EVANSVILLE, IL (West Frankfort Gazette – Click to read the full story on the link above. Here is an excerpt below)
University of Evansville student Neil Brookhouse of West Frankfort has received the Department of Creative Writing 2017 Virginia Lowell Grabill Award for excellence in undergraduate creative writing. Brookhouse, a Psychology major, won first place in fiction for his piece entitled “Neighbors”.
The Virginia Grabill competition is held by the University of Evansville’s English department every year. Brookhouse added, “I figured that since it was my senior year and therefore my last chance to do so, I should submit something.”
“I’m really honored by the award, honestly. And surprised, too. I’ve been sitting on this story for a year now, just re-reading it and editing it and talking myself out of it. I think when you look at anything you’ve made for too long, you start to hate it. The story had become something way too familiar and simultaneously completely unrecognizable to me, and I felt like I’d lost sight of the narrative during the editing process. So in that respect, the award was really reassuring, too. It made me feel like I was doing something right.”
WEST FRANKFORT, IL (Roni Leforge – WSIL TV. Please click to read the full story and watch the accompanying video. Here is an excerpt) City leaders dispute claims they didn’t do enough to ease flooding that caused people to leave their homes. Several homes had more than six inches of standing water inside over the weekend, which led some residents to believe the city’s pumps may have not been working properly. But News 3 spoke with the mayor, who says the pumps were working just fine. The system just couldn’t get the water out of town quickly enough. Michele Odle spent Tuesday morning unpacking her home. “I left pots and pans and stuff like that in there, but all my big furniture and stuff was all in a U-Haul,” said Odle. Within hours on Saturday morning, her yard had become a lake. She and her husband decided to get the important things out, so they wouldn’t be destroyed by flood waters. 
Billy Ray Keltner, 20 of Christopher IL, passed away on Wednesday April 26, 2017 as a result of an automobile accident.
BENTON, IL (Sean Conway, WSIL TV- Please click for the full story and accompanying video. Here is an excerpt.) A Benton man is credited with saving his neighbor’s life during a morning house fire. The man pulled a woman from her burning home shortly before fire crews arrived. Benton fire crews responded to a neighbor’s report of a fire on the 500 block North McLeansboro St. on Monday morning. A neighbor walking by said he noticed the smoke coming from the house and sprang to action to save the woman trapped inside. 
