In advance of Monday night’s Kenai school board meeting, the chief of staff to Kenai Borough Mayor Charlie Pierce says it’s time for the Kenai School District to let students back in the classrooms.
In an open letter to the district school board, James Baisden wrote, “It’s time you give parents the choice to have our children back in the classroom with their teachers. Your decisions to keep schools closed is having a much worse effect on our kids and family then the virus ever will. Opening the Kenai Peninsula Schools to all grades is the most essential and life saving thing the School Board can do now.”
Baisden said the school board is harming children by keeping them out of schools.
“If big box stores and government can still operate daily because they have been deemed essential, so can the school district,” James Baisden said.
If a parent feels it’s not safe for their child to be in school, they can have the choice of keeping their child at home, and can continue remote learning online, he argued.
“Please don’t say help is on the way or coming soon, and you’re waiting on a vaccine. A vaccine is not going to have much positive effect in the near future, because 50% of the population will refuse to take it, including your educators,” Baisden wrote.
“As a retired emergency responder, I have seen the family situations that a lot of our children live in daily. Loving, caring teachers is the most positive thing these kids have in their daily life, and they need teachers back in their life now!” Baisden said, adding that the metric the School Board is using is not working, “and we will never open up the District under this system.
“The vast majority of parents that I’m in contact with want their children back in school now. These parents believe the School District is having a more negative effect on their children than the virus,” he wrote. Baisden and his wife have three children in the Kenai Peninsula public schools.
How to watch the Kenai Peninsula Board of Education meeting online:
The Kenai Peninsula School Board is meeting tonight at 6 pm on livestream.
Zoom ID: 708 024 188
Telephone #: (877) 853-5257 Conference ID: 708 024 188 When prompted for an Attendee ID, press #.
In addition, the meeting will be broadcast live on the district website. https://www.kpbsd.k12.ak.us/
Today we pause to remember the “Day of Infamy” that plunged this nation into war.
Japan, early on Sunday, Dec. 7, 1941, without warning attacked the United States at the American Navy base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. President Franklin D. Roosevelt the next day stood before Congress and described Dec. 7, 1941, as “a date which will live in infamy.” Across history, the attack has.
Veterans of that battle and the others that followed are elderly men nowadays, their numbers fading. But the memory of their sacrifice should forever be a torch for future generations. These warriors, after all, paid with blood, sweat and tears for our freedom.
The Japanese attack on that day was fierce. Carrier-based warplanes sank five battleships, severely damaged three others anchored alongside, crippled or sank other ships of the U.S. fleet, and destroyed much of the nation’s Hawaii-based combat airplanes. The attack left 2,403 military and civilians dead – 1,177 from the USS Arizona alone.
Two Army Air Corps fighter planes got into the air to engage the Japanese attackers. One of those was flown by Ken Taylor, who survived several more combat missions during the war and who lived in Anchorage until his death in 2006.
Taylor accounted for four Japanese dive bombers on Dec. 7 and was injured. After his retirement from a long career of active Air Force service, Taylor headed the Alaska Air National Guard, a brigadier general whose wartime heroism is still hailed.
Four years later, World War II ended with victory over the Axis forces of Germany, Italy and Japan after bloody fighting in the North and South Pacific, in North Africa, in Europe, China, Burma and India. In the rebuilding that followed, nations once our enemies became our friends, allies and trade partners.
At Pearl Harbor, the attack of more than seven decades ago is remembered at the USS Arizona Memorial, erected over the sunken remains of one of the battleships shattered in those opening moments of America’s entry into World War II.
On this day, we salute the gallant men and women who fought for our freedom, a job that seemingly has no end.
Although Alaska is still a red state whose residents voted 53.1 percent for Donald Trump in 2020, it’s far down the list of the 25 states that had a majority vote for the president in November. (Trump carried the 49th state in 2016 with 51.28% of the vote.)
