Columbus
Valley Press - Mineral Independent
Hunter ed instructors honored for service
Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks honored the service of its volunteer Hunter, Bowhunter, and Trapper education instructors at a workshop and awards luncheon this month in Missoula.Montana's Hunter, Bowhunter and Trapper Education program is made possible by a group of dedicated volunteer instructors that collectively teach hundreds of classes each year around the state. In west-central Montana, over 100 volunteer instructors teach approximately 1,000 students annually, and some instructors have spent decades with the program.Two instructors, Dave Tweet of Missoula and Gordon Pierson of Deer Lodge, were recognized for 40 years of service in the Hunter Education program. John Benda...
PHOTOS: Superior T-ball sluggers
PHOTOS: Superior T-ball sluggers Sometimes doing the robot helps you make it to second base. Henry Crabb on the Blue Team for Superior's T-Ball throws in the some style Thursday night at Timberman Park. (Mineral Independent/Amy Quinlivan) Who's running to third, Gavin Steele is heading for home, and I don't know what the third baseman is digging in the dirt for. T-ball can be quite a riot! (Mineral Independent/Amy Quinlivan)
Community calendar
Mineral County Chamber of Commerce meetings are the first Wednesday of the month at 5:30 p.m. and are open to the public with encouragement of businesses to participate. The next one is May 1. Info 406-370-5915.Mineral County Transportation. Mineral County residents can schedule rides to Missoula or medical runs inside Mineral County with the Pioneer Council. (406) 552-7003.Sanders County Transportation. Serving Sanders County residents. Call 406-741-2346 or go to www.rideSCT.com to schedule.Plains Community Food Bank hours are Tuesdays 10 a.m. - 1 p.m. 300 Clayton St. Plains.VFW Auxiliary in Plains hosts a veterans lunch every third Thursday of the month...
St. Regis star John Pruitt signs with Rocky
One of the greatest challenges facing small town athletes who aspire to move on and continue their sports careers in college is that the small number of students at many B and C schools do not typically produce college-level competitors.Or so they think.And St. Regis High could easily claim to be the leaders of the pack in producing quality where quantity is lacking.The latest example is the signing this past week of St. Regis all-around athlete John Pruitt to a scholarship and a spot on their “developmental” team, aka JV.Widely regarded as one of the best players in the area,...
COLUMN: Choosing sides
Life, they say, is all about choices.Go down one road and its smooth sailing.Embark on a journey down the other fork in the highway, the one filled with unknowns, and it can be like a ride down Grand Avenue in Billings, a major thoroughfare that no doubt resembles Swiss cheese when viewed from above thanks to a plethora of potholes.Not Chuck holes. Potholes.And like all things seem to be, choosing the right road is often a day-to-day, always-changing gamble. If I pick Johnny for my school yard basketball team, will he be dead eye Johnny, the kid who never misses...
Plains girls finish 3rd at ARM track meet
Host Whitefish swept the men’s and women’s team titles at last weekend’s ARM track meet, while the Plains women continued their impressive run in the women’s title chase.Whitefish won the boys team crown with 126 total points, easily outdistancing second place Bigfork, which amassed 98 points. The Whitefish women compiled 167.5 points, well ahead of runner-up Columbia Falls.The Plains women, meanwhile, led by another double weight event sweep by junior Alexis Demmng, placed third in the women’s team standings with 62 points, many of them via Demming’s first place showing in both the discus and shot put.Demming is the defending...
Plains’ Alexis Demming competes at 'Top 10'
It is billed annually as the “Top 10” track and field meet, a measuring stick event featuring the top 10 performers from throughout Western Montana in track and field events.And while the meet is typically dominated by Class AA and A schools, athletes from small Montana high schools have an opportunity to shine against the best in the state regardless of class.And for local standout track and field athletes like Plains’ Alexis Demming, there are no doubt some extra eyes on a handful of Class B and C standouts this year.Demming, the defending state girl’s discus champion from last year,...
