Columnists | The Prairie Press

More often than we are ever prepared for, tragedy strikes. From time to time, we all are faced with heartache, sorrow, death, job loss, illness or any number of other difficulties. When this … more

By Gary Williamson | 7/31/23

New discovery points to natural hair color for life

Hair, skin and eye color are controlled by genetics. Some of our knowledge dates back to our earliest understanding of genetics, but scientists just unlocked a major secret controlling how it changes … more

By Terry Sullivan | 5/17/23

Starting awake for Alvie

Alvie McNull was a retired farmer from White County. He was active in his younger days, mostly involved in raising Hereford beef cattle. For a few years, he traveled with a rodeo group from … more

By Allen Englebright | 5/17/23

4 sketchy mothers

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day. Usually, the best we preachers can do to connect Mother’s Day to scripture is to focus on one or two especially well-known biblical mothers, perhaps Jesus’ … more

By John Youngblood | 5/17/23

For any vendor or entrepreneur setting up for the Honeybee Festival in Paris this year, you will have a healthy support network at your fingertips.

What’s New for Next Year

Where has time gone for this last year? I have been involved in a new book that will be printed in the next couple of weeks. I have never been involved with publishing, formatting, editing, … more

Roger Staley - Notes from the Prairie | 12/29/23

Not all grandmas are sweet

Grandmas have, for centuries, earned a commendable stereotype reputation. Sometimes you encounter a person who for whatever reason, never knew their grandmother, usually because she had … more

By Allen Engebright | 10/2/23

Phlogiston is the secret ingredient for life

Air was viewed as one uniform thing for millennia until science began sorting the individual parts starting 250 years ago. As they sorted the atmosphere’s gasses, they named one component … more

By Terry Sullivan | 6/18/23

Food preservation dates to prehistory

It’s the last week of August and home gardeners are busy pickling, canning, freezing and drying this year’s production to store and enjoy later — all in time for September as … more

By Terry Sullivan | 8/27/23

Earth Day is an opportunity to think about environmental impact

Today, April 22, is the 53rd annual Earth Day event. Senator Gaylord Nelson created Earth Day in the spring of 1970 to push a national environmental discussion. Earth Day went global in 1990 when … more

By Terry Sullivan | 4/24/23

Anxiety and social media

Social media increases anxiety Social media has become an essential part of our daily routine, providing us with instant connections to friends, family and colleagues. However, concerns have grown … more

By Jonathan Burns | 4/24/23

Tales of Chuck Littleton

Mayo School had its share of friendly, humorous, story-telling custodians during my tenure there as a teacher. Some of them worked an eight-hour shift elsewhere, then worked late afternoon and … more

By Allen Englebright | 4/24/23

Bamboo is starting a 120-year flowering cycle

Bamboo, a mythical, magical plant, is starting a 120-year flowering cycle We have entered the fall season with harvest in full swing, and it is time to prepare our yards for winter and … more

By Terry Sullivan | 10/2/23

Trying to put out fires

She seemed frustrated. She was trying to do her best, but the drive-through line was backed up. There were cars in the overflow spots, and it just seemed like things weren’t going good for … more

By Nate Alexander | 4/24/23

Avoiding AI's fate

All the tech news these days surrounds the frontier of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Currently, AI is essentially a massively beefed-up model of what happens on the AutoText on our … more

By Thomas Black | 10/2/23

Self-Advocacy Leads to Empowerment

Developmental disabilities affect a significant portion of the population, including individuals with intellectual disabilities, Down syndrome, cerebral palsy and autism spectrum disorder. As … more

By Jonathan Burns | 10/2/23

Out of the Past

Here is a compilation of stories appearing in the September 1924 issues of the Paris Beacon-News. The September 1923 volume is misplaced so Out of the Past is 99 years instead of a century ago. … more

By Callie Baber | 10/2/23

What if everything worked?

What if everything worked as it should? If everything was perfect, I wouldn’t need a napkin or a handkerchief or an eraser on my pencil. We certainly wouldn’t need a mechanic, a doctor … more

By Roger Stanley | 4/24/23

Out of the Past

Here is a compilation of stories appearing in the April 1923 issues of the Paris Beacon-News. Spelling and punctuation have not been changed except where necessary for better understanding. … more

By Callie Baber | 4/24/23

LK-99 disappointment proves science is self-correcting, values truth above all else

The past couple weeks were a wild ride in materials science and thermodynamics. It was the equivalent of an 1849 Gold Rush for science with announcements followed by excitement. Sadly, on … more

By Terry Sullivan | 8/12/23

Eclipse opportunities approach with the Lunar Cycle

This coming Saturday, Oct. 14 is the first of two eclipse opportunities. The Harvest Full Moon occurred on Sept. 29 and was larger and brighter than normal. It was also a Supermoon, which is when the … more

By Terry Sullivan | 10/9/23