AREA -- Forty-one baseball and softball players from Harlan Community, AHSTW, IKM-Manning and Exira-Elk Horn-Kimballton were named to this year's all-conference teams for the Hawkeye Ten, Western Iowa and Rolling Valley conferences. The list of local players includes 11 first-team selections.
   All-Conference teams and final standings are as follows.
Hawkeye Ten All-Conference Baseball

    COUNTY -- Bacon Buddies, a new program that pairs people with special needs with 4-H and FFA members to show pigs, kicked off this summer and was considered a huge success.    The special needs participants had the opportunity to not only interact with livestock, but to show pigs in the main ring.

    EARLING – A cherished windmill damaged during heavy thunderstorms and straight-line winds back in 2006 is getting new life after being restored and erected last month on an Earling family farm.    On Wednesday, July 22, a crane operated by Tom Muenchrath lifted the vintage windmill into the air.  He was assisted by Gary Blum with a loader on the windmill base to prevent the legs from buckling as the 40-foot tower was raised from the ground

    SHELBY -- Marsha Hursey learned to sew by trial and error. A seamstress for more than five decades, her projects range from wedding dress alterations to making memory quilts. During the pandemic she has made more than 500 masks.    Hursey didn’t take her high school home ec teacher’s advice when she said Hursey had no talent for sewing. It just made her more determined to learn on her own.
 

    PORTSMOUTH -- Irene Lefeber of Portsmouth will mark her 80th birthday on August 16. Her family is planning a card shower in her honor. Cards will reach her if sent to P.O. Box 42, Portsmouth, IA 51565.    Her children are Tom and Janet Lefeber, Portsmouth; Jackie and Jon Harvey, LaVista, NE; Michele Lefeber and friend, Mike Gray, Harlan; Scott Lefeber, Harlan; and John and Micheal (Patzloff) Lefeber, Glendale, AZ.
 

    HARLAN -- Amy Petersen and Tyler Thomas both of Earling were planning to marry on July 30 in Harlan.         Parents of the couple are Brunhilde Petersen, Harlan, and the late Brian G. Petersen; and Steven Thomas, Walnut; and Denise and Randy Sandbothe, Walnut.
 

    STATE --  The annual Iowa Sales Tax Holiday will take place this weekend on Friday, August 7 and Saturday, August 8.    Shoppers will be exempt from the seven percent sales tax within stores throughout the entire state of Iowa these days, thanks to a sponsorship from the Iowa Department of Revenue.    Sales of a single item with a price that is less than $100 only qualify for the exemption, but items that sell for more than that do not.  

Elementary Plan?    Classes outdoors when appropriate.    Specials (music, PE, art) meet in the safest settings.    Will make up missed learning.    Students will primarily remain with their classmates during the day.    Grab-no-go breakfast.    Lunch in an outside space, in classrooms, or in cafeteria with spacing.    To limit traffic flow, students will be given an assigned door for enter/exit.

    HARLAN -- Gerald “Jerry” Kloewer, 94, Harlan, died Saturday, Aug. 1 in Harlan.    Services were held Tuesday, Aug. 4 at 11 a.m. at St. Michael’s Catholic Church in Harlan with burial in the Harlan Cemetery.    Kloewer is survived by his wife, Pauline Kloewer, of Harlan; daughters Sue (Steve) Daeges of Harlan, Jeri (Steve) Ozbun of Harlan, Connie (Bill) Catrenich of Ankeny and Cindy (Curt) Schultz of Ankeny; sisters Sr.