The Hemphill County Library is proud to announce that two more of their young patrons have read 1,000 books before kindergarten! Emerson Hunter (at left), daughter of Ryan and Rosebelle Hunter, and Konner Yarnold (at right), daughter of Kade and Meredith Yarnold, have both completed the ‘1,000 Books Before Kindergarten’ program. ‘1,000 Books Before Kindergarten’ is an early literacy program hosted by the library. The program is designed to promote reading in young children. With each reading level a child completes, they are able to move their star up the leaderboard and receive a prize from the treasure box.“Sharing books and stories is important to your child’s brain development,” said April Dillon, Hemphill County library director. “Studies show that children who are read to at an early age have a bigger vocabulary when they enter school, and are more successful in school.” Congratulations to both of these young readers!

It is a well-known fact that we are allowed to chew out the people we care about. Most recently, this came to mind when I gave my old friend, Andrew, a serious tongue-lashing.

The Eyes of Texas is officially in the Twilight Zone. The University of Texas’ controversial school song is in trouble again. Two weeks ago, UT announced that the Longhorn Band is required to play the alma mater. “Oh, no we won’t,” said band members. The solution is a new band to be formed in 2022 that will not be required to play the school song.

Hemphill County commissioners awarded the contract for construction of a new emergency radio communication tower here to Amarillo’s CommTech LLC, for the low bid of $107,373. Eight bids were received—ranging as high as $170,325—from companies in locations ranging from Florida to Indiana, and from Kentucky to Iowa.