VOLUME 146 ISSUE 73 | WEEKEND EDITION, SEPT. 12-13, 2026 | STANLYNEWSJOURNAL.COM
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Stump speech Republican U.S. Senate candidate Michael Whatley speaks at the Republican convention on Wednesday in Dallas, Texas. The unusual midterm convention featured much of the same sorts of speeches, pomp and circumstance as one from a presidential campaign year.
WHAT’S HAPPENING SCOTUS again rejects push to use GOP-backed congressional map in Missouri Jefferson City, Mo. The U.S. Supreme Court has again rejected Missouri congressional maps backed by President Donald Trump, a loss for Republicans trying to maintain control of the House in the fast-approaching midterm elections. The decision Thursday appears to clear the way for use of the old map, as the state’s highest court had ordered. It’s part of a pitched court battle that has created confusion for voters and others shortly before ballots begin going out for the November elections. The maps were drawn to help Republicans gain an additional U.S. House seat. It’s the second time the high court has refused to keep the Trump-backed maps in place.
Average rate on 30-year loan hits highest level in more than 14 months Mortgage rates rose for the third week in a row, pushing the average long-term U.S. home loan rate to its highest level in more than 14 months. Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday that the benchmark 30-year fixed rate mortgage rate rose to 6.76% from 6.71% last week. One year ago, the average rate was 6.35%. Higher mortgage rates can add hundreds of dollars a month in costs for borrowers, limiting homebuyers’ purchasing power.
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Stanly commissioners censure Hatley, approve ethics investigation The action followed allegations involving a pending civil case By Jesse Deal Stanly News Journal ALBEMARLE — The Stanly County Board of Commissioners voted Tuesday night to censure Commissioner Trent Hatley and spend up to $10,000 on an outside ethics investigation into allegations that he contacted a judge about a pending civil case. After Hatley and Chairman Scott Efird were recused, the remaining commissioners approved the censure 4-1, with Vice Chairman Bill Lawhon casting the lone dissenting vote. Lawhon opposed spending
money on the independent investigation, which the board hired attorney Patrick Flanagan to conduct. The action followed allegations raised Aug. 3 by Norwood resident Erin Beth Pinkston, who accused Hatley of calling District Court Judge Thai Vang at his home July 15 to discuss an equitable distribution case involving her and her former husband. Pinkston said Vang notified the case’s attorneys about the call and told them the next morning he would step away from the case because he believed Hatley had attempted to influence him on another party’s behalf. Court records reviewed by SNJ show Vang recused himself from all matters in the case through an order signed
“I think $10,000 would be well spent to find out if this county government is being run correctly.” Commissioner Mike Barbee July 21. The order does not give a reason and directs that future hearings be scheduled before District Court Judge John Nance. Efird opened Tuesday’s discussion by seeking recusal because Pinkston’s attorney, his nephew, also represents him. Lawhon and Commissioners Billy Mills, Brandon King, Mike Barbee and Hatley granted the request, while Com-
Albemarle approves fee waiver for historic garden maintenance “The Historical Society is responsible for the maintenance and the care of those buildings.” Bain Jones, Stanly County Historical Society president
The waiver supports irrigation at two historic Albemarle homes By Jesse Deal Stanly News Journal ALBEMARLE — The Albemarle City Council unanimously agreed Tuesday night to waive a $1,500 utility fee for an irrigation system serving the gardens at two of the city’s historic homes. Bain Jones, president of the Stanly County Historical Society, requested the waiver for the Snuggs House
and Freeman-Marks House. “The Historical Society is responsible for the maintenance and the care of those buildings,” Jones said, noting that an 1850s-style garden was established around the homes last year. Tim Johnson and Alice Whitley designed the garden without charge and supervised its installation, while the society spent $3,200 on planning and materials. Hank Culp donated mulch for the beds. Jones explained that keeping those plantings watered See WAIVER, page A8
missioner Patty Crump voted against it. The remaining board members then unanimously approved Hatley’s recusal from the votes involving him. King said the allegations warranted examination. “I think that the judicial system is supposed to be fair and unbiased, and if an elected official reached out to a judge to talk about a court case that he has no bearing in, that is just pushing it to the extreme that it shouldn’t be pushed to,” King said. Crump reviewed the county’s Code of Ethics, emphasizing that censure is not a legal finding of guilt but addresses the appearance of improper conduct. The policy calls on See HATLEY, page A5
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
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SENIOR NUTRITION MEALS | WEEK OF SEPT. 14 Stanly County residents 60 and older can enjoy nutritionally balanced lunches at five locations Monday through Friday from 11 a.m. to noon. First-time participants must register by calling 704-986-3773. Meals must be eaten on-site — no takeout is available. Donations are welcomed but not required. Sites also offer social activities including bingo, Bible study, crafts and music. Locations are the Niven Center in Albemarle, community centers in New London and Norwood, the Old Boy Scout Hut in Oakboro and the Locust Community Building.
MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SEPT. 14
SEPT. 15
SEPT. 16
SEPT. 17
SEPT. 18
• Cheeseburger with bun • Sliced tomatoes (3) and lettuce • Macaroni and cheese • Warm pears • Sugar cookies (2) • Mustard, mayo and ketchup
• Meatloaf with brown gravy • Green beans • Mashed potatoes • Whole wheat roll • Margarine • Melon
• Taco salad with taco-seasoned ground beef and pinto beans • Shredded lettuce, cheese • Diced tomatoes • Spanish rice • Tortilla chips • Apple • Mild salsa
• Pork roast with gravy • Steamed cabbage • Hashed brown potato casserole • Cornbread • Mandarin oranges
• Oven-fried chicken breast • Honey-glazed carrots • Corn • Biscuit • Fruit cocktail
‘South Park’ creators ‘rename’ show to ‘South America’ in jab at Trump The satire targets the president’s geographic renaming campaign and corporate America’s swift capitulation By Jocelyn Noveck The Associated Press THE CREATORS of the long-running and enthusiastically insolent TV show “South Park” aren’t known to be huge fans of President Donald Trump. However, they’ve decided to adopt one of his ideas — in a way. They’re changing — at least for the moment — the name of the popular series, which just won the Emmy for outstanding animated program. In a statement posted on the show’s Instagram page, creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone say they are “changing the name of South Park to SOUTH AMERICA.” The statement comes as Trump, escalating his trade war with Canada, has declared he’s renaming Lake Ontario to be known as “Lake America” in the United States.
Coincides with changes in popular maps The move by the two satirists, a week before the 29th season premiere of “South Park” — er, “SOUTH AMERICA” — also takes aim at Apple and Google, which have adopted Trump’s changes, as well as the show’s own parent company. Apple has relabeled Lake Ontario to “Lake America” for U.S. users of its Maps app, following cartographic competitor Google. “Inspired by the bravery and patriotism of Apple and Google, we are changing the name of South Park to SOUTH AMERICA. We especially want to thank our parent company Paramount — a Skydance Capitulation.” The hugely successful “South Park” airs on Paramount-owned Comedy Central. Parker and Stone have taken aim at Paramount’s merger with Skydance. But in July 2025, Paramount announced a five-year renewal deal with Parker and Stone, including streaming rights for previous “South Park” seasons on Paramount+. During his second term,
“You finally got your Emmy.” “South Park” post on Instagram Trump has also signed an executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” even though parts of it lie in international waters. Apple and Google maps also followed suit in that case. Also in line with Trump’s enthusiasm for renaming things — after America, or after himself — he recently suggested New Mexico be renamed “New America,” though it was uncertain whether that was serious. He also arranged for the Kennedy Center to add his name to its building, a move that has triggered much controversy. Show’s creators have needled Trump before The decision to rename the show is not the only jab Parker and Stone have recently taken at Trump.
“You finally got your Emmy,” the show posted on Instagram along with a cartoon depiction of the president — with his pants down, surrounded by the show’s characters. A recent storyline on the show depicted Trump as romantically involved with Satan. Canada, too, has not gone unnoticed by the show. In 1999, its foray onto the big screen, “South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut,” depicted Canadians as scapegoats of a national parental movement to stop children from swearing — which they blamed on comedians from Canada named “Terrance and Phillip.” The movie was structured like a Broadway musical, and one of the key “show tunes” it presented was called “Blame Canada.” Its overall point: People can find a way to blame anyone for anything. “It seems that everything’s gone wrong since Canada came along,” one character sang. Other targets of the show’s sharp parody over the years have been Saddam Hussein, Tom Cruise, the soft drink Prime and GLP-1 weight-loss drugs.
CRIME LOG Aug. 31
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• Amber Nichole Davis, 34, was arrested for driving on a revoked license. • Khadjiah Briana Little, 32, was arrested for habitual larceny and misdemeanor larceny.
misdemeanor crime of domestic violence and cruelty to animals, and other charges.
arrested for driving while impaired, reckless driving to endanger and no operator’s license.
• Yael Alberto Montiel-Chan, 20, was arrested for simple assault and a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
• Arthur Eugene Wright, 51, was arrested for simple assault and injury to personal property.
• Eric Lee Whitley, 38, was arrested for assault inflicting serious bodily injury.
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• Jose Baza Martinez-Cruz, 35, was arrested for assault by strangulation, second-degree kidnapping and assault with a deadly weapon, and other charges.
• Chloe Smoot, 21, was arrested for a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
• Johnnie Williams Owens, 27, was arrested for misdemeanor larceny.
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Sept. 1 • Marshall Dillion Fesperman, 32, was arrested for assault on a female, a
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• Luis Franco Ruiz, 21, was arrested for abduction of children.
• Christy Jane Fraley, 41, was arrested for a civil order for arrest for child support. • Sixto Espinoza Jaimes, 37, was
Sept. 2 • Amanda Rose Davis, 68, was arrested for possession of methamphetamine and possession of drug paraphernalia. • Steven Sky Merto, 74, was arrested for assault inflicting serious bodily injury. Sept. 3 • Nicholas Scot Gunther, 25, was arrested for reckless driving with wanton disregard and resisting a public officer.
Sept. 4 • Yvette Denise Lee, 60, was arrested for shoplifting by concealment of goods, misdemeanor larceny and resisting a public officer. Sept. 5 • Christopher Shayne Boatman, 23, was arrested for indecent exposure, simple possession of a controlled substance and intoxicated and disruptive. Sept. 6 • Markez Tymik Parks, 24, was arrested for assault on a female and a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
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THE CONVERSATION Trip Hoffend, publisher | Frank Hill, senior opinion editor VISUAL VOICES
COLUMN | STEPHEN MOORE
How to waste $9 trillion to not ‘save the planet’
Doomand-gloom environmental predictions have been wrong over the past century.
THE WORLD has spent $9 trillion to combat climate change since 2020. That is a World War II-type number. Except we won WWII. But now even the left admits this torrent of money has accomplished ... nothing. According to ESG Today, citing a 2026 United Nations report, the “multinational goal to limit global temperature increase to 1.5 C, identified as the threshold to avoid the most significant impacts of climate change, is now out of reach.” The “best-case scenario (is) now at 1.8 C.” In other words, we’re doomed. Well, not necessarily: According to the UN, Climate Policy Initiative “estimates that an average of USD 7.8 trillion a year will be needed through 2030 ... to stay on track” regarding climate mitigation. The price of poker — er, saving the planet — has just tripled. To put that UN price tag in perspective, this global warming solution will cost roughly 10 times as much money as the $4 trillion in today’s dollars that America spent to win WWII. Yet even if we spend that money, temperatures will continue to rise. Wouldn’t it be smarter and cheaper to just get every household in the world air conditioning? That may seem cavalier, but it would reduce the misery of any higher temperatures. But the UN is against air conditioning because it says that causes climate change. These people would be against electricity if we didn’t already have it.
Sounds like we’re in a cycle of ruin and misery no matter what we do. Yet there is no reason to despair. First, climate change models have been notoriously wrong about temperature changes. Second, doom-and-gloom environmental predictions have been wrong over the past century. Since the 1970s, every study predicting apocalypse — including the coming of another ice age — by 2025 has turned out to be false. This time may be different. Sometimes a batter who bats .000 hits a home run. But almost never. But please realize that the solution they are peddling is to make everyone poorer by installing a Stalinistic government that hangs out in your kitchen and your bedroom, regulating everything you do. We know with almost 100% certainty that’s a nightmare scenario in itself for the future of freedom and prosperity. To quote John Lennon, “If you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao, you ain’t gonna make it with anyone anyhow.” I will take my chances with a warming planet rather than turn over more trillions of dollars and power to fools like these. Stephen Moore is co-founder of Unleash Prosperity and a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation. (Copyright 2026 Creators.com)
COLUMN | RICH LOWRY
A foolhardy conflict with an inoffensive ally We can also land the 101st Airborne in Nova Scotia. But why would we want to do it?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP’S tariffs aren’t popular, but he’s found a way to make them even less so — a trade war with America’s most inoffensive ally. When one thinks of countries that deserve to be subjected to a steady stream of insults (it’s Lake America now, not Lake Ontario) and a punishing regime of tariffs, Canada is far down the list. Ottawa has been a loyal, if occasionally annoying, friend of the United States for nearly 100 years. The presence of a well-meaning country with similar values along the 5,000-mile border to our north is a gigantic geostrategic blessing, although one that is apparently lost on Trump. Both sides deserve blame for the breakdown in negotiations, but news reports suggest it was the U.S. that made additional demands at the 11th hour. Now both sides are imposing new duties on the other, and Trump is threatening 50% tariffs on all Canadian cars, trucks and parts beginning in the new year. It is certainly true that we can impose more pain on the Canadians than they can on us and grind them down economically. We can also land the 101st Airborne in Nova Scotia. But why would we want to do it? The contention with Canada is characteristic of Trump’s economically senseless, legally dubious and politically harmful push to tariff everything and everyone he can. Trump’s imposition of all these duties — often relying on strained interpretations of U.S. statutes — has run directly counter to his promise in the 2024 campaign to reduce prices, a pledge central to his victory. Although the administration maintains that the cost of tariffs isn’t passed on to U.S. consumers — instead borne by foreign countries and producers — its actions implicitly concede the opposite. The administration excluded an array of consumer electronics from new reciprocal tariffs on China to avoid unpopular price increases, and it lifted tariffs on a long list of foodstuffs late last year. Twice this year, including about a week ago, the administration widened exceptions for beef imports. If tariffs were genuinely cost-free, none of this would have been deemed necessary by the most protectionist administration since that of Herbert Hoover. A chief argument for tariffs is that they will revive American manufacturing. Even if this is true, it’s a long-term play, whereas the disruption from tariffs is experienced
immediately. It’s also a questionable proposition: Increasing the price of imported goods used in manufacturing, which is the effect of the scattershot tariffs, doesn’t do U.S. producers any favors. It is telling that the National Association of Manufacturers opposes the sweeping tariffs. Polling consistently finds that the duties are unpopular. Majorities oppose Trump’s handling of the issue, and the public believes that the tariffs have increased prices and should be lowered. The trade war with Canada in particular fares poorly. A YouGov survey found that 62% of people oppose the imposition of 50% tariffs on many Canadian imports. At the end of the day, Trump has chosen a long-standing ideological goal and his legacy over his short-term political standing. He has advocated for major tariffs for decades and has finally gotten them. They are likely to endure, even if they hurt now. His most probable Republican successor, JD Vance, presumably wouldn’t roll them back, and the Democratic candidate in 2028 might be equally protectionist. Regardless, it’s going to be difficult for future presidents to give up the revenue generated by the duties. And so a president who campaigned on lowering prices has embraced a policy that, at the margins, increases them. Unless things are smoothed over with our Friendly Neighbor to the North, there will be more where that came from — in a dispute with a country that no one considers an economic threat to the United States. If the midterms end up sending a broad message of discontent, the tariffs will surely be a reason why. Rich Lowry is editor of the National Review. (Copyright 2026 by King Features Synd., Inc.)
