Its a pretty safe bet that Barn Swallows have always had a place on the front and back porches of the Dinsmore Homestead in Boone County. Built in 1842 by patriarch James Dinsmore, family members and more recently, employees of the homestead have been cohabitating with the swallows for 170 years now.

The Barn Swallows were obviously special to the Dinsmores, said Cathy Callopy, education coordinator for the Dinsmore Homestead. Julia Dinsmore (daughter of James) loved nature and all of the girls spent a lot of time outdoors and paid attention to nature. The back porch, also referred to as the back gallery, was really just another room in the house.

The swallows were so meaningful to Julias niece Patty Flandrau, whom Julia raised, that Patty painted five of them on her bedroom wall. In a letter dated Nov. 14, 1882, Julia wrote Pattys sister Sally Flandrau: Patty has been trying her hand at decorative art there swoops a flight of swallows five in all and named for all of you children according to age. By lamplight they are very pretty. You and Patty are the only ones with the bill turned towards each other and though I dont believe swallows coo, it makes you look affectionate and glad to see each other. The swallows tell me life is short but love is long

Those same swallows, still that original artwork, adorn Pattys bedroom wall to this day at the Dinsmore Homestead.

Easily identified by their deeply forked tail feathers, Barn Swallows are the most widespread swallow species in the world. They breed throughout the Northern Hemisphere and winter across the Southern Hemisphere. Before man-made structures became common, they nested on cliff faces or in caves. Now however, they live hand in hand with humans, nesting in barns, stables, under bridges and, as at the Dinsmore Homestead, on porches small and large.

Humans have always thought highly of Barn Swallows. They are voracious insectivores and a joy to watch. Famed naturalist and artist John James Audubon wrote, In the spring the Barn Swallow is welcomed by all and is looked upon as the harbinger of summer. As she never commits depredations on anything that men consider as their own, everybody loves her, and, as the child was taught by his parents, so the man teaches his offspring, to cherish her.

Gayle Pille is a Burlington resident. Visit the Dinsmore Homestead to see Barn Swallows inside the homestead and outside. The homestead is open every Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. with tours hourly through 4 p.m.

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Column: Barn Swallows part of Dinsmore Homestead

The Philipsburg-Osceola Summer Band marches through Osceola Mills during the Columbia Fire Company's annual Fourth of July parade. Lori Falce

Osceola Mills dripped with patriotism and tradition on Wednesday.

The porches, the children, the firetrucks, even the folding chairs looked like they had been hosed down with red, white and blue for the annual Columbia Fire Company Fire-mens Parade, a Fourth of July celebration 90 years in the making. Todd Jeffries, of Philipsburg, has been pulling up a chair for the festivities for 60 years.

Its a wholesome fun time for the whole community, he said. And family is always a part of that, as he pulled up chairs beside three generations of his clan.

The Calon family, of State College, found its way back to an old holiday haunt. Megan and Paul and their kids, Natalie, 10, Hannah, 8, Blake, 5, and Abbey, 6 months, had never been to the festivities, but Megans mother, Kathy Cady, of Chester Hill, has been coming all her life. Mother, daughter and grandkids gathered on Lingle Street to relive old memories and make new ones.

This is our first time. Its great for families, said Megan Calon.

Families were everywhere. From proud grandmas like Betsy Mignot, of Osceola Mills, showing of her brood of patriotic beauties (Sian, 9, Jada, 8, and Sage, 5) at their usual spot in front of the United Methodist church, to indulgent parents willing to brave a household sugar high after their kids collected bags full of Tootsie Rolls and root beer barrels. Noah Anderson, 7, was quite clear that the candy was what brought him to the parade with sisters Leigha and Annabeth and dad Chris, of Smithmill, was just as clear: I want to see the look on their faces, he said.

For some, however, the passing marching bands and floats were incidental. The real tradition was sharing the good time with friends.

I drove 584 miles from Knoxville, Tenn., for this, said Michael Turner as he held court on Curtin Street. His old friends knew just where to find him, the same place hes been every year since he stopped marching in the parade in high school.

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Holiday tradition runs deep in Osceola Mills

Mike Madel hasn't stopped moving since the grizzlies woke up. They're getting onto porches and into bird seed and cattle feed. The bears have been pushing east out of the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem for years. But Madel, Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks' bear management specialist in Choteau, hasn't seen this many human-griz conflicts in more than two decades. "We're repeating the types of conflicts we experienced in the mid '80s," he says. "We had lots of sheep depredation and beehive damage early on. Now, it's porches, human food and livestock food."

