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Ellington
Fields Could Become Smoke Free Under New Proposal By Linda Tishler Levinson
ELLINGTON — Smoking would be banned on town athletic fields under a proposal the Board of Selectmen discussed at its Aug. 20 meeting. The board’s Ordinance Committee has been working on a proposal for the ban and has asked town counsel to look at its draft ordinance, First Selectman Maurice Blanchette said. If the proposed ordinance passes legal muster and is adopted, it would ban smoking on athletic fields and establish the boundaries for that ban. New ambulance The Ellington Volunteer Ambulance Corps is closer to having some new equipment. The selectmen moved to support the purchase of a new ambulance costing up to
$200,000 at their Aug. 20 meeting, Blanchette said. The proposal next goes before the Board of Finance and will require town meeting approval. Architect for school plans The selectmen considered the selection of an architect for Crystal Lake and Windermere elementary schools renovation projects. The Permanent Building Committee had awarded the contract to Moser Pilon Nelson Architects, but concerns were raised in July that its bid was $600,000 higher than that of Silver/Petrucelli & Associates. In what Blanchette described as “a lively discussion,” the selectmen considered whether to ask the building committee to reconsider their decision. The matter was scheduled to be discussed further at the board’s Aug. 28 meeting, after the North Central News
went to press.
New Assessor At the July 16 meeting, the Board of Selectmen appointed Cynthia Roman as Assessor for the Town of Ellington, effective August 27. Roman, according to an announcement from the selectmen, “is a highly qualified individual with many years of experience in the Assessment and Appraisal, which includes working as assistant assessor for the Town of Coventry and the Town of Manchester.” Roman holds a Bachelor of Science Degree from Eastern Connecticut State University and is a State of Connecticut Certified Assessor and a Certified Residential Appraiser.
‘Letters from Nancy to Her Dear Mother’ - A Tale of Valor and Faith By Ellen Karadimas ELLINGTON - Confucius once said, “Wherever you go, go with all your heart” and heart is certainly what a young Nancy Ann Sikes Porter, of Somers displayed when she set sail with her new husband, the Reverend Rollin Porter, to do missionary work in Gaboon (Gabon), West Africa in 1851. Leaving safe shores and the supportive circle of family and friends, the great-aunt of Ellington’s well-known Nellie McKnight embarked on an adventure that
was rooted in her deep faith and strengthened by her exemplary courage. That adventure, from 1851-1852, had been journalized via letters home; and recently transcribed (with some assistance) by Ellington’s renowned nanogentarian, Mildred Arens Dimock, into a book entitled “Letters from Nancy to Her Dear Mother – A Missionary Tale in the 1850s.” The letters, 150 years old, had been found by Lynn Fahy, volunteer archivist for the Nellie McKnight Museum, who presented copies to the Ellington
Congregational Church, of which Dimock is a member. The correspondence, published as closely to the original letters by Nancy Sikes Porter as possible, tells a tale of homesickness, seasickness, sea-faring tornadoes, bouts of “the African fever,” and run-ins with snakes, scorpions, cockroaches, and unusual creatures in both human and animal form. But never once was she weakened by doubt or lack of perseverance in what she and her husband had set out to do. Of her arrival in Africa, Nancy wrote: “I
cannot describe my feelings when I first placed my feet upon the shores of Africa— the land to which I had so often looked as the place of my future home—the land which I had longed to look upon—in which I hoped to spend my days, among whose people I was to live, and hoped to die, and be buried. This was indeed the land, and these the people. My heart was filled with love for them, and I was grateful, I am sure I was, that I had been
LETTERS/page 9
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September 2012 North Central News
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