BE IN TOUCH
Letters addressed to the editor may be sent to letters@nsjonline.com or 1201 Edwards Mill Rd., Suite 300, Raleigh, NC 27607. Ideas for op-eds should be sent to opinion@nsjonline.com.
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Stanly County Journal for Wednesday, January 18, 2023 Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
obituaries obituaries
to Monroe, Billy became principal of Piedmont High School in Union County. He spent the final 19 years of his professional career as principal of the Union County Career Center in Monroe. Throughout a career spanning decades, he influenced generations of students, teachers, and colleagues and remained a lifelong believer in education and the value of continuing to learn. Billy was active in his community as a member of the Monroe Rotary Club and a Paul Harris Fellow. He was a Master Mason in24, Starnes No. 348, January 1939 Lodge ~ January 15, Sept. 7, 2026 where he was2023 honored as a 50April 17, 1936 ~ January 14, 2023 year member. He also gave his Claude Billy Tyson, 89, of time to fundraising, charitable Dwight Britten Farmer Sr., 83, Barbara Taylor Drye, passed 86, Monroe,Jean North Carolina, and the community he ofcauses, Norwood died Sunday morning, of Oakboro, passed away away peacefully at hisSaturday, home on called home. January 15, 2023 at Forrest Oakes. January 14, 2023 at her home. Monday, September 7, 2026, Yet forwas all of hisJanuary education Dwight born 24,and Barbara was born April 17, 1936 surrounded by the family he professional accomplishments, 1939 in Stanly County to the late in North to the late loved.Carolina He was the son of Robert the someVirgil of Billy’s hours Walter andhappiest Martha Adkins Claude Bryan and Leelate Taylor and the lateTyson Eva Belle were spent onathe family land that Farmer. He was 1957 graduate Margarette Watts Taylor. Berniece Neill Tyson ofhad been passed downand through Norwood High School was of Union County, North Carolina. a United She was also preceded in death generations. feltVeteran. a profound States He Army The family will receive friends He by husband of 61 years, Keith Furr connection to that land and to was a member of Cedar Grove andand relatives from 5:00PM Drye, brothers, Robert Lee until thoseMethodist who had cared forwhere it before United Church he 7:00PM onGeorge Friday,Kenneth September 11, had Taylor, Jr. and him. Through the years, it was served as church treasurer anda 2026, at Gordon Funeral Service choir Taylor. place for farming, raising cattle member. He began his career and Crematory, Lancaster Survivors include1904 children, andthe horses, hunting deer. with Stanlyand County Sheriff’ s Ave, (Mike) Monroe, NC 28112. Debbie Williams of Later in moving life, hunting Department to the Norwood The family have a private Albemarle, Teresawill (Tom) Curry sometimes seemed Police Department andalmost retiring as burial at Lakeland Memorial Park Chief of Oakboro, Douglas (Tammy) beside the point. TheTown farmof was of Police with the Cemetery. where Billy the Drye of Oakboro; grandchildren, Norwood aftercould manyretreat years offrom service. At(Don) the center of of Billy’s life world, enjoy quiet, and simply Melissa Parrish Albemarle, Dwight was the an avid gardener, was his (Destiny) loving and devoted be watcher alone with thoughts. Samantha Smith of bird andhis Carolina fan. It wife and best friend, Trina Holt was his place ofbypeace. Billy was Oakboro, Bradley Smith of Oakboro, He is survived his wife Hilda Tyson, Stover with whom he recently brilliant and endlessly curious. Jonathan of Peachland, and Whitley Farmer; one son D. Britten celebrated years ofsistermarriage. He was gifted of writer and avid Jessie Stover of61 Lylesville; Farmer Jr.a(Mary) McLeansville, Their life together was filled reader who never lost desire in-law, Beatrice Goodman; many NC; one daughter Sharonhis Farmer withand family, laughter, andbeloved more to learn or toofthink deeply about nieces nephews; and her Lowe (David) Norwood; one than few of Billy’s projects, the world around him. cats, Bo a and Garfield. sister Geraldine Dennis of Troy; two antics, and He loved working the yard Barbara wasunconventional a member of grandchildren, Dwight in Britten “Dee” ideas, which Trina met with her and enjoyed cooking, frequently Oakboro Baptist Church for over Farmer III and Whitley Rose Hui patience good inventing culinary concoctions 60characteristic years. She worked over 30and years Lowe. humor. Her kindness, steadiness, that he found considerably more at Stanly Knitting Mills. After just He was preceded in death by devotion were constant appealing than the rest of his twoand years of retirement, she began his son Alex, brothers, Tommy and throughout their marriage. In his family did. managing the Oakboro Senior Jimmy, sisters, Nancy, Cornelia laterand years, for him with He had a wonderful sense of Center did she that cared for 18 years Annabell, Glennie Mae, and Betty. extraordinary tenderness and humor, loved a good story, and until this past week. Barbara was Memorials may be made to Cedar love,for remaining by his was never short on ideas. known her goodfaithfully cooking and Grove United Methodist Church, side through the end of his life. Above all, Billy was fiercely always taking care of others. She also Cemetery or Choir Fund c/o Pam also by his loyal to the people he loved. He loved Billy goingison daysurvived long shopping Smith 36071 Rocky River Springs son, Bryan Lee Tyson (Kimberly valued his family and friendships trips - she could out walk and out Road, Norwood, NC 28128. B.)people of Charlotte, Carolina, deeply and made a point of shop half her North age. She kept his daughter, Dr. Julia A. Tyson staying connected, frequently her mind and body active through Snyder (Blaine J., II) of Trade, picking up the telephone to call gardening, word searches, and Tennessee, and his nephew, or sending a card simply to let various other hobbies. William “Billy” Pierce Straitiff someone know he was thinking Williams of Monroe, North of them. He could be stubborn, Carolina. certainly, but he was also His five grandchildren, Alice thoughtful, loving, and generous Tyson, Audrey Tyson, Adam with the people fortunate enough Tyson, Trina Tyson, and Mary to be his. Tyson, were among the great joys Among the most beloved of his later years. members of Billy and Trina’s He was preceded in death by household is their dog, Jasmine, his parents and his sister, Peggy his faithful companion whom O’Neil Tyson Straitiff. Billy lived Billy adored. Billy’s family a life marked by intellectual has deep roots at Bethlehem curiosity, education, service, and United Methodist Church in a deep commitment to the people Waxhaw, North Carolina, where and places he loved. generations of his family have A graduate of Mineral Springs been laid to rest. High School, he earned degrees Billy leaves behind an from Pfeiffer University, Duke extraordinary collection of University, and Appalachian State stories, lessons, laughter, and University. memories, along with a family During his high school years, shaped by his fierce loyalty, Billy earned the rank of Eagle restless curiosity, and love, Scout and lettered in basketball and on the land, he cherished, his senior year. He went on to among the family and friends letter in basketball all four years whose lives he touched, and in at Pfeiffer College and attended the generations who follow him, a Duke on a graduate teaching part of Billy will always remain. assistantship in biology. The family respectfully Billy devoted his professional requests no food or flowers. Any life to education. He began his memorials should be made to career teaching biology and Bethlehem United Methodist chemistry at Albemarle Senior Church or to the charity of your High School, where he also choice. coached women’s basketball and Online condolences both women’s and men’s tennis. may be made at www. He later served in elementary gordonfuneralservice.com and high school principalships Gordon Funeral Service & in Mount Airy, North Carolina, Crematory, 1904 Lancaster Ave, and as an assistant professor in Monroe, NC 28112, is honored to the Department of Education at be entrusted to care for the Tyson Pfeiffer University. After returning Family.
Claude Billy
Barbara Jean Tyson (Taylor) Drye
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Dwight Farmer
Celebrate the life of your loved ones. Submit obituaries and death notices to be published in SCJ at obits@stanlyjournal.com
IN MEMORY
KELLY BROWN
DELLA KIMBLE STARNES OCT. 16, 1940 – SEPT. 3, 2026
MARCH 26, 1959 – SEPT. 6, 2026
Della Kimble Starnes, 85, of New London, passed Kelly Brown, 67, of Stanfield, passed away Sunday, away on Thursday, September 3, 2026, at Tucker September 6, 2026, at home. Hospice House. Kelly was born March 26, 1959, in North Carolina to A funeral service will be held at 2:00 p.m. on the late Jimmy Harold Poplin and the late Sue Burris Tuesday, September 8, 2026, in the Stanly Funeral Poplin. She was also preceded in death by her son, Home Chapel in Albemarle, with Pastor Ron Loflin Aaron Murray Pattenick. officiating. Burial will follow at Stanly Gardens of Kelly was a loving mother who was most proud of Memory. The family will receive friends from 12:00 her daughter Taylor and all of her accomplishments. until 1:45 p.m. prior to the service at Stanly Funeral Kelly shared a deep and special love for her significant and Cremation Care in Albemarle. other, Ron, who was an important part of her life for 18 Della was born on October 16, 1940, in Cabarrus years. Kelly loved her fur baby Harley, who was always to the late John 10, and2023 Helen Kimble. her side. 9, She enjoyed traveling to the beach and JuneCounty 23, 1967 ~ January March 23, 1935 by - January She is lovingly survived by her husband of 58 2023making memories. October 11,from 1944 - January 10, years,Arthur Teddy Roseboro, Starnes. Those The family will receive friends 5:00 pm James 55, ofalso left to cherish 2023 her memory include her children, WendyJohn Starnes7:00 pm, Thursday, September 10, 2026 at Hartsell Albemarle, passed away Tuesday, grew up in the Millingport Reynolds, andat Derek Starnes grandchildren, January 10, 2023 Anson Health(Christy); community where heFuneral drove aHome schoolof Albemarle. Doris Elaine Jones Coleman, 78, Michael Reynolds (Haleigh), Graham Matthew Survivors Taylor Eudy; significant and Seth Rehab. bus and worked at the local gas include daughter, went home into Buddy God’s presence Reynolds (Morgan), Hunter and his High other, Ron years. St. Arnauld; and brother, Poplin. on Mr. Roseboro was born on Starnes (Victoria), station during School 10 afterthank a sudden Starnes (Paul); great-granddaughter, Eloise Family would like January to say a special you illness to her and JuneKylee 23, 1967 to the late Robert He graduated from Millingport a valiant fight ICU. and Roseboro. brother, Donnie (Linda). Hospice Teresa,week-long and Crystal, forinthe and Reynolds; Delena Shipp He KimbleHigh in 1954 and entered intoNurses, Lisa, Doris was born on October 11, In addition to her parents, Della was preceded in love, care, and support given to Kelly during her time graduated from South Stanly service with the US Airforce by and her siblings, John Thomas “Bo” Kimble, Jr. 1944, in the mountains of Marion, withUpon them. Highdeath School was employed by immediately afterward. and Gloria Anderson. NC while her father was away Triangle Brick.“Sissy” He enjoyed watching return from the service, he and his was a devoted wife, mother, fighting in the US Navy during footballDella and basketball, especially the grandmother, high school sweetheart Julie were and great-grandmother whose greatest joy was found World WarKIRK II. Raymond Jones was Carolina TarHeels and Miami. married in 1956. He graduated fromRICHARD the people sheparents loved. Family the heart of her so proud to return after the war and Ininaddition to his he is was atNashville Auto Diesel College later DEC.in15, 1936 – SEPT. 6, 2026 life, and she especially treasured the time she spent meet his little girl! Doris grew up in preceded in death by his brothers 1959 and began his career as a diesel herBarbara grandchildren. She and Teddy shared many Durham, NC and graduated from and with sisters: Lee Roseboro, mechanic at Mitchell Distributing Richard David Lee Kirk, 89, of Richfield, NC, was wonderful years together and enjoyed fishing in Adam Durham High School. She furthered Dorothy Brown, Verna Roseboro, Company, moving his growing called peacefully to his heavenly home on Sunday, & Eve tournaments, creating memories that became her studies at Watts Hospital Henrietta Ingram, and Harold family to Charlotte where they lived September 6, 2026. a special part of their life together. School of Nursing in Durham and Roseboro. until their retirement. Richard was born in Stanly County on December also loved trips to the beach, working in her graduated as a Registered Nurse in He isDella survived by his sisters: When John purchased his first 15, 1936, to the late Jodie Edward Kirk and the late garden, and the companionship of her beloved cat, 1966. Helen (James) Roseboro Edwards Model A Ford at the age of 17, he Bertha Drye Kirk. “Lucky.” She enjoyed dancing, especially shagging, Doris married Rev. Dr. Ted of Albemarle, Mary Roseboro member of Wesley Chapel said that he took the carRichard to the was an active and carried with her a love for the simple pleasures Coleman in 1966 and had two of Washington DC, and Marion UMC. After retiring from Alcoa, he enjoyed many community mechanic when he had that made life meaningful. Whether spending time daughters Amy and Laura. Doris Morrison of Albemarle; brothers: years volunteering at the Community Table and small problem.The mechanic told with family, enjoying the outdoors, orasharing a dance, Amy and Laura North Thomas D. Roseboro of Charlotte, Meals on Wheels. Heraised served in the US Armyinand was him that if he was going to keep the Della embraced the moments that brought happiness Augusta, SC. Robert Roseboro (Patricia) of a volunteer Fireman for Richfield-Misenheimer Fire car, he needed to learn to work on to those around her. Doris was an incredible neonatal Norwood, and Van Horne; a special it. This is when John’Department. s passion for The family would like to express their sincere intensive care nurse for most friend of over 40 years, Michelle In addition to his parents, he was preceded in of her Model A Fords gratitude to the staff of Tucker Hospice House for thebegan and how he career, and this was her passion. McLendon of the home; special death by his first wife, Billie Faye Ridenhour Kirk; spent his happiest days with his best compassionate care, kindness, and support provided The Augusta Chronicle did a feature nieces: Nybrea Montague, Knya Lucille Hamilton, Exie Wilson, and Katherine friendshealth. from aroundsisters, the globe for the to Della and her family during her declining on her in 1985. She was aKirk. clinical Little, and Laquanza Crump; special Burris; and brothers, Charlie Kirk and Lewis rest ofofhis life! Della leaves behind the beautiful legacy a life manager in Augusta, Georgia nephews: Robert Jr., Desmond He is survived by nurse his wife, Kathleen Miller Kirk; At age 50, after years as a Detroit centered around love, family, and cherished