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Prime time of year to visit farmers markets in area

Though seeing the summer days slip by carries a little sadness, one of the prime benefits of August is fresh produce and other products that can be purchased — often only a short time after being picked — at the farmers markets that set up in area communities. Most gardens or farms that cultivate fruits and vegetables are now far enough along in the season to have a wide variety available for sale. And many area communities, even in the Upper Peninsula, have regular days of the week or month when vendors gather with what they’ve grown this year. Locally, the Downtown Iron ...

Almanac for Aug. 7, 2026

Today is Friday, Aug. 7, the 219th day of 2026. There are 146 days left in the year. Today in history: In 1974, French high-wire artist Philippe Petit performed an unapproved tightrope walk between the two towers of the World Trade Center in New York, more than 1,300 feet above the ground; the event was chronicled in the Academy Award-winning documentary “Man on Wire.” Also on this date: In 1789, the U.S. Department of War was established by Congress. In 1942, U.S. and other allied forces landed at Guadalcanal, marking the start of the first major allied offensive in the Pacific ...

War against sea lamprey expensive but worth the money

While it might seem to some that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is throwing good money after bad fighting the invasive sea lamprey, we support continued efforts by this agency and others to rid the Great Lakes and adjacent waters of this nasty invasive species. Sea lamprey are parasitic fish native to the Atlantic Ocean that invaded the Great Lakes via shipping canals in the early 1900s. They attach to fish with a suction-cup mouth lined with sharp teeth, feed on their body fluids, killing up to 40 pounds of fish during their parasitic phase. Many Great Lakes anglers can ruefully ...

The Iran War is eating Trump’s presidency

An Iran war that was supposed to be brief, and then was supposed to be over, is imposing an increasing price on Donald Trump’s presidency. We’ve seen a second term of a Republican administration go this way before. There are distinct echoes of George W. Bush’s Iraq War — the ...

Almanac for Aug. 6, 2026

Today is Thursday, Aug. 6, the 218th day of 2026. There are 147 days left in the year. Today in history: In 1945, during World War II, the U.S. B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, resulting in an estimated 140,000 deaths. Also on this date: In 1806, Emperor Francis II abdicated, marking the end of the Holy Roman Empire after nearly a thousand years. In 1825, Upper Peru became the autonomous republic of Bolivia. In 1890, at Auburn Prison in Auburn, New York, William Kemmler became the first person to be executed via the electric chair. In 1926, ...

NM sues DOJ and Blanche, claims they blocked state’s Epstein probe

CEDAR CREST, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico’s attorney general sued the U.S. Department of Justice on Wednesday, accusing it of blocking the state from investigating sex crimes at Jeffrey Epstein’s sprawling ranch near Santa Fe. The lawsuit in federal court in Washington, D.C., said the ...