Presuming Georgia and Pennsylvania will be decided for the Democrats, we’ve come up with the list of where the 25 states ranked from “most red” to least. In terms of percentage voting for Trump, Alaska is fourth from the bottom of the red states, which will make it an easy target for Outside Democrat front groups in future election cycles.
(Note: This story was first published Dec. 7, 2019 and is being reprinted in honor of Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day, 2020.)
Earlier this week, Must Read Alaska asked readers to pause for a moment and call a relative or friend who is “getting up there” in years, and gather their account of their lives on Dec. 7, 1941, the day the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Readers delivered! Here are their eyewitness accounts to history that happened 78 years ago:
JOYCE PORTE, LIVING IN AFRICAON DEC. 7, 1941
I was just-turned five when I heard abut the bombing, a month after it happened, because we were living in Africa at the time. Our mail was delivered monthly from the nearest postal facility, by a runner with a packsack. My parents were missionaries along with about six others in a remote location. The mail was dumped on the floor and being sorted when someone picked up a letter and started to cry.
Soon everyone was bawling. Watching from the doorway, I wondered why someone would bomb a place where pearls were harvested. I was afraid they would come and confiscate my mother’s beautiful string of pearls.
I already knew about bombing because we lived in British territory and had instructions from the government abut what to do if bombing came our way from the North Africa Theater.
DPRINDA MAKANAONALANI NICHOLSON, HONOLULU
Pearl Harbor, Hawaii – My baby brother was asleep in his crib when the bombs started falling.
Meanwhile, in the front room, Mom twisted the wood knob on the big stand-up Philco radio to listen to KGMBʻs station whie she cooked breakast. She grabbed a roll of Portuguese sausage out of the icebox and sliced thick circles into the frying pan.
My dog, Hula Girl, thumped her tail, sniffed the air and hopped off my bed and trotted to the kitchen, with me right behind her. She gave Mom a pleading “feed me” look and waited, curled up next to the kerosene stove with her neck and muzzle across Momʻs barefoot toes.
“Hmm, the manuevers sound so real this morning,” Dad said as he filled his plate with two scoops of rice, eggs, and chunks of sausage.
Mom nodded, saying “the planes felt too darn close to the house and how unusual for the Army and Navy to practice drills on a Sunday morning,”
Thatʻs when the explosions ratted the plates and forks almost all the way off our yellow formica tabletop.
The roar of planes was too much for my Scots-Irish dad to ignore. He bolted up from the kitchen table and pushed past Mom. Sprinting to the screen door he shoved it open and raced down the front steps into the yard.
I was right behind him, squeezing through the door before it had a chance to bang shut.
We shielded our eyes from the low morning sun and looked up into orange-red circles painted on the wings of Japanese torpedo planes.
The planes were so low and loud, Dad had to shout, he was scared they would hit the top of our house.
One plane flew just barely above our treetops and tipped his wings. Since his overhead canopy was pushed back and open, I saw the pilotʻs face with round goggles anchored to his forehead.
The fighter plane slid quickly into its final descent and headed for unsuspecting American ships filled with sleeping sailors, just a few hundred yards from our house.
Our family hid in nearby sugar cane fields shielding ourselves from the attacking bombers. At dusk, I wanted to go home and see if Hula Girl, my poi-dog was okay. But martial law was in place, we were not going home, but being evacuated to a sugar plantation, where we slept in the community center on cold hard floors.
Blackouts began that night over all the islands, the only visible light escaping from the torches of burning oil and orange-red flames of crippled ships burning bright in the Harbor. One of the smoldering ships, was the West Virginia, collapsed on the mud floor of the harbor, ravaged by torpedos.
Surviving the sinking of the battleship, West Virginia, was 19-year-old Master Sergeant Richard Fiske, who had abandonded ship per Captain Bennionʻs orders.The face of the Japanese pilot haunted Richard that night and every night, and fueled his hatred of all things Japanese. He was pleased to be sent to fight on Iwo Jima.