Madel thinks the bears are showing up and getting in trouble at least in part due to a mild winter with a low level of livestock deaths along the Rocky Mountain Front. Without those early carcasses to feed on, he says, dispersing sub-adult males began traveling east much earlier. This spring, Madel captured a male preying on calves on the east side of the Continental Divide. The bear had become habituated to the food source; only after the agency euthanized it did they realize the bear had made his way over all the way from the Blackfoot River.

Even sows have proven unusually problematic this year. Last month, a four-year-old female griz caused the deaths of roughly 70 sheep on three Great Falls area ranches in a two-week span. FWP trapped the female, who was in poor shape, along with her cub and relocated the two to northwestern Montana in accordance with interagency grizzly management guidelines.

The sow was an extreme case, Madel says. She was one of the youngest sows with a cub on Montana record, and she was likely stressed as a result.

Females have been establishing home ranges beyond the mountains for years, infringing on agricultural land and teaching their offspring how to live outside state and federally owned tracts. In fact, grizzlies are spending much more time on the high plains these days as they begin to repopulate their native habitat. It's this development that has FWP and other agencies switching focus to areas outside the grizzlies' recovery zone, and working to strengthen the level of acceptance for bears they've been fostering along the Front for decades.

"The pulse this year is something we could see year after year after year now," Madel says. "And we may have to become more creative about how we handle grizzlies on private property."

Link:
Grizzly bears take to Montana's plains

LEWISTON Firefighters worked for hours Tuesday to put out a fire that involved three buildings in the area of the city known as Little Canada.

The fire involved a 12-unit, four-story apartment building at 32-34 River St., a 1-story, single-family structure next door at 46 River St., and a third building that also appeared to house apartments.

Police said no injuries were reported. One firefighter was treated for heat exhaustion and then released.

By late Tuesday, no cause had been determined, fire investigator Paul Ouellette said. He said he did not know how many people had been displaced.

The fire broke out shortly before 11 a.m. By 2 p.m., firefighters were focused on the four-story building whose roof had collapsed. Flames continued to appear at the roofline and hidden hot spots under the debris continued to smolder.

Fire Chief Paul LeClair said at 2 p.m. that fire investigators from his department and six investigators from the state fire marshals office were on scene and planned to complete investigations into the cause and area of origin of the fire once the buildings were safe. At that time, officials would determine whether any of the buildings would have to be demolished. The four-story building was heavily damaged, he said.

He said firefighters worked hard to keep the fire from spreading to neighboring buildings.

Crews likely would monitor the buildings overnight, he said.

At 2:30 p.m., radio traffic indicated firefighters were entering 32-34 River St. They checked all of the floors, going from apartment to apartment. They recovered valuables of the tenants and several pets that survived the ordeal.

By 3:30 p.m., crews began to clean up the scene, rolling up hoses and clearing debris from the streets and sidewalk. The fire was declared to be out just before 5:30 p.m.

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Fire in Lewiston’s Little Canada burns three buildings, displaces tenants

Patti Slobogin drove slowly so that her mother could take in all the changes to the neighborhood she hadnt seen in more than 75 years.

Some things had changed--others hadnt. But to just be there againto see the porches where she would sleep on warm summer nights--was enough for 88-year-old Becky Slobogin, who grew up in The Deserted Village, in the heart of Union Countys 2,000-acre Watchung Reservation.

Slobogin is the oldest person known to have lived in the small enclave, once known as Feltville, a small mill community founded by David Felt in 1845. So when County parks officials learned that she wanted to visit, they were thrilled.

"It was wonderful to hear Mrs. Slobogin's recollections of her childhood in the Deserted Village," said Union County Freeholder Bette Jane Kowalski, who met Slobogin and her family at the Deserted Village's restored church/general store.

"She came a long way -- in distance and in time -- to share her memories with us," Kowalski said, noting that Slobogin, her daughter, and granddaughter, Cassie Spodak, drove all the way from Ossining, N.Y.

"She is a living link to a past that few people remember, and we are very grateful to her for taking the trouble to come and visit us," Kowalski said.

