Opinion

Act like citizens instead of sports fans

Letters To The Editor July 18, 2026

Dear Editor, Politics are not a team sport. It’s not the same as sticking with the Browns or the Steelers no matter how bad the season. The political process is about choosing the right people who can lead a government in ways that support its citizens. Right now our state government has allowed Ohio to drop from having the fifth best school system in the country (2010) to the 35th. Our infant mortality rate is the fifth worst in the country. Who is suffering from our loyalty to a political team? Our children. In sports the owners of the teams can spend millions to ...

A restorative dose of Lincoln

Local Columns July 13, 2026

When I’m at a loss for a good book to read, I go to the library in our basement and scan the familiar titles on the wide floor-to-ceiling shelves. When I did this late last night, my eye rested, as it often does, on the long row of Lincoln books. I chose a slim volume, “The Wit and ...

Approach of Columbiana County Fair prompts memories of those past

Local Columns July 13, 2026

Sometime in the late 1830s or 1840s, an agricultural “fair was held on the site of a woolen mill on East Washington Street in Lisbon across the street from the R. Thomas & Sons plant. It was a small beginning to what would become a major annual event. It wasn’t until 1846 that a meeting ...

The damp cool of my morning garden

Local Columns July 6, 2026

Around the roots of each stalk of sweet corn I see a little circle of wet dirt, a gift of the morning dew, a drink of water conjured out of the air. The corn plant itself seems designed to capture and funnel this free air water to itself; my cabbages even more so, their wide leaves a ring of ...

America at 250: A reminder that all are created equal

Editorial July 3, 2026

As our country celebrates not just any Independence Day, but the 250th anniversary of one of the boldest declarations in human history, the festivities give us an excellent opportunity to look back on two-and-a-half centuries of this American experiment and check ourselves against what the founders hoped they were setting in motion. Draped in red, white and blue and surrounded by flags and fireworks, it is easy to forget how we got here and why we are free to celebrate as flamboyantly as we’d like. Richard Henry Lee made the motion to declare independence in June 1776, but not ...

Easter Islanders mulched with rocks

Local Columns June 29, 2026

Gardeners around the world throw stones out of their gardens. The residents of remote Easter Island carried stones in to use as mulch because rock mulch works. Also, because they had nothing else. Anyway, they were used to moving incredibly heavy things like those strange, iconic statues they ...