Baseball co-op Red Devils fall to Ronan, Frenchtown
It was an overcast, chilly day in the Northwest corner of Montana...perfect weather for baseball?Depends on your point of view.But with rain wreaking havoc on spring sports schedules in the first half of the 2024 season, getting a game or event in is a victory in its own right.Nonetheless, while the rain held off, the new kids on the block got in some innings and experience, two things the new varsity baseball players from the Noxon-Thompson Falls co-op team need more of.Tuesday the Red Devils traveled to Ronan for a make-up game that was canceled earlier this month and fell...
Tigers golfers win on home course
Apparently, St. Regis golfers like home cooking.The Tigers boys blistered the Trestle Creek Golf Course on the edge of town for a 345 team total over the 18-hole layout to clinch the team title by a wide margin over runner up Thompson Falls, 345-397.With senior Jack Connolly leading the way with a 79, the Tigers pulled away from T Falls on a cool, windy day that eventually gave way to bright Montana sunshine.Meanwhile, in the girls’ competition, Thompson Falls carded a team score of 464 to best three other schools with enough golfers to qualify for the team chase. Second...
Mixed results for Superior tennis team
It was a mixed bag for the Superior tennis team this past week.Not so much in results as the Lady Bobcats kept dispatching the majority of players they faced in Philipsburg and Mission last week.But the makeup of the teams they played and mostly defeated consisted of girl and boy players from both of those schools.With not enough players available for a legitimate high school tennis match, Mission and Philipsburg recruited some male student players to fill in their depleted ranks.Mother Nature finally stepped in and halted the match with a Superior duo ahead in the last doubles match before...
Thompson Falls-Noxon co-op softball team wins four straight
Momentum with post season play on the horizon is always a good thing.That being said, the Thompson Falls-Noxon co-op softball team has a good thing going.Assuming they beat Whitefish on Monday afternoon, the red hot Lady Hawks will have reeled off five lopsided wins in a row, with four games left in the regular season.A four-game sweep this past week of Troy, Bonners Ferry, Idaho, Anaconda and Deer Lodge, along with a likely road win over Whitefish, and the Lady Hawks will be rolling along with an 11-3 season record.They completed the week’s “quad-win” this past Saturday, dodging heavy rain...
St. Regis senior Connolly earns Gaylord Green Scholarship
Gaylord Green lived in Haugan and graduated from St. Regis High School in 1958. He received an appointment to the Air Force Academy where he graduated with a degree in engineering science, followed by a master’s in aeronautics/astronautics at Stanford. He had a successful career in the Air Force. Green had a major role in ending the Cold War and he is credited with inventing the Global Positioning System (GPS). “I received no money from that [creating the GPS] other than my Air Force salary as those were my Air Force assignments,” he humbly shared. “After my Air Force retirement, I made...
Copperheads take one from Trotters
The unofficial score: Anaconda 1, Plains 0, Mother Nature, 1-1.And in the end, Ma Nature was the big “winner” Saturday as Anaconda’s Lady Copperheads came to town and scored a 19-4 win over Plains. A second scheduled game, against Deer Lodge, was rained out by the nature lady as heavy, off-and-on showers swept through the Plains area.Anaconda broke loose for six runs in the top of the first inning at Plains field. The Lady Copperheads pounded out five hits in the first inning in their opening turn at the plate.However, Plains came back in the bottom of the first with...
Mineral County Sheriff's Office report
911 HANGUP OR OPEN LINE 4ABANDONED VEHICLE 1ANIMAL ABUSE 1GENERAL ANIMAL CALL OR COMPLAINT 3ANIMAL OTHER 1ASSIST OTHER AGENCY 2ASSIST MOTORIST/CITIZEN 8BODY FOUND/CORONER 1BUSINESS CONTACT 38DRUGS/NARCOTICS 1EMS 4EXTRA PATROL 2FIRE 2FOLLOW UP 2HARASSMENT/ PRIVACY IN COMMUNICATION 1INFORMATIONAL 16INTIMIDATION/HARASSMENT 1MOTOR VEHICLE CRASH 4OFFICER ADVICE 2PROPERTY LOST 1ROAD HAZARD, DEBRIS ON ROAD 4SEXUAL ASSAULT 1SUICIDE ATTEMPTS/THREATS 2SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY 6TCMPL P TRAFFIC COMPLAINT 5THEFT P THEFT 2TRANSP P INMATE TRANSPORT 2TRAFFIC STOP 12VIN INSPECTION 3REQUEST FOR WELFARE CHECK 2WELFARE CHECK 1
Donald Trump Jr. rallies Republican support for Montana candidates
Former president Donald Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., rallied on Sunday for leading Republican candidates in Montana, urging support for a conservative agenda that he said will help win races up and down ballots in November.The “Protecting Freedom” event was hosted by the recently formed Montana Association of Conservatives, or MAC-PAC, and featured speeches from U.S. Senate hopeful Tim Sheehy, U.S. Representative Ryan Zinke, Gov. Greg Gianforte and conservative political commentator Alex Bruesewitz.Speaking to a crowd of roughly 300 people at the University of Montana, the speakers criticized the Biden administration, Democrats in Congress, Montana Democratic U.S. Senator Jon...
