The Weekender Saturday, July 4, 2015
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Large grant to fund Family digs into gardening health project
‘Go BIG or go home’
T
hough their day jobs are as bookkeepers, Jan Sigg and Nikki Damron spend as much time in the garden and kitchen. The two women share a garden plot just east of the Elm Creek Community Garden south of town. Their love of cooking and canning fresh produce has made them fast friends. That, and the fact they are connected to the Sigg family — a family whose roots spread deep and wide in these parts. Jan, 49, works at Macha Enterprises and is married to Dan Sigg. And Nikki, 35, who works at Clayton Corp., is in a longterm relationship with Ryan Sigg. Their garden plot is owned by Ryan’s dad and Dan’s brother, Jerry Sigg, whose garden is as big as the two women’s combined. “Gardening is in the Sigg DNA,” said Jan. “It’s ‘go big or go home,’” Nikki said of the family’s attitude to just about everything it does. The women say the Sigg men “are good at the front end” of getting their gardens started, in-
See GARDEN | Page A3
Story and photos by Susan Lynn
By RICK DANLEY The Iola Register
Thrive Allen County continues to gather steam toward its goal of making Allen County one of the healthiest counties in Kansas. The Kansas Health Foundation — in partnership with the Washington D.C.-based Center for Global Policy Solutions — has awarded the non-profit a $250,000 “Community Engagement Initiative” grant. According to KHF, the grant — the second largest in Thrive’s history — is intended to “support resident-led efforts to improve health. “Recognizing that commuSee THRIVE | Page A5
SUMMERTIME TRADITION: Cool treats cap off games For as long as anyone can recall, Iola’s rec league baseball and softball players have collected on the curb outside Dairy Queen after games to enact a local tradition. They grip their cones or cups in one hand and tug furiously on the air with the other — a gesture urging cars on State Street to sound their horns. When the mix of kids to cars is right, the warm evening air at the corner of Neosho and State condenses with the noise of horns and excited cheers…. “Will Talkington! This side of the grass,” shouted his mother, as her bright-eyed son inched closer to the passing traffic. “Just because you’re 9 doesn’t mean you can stand in the grass. Double digits,” she reminded, hinting playfully at the riches that will greet Will when he’s 10. Faith Warden wore the only yellow shirt among the crowd of kids. The rest of her team had gone home. Faith was the holdout. Faith had energy to burn. She didn’t want to go home. Faith’s mother, on the other hand, was very eager to go home. “But you’re the last yellow here,” she said, urging her daughter to call it a night. “Well, then I’m just going to faint,” said Faith Warden — and then she did, in perfect
Landon Weide, above from left, checks to make sure his seat is clear of ice cream drippings with his ACE Refrigeration teammates Charles Rogers and Isaac McCullough Tuesday evening. Travis Church, above right, who coaches the Nelson Quarries Bitty Ball League team, tries to get his players’ attention shortly before ordering ice creams, Blizzards and other treats at Iola Dairy Queen. A group of Pixie League players counted more than 50 passing motorists who obliged their pleas to honk while they drove along South State Street. REGISTER/RICHARD LUKEN
See DQ | Page A5
Small hospital setting offered expanded role for med tech By RICK DANLEY The Iola Register
For 37 years, Oliver Meliza made a career of paying closer attention to your blood than you did. As Allen County Regional Hospital’s chief medical technologist, Meliza’s role was to test and analyze the assortment of bodily fluids that influence the health of a patient — blood primarily, but he’s an expert on the less savory human liquids, too. But, at 68, the hospital’s senior med tech is hanging up his hypodermic
tips and his specimen cups and moving to Lawrence with his wife, Karen, to be nearer the couple’s children and grandchildren. Meliza grew up in Garnett and joined the Army soon after graduation in 1965. It was not an idle time in American military history, and before the sun had set on his teenage years Meliza found himself in Vietnam, employed as a forward observer. “Which means, you’re attached to a unit out in the field, calling in
Quote of the day Vol. 117, No. 167
artillery,” explained Meliza, whose early post was as the immediate successor to a young soldier who had been killed when an R.P.G pierced the walls of the vehicle that held him. Having received his fill of combat, the first lieutenant ended his threeyear stint in the Army and returned to southeast Kansas. T a k i n g turns at the S u n fl owe r Army Am-
Just a reminder, the July 4 Register is being condensed into today’s paper in order to give staff a day off to celebrate our nation’s birth. 75 Cents
munition Plant, near De Soto, then at Thompson Poultry, in Iola, Meliza eventually heeded the counsel of his mother — a nurse’s aide at Anderson County Hospital, in charge of caring for the rows of newborns — who suggested that her son investigate a career in medical lab work. After graduating from Emporia State University and completing his internship at Wesley Medical Center, in Wichita, Meliza seized on the job at the Iola hospital. Having glimpsed the life of a bigSee MELIZA | Page A5
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