Richard and I would meet decades later and remain friends forever because of the gift he gave me, his story. The story of how hatred can become frienship between bitter enemies, eventually. His friendship story was an example of how the Power of Love can overcome the Love of Power.
His veteranʻs story became the book, Pearl Harbor Warriors, The Bugler, The Pilot, The Friendship. After it was named to the Missouri Mark Twain book List, and the DVD, named best DVD by the American Library Association, I joined the Missouri Humanities Council Speakerʻs Bureau and shared WWII history across our state.
Years earlier, I came to Missouri to attend college and to meet my fatherʻs family for the firsst time. At college, I met a really cute guy from Missouri and settled here. Perhaps, because of the trauma of surviving a bombing at ground zero, is one reason I chose to earn a psychology degree.
That therapy license provided a day job to allow me to be continue to be an author of WWII history from primary resources, and as a speaker, especially in schools.
When speaking in schools, I love to ask students to guess which country am I from?
“I carried a gas mask wth me everywhere, I could not leave my house after dark, I carried invasion currency, my school playground had bomb shelters, I had air-raid drills at school, we painted our windows black so no light could show at night, there was a shortage of food, all mail was censored…….What country am I from?”
And after many guesses, I tell them this is their own American history and what happened in WWII, especially through the eyes of children. I then ask them to write their own stories.
I always end with the story of Richard Fiske and his eventual friendship with Japanese bomber pilot, Zenji Abe. Two former enemies becoming sincere friends and the example they are today in our lives, of overcoming hatred, bullying, and prejudice.
Tacoma, Washington – I was 6 years old Dec 7, 1941 and remember clearly being in the kitchen that Sunday morning as the radio interrupted normal broadcast with news of Japanese bombing PearlHarbor. My father, an electrical engineer had recently been hired by the new government owned aluminum smelter in my hometown of Tacoma, Washington. As the plant engineer he was quickly declared essential defense personnel so my brother and I had an at-home father throughout WW-II. We were privileged in that regard but rationing and low salaries motivated Dad to plant a big Victory garden so we ate pretty well.
I spent those years making balsa wood models of war planes and listening to after school radio programs for kids. Today at age 84 I look back on those days as good times. …. George Wuerch, LtCol, US Marines (retired) and former Mayor of Anchorage.
Mercedes Prescott (now Angerman, far right), her cousin Marlene Messinger (now Clark) in the middle, and friend, Alora Petticrew (Gunderson -left). Alora has passed but Mercedes and Marlene are still alive and well.
MERCEDES PRESCOTTANGERMAN, WRANGELL
Wrangell, Alaska: Born on December 7, 1937, my mother, Mercedes Prescott was 4 years old on that day. Living on Wrangell Island, where she still resides today, the news wasn’t as immediate; however, once it hit the town, it traveled fast. Although my mother doesn’t remember a lot of that specific day, she certainly vividly recalls the days that followed during the war.
One thing that is solid from her 4 year old mind, is the day her mother received a telegram. Her mother, Edith Prescott, worked for the weather service on the island. She received a telegram asking her to move to Hawaii to work. It traumatized her son, Mitchell, to the extent he hid the telegram in a small hole in the wall of the family home. The thought of her leaving terrified him. She ultimately didn’t accept the work offer in Hawaii. And many years later, the telegram was found in the wall during a remodel.
Her father, Ralph, served on the island as an Air Raid Warden after the Japanese bombed Dutch Harbor. When the sirens rang, he donned his hardhat and patrolled the streets. The siren signaled everyone on the island to turn off their lights and place blankets over windows to hide any internal fire/stove flickering.
My mother is currently here in Anchorage, visiting me so this is perfect timing for some reminiscing. She notes that everyone was patriotic during that time. Even the children would wear junior WACS and WAVES uniforms to school. The picture attached shows my mother, Mercedes Prescott (now Angerman, far right), her cousin Marlene Messinger (now Clark) in the middle, and friend, Alora Petticrew (Gunderson -left). Alora has passed but Mercedes and Marlene are still alive and well.
