The unique area held a mixture of mountain and
lowland species. Then, around the turn of the century a process began that
would dam much of the Catawba River, including the Great Falls. All but
one short section was flooded under reservoirs, and that remaining section was
dewatered by a canal that lead to more hydropower generators. The river
was silenced, the fish ceased to return up the river, and the Falls were largely
forgotten - until the relicensing of the Catawba River Dams began in 2002.
American Whitewater and other groups are now excited to have the
opportunity to restore a portion of the Great Falls to a functional river again,
and a regional recreational treasure. Much of the land along and around
the Great Falls has recently been set aside for preservation assuming funding is
available, and Duke has proposed to lease at a nominal fee all the islands
around Great Falls to become a new state park. There is now the unique
opportunity to create a state park that offers large tracts of undeveloped and
ecologically rich open space, a rich historic and prehistoric legacy, the chance
to view and hear the Great Falls roaring, a restored river that supports native
aquatic sepcies, and a truly wonderful recreational boating opportunity on a
class 2+ reach, a solid class 3 reach, as well as on multiple reservoirs.
All of this - and it is located next to the ailing yet optomistic mill town of
Great Falls - half way between Charlotte and Columbia.
The study data has yet to be analyzed, but there were lots of very large
smiles on the river last weekend. Paddlers appreciated the great scenery
and wildlife and found some great playboating including some great big waves and
some smaller mystery spots, cartwheel holes, and spinning/blasting holes.
At the right level, the Great Falls could provide some of the biggest and best
playboating on any dam released river south of the Gauley River in West
Virginia. Currently access is a big limitation to enjoying the Great Falls
but AW will be working to develop ecologically sensitive and recreationally
preferable access proposals. AW will also continue our efforts to restore
water to the Great Falls and to protect and improve the quality of that water.
A full flow study will be out soon, but for now check out a teaser video
of 3 rapids:
http://homepage.mac.com/fallingwaters/
iMovieTheater5.html
We received quite a bit of press for this study, including this article:
http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/
10007659.htm
We would like to thank the volunter participants that got up early and
pulled on cold wet paddling gear in the name of river stewardship. We
would like to thank our many supporters of our work on the Catawba, including
the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation. We would like to thank Duke Power and
Bunny Johns for working with us so opennly and collaboratively. And
especially AW wants to thank volunteer Andrew Lazenby and his wife Mary for
their help in organizing this study and the many others on the Catawba this
summer. Great Work Everyone!
Next up: nearly two years of negotiations regarding the fate of the Great
Falls! We need your support: Join and donate to American Whitewater!
Posted: October 27, 2004 by Kevin Colburn
Contact: Kevin Colburn
EASTERN CONSERVATION/ACCESS DIRECTOR
20 Battery Park Ave, Suite 302
Asheville, NC 28801
White-Water
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American Whitewater and many other stakeholders are making solid progress on the Catawba River relicensing in North and South Carolina. Recreational flow studies have been ongoing for the past few months all along the Catawba thanks to Duke Power and the excellent guidance of consultant Bunny Johns, and the assistance of volunteers Maurice Blackburn (Carolina Canoe Club), Andrew Lazenby (AW), and many others.
Later this fall we will be studying the Great Falls of the Catawba, a reach that currently only runs after significant rains and/or the weekly hurricanes that have been rolling up the Catawba Watershed. We are very excited about the prospects of restoring water to this very special section of river for both ecological and recreational reasons, and the studies will form a critical basis for those negotiations. We hope the paddling community is very excited about paddling these reaches, and yet we have to ask that paddlers that are not part of the official study not attempt to paddle the Great Falls during the study flows. For logistical reasons the study teams are limited, and participants have been picked that are already involved in the relicensing and/or will share their experiences with the larger paddling community. Participants will represent a cross section of potential users and you can be assured that your interests will be represented during and after the studies. Paddlers crashing the test flows could jeopardize the entire study.
American Whitewater excitedly awaits the day we
can invite the entire paddling community to enjoy the Great Falls, and we
greatly appreciate your support of this project. We will keep you informed
of the study results and the resources that we discover. Only a couple more
years of negotiations!
