Elliott Engel in Hickory.

Last night we were stunned!  The absolutely unexpected happened!  And it  happened again and again and AGAIN!  Those of us who were there looked at each other in amazement! “Wow” we said, with out mouths wide open.

We learned things nobody else ever knew.  Things everybody has heard about but NObody knew  what we had just learned.  We found out what a “Boxoffice” really is, and we found out about the most expensive product in the world (popcorn), and  . . . BUT – I can’t go on.  Oh yes, I could tell you what Elliott Engle told us last night, I could tell you the same thing he did.  But I  can’t tell it the same way.  

He was talking about a guy named William.  He talked about how William later became known as Shakespeare.  And how that William became the greatest writer in the entire history of mankind.  We were in awe. Especially when we heard a few of the examples Elliott Engel told us.  Most of us had never heard about little pig bladders filled with blood, for example just before the play begins, or . . . but I digress  . . . You really need to hear Elliott Engel explain these things to you so you can get it straight. 

Isabel Wilkerson, Visiting Writer at LRU in Hickory, NC

Isabel Wilkerson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist spoke on the campus of Lenoir-Rhyne University, in Hickory, NC, on 20 February, 2014 about  her book “The Warmth of Other Suns” which describes the “great migration” of blacks from the American south into the cities of the the north.  

Ms. Wilkerson spoke in the auditorium of the Belk Centrum which was filled with spectators, and two other rooms were also packed with people watching her presentation on closed circuit television.

Hickory Community Theatre, "On Golden Pond"

James Best, AKA Rosco P. Coltrane, new resident of Hickory, NC, appeared in the play “On Golden Pond” at the Hickory Community Theatre in March of 2014.

He played opposite Norma Frank, another Hickory resident, as Ethel and Norman Thayer, and they and the audience had a blast.  James’ wife, Dorothy (another new Hickory resident) played his daughter.  Good job, good performances, a marvelous time and lots of fun.