UP: To the annual Vienna and Parkersburg Christmas parades. Although the forecast is calling for rain, this event is always popular with families and is a holiday tradition. Hopefully, the rain will hold off during today's parades.
UP: To Robert Lent, who returned a bank deposit he found on the road earlier this week. Lent, who was on his way to work, found the money in a sandwich bag on Gihon Road near Hope Hill. According to a deposit slip with the money, it was from the Winding Road Church of Christ. Lent, a Division of Highways equipment operator, called a church secretary, who in turn called the Wood County Sheriff's Department. Lent turned the money over to a Wood County sheriff's deputy upon his arrival to work. It's wonderful to know there are people like Lent who do the right thing just because it is the right thing.
DOWN: To the thieves who stole approximately $17,000 in copper pipe and fittings from the Sumnerite Museum on Avery Street sometime after Thanksgiving. Copper thieves are becoming too common and seem unconcerned about the trouble they leave behind. In addition to the historic school and museum, brazen copper thieves posing as contractors were allowed to drive into Ravenswood's Constellium Rolled Aluminum plant where they escaped with $15,000 worth of copper scrap.
UP: To Bob Enoch and other volunteers for their dedication to Wood County's past by working to document the area's forgotten rural cemeteries. The latest to be documented was a cemetery located in the Belleville area. The cemetery, which contains the last names of the Swain, Flinn, Boso and Beegle families, had not been used as a burial site since the 1920s. Enoch and the other members of the Wood County Historical Society who have been doing this work for the past several years are providing a valuable service to the area. Approximately 270 rural cemeteries have been found and their locations documented.
