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KU prof: ‘I felt like I had enough’ 12/21 ‘Mayan’ forecast a fallacy Girl eschews birthday gifts in favor of helping victims of hurricane
By Ian Cummings
icummings@ljworld.com
A 9-year-old girl in Perry made a special request for her birthday this year, and it wasn’t a pony or a new toy. Asking instead that her friends and family donate money to help hurricane victims on the East Coast, she raised hundreds of dollars for the American Red Cross. Weeks after Superstorm Sandy killed more than 100 people and displaced thousands in New York and New Jersey, many remain without their homes and are struggling through the winter. Jaedin Turner hasn’t forgotten them, and she used her Dec. 2 birthday party as an occasion to raise about $500 for Red Cross relief efforts on the East Coast. She then sought matching funds from area businesses, and will have raised about $1,000 by the end of the year. When Jaedin saw news footage of the hurricane’s devastation of New York, it hit home for her, she said. She’d visited New York City with her mother two years ago and recognized some of the flooded areas. When her birthday approached and the subject of gifts came up, she decided to do something about it. “I felt bad that everyone lost pretty much everything,� she said. “And I felt like I had enough.� When Jaedin and her
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Expert on ancient civilization says no apocalypse was ever predicted By Matt Erickson merickson@ljworld.com
If the world doesn’t end Friday, John Hoopes says, please don’t blame the Mayan civilization. Whatever you’ve heard or will hear in the run-up to a date that’s been assigned special significance — Dec. 21, 2012 — it’s just not true that the Mayas predicted that the apocalypse would happen on that day, the Kansas University archaeologist says. “Hopefully they won’t be angry and resentful and feel like it was the Mayas who pulled this big trick on everybody,� Hoopes said of anyone who’s bought into the doomsday frenzy. “Because it wasn’t.� Hoopes, an associate professor of anthropology at KU, has spent nearly a decade studying the “2012 phenomenon,� the belief that some sort of global transformative event — be it the end of the world, the arrival of extraterrestrials or something else — would occur on Dec. 21 of this year. While that belief is often associated with a supposed prophecy made by the Mayas, the people who really deserve credit are countercultural groups and New Age adherents in the United States from the 1970s to Please see MAYAN, page 5A
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$92.5M bond issue sought ——
School board asking voters for maximum By Peter Hancock phancock@ljworld.com
Mike Yoder/Journal-World Photo
JAEDIN TURNER, 9, OF PERRY, is raising money for the American Red Cross to help victims of Superstorm Sandy, which devastated much of the East Coast in October. For her recent birthday, she asked friends to donate and sought matching funds from area businesses. She has raised more than $800 so far. mother, Brandi Turner, approached area businesses to match Jaedin’s donation to the Red Cross, they found willing partners in Topeka, at Hill’s Pet Nutrition and Binswanger Glass, and in Perry at Hamm, a construction
and contracting company, as well as Perry’s First State Bank and Trust. The money will go toward maintaining shelters for displaced people in New York, said Jo Ann Long, regional development
director for the Red Cross in Kansas. It will also help provide food, cleanup kits and programs to help people get back on their feet. Long said it wasn’t uncommon anymore
The Lawrence school board voted unanimously Monday to seek voter approval for a $92.5 million bond issue, the maximum amount the district could issue without having to get permission to exceed the state cap on bonded indebtedness. S c h o o l board members are calling it a “no tax increase� bond SCHOOLS proposal because it would not require the district to raise its property tax mill levy. That’s because the district is retiring other bonds this year. Still, they admitted, that may be a hard message to sell to voters. “The job for us is to ensure we can communicate this to the public, that this is not a luxury, and that these are not only things that are needed but are long, long overdue,� said board member Rick Ingram. Before the vote, board members received the results of a public opinion survey of
Please see BIRTHDAY, page 2A
Please see BOND, page 5A
Town Talk Selling an agency, putting up poles and talking fiber optics
Chad Lawhorn clawhorn@ljworld.com
It sure appears that one of Lawrence’s larger and older real estate agencies is about to be sold. Multiple sources are indicating that a deal is expected before the end of the year that will sell Stephens Real Estate to two employees of the
Business Classified Comics Deaths
Low: 31
Today’s forecast, page 10A
new deal. McCandless declined to comment when reached. McCandless is the company’s director of personnel, and Earl is Stephens’ sales manager. Sources indicate the deal is progressing but hasn’t yet been finalized. If the deal is com-
pleted, it will be the first time since the company’s founding in 1978 that it hasn’t been controlled by the Stephens family. Longtime real estate broker Bob Stephens founded the agency after it split off from the Mitchell-Stephens Agen-
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Lawrence-based agency. Doug Stephens, president of Stephens, wasn’t yet ready to comment about the speculation. But talk around business circles is that Stephens employees Pat McCandless and Chris Earl will be principals in the
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cy, which had its roots dating to 1970. Doug Stephens, Bobâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s son, became president of the company in 1997, according to the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s website. The agency went on to become not only a large
$13M donated to KU
Please see TOWN, page 2A
Vol.154/No.354 20 pages
Kansas University announces $13 million more in donations for the planned new building for the KU School of Business, which is now more than halfway to its goal. Page 3A
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