| By Alvin Engelke
 By Alvin Engelke
alvinengelke@hotmail.com
There were 233 who signed up for the Creston ATV poker run and 17 young folks participated in the DMV young rider safety program. Dan Cole from Akron placed first while Beth Guinn came in second and John Nichols was third. April Runner won the 50/50 while Annie Stanley, Tom Kimes, Dana Dalton, Beth Guinn, Don Richard, Helen Batten, John Mayne, Fred Lynn, Denise Parsell, Matt Alfred, Shawn Parsell and Jamie Blake won door prizes. The community would like to thank everyone who came to make this the most successful poker run ever (for Creston), all those who worked and prepared the food, set up the route, placed the signs, prepared the forms, etc. The following merchants are to be thanked for donating to the successful event, viz: J & S Auto, Larry Shears Barber Shop, Mom's Place, Giovanni's, Holbert's Self Serve, Lemon & Barrett, Devol's Honda, Kawasaki, Black's Motor Sports, M. & J Sales as well as G. McKown. Jane Bingman Cooper also sent a nice donation to the Community Building. Jean Grapes' son-in-law Bill Cowan was also very generous.
The folks from the DMV thought that the riders would be a rowdy crowd of young toughs but found that the folks in the event were a slice of Americana ranging from small children who were riding with parents or other relatives ranging up to "young at heart" folks who were pushing 80. One DMV lady wanted to come back for the next ride and make the trip.
R. G. Snyder is to be commended for arranging to have the DMV folks present to give the youth training. Lyn Brindo who is an office deputy for the Wirt County Sheriff's office assisted with the training.
There was a full house Thursday evening at the Burning Springs M. E. Church for the local part of the Wirt Parish revival. Rev. Roger Parsons brought the message with assistance from some fine singers and a number of other ministers.
Rev. Paul Williams filled his regular appointment at the Burning Springs M. E. church.
While peach trees have been blooming, Dutchmen breeches are at their peak and trilliums are spectacular, the tent caterpillar worms are devouring fruit trees and the USDA's multiflora rose already has shoots several inches long. The local area has had frost almost every morning although Helen Nutter reported that on Creston Heights there was no frost. With the unexpected dry weather quite a bit of ground has been worked up.
Laverne Harper who is both a faithful reader of The Creston News and a granddaughter of "Mammy Jane" Jarvis has been taking care of her lawn and flowers. Last year she got to see Josh Turner perform "Long Black Train" live at the Putnam County Fair.
Mr. & Mrs. Fred Bish were spending some time at their place in Creston.
Rev. Gladson Grim has been in and out of the hospital having problems with circulation in his legs.
Joe Cunningham's daughter and grandson have been visiting from Florida.
Some local residents have been following the United Nations Oil for Food scandal which, each day takes a new twist and includes more rogues. The name of Mark Rich who was pardoned by Slick keeps coming up. Some years back he owned the aluminum plant in Ravenswood and the folks down at the Mouth of the Elk River were doing all sorts of favors for him. Now, it seems back in 2001 (before 9/11) there was an effort to clean up the corruption in the oil for food scam and Saddam got upset. Did he call his buddy Osama to tell him to let us have it? With the dirty bomb stuff there is now concerns about a "Tet Offensive" like attack on several U. S. cities simultaneously. Those "nice folks" will take full advantage of those well meaning folks who want to give them the benefit of the doubt, those who say we should not profile, etc. As it now stands the Oil for Food Program is the biggest fraud in the history of the world and likely was set up to be such from the very beginning.
Speaking of oil the price of local Pennsylvania grade crude has fallen to $47.25/bbl.
Citing high oil prices the price of hotmix for the taxpayers rose to $75/ton although it is mostly stone as the percentage of asphaltic materials was reduced back during the "energy crisis" of the 1970s and never changed. The Route 50 job around Parkersburg will no doubt go down as a prime example of wasted funds as four foot lifts of dirt were put in including huge boulders and frozen ground. There have already been several slips, slides and settlements. The inspection was done "by contract". It seems that there are those in government who believe that West Virginia has unlimited amounts of funds to waste on shoddy workmanship that has to be done over. When one considers that the Romans build bridges 2000 years ago that are still in use while new bridges built in West Virginia will not last even a lifetime. The Roman bridges were built for men and animals and are now used by trucks so there should be little excuse for the shortfalls. On one job not so long back the finished blacktop was off 3 feet from where it should have been but the state inspectors were told not to meddle as the contractor was a "big wheel" down in the Kanawha County seat.
Eastern American Energy Corp. has announced a public offering of what appears to be a production payment. Pennzoil, a Rockefeller company used to do this. They would put up their oil and gas income as collateral to borrow money for capital expenses. One would assume that Eastern American (also known now as Energy Corp. of American) plans on drilling a number of wells somewhere. Some years back they took their W. Va. profits and went to the Rockies "to hit it big" but they soon returned to the hills and hollers of West Virginia.
Jane Engelke & husband Wilbur Schenerlein and friends motored to Kentucky to visit Dr. & Mrs. Jeromy Warner and attend the Toyota Bluegrass Stakes at the Keeneland Race Track in Kentucky.
One local resident was attending to business in Gilmer County the other day and the folks said, "You know this is Gilmer County but we have Ritchie County addresses." Such would be expected when X-perts are fetched in to help us ignorant natives.
Jeff McFee is back in the territory. The other evening he wasn't feeling too good and the ambulance was called from Grantsville. They didn't have to use enhanced 911 addresses to make the trip to Wirt County in 15 minutes.
Anna Engelke was attending to business with her work friend Teresa Bulger in the Brandywine Valley. Part of her employment is to go on FAM trips, that is to go and enjoy the places they send their customers while touring our country. After hitting a giant pothole and losing a hubcap [which was recovered] they visited the Chadford Winery, the nation's only helicopter museum, QVC (the Tee Vee shopping channel), the duPont black powder factory at Hagley, the Brandywine River Art Museum, Longwood Gardens, Winterhur Estate and the Herr's snack factory. Back about 200 years ago the duPont family carried the mortgage on a significant part of what is now Wirt County and Herr's Potato Chips was one of the "fat chickens" that were plucked by promoters who drilled wells in the Creston area.
Tom Jarvis and family spent the weekend at their place on the Richardsonville road.
Some folks who said they were from the company in Vermont that is doing all the 911 business were in Creston talking to people about their new addresses and about how they will do with folks who have post office boxes. They said they were in a big hurry. Turns out the reason they may have been in such a big hurry was that they had no authority to be out and around until the folks down at the county seat gave them the "go ahead". What are the chances that the taxpayers will have to pick up the tab for these fine folks anyway? In addition the Parkersburg media announced that thanks to the folks who recently met down at the Mouth of the Elk River, 911 fees will go up again.
Nancy Engelke & Susan Myers attended the Black Walnut Festival pageant in Spencer Saturday evening. They also dined at an oriental eatery in the Spring Creek community.
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