TODAY'S FOCUS
Ah, the pleasures of travel overseas with a group of friends
By BETH CHANDLER
Special to Gwinnett Forum

(Editor's Note: with school out for both college and high school, it's time to think vacations. Here's an interesting travelogue from a group just back from a trip to Barcelona and Provence. -- eeb)

DORAVILLE, Ga., June 1, 2011 -- Bleary eyed but filled with excitement, five friends and I stumbled into the Barcelona airport, exhausted but ready for 12 days of adventure in Barcelona and Provence.

Our first challenge was getting from the airport to our hotel in downtown Barcelona. Our guidebooks suggested a train, but the folks at the tourist booth recommended a bus. We opted for the train and two hours later, we finally dragged our last bags into the hotel.

With just 24 hours in Barcelona, there was much to do. We started with the famous Sagrada Familia, the cathedral begun in 1882 (and still under construction) by the architect Gaudi. It's an amazing structure with something different to catch the eye everywhere you look.

Our next day took us to Guell Park, with more Gaudi architecture. Then we were off toward Provence. We rented a couple of mini-vans as eventually there would be nine of us, and headed off to a beautiful seaside town of Collioure. Two days is more than enough to visit all the quaint shops and enjoy a coffee or glass of wine overlooking the Mediterranean.

A villa in Provence awaited us, a very wise move. With a total of nine of us splitting the cost, it was economical and comfortable. We chose a location that allowed for easy day trips, most days.

Traveling together recently were George Taft, Beth Chandler, Pam Reddeman, Lane Reed, Stacey Milam, Martha Hale, Todd Reddeman, MaryBeth Cornell and Brianna Reddeman.

Many small towns have a market day. That's where you'll find those unique items you'll always treasure, from olive, lavender and other scented soaps, to the beautiful table linens, so evocative of Provence. But if shopping isn't on your agenda, you'll want to choose another day to visit a market town.

I was amazed by the variance in the landscape of the region. I envisioned vineyards and fields of lavender, stretching as far as I could see, and we definitely saw that. But there were rock outcroppings, seemingly out of nowhere. The scenery was just breathtaking and every day brought different wonders to behold.

But places we particularly liked:

• The Pont du Gard (outside Nimes) is one of the best remaining examples of a Roman aqueduct, crossing the Gard river. To see a structure built in the first century A.D. without all the modern construction methods is something not to be missed.
  
  
• The city of Grasse is known throughout the world for its perfumeries.
  
  
• Rossillon, a small walled city from the Middle Ages, was established because of the ochre soil, used for hundreds of years as a paint pigment. It reminded us of our own Georgia red clay.
  
  
• A drive to Cassis was breathtaking, but not for the faint of heart. Nice, Arles and Avignon were places we wouldn't revisit.

A few things to consider if you're interested in a similar vacation: look into villa rentals. They're a wonderful way to enjoy the area with space to spread out and relax. If you're renting a car, be sure to take a GPS with you, and download maps of the area.

Build in some time to relax. It's tempting to want to see everything, but you just can't do it. And take lots of photos. On those cold, rainy days during winter, you'll enjoy looking back at your adventures and start dreaming of the next trip.

EEB PERSPECTIVE
Tornado brought extensive damage to Ga. national forests
By ELLIOTT BRACK
Editor and publisher

JUNE 1, 2011 -- Georgians may not realize the extent of the damage to the National Forest that this year's tornadoes have caused. Besides the extensive damage to in areas such as Ringgold, Lake Burton and numerous Georgia communities, many of which have been extensively reported, little has been reported on forest damage. The tornados unleashed a tremendous destructive power to the Chattahoochee and Oconee National Forest across North Georgia.

Brack

The National Forest Service estimates that more than 2,000 acres are extensively damaged. The vastness of the destruction in some areas has yet to be determined, simply because crews cannot get into the area.

Some areas have been closed since the storms, including Chattahoochee River Road north of Helen; Boggs Creek Road in Lumpkin County; and Timson Creek Road in Rabun County. Just open last week was the east end of Tray Mountain Road in White County. The trail at Helton Creek Falls has been reopened, but the observation deck at the end is closed. The observation deck at Keown Falls is closed indefinitely until repairs can be made. Trails in much of the Forest Service land have downed trees. However, many areas severely damaged have been re-opened after crews cleared the areas.

Altogether, more than 80 miles of roadways are still closed from the storm.

George Bain, forest supervisor, says that the Forest Service will be conducting timber sales where there were downed trees with significant commercial quality. Some of the work will be with contracted firms, and other work will be by Forest Service personnel, Bain says.

The Forest Service is working to make as many of the commercial downed trees available to local industry as is feasible, according to guidelines in the forest Land Management Plan. Because of the location and type of damage, it is expected to take longer than normal to remove, causing some areas to remain closed this recreation season and even into next year, officials predict.

Bain adds: "There is tremendous damage at Boggs Creek, but the damage is so thick, that we don't have a good idea how extensive it is. If there is damage to the camping areas and toilets, we will have to contract that out for repair." Other type of damage, besides areas with trees falling across them, include clogged culverts and water damage.

