Lamont Growers elect Morton

Lamont

This deer was shot by Chris Shields Saturday morning on the Ed Shields ranch. It was probably the largest deer killed so far in the area and also, one of the few bucks seen in the Lamont area. A Ritzville High School June graduate, Chris is a freshman at Eastern Washington University in Cheney.

Lamont Grain Growers annual dinner meeting was Oct. 13 at the Lamont Community Center. The Lamont Women’s Club with co-chairs Sherrill Nelson and Bonnie Swannack in charge, served a lasagna dinner to guests. Board of Directors in attendance were Gil White, president; Pete Swannack, vice-president; Burke Melville and Chet Swift. Steve Swannack, secretary-treasurer, was unable to attend. Gil White brought the meeting to order.

Tim Fuhrman gave the manager’s report and introduced his office assistant, Tom Pedersen, warehousemen Art Boutain and Ron Dixon and scalehouse attendant, Amanda Courneya. Brian Madison gave the auditor’s report. Peter Swannack chose not to rerun for office. David Morton was elected to the open position.

Nita Polda and Betty Stone flew to Switzerland Sept. 22 for a two week visit with Nita’s daughter and husband, Kris Ann and Richard Bulcroft, in the town of Pura. Kris Ann is vice-president of the USA Franklin College, and Rick teaches at the same college. Their hosts started their sightseeing with a trip into Italy. The first night was in in Barolo, then they spent two nights at a bed and breakfast in Cantarana where they attended a pumpkin festival and toured villages and castles.

When they returned to Pura, Rick took them on a boat trip down Lake Lugano. One evening they attended a law and culture conference at the Franklin College where Kris Ann gave the opening address and introduced the guest speaker, Esra’a Al Shafer of Bahrain, who spoke about working for a more open society in the Middle East.

People from all over the world attended.

On their last weekend their hosts took them to the French-German part of Switzerland where they stayed two nights at a bed and breakfast in Lucens where they took a tram up to the village of Murren to see Roman ruins in Avenches, vineyards harvest, Swiss brown cows with big bells around their necks and beautiful green countryside.

They had perfect 80 degree weather during the trip and returned home Oct. 7.

Marguerite Miller drove from the Spokane Valley to help with the Grain Growers dinner and spent two nights at the home of Kathy Shields before returning home.

It is time to shear sheep at the Art and Jill Swannack ranch for about 1,100 head of sheep. They started Friday at the ranch where they live and did about 300 head before moving to Washtucna where the rest of the herd stays until the snow flies. Three shearers came to do the job, one from Idaho, one from South Carolina and one from California.

The Swannack children are busy shoving the sheep to the shearers. They also check the wool to remove any weeds or other debris. They then roll them up and put them in a baler which makes them into a 4 X 4 bale weighing 490 pounds.

Guests at the Allen Cook home, for a few days hunting, were Tom Haleki, Jack and Louise Armstrong, Lonnie Willis and Ryan Carter, all of Kennewick. Lonnie and Ryan returned home Sunday the rest left Tuesday, Tom, who had a doe tag, was the only one in the group to get a deer. Also, staying over on Friday were Sandi, Logan and Kristen Miller of Kahlotus. The Millers returned home late Saturday afternoon.

Dave and Ginny Rajala and Dan and Jean Stromberger helped serve at the annual pledge banquet at the Christian Heritage School in Edwall last Saturday.

Bonnie Swannack drove to Spokane Friday to help set up the quilt show at the fair ground in Spokane. Bonnie enjoyed the show on Saturday, stayed in Spokane that evening and Sunday showed how to put bindings on quilts, center pieces and other items that use bindings. After the show on Sunday, she helped take down the 600 quilts.