ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, July 24, 1996 TAG: 9607240051
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
Whad'ya know, Salem?
It may not be the equivalent to All America City honors, but Salem had its 10 minutes of random fame Saturday as Town of the Week on National Public Radio's syndicated talk show "Whad'Ya Know?"
Each week the two-hour show salutes an American town or city with some tidbits about its history and achievements.
Receiving the honor took no efforts from the city.
To choose a town, "Whad'Ya Know" host Michael Feldman gets an audience member in the Madison, Wis., studio to throw a dart at a map of the United States. Wherever it lands becomes the Town of the Week for the next show, which airs Saturdays at 11 a.m. on WVTF, 89.1 FM.
The salute to Salem included mentions of Salem's historic downtown and minor-league baseball team, the Buccaneers. Feldman gave a quick read of some headlines from a current issue of the Salem Times-Register. And a Salemite was called at random to give an insider's perspective on the city. Eight-year resident Kathy Singletary got the call.
She quickly corrected co-host Jim Packard for calling the baseball team the Buccaneers. It's now the Avalanche, she said. |- S.D. HARRINGTON
Whad'ya gnaw, rodents?
The rumor was rather gruesome.
Construction workers building a drainage ditch through the old Greenwood Cemetery in Buena Vista, according to the anonymous caller to The Roanoke Times, had ravaged graves and turned up a human leg bone.
"Oh yeah, we found a bone," confirmed Tom Klatka, an archaeologist with the state Historic Resources Department in Roanoke. And it was human.
But the excavation for the city-approved drainage ditch, part of the construction of the Savernake subdivision, hadn't disturbed any graves at all, according to Klatka. The bone, he said matter-of-factly, was covered with gnaw marks.
Rodent gnaw marks.
The bone was found just a few feet from a rodent hole leading into a grave in the old Buena Vista city cemetery, apparently exhumed without permission by a marauding varmint. |- MATT CHITTUM
LENGTH: Short : 49 linesby CNB