Bain urges the public "to exercise extreme caution when traveling forest roads in the area where there is tornado damage. "

The most popular hiking trail, Appalachian Trail from Springer Mountain to the North Carolina border, apparently suffered little damage from the storms, and remains open. However, Logan Turnpike near the Appalachian Trail in White County, is blocked from tornado damage. Other trails closed include the Town Creek OHV Trail System near Greenville and the Ocmulgee Bluff Equestrian Trail in Jasper County.

Meanwhile, the Forest Service is assessing damage to the area. Bain says that many areas in the National Forest will be cleared of debris, especially if commercial timber can be salvaged. "Other places won't, if it is not easily logable ground, or if it would required road construction, or have steep ground to work in and equipment cannot get in."

To see some of the damage from photos of the Forest Service, go to:

• http://www.flickr.com/photos/chattoconeenf/sets/72157626514458743
  
  
• http://www.flickr.com/photos/chattoconeenf/with/5684257370

ABOUT OUR SPONSORS
Howard Brothers

The public spiritedness of our sponsors allows us to bring GwinnettForum.com to you at no cost to readers. Today's sponsor is Howard Brothers, which has outlets in Duluth, Norcross and Oakwood. John and Doug Howard are the owners/operators of the Howard Brothers stores, which specialize in hardware, outdoor power equipment and parts and service. Major trade brands are a hallmark of Howard Brothers. And did you know that Howard Brothers is the largest seller of Stihl Outdoor Power products in the United States. Howard Brothers also carries Makita Power Tools. Visit the web site at www.howardbrothers.com.

FEEDBACK
Fondly recalls Suwanee's Loretta Roberts and her memories

Editor, the Forum:

I met Loretta Roberts a few years ago because she wanted to write a book. When she realized that it would focus on her rather than serve as a guide for caring for the elderly (a project that would have overwhelmed her), she decided her personal story was not worth sharing and ended the project. I didn't want her memories to be forgotten, so I encouraged her to enlist a family member to capture her on camera while she told her tales. With her sharp mind and deadpan wit (she never tried to be funny), Loretta had a talent for taking you on her little journeys back in time! I could have listened to her for days.

Thank you for sharing the news of her passing.

-- Sallie W. Boyles, Duluth

Dear Sallie: Some good news: before her passing, Loretta indeed began to put some words on paper, and also did some taping. Her niece, Carolyn Hill, says she was better at getting other people to talk than she was to talk about herself. So perhaps from gathering all this together, plus a lot of work, something good can come of her labors before she died. -- eeb

• Send us your thoughts. Our policy: We encourage readers to submit feedback (or letters to the editor). Send your thoughts to the editor at elliott@brack.net. We will edit for length and clarity. Make sure to include your name and the city where you live. Submission of a comment grants permission for us to reprint. Please keep your comments to 300 words or less. However, we will consider longer articles (no more than 500 words) for featuring in Today's Focus as space allows.

UPCOMING
Pre-demolition, salvage and porch party in Norcross Saturday

A pre-demolition, salvage picking and porch party -- something distinctive -- is scheduled Saturday, June 4, from 10 a.m. until 12 noon.

The event will be at 155 North Cemetery Street in Norcross, one block west of Buford Highway.

The idea behind the Deconstructed House is to divert re-usable building products and architectural salvage from landfills. Enjoy live old-timey music by Kirk McAlpin and Company, artwork featuring rescued building materials by Recentered Pieces, sustainable networking, and opportunity to purchase architectural salvage, fixtures, heart pine flooring and more from 1900 -1930 period houses scheduled for demolition. The event accepts cash or check payable to City of Norcross.

For more information, visit sustainablenorcross@gmail.com or call 770-246-0083.

GGC expands curriculum with new academic programs

Georgia Gwinnett College has again expanded its curriculum by introducing several new academic programs. New offerings in leadership, management information systems, political science, information technology, English and teacher education will be available in Fall 2011.

GGC's curriculum committee approved the addition of a leadership minor and concentration in the School of Business. This program is unique and one of the few pioneers of its kind within higher education. It is intended to prepare students in activities and positions requiring leadership knowledge and skills. The leadership concentration is available to business majors and the leadership minor is available to non-business majors.

The School of Business now also offers a concentration in management information systems, a specialized area at the interface of information technology and management science. The School of Liberal Arts has introduced minors in English and political science, both of which would augment other degrees with critical thinking skills useful in many employment situations. The School of Science and Technology has added a minor in information technology.

Students interested in Georgia Gwinnett College are encouraged to attend either a June 7 or June 28 Open House. For more information or to register for an open house, visit www.ggc.edu.

NOTABLE
Suwanee names Kevin Skinner as Police Officer of the Year

Skinner

The Suwanee Police Department has honored 10 officers for exemplary service. Officer Kevin Skinner was elected Officer of the Year by his colleagues. A Suwanee area resident and North Gwinnett High School graduate, Skinner first came to the Suwanee Police Department as an intern from North Georgia College and State University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in criminal justice. He was hired by the department in 2007 as a dispatcher; he's been a patrol officer for nearly three years.