Slobogin, who was five years-old when her family moved to The Deserted Village in 1928, was interviewed by Daniel Bernier, who oversees historic settlement as part of his responsibilities with the Union County Parks department. The interview was videotaped and will become part of the growing online archive about The Deserted Village on the Countys website, ucnj.org/desertedvillage.

(Anyone wishing to participate in the oral history project can send an email to dv@ucnj.org or call 908-789-3682.)

After the interview, Bernier led a tour of the village. While Slobogins home was destroyed in a fire in the 1950s, just to finally return and see her childhood neighborhood brought her close to tears.

While she would later live all over the world because her husband was with the CIA, Slobogins greatest wish in recent years, her daughter said, was to see the Deserted Village again.

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The Deserted Village: In the heart of Watchung Reservation

ERIC CONOVER/Staff Photographer Richard Wech, Hazleton code enforcement officer, inspects a home on Vine Street, Hazleton, on Monday as he and other city officials start to enforce quality-of-life offenses. Three tickets were written for trash, an old vehicle on the property and indoor furniture on the porch.

Hazleton Code Officers Richard Wech and Mary Ann Thomas began walking on Vine Street, looking at yards and porches for weeds, garbage and other violations of city ordinances Monday morning.

At one house, they found two tires by a front door. In a lot next to a vacant house, weeds grew knee high.

On another lot, Thomas placed a ruler next to a clump of weeds. They were taller than the 10-inch limit, so the owner was fined $25.

The code officers, helped by health officers and firefighters, swept through Hazleton while inspecting properties as part of a campaign to maintain the city's quality of life. In addition to Vine Street, they checked center city, the Heights and Terrace sections and the Beech Street neighborhood. They plan to continue inspections during the week.

Following a checklist, the inspectors looked for weeds, vehicles, trash, indoor furniture or appliances placed outdoors and 15 other possible violations including unlicensed food carts, littering and improper storage of recyclables or hazardous waste.

While inspectors have inspected properties during other summers, this week's patrol is different because owners get tickets without being warned.

The effort was publicized previously in the Standard-Speaker; a Spanish newspaper, Molinegocios USA Inc.; and on local television news programs, yet the lack of warning upset residents when inspectors handed them tickets.

Diana Anciburo said she pays attention to raising children, not watching the news. Plus she was out of town during the weekend when some of the stories were published.

"Why don't they give a warning?" Anciburo said after Wech handed her three tickets - one each for a vehicle with expired registration, for trash in the backyard and for indoor furniture on the front porch - totaling $75.

More here:
Code officers issue citations as part of new city initiative

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LaVerne Donato shows the smashed windshield of her car on Monday at the Winston Garden senior apartments in Oroville. (Mary Weston/Staff Photo)

LaVerne Donato, 71, said somebody smashed the windshield on her minivan and the windows on several other vehicles.

Monday, a man walking down the street said the vandals had smashed the windows on a friend's car down the street.

Other residents had items stolen off of their porches.

Donato said it's an ongoing problem that starts in the spring and continues through the year, with people driving in pickups and loading up the senior's plants and yard decorations and vandalizing their cars.

She said there are known gang residences on a street north of the apartments and at a large apartment complex to the south of the senior housing.

"They are at war with each other, and we are in the middle of it," she said.

She said the gang members from both sides run through the apartment complex and jump over the fence to get to each other. They also congregate in Play Town USA Park on Fifth Avenue.

Her car has been vandalized three times in the last year, and residents have had many items stolen from their yards, she said.

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Seniors upset about raids by vandals in Oroville

HUNTINGTON -- People across the South Side of Huntington were finding out Friday night and Saturday morning that their front porches can be a cool place.

High winds and a thunderstorm Friday evening knocked out power to thousands of homes in the Tri-State, leaving people without air conditioning on days when the temperatures reached the triple digits and heat advisories were issued.

"Before the thunderstorm hit, the power went out," said Nam Phan of 9261/2 9th St. "It was miserable."

He and a neighbor, Stephanie Walker of 925 9th Ave., were cooling their heels on their shaded front porch Saturday morning wondering when the power would be restored.

"I'm going to have to empty out my freezer and grill out," Walker said. "We opened the windows. There was a breeze coming through. We got the candles and the flashlights."

She and her 4-year-old son, Willie, took a cool bath Friday night. "It got us through. I would have been in a panic if we didn't have water."