Posted: October 7, 2004 by Kevin Colburn
| Contact: | Kevin Colburn EASTERN CONSERVATION/ACCESS DIRECTOR 20 Battery Park Ave, Suite 302 Asheville, NC 28801 E-mail: Kevin@amwhitewater.org Phone: 828-252-6482 Fax: 828-254-4429 |
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You gotta love Robin Williams...
Leave it to Robin to come up with the perfect plan
what we need now is for our UN Ambassador to stand up and repeat this message.
Robin William's plan. (Hard to argue with this logic!)
I see a lot of people yelling for peace but I have not heard of a plan for
peace. So, here's one plan.
1.) The US will apologize to the world for our "interference" in their affairs,
past & present You know, Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, Noriega, Milosevic and the
rest of those 'good ole boys,' We will never "interfere" again.
2.) We will withdraw our troops from all over the world, starting with Germany,
South Korea and the Philippines. They don't want us there. We would station
troops at our borders. No one sneaking through holes in the fence.
3.) All illegal aliens have 90 days to get their affairs together and leave.
We'll give them a free trip home. After 90 days the remainder will be gathered
up and deported immediately, regardless of who or where they are. France would
welcome them.
4.) All future visitors will be thoroughly checked and limited to 90 days unless
given a special permit. No one from a terrorist nation would be allowed in. If
you don't like it there, change it yourself and don't hide here. Asylum would
never be available to anyone. We don't need any more cab drivers or 7-11
cashiers.
5.) No foreign "students" over age 21. The older ones are the bombers If they
don't attend classes, they get a "D" and it's back home baby.
6.) The US will make a strong effort to become self-sufficient energy wise. This
will include developing nonpolluting sources of energy but will require a
temporary drilling of oil in the Alaskan wilderness. The caribou will have to
cope for a while.
7.) Offer Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries $10 a barrel for their
oil. If they don't like it, we go some place else. They can go somewhere else to
sell their production. (About a week of the wells filling up the storage sites
would be enough.)
8.) If there is a famine or other natural catastrophe in the world, we will not
"interfere." They can pray to Allah or whomever, for seeds, rain, cement or
whatever they need. Besides most of what we give them is stolen or given to the
army. The people who need it most get very little, if anything.
9.) Ship the UN Headquarters to an isolated island some place. We don't need the
spies and fair weather friends here. Besides, the building would make a good
homeless shelter or lockup for illegal aliens.
10.) All Americans must go to charm and beauty school. That way, no one can call
us "Ugly Americans" any longer. The Language we speak is ENGLISH.....learn
it...or LEAVE...Now, isn't that a winner of a plan.
"The Statue of Liberty is no longer saying 'Give me your tired, your poor, your
huddled masses.' She's got a baseball bat and she's yelling,
'You want a piece of me?'
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That's Incredible
In 1939, Banks McFadden led Clemson to its first conference championship in
basketball and to its first bowl game in football
By BOB SPEAR
Sports Editor
The State
A national publication chose the greatest athletes from each state in a yearlong
series not long ago, and one missing name from South Carolina shattered the
project’s credibility.
In an incredible faux pas, Banks McFadden did not receive mention.
To pick the Palmetto State’s finest without including the Clemson legend called
Bonnie Banks is equivalent to eliminating John Philip Sousa’s stirring marches
and red, white and blue bunting from Fourth of July celebrations.
The only valid explanation for his absence could be that the researchers asked
McFadden for recommendations and took him at his word.
Just the other day, McFadden, who turns 88 in February, shrugged off suggestions
that he deserved accolades.
“Anything I accomplished, I owe to my teammates,” he said. “I received a lot of
credit for things they did.”
He delivered those thoughts with sincerity. Ego is only a word in the dictionary
to him; a more humble person would be difficult to imagine.
But do not be misled. McFadden made All-America in football and basketball in
the same year. He set state college track and field records that stood for 20
years or more. He led his high school to a pair of state football championships
and averaged 6.5 yards per carry in his only season in pro football.
