Some news, nuggets and info for you, dear reader, the final weekend before the 2013 holiday season begins in earnest …
GET YOUR 20 UNDER 40 NOMINATIONS IN: For the sixth straight year, The Free Press presents 20 Under 40 — your opportunity to recognize and honor folks under 40 years old in our neck of the woods who are doing great things for our community.
Nominees have to be from Lenoir, Greene or Jones counties, and currently living here. You also can’t nominate someone who has already received the honor (the full list is in the advertisement to your right).
Those who win this year’s award will be honored at a reception sponsored by the Young Professionals of Lenoir County, the Kinston/Lenoir County Chamber of Commerce and The Free Press on Saturday, Dec. 14, at the Kinston Country Club. They’ll also be featured in a special section that will be published by your Free Press in December.
Some of the honorees in the inaugural class of 2008 included Vivian Howard, Nicholas Harvey II, Wells Gulledge, Robbie Swinson, Wynn Whittington, Scott Newton, Chris Humphrey and Kevin Zoltek. In later years, Kinston Mayor B.J. Murphy (Class of 2009), Wanda Hall Jordan (2009), Lenoir County Sheriff’s Office Maj. Ryan Dawson (2009), Trent Mooring (2010), Tonya S. Adams (2010), Eric S. Rouse (2011), Ben Knight (2011), Perry Tyndall (2012), Ashley Pierce (2012) and Justin Hill (2012) have received the prestigious honor.
The deadline for submitting a nomination is noon on Monday, Dec. 1, so get yours in as soon as possible. You can fill out the form to your right in the paper edition, visit Kinston.com or send me an email to the address listed below.
The Young Professionals will also be honoring their YP of the year at the Dec. 14 ceremony, along with their Mentor of the Year. You can make nominations for those honors at the Chamber’s website at kinstonchamber.com.
LA GRANGE CHRISTMAS PARADE: Today at 3 p.m., the La Grange Christmas Parade will take place in the beautiful Garden Spot. For the third year in a row, Jon Dawson and I will be a part of it — and we’d love to see you!
When you see The Free Press vehicle today, give us a wave; we’re taking a lot of photos from the parade and will be posting them in an album at Kinston.com later this afternoon.
The photo album is sponsored by Dan Wise Chevrolet, who is also providing us with our vehicle today.
Jon and I will also be taking part for the first time in the Pink Hill Christmas Parade next Sunday and for the fifth straight year in the Kinston Christmas Parade on Saturday, Dec. 14. We are grateful to Dan Sale, Grant Jones and the fine folks down at Sale Auto Mall, who are providing our convertibles for the Pink Hill and Kinston parades — and they’ll also be the sponsors of the photo albums that will be on Kinston.com later on those days.
NORTH WILKES SEASON COMES TO END: Thanks to all of you who sent me emails and congratulations on my column topic from last week, my high school alma mater of North Wilkes. The Vikings’ historic football season came to an end Friday against Shelby, but not before the team broke plenty of school records.
Again — many thanks to North Wilkes head football coach Monty Chipman, who has led the Vikings to their incredible turnaround and who was a guest with us on this week’s Free Press Football Show.
Bryan C. Hanks is the editor of The Free Press; his column appears in this space every Sunday. You can reach him at 252-559-1074 or at Bryan.Hanks@Kinston.com. Follow him on Twitter at @BCHanks.