Electrifying

Thumbs-up to David Guthrie of Medora. The Class A lineman with Jackson County REMC joined 15 other linemen from electric cooperatives in Indiana and spent the second half of March electrifying 60 homes, a school, a church and a medical clinic in the small village of El Zapotillo in the mountainous Cuilco, Huehuetenango region of Guatemala. It was the first time the nearly 200 people in the village have had electricity. All of that work was done by hand and without the aid of modern conveniences, such as the bucket trucks the linemen normally use in their everyday job.

The gift of life

Thumbs-up to the organ donors who made it possible for doctors to successfully complete more than 33,600 transplants in 2016 in the United States, giving patients a second chance at life, according to the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network. April is National Donate Life Month.

Flying like an Eagle

Thumbs-up to Boy Scout Elliott Hughel with Troop 526 at St. Ambrose Catholic Church in Seymour. The 17-year-old recently completed the community service project he needed to become an Eagle Scout, scouting’s highest rank. The portable walls Hughel and his fellow Scouts built will be used by for an interactive adventure game and other purposes at the Seymour Museum in the future.

Community focus

Thumbs-up to members of the Medora Brick Plant and Historical Sites committee for putting together a video showcasing a brief history of the plant, its importance to the community and proposed plans for the site. The video was entered into USA Today Network’s A Community Thrives contest with the hope that it will win the top prize of $100,000 or one of two $50,000 prizes for finishing second. The money would be a good start in seeing the brick plant, which operated for nearly 90 years in the 20th century, become a focus of the community again.

Weathering the storm

Thumbs-down to Mother Nature for teasing us with some really almost summer-like weather in late March and then showing us who is really in charge by hitting us with a cold blast the past few weeks. It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.