Today's News

Jesus stood for love

In 1604, King James I of England initiated the process for a new interpretation of the Christian Bible, primarily to consolidate the ecclesiology and orthodoxy of the Church of England under royal control.

He gathered 47 scholars (notably, all members of the Church of England), and seven years later they published what has become known as the King James version of the Bible.

John Nunn of Galax remembers hearing about a drug store located at the old First National Bank in Galax. The owners kept ice in the basement that they chiseled away from the New River in the winter and used it to cool Coca-Colas — back when Coke was made with cocaine.

In the 1950s, Nunn recalls that Galax had more manufacturers than any other town, and there were more people working here than lived here, he said.

The national credit crunch has idled some construction crews around the Twin Counties, according to a count of permits issued by local building officials' offices.

In Carroll County alone for 2008, new housing starts fell by more than a quarter from the year before.

From January to mid-December of this year, the number of building permits issued totaled 98, paperwork from the building official's office shows. That same construction category amounted to 169 for 2007.

That's a decline of 42 percent.

HILLSVILLE — Eight-year-old Presley Talley's Down syndrome turned out to be a blessing in disguise, after it likely spared him from the worst ravages of leukemia.

As Presley's family prepares to celebrate the child being declared cancer-free, they are contemplating the role that the genetic abnormality played in saving him from one of the most feared diseases.

It looked like Presley had been dealt a bad hand from the start.

At birth in November 2000, he looked normal to his parents, Greg and Theresa Talley — of Hillsville and Woodlawn, respectively.