BOB TRIPP, JUNEAU
I am 81 years old and remember very distinctly what happened when we got the news. I was 6 days shy of my 4th birthday so I was a sentient human being on 7 December 1941.
The reason I distinctly remember the event is because of the impact on my parents that Sunday. My father was an Army captain and a USMA graduate class of 1933 stationed at West Point as a physics instructor to West Point cadets at that time. His roommate at the Point had graduated into the Coast Artillery branch of the service and was stationed in the Philippines on Corregidor.
By that time the winds of war had given every indication that if war with Japan broke out, the Philippines would be Japan’s first target. My parents agonized over what that meant. Predictably he was soon captured. We learned later that he survived the Bataan death march but not captivity.
His roommate had married my mother’s sister so in addition of being father’s cadet roommate and close friend he was also my uncle. Our two families were very close so December 7 was a traumatic day in our family.
In short order my father was sent overseas and my mother and I became war Gypsies traveling from relatives to relatives as we owned no home of our own. In those days, most military personnel did not own houses and lived in military housing.
BOB ADAMS, JUNEAU
Juneau, Alaska – As I was a 5-year-old, I don’t remember the actual attack, but living in Juneau I do remember vividly the “tar paper” on the windows, the “blackouts” when practice for an attack on Juneau would require all lights to be off. Also remember the Air Raid Wardens who stopped at each house to check on covered windows, and lights out during practice, etc.
DICK MACKEY, WASILLA
I was nine years old, listening to the “Shadow” on the radio that Sunday afternoon. The program stopped for a news headline that the Japs had bombed Pearl Harbor. I knew something was bad but did not realize the impact it really was on our country. I ran out to the back yard to tell my parents. The next morning my Dad was in line to sign up!
MARLYS BURNETT, BEND, OREGON
Bend, Oregon : Marlys was a 12-year-old child in Bend. Her father, Bob Prentice, was a minister at the Presbyterian church and he and his wife Doris were at the church for their pastoral duties on Dec. 7, 1941, a Sunday, while Marlys was sick at home.
At about noon, Marlys turned on the radio, tuned to the only station they had — KBND — and heard news of the attack crackle through the tubes. “I was laying in my bed and I was horrified. I was scared. When I heard my parents’ car pulling into the driveway, I leaned over the banister looking straight down the steps and shouted: ‘The Japanese have bombed Pearl Harbor!'” That’s how my parents heard the news.
“I didn’t say Japs — we were trained not to say things like that. Then the downstairs radio went on and we never left the radio that day. The president’s voice — I won’t forget when he came on the radio and said ‘We are at war.'”
“It drained our little town of all the young dads and lads overnight to create a big Army and Air Force. One of the members of the church — my father’s best friend and hunting buddy — signed up right away, and was killed in action, and so was my piano teacher’s son. The church was packed on Dec. 14, as people came to hear what my dad, the preacher, had to say.”
MELDONNA CODY
My mother, born in England, was 11. She spoke more about listening to Winston Churchill’s speeches on the radio, as well as spending time in bomb shelters, memories of food and other supply rationing, along with air raid sirens and blackouts.
British war humor was a resilient spinoff of coping with life in an active war zone. Contacting bomb squads to dig unexploded ordnance out of “gardens” (British for “back yard”) was part of day to day life.
She did not state any direct memories of the Pearl Harbor bombing. I suspect as an 11-year-old girl living in an active war zone, the U.S. news may not have been her prime interest.
My father is no longer with us, but he either never spoke of the Pearl Harbor attack, or I never paid attention. He was, during the war, one of those men who switched from the U.S. Army to the U.S. Air Force at its inception. He was, for a time, stationed at Hickham Field as a master sergeant working as a ground flight crew chief. He later was stationed in England where he and my mother were married then moved with the Air Force to the States, where Mom studied and took the test to become a legal U.S. citizen.
