Jenkins board targets teacher



The Jenkins Independent Schools Board of Education is taking legal action to recover salary and other money wrongfully spent for or by a school district employee the board declined to identify. Board Chairman Durward Narramore Jr. said the board’s action, approved unanimously at its April meeting this week, is the result of a report issued by the Office of Educational […]

Fallen Letcher sheriff, two deputies honored



Ann Estep held a photograph of her late father, former Letcher County Sheriff Raymond "Tip" Warf, while standing in front of the Kentucky Law Enforcement Memorial in Richmond on Monday. (Photo by Joseph Estep) A former Letcher County sheriff and two deputy sheriffs who died in the line of duty were among 28 fallen police officers whose names were added […]

Boys’ coach is dismissed from duties



Raymond Justice has been dismissed as boys’ basketball coach at Letcher County Central High School despite winning the 53rd District championship and advancing to the semifinals of the 14th Regional Tournament the last two seasons. Letcher Schools Superintendent Anna Craft declined to comment on her reason for firing Justice from his coaching duties, but did say he will remain as […]

Man sought in stabbing



Police are looking for a 25-yearold Blackey man accused of stabbing a 32-year-old Blackey man several times on a mountaintop mining site on April 25. Kentucky State Police said Dustin K. Caudill, of 673 Carbon Glow Road, and Robert Michael Joseph Arredondo were fighting on a mining site off of Carbon Glow Road when Caudill pulled out a knife and […]

Political Cartoon



RIP to a GOP



The Republicans don’t want him. The Democrats do. They would have booted him out. We’ll do everything we can to support his re-election. It’s a tough day when you leave your party, but being a hero certainly beats being reviled. The truth is that by the time he left the Republican Party, Arlen Specter was a man without a Party. […]

For Specter, full circle



WASHINGTON When Arlen Specter ran for Philadelphia district attorney in 1965, he proudly proclaimed himself a “Kennedy Democrat,” and said he was running as a Republican to take on what he saw as the corruption of the city’s then-legendary Democratic machine. Forty-four years later, Arlen Specter has come full circle. In announcing his switch to the Democratic Party on Tuesday, […]

Do ‘dryland fish’ have an ideology?



A person with a job like mine gets lots of mail, but perhaps the most bizarre piece to hit the box in some time was sent by Sen. Jim DeMint, the hard-right Republican from South Carolina. It’s a nine-page, single-spaced solicitation for one of his favorite groups, the Washington-based Leadership Institute, which trains young conservatives and operates a Student Publications […]

Throwing out Utah stereotypes



SALT LAKE CITY American flags and lush spring grass lined the long drive of a Mormon meetinghouse here in the desert capital of Utah. Television trucks parking outside. Utahans were gathering last week for the funeral of Bill Orton, a Democrat who had represented an especially conservative congressional district in this most Republican state for three terms. Orton’s unlikely career […]

The way we were

Clips from Mountain Eagle front pages over the past 50 years

April 30, 1959 Two thousand members of the Kentucky National Guard remained on duty in Letcher and Perry counties today, as violence continued to mark the six-week-old coal strike. The latest reported incident was a dynamite explosion at a tipple at Ulvah owned by Paul Tayloe of Perry County. The explosion occurred about midnight Wednesday. Wednesday morning, shots were fired […]