time at University Hospital NICU and Roseboro, and Marcus Lilly; and daughter, Karen (Trent) Culp; sons Ryan (Sally) Kirk Diesel Mechanic he and Julie together. Though she will be deeply missed, the worked there for 20 years. and Kristopher(Lily) Kirk; and grandson, EmeryDuring Godmemories daughter, made Daphne Johnson; and decided to take the plunge and throughout her 58 years of marriage, this time, Doris mentored young (Jenny) Culp. special friends, Vetrella Johnson and open a full Model A Restoration the joy she found in her children and grandchildren, nurses and assisted in saving There willinbe a graveside service on Friday at the Benand McLendon. Shop. They thrived at their shop the love she so freely shared will remain a lasting lives of so many babies. She also 10:00 am at New Bethel Lutheran Church in Richfield, source of comfort to all who knew andCornelius, loved her.NC until their retirement worked for Pediatrician Dr. William officiated Shrader. in 1998 when they moved backby toRev. Kelly A. Wilkes ininAugusta formemory several be made Richard’s Cabarrus County. JohnMemorial once againgifts may yearsChurch, prior toc/o herCemetery NICU career. Doris to yard New garage Bethel Lutheran set up shop in his back DAPHINE POPLIN PICKLER retiredRogers from the mother/baby area at Road, Richfield, NC where he attracted aMaintenance loyal group ofFund, 21746 Atrium Stanly in 2007 after over 40 FEB. 25, 1941 – SEPT. 4,friends 2026 who visited almost 28137 daily. or Wesley Chapel UMC Cemetery Maintenance of nursing. Misenheimer, NC 28109. While on the farm inFund, Gold P.O. Hill,Box 1532,years Miss Daphine Poplin Pickler, 85, of New London Doris was a gentle and sweet John also began a lifelong love with passed away on September 4, 2026, at The Greens at spirit and loved her Lord. She never Alis Chalmers tractors after he Cabarrus. met a stranger, and she always left restored his Dad’s tractor and began Her funeral service will be on Thursday, September you feeling uplifted after talking amassing his collection of tractors 10, 2026, at 2:00 p.m. in the Stanly Funeral Home with her. She would often claim that as well. Chapel in Albemarle. Rev. Jody Yopp and Rev. Charles she had “adopted” friends into her John restored many cars of Hensley will officiate the service. Burial will follow immediate family, and honestly, she his own and had the crowning in Fairview Memorial Park. The family will receive never made a distinction between achievement of winning the most friends on Wednesday evening, September 9, 2026, the two. Positivity radiated from her prestigious award from MARC, The from 6:00 p.m. until 8:00 p.m. at Stanly Funeral and like sunlight. She was selfless, funny, Henry for a restoration that garnered Cremation Care of Albemarle. smart, and sentimental. During her top points. He was also presented She was born February 25, 1941, in Stanly County, lifetime she was an active member with the Ken Brady Service Award NC, and was the daughter of the late Claude Franklin of First Baptist Church of Durham, the Pickler, highest and award given to members Pickler and the late Mary Earnest First Baptist Church of Augusta, January 7, 1973 ~ January 8, Poplin at the national level. the granddaughter Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church 2023 of the late Pleasant Cornelius is what (Neal) Pickler, Emma Frances Harwood This Pickler, and John’s Model A in Augusta, and Palestine United Community had to say upon the lateVashon Jacob Laster Poplin (Mattie Methodist Church in Albemarle. Darrick Baldwin, age and 50, Martha learning his death: or Matt) Rowetta LowderJanuary Poplin. In addition toof her She especially loved helping at entered eternal rest, Sunday, He was active member of parents and grand parents she was preceded in an death church with older adults, youth, and 8, 2023, Albemarle, North Carolina. Wesley5,Chapel her sister Shelva Pickler December 2018. Methodist Church children. Bornby January 7, 1973, in Jean Stanly where he loved wasCarolina, a member of the First Church of serving as greeter on She was especially talented County,She North Darrick was Baptist Sunday He also belonged New Inc., since August Shemornings. had 73 at sewing from a young the son ofLondon, Eddie James Baldwin Sr. 26, 1951. Celebrate the life of age and to the United Methodist Men. years ofPhyllis Sunday School perfect attendance pins. She made gifts for friends, Christmas and the late Blue Baldwin. John is survived by his wife wasenjoyed a bookkeeper for 35kept years at Lowder Hardware your loved ones.Halloween SubmitCostumes, ornaments, Darrick life, always Ussery Kluttz, for 66 years Company and in the office of Lowder Julie Supply doll clothes, pageant dresses, prom things lively and enjoyed making obituaries and death notices the home. Company, Thomasville, NC. She also of worked five He is also survived dresses, coats, tote bags, others smile. His presence is no a son John to be published in Stanlyscarves, years in the office of Hartsell Funeral by Home and wasDavid Kluttz (Kim) outfits for Amy and Laura, and longer in our midst, but his memory of Oakboro, NC; two daughters, the bookkeeper for Norview Gardens. In 1959, she News Journal atgowns obits@ Christening for each of her will forever live in our hearts. Sallyand Simerson of Denver, CO and graduated from New London High School went to grandchildren. He was educated in the Stanly stanlynewsjournal.com Betsy Tusa (John) of Lafayette, CO; Morgan Business College. Doris was preceded in death by County public schools and attended grandchildren, Bonnie Kluttz Miss Pickler was very active in her three church, where her father Arthur Raymond Jones, Albemarle Senior High School, Sammons (Ben) of Richfield, NC she served on the following committees: Co-Director her mother Mary Ellen Cameron Albemarle. John Sunday Alexander McKinnon (Sarah) for the JOY Makers for 13 years, Assistant Jones, and her sister Maryanne He was a great conversationalist of Asheville, NC and Seth William School Teacher, Training Union Teacher, Sunday Jones Brantley. and loved meeting people. Darrick McKinnon (Amanda) of Germany; School Director, Finance, Music, Nominating, Flower, Survivors include her two never met a stranger and always five great-grandchildren, Charlotte, Counting and Assistant Church Treasurer, former precious daughters: Amy Cameron showed love and compassion for his Meredith, Choir Member, and a Messenger to the Baptist Grant, Victoria and Coleman (partner Dr. Edward Neal fellowman. He also loved his dog, Ronan.was John is also preceded in Association. She made the church bulletins, Chernault) of Albemarle, NC, and Rocky. death by histhe parents, J.S. Kluttz and Chairman of the Church Historian, and compiled Laura Lindahl Coleman Oliverio He is survived by his father, Clayton Kluttz; a large 100th year book. She was a member Mary of the Wyatt I. G. Greer (husband David) of Cincinnati, Ohio; Eddie J. Baldwin Sr.; sisters: Crystal andofloving group of brothers and Society of the Baptist Children’s Homes NC and seven grandchildren: Cameron (Eric) Jackson, LaFondra (Stoney) Jack Methias Kluttz, Annie was on the first Friend of the Childrensisters, Committee for David Oliverio, Stephanie Jae Dejak, Medley, and Morgan Baldwin; Lou Kluttz Honeycutt, Jake Nelson the Baptist Children’s Homes of NC, Thomasville. Luca Beatty Oliverio, Coleman John brothers: Eddie Baldwin Jr., Anton Kluttz, Julius Kluttz, Mary Patricia Miss Pickler is survived by a number of cousins; Dejak, Carson Joseph Oliverio, Ryan Baldwin, and Lamont Baldwin; a and Linda Phillips a grandson, Kevin special neighbors, Don Shaver andand Mark Nicholas Dejak, and Jadon Richard hostSample; of other relatives and friends. A Fowler Kluttz. and her special dog, Sweet Pepper. Oliverio; and numerous in-laws, limb has fallen from ourbefamily Memorials may madetree. to Baptist Children’s nieces, nephews, cousins, and loved We will not grieve Darrick’ s death; Homes of NC, P.O. Box 338, Thomasville, NC 27361ones. we will celebrate his life. We give 0338.
James Roseboro
Darrick Baldwin
thanksgiving for the many shared memories.
John B. Kluttz
Doris Jones Coleman
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
HATLEY from page A1 commissioners to avoid conflicts and allows the board to issue sanctions, including censure or removal from committee assignments. Crump supported the censure, saying the investigation could substantiate the allegations or clear Hatley. “If the investigation happens and we find out that there was nothing to this, then he needs to be vindicated publicly,” Crump said. “So undoubtedly, this situation does have the appearance of impropriety, and it’s most definitely had an impact on public trust, so I say let the investigation speak for itself.” Before the vote, Mills asked Hatley directly whether he had contacted Vang about the pending matter. “Mr. Mills, I have never violated my oath of office as county commissioner,” Hatley responded. “I have never violated my ethical obligation as a county commissioner. That’s all I’ve got to say.” Mills repeated the question and asked whether Hatley denied discussing a judicial decision with any court authori-
COURTESY STANLYTV
The Stanly County Board of Commissioners censured Commissioner Trent Hatley during Tuesday night’s meeting. ty. Hatley answered each time, “That’s all I’ve got to say.” “This is why I voted the way I did,” Mills said later on. “I asked him to deny that he had approached or had talked to Judge Vang, and he wouldn’t answer that direct question.” County Manager Andy Lucas previously explained that censure would not remove Hatley from office, restrict his voting rights or otherwise limit his service. Lawhon said he objected to the money allocated for the investigation: “Ten thousand dollars is a waste of taxpayer dollars.
If (Pinkston) wants to sue (Hatley), she can hire an attorney.” After Lawhon questioned Barbee about supporting the expenditure despite his record of fiscal conservatism, Barbee defended the investigation. “I vote to look after the people of this county,” Barbee said. “I think $10,000 would be well spent to find out if this county government is being run correctly.” The commissioners will hold their next regular meeting Oct. 5 at 6 p.m. in the Gene McIntyre Meeting Room at Stanly County Commons.
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Salvadorans sent home $9.9 billion last year, a quarter of the nation’s economy By Gisela Salomon The Associated Press MIAMI — A deadline for the Trump administration to decide whether about 200,000 immigrants from El Salvador can remain protected from deportation has passed without any public announcement, raising hopes among many for another six-month extension while also sowing confusion. The Department of Homeland Security has been quiet about its plans, leaving attorneys and advocates scrambling to decipher what might happen next to Salvadorans who have been raising families in the U.S. for decades. On Thursday, Homeland Security issued a statement saying the department would make an announcement “at an appropriate time” and that Temporary Protected Status for El Salvador would stay in effect until then. The department issued the same statement during Wednesday's deadline. “Let’s be clear: this is not an official extension or decision by DHS as to the fate of TPS for El Salvador,” Ben Johnson, who directs the American Immigration Lawyers Association, posted Wednesday on social media. The Trump administration is leaving TPS holders, their families and their employers in limbo, he said. TPS allows people already in the country to remain, with work permits, for renewable periods of up to 18 months, if the Homeland Security secretary determines conditions are unsafe for their return. Under immigration law, the status is automatically extended for six months if the government takes no action. Some attorneys are cautioning that the administration could eliminate the protections without making a public statement or announce a decision at any time. Meanwhile, the absence of an announcement has raised expectations that Salvadoran immigrants could be spared the fates of hundreds of thousands of immigrants from other countries whose protected status has ended during President Donald Trump's second term. In May, protections were automatically extended for six months for about 11,000 Lebanese. Administration ended protections for more than dozen countries In Trump’s second term, Homeland Security has ended TPS for more than 1 million people from more than a dozen countries, including Venezuela, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Afghanistan and Syria. In addition to the Salvadorans, about 103,000 people, from Ukraine, Sudan and Lebanon,
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Trump admin silence has 200K Salvadoran immigrants hoping they’re protected “Let’s be clear: this is not an official extension or decision by DHS as to the fate of TPS for El Salvador.” Ben Johnson, American Immigration Lawyers Association have remained protected from deportation under TPS. The Trump administration notched a major victory when the Supreme Court ruled in June that it acted within its authority by ending TPS for about 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians. Tom Homan, Trump’s “border czar” who has advocated for ending TPS, said Tuesday that the decision for El Salvador rests with Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin. “If it expires, it’s up to the secretary,” Homan said. “Temporary protected status means temporary. Let’s face it, El Salvador is a much safer country than it’s ever been now with a new president up there.” Congress created temporary protections in 1990 TPS was created by Congress in 1990 to prevent deportations to countries suffering from natural disasters or civil strife. It was granted to El Salvador following two devastating 2001 earthquakes that left hundreds of thousands of people homeless. Just before leaving office, President Joe Biden extended it for El Salvador for 18 months to Sept. 9, 2026. El Salvador been ally to Trump El Salvador, once one of the most violent places in the world due to organized crime, has become one of the safest countries in the Americas since Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele cracked down on gang members in 2022. But human rights advocates have denounced mass and arbitrary arrests, torture and disappearances in its prison system. Bukele has supported Trump’s deportation campaign, and his government was among the first to receive deportees, holding them in a mega prison known as CECOT. But mass deportations of his own citizens could shock El Salvador's economy. Salvadorans in the U.S. sent home $9.9 billion in remittances last year, representing 24% of El Salvador's gross domestic product, its central bank said. The two leaders have met twice in Washington, D.C., since last April. In 2019, during the first Trump administration, Bukele asked Trump to extend TPS. Bukele has not said publicly if he has requested another extension.
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MARK SCHIEFELBEIN / AP PHOTO
President Donald Trump greets El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele in March at the Shield of the Americas Summit at Trump National Doral Miami in Doral, Florida.
