Edward J. Pluchar

Resident Input wanted for Greenbrier County Comprehensive Plan
By Edward J. Pluchar

Citizens interested in the future of Greenbrier County met in Lewisburg on September 29 and in Rupert on September 30 with comprehensive planning consultant Megan Dorset to initiate public involvement in the new, state-mandated comprehensive plan.

“A comprehensive plan is one long road map,” Dorset [...]

Open Book Hosts Local Doctor for Book Signing
By Edward J. Pluchar

A steady procession of friends and new faces came to praise Z. Shamma-Othman, MD and her book, What Parents of Special Children Should Know: The Story of Sarah Reem, at the Open Book last Friday, August 1st.

Shamma-Othman signed copies of her book, which began [...]

Once before I might have read it through, but a couple of days ago I finished reading the book of Genesis straight through.  In terms of length and density, this isn’t saying a lot, though the genealogies do become a little tedious.
That’s interesting, though.  If I kept reading, a long time from now I’d encounter [...]

Groups plumb depths of Board’s support
By Edward J. Pluchar

Greenbrier County is home to some 1,300 caves, the second largest number for any county in the nation. It is a wonder then, said John Pierson of the National Speleological Society, that Greenbrier County has never hosted the Society’s Convention.

“People come from around the world [...]

Rainelle Council Properly Disposed for Littering Ordinance
By Edward J. Pluchar

When Rainelle physically transferred their ordinances from one book to another, somehow an ordinance against littering went missing. Discarding the ironic possibility that the old ordinance has itself become a piece of litter, Council approved the second reading of a new littering ordinance on [...]

Catching up with environmental lawyer Joe Lovett in his modest office one story above The Wild Bean in Lewisburg, I thank him for meeting me on a Saturday. Casually, Lovett indicates a Saturday meeting is no problem, because he often works weekends.

Lovett figures prominently in Coal River by Michael Shnayerson, a book sympathetic to [...]

Working until one dies seems a grim forecast, and such a thought is usually uttered with some resignation.

On the other hand, there are people who are equally grim about retirement. For these, there’s something special about coming to work every day, a consequence of the well-established marriage of one’s passions to his livelihood.

Sidney Jacob Neathawk [...]

It’s Tuesday evening sometime in your near future, and you decide, “Why not?”

Maybe it takes you just 10 minutes, but more likely you’ve driven twenty minutes or so when you finally reach the bottom of Clayton Road. There’s only one way to turn, so you begin the ascent.

If you’re experiencing some trepidation after a [...]

My mother, brother, and I have suffered from migraine headaches for years.  I’m sure I had such headaches from a fairly young age, and I can specifically remember a migraine I suffered at a community picnic at 8 years old, until I finally vomitted, and thereafter recovered.
I am now convinced that high fructose corn syrup (HFCS from now on) has been a [...]

This also is a two-for-one, and I’m starting to realize that the full experience of person is usually brought out by another with strong and distinct characteristics of his/her own.
Character #1 is Mrs. Wiley, an 81 year-old African-American woman for whom Joe and I are installing new windows. We accomplished some of this work with [...]