DAVE HARBOUR, ANCHORAGE
Dad and Mom, Col. and Mrs. Dave Harbour, share a peaceful space under a huge, 150-year-old tropical shade tree above Honolulu at Punchbowl National Cemetery of the Pacific. Their remains rest where their relationship began 71 years ago.
On December 6, 1941, my fighter pilot dad, then a second lieutenant in the Army Air Corps, had taken an English-Latin teacher, an Eastern Pennsylvania farm girl, out on a date. Everyone called her, “Bobbie”, though her given name was Selma.
While Mom and Dad were a little sketchy about the details, I do know that early Saturday morning, December 7, Dad had dropped Mom off at her place and was returning to his base when all hell broke loose.
He hurried to the airfield where his fighter and many others were already being strafed and bombed by Japanese Zeros.
Failing to get a plane in the air, he did the only thing he could, take cover and try to place round after round from his .45 semi-automatic pistol through metal and flesh of the alien aircraft as they made pass after pass over the airfield.
Mom and Dad shared special moments together in the hectic days following that day of infamy until he received orders shipping him out to New Guinea. There he would patrol the seaways to intercept, engage and destroy, enemy ships and planes.
Before Dad left, he and Mom were married. Dad then left Oahu for his new assignment and would get his start as a famous outdoor writer, later producing several books and writing hundreds of articles for outdoor publications like Sports Afield…and assisting in the foundation of the American Wild Turkey Federation. He got that start by learning to write action stories for ‘pulp war magazines’ during the unpredictable moments of tense leisure between combat missions in New Guinea.
The Army shipped Mom back to Coleman, Texas to stay with Dad’s folks until he was reassigned to the Continential United States (CONUS). I was born a Texan, about nine months after those perilous Pearl Harbor days–on September 4, 1942.
I think that one of the reasons Dad did so well in combat and in a distinguished Air Force career, was his motivation to protect the country for his new family.
I remember sharing that feeling when as a 2nd Lieutenant, I shipped off years later to Korea. The hugs and smiles Dad and Mom and I shared at that parting seemed to transmit from one generation to the next the love of God, country, and family and the determination to protect our way of life. And, what Mom and Dad’s generation protected has provided a wonderful way of life, cultivated in the fertile land of freedom.
On this day my reflection and prayer is that our children will inherit and keep the same freedom and way of life we inherited from our parents. When those in power have boldly stated they want to ‘fundamentally change the United States,’ it makes me cringe and wonder if I would feel as inclined to volunteer for military service now as I did in 1966. I knew what values I was protecting then. Today, I join many others in being somewhat confused and fearful as to what our country now stands for and is evolving into.
So, today I pray for clarity. I pray that our country’s values for this generation will be as worth protecting as they were when Dad and Mom faced the horror of war head on, and when I served.
I pray this moment for our Nation, knowing that the ONLY reason we have been enabled to succeed is that we have followed our founders’ respect for, devotion to and love of God, His Savior son and His guidance.
I pray for those now serving in uniform and those contemplating service.
I pray that we do not lose our love of God and and our Founders’ dream, lest we lose the values that have inspired generations of patriots, until now, to defend them with their lives and sacred honor.
Amen.
OLE JORDAN’S FAMILY, ANCHORAGE
My mom was in Anchorage during WWII, they were worried the Japanese were going to come marching down the streets of Anchorage.
They were in the Aleutians, the U.S. didn’t do anything for a while. My grandfather was a WWI vet, he was ready for them.
I will ask her about Pearl Harbor. My brother-in-law’s dad was at Pearl Harbor that day, and I listened to that story every time I saw that man. I think it was a PTSD thing, that day never left the front of his mind. All you had to do is say one of 100 trigger words. Of course, I listened to every word and asked a question or two.
He died about 10 years ago. I would not mind hearing the story another 200 times. He spent that day helping wounded near the hospital.