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
Artemis II moonshot commander, pilot hanging up suits at NASA They will mentor staff as emeritus astronauts while pursuing new paths By Marcia Dunn The Associated Press CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — The two NASA astronauts who led the Artemis II moonshot earlier this year are stepping away from spaceflight. NASA announced Wednesday that Artemis II commander Reid Wiseman and pilot Victor Glover will no longer serve as active astronauts but will continue to support the moon exploration program as emeritus astronauts. Glover has taken a leadership job at his alma mater, California Polytechnic State University, while Wiseman’s future plans weren’t disclosed. They flew around the moon in April with two other astronauts, setting a new distance record for humanity. Artemis II’s Jeremy Hansen retired from the Canadian Space Agency in July. That leaves North Carolina native Christina Koch as the only crew member still on the active astronaut rolls. As emeritus astronauts,
Wiseman and Glover will donate their time to train and mentor NASA workers and share their knowledge for future moon missions. It’s a new approach to taking advantage of expertise, according to the space agency. “Together, they took on one of the most challenging missions in human spaceflight and helped return America to the lunar environment,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said in a statement. “I’m grateful they will continue sharing what they learned.” Cal Poly said Glover will help shape long-term strategies and inspire students to study science and engineering. His new job in San Luis Obispo took effect Sept. 1, the same day he retired from the Navy. In an interview with The Associated Press, Glover stressed “this is not a leaving ... for me, this is opening the aperture, not closing it down. “I want to keep talking about how faith and science work together in my life. That’s not NASA’s mission, but I can still help NASA from the sidelines.” Instead of waiting to command a moon-landing mission, Glover said he decided to put spaceflight behind in order to focus his efforts on young people
KAREN WARREN / AP PHOTO
Artemis II Pilot Victor Glover, left, and Commander Reid Wiseman participate in a Congressional Space Medal of Honor ceremony at NASA’s Johnson Space Center on Aug. 28 in Houston. and spend more time with his wife and four daughters. Three of his daughters are currently enrolled at Cal Poly. The oldest has already graduated from there. Wiseman’s status change will take effect this month. Chosen by NASA as an astronaut in 2009, the retired Navy captain spent more than five months aboard the International Space Station in 2014, later becoming the space agency’s chief astronaut. After graduating from Cal Poly in 1999, Glover became a Navy test pilot before NASA picked him to be an astronaut in 2013. He served as pilot on
“This is not a leaving ... for me, this is opening the aperture, not closing it down.” Victor Glover, Artemis II pilot SpaceX’s second crew flight for NASA, a nearly six-month mission to the space station in 2020 and 2021. Glover’s eloquence stood out while flying to and from the moon. Earth is an oasis in “a whole bunch of nothing, this thing we
call the universe” where humanity exists as one, he observed from space. “This is an opportunity for us to remember where we are, who we are, and that we are the same thing and that we’ve got to get through this together.” Wiseman also tugged at heartstrings as he and his crew asked for permission to name one of the moon’s craters after his late wife Carroll, who died of cancer in 2020. Last month, the Artemis II crew received the Congressional Space Medal of Honor from President Donald Trump during a ceremony at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Trump defends Iran war, slams Democrats, promises citizens cash at Republicans’ midterm convention The convention highlighted GOP efforts to overcome voter concerns about the economy and an unpopular war
“Vote Republican and we will leave the world in our dust for generations to come.” President Donald Trump
By Jill Colvin, Thomas Beaumont and Will Weissert The Associated Press DALLAS, Texas — President Donald Trump capped Wednesday’s opening night of the unusual Republican midterm convention by slamming Democrats as extremists and staunchly defending the war in Iran while making the extraordinary pledge to pay every adult American $5,000 if his party retains its control of both chambers of Congress after November. The proposal, which could cost at least $1 trillion, was financially and politically implausible. But it reflected Trump’s apparent calculation that he needs bold moves to revive Republicans’ chances as Democrats try to take advantage of his low approval ratings in close races across the country. Trump reveled in making the upcoming elections all about himself, even though it’s unclear whether that will help or hurt his party. Many Republicans are skipping the two-day affair in Dallas, Texas, while others hoped their appearance would put them in the national spotlight as they work to turn out Trump’s supporters in a year without him on the ballot. “If we hand America’s future to the radical-left Democrats, our nation will spend the next decade just getting back on its feet,” Trump said. “Vote Republican and we will leave the world in our dust for generations to come.” The president urged the crowd to pretend he’s running in November and said there were about 35 key races in the Senate and House as his party hopes to maintain congressional control. He pledged “to go to everyone one of those states,” suggesting he might visit some repeatedly. But Trump also frequently mentioned the unpopular war in Iran, even seeming to acknowledge that it had hurt the U.S. economy. “We were doing great,” he said before he ap-
lican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is in a tough Senate race in normally what is America’s largest red state. “He may not talk exactly perfectly, and he may not be the best-looking guy I’ve ever seen,” Trump said of Paxton, while adding, “he deserves to be your next senator.” The convention got a boost from an unlikely source — Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, who said in a video message, “I’m always going to reject the extremes and socialism.” Fetterman, who has clashed with his party’s leaders, referenced his state’s steel industry in pledging to “work with President Trump to fight and defend the steel way of life.”
signs reading “Republicans Are Fixing Democrats’ Mess,” despite Republicans controlling the U.S. House, Senate and presidency. During the early hours of programming, speeches were delivered to scores of empty seats, even in areas close to the stage. Crowds began mostly filling them before Trump’s speech, though areas in the upper decks remained sparsely populated. Trump was set to follow up Wednesday’s address with closing remarks Thursday, after Vice President JD Vance gives his own speech. “I’m not doing a big deal like this,” Trump said, wrapping up his opening night address that approached the two-hour mark. Ray Washburne, co-chair of the Dallas host committee, said the event is expected to draw roughly 30,000 people across both nights, but getting airtime was challenging. The NFL season kicked off Wednesday with a game between the Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots. On Thursday, the San Francisco 49ers and the Los Angeles Rams will play in Australia.
Lineup of Trump, more Trump
Key candidates have turns on stage
Normal political conventions are held every four years and serve a purpose beyond pomp and circumstance, with parties formally nominating their presidential picks. This week’s convention, by contrast, is The Trump Show, through and through. The walls of the arena where the Dallas Mavericks play were covered with photographs of Trump, even in the elevators. Plenty of attendees wore cowboy hats and boots, and many sequins were on display — as well as “Make America Great Again” and American flag caps and other gear. People in the crowd waved
Speakers included Republican congressional leadership and Cabinet members. Attorney General Todd Blanche also spoke, which is uncommon for the nation’s top law enforcement official, as Justice Department leaders don’t typically address such events given the agency’s tradition of political independence. Blanche said Trump and Vance “put American families first. They prove that order and prosperity go hand in hand.” Republican Michigan Senate nominee Mike Rogers, who is facing off against Abdul El-Sayed, was set to give his speech Thursday night. Howev-
TONY GUTIERREZ / AP PHOTO
President Donald Trump speaks at the Republican convention in Dallas, Texas, on Wednesday. proached his economic advisers to say, “I hate to do this to you,” explaining that he needed to start the conflict because Iran was perhaps “two, maybe three weeks away from having a nuclear weapon.” Trump similarly defended imposing sweeping tariffs on U.S. trade partners, insisting the resulting economic turmoil would be worth it in the long run. His most dramatic comments, however, were to promise, “If the Republicans win the Senate and House, because of our tremendous strength and success economically, I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000.” The president said the only caveat would be that recipients spend the money in the U.S. He provided no details on how such a plan would be implemented but declared, “It will be called the Trump dividend.” Convention part rally, part fundraiser The gathering took place as Republicans try to boost enthusiasm heading into the final stretch before Election Day despite voters’ economic concerns and dissatisfaction with the war in Iran. The event described Democrats as communists, anti-American or even evil. Republicans called themselves a “commonsense” alternative. Trump used several minutes of his speech to praise Repub-
er, many opening night speakers singled out El-Sayed as a sign Democrats were too radical. There are 12 hours of programming over two nights, with 100-plus speakers and segments focused on subjects such as tax cuts, fraud allegations and border security. Trump also hinted that he’d talk a lot about Iran even before leaving for Dallas. As he spoke to reporters on the tarmac prior to boarding Air Force One, the president said that oil prices — which have surged because of the conflict — likely won’t come down until after the midterms, a bit of economic forecasting that could darken his party’s fortunes. “Right after the election, oil prices are going to be tumbling downward,” he promised as oil prices jumped more than 3% Wednesday. Organizers say they’re fine with some Republicans skipping convention Some Republicans balked at high attendance fees. Republican House members were being asked to pay $25,000 for convention tickets and lodging, according to people familiar with the situation and granted anonymity to speak frankly about the private arrangement. An additional 2,000 tickets were distributed by the National Republican Congressional Committee, largely to donors and others to attend the convention. Other tickets were allocated to state parties to distribute as they saw fit. “Per the RNC, this is a ticketed fundraiser and rally, not a traditional national convention,” the Denton County Republican Party in Texas wrote in a Facebook post, which advertised packages from $5,000 to $20,000. Trump’s political operation, which has been sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars, began spending heavily through a new group, the No Going Back PAC Inc., the New York Times reported Wednesday. The group has reserved $49 million in six competitive Senate races and one competitive House race. That’s in addition to the $10 million that MAGA Inc., Trump’s super PAC, has spent on the Texas Senate race.
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
In North Carolina, race is on to restore critical peatland before it dries up or is destroyed The ancient peatlands store more carbon than all forests combined but remain largely unprotected
By Tammy Webber and Joshua A. Bickel The Associated Press BELHAVEN — The birds are up with the sunrise — warblers, flycatchers, sparrows and towhees calling across the treetops. Deer browse on tender buds emerging from dense shrubs. Black bears scrounge for roots, insects and other edibles. It’s an idyllic setting in North Carolina’s Inner Banks, where fields of cotton, soybeans and corn stretch for miles, country roads wend through stands of pines and thousands of bird watchers converge to witness the spring migration. But it’s what’s underground that has drawn scientists and investors to this 23-square-mile tract: spongy, dense peat up to 15 feet deep. They’re here to save it. Fifty miles of ditches dug decades ago for an abandoned farming venture drained much of the water from thousands of years of accumulated peat, leaving the site vulnerable to drought and wildfires, altering its native habitats — and allowing it to emit 130,000 tons of climate-warming carbon dioxide a year. “Our goal is for perpetuity to conserve these lands so they can’t become oil and gas fields, so they’re not mined for phosphorus or turned into parking lots and shopping centers,” said Tripp Wall, CEO of Colorado-based company Pantheon Regeneration. “They’re just these incredible systems that I feel are underappreciated here in the U.S. (that) for 10,000 to 15,000 years have been climatologically resilient until we screwed them up.” Peatlands are a climate paradox. Though they account for just 3% of global land surface, they store one-third of the Earth’s carbon dioxide, more than all forests combined. But when degraded — primarily when farmers lower the water table to grow crops — destroyed or burned, they become part of the problem, releasing huge volumes of greenhouse gases, now about 6% of the annual global total from all sources. And the type of peatlands found in North Carolina, and for hundreds of miles along the Eastern Seaboard, are among the most threatened in the world. Pantheon plans to reverse the damage by blocking off ditches to control the water table and significantly reduce carbon dioxide emissions. Then it will cull invasive species and replant native grasses, flowers and other plants. The restoration is modeled after other projects by nonprofits and government agencies, including at the adjacent 175-square-mile Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge — one of the largest peatland restoration projects in the U.S. — which provides habitat for threatened and endangered species such as red wolves, yellow pitcher plants and Atlantic white cedar, and has become an important stopover for migrating birds such as Tundra swans. But what sets apart Pantheon’s project is a plan to sell carbon credits to tech companies and other corporations that want to compensate for their own greenhouse gas emissions and then use the money to restore and preserve a million acres of peatland from Virginia to northern Florida over the next decade. Each property will be permanently conserved and rewilded — “big corridors, big birding habitats, big biodiversity hotspots that have an outsized impact on climate,” said Wall. Ancient ecosystems under threat Neal Flanagan pushes a metal tube through roots and around buried logs until it sinks about 3 feet. When he pulls it out, it’s packed with black soil. Near the surface, it’s dry and
JOSHUA A. BICKEL / AP PHOTO
Neal Flanagan, right, a research scientist at Duke University, uses a tool to take a soil sample from a peatland as Curt Richardson, an ecology professor at Duke, observes May 6 in Belhaven.
“Our goal is for perpetuity to conserve these lands so they can’t become oil and gas fields, so they’re not mined for phosphorus or turned into parking lots and shopping centers.” Tripp Wall, Pantheon Regeneration CEO
JOSHUA A. BICKEL / AP PHOTO
A bracken plant grows out of peatland soil May 6 in Belhaven. full of dead fibers from plants like wood fern, blueberry and Lyonia. The middle is crumbly, moist and odorless, with bits of charcoal from long-ago fires. But the saturated bottom, 50% carbon, is the consistency of axle grease. “This is the black gold,” said Flanagan’s colleague, Duke University ecologist Curtis Richardson, as ancient peat oozes from his closed fist. Its “magnitude and importance cannot be underestimated,” he added. When peatlands are intact, gases generated by decomposing plants are trapped in a waterlogged, oxygen-deprived environment, while surface vegetation absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, scientists say. That makes ancient, intact peatlands a carbon vault up to 50 feet deep in some parts of the world. They also store about 10% of global fresh water, help control flooding and can help stem wildfires. But two-thirds of temperate peatlands — mostly in Europe and the U.S. — have been dewatered, while about 45% of tropical peatlands have been similarly disturbed, according to a 2025 study published by The Society for Conservation Biology. Boreal peatlands, or those in colder climates in places like Canada and Russia, are about 90% intact but face growing pressure from thawing permafrost and intense fires, both linked to climate change, as well as mining and critical minerals exploration. At the same time, only 17% of global peatlands are officially protected, according to the study. In the U.S., significant amounts of peat are also found in Alaska, Florida, parts of the Northeast and the northern
Great Lakes, though the type of domed peatlands found in North Carolina exist only along the Eastern Seaboard. Called Pocosin peat, it formed from coastal pine forests and evergreen shrubs that decayed over millennia. In North Carolina alone, 11,000 miles of canals drain peatlands before the water empties into coastal estuaries, Richardson said. Combined with climate change, that leaves them vulnerable to the greatest threat to peatlands globally: catastrophic fire. Peatland fires can burn for months Blackened tree trunks rise above bushes and dry grasses, the only sign that a fire burned almost 2,000 acres here four years ago, lowering the ground by a foot and a half in some places. It could have been worse, but the North Carolina Forest Service and other agencies extinguished it fairly quickly — in about three weeks — pumping water from nearby lakes to prevent it from spreading into the wildlife refuge, which borders Pantheon’s property on three sides. A 2008 fire that began during a drought burned for three months above ground and smoldered for another four underground, damaging more than a quarter of the refuge and lowering the ground by several feet in some areas, refuge manager Sarah Toner said. In areas where water-level restoration had begun, though, the fire burned less deeply. Saturated peatlands are nearly fireproof: Just the sur-
face vegetation and a few inches of peat burn, which releases nutrients, regenerates seed banks and creates beneficial biochar. But when they’re dry, fire can burn underground for weeks or months — drying out and destroying even the saturated layers — emitting enormous volumes of carbon dioxide and destroying thousands of years of accumulation. “We’ll lose 5, 6 feet of peat in a matter of weeks, which equates to millions of tons of carbon loss — ancient carbon loss that we simply can’t ever get back in human lifetimes,” Richardson said. That’s why Pantheon is moving quickly to restore the North Carolina site, Wall said. Although the company hopes to also buy intact peatlands, its first priority is drained sites. “There’s this urgency to start with what’s degraded now,” Wall said, “before it goes away.” Project aims to restore native biodiversity Steve Apfelbaum steers his SUV down grassy, rutted lanes, then hops out to listen intently, occasionally peering through binoculars. He smiles when he hears prairie warblers, a bird whose population is declining. “We heard hundreds of them today,” said Apfelbaum, a plant and animal ecologist conducting breeding and migratory bird surveys at the site. “What that tells me is that this ecosystem is really important” for the species’ migration. He hears Nashville warblers that call from the tops of trees but nest in cavities in the peat. Peatlands are key to helping preserve bird populations,
which are declining across all habitats, said Apfelbaum: “All sorts of cool birds will be back.” So will native reptiles, plants, fish and insects, said Vlad Roosevelt, Pantheon’s operations director, who’s overseeing the restoration. The company already released a pair of red wolves a couple years ago that have since had pups. Carbon credits, sometimes controversial, central to the project Carbon credits work like this: Companies, governments or individuals seek to offset their carbon pollution by investing in projects, such as a peatland restoration, that capture carbon. Their effectiveness, however, has been questioned, as over the years some programs have been exposed as exaggerating how much carbon they were capturing or were simply fraudulent. Pantheon says it’s aware of those concerns and guarantees high-quality, scientifically verified credits, based on Richardson’s decades of data on carbon loss at the site, ongoing measurements of groundwater levels and the use of sophisticated monitoring equipment, including a tower that measures how much gas is absorbed by and released from the site, as well as computer modeling and core sampling. Those results will be verified by an outside third party. Investors including Microsoft are providing Pantheon the initial capital to acquire peatland, Wall said. Income from carbon credits — each credit represents a metric ton — will help fund future land purchases. The changes will be exciting, Apfelbaum said. But everything comes down to first rewetting and restoring the peat, a natural climate solution often overshadowed by other efforts, including reforestation — important, he said, but not as effective. “We’ve all been bear-hugged and distracted by trees,” Apfelbaum said, “when it’s really soil and peat that hold the most carbon.”
