We want to thank those involved with all the local summer festivals and for working hard to make them a success. Olivia Kahler (chair of Kalona Days), Heather Trimple (chair of Wellman’s July 3 celebration) and Kevin Meller (chair of Riverside’s Trek Fest) all did great jobs working with their committees  of volunteers to stage successful celebrations after having to skip a year because of COVID.

Another big thank you goes to Katie Miller who served as president of the Kalona Rotary Club. She was inducted as president virtually because of COVID and was unable to have club meetings for several months. She kept the club together virtually and then gradually meeting again, first in the shelters at Kalona City Park and then finally in the group’s regular meeting room in the basement of CBI Bank and Trust starting in June.

On July 6 she handed off the position as president to Tim Sullivan who presented Katie Miller with her past president’s plaque. During the past year she accepted a job out of town at Sharon Telephone Co. in Hills, but she always was able to preside over the Rotary meetings, often having to provide programs and activities.

On July 3, Helen and I attended the funeral services for Wes Rich at Yoder-Powell Funeral Home. The services were held on his birthday. He would have been 74 but died earlier this year.

We had a good visit with his wife Riella, as well as many friends and Wes’s relatives. Riella shared with us a cookbook of her family recipes.  She did much of the artwork with graphic skills she polished while being an ad designer for The News after closing The Fireside Grill restaurant where she was a chef. Most of the recipes were from her grandmother and mother.

Riella plans to continue to live in the home she shared with Wes in  Alabama.

Many of Wes’s friends and relatives wore T-shirts with a photo of Wes smoking a cigar. It was designed by the owners of the cigar bar where Wes enjoyed smoking cigars and spending time with friends.

The News staff has been busy this past month preparing the Fall/Winter Community visitors guide. This issue will highlight the Kalona Fall Festival in September and Kalona Gospel Sing in August.

Other stories will be about Mike Zahs’s Feed Sack quilt show at the Historical Village plus a story on Steve Reif’s spool cabinets and other items at the Kalona Historical Society Visitors Center.  If you haven’t visited the Historical Village lately you should do so as there are a lot of new interesting displays.

We want to thank the advertisers from Kalona, Wellman, Riverside and Washington who help make this publication possible. This will be a 52-page section making it one of the largest editions The News has published. The new guide will be available the last week of July at the Kalona Area Chamber of Commerce and many of the stores in the Kalona community.

In addition, The News will be distributing 18,000 copies to visitor information centers across Iowa plus at the Kalona Chamber booth at the Iowa State Fair.  The guide will be distributed to hotels and information centers in Iowa City, Coralville, Cedar Rapids, Davenport, Washington, Mt. Pleasant, etc.  Some of the first places to receive the books will be the official Iowa all visitors centers along the Interstate highways (provided they are open).

Good news from The News staff member Paul Bowker.  He reports that he is done with his cancer treatments and the lymphoma is gone! He had his last PET scan last Wednesday. His next follow-up is in September.

He has been able to cover a number of ball games in person and other stories remotely.  He is doing what he can to help out sports editor Jeff Yoder and news editor Molly Roberts. We appreciate all that he is able to do and wish him well on his continued challenge to fully recover.