Wheeling Jesuit University in Wheeling just kicked off what will be a month-long celebration of all-things Appalachia. “Celebrate Appalachia” is the name of the series of lectures and events.
An open letter addressed by a Bishop to Catholic clergy, laity and the general public in 1975, entitled, “This Land is Home to Me,” was the impetus for what has become the Appalachian Institute at Wheeling Jesuit—a place for research, service, and advocacy for and with the people of Appalachia. From that place, through the initiative of a vista volunteer turned director of the institute, “Celebrate Appalachia” has grown.
Beth Collins was that volunteer. She says what started as a single night of celebrating Appalachian culture with food and revelry has turned into a month full of events that shines a light on everything from corn cob pipes and bluegrass music to mountain top removal coal mining techniques.
West Virginia’s got a lot of deer within its borders, and they can be a burden. For instance, the state’s vehicle collision rate with deer is one of the…
West Virginia’s got a lot of deer within its borders, and they can be a burden. For instance, the state’s vehicle collision rate with deer is one of the highest in the nation, according to a study by State Farm Insurance. In Morgantown, new technology is being used to monitor these animals.
You see them while driving along the interstate. You’ll catch them in your residential neighborhoods, eating vegetables from your garden.
They’re deer, and the state is trying to find better ways to quantify how many of them are in West Virginia. Sheldon Owen is a wildlife specialist at the West Virginia University extension office in Morgantown.
“A lot of people will say that we have too many deer out there. Those individuals who love to see a lot of deer are happy with the numbers. We are experiencing a lot of deer damage in the state, to agriculture, to our gardens, and also to our natural resources,” said Owen.
“Our forests are taking a hit because of the number of deer foraging on the seedlings and things that are trying to grow.”
This week, members of the extension office are canvassing Morgantown using new methods to track how many deer are in the city. This includes using a special infrared technology, said Owen.
“Any object gives off heat radiation, or a thermal signature. A thermal imaging device basically captures that information and translates it onto a screen so we can form a picture of what is going on out there. We can see this thermal picture of what is across the landscape,” he explained.
“We can determine the outline of a deer, a dog, raccoon, houses, cars, so we can differentiate between what is a dog, deer, or what is going on in the landscape.”
Owen says the infrared technology is superior to the current system that utilizes spotlights.
“We have used spotlights and have driven specific routes and located deer and counted deer over certain area. In using spotlights, we are relying on an external light source, we are missing deer because we can’t see them through vegetation,” he said.
By using this infrared technology, Owen said they find up to 30 percent more of the deer that are out there.
The extension office works closely with the Division of Natural Resources on projects like this. Owen is hoping more counties will use this infrared technology so deer counts can be more accurate.
“We’re doing this to try to see, well to come up with a kind of protocol, that everyone can use, other municipalities and communities can use to get a handle on the number of deer in their area,” said Owen.
Even with the new system Owen expects there will be challenges. He says the biggest one may be line of sight, in other words, finding deer that may be hidden behind buildings and in geographically tricky locations where it could be tough to find them. But he says infrared gives another advantage.
“You’re able to see through heavy fog, smoke, mists and things, so it allows us to detect animals that are otherwise missed with our other technologies, such as using a spotlight,” Owen said.
The locators will be traveling in vehicles to do the work. Once the information is collected, the Extension Office will pass along the numbers to the city of Morgantown, which allows urban deer hunting. Owen and his team also work with the Division of Natural Resources, so they will receive the more accurate numbers as well.
The state Department of Agriculture is seeking nominations for a program honoring contributions by women to the agriculture, forestry and specialty crop industries.
The West Virginia Women in Agriculture program has recognized 26 women since it began in 2010. Previous honorees have been involved in a variety of fields including beef, dairy, education, specialty crop production and forestry.
Nominations are due by June 1. Forms can be obtained by contacting (304) 585-2210 or on the department’s website at www.wvagriculture.org.
Biographies of this year’s honorees will be featured on department displays during the State Fair of West Virginia in August.
The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded grants to two humanities projects in West Virginia.
West Virginia University Research Corporation received a $59,973 grant to develop a search engine for electronic literature. The search engine would link nine international research centers’ databases.
West Virginia University received a $6,000 summer stipend grant for a project called “Black Litigants: Rethinking Race and Power in the American South, 1820-1860.”
The National Endowment for the Humanities announced the grants Thursday.
As the deadline for signing up for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act approaches audiences in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia will have the opportunity to view the issue of health care through a one-man play called Mercy Killers.
The main character in the play is Joe. He’s from southeast Ohio, works as an auto mechanic and is libertarian in his political views. Michael Milligan, the Juilliard educated stage actor, wrote the play and has been performing it for about a year now.
Milligan said when he was younger he had insurance but had not given much thought to the issue of medical care. Then he was in a relationship with someone who needed a lot of medical care.
“It was thrust upon me, the reality of how difficult it is for many people to get the care that they need,” Milligan said.
In the play, Joe’s wife has cancer and loses her health insurance. And the couple struggles with paying for the treatment she needs.