A8
Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
Paintings like Renoirs worth a fortune, but not when heisted by thieves Pilfered paintings are far harder to profit from than other museum treasures By Wyatte Grantham-Philips The Associated Press TWO RENOIR paintings stolen from a small French museum have yet to be recovered but if the thieves are hoping to cash in on the artwork, they would be hard-pressed to find a buyer. Selling well-known, stolen art is impossible to do at an auction house or through other public channels without raising eyebrows. Even under the table, the value plummets. And unlike other eye-catching artifacts such as jewels, paintings can’t be chopped up and sold for parts without losing their entire worth. Art crime experts stress that most buyers simply don’t want the liability. In short, the reality looks nothing like the movies. “People always think that there is this kind of ‘Dr. No’ type from the James Bond movie,” said Arthur Brand, a private art detective based in the Netherlands. “But that’s Hollywood. In the real world, there are no collectors like that.” Brand, who has investigated art crime for about 20 years, explains that often “nobody will touch” stolen art, particularly high-profile work. Sometimes that means paintings valued at millions of dollars are effectively “worth zero” once they’re outside of the museum, he added, if not a small fraction of the price. Tuesday’s theft at the Renoir Museum — the last home of painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir in the French Riviera — marks the latest high-profile art crime targeting collections around the world, and experts warn there could be more. Here’s what we know. Where the Renoirs could wind up Cagnes-sur-Mer’s mayor, Bryan Masson, said a group of “well-equipped” burglars stole a total of four Renoir paintings from the museum in his town on Tuesday. But they dropped two of them — Renoir’s “Portrait of Madame Pichon” and “Coco Reading” — in the museum garden before they fled, the prosecutor’s office said in a statement. Police are still searching for the perpetrators. In the meantime, Renoir’s “Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano” and “Young Woman at the Well” remain missing. Masson estimated the value of the combined Renoir works stolen Tuesday at 9 million euros ($10.5 million). But the probability of profiting off such a heist is “extremely low,” said Erin Thompson, an art crime professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. And in cases that end in arrests, the common takeaway is that “thieves are people who are good at stealing things and bad at thinking
CITY OF CAGNES-SUR-MER VIA THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
“Coco lisant” was among the paintings by Pierre-Auguste Renoir stolen at the Renoir museum last week in Cagnes-sur-Mer, France. It was one of two recovered.
through the consequences,” she added. Some may try to make money from heists in other ways, such as through demanding a ransom or looking for an insurance payout. But Thompson explains many museums don’t have insurance because it’s too costly. That’s why the practice is so rare in the U.S., for example, and it would be difficult to negotiate with insurance companies elsewhere without the thieves incriminating themselves. As a result, if not surrendered or otherwise recovered, stolen paintings may remain hidden — or in some cases eventually destroyed to get rid of evidence, Thompson says. Brand, who collaborates regularly with law enforcement in his art crime investigations, says that he’s still seen limited cases of stolen paintings “floating around in the underworld” — perhaps as partial payments for products like drugs. And depending on country-by-country laws, he noted that the promise of returning the art has led to reduced sentences on other charges. “Some more savvy criminal will acquire it as a get out of jail free card, sort of a bargaining chip,” added Christopher Marinello, a lawyer and founder of Art Recovery International. “So if some drug dealer ever is arrested, he can bargain with the prosecutor and say, ‘Listen, give me a lesser sentence and I’ll show you where these Renoirs are.’ And that has always worked and it will work again.” Paintings harder to hide, sell than jewels Stolen paintings are much more difficult to profit from than museums’ other crown jewels — literally. Jeweled and metal goods have increasingly become a target of theft because they can be melted down or broken down into parts. Last year, a handful of experts warned that could be the fate of the stunning heist of crown jewels at the Louvre Museum in Paris, for example — noting that, if done suc-
cessfully, smaller pieces could later go up for sale as part of a new necklace, earrings or other jewelry without turning too many heads. But of course, such pieces would lose their historical worth and, if actually sold, likely only go for a fraction of their original value. Experts also warn that it’s far from a simple process overall — and gems may still be identifiable by characteristics like clarity, for example. Apart from an emerald-set imperial crown found outside the museum the day of the October 2025 heist, the stolen jewels remain unrecovered. Paintings, in contrast, don’t have the same commodity value that can potentially be parceled off. “It’s a canvas with some old oil paint on it,” said art theft expert James Ratcliffe of the Art Loss Register. “You can’t touch it up. You can’t resell it other than for what it is.”
WAIVER from page A1 has depended on society board members dragging hoses across the property, an approach that became especially difficult during periods of severe heat last summer and this summer. “The society is very much aware that this is not a practical approach for the future,” Jones said. To provide a long-term solution, the society’s board approved the installation of a drip irrigation system by Bushwhackers for $6,986. The historical society will cover that expense, but representatives of Albemarle Public Utilities told Jones that a water meter and its installation would cost another $1,500. Jones asked council members to waive that amount, saying the irrigation system would protect the health and appearance of the gardens. Mayor Pro Tem Martha Sue Hall initially questioned the scope of the request because the council’s agenda packet did not clearly state that the society was seeking only relief from the tap fee.
She said the material appeared to suggest a request for several thousand dollars. “You’ve got the money to put the irrigation system in, so the thing that you are asking for is the tap fee?” Hall asked. Jones confirmed that the society was only requesting the $1,500 waiver. Councilmember Dexter Townsend asked whether Albemarle had waived a fee of that type before. Several council members said the city had approved similar requests in the past, though the discussion also touched on avoiding a precedent for larger financial requests. Council members approved the waiver without opposition. The two houses at 112 N. Third St. are listed together on the National Register of Historic Places. The Freeman-Marks House is considered Albemarle’s oldest house, while the Snuggs House is the city’s oldest dwelling remaining on its original site. The Albemarle City Council will hold its next regular meeting Sept. 21 at 6:30 p.m. in the City Hall Council Chambers.
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Uptick in art crime overall Ratcliffe and others note that hasn’t stopped thefts of famous paintings and other artwork from museums. Just earlier this year, three pieces by Renoir, Cézanne and Matisse worth millions of euros were stolen in Italy, for example, before being recovered last month. Ratcliffe notes that smaller museums, in particular, are harder to secure because they might not have the funding necessary to invest in the latest technology — or are located in historic buildings that may take more time and effort to install new guardrails. Still, pressures are piling up, with some warning that future cases of art theft could be likely as vulnerabilities persist. “We need to change the way we treat small and country house museums before we lose our cultural heritage permanently,” said Marinello, who stresses that stronger security and enforcement is overdue. “We’re supposed to be preserving our cultural heritage, not allowing criminals to take what they want and using them as shopping malls.”
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Thieves stole four valuable Renoir paintings from the Renoir Museum in Cagnes-sur-Mer, France, on Tuesday.
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STANLY SPORTS
COURTESY NORTH STANLY BOOSTER CLUB
The North Stanly volleyball team poses following its 3-0 win over South Stanly on Tuesday.
North Stanly volleyball keeps rolling with wins over South Stanly, North Rowan The Comets are seeking fourth straight conference title By Jesse Deal Stanly News Journal NEW LONDON — Reigning Yadkin Valley Conference volleyball champion North Stanly won its fifth consecutive game Tuesday as the Comets defeated South Stanly 3-0 at home. The Comets (12-2, 4-0 YVC) responded a day later with a 3-0 victory in Spencer over the North Rowan Cavaliers (0-10, 0-4 YVC) for their sixth straight win. Hosting the Rowdy Rebel Bulls (8-3, 2-1 YVC), who are
currently on pace for their first winning season since 2021, North Stanly won the first set 25-16 and followed that up with set wins of 25-17 and 25-14. It snapped the Bulls’ five-game winning streak that dated back to Aug. 18. On Wednesday, the Comets breezed past the Cavaliers, taking the opening set 25-1 before closing out the game with 25-3 and 25-13 sets. North Stanly has only surrendered five sets all season, with the last one coming against Southwestern Randolph on Aug. 26. Currently undefeated in league play, the Comets are pursuing their fourth straight YVC championship. North Stanly finished the 2025 season 18-11 and
won the YVC championship with a 9-1 league record before advancing to the third round of the NCHSAA 3A state playoffs. North Stanly will return home Tuesday to host Albemarle, while South Stanly will head to West Stanly on Monday.
12
Wins for North Stanly through 14 contests
Albemarle 3, North Rowan 0
West Stanly 3, Piedmont 0 Over in Monroe, the West Stanly Colts (9-4, 4-0 Rocky River Conference) won their third straight match and remained perfect in league play with a 3-0 win over the Piedmont Panthers (5-7, 1-3 Southern Carolina). Taking a nonconference detour from their goal of an eighth consecutive RRC championship, the Colts will host South Stanly
Following a 6-0 start to the season, the Knights have now lost three of their past four matchups as conference play is now underway. Gray Stone will aim to bounce back Tuesday at North Hills Christian.
on Monday. West Stanly finished with a 23-4 record last season. Union Academy 3, Gray Stone 2 The Gray Stone Knights (7-3, 1-2 YVC) came up short against the Union Academy Cardinals (4-11, 2-1 YVC) on Tuesday in a 3-2 loss.
With a 3-0 victory over North Rowan on Tuesday, the Albemarle Bulldogs (3-3, 1-2 YVC) picked up their first conference win of the season. The Bulldogs, who landed fifth in the YVC standings last season at 2-9, will face conference frontrunner North Stanly on Tuesday. The Comets defeated Albemarle twice last season with a pair of 3-0 finishes.
Falcons post highest-scoring performance since 1980 The Pfeiffer men’s soccer team scored 11 goals in a rout of Averett By Jesse Deal Stanly News Journal MISENHEIMER — Pfeiffer’s men’s soccer team delivered its most prolific scoring performance in nearly half a century last weekend, routing Averett 11-1 at Lefko-Mills Field. Eight different Falcons (2-0) found the net Sept. 5 as Pfeiffer recorded its second home win of the young season. The Falcons, who also defeated Guilford (0-2) earlier this month, led the Cougars (0-2) 8-0 by halftime before adding three more goals after the break. Marking Pfeiffer’s highest-scoring game since a 16-0 victory over Wingate in 1980, the 11-goal outburst was also the 11th time in program history that the Falcons have reached double figures in a match.
Junior forward Wesley Hooker powered the attack with a career-high four goals, including one on a penalty kick. He opened the scoring just 52 seconds into the match off an assist from senior midfielder Caleb Yopp. Sophomore midfielder Barrett Owens made it 2-0 in the 14th minute, and Hooker followed with three more goals between the 19th and 27th minutes to push the margin to 6-0. Freshmen Cole Patton, Eros Jimenez and Jefferson Paguada each scored their first collegiate goals before halftime, giving Pfeiffer an eight-goal cushion at the break. “I have to shout out to the boys — they were giving me the ball in good areas so that I could put the ball in the back of the net,” Hooker said after the win. “It was really a whole team effort. Everyone was being clinical throughout the entire game.” Hooker was later named USA South Men’s Soccer Player of the Week for his performance.
“It was really a whole team effort.” Wesley Hooker, Pfeiffer forward
COURTESY PFEIFFER ATHLETICS
Pfeiffer’s Josh Aguirre-Escobar provided an assist during the Falcons’ win over Averett on Sept. 5. Freshman forward Tyler Ridley scored in the 70th minute to make it 9-0. After Averett scored its lone goal, Micah Paylor and Juan Argueta answered with late goals to com-
plete the rout. Freshman goalkeeper Kian Fuertado-Morgan made one save for Pfeiffer. The fast start comes as the Falcons try to build on one of the strongest seasons in pro-
gram history under veteran coach Tony Faticoni. Pfeiffer finished 13-0-4 overall and 5-0-2 in USA South play in 2025, winning its first conference regular-season championship before finishing runner-up to Methodist in the league tournament. The 13 victories were the most in Faticoni’s tenure and the program’s highest total since a 19-3 season in 2016. The unbeaten campaign was also the Falcons’ best since their 25-0 national championship season in 2015. Pfeiffer next travels to Lynchburg, Virginia, to face Randolph on Tuesday, less than two weeks before opening USA South play Sept. 26 at home against N.C. Wesleyan.
