by Nancy Besonen
Doreen Zagar has done it again! The “Yooper Gals” celebrated the pioneer spirit Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2017 with horse & wagon rides and a big spread at Zagar’s in L’Anse. The former Red Hat Society club gone rogue marches to the beat of its own drum. Last Tuesday, Doreen was the drummer. Women dressed as all manner of pioneers, from dance hall girls (Faye Lozier) to a “poor pioneer woman busy baking biscuits” (Ruthy Brown) to a pistol-packing outlaw (that would be Doreen) gathered at Zagar’s for an afternoon of food, friendship and fun. Guests gathered at Zagar’s bar (“saloon”) indoors, visited on lawn chairs outside or cruised, as. Dean Wascher of Greenland drove groups of happily waving Yooper Gals around town in his horse-drawn wagon–with one Gal toting a toy rifle riding shotgun on the back. “We meet once a month, and once a year I host a great big one,” Doreen explained prior to the event. “This year I’m doing ‘Pioneer Day.’ I’ve got a horse and wagon coming out of Greenland, and you should see the menu! I’m going all out. This is what I like to do.” It’s all in the spirit of the Red Hat Society, an international social organization that encourages women to get together, get out and have fun. The movement began with a poem by Jenny Joseph titled, “Warning,” whose opening line sets both the tone and dress code for the organization: “When I am an old women, I shall wear purple, with a red hat which doesn’t go and doesn’t suit me.” To read more, subscribe to the L’Anse Sentinel online, or buy a print copy at our local retailers.

by Melissa Newland
This year, an estimated 2,600 men in the United States will be diagnosed with breast cancer. It is estimated 440 men will die from breast cancer this year. But for Steve Portice of Rose City, MI, grandson of the late Andrew McGee and Maggie Mae Portice of Skanee and son of George and Janice Portice of Twining, MI, these statistics are not going to include him! Steve was diagnosed with a 2.5-cm HER2/neu-positive stage IIIB breast cancer in June of 2016 after feeling a lump in his left breast. His diagnosis was confirmed after surgery was done Sept. 12, 2016 to remove the lump, along with 21 lymph nodes, among which four were found positive for cancer. A Stage IIIB tumor is characterized by having spread to the chest wall or has caused swelling or ulceration of the breast or is diagnosed as inflammatory breast cancer. It may or may not have spread to the lymph nodes under the arm, but it has not spread to other parts of the  body. HER2/neu testing is recommended because the outlook for HER2-positive cancers is reportedly improved if drugs targeting the HER2/neu protein are used as part of treatment. In some men with breast cancer, the cancer cells have too much of a growth-promoting protein known as HER2/neu (or just HER2) on their surface. Breast cancers with too much of this protein are called HER2 positive. They tend to grow and spread more aggressively without special treatment.  To read more, subscribe to the L’Anse Sentinel online, or buy a print copy at our local retailers.

by Melissa Newland
A new meteorological mast for the purpose of testing wind resources has been erected at 17193 High Point Road leading to Mount Arvon in L’Anse Township. This is apparently the third mast that has been put up in the area, with one of the other two locations at 18255 Mount Curwood Road and the third location at 17300 Black Bear Road. According to Catherine Andrews, who is on the L’Anse Township Planning Commission, 13 new locations have been added to the original 120 sites, with the new ones around the Herman area and one near Shepard. According to L’Anse Township Building Inspector Don Mleko, the company responsible for the wind test masts is Renewable Energy Systems Americas, Inc (RES Americas) based in Broomfield, CO. Mleko stated the company is leasing the properties from Weyerhauser, formerly Plum Creek Timber Company. It is standard practice to utilize meteorological masts to measure wind data for a potential future wind farm. High-quality data from a site is a key requirement for optimizing the design of the wind farm, predicting the future energy production of the wind farm and also as an input to selecting the type of wind turbines for a particular wind farm. A wind turbine obtains its power input by converting the force of the wind into torque acting on the rotor blades. The amount of energy which the wind transfers to the rotor depends on the density of the air, the rotor area, and the wind speed. To read more, subscribe to the L’Anse Sentinel online, or buy a print copy at our local retailers.

by Barry Drue
Beavers wreaked havoc that will prove a major headache and expense. A beaver dam failed and a wall of water cut a gorge through Stagecoach Road in Spurr Township. The dam failure took place around 12:30 a.m. on July 18, 2017. The Baraga County Road Commission is working to restore the culvert and road that was washed out. “There was no big storm event,” Road Engineer Doug Mills said. “When it went, it went dramatically. It was a high dam. There was about a 10-foot high wall of water.” “We took delivery on a 72- inch culvert last Friday. It’s designed for a 100-year storm event. But when a beaver dam breaks, all bets are off,” Mills said. Stagecoach Road is a dead-end road serving 17 property owners. The Road Commission was allowed by forest landowner Weyerhaeuser to make some improvements on an existing logging road that is being used for temporary access by residents and property owners. “Thanks to Weyerhaeuser— and they are making sources for materials available close by. If we had to haul the backfill a long distance that would get very expensive,” Mills added. “We’re working on it. We have a lot of prep work to do. We’ll get the road back to the way it was and open to traffic as soon as possible.” To read more, subscribe to the L’Anse Sentinel online, or buy a print copy at our local retailers.