BILL QUANTICK
My sister-in-law’s mother was a young lady at the time of the attack living on Oahu, Hawaii in Kaneohe. The story she told me was that her and her father we’re working on the roof of their house and she heard and then noticed planes, not recognizing the the markings, when she asked her father who they were, all he did was to take the family to a safe location.
Editor’s note: Thank you to everyone who sent in their stories. If you didn’t get to it in time for the compilation, please add your own family memories and comments below.
Thomas C. Sullivan, the father of U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan, passed on Nov. 30, surrounded by loved ones. He was 83 years old.
Tom is survived by his children Frank (Barbara nee O’Rourke), Sean (Mary nee Conway), Tom, Jr. (Mary nee Frain), Dan (Julie nee Fate), Kathleen Sullivan (Blaise Dupuy) and Julie Sullivan (Bruce Shagvoc); his beloved brood of 16 aspiring grandchildren, Sully, George, Grace, James, Virginia, Joe, Margaret, Meghan, Audrey, Rose, Isabella, Ingrid, Laurel, Will, Rory, Grady and great-grandson Callahan; as well as his sisters Kaki O’Neill, Joan Livingston and Sue Jacobus. He was preceded in death by his sister Patricia Schreiner, brother Father Sean Sullivan and devoted wife of 59 years Sandra (nee Simmons).
Tom lived a life in full — an inspiration and example for so many as a loyal son and brother, a patriotic Naval officer, a dedicated husband, a beloved father, an internationally recognized business leader, a generous philanthropist, a widely respected community leader and a man of faith.
Tom was also a man of superlatives who shined brightest in reference to others. He had a unique ability to make each person around him feel like they were the most important person in the room. Despite countless achievements, Tom never sought attention to his own good deeds or hard work. Not a fan of self-aggrandizement, he always connected his own success to the success of others.
Tom was born in 1937 and was the youngest of six children. He received a dinner-table education in business and entrepreneurship from his father, Frank C. Sullivan, who was building the roof coatings business he founded in 1947. Tom demonstrated leadership skills at an early age. After graduating from Culver Military Academy, where he was a personnel officer and helped to counsel other students, Tom attended Miami University of Ohio where he was elected president of the freshman class and served on the student senate for four years.
Post college, Tom was commissioned as an ensign in the U.S. Navy, stationed in San Diego as part of the Navy’s Pacific fleet. He deployed throughout the Pacific as a communications officer on the destroyer the U.S.S. Braine. Always a proud patriot, later in life Tom would provide strong support for West Point and its Combating Terrorism Center, one of the military’s premier training institutions.
Tom married Sandra Simmons, the love of his life, in 1960. The two had met intermittently during the many summers Sandy spent North of her native Texas with her older sister Marietta Kelly who lived in Lakewood, Ohio, down the street from young Tom. Orbiting around each other over years, the stars finally aligned one summer when Tom was on a sales itinerary that included stops in Dallas and Tulsa. Tom clearly remembered being met by a stunningly beautiful force of nature, and following dinner, he cancelled his trip to Oklahoma. And so began what would be a 59-year marriage, a blessed union that sought to enrich the lives of others, providing opportunity and hope to innumerable people.
In 1961, Tom joined his father’s business, Republic Powdered Metals, today known as RPM International Inc., as a division sales manager. The company’s sales were $2 million at that time. He was part of a team that sold shares of the company in a public offering. The proceeds were used to launch RPM’s acquisition program in 1966. Tom’s approach of maintaining an acquired company’s employee base, honoring its heritage – often built over multiple generations – and supporting its continued growth addressed the key concerns of most selling owners. As a result, RPM is now widely recognized as the best home for entrepreneurial companies in the paint and coatings industry.
In 1971, at age 34 and with six young children at home, Tom was thrust into the role as RPM’s leader after his father, who was also his boss and mentor, died suddenly. At the time, the U.S. economy began to slip into a period of stagflation. Despite these pressures, he hatched a plan to aggressively grow the $11-million company and guided RPM into international markets, instituted an annual planning process and committed to rewarding shareholders with a consistently increasing cash dividend.