B2
Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
Williams sisters reunite iconic doubles team at US Open The legends lost narrowly but thrilled the New York crowd By Jocelyn Noveck The Associated Press NEW YORK — “Welcome to the Williams Show,” read one fan’s sign in Arthur Ashe Stadium, as Venus and Serena Williams took the court for their doubles match, 25 years after first facing each other in the 2001 U.S. Open final. A quarter-century of playing pro tennis at a top level — at any level — is not a very common thing. And even more incredibly, the Williams sisters, now ages 46 and 44, showed they can still come agonizingly close to beating a top team that is cumulatively around half their age. In a three-set thriller that delighted a packed and vocal evening crowd, the sisters fell short only at the end, blowing a 5-0 lead in the final 10-point tiebreak to lose to Hao-Ching Chan of Taiwan and Maya Joint of Australia, 6-3, 6-7 (6), 7-6 (10-7). So it was indeed quite a thrilling show — even the sisters themselves, narrowly defeated, walked off with smiles on their faces, though they declined to speak to the media afterward. “It was an amazing match,” Joint said. “They played really well, and I think just the atmosphere on the court. ... I don’t think either of us has experienced quite like that before. And playing two legends of the game is just a super special moment that we might not get again.” The hugely entertaining evening came four years after the sisters last played doubles together at Flushing Meadows. That match came just a few weeks after Serena Williams announced, in a poignant Vogue essay, that she was “evolving away from tennis.” Whatever the wording, though, the message was clear: Daughter Olympia really wanted to be a big sister. And Williams knew she couldn’t accomplish that and still
ADAM HUNGER / AP PHOTO
Sisters Venus Williams, left, and Serena Williams arrive for their women’s doubles match at the U.S. Open. play tennis the way she wanted. Well, Olympia got her little sister. And this year, her mom was fulfilling another of Olympia’s requests: that she play doubles again at the U.S. Open with Aunt Venus. “You need to play with Auntie VeVe,” 9-year-old Olympia told her, Serena Williams said this week on ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “She said it so clear and so calm,” Williams said. “She’s like my mom — she doesn’t really talk a lot, but when she does talk, you listen. And I was like, ‘OK.’” And so the sisters returned as a team to the tournament where Serena won six singles titles, and Venus two — one of them against Serena, who returned the favor the following year.
That 2001 victory for the elder sister came a full quarter-century ago — which was enough to give fans goose bumps that this partnership is alive. They didn’t win, but they made it a close fight — thrilling the crowd with some vintage volleys as they took the second set tiebreak to force a decider, then came close to winning that set. The unique nature of the evening was clear before a ball was struck, during player introductions. After a fairly routine introduction for Chan and Joint, the announcer moved on to the Williamses. “They’ve transformed and elevated the sport as we know it,” he said. “They’re two of the greatest athletes of all time.” As a doubles team, the sisters
“You can do anything at any age as long as you work hard and put some effort and dedication behind it.” Serena Williams won two of their 14 Grand Slam titles at the U.S. Open — in 1999 and 2009. They last played together at Flushing Meadows in 2022, also losing in the first round. (This year, they had to scrap their appearance at Wimbledon because of Serena’s knee injury, but they played in Cincinnati last month.) But victory or defeat does not seem, for many fans, the point.
NBA suspends Clippers owner, fines team $30M, Leonard $700K for cap circumvention Los Angeles was also docked five first-round draft picks By Beth Harris The Associated Press LOS ANGELES — The NBA imposed a sweeping punishment against the Los Angeles Clippers for violating salary cap circumvention rules, suspending owner Steve Ballmer for one year, fining the team $30 million and forcing it to forfeit five first-round draft picks. Also, two-time NBA Finals MVP Kawhi Leonard was hit with a $700,000 penalty, president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank was banned for six months, and team president of business operations Gillian Zucker was suspended for one year. The Clippers will give up one first-round pick in each draft from 2029 to 2033. The league came down hard on the organization after a nearly yearlong investigation led by an outside law firm. The Clippers had said multiple times that they had done nothing wrong and expected to be exonerated. “I think that we’re going to be in the clear,” Leonard said in April, “so I’m not stressing it.” At the same time, Frank said, “If you know Steve and know Steve’s integrity, you know there’s nothing to it. We believe, and we’re very confident we’re on the right side of this.” The Clippers said they will “now fight just as hard to demonstrate our innocence. We intend to vigorously challenge these findings and penalties through every avenue available to us and look forward to an ethical and impartial arbitration process.”
JENNY KANE / AP PHOTO
Los Angeles Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard warms up before an April game. “I am deeply disappointed by the flagrant violations of our rules and by the Clippers’ institutional and leadership failures that led to this misconduct,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement. “The severity of the penalties reflects the seriousness of the violations.” The NBA began investigating in September 2025 whether a $28 million endorsement contract between Leonard and Aspiration Fund Adviser LLC — a company that filed for bankruptcy last year — broke league rules, following a report by journalist Pablo Torre. The Clippers released a letter from Ballmer’s attorney David Kelley to Silver in which he described the investigation as “a witch hunt” and the subsequent
“The severity of the penalties reflects the seriousness of the violations.” NBA commissioner Adam Silver penalties as a “gross injustice.” Kelley accused Silver of not keeping his promises that the investigation would be governed by due process and fundamental fairness as well as the burden being on the league to prove any violations through evidence. “Mr. Ballmer’s reputation has been irreparably damaged as he now finds himself embroiled not only in this heavily biased in-
vestigation, but in civil litigation, the Aspiration bankruptcy proceeding, and more,” Kelley wrote. Kelley wrote that no league rule prohibits team personnel making introductions to both sponsors and vendors in response to player requests. “Retroactively punishing the Clippers for violating a rule that never existed is hardly consistent with due process,” Kelley wrote. The league said Ballmer knowingly sought to help Leonard obtain off-court income deals, approved a business deal that he knew was a precondition for Aspiration to enter into an endorsement contract with Leonard, and for failing to create conditions under which
The point is that they’re back in the spotlight. Green, the fan from Virginia, recalled something a former pastor had told her: “Even the sky is not the limit. You can go beyond it.” Which sounds just like the lesson Serena Williams now wants to teach her daughters — and why, four years after stepping away from tennis, she is back, at least in doubles and probably, she said on “Good Morning America,” in singles again soon. “I just really want my children to see me play at a different age,” she said. “I hope to show them that anything is possible. You can do anything at any age as long as you work hard and put some effort and dedication behind it.”
his team followed league rules. “I accept full responsibility for lapses in judgment by people within my inner circle and regret the distraction this situation has caused the fans and my family,” Leonard said in a statement. The NBA said Leonard, through his former business manager and uncle Dennis Robertson, “violated the circumvention rules by pressuring the Clippers to assist him in obtaining off-court income opportunities, successfully obtaining those opportunities, and failing to reimburse payments by the Clippers for personal expenses.” “I entered into my contract with the Clippers as well as the agreements in question in good faith, fully committed to fulfilling my obligations and with no knowledge of any intent on anyone’s part to circumvent the salary cap,” Leonard said. The league said Ballmer was suspended for “knowingly seeking to help Mr. Leonard obtain off-court income opportunities,” among other issues. Leonard’s trade to the Toronto Raptors has been on hold pending the outcome of the investigation. “As I return to Toronto, I am focused on what I can control, closing this chapter, and moving forward with a clean slate,” Leonard said. The Clippers and their personnel will be under a compliance and monitoring program by the league for five years, and Robertson was banned from doing business with NBA teams for five years. The league penalized Frank for his involvement with the impermissible endorsement arrangements and for approving impermissible expenses incurred by Leonard and his family. Zucker was banned for being primarily and directly culpable for the illegal endorsement arrangements and for lying to investigators. Both will lose their salaries during their bans. Ballmer, 70, was CEO of Microsoft from 2000 to 2014.
B3
Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
NASCAR drivers in favor of return to Chase format, saying change will lead to more legitimate champ
ATHLETE OF THE WEEK
Georgia Moffitt
The new postseason rules are similar to the ones last used in 2013 By Steve Reed The Associated Press CHARLOTTE — Denny Hamlin has never won a Cup Series championship. This may be the 45-year-old’s best chance based on his overall body of work this season. Hamlin entered the second week of Cup’s modified 10-race playoff format known as “The Chase” with a 12-point cushion over second-place Christopher Bell, a 16-point edge on Ryan Blaney and an even bigger advantage over the rest of the 16-driver field after finishing the regular season with the most driver points. The new format — which was last used in 2013 — is designed to reward performance throughout the entire season and provide a larger sample size to determine a champion. Fans have been clamoring for its return because of its simplicity. And the drivers love it. Hamlin, speaking at last Wednesday’s playoff media day in Charlotte, called it a “giant leap forward in crowning a champion.” “I think all of the drivers would tell you it’s a more fair way to do it,” Hamlin added. Chase Briscoe agreed. He said the format feels like it will produce a more “legitimate” champion. “I’m not saying the past champions weren’t legit, but before, you could win the first 35 races and go to Phoenix (for the season championship) and blow up and finish fourth in points,” Briscoe said. “It’s not going to be like that anymore. I think this says so much more about your body of work.” Unlike previous years, there will be no elimination rounds. That means no points “reset” midway through the playoffs. The champion will be determined by which driver amasses the most points over the final 10 races.
ROBERT SIMMONS / AP PHOTO
Denny Hamlin’s pit crew goes over the wall during a race at Richmond last month. Hamlin began with 2,100 points, 25 more than Blaney and 35 better than then-third-place Tyler Reddick based on the new format. Fourth place started 40 points behind Hamlin, fifth 45 points back and so on in descending five-point increments down to 16th-place Ryan Preece, who started 100 points behind but leaped past William Byron after Sunday’s postseason opener at Darlington. Kyle Larson, who started and remains in seventh place, won last year’s Cup championship. But even he is good with the change. “For the sport, I’m happy with the change for sure, and I think this format has proven to be very exciting,” Larson said referring to Preece’s dramatic win last weekend at Daytona, which allowed him to qualify for The Chase. Larson is more concerned with catching up to the speed of the Toyota cars, which have been running faster all season than the Fords and Chevrolets. Of the top six cars entering the playoffs, five are Toyotas. One notable change to this year’s format is that wins are weighted heavier. Drivers get 55 points for a race win, an increase from the previous structure of 40 points. The remaining positions pay the same points as the regu-
lar season (35 for second, 34 for third, 33 for fourth, etc.) and stage points also are the same (10 points for first, nine points for second, eight points for third, etc.). While wins are rewarded, consistency is the key to winning a championship, Bell believes. “The previous format and system, it was just three races at a time,” Bell, Sunday’s winner, said. “And if you had a bad race, it’s like just survive. Just gotta get above the cut line. Once you get above the cut line, you’re like, ‘OK, we’re in great shape now.’ Whereas now, there are no freebies. You can’t have a bad race and get a reset in three weeks. So you’re going to have to perform every week.” Hamlin and Joey Logano are the only drivers still on the Cup Series circuit who were around the last time NASCAR used this playoff format 13 years ago. Logano said there isn’t much he can take overall from the experience. But he said it harkens back to something seven-time Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson once told him. “Jimmie would say, ‘It’s 10 weeks of hell,’” said Logano, who is going for his fourth Cup title after a late-season push to make the playoffs. “And it’s pretty true. It’s a grueling 10 weeks. But hey, there is a pretty cool trophy at the end of it.”
COURTESY MAXPREPS
West Stanly, volleyball Georgia Moffitt is a senior libero on the West Stanly volleyball team. The Colts are 9-4 on the year after winning three straight last week. Moffitt led West in digs and receptions in all three games, totaling 63 digs and 51 receptions in the trio of victories. She also had four kills, four service aces and eight assists. For the season, Moffitt leads the Colts in digs and receptions, is third in aces and second in assists. She’s second in the Rocky River 4A/5A conference in digs.
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NORTH CAROLINA – STANLY COUNTY 26E000379-830 The undersigned, having qualified as Executor of the Estate of Gilbert Walton Picklesimer, deceased, late of Stanly County, North Carolina, does hereby notify all persons, firms and corporations having claims against the estate of said decedent to present them to the undersigned on or before November 23, 2026, or this notice will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons, firms and corporations indebted to the said estate will please make immediate payment to the undersigned. Crystal Ann Snyder, Executor Estate of Gilbert Walton Picklesimer c/o Katherine C. Rabtoy, Esq. ROBBINS LAW FIRM, PLLC 19453 West Catawba Avenue, Suite E Cornelius, NC 28031
NORTH CAROLINA STANLY COUNTY IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK FILE NO. 26E000395-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS Having qualified as Executrix of the Estate of Jimmie Price Morgan deceased, of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons having claims against the Estate of said Jimmie Price Morgan to present them to the undersigned on or before November 30, 2026 or the same will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to said Estate please make immediate payment. This the 30th day of August 2026. Donna Kay Lewellen 117 Lake Shore Drive Norwood, NC 28128 Executrix
NOTICE NORTH CAROLINA, STANLY COUNTY. NOTICE TO CREDITORS In the General Court of Justice Superior Court Division File No. 26-E-000382-830 Having qualified as Executrix of the Estate of RAYMOND EDWARD WILLIAMS, SR., Deceased, of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons having claims against the decedent, or his estate, to exhibit them to the undersigned, or her attorney, on or before the 23rd day of November, 2026, or the same will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons, firms and corporations indebted to the said estate should make immediate payment to the Executrix. This the 19th day of August, 2026. Gale Stein Williams, Executrix Estate of Raymond Edward Williams, Sr. c/o Jeremy D. Griffin, Attorney PO Box 422 Locust, NC 28097 JEREMY D. GRIFFIN MORTON AND GRIFFIN LAW FIRM, PLLC Post Office Box 422 – 161 Ray Kennedy Drive Locust, North Carolina 28097 Telephone: 704-888-2311 STANLY NEWS JOURNAL Publish: August 23, 30, September 6 and 13, 2026
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NOTICE TO CREDITORS NORTH CAROLINA STANLY COUNTY In the General Court of Justice Superior Court Clerk Before the Clerk 25E000167-830 Having qualified as Co-Executors of the Estate of Joe C. Pickler, deceased, late of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons, firms and corporations having claims against the Estate of said deceased to exhibit them to the undersigned or his attorney on or before December 13th, 2026, or this Notice will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to said Estate please make immediate payment. This the 27th day of August, 2026. CAROLYN T. PICKLER MARY P. PICKLER CO-EXECUTORS FOR THE ESTATE OF JOE C. PICKLER MARK T. LOWDER ATTORNEY AT LAW PO Box 1284 Albemarle, NC 28002 Telephone (704) 982-8558 Publish: September 13, 20, 27, and October 4, 2026
NOTICE NOTICE OF ALBEMARLE CITY COUNCIL PUBLIC HEARINGS Notice is hereby given that the Albemarle City Council will hold public hearings on Monday, September 21, 2026, at 6:30 p.m. in the City Council Chambers at Albemarle City Hall, 144 N. Second Street, Albemarle, NC 28001, to consider the following zoning map amendment petitions: ZMA 26-02 and AX 26-01 – Voluntary Annexation and Zoning Request: A petition has been submitted by the Harvey G. Carpenter and Julia P. Carpenter Revocable Living Trust requesting the voluntary annexation of one parcel totaling approximately 56.05 acres, located at the corner of NC Highway 24/27 Bypass West and St. Martin Street and identified as Tax Record 31834. In conjunction with the annexation, the applicant requests that the property be assigned City of Albemarle R-10 (General Residential District) zoning. The property is currently within Stanly County’s jurisdiction and is zoned RA (Residential Agricultural District) and R-20 (Low-Density Residential District). ZMA 26-03 – A request to rezone approximately 0.42 acres located at 1220 Poplar Street, identified as Tax Record 22671, from LID (Light Industrial District) to R-8 (General Residential District). ZMA 26-04 – A request to rezone approximately 0.43 acres located at the corner of Englewood Avenue and S. Second Street, identified as Tax Record 5168, from R-6 (General Residential District) to CBD (Central Business District). Interested persons are invited to attend and provide comments. The meeting agenda and supporting materials will be available at www.albemarlenc.gov/ government/city-council-meetings. Published: Sunday, September 6, 2026, and Sunday, September 13, 2026.