Glacier National Park plows less than a mile from Logan Pass
Glacier National Park Going-to-the-Sun Road snowplow crews are knocking on the door of Logan Pass. This week they reached the point just below Rim Rocks on the west side and plan to start plowing that area on Monday.Rim Rocks is just under a mile from Logan Pass. Snow depths were between 2 and 10 feet.On the east side the crew worked from Jackson Glacier Overlook to Siyeh Bend and will be moving beyond Siyeh Bend next week, the Park Service said.The hiker-biker closure on the east side is at the Grizzly pullout when crews are not working.The hiker-biker closure on the west side is Road Camp when crews aren’t working.Crews typically don’t work on the weekends. The closure points can change depending on conditions. Folks can text GNPROADS to 333111 to get the latest updates.Folks can drive the Sun Road as far as Lake McDonald Lodge on the west side and Rising Sun on the east side. The Many Glacier, Camas, and Chief Mountain roads are all open to vehicles.
Energy Keepers offers weekly “Range of Forecast”
Energy Keepers Inc., the owner and operator of Salish Ksanka Qlispe (SKQ) Dam, began posting a new graphic last week that shows the possible lake level ranges this summer.According to a press release, the Range of Forecast Graphic will be updated every Monday afternoon through the spring and summer on the Energy Keepers website, www.energykeepersinc.com, and Facebook page.“What will happen with lake levels is a question on the minds of everyone in the Flathead Lake community. There’s an ample amount of incorrect information going around so in an effort to keep the public apprised of the ever-changing conditions we are...
Bruce Moats: An introduction
“The boy is finally home.”That is what my nephew wrote in a text when my wife, son and I moved back to my childhood home, Superior, a few months ago.I graduated from Superior High School in 1974. My family operated a small ranch just east of town. My father, Lee Moats, died that year of a heart attack at the young age of 51. One of my eight brothers (I have one sister) continued to operate the ranch for a while, but now there are just a couple of horses in the fields. “Town” has steadily grown out to our...
Trotters softball shows fight against Eureka
Despite what the scoreboard read at the end of the game, this was maybe the sign the Plains Trotters softball team has been waiting for.The young Trotters, who have yet to win a game this year, battled to the end with 7B conference partner Eureka before finally falling 24-7.But the real story may have been how the Trotters came back, avoiding another Mercy Rule shortened game until the last out of the fifth inning.In doing so, they thwarted the Lady Lions' attempt to close them out after three innings.It can be viewed as a hopeful sign.That youth extends to the...
Plains and T-Falls athletes shine at local track meet
This may as well have been a preview of next month’s Montana high school track and field postseason as a pair of local teams strutted their stuff at the Thompson Falls Invitational meet this past Tuesday.Host Thompson Falls and Sanders County rival Plains basically went toe-to-toe in the team competitions, with both schools showing individual and team depth up and down the line-up.T Falls won the women’s team title by four points, 86-82 over the Plains Trotters, while the Plains mens’ team finished third with 64 points and T Falls guys finished fifth with 53.Troy won the men’s team title...
Valley Press - Mineral Independent
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We are the local newspapers for Sanders & Mineral Counties in Montana. The Clark Fork Valley Press is published in Plains, and the Mineral Independent is based in Superior. Both papers are published weekly on Wednesdays. Our office (at 105 W. Lynch St., Plains MT 59859) is open Mon. - Fri. 8 a.m. - 5 p.m.
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