Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 7, 1994                   TAG: 9401070191
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

IN VIRGINIA

RICHMOND - If legislators and voters approve riverboat gambling in Virginia, a $35 million gaming complex will be built along the James River, the owner of the downtown site said Wednesday.

"This is not a pie-in-the-sky idea," Thomas Mountjoy, general partner and primary owner of the cruise ship Annabel Lee, said at a news conference at the site.

He is betting that the General Assembly will approve a bill to put riverboat gambling to a statewide referendum. The bill will be considered at the 60-day session that begins next week.

Last year, the bill sponsored by Del. Jerrauld Jones, D-Norfolk, died in committee, but Mountjoy said he expects the bill to have "a reasonable chance" this year. Gov.-elect George Allen has said he would sign it.

- Associated Press

Schools to open after Jewish holiday

Two Northern Virginia school systems will open two days after Labor Day to avoid a conflict with the first day of the Jewish New Year.

Schools in Fairfax and Prince William counties will open Wednesday, Sept. 7, school officials said.

The move will mean Jewish parents won't be forced to choose between observing the beginning of the two-day holiday and sending children to the first day of school.

- Associated Press

Bowling Green couple claims Lotto jackpot

RICHMOND - A Bowling Green couple has claimed half of a $20.6 million Lotto jackpot.

Eddie and Faye Bryant bought one of two winning tickets for the Dec. 18 drawing, but they chose to have a quiet family Christmas and wait out two winter storms before claiming the money.

Eddie Bryant works on a Rappahannock Electric Cooperative service crew. His wife is a secretary in the Fredericksburg public schools.

The Bryants said they have made few plans for the money, and neither has decided to quit working.

- Associated Press

Lynchburg man cries foul over baseball rain

LYNCHBURG - A Jefferson High School chemistry teacher is asking a Bedford County circuit judge to order the high school to stop using its baseball field.

John C. Murphy Jr., an equestrian coach who lives across from the school, says he and his horses have been dodging "raining baseballs" for years. Murphy said he hopes the school system will build a baseball field at the new Forest Middle School, now under construction.

But Bedford County School Superintendent John Kent said that is unlikely and added that the school has answered Murphy's concerns over the years by putting up netting, raising the height of the outfield fence and moving the position of the baseball team's pitching machine.

- Associated Press