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NORTH CAROLINA, IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE STANLY COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK 26E000360-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS The undersigned, having duly qualified as Administrator CTA of the Estate of Mickey Loyd Cauble, deceased, late of Stanly County, North Carolina, is hereby notifying all persons, firms, or corporations having claims against said decedent, or his estate, to present the same to the undersigned Administrator CTA, duly itemized and verified on or before the 23rd day of November, 2026, or this notice will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to the said decedent are hereby requested to pay the said indebtedness to the undersigned Administrator CTA. This the 14th day of August, 2026. John Michael Cauble Administrator CTA of the Estate of Mickey Loyd Cauble 3351 Keady Mill Loop Kannapolis, NC 28081 PUBLISH: August 23, 30, September 6, 13, 2026 James A. Phillips, Jr. Attorney for the Estate P.O. Box 1162 117 W. North Street Albemarle, NC 28002-1162
NOTICE NORTH CAROLINA, IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE STANLY COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK 26E000337-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS The undersigned, having duly qualified as Administrator of the Estate of Bruce Cletus Burleson, deceased, late of Stanly County, North Carolina, is hereby notifying all persons, firms, or corporations having claims against said decedent, or his estate, to present the same to the undersigned Administrator, duly itemized and verified on or before the 13th day of December, 2026, or this notice will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to the said decedent are hereby requested to pay the said indebtedness to the undersigned Administrator. This the 4th day of September, 2026. Sheryl Burleson Administrator of the Estate of Bruce Cletus Burleson 25647 April Lane Albemarle, NC 28001 PUBLISH: September 13, 20, 27, October 4, 2026 James A. Phillips, Jr. Attorney for the Estate P.O. Box 1162 117 W. North Street Albemarle, NC 28002-1162
NOTICE NORTH CAROLINA STANLY COUNTY IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK FILE NO. 26E000346-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS Having qualified as Administratrix of the Estate of Julia Lee Clark Threadgill deceased, of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons having claims against the Estate of said Julia Lee Clark Threadgill to present them to the undersigned on or before November 30, 2026 or the same will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to said Estate please make immediate payment. This the 30th day of August 2026. Karen Crump 417 Lincoln Street Albemarle, NC 28001 Administratrix
NOTICE NORTH CAROLINA STANLY COUNTY IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK FILE NO. 26E000397-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS Having qualified as Executor of the Estate of Janet Ordille Hill deceased, of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons having claims against the Estate of said Janet Ordille Hill to present them to the undersigned on or before November 30, 2026 or the same will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to said Estate please make immediate payment. This the 30th day of August 2026. Cynthia Jane Hill PO Box 54 Norwood, NC 28128 Executor
NOTICE NORTH CAROLINA STANLY COUNTY IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK FILE NO. 26E000412-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS Having qualified as Executor of the Estate of Linda Hoyle Henson deceased, of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons having claims against the Estate of said Linda Hoyle Henson to present them to the undersigned on or before December 15, 2026 or the same will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to said Estate please make immediate payment. This the 13th day of September 2026. Jeffrey A. Henson 1122 Timber Drive Greenville, NC 27858 Executor
PUBLIC NOTICE Notice is hereby given that the Town of Oakboro will hold a Public Hearing at Oakboro Town Hall located at 109 N Main Street, Oakboro, NC 28129 on Monday, September 21, 2026 at 7:00pm. The purpose of this hearing is to hear comments for, or against, a voluntary annexation request for three contiguous lots on East Tenth Street/East Eighth Street, PINs are 650403322021, 650403323018, 650403314728. The properties are located within the Extraterritorial Jurisdiction (ETJ) of Oakboro and are zoned R20. Further information is available at Oakboro Town Hall. Any person wishing to speak should plan to attend the Public Hearing. Leslie Hatley-Murray Town Clerk
NOTICE NORTH CAROLINA STANLY COUNTY IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION BEFORE THE CLERK FILE NO. 26E000333-830 NOTICE TO CREDITORS Having qualified as Executrix of the Estate of Ruby Caudle Fraley deceased, of Stanly County, North Carolina, this is to notify all persons having claims against the Estate of said Ruby Caudle Fraley to present them to the undersigned on or before November 30, 2026 or the same will be pleaded in bar of their recovery. All persons indebted to said Estate please make immediate payment. This the 30th day of August 2026. Debra Fraley Smith 24543 Rogers Road Richfield, NC 28137 Executrix
B5
Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
‘Divorce-tok’ fills social media as creators find audiences — and support — by sharing heartbreak Vulnerability on social media helps people process pain and feel less isolated By Kaitlyn Huamani The Associated Press ON INSTAGRAM feeds that are often teeming with curated, contrived content, a recent post from Monette Wagner stood out for her disarming openness. Looking into the camera, Wagner, a 36-year-old mother of three, said in the video: “Divorce can feel like a death.” In what resembles a digital journal, Wagner has posted videos in real time about the emotions and life changes that have come with her recent divorce. Developing financial independence, getting used to co-parenting and moving on from heartbreak are frequent themes of her Instagram posts. A growing number of people, the majority of them women, are sharing unvarnished divorce stories, both offering and seeking advice on social media. Moving beyond a stigma around discussing marital breakdowns, the content provides a space for the creators to heal and for their followers to relate and reflect on their own experiences and emotions. A professional photographer in Indianapolis, Wagner already had a platform on Instagram to share and promote her work. But she recently took the page in this more vulnerable direction. Alongside posts about the heavier moments, she also shares lessons learned and more optimistic musings. She has posted about wanting to reconnect with the confident, curious person she was more than a decade ago — before she met her now-former husband. She’s revisiting passions she had as a teen, including skateboarding and learning to DJ. “I wanted to show my kids that you can still be strong even through these hard days. I want-
Dunn said. “People maybe feel a little bit safer to put that content out there rather than to have a physical town hall and say, ‘Everybody come, I’m going to share my experience.’”
ed to show them how strong hope is,” she said. “I feel more confident. I feel resilient. I feel like I faced my fears of showing up scared, of putting myself out there as my authentic self.” Social media platforms rife with divorce-related content On TikTok, where niche categories of content sometimes earn a nickname, content that delves into marital woes has been dubbed “divorce-tok.” The level of detail creators choose to divulge about their divorce and marriage varies widely. Some, like Wagner, do not post about their ex-partners. Others provide detailed accounts of issues in their marriage and the sometimes messy and lengthy process of finalizing their divorce. The voyeuristic world of social media tends to love story-time-style videos where creators talk as if they’re chatting on the phone with a friend, sparing no details. Some creators post one-off videos, while others make it the focus on their platforms. Trends related to divorce also periodically pop up online, like this season’s “hot divorcée summer” videos and clips showing people’s post-divorce “glow-ups” — or physical, and in many cases, emotional — transformations. The #divorce hashtag has millions of posts on both TikTok and Instagram. Jen Hamilton, a labor and delivery nurse with more than 5 million TikTok followers, recently has been sharing the “nitty-gritty” details behind her divorce, as she said in one video. Hamilton has explained how her husband led what she called a “double life” with another partner and has shared videos of herself crying, cracking jokes and generally processing the news while maintaining her signature optimism. In a more celebratory post, Hamilton shared photos and videos from what would have been her 14th wedding anniver-
Honesty breeds virality, but public posts carry some risks
MICHAEL CONROY / AP PHOTO
Monette Wagner cuts strawberries as she prepares an afterschool snack for her children at her home in Indianapolis on Aug. 18. sary, recognizing the occasion with what she called a “Jendependence Day” party. More than a dozen friends and co-workers joined her at her North Carolina home as she burned her bedsheets and toasted to her future beyond her marriage. “I feel like if I share my pain with you, I don’t feel so alone because there’s so many other people going through the exact same thing,” she said in a video in July. She added that her followers then, in turn, feel less alone too. Some men have posted content along these lines, but women make up the vast majority of creators posting about divorce. Creators help build sense of community, support Many of these creators say they’re not sharing their stories in hopes of gaining pity or sympathy but rather are hoping to develop a sense of community online with people who have gone through similar experiences. Alex Daly, a 41-year-old creator in Philadelphia, started posting about her divorce around three years after she went through it. Once she found that she had processed her emotions around the divorce, she was
eager to talk about it. She aims to reach people who are “still in the thick of it because it’s a really hard place to be,” she said. “It can feel very lonely and isolating. It can feel like you’re the only person going through it,” Daly said. Followers have thanked her and told her she’s saying what they’ve been thinking and feeling. “You’re making me feel normal,” she said some people message her. It seems paradoxical that a topic that can be difficult or awkward to discuss with family and friends is also one some feel comfortable sharing with potentially millions of strangers online. But it can be much easier to forge digital connections than in-person ones, according to Tasha R. Dunn, an associate professor at the University of Toledo. Dunn researches the relationship between lived experiences and media, including how we present our lives on social media. “There are few divorce support groups in a given community, but you have something at the tip of your fingers on your phone or computer where you can find people who’ve literally shared your same experience,”
The candor that makes divorce-related content so popular could also be detrimental for those posting if they’re in the midst of legal proceedings. Jackie Combs, a matrimonial and family law attorney in Los Angeles, said she does not recommend that people share anything related to their divorce, especially personal grievances or intimate details, publicly online. “Every single reel that you put out there, every piece of content that’s related to it, you have to presume that somebody is watching and is going to use it as evidence, if needed,” she said. On social media, Combs herself often shares content about divorce, speaking about the importance of financial independence and prenuptial agreements. She said she sees social media as a key part of the “destigmatization” of divorce to show people it’s “not the end, it’s just a pivot.” Creators like Wagner and Daly also can be the subject of intense trolling and negativity. Daly said she’s received comments and messages from people saying she’s “ruining people’s lives” or that she doesn’t have morals. She said she tries not to let those comments or interactions get to her because those people don’t know what happened in the privacy of her marriage or who she truly is. The negativity is “just proving that there is still a stigma and a taboo around divorce,” Daly said. So it keeps her motivated to “share about how divorce just doesn’t have to be the end of your life and how it can actually be an amazing beginning.”
Why versatile PB&J remains king of the lunchbox after 125 years The sandwich has traveled from tea parlors and fancy restaurants to school lunchboxes By Katie Workman The Associated Press IF THERE is a single sandwich associated with childhood and school lunches in the U.S.A., it has to be the PB&J. Sweet and salty, inexpensive, easy to make (maybe the first sandwich many kids make for themselves?), peanut butter and jelly is as close to iconic as a sandwich can get. It’s been 125 years since the first known written recipe, and the PB&J concept is still going strong. In its simplest form, it’s a lunchbox staple, but it’s also a jumping-off point for creative takes in eateries from delis to high-end restaurants. It’s nothing if not versatile: When peanut allergies led to school bans, alternative nut butters like almond and seed butters like sunflower, flaxseed and pumpkin seed stepped in. Combo began as tea sandwich for the wealthy The recipe that appeared in 1901 in The Boston Cooking School Magazine was written by Julia Davis Chandler. It called for currant or crab-apple jelly and was viewed as a fan-
At Big Spoon Roasters in Hillsborough, bestsellers include Pistachio Crunch Almond Butter made with almonds, pistachios, organic maple syrup and sea salt. cy tea-time snack for wealthy people. In the 1920s and ’30s, commercial peanut butter and machine-sliced bread became widely available. Peter Pan and Skippy were early brands, and then Jif came along in the 1950s. Natural peanut butter has also carved out a niche, though what “natural” means is up for debate. Many people think of it as peanut butter that allows the natural oil to separate, which requires stirring to emulsify. The classic old-school sandwich would have to be two slices of soft bread, probably white, maybe wheat, with a layer of peanut butter (crunchy or smooth) on one side, jelly (often grape, maybe strawberry or raspberry, probably seedless) on the other. Simple and perfect. Not so long ago, a kid who lugged sandwiches to school made with heavy natural peanut butter and sugar-free jam on multigrain bread wouldn’t
GERALD HERBERT / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A peanut butter and jelly sandwich is a classic that spans generations and regions. have found anyone who wanted to trade. (Trust me on that.) But times and tastes have evolved, and now a sandwich like that would no longer feel crunchy-granola-weird.
deep-fried (though I’d advise waiting a while before getting on any rides afterward).
Twists include adding pickles, chips, marshmallow fluff and more
In San Antonio, a restaurant called PB&J with Tay has a whole menu inspired by this sandwich. You might try The Egg-Cellent, which contains peanut butter, hard-cooked egg, bacon and strawberry-jalapeño jelly, or The Kitchen Sink (Double Decker), jammed with peanut butter, banana, walnuts, almond butter, bacon, cream cheese and choice of jelly. The South Philadelphia Tap Room in Philly has a Fried PB&J made with sourdough bread that is crusted in Frosted Flakes before being griddled. At Pearl Street in New York City, you can indulge in PB&J Triangles with fois gras ganache on milk bread. Fancy, but it’s noted on the menu that the strawberry jam is Smuckers and the peanut butter is Jif. This mashup will set you back $24.
