Highway to Heaven takes downward turn
The greed of the city of Salisbury knows no boundaries. It continually thrusts out its money-grabbing claws and snares into its growing boundaries thousands of irate homeowners who don’t want to be a part of something that offers no benefits or value.
The residents of N.C. 150, also known as the Highway to Heaven due to the large number of churches, will be forced to spend as much as $10,000 dollars to install water and sewer lines. They will suffer torn up roads and yards and spend eternity paying double property taxes and have the enjoyment of paying monthly water and sewer bills, when it was all free before.
The city claims we receive many benefits that we don’t pay for. Well, prove it to us. We shop in your stores, we eat in your restaurants, we pay for your newspaper, we attend your churches, we provide thousands of volunteer hours serving citizens of the city in many ways, and we receive no compensation, nor do we ask for any. The added taxes and costs will impose hardships on many who currently live from paycheck to paycheck or live solely on Social Security. Does the Salisbury City Council have no conscience? Obviously not.
They care not about taking money away from folks who have very little and need all they have to survive. And what will the city do with its added income? Brick Main Street? Install brick golf-cart paths for country clubbers? If so, the city should engrave the names of each of the N.C. 150 residents on the bricks in memory of those who sacrificed so much for nothing. We want to be left alone, just as the citizens of many European countries did when Nazi Germany and the U.S.S.R. forcibly annexed them.
ó Donald Schumacher
Salisbury
Poignant visit
In September 1969, I arrived in Salisbury as a freshman at Catawba College. I spent four wonderful years in this town. Along the way, I met my wife (Ann Gwathmey, Catawba class of 1973), worked in several area businesses, sang in the choir at First Methodist, worked at the telephone crisis line and became friends with so many good people.
Ann and I married in 1973 and went to graduate school in Canada. After we finished, we returned to Salisbury because we wanted to. We bought a house in Brown Acres and our first two children were born. We moved to the Richmond, Va., area, and I got my dream job with the Chesterfield County Fire Department. I moved to the James City County Fire Department in 1988.
I returned to this fine city last week to honor the supreme sacrifice of two brave and selfless firefighters. I arrived in town on Wednesday and stopped at all of the Salisbury fire stations. The memorials to your fallen heroes touched me. I was overwhelmed by the support of the different area FDs staffing the stations to give the SFD members time to grieve.
Everywhere I went, I found the same friendly people that I have missed since moving away. Most of the clothes I wear have a fire department theme on them. Once people saw the FD identification, I received hugs, kisses and thanks for coming to Salisbury in this time of sorrow.
My prayers and best wishes go out to the fallen firefighters and their family, friends and co-workers. Every time a brother is lost in the line of duty, I am saddened and a part of my heart dies with them. The only solace I receive is the hospitality that the residents of this area freely offer.
Salisbury, I commend you on a job well done.
ó John W. Porter
Williamsburg, Va.
A higher calling
At what point is it we realize that our time has come? That our time is near?
We never know. We just never do. It’s sad when someone leaves like that, but in the time of someone like a fireman leaving, it is a truly great loss. They live a life some of us can’t comprehend or even handle. Getting up in the middle of the night and rushing to their stations, donning their gear, rushing to the fire. Putting their life on the line every time those dispatch tones come through on the radio, every time they hear their company called, their truck called. Watching out for the driver who doesn’t get off his cell phone to get out of the way, having to slow to pass the woman putting on makeup, not caring that the delay she causes may cost someone’s life.
Firefighters live a life where seconds count, and in a few seconds, it can all go wrong. Sometimes it does, sometimes not, but even when it does, they go to a better, higher station. One where they don’t have to worry about falling through the floors of a house and getting hurt. Two men live in this station now, Victor Isler and Justin Monroe.
Rest in peace, brothers.
ó Jeremy Hughes
China Grove
headilne headilne headilne
Now the inquisitors are saying the Inquisition wasn’t as bad as it was portrayed. It wasn’t as bad as it was told when a Christian honoring Christ was hung upside down over a flaming fire? It wasn’t so bad when a pregnant mother’s belly was slit open with a sword, the baby then stuck on the end of the sword and cast into the sea while the dying mother was screaming for her child? It wasn’t so bad when person was put into a hollow log and him and the log sawed in two? It wasn’t so bad when a person was pulled in two between two horses? I could go on and on.I know I will get repercussions but you can argue your way into hell if you care to.
Just get a copy of Fox’s “Book Of Martyrs.” But for the grace of God and the laws of the land, this would still be happening. No man can forgive sin, It’s Christ or hell.
ó Henry Bame
East Spencer