Successful festival
Thumbs up to the organizers of the 47th annual Medora Christmas Festival. The event featured the annual parade, which drew 50 entries, music and more than 30 vendors. A related thumbs up to this year’s parade prince and princess, Ava Brewer, 4, and Jeffrey Atkins, 8.
Stuffed
Thumbs up to the congregation of Tampico Baptist Church, which collected and filled 72 shoeboxes during Operation Christmas Child’s National Collection Week in mid-November. Since 1993, Operation Christmas Child has collected and delivered more than 168 million gift-filled shoeboxes to children in more than 160 countries and territories.
Thumbs up to members of Seymour Elks Lodge 462 and Delta Delta chapter of Epsilon Sigma Alpha and other volunteers who stuffed gift bags for local veterans Tuesday night at Zabel Funeral Home in Brownstown. Volunteers delivered the 63 bags for men and two for women at Covered Bridge Health Campus, Hoosier Christian Village, Lutheran Community Home, Seymour Crossing and Seymour Place. A related thumbs up to everyone who contributed money or supplies for the project.
Pennies pay off
Thumbs up to Rob Schwartz, who recently donated an estimated 30,000 pennies or $300 to his granddaughters Miriam Boyd and Nola Grube’s class at Emerson Elementary School for a fundraiser for Riley Hospital for Children at Indiana University Health in Indianapolis.
Gift lift
Thumbs up to everyone who made the Mental Health America of Jackson County’s Christmas party a success. Nearly 250 clients attended the annual event, known as the Gift Lift, at Central Christian Church in Seymour. The clients received dinner, a visit from Santa and Mrs. Claus and presents supplied by individuals, business and industries.
Hall of Famer
Thumbs up to Ed Spray, who recently was inducted into the Richard M. Fairbanks Indiana Broadcast Pioneers Hall of Fame. The 1959 graduate of Shields High School joined five friends as a co-founder of the Home and Garden Television Network (HGTV) in 1994. His career in the television and cable industries spans five decades.
Promoted
Thumbs up to 1993 Brownstown Central High School graduate James "Jamie" R. Fee Jr. with the Air Force who was promoted to colonel in April and named associate dean of the Graduate School of Engineering and Management at the Air Force Institute of Technology in June.