Griddled or pan-fried versions of the PB&J are popular throughout the South and Midwest. In some regions of the U.S., you might find dill pickles tucked into the sandwich or potato chips layered in for salty crunch. PB&J with a side of chili is pure school-cafeteria nostalgia — cheap, protein-packed and filling. In New England, the “Fluffernutter” still reigns, with marshmallow fluff standing in for the jelly. Texans sometimes take their PB&Js with jalapeño jam and crispy bacon, often double-decked with an extra slice of bread. And at Southern state fairs, you can find the sandwich
Restaurant menus play with peanut butter and jelly
Just changing up two main ingredients, and bread, creates whole new sandwich experience There are a lot of companies making gourmet versions of peanut butter. At Big Spoon Roasters, in Hillsborough, bestsellers include Pistachio Crunch Almond Butter made with almonds, pistachios, organic maple syrup and sea salt. They describe their Maple Cinnamon Peanut and Pecan Butter as “cinnamon-dusted pecan pie in a jar.” Peanut Butter & Co., based in New York, sells a flavor enticingly named Dark Chocolatey Dreams and another called The Bee’s Knees, made with honey. To change up your jelly, add chia seeds, maple syrup, crushed pretzels, sliced peaches or apples, or pomegranate seeds. Try it on a croissant or challah. No matter how far the PB&J has come from its 1901 currant jelly version, somehow it still tastes like being a kid.
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
famous birthdays this week
this week in history Attica prison uprising, Hurricane Florence hits Wrightsville Beach, Jimi Hendrix dies at 27
Stella McCartney is 55, Ben Savage turns 46, Tommy Lee Jones hits 80, Frankie Avalon is 86
The Associated Press SEPT. 13
The Associated Press THESE CELEBRITIES have birthdays this week. SEPT. 13 Actor Barbara Bain is 95. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Óscar Arias is 86. Actor Jacqueline Bisset is 82. Singer Peter Cetera is 82. Actor Jean Smart is 75. Olympic gold medal sprinter Michael Johnson is 59. Fashion designer Stella McCartney is 55. Actor Ben Savage is 46.
MANU FERNANDEZ / AP PHOTO
Former U.S. sprinter Michael Johnson turns 59 on Sunday.
1788: The Congress of the Confederation authorized the first national election and designated New York City as the temporary national capital. 1940: During World War II, bombs dropped by the German Luftwaffe struck and damaged Buckingham Palace. 1971: A four-day inmate uprising at the Attica Correctional Facility in western New York ended when state troopers and correction officers stormed the prison.
SEPT. 14
SEPT. 14
Actor Walter Koenig (“Star Trek”) is 90. Architect Renzo Piano is 89. Basketball Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown is 86. Pope Leo XIV is 71.
1847: During the Mexican-American War, U.S. forces under Gen. Winfield Scott took control of Mexico City. 1861: A boat crew from the USS Colorado boarded and burned the schooner Judah at the Pensacola Navy Yard in one of the Civil War’s earliest naval actions. 2018: Hurricane Florence made landfall near Wrightsville Beach, bringing catastrophic flooding to the Carolinas and causing 52 deaths.
SEPT. 15 Writer-director Ron Shelton is 81. Actor Tommy Lee Jones is 80. Film director Oliver Stone is 80. Actor Josh Charles is 55. Olympic gold medal swimmer Tom Dolan is 51. Actor Tom Hardy is 49. Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, is 42.
CHRIS PIZZELLO / AP PHOTO
Jacqueline Bisset turns 82 on Sunday.
SEPT. 15
SEPT. 16 Actor George Chakiris is 94. Actor Ed Begley Jr. is 77. Author-historian-filmmaker Henry Louis Gates Jr. is 76. Country singer David Bellamy (The Bellamy Brothers) is 76. Actor Mickey Rourke is 74. Magician David Copperfield is 70. Retired MLB All-Star pitcher Orel Hershiser is 68. SEPT. 17
RICHARD SHOTWELL / INVISION VIA AP
Actor Cassandra Peterson turns 75 on Thursday.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) is 93. Mountaineer-explorer Reinhold Messner is 82. Basketball Hall of Fame coach Phil Jackson is 81. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is 76. Actor Cassandra Peterson (“Elvira, Mistress of the Dark”) is 75. Film director Baz Luhrmann is 64.
1835: Charles Darwin reached the remote Galápagos Islands aboard the HMS Beagle, an experience that would help shape his ideas about evolution. 1935: The Nuremberg Laws were enacted in Nazi Germany, stripping German Jews of citizenship rights and imposing sweeping racial restrictions. 1963: Four black girls were killed when a bomb exploded during Sunday services at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. SEPT. 16 1810: Catholic priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla called on his
R.T. PRITCHETT / THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY VIA WIKIPEDIA
Charles Darwin reached the remote Galápagos Islands aboard the HMS Beagle on Sept. 15, 1835, an experience that would help shape his ideas about evolution.
“Observe good faith and justice toward all nations. Cultivate peace and harmony with all.” President George Washington parishioners to rebel against Spanish rule, marking the beginning of the Mexican War of Independence. 1893: The largest land run in U.S. history began as more than 100,000 settlers raced to claim parcels across more than 6 million acres of the Cherokee Outlet in what is now northern Oklahoma. 1908: General Motors was founded in Flint, Michigan, by William C. Durant. SEPT. 17 1787: The Constitution of the United States was completed and signed by a majority of delegates attending the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. 1862: More than 3,600 men were killed in the Civil War Battle of Antietam in Maryland. 1908: Lt. Thomas E. Selfridge of the U.S. Army Signal Corps became the first person to die in the crash of a powered aircraft, the Wright Flyer, at Fort Myer, Virginia, just
outside Washington, D.C. The pilot, Orville Wright, was seriously injured but survived. SEPT. 18 1970: Rock star Jimi Hendrix died in London at age 27. 1975: Newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst was captured by the FBI in San Francisco, 19 months after being kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army. 2020: Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a towering champion of women’s rights who became the court’s second female justice, died at her home in Washington, D.C., at age 87 of complications from pancreatic cancer. SEPT. 19 1796: President George Washington’s farewell address was published. In it, America’s first chief executive advised, “Observe good faith and justice toward all nations. Cultivate peace and harmony with all.” 1957: The United States conducted its first contained underground nuclear test, code-named “Rainier,” in the Nevada desert. 1995: The New York Times and The Washington Post published the manifesto of Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, which proved instrumental in identifying and capturing him. Inmates at Attica State Prison in Attica, New York, raise clenched fists in a show of unity in September 1971 during the Attica uprising, which claimed 43 lives.
SEPT. 18 Hockey Hall of Fame coach Scotty Bowman is 93. Singer Frankie Avalon is 86. Actor Anna Deavere Smith is 76. Neurosurgeon-author-politician Ben Carson is 75. Basketball Hall of Fame coach Rick Pitino is 74. Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) is 72. Comedian-actor Jason Sudeikis is 51. SEPT. 19 Actor Rosemary Harris is 98. Singer-songwriter Paul Williams is 85. Singer Bill Medley (The Righteous Brothers) is
JORDAN STRAUSS/ AP CONTENT SERVICES FOR KING RICHARD PRODUCTIONS
R&B singer Freda Payne turns 83 on Saturday. 85. Singer Sylvia Tyson (Ian and Sylvia) is 85. R&B singer Freda Payne is 83. Actor Jeremy Irons is 77. Musician-producer Nile Rodgers is 73. Musician Jarvis Cocker (Pulp) is 63. Country singer Trisha Yearwood is 61. Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina is 60.
AP PHOTO
Singer, actor Grande steps out of spotlight with gratitude at closing of tour The performer’s physical appearance has sparked concerns
RICHARD SHOTWELL/ INVISION VIA AP PHOTO
Ariana Grande arrives at the 31st Annual Critics Choice Awards on Jan. 4 at The Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, California.
“I’ll cherish this experience always.”
By Hilary Fox The Associated Press
Ariana Grande
LONDON — Ariana Grande’s final words, before she stepped offstage and out of the spotlight, were for her fans. Addressing the crowd during her last concert in London last Tuesday before she takes a break from the public eye, the singer was full of emotion and gratitude. Grande thanked the audience and called The Eternal Sunshine Tour one of “most beautiful, extraordinary, experiences” of her life. The music star confirmed in August that she’d be taking time out after the conclusion of her live shows, with the final leg being a 10-date run at London’s O2 Arena.
On stage, Grande has admitted to being emotional about the tour coming to an end after 41 dates, which also took place in the U.S. and Canada before the U.K. Last Tuesday, she tried to speak “without sobbing completely,” she said. “I’ll cherish this experience always. I have the best fans in the entire world, and I always have,” she said. A representative for Grande told People magazine in August that the 33-year-old singer “will be taking a step back from visibility” after the tour. “She looks forward to finishing the tour and ending it on a high note, both healthily and happily, and then taking
a much-deserved break from public-facing work and appearances, which has led to endless, ongoing public scrutiny,” the statement said. In a social media post ahead of the penultimate night, Grande warned fans that she had to swap out her trademark six-inch heeled platform boots after cutting her foot. She reassured them that she was on the mend, even if she was a few inches shorter on stage. While Grande wasn’t in her highest heels, her followers still were; the audience dressed up in her style with stilettos, cat ears and ponytails — something the star noticed. “Thank you for all of your effort and continuing to make this so special. I have loved every minute of this with you all,” Grande said. The concert concludes with Grande summoned back, sci-fi style, to a spacecraft as she ascends to the mothership in a beam of light. It’s not known when she will next be seen on Earth, although Grande’s most recent album, “Petal,” will certainly be a fixture at this month’s MTV Video Music Awards, where she’s in the running for artist of the year.
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
120-foot burst of genius: Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’ scroll still cherished The author spoke to and for the Beat generation
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Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road” and its working manuscript, the extraordinary 120-foot scroll he would unfurl before startled publishers, is on display at the American Writers Museum in Chicago.
“It was a once-in-alifetime, once-in-acentury achievement.” Gerald Howard, author and editor author was in the Manhattan apartment of then-wife Joan Haverty, with rolls of architectural tracing paper that fit seamlessly into his manual typewriter. “He realized that by feeding the paper in it would prevent him from having to change a sheet of paper over and over, which would pretty much guarantee a higher level of spontaneity,” Howard says. The scroll is now a piece of literary history, but it initially helped delay the novel’s release. His publisher, upon see-
ing Kerouac unfurl his draft, allegedly told him it couldn’t be edited. Kerouac stormed out. Kerouac’s agent, Sterling Lord, spent years trying to attract interest in Kerouac’s jazzy, unorthodox tale before Viking signed it up for an advance of $1,000. “On the Road” has since sold millions of copies and inspired countless literary — and literal — quests to “find America.” The manuscript itself has made several stops since Kerouac’s death in 1969. Earlier this year, country star Zach Bryan bought it for more than $12 million. “Jack never called it a scroll,” notes Kerouac biographer Gerald Nicosia, adding that the author found the word too pompous. To Kerouac, he said, “it was like the white line of the highway unrolling in front of your front tire as you were speeding down the highway.”
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NEW YORK — In the spring of 1951, the muse landed so hard in the caffeinated mind of Jack Kerouac that within three weeks he had hurried out a full-length, single-spaced manuscript — a draft for “On the Road” that he taped together into a scroll some 120 feet long. Published six years later to instant acclaim and notoriety, “On the Road” may not be the Great American Novel, but Kerouac’s epiphany surely stands as the Great American Manuscript. “It was a once-in-a-lifetime, once-in-a-century achievement. In short, a literary singularity,” says the author and editor Gerald Howard. Kerouac was among the novelists who embodied the mad American quest to “say it all,” to somehow capture the country’s spirit within a single narrative — the kind of epic ambition behind such canonical books as Herman Melville’s “Moby-Dick” and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby.” In “On the Road,” the raw, wild energy that drove Kerouac to type down his thoughts as quickly as they came to him would inspire one of the defining tales of the post-World War II era — two young Beats out for adventure, for kicks, “desirous of everything at the same time.” Howard says Kerouac had been working on the book for three years before his sudden inspiration. The 29-year-old
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Oasis reunion tour documentary rocks Venice Film Festival
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The film will be released in Imax theaters Sept. 11 By Lindsey Bahr The Associated Press VENICE, Italy — The Gallagher brothers brought some rock star energy to a sleepy, and sweaty, Venice Film Festival Saturday, where the documentary about their reunion tour made its world premiere. “Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger” is part concert film and part exploration of the contentious relationship between Noel and Liam Gallagher, whose long-held feud led to Oasis disbanding in 2009 in spectacularly theatrical fashion after a backstage altercation moments before they were due on stage in Paris. Noel infamously said his brother is “the angriest man you’ll ever meet. He’s like a man with a fork in a world of soup.” Liam told the Guardian in 2018 that his brother “did me out, mate, he threw me under the (expletive) bus, and I won’t forget that. He split the band up, and it meant the world to me. Just to further his career.” The band was founded in working-class Manchester, England, in 1991 and became one of the most popular British acts of the 1990s, hitting No. 1 with their debut album “Definitely Maybe” in 1994. Their 1995 follow up, “(What’s the Story) Morning Glory?” became one of the U.K.’s bestselling albums of all time. The film looks at the phenomenon of Oasis and the prickly personalities behind the hit songs, most of which were written by the elder Gallagher brother, Noel, from “Wonderwall” to “Live Forever.” In 2025, the brothers ended a 16-year hiatus with a reunion tour that kicked off in Cardiff,
SCOTT A. GARFITT / INVISION VIA AP
Liam Gallagher, left, and Noel Gallagher pose for photographers at the red carpet for the film ‘Oasis: Don’t Look Back In Anger’ during the 83rd edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, last Friday.
“The documentary, like the reunion and the tour, took on a life of its own.” Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace, “Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger” filmmakers Wales to an ecstatic, all-ages crowd of more than 60,000. Many worried that like in Paris in 2009, it might not actually happen. But the show went on, with former Oasis members Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs and Gem Archer on guitar, bassist Andy Bell and drummer Joey Waronker. Steven Knight, who is credited as the writer of the documentary, said he and Noel wanted to explore the question of why the music endured, not just with fans who experienced it in the ‘90s but with the next generation as well that culminated in such intense demand for reunion tour tickets. Filmmakers Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace spoke
to the brothers separately before the rehearsals had started and then together while the tour was in full swing to reflect the true progression of the relationship. “We set out to make a film about the reconciliation of two brothers, infamous for their volatile relationship, but we also wanted to make a film about the power of music and the way Oasis’ songs have continued to have a life of their own, as the band lay dormant for 15 years,” the filmmakers said in their directors’ statement. “The documentary, like the reunion and the tour, took on a life of its own.” The filmmakers said their goal was to make their cameras and presence invisible to the band during rehearsals. At the concerts, they wanted to make the audience feel like they were there as well. The film also focuses on various fans from around the world. “Sometimes you might just bump into someone with a dog called Bonehead and that becomes part of the story,” Southern said.
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Stanly News Journal for Sunday, September 13, 2026
SNOWFLAKES
SUDOKU
Solution to last issue’s puzzle
Solution to this week’s puzzles