His credentials glitter in any era, and the passing of time cannot dull their
luster.
Much too modest. The athletic wonders of Banks McFadden come to mind today near
the 65th anniversary of Clemson’s first splash on the national stage, a berth —
and a victory — in the Cotton Bowl.
He is in the September of his years now, lives with one of his four daughters
and admits he has lost a bit of his agility.
“I’ve got everything (wrong), starting with ingrown toenails,” he reported in
that familiar voice via long distance from Patsy Harlow’s home Durham, N.C. But
optimism has never been far away in his outlook and he quickly added, “I expect
to be better in the near future.”
He wasted no time in praising his teammates at Great Falls High and Clemson, and
he did not waver from playing down his talents. “Oh, I was pretty fair in a
number of sports, but not that good in any one,” he claimed.
The record books say he is much too modest, and so does Walter Cox, a teammate
and coaching colleague at Clemson and, more importantly, a friend for all these
years.
“He was the finest athlete I have witnessed,” Cox, a retired Clemson
administrator, said. “When they selected the top athletes of the century and
didn’t mention him, I wondered what they were thinking.”
Cox, a guard, would pull on sweeps in Clemson’s single-wing offense and lead the
blockers. “But Banks was so fast that he would be pushing me in the back to
block the cornerback,” Cox remembered.
He also remembered a punting exhibition in which McFadden would repeatedly boom
65- and 70-yard kicks that “would go up like a bullet and come straight down.
His punting was often our best weapon.”
Charlie Tisdale, another guard on the Tigers’ Cotton Bowl team, recalled a sweep
named 57. “I loved that play,” he said. “I would pull, get a piece of the
outside linebacker, and Banks was gone down the sidelines.”
McFadden passed, too, and played defense. “Mac swooped out of the sky like a big
bird and knocked down (a pass) in the end zone” to save the Tigers’ 6-3 win
against Boston College in the Cotton Bowl, the late Frank Howard once said.
Understand, this is just a quick synopsis from football, one of the sports
McFadden “piddled around” with in its season. He had earned All-America honors
in basketball earlier in 1939 and set records in track and field in the spring
of 1940, and after the 1939 season he earned All-America in football, too.
In a giant-sized understatement, Cox said, “That’s pretty incredible.”
AT HOME AT TAILBACK
McFadden arrived at Clemson in the fall of 1936, and Howard, then an assistant
on the football staff, took one look at the 6-foot-3, 165-pound beanpole and
wondered if head coach Jess Neely had lost his mind.
“He was so thin I could have poured a glass of tomato juice down him and used
him for a thermometer,” Howard once growled. “A good puff of wind would have
blown him away.”
What Howard didn’t know about McFadden the late Abe Fennell, who officiated high
school games, could have told him.
“I had Great Falls in the state championship game one year,” Fennell once said.
“We worked with two officials back then, and I told the other guy he had better
get way down the field if Great Falls punted. Well, he didn’t believe me, and on
McFadden’s first punt, it looked like he would run forever trying to catch up
with the football.”
Most fans do not know that the future All-America tailback played end with no
particular distinction on Clemson’s freshman team and was a reserve wingback his
sophomore season. In the latter role, he worked with the scout squad against the
first team and learned a valuable lesson.
“The varsity was killing us one day, and we started dragging around,” McFadden
remembered. “Dusty Wiles, who was a senior that year (1937), looked around at us
sophomores in the huddle and told us, ‘You’ve got two choices: Keep piddling
around and be like me, or get better and make the varsity.’ I made up my mind
that very day to get off the scout team.”
He did, and a position switch paved the way. In spring practice of 1938, he
moved to tailback, and Shad Bryant switched to wingback.
“He was terrific at wingback,” McFadden said. “He blocked better than I did, and
we both found a home.”
The Tigers and McFadden prospered, but Clemson’s publicist, the late Joe
Sherman, once worked to keep the Tigers star from making an All-America team.
A Chicago publication chose a Little All-America team composed of players out of
the mainstream, and the editor inquired about McFadden. Sherman believed
McFadden could make the “Big” All-America team composed of players from teams
such as Michigan and Notre Dame.