"I took a bath," Willie Walker said. "We had three flashlights and two candles."

Earlier he saw a tree crush a car.

His mom was planning to get the sprinkler out to keep Willie cool later in the day.

Trees, large limbs and downed power lines were a common sight around Huntington Saturday.

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Powerless residents improvise to get cool

Before the sun rises, Brian Gay of Mendon is at work loading his truck and quietly placing milk in metal drop boxes or coolers left in people's driveways or doorsteps, back porches or garages.

I'm kind of a dinosaur, Mr. Gay, 48, said.

Mr. Gay, owner of Maple Farm Dairy, is a milkman, one of a few left around who deliver milk in glass or plastic bottles to homes and businesses in vintage-style trucks.

You see my truck in the neighborhood, it's there for only one reason. When you see that truck, you know what it is doing, Mr. Gay said, adding that he still delivers glass-bottle milk from Monroe Dairy in Providence, and plastic-bottle milk from Oakhurst Dairy in Connecticut.

Mr. Gay took over the delivery business from his uncle when he was 18 years old, delivering milk out of the back of his Chevy van to 120 customers. Mr. Gay's Mendon company does not run a dairy.

Today, Maple Farm Dairy delivers to about 1,000 customers in more than 20 communities, as far out as Norfolk and Wrentham. However, Mr. Gay, like other milkmen, has had to deliver more than milk to stay in business.

I've got a whole grocery store in that truck. You just can't make it on milk and eggs alone anymore, Mr. Gay said, adding that the Maple Farm Dairy trucks carry juices, baked goods, breads, frozen vegetables, butter, cheese, coffee and yogurt .

Gibson's Village Dairy Farm on Sunderland Road in Worcester has been delivering milk to area homes since 1923 and continues to do so now as Gibson's enters the family's fourth generation of ownership.

When my grandfather started this dairy there were 52 dairies doing home delivery in Worcester, Francis Gibson said. Mr. Gibson works with his brother Glenn, and the fourth generation his daughter Sarah Gibson and nephew Glenn Gibson Jr.

Mr. Gibson said his daughter and partner Allison Smith rescued the home-delivery service by incorporating local organic products, adding that Gibson's largest customer base today is young families who are dedicated to the buy local movement.

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Got milk?

This time of year when temperatures flirt with or conquer 100 degrees every day the inevitable question is: How on earth did people survive before air conditioning?

The idea of spending a day or night in an non-airconditioned house seems unimaginable. The most obvious answer is that because few people had any form of artificial air conditioning in their homes before the 1950s, they had no idea what they were missing and simply toughed it out.

That's partly true, but not entirely. In fact, homes built in pre-air conditioning days were made to be livable without air conditioning. Many newer homes are not.

A drive through older parts of Wichita Falls will show you. Note that the homes built before the advent of any form of air conditioning tend to have tall roofs and spacious attics. Those attics weren't added just to store Grandma's old cedar chest, but to create a buffer between the blazing sun and the living areas of the house. Back then, most people just stayed out of the upstairs bedrooms during the heat of the day, opting to stay on the lower floors where it was a tad cooler. Many homes had tall ceilings so the heat could follow its natural tendency to rise above where people were.

Pre- air conditioning homes were also pre-Sheetrock homes. Brick and stone homes were really brick and stone not veneer. Wooden homes consisted of plaster and lath walls. Even prehistoric people knew caves were cool in the summer. Our more recent ancestors knew the insulation value of bringing cave-like walls above the ground.

Houses back then had lots of windows that would actually open and close. They were positioned so that opening one on one wall and another on another wall would pull a draft of air through the room. Likewise, the front doors were often lined up with the back doors so drafts through the screen doors would waft through the length of the house.

Then there's the front porch that nostalgic relic of yesteryear. In pre-television and computer days, people actually did sit on the porch in the relative cool of the evening and socialize with neighbors. In some older Wichita Falls neighborhoods you'll find the front porches closed in. That happened with the coming of air conditioning and TV. A back porch screened off from mosquitoes was an excellent alternative bedroom on those especially brutal nights.

Porches front, back and side had another purpose: they shaded the house from the sun. Trees, bushes and vines offered the same insulation. It's doubtful the earliest trees here were planted for their ornamental value.

Was it as comfy cool as our modern air-conditioned homes?

Absolutely not. But it was bearable.

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Walker: Before we became cool, we had porches