Area News

The Laurens County NAACP is set to host its 41st Annual Freedom Fund Banquet at Springfield Baptist Church on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2018 beginning at 6 p.m. The NAACP banquet will share the date with the Sanders High School Alumni Association’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Celebration, which is set to begin at 10 a.m.…

  Enoree native and U.S. Army career officer Milford H. Beagle, Jr. was promoted to Brigadier General on Monday, Dec. 18 during a ceremony in his honor at Fort Drum, N.Y. With the promotion, Beagle becomes the Deputy Commander General for Support for the 10th Mountain Division and Fort Drum. “It was pretty surreal,” Beagle…

ALDI stores in the Carolinas, Georgia and Indiana and Jack Brown Produce, Inc. have voluntarily recalled an assortment of apples that were available for purchase in stores starting on Dec. 13, 2017 due to possible Listeria monocytogenes contamination. The grocery chain issued a press release earlier today that said ALDI stores immediately removed the affected…

Chad Gambrell has been appointed as Agent-in-Charge of the Greenville County office of the S.C. Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon Services. Gambrell, a Clinton resident, had served in the same capacity in Laurens County since 2010. He began his new duties in Greenville Monday. “This promotion is truly a bittersweet opportunity for me,” Gambrell…

Clem Patterson Ham, who played a vital role in the construction of Laurens Memorial Hospital, died Saturday after a long illness at his home in Marion, S.C. He was 84. Ham took over as Chief Executive Officer of the Laurens County Health Care System in 1979. He was also then administrator of Bailey Memorial Hospital…

Three local men remained in the Johnson Detention Center Tuesday morning after being arrested a week earlier by Laurens County Sheriff’s Office deputies on drug and burglary charges. Christopher Kevin Boggs, 27, William Alexander Kellett, 31, and Joshua Allen Knight, 30, were charged with manufacturing methamphetamine and unlawful disposal of meth waste. Kellett also faces…

The Laurens County Council voted Tuesday night at its regular meeting to begin the bidding process for  a new roof and HVAC system for the county’s Judicial Complex at Hillcrest. Council members voted previously to approve the new roof and was asked to fund it Tuesday night, but council members decided to replace some 27…

Some 125 people attended a safety course Saturday offered to local church congregations that might face an active-shooter situation in Laurens County. The number of attendees, which represented more than 40 local churches, was about double what was expected for the four-hour training session at the Laurens County Judicial Complex at Hillcrest. “We were prepared…

Some Laurens County residents got their first look at one of the latest additions to the Lauren County Sheriff’s Office Saturday during the Laurens Christmas Parade. The LCSO’s new LMTV (Light Medium Tactical Vehicle), a military-surplus armored truck, was outfitted with Christmas lights and chugged through the parade, but is expected to do more serious…