HARLAN -- Joyce Nielsen of Harlan will mark her 90th birthday on April 10. She will celebrate with a family dinner on her birthday. Cards will reach her if sent to 2004 Garfield Ave., Apt. 6,  Harlan, IA 51537.    Her family includes children, Becky and Gary Feser, Irwin; Jay and Susan Nielsen, rural Defiance; three grandchildren and two great-grandsons.    Joyce’s husband is the late Hans Nielsen.

    HARLAN -- Ray Book of Harlan will celebrate his 80th birthday on April 13. His family is planning a card shower in his honor.

    ANKENY -- Emily Murtha and Bradley Brue, both of Ankeny, will exchange marriage vows on April 17 in Ankeny.    Parents of the couple are Greg and Beth Murtha, Marshalltown; and Bob and Patty Brue, Harlan.    Emily is a 2014 graduate of Marshalltown Community High School and a 2018 graduate of the University of Northern Iowa where she was awarded a bachelors degree in business administration and gerontology.

    HARLAN – Ken Weber is the first to admit he has a home in Avoca.    But he also has one in Harlan.    Weber’s actual residency has come into question in recent weeks as Harlan residents come to grips with higher than normal utility bills due to February’s unprecedented extreme cold via a polar vortex that swept through the entire Midwest.    Residents are questioning that if Weber, the chief executive officer of the Harlan Municipal Utilit

    STATE -- While the Harlan Municipal Utilities isn’t planning to utilize it, many municipal utilities in Iowa are being offered a natural gas loan program through the Iowa Economic Development Authority to help with costs associated with last month’s unprecedented cold and the bills associated for energy purchases.    HMU CEO Ken Weber said the polar vortex was a big enough event impacting all Iowa municipalities, that the state has set up

 ATLANTIC (March 24) -- Harlan Community alum Joe Brummer is the new head football coach for Atlantic High School following approval by the Atlantic Board of Education on Wednesday. Brummer, a 2012 HCHS graduate, told Atlantic radio station KSOM that he was ready to “hit the ground running” in his new post, putting an emphasis on the program’s off-season weight and agility program. As a two-way starting lineman for Harlan Community, Brummer wa

 DES MOINES -- The Iowa Girls Coaches Association has named four area student-athletes to its 2021 All-State Girls Basketball teams. Exira-Elk Horn-Kimballton sophomore guard Quinn Grubbs was selected as a Class 1A first-teamer and Spartan junior forward Macy Emgarten made the 1A third team.

 AVOCA -- AHSTW senior Morgan Holtz signed a letter of intent on March 10 to continue her education and soccer career at Iowa Western Community College in Council Bluffs. Holtz has played two seasons for the Lady Vikes prior to last year’s season being cancelled due to COVID-19.

    On Friday and Saturday, April 9th and 10th, Myrtue Medical Center’s Public Health, in partnership with Rex Pharmacy from Atlantic, will host a mass COVID-19, Pfizer vaccination clinic with 1,170 doses available. “With all Iowans being eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine beginning April 5, the timing of this mass vaccination clinic couldn’t be better,” said Lori Hoch, Myrtue’s Public Health Director.