He also set a high bar for business ethics and corporate governance. In the late 1970s, RPM’s board was primarily comprised of outside directors, decades before it was required by the New York Stock Exchange. By 1979, RPM revenues reached $100 million, an accomplishment that gave Tom the confidence to forge ahead with his strategy. During the ensuing 30 years, he grew the company to more than $2 billion in sales through a combination of internal growth and acquisitions, achieving record sales every year and record net income in nearly every year as well.
Tom shared his business experience and expertise through his service on many professional and nonprofit boards, among the most prominent were Nasdaq, the Cleveland Clinic, the National Paint and Coatings Association and Culver Academies.
Publicly, most would recognize Tom’s success as a titan of industry, but privately it was his philanthropic work that gave him sustained joy in collaboration with his most beloved Sandy. Tom would readily explain that his work in the non-profit sector was inspired by his wife and their shared faith in God. In 1991, through Tom’s signature generosity, they established The Thomas C. and Sandra S. Sullivan Family Foundation primarily as an example for their children and grandchildren of the importance of giving back to the community, finding fulfilment in assisting others and living the adage “to whom much is given, much is expected.”
Tom and Sandy were especially motivated to promote education initiatives championing the aspirations of underprivileged youth from elementary school through college, as demonstrated by their enduring support and involvement with Metro Catholic and Urban Community School, as well as the Sullivan Scholars, a nonprofit established by their children. Other recent grant recipients through the Sullivan Family Foundation include Greater Cleveland Food Bank; Community Service Alliance, which helps people emerging out of homelessness; Boys Hope Girls Hope of Northeast Ohio; the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, in support of its west side food centers; the West Side Catholic Center and Malachi House. In addition to financial assistance, Tom gave of his time, connections and expertise to help these and many other organizations flourish. He was a mentor and father figure to numerous people, many of whom his immediate family would never know.
Tom especially loved Bal Harbor, Florida, which he called a second home for more than 50 years. It was there that he would relax, play bocce and welcome family and friends.
A man of deep faith, he was inspired by St. Teresa’s counsel — what matters most in life is not great deeds, but great love. As a Catholic, he was particularly proud to receive the Charles Eisenman Award, presented by the Jewish Community Federation for embodying the tenants of his faith by embracing the faiths of all people. Tom’s most enduring trait, and perhaps the secret to his success, was his belief in and love for people. He had an incredible knack for connecting with others and trusting in their abilities. As a result, people would rise to the occasion to deliver on his positive expectations.
Tom’s favorite adjective was “super” — a two-syllable word to describe joy and immediacy, enthusiasm and fun. This is the spirit he brought to the boardroom, family table and the widening circles of his influence, which will long be felt in the greater community. Tom Sullivan will be sorely missed, but found in every good deed done without pronouncement, and every encouragement given to help others, to lift their spirits, to be the best we can be.
In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to any one of the following institutions — Urban Community School, 4909 Lorain Ave. Cleveland, OH 44102, MCS Vision Endowment Fund, Metro Catholic School, 3555 West 54th St. Cleveland,OH 44102 or the Greater Cleveland Food Bank, 15500 S. Waterloo Rd. Cleveland, OH 44110. A celebration of his life will be held in Cleveland, Ohio, on July 17, 2021. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, a private funeral mass was live streamed on Saturday Dec. 5, 2020.
Save Anchorage made a $5,000 contribution to Covenant House Alaska on Sunday. Covenant House is the largest provider of services to homeless and runaway youth in the state of Alaska.
“Covenant House is a critical bridge for many teens experiencing homelessness in the Anchorage Municipality, and their organization provides a wide variety of essential services to the community by sheltering and protecting the most vulnerable of our city. We salute Covenant House Alaska’s staff – their tireless efforts make a lasting, tangible difference in many young lives,” said Assembly member Jamie Allard of Chugiak-Eagle River, who is associated with the group.
