Dennis L. Garrison, age 72 of Wall, SD, died November 21, 2008, at his home in Wall.

Closed casket visitation will be 1 to 3 p.m. Friday, November 28, at the Rush Funeral Chapel in Wall with the family present.

Private family interment will take place at the Wall Cemetery, with Pastor JoEllen Flesner officiating.

Dennis L. Garrison was born October 17, 1936 in Rapid City, SD, the son of Wayne Dennis and Arlene (Carstensen) Garrison. He attended grade school at the Pennington Square School, rural Wall, for eight years.

The Philip Lady Scotties defeated the Edgemont Moguls 3-0 in the Region 7B volleyball match in Philip on Tuesday, November 11.

The Scotties began the first game a little sluggish, but came back to win. The game scores were 25-21, 25-16 and 25-9. Philip's season record going into the state tournament is 30-3. Philip is out to finish far above its seventh place position it earned at last year's state tournament.

The South Dakota State "B" Volleyball Tournament will be Thursday, Friday and Saturday Novemeber 20 through 22 in Rapid City.

Philip's Hans. P. Peterson Memorial Hospital will receive $5,000 in grant money from the state of South Dakota, which has approved $1,020,500 in grants to help hospitals and clinics with disaster preparedness efforts.

Since 2004, the state has awarded hospitals and rural health clinics more than $5.7 million dollars for such preparedness efforts as isolation and decontamination equipment, pharmaceutical stockpiles, and exercises and drills.

Dear Editor,

As we approach Thanksgiving, I'm sure many of you have turkey dinners and road trips on your mind.  Please add seatbelts to that list.  They are the best tool you have for keeping you and your family safe on the road.

Last year's Thanksgiving was the deadliest on record.  Seven people died in car wrecks.  Six of those people weren't wearing their seatbelts.

Haakon School District 27-1 Board of Education held its monthly scheduled meeting at 6:00 p.m. on Monday, November 17.

October's total for substitute pay is $1,225 for an equivalent total of 21 teaching days. The month's total for wages going to hourly employees was $23,552.11 for a total of 2,198 hours of work amoungst 17 employees filling the responsibilities of 22 functions or positions.

The board approved a school calendar change. School was cancelled on November 6 because of a dangerous winter storm. That school time will be made up on Friday, February 20.

The November 5 and 6 ice storm knocked down more than 2,900 power poles, broke numerous cross arms and caused wire breaks on power lines in western South Dakota. Most of the damage occurred in 13 counties and disrupted electric service to more than 12,500 rural electric cooperative members.

A total of eight co-ops were initially hit by the storm, but only six had extensive damage requiring outside assistance to make repairs.

The Philip Lady Scotties defeated the Jones County Coyotes in the second round of District 13B Tournament play. The Tuesday, November 4 match ended 3-0, with game scores of 25-13, 25-13 and 25-11.

The first round of play was between the fourth seeded Kadoka Area Kougars and Crazy Horse ended with a 3-0 win for Kadoka Area. The other teams received a bye for the first round. After a 20 minute rest, the Kougars had to face the top seeded White River Tigers. Kadoka Area did offer a challenge to White River with scores of 25-18, 25-10 and a hard game of 32-30.

Haakon County residents will benefit from federal mandates that require counties to replace and upgrade road signs and to install 9-1-1 addressing signs.

Road signs include stop, yield, curve, along with any other signs normally seen along the county roads, all have to be upgraded by the year 2012. The federal mandate also stipulates the reflectibilty of the sign, as well as the sign's distance from the road.

"This means a complete overhaul by Haakon County," stated Kenny Neville, county highway superintendent.

The 100-year-old Cottonwood research station has a new superintendent in charge of its day-to-day operations.

David Gay began his tenure as the South Dakota State University's Cottonwood Range and Livestock Research Station superintendent in mid-October. He replaced outgoing superintendent, Ron Haigh. Haigh retired from SDSU after more than 30 years of service.

Gay moved to Cottonwood from Lima, MT. He has held similiar positions in the past. Gay holds a bachelor of science degree in animal science and a master's degree in range science, both from Oklahoma State University.

The Philip Chamber of Commerce meeting on Monday, November 10, was its last as an organization run by a board of directors. It is now officially under a general assembly format of operations.

Though co-chair Kent Olson is willing to continue on in some capacity, he began the meeting as an out-going board chair by wrapping up old business. The plans to re-start the Prairie Expo are tabled for now. The optimum time for a livestock show, such as a pen-of-three, would have been in January.