Ohio County Times

William Jared, a former intern at the Hartford toll plaza, drives a 1968 convertible Mercury with former and current toll attendants as passengers for the final toll at 11:15 a.m. Tuesday. The Green River Natcher Parkway opened as a toll road in 1972.

Earl Russell was 4 years old and pretty much under his parents’ feet at the family grocery store when a critical decision was made. With the assistance of a teacher, he would be admitted to the one-room school on Maxwell Road. Thus was started a career in education that would extend all the way to 1986 and a position in the Ohio County school system’s central office. Earl Russell, an educator-turned-politician died early Monday morning after battling cancer at his Clay Street home in Hartford. He was 80 years old.

Daniel “The Sandman” Maldonado captured his dream last Friday night when he defeated Jose Alberto Gonzalez for the International Boxing Association’s featherweight championship at the Orleans Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. In a grueling 12-round bout, Maldonado won in a split decision over the 24-year-old Gonzalez. “I’m actually pretty cotton pickin’ sore,” said Maldonado about how he was feeling three days after the fight. “It creeps up on you and today my body really hurts.”

A program by Audubon Area Community Services will ensure at least 100 homes will be warmer this winter. Anna Stewart, a Buford resident, is taking full advantage of the program after battling an in-and-out furnace and worrying about electric heaters for the last three years.

The Bluegrass, Blues & Barbecue Tourism Region of Western Kentucky has announced a new initiative to pay tribute to the region’s rich musical heritage by reaching out to those involved in bluegrass music. Never before has a region dedicated itself to the bluegrass genre to this degree.

Two Ohio County couples have fallen victim to scams originating in foreign countries. The two unidentified couples, according to Charlotte Whittaker, executive director of Ohio County Senior Services, were cheated out of a total of $8,000. “One of the couples, both prominent, was cheated out of $5,000 and the other lost $3,000 in a scam operating out of Nigeria,” Whittaker said. “The crooks seem to know how to target people with money.”

When the new Sony Playstation 3s (PS3s) debuted last Friday, all you had to have was $600, a portable sleeping pad and a couple of free days to hang out at a retail store. Locally, the Beaver Dam Wal-Mart was the only store in the county selling the game system and by noon Wednesday there were people camping out inside the store’s greenhouse area.