Save Anchorage describes itself as a “grassroots effort to create positive change within our community,” and has been active in encouraging citizens to attend Assembly meetings and get involved in the decisions impacting Anchorage neighborhoods.
In its most recent Facebook post, the group asked people to attend the Dec. 8 Assembly meeting to provide public testimony about the most recent economic shutdown in Anchorage:
“We need to flood the assembly meeting. Voice your concerns about EO-16. If these shut downs have negatively affected you let your voice be heard. You can provide testimony by phone, email or in person. We need as many people as possible there to show the assembly the face of the people they are hurting.”
Anchorage’s Acting Mayor Austin Quinn-Davidson has come down with COVID-19.
She said she started feeling under the weather last Sunday and took three tests over the week; the first two were negative but the one she took on Saturday came back positive, according to her statement.
She is experiencing mild symptoms.
“It’s so important to stay home and to get tested if you aren’t feeling well,” said Acting Mayor Quinn-Davidson. “I’m grateful my symptoms are mild and thankful for the many free testing sites in Anchorage. I will continue to isolate at home as directed by my health care provider.”
Her wife, Stephanie Quinn-Davidson, has tested negative and is not experiencing symptoms.
Quinn-Davidson has been an advocate for masks and has mandated them throughout the municipality. She wears one religiously.
There’s no word as to what this means for the Anchorage Assembly, which meets in joint session with the Anchorage School Board on Monday and in a regular Assembly meeting on Tuesday, during which it is scheduled to vote on Quinn-Davidson’s choice for the new city manager.
Rudy Giuliani, the attorney for President Donald Trump, typically does not wear a mask and has also come down with COVID, and was admitted to Georgetown University Medical Center on Sunday for treatment.
Ketchikan Lake has subsided from 350 feet to 348.95 feet as of Sunday morning, according to the Ketchikan Emergency Operation Center, which has lifted the voluntary evacuation for the area surrounding Ketchikan Creek.
The use of generators and a decrease of rainfall allowed the drawdown to occur.
On Saturday, a large area was voluntarily evacuated as the creek raged below the nearly full lake, which was within one foot of breaching the dam.
The forecast for Ketchikan also has approximately 1.5 inches of precipitation expected in the coming 12 hours, compared to the 2.8 inches on Saturday.
“As a result, the lake level is not anticipated to reach actionable levels and the voluntary evacuation order is now canceled,” the EOC reported. People in the evacuation area may return home, but should stay tuned to the Ketchikan City and Borough’s Facebook page for further updates.
The Recreation is remaining on standby in case another evacuation is called for, and staff continues to monitor the situation, and has Freeman Street closed as of Sunday morning.
A flood advisory remains in effect until midnight.
After 15 years, the northern-most opera company in the United States is closing due to the financial strain caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic fallout from efforts to contain the virus.
Opera Fairbanks has been a professional opera company since organizing as a A 501c3 nonprofit entity in 2005. According to Dun & Bradstreet, it had one employee and an annual budget of $194,000.
The group’s 2019 season included Trouble in Paradise by Leonard Bernstein, Falstaff by Guiseppe Verdi, and The Impresario (Der Schauspieldirektor) by W.A. Mozart (2019 Opera Ball). After the pandemic hit, the opera company went dormant and the board of directors voted to disband it.
In September, the Metropolitan Opera in New York decided to stay closed until Sept. 27, 2021, saying it would only resume performing when “a vaccine is widely in use, herd immunity is established, and the wearing of masks and social distancing is no longer a medical requirement.” The closure is estimated to cost The Met more than $100 million in lost revenue.
Fairbanks Light Opera Theatre, known as FLOT, continues as a theater group in the Golden Heart City; it has been providing community musical theater opportunities in Fairbanks, Alaska for over 51 years, since its founding in March of 1970.
