Stories from Thursday, July 11, 2019

A year after he came to Greencastle to lead the Putnam County Public Library as its director, Brian Briscoe has now left his post. In a special executive session and public meeting convened Wednesday afternoon, the library’s board of trustees voted to not renew Briscoe’s contract into next year. Comments from the public were also not allowed during the public meeting...

Cloverdale pitching standout Macie Couch and South Putnam slugger Alex Steffy won the top awards for the 2018-19 all-Putnam County softball team. Both Couch and Steffy had previously been honored as second-team all-state selections for Class 1A-2A. Couch had a 13-4 pitching record and a 1.47 earned run average in 114 innings of work. She struck out 100 batters while walking just 32...

William Richard “Bill” Higgenbotham, 72, of Greencastle, passed away on Tuesday, July 9, 2019. He was born March 17, 1947 in Mattoon, IL, the son of William and Marjorie Mary (Mettendorf) Higgenbotham, and was a 1965 graduate of Neoga High School. Bill had worked at Kroger for 31 years, retiring in 2007...

DePauw University head women’s basketball coach Kris Huffman is among the 2019 inductees into the University of Northern Iowa Athletics Hall of Fame. A 1990 graduate of UNI and the coach of two national championship teams at DePauw, Huffman and the other honorees will be inducted in ceremonies on Sept. 21 in the McLeod Center...

TAMPA, Fla. – A 2003 North Putnam High School graduate recently competed in the 2019 Department of Defense Warrior Games from June 21-30. Engineman 1st Class Matthew Parker competed for Team Navy during the games, held in Tampa, Florida. He participated in wheelchair rugby, wheelchair tennis, wheelchair basketball and sitting volleyball...

South Putnam’s Aidan LeBlanc and Greencastle’s Nick Sutherlin received to honors for the 2018-19 all-Putnam County baseball team. LeBlanc was the county’s player of the year, after a standout senior season in which he batted .328 with two home runs, one triple, three doubles, nine RBI and 11 runs scored...

County Jail One person was booked in the Putnam County Jail on Wednesday. • At 9:01 p.m. Joshua Damon Channell, 37, Fayette, Ala., was lodged at the jail for possession of paraphernalia. Sheriff’s Department Putnam County sheriff’s deputies investigated four recent property-damage crashes...

Who will be crowned?

The South Putnam School Board is moving forward with its consideration to sell the former Reelsville Elementary School. As one of only two non-routine items on the board’s short agenda Wednesday evening, Superintendent Bruce Bernhardt announced that a public hearing will be held on July 29, during which the board will decide whether to move forward on the sale. If they do, the board will also select an auctioneer, as well as set a minimum bid for the property...

With the high projected to toe the 90-degree mark for the mid-afternoon 2019 Putnam County Fair Parade on Sunday, a bit of cooling H2O could again be the order of the day, such as when this youngster fired a squirt gun from the Elks Float in the 2018 parade.