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All aboard the dinner train
By Scott Rothschild srothschild@ljworld.com
Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photos
IRA SCHREIBER, PART OWNER OF THE KANSAS BELLE DINNER TRAIN, descends Monday from a dining car, which will be one of several cars to be moved to Baldwin City from Fremont, Neb. The owners hope the dinner train will be operating on Midland Railway’s 21-mile line sometime in December. BELOW: Schreiber talks about the train’s interior.
Kansas Belle hopes to be offering mobile meals, entertainment soon By Elvyn Jones ejones@theworldco.com
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Monday morning in a rock quarry north of Ottawa, a crane operator gently picked a 75-foot red dining car from the back of a semitrailer to place on two sets of wheel assemblies already on railroad tracks. The car was pulled later in the day to Midland
phancock@ljworld.com
The age of computers hasn’t yet made handwriting obsolete. But many state school officials are still worried that the traditional loops and slants of cursive penmanship could become a lost art. According to a survey released Wednesday by the Kansas State Department of Education, 90 percent of state school districts said they are
By Chad Lawhorn clawhorn@ljworld.com
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still teaching cursive they do not consider writing in elementeaching handwriting tary school. Of those, to be a high priority, most begin teaching and about 6 percent it in third grade. And said they anticipate in schools where it’s eventually decreasing taught, teachers typi- SCHOOLS the amount of class cally spend anywhere time they spend workfrom 15 minutes to an hour ing on it. a day working on cursive State board member Janet script. Waugh, of Kansas City, raised But there were indications the issue about cursive inin the survey that handwrit- struction last month. She said ing skills are losing impor- she had been contacted by tance. Nearly 23 percent of parents and constituents who districts responding said were concerned that many
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young people today either can’t write in cursive or can’t read material written in it. “I started asking people within school systems,” Waugh said. “Cursive is losing priority because of technology.” Board member Carolyn Campbell, of Topeka, said she noticed during the recent election campaign that cursive seems to be alien to many young people. During one day of campaigning, she Please see CURSIVE, page 2A
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Heating your home is likely to cost a bit more this year
Railway’s Baldwin City yard, where it will be part of what is now called the Kansas Belle Dinner Train. The use of the quarry site for the transfer was the latest adjustment the owners of the dinner train made to move their business from Fremont, Neb., to Baldwin City’s Midland Railway. Last week, they found there wasn’t enough room at the Baldwin City
Officials want to keep cursive in the loop By Peter Hancock
The South Lawrence Trafficway project is the second most expensive project on the state’s transportation to-do list, which was released Wednesday. The estimated construction costs for the nearly six-mile stretch is $150 million, according to the Kansas Department of Transportation. That was No. 2 behind the Johnson County Gateway interchange project at Kansas Highway 10 and Interstates 435 and 35 junction, which will cost $250 million. KDOT put together a list of more than 430 projects that are under way or will be within the next year or so with a total price tag of $1.1 billion. “The majority of these projects are considered preservation work and will protect the investment Kansans have made in their transportation system,” said Kansas Transportation Secretary Mike King.
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Winter in Lawrence this year may not be such a day at the beach. Leaders with Black Hills Energy, the city’s largest provider of natural gas, are predicting natural gas prices will rise for the first time in three years, although prices will still be near historic lows. But if Mother Nature produces a winter more in line with Kansas averages, residents may notice an increase in their heating bills this season. “If you remember, we basically didn’t have a winter last year,” said Larissa Long, a spokeswoman with Black Hills. Even if the winter is mild like it was a year ago, residents likely will notice an increase. Black Hills officials are predicting that gas prices will increase to $3.55 per million BTU, up from $2.94 a year ago. That’s a 20 percent increase in the price of natural gas, but because natural gas represents only a portion of a Please see HEATING, page 2A
Fraud against KU trust
Vol.154/No.320 20 pages
A former Topeka lawyer pleads guilty to federal charges of money laundering and wire fraud for stealing funds established to benefit the KU School of Business. Page 3A
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