Milligan has done readings of Mercy Killers and has performed it steadily for a little over a year now in several states and at the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland where it won the Fringe First Award for new plays.
All the while, the heated national debate over the Affordable Care Act and its implementation raged on.
“I remember during that weekend when the shutdown was happening which was about Obamacare, I was performing it in an open garage in Williamsburg Brooklyn sort of spilling over into the sidewalk on a Saturday night as people were walking by going to meet their friends at bars and stuff,” he said. “And people stopped and listened and really got the sense that ‘oh, this debate is still going on,’ that was interesting.”
Milligan said the play doesn’t take a position on Obamacare but tries to remind people about why something had to be done to address problems with the health care system.
“People losing their insurance at the moment they needed it most was really an immoral condition that was going on and however we move forward we need to remember that and not go back to that situation,” he said.
Milligan hopes the audiences who see the play leave with a raised awareness and are willing to take another look at the issues surrounding the health care system.
“From a wider point of view that includes their humanity, their sense of human empathy and their hearts,” Milligan said. “Because I think that the thoughts that people have about it change then when they realize these are real people this is happening to.”
The Iditarod. Referred to as the Last Great Race on Earth. The annual long-distance sled dog race occurs in early March from Anchorage, Alaska, northwest…
The Iditarod. Referred to as the Last Great Race on Earth. The annual long-distance sled dog race occurs in early March from Anchorage, Alaska, northwest to Nome—just over 1000 miles. Mushers and a team of 16 dogs cover the distance in about a fortnight. But there’s another event, the Iditarod Trail Invitational, which covers the same route, but by foot, bike, or ski. This year, a Tucker County resident won the race on foot.
Credit Nils Hahn / The Nome Nugget newspaper
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The Nome Nugget newspaper
Dr. Logar is an emergency room physician who works in Randolph County. He’s part of a subculture of extreme ultra-athletes who do crazy things like race really long distances in difficult conditions. He says he doesn’t really remember when or how he became interested in the Iditarot, but last year he ran the qualifying 350-mile event, and after applying and being accepted to race the 1000-mile event this year, he paid the 1200-dollar fee, took some time off from the emergency room, and headed to Alaska.
The Iditarod Trail Invitational started off February 23. 23 days, 22 hours later, John Logar from Tucker County made it to Nome, Alaska. There were 7 who started the foot race.
“Five of us made it to Nome,” Logar says. “ I was the first person to get to Nome. But we [ultra-athletes] don’t really care. Winning is finishing.”
Tucker County Ready
Logar spends a lot of time bicycling, year-round, through Tucker County, W.Va. Steep slopes, dicey roads–not a lot of people are regularly biking through and around Tucker County no matter the weather.
“For me it’s a lifestyle of activity,” Logar says. “I don’t have a training program, I don’t have a regiment, I don’t have a diet, I attempt to be active every day, do something every day.”
Logar says the rolling-hill landscape of the coastal portion of the trip reminded him a lot of West Virginia. But covering 1000 miles is like driving from Morgantown to Naples, Florida—in the car that would take about 18 hours. He says when you cover that kind of area, you’re bound to run through a variety of landscapes.
The Iditarod trail goes north on even years and south on odd years–spreading the adventure through different sets of villages.
The Route
“The villages use this trail as a way to get between their towns in the winter, and it’s also being used by the sled dogs for the Iditarod. The weather, the conditions, the villages, everything changes throughout the course—different cultures as you move your way through.”
It took him 23 days, 22 hours, and 10 minutes. Logar ran 18-20 hours each day stopping for 3 or four hours to sleep and maintain. He slept outside mostly. Showered twice. He would be offered meals throughout the trip but for the most part, he ate along the way. He carried about three days’ worth of food at a time, collecting it as he traveled from post offices that he sent packages to beforehand.
Doctor Ready
Logar says for the most part he enjoyed himself. But there were some stumbling blocks.
“Yes, I was unfortunate enough to have, um, pretty severe diarrhea for the last five days,” Logar recalls, laughing. “It was horrible.”
Good thing he’s a doctor, right? And what did he prescribe for himself? What’s the secret of champions that allowed him to preserve and be first to the finish line?
“I asked a guy at the house I was staying at, ‘Do you have Laffy Taffy?’ He went and bought me, gosh, a hundred dollars worth of Laffy Taffy and Bit O Honey and that’s what worked for me. I ate Laffy Taffy the whole way.”
The Prize
Well, for winning first place, Logar didn’t receive any medal or ceremony or trophy. Just love and admiration from his community and free entry into next year’s race. He says he might have to do it again. But if he does, he’ll likely race on a bike.
Iditarod Lessons
Logar says first and foremost, the race taught him a lot about management. But he says he also learned a lot about what it means to be selfish:
“I’m gone for a month and I’m thinking only about myself and some very basic needs for myself. So it’s pretty selfish. And that was hard to deal with realizing that. It’s only possible because of my wife Jody. This would not be something I could do without her giving me the go-ahead. So it’s her fault,” he says laughing.
