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Applause, Applause

Each Saturday, The Express community newspaper highlights people, groups and activities our readers deem worthy of applause. During this incredibly difficult time, our family has been deeply touched by the kindness, prayers, messages, calls, visits, flowers and every thoughtful gesture shown to our family. The love and support you have extended to us has brought comfort beyond words. A special THANKS to UPMC Hospice, VA Home Health Care, Frank’s caregivers, South Renovo Citizen’s Hose Company and the volunteers who helped create a beautiful Celebration of Life for Frank. God bless ...

Progress for Water Street’s Old Ladies

Progress brings change! Prior to the 60’s, the Duck family, and other restaurateurs, operated Mill Hall’s “Blue Chimney,” now Advanced Family Chiropractic. A blue chimney was erected at the marquis and locals dubbed it “The Blue Flu.” It was next to Miller’s Furniture, behind Johnstonbaugh’s Dairy and near Net Hill’s famous Dutch Inn Gift Shop and Restaurant. During Blue Flu visits you might find Richard “Dick” E. Winters, smoking a pipe and reading a paperback. For seven years he, along with WBPZ News Director Keith Kline, were Directors of the Lockettes Drill ...

Dear Annie: Afraid to trade security for soil

Dear Annie: I’ve been married nearly 40 years. My wife’s father has passed, and her 81-year-old mother still lives on the family farm. My wife is on a loan her mother took out to buy part of that farm, and she handles everything for my mother-in-law. One of her brothers lives in the farmhouse and is a slob. He won’t take off work to take their mother to appointments, so my wife does that, too. Now she wants to build a house on the farm next to her brother. In October 2024, she survived a “widowmaker” heart attack and had a stent placed. Her brother had a valve replaced in his ...

Rookwood Pottery was an early woman-owned business

The Rookwood Pottery Company was at the forefront of the art pottery movement in the United States. It was founded in 1880 in Cincinnati, Ohio, by Maria Longworth Nichols, making it one of the earliest companies in America owned by a woman. Many of its most notable artists were women, too. ...

Trump needs to get ready for the blowback

It is a special kind of folly to make long-term predictions amid the fog of war. Nobody knows how Operation Epic Fury will end. But there are already a few things we can celebrate and condemn. On the celebration side: The professionalism and courage of the American military stand out. So does the just demise of Ayatollah Khamenei, amid scores of his murderous henchmen. Other things worth celebrating are merely possibilities at this point. If the nearly half-century of Iranian repression at home and terrorism abroad is poised to end, along with Iran’s nuclear ambitions, that would be ...

Why health care is so expensive in America, and what to do about it

America’s health care system consistently ranks as the most expensive in the developed world. It’s not, as some politicians claim, expensive because markets have failed. It’s expensive because the market has been repeatedly blocked from succeeding. Until we’re honest about that, any potential reforms will only address symptoms while ignoring the disease. The health care market is hindered in many ways, but the core structural problem is simple: The person receiving care is almost never the person actually paying for it. Roughly 90 cents of every dollar is covered by a third ...