DR. BRUCE EDMOND NAMED ITALIAN MAN OF THE YEAR IN WEST VIRGINIA

Dr. Michael Bruce Edmond, Class of 1979, was named Italian-American Man of the Year for 2022 at the annual West Virginia Italian-American Festival held every year in Clarksburg, the most Italian city in the state.

Rachel Romano was named Italian-American Women of the Year.

Stephen McCoy was named Honorary Italian-American Man of the Year.

Pamela Hotsinpiller was named Honorary Italian-American Woman of the Year.

Josephine Columbo Quinn was named Italian Mother of the Year.

Louis Spatafore got the Distinguished Pillar Award.

Dr. Edmond, who prefers to be called Bruce, has been married to Laurie Jean Lyckholm since 1994. Bruce was co-valedictorian of the Class of 1979, the last Monongah High graduation class before the merger with other Marion County schools into North Marion. His parents are Mr. and Mrs. Bruce Edmond. His father is Class of 1957. Lisa Marie Edmund Johnson, Bruce’s sister, lives in Monongah and is chief financial officer at FCX Systems after being at Martin & Lambert CPAs and getting her education at Pierpont Community and Technical College and University of West Florida.

Bruce’s co-valedictorian was Anthony Joseph Saverino, son of Mr. and Mrs. Tony Savereno.

 

Dr. Edmond is a world-famous pioneer in the treatment of C.Diff (Clostridium difficile), an infectious disease that is dangerous and sometimes fatal to hospital patients. He came up with a unique and successful way to treat the illness: Using feces of a close relative to battle and usually cure C.Diff. It works 90% of the time.

 

The lifesaver is being used around the world. Dr. Edmond’s book is titled “The Power of Poop.”

 

Dr. Edmond is a West Virginia University graduate who was chief quality officer at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics and professor of Internal Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Virginia Commonwealth University before becoming Chief Medical Officer of WVU  Medicine in Morgantown.

The 1979 class’ valedictorian was Brenda Lee Graffius, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Don Graffius. Her siblings are David Graffius and Ed Graffius.  Michael Delligatti, Evelyn Prahl Kurtock, Pam Prahl Johnson and Eleanor Slavik Varga are her cousins. Jennifer Linn-Foster is her niece.

State Senator Roman Prezioso, Class of 1967, was named Italian-American Man of the Year in 2017. The same year that Catherine Joan Tiano Mancina was named Mother of the Year. She is the widow of Joe Mancina, once my roomate during my WVU days. Joe was a tax auditor for the state for three decades.  

SUE SCHRADER GETS HER NAME ON AIR FORCE BASE BRICK

 

Sue Ahouse Schrader, Class of 1971, has been honored with a brick that carries her name as Air Force Master Sargent Sue Schrader at Plattsburgh Air Force Base where she was station in 1973-76.

 

Sue’s brick is next to “my adopted dad, Robert Llewellyn,” who married Nida Louise Bowen, switchboard operator on the base. Both are deceased.

 

Brenda Llewellyn Smith, Robert and Nida’s daughter, forwarded the photos to Sue. Brenda lives in Peru, New York. Gloria Llewellyn, Robert and Brenda’s daughter who also lives in Peru, New York, also joined Brenda in informing Sue about the honor.

The late Nida Bowen Llewellyn was married to Robert, who passed away in 2002. They also had a son, Robert, Jr.

Sue moved from Piscataway, New Jersey to Mount Bethel, Pennsylvania, where her son,  Chris Schrader, also lives. 

Plattsburgh Air Force Base is a former United States Air Force Strategic Air Command (SAC) base covering 3,447 acres in the extreme northeast corner of New York, on the western shore of Lake Champlain opposite Burlington, Vermont, in the city of Plattsburgh, New York.

 

Sue was stationed at Plattsburgh Air Force Base from 1973-1976 then went to McGuire Air Force Base in the Air National Guard in New Jersey from 1976-1977, then to Stratton Air National Guard Base until 1997.

 

Sue’s siblings, constant travelers like her, are Kitty Ahouse Morrison, Class of 1968, and Mike Ahouse, a 1985 North Marion graduate. Both live in Monongah

Jim McDaniel wheeled meals for 20 years

Jim McDaniel, plaque, director Kathy Keuski

Jim McDaniel, Class of 1960, who has dodged adversity during his long Air Force career, last October when Hurricane Joaquin flooding drove Jim and wife Mary Bolin McDaniel from their Rehoboth Beach, Delaware home for two days and in April when a neighbor’s propane tank exploded into a giant fireball across the street from the McDaniel home, burned 100 acres and caused $75,000 in damage to three mobile homes, was honored for his 20 years of service as an outreach worker in the Meals on Wheels Lewes-Rehoboth program.

The adjoining Lews and Rehoboth areas combined for the Meals on Wheels project. Kathy Keuski has been its director for 25 years.

When she began, there were 62 clients and the meals were prepared at the Lewes Senior Center. Today the program serves more than 110,000 meals a year to more than 351 clients.

They are prepared in the huge kitchens at Fish On restaurant in the Villages of Five Points and people like Jim McDaniel deliver them to the doors of the elderly and handicapped.  There are 14 routes and 120 volunteer drivers, including Jim.

After making sure that the neighbor’s fireball didn’t damage the McDaniel home, Jim took donations to the park office to help out the fire victims.

Rehoboth Beach and Lewes are the principal small towns in Delaware's Cape Region.

Jim and Mary celebrated their 37^th wedding anniversary on March 15. Jim met Mary, by then from Upper Marlboro, Maryland, at Anne Arundel Community College in Arnold, Maryland.

Jim’s siblings are Jo Ann McDaniel Huff, Class of 1949, who lives at the bottom of Kings Alley in Worthington; Mary Jane McDaniel Pritchard; and the late Donald McDaniel, Class of 1946.

Their mom was Mary Curry McDaniel, who with 5 siblings were raised in the hotel owned by their father, Carroll Curry, who owned the hotel, theater and bank on the same street in downtown Monongah. 

They are the grandchildren of long-ago Monongah stationmaster Ted McDaniel and Adrian Curry McDaniel, Class of 1923.

Mary Curry McDaniel's sister was Ava Curry Cogar, married to Fred Cogar and living on Cottage Avenue. Ava and my mother, Lena Futten Olesky, who lived across Camden Avenue (U.S. 19) on Church Street with John W. Olesky, Sr., were best friends and often sat on our back porch and talked of many things.

Ava was the lay assistant in 1924 when St. Stanislaus Church priest Father Lawrence Michalski asked Mother Mary Ursula, Mother Mary Arsenia and Sister Mary Clara to begin St. Stanislaus School. It later was renamed Sts. Peter and Paul School.