“I wrote (the editor) and told him Clemson hoped to shed the ‘Little’ image and
putting McFadden on his team would not help us,” Sherman once said. “Of course,
Banks made the regular All-America team with the players such as Tom Harmon of
Michigan.”
Coupled with the honors earned earlier that year in basketball, the football
awards assured his prominent place in athletic lore.
‘SECRET’ STRATEGY
Clemson sneaked into the 1939 Southern Conference basketball tournament by the
skinniest of margins. With the Tigers among four teams tied for the last two
berths, league officials took 10 rather than the usual eight for the
championship event.
The Tigers beat North Carolina, Wake Forest, Davidson and Maryland to win the
title and expected to head to New York for the National Invitation Tournament.
Instead, coach Joe Davis took his squad back to Clemson.
“We didn’t understand, but we did what we were told, went home and started
spring football practice,” McFadden said. “Years later at a reunion, we asked
coach Neely (also the athletics director) about the NIT and he told us, ‘Yeah,
well, we did get an invitation. But football was starting and three or four of
you (basketball) guys played football. Anyhow, it would have taken $400 or $500
to send you fellows to New York.’• ”
Neely figured in the basketball championship.
“Against North Carolina, he saw I could beat their center down the floor and
suggested to coach Davis that we take advantage of my speed,” McFadden said.
“Coach Davis made like he knew that, too, and told coach Neely that has was
saving that for a secret play. We did get a couple of baskets out of it, and we
won by one point.”
Meanwhile, back at football practice, McFadden figured to ease through spring
practice, which in those days Clemson finished with a trip to Duke for a
scrimmage.
“Coach Neely told me to pack a bag and go along just for the trip,” McFadden
remembered. “Then he said I might play a down or two. Then I started and played
about three-fourths of the time.
“Duke’s line broke though several times, and I would run out of the pocket.
Coach Neely got all over me for that, even though I scrambled and threw three
touchdown passes. The Duke coach (Wallace Wade) came over after we finished and
told coach Neely that it looks like you have something special there.
“All the time, coach Neely gave me the dickens for not staying in the pocket,
but he said, ‘I think you’re right. We’ve been working on that.’”
‘HE’S DAD TO US’
His football and basketball exploits tend to overshadow McFadden’s
record-breaking day in track, a sport that came naturally to him.
“Coach Howard had the track team and told me he wanted me to be a hurdler,”
McFadden said. “I told him I didn’t know anything about running hurdles, and he
gave me a book to read. He told me, ‘The idea is to get over them fast.’”
Before McFadden ran the hurdles in the 1940 state meet, he competed in the long
jump and trailed heading into his final attempt. Howard put his handkerchief
next to the pit and told McFadden he needed to jump that far to win.
“I took off, and the further I got out, the further away that handkerchief
looked,” he recalled. “I came up short, and that burned me up. I knew I had just
had the best jump of my life, and it was short. I was mad and stomping around,
and coach Howard said, ‘Let ’em measure it.’
“I couldn’t believe it when they said I had set a state record at more than 23
feet. Coach told me, ‘I put that handkerchief at 24 feet just to see what you
could do.’”
In that same meet, McFadden set records in the 120-yard high hurdles and the
220-yard low hurdles, placed third in the shot put, and ran a leg on a winning
relay team.
He played in the old College All-Star football game that summer in Chicago and
came home prepared to join the Clemson coaching staff. Instead, the old Brooklyn
Dodgers made him the third pick overall in the pro football draft, and he played
one season.
“But I liked grass under my feet, not pavement,” he said.
He came home, served in the military, coached at Clemson, married the former
Aggie Rigby and raised a family. All the while, his legend grew — and he did his
best to dispel the notion that he was anything special.
“We know he did all those things, but he has always been very humble,” said
Patsy Harlow, his oldest daughter. “Although he worked long hours in coaching,
he spent a lot of time with us. He always has been Dad to us.”
To everyone else, he set standards that all these years later command
admiration, and neither time nor his attempts to deflect credit will dull the
luster of his achievements.
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