Franklin

Lawrenceville resident Gwen Franklin was voted Civilian of the Year. A U.S. Army veteran who served in the Middle East, Franklin is the police department's evidence/records technician.

Sgt. Nick Jacobs and Sgt. Robert Thompson received the Chief's Award, which is presented each year to officers who distinguish themselves day in and day out through their professionalism and strong work ethic. A 10-year Suwanee veteran, Jacobs was recognized for his work last year as head of Suwanee's selective enforcement unit and special events liaison as well as for his leadership. Thompson, a Lawrenceville resident and Detroit native, received the award based on his leadership role in the department's attainment of an automatic license plate reader system.

Jacobs, who lives in Bethlehem, also received the highest score in the department's annual firing range competition and was named Top Gun.

Several officers received Merit Awards for exemplary service on specific calls or initiatives:

• Capt. Clyde Byers for developing and maintaining systems that have enabled the department to better track spending.
  
  
• Lt. Dan Clark for his management of the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies national accreditation process. Clark also received a Hardin Watkins Star Award from the City for his accreditation efforts.
  
  
• Officer Elton Hassell for his role in securing a $10,000 grant from the Governor's Office of Highway Safety.
  
  
• Cpl. Susan Roetzer and Officer Michael Troutman for their investigation of a methamphetamine lab, which resulted in two arrests.
  
  
• Officer Robert Stewart for pulling two adults and a three-year-old child from a burning car.

Anna Shackelford new chair of Gwinnett Senior Leadership

New leaders have been named by Gwinnett Senior Leadership, a 12-year-old program hosted by Gwinnett Technical College.

New chair of the Board of Trustees is Anna Shackelford of Snellville. Other new officers include Bill Atkinson of Lawrenceville, vice chair; and Tim Dunn of Lilburn, secretary. Pat Swan has been named general chair for the 2011-2012 program year, with Bill Barry as vice chair.

Elliott Brack, chairman since the inception of the program in 1998, remains on the board, as does former vice chairman Bill Barry.

In addition, four new members have been added to the board of trustees. They include Judy McDaniel of Lawrenceville; Annie Copeland of Snellville; Don Segars of Lawrenceville; and Larry Reed of Norcross.

Gwinnett Senior Leadership is now gearing up for its 13th class, to begin in August. Deadline for applying for the program, for those 55 and older, is July 18. For more information, email Lorri Christopher , or call 678-226-6316.

Since the program began, there have been more than 300 persons who have graduated from the program. Many of these graduates now serve on non-profit and governmental boards and in other key positions in the county.

Psychology honor society establishes charter chapter at GGC

Georgia Gwinnett College has installed its chapter of Psi Chi, the international honor society for the field of psychology. At the chapter's May 24 induction ceremony, 18 students and three faculty members joined the organization as charter members. They were joined by four faculty members whose membership was transferred to the GGC chapter.

Psi Chi was founded on September 4, 1929 in New Haven, Conn. The society's purpose is to encourage, stimulate and maintain excellence in scholarship, and to advance the science of psychology. Psi Chi is a member of the Association of College Honor Societies and has grown over the past 81 years into one of the largest and most successful honor societies in the world. Psi Chi has more than 1,100 chapters located at college and university campuses throughout the U.S. as well as in Canada, Ireland, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

RECOMMENDED

• An invitation: What Web sites, books or restaurants have you enjoyed? Send us your best recent visit to a restaurant or most recent book you have read along with a short paragraph as to why you liked it, plus what book you plan to read next. --eeb

GEORGIA ENCYCLOPEDIA
Macon's Katharine Du Pre Lumpkin key sociologist of her era

Sociologist, activist, teacher, and writer, Katharine Du Pre Lumpkin spent a lifetime studying and combating economic and racial oppression. She is best known for her autobiography, The Making of a Southerner (1947).

Lumpkin was born on December 22, 1897, in Macon to Annette Caroline Morris and William Lumpkin, a veteran of the Civil War (1861-65). As a member of a prominent Georgia family and the daughter of a veteran, she was inculcated in the cultural mythologies of the Lost Cause and white supremacy. The Lumpkin children responded differently to their upbringing: although Katharine's eldest sister, Elizabeth, remained committed to the Lost Cause, another sister, Grace, later wrote a series of leftist novels.

As Lumpkin describes in her autobiography, her racial attitudes slowly but irrevocably changed during her undergraduate and graduate careers. She attended Brenau College in Gainesville from 1912 to 1915 and worked there as a teaching assistant following her graduation. In 1918 she moved on to Columbia University in New York, where she received an M.A. in sociology the following year. Between 1920 and 1925 Lumpkin worked as the national student secretary for the YWCA's southern region. In 1925 she entered the sociology program at the University of Wisconsin, where she earned a Ph.D. in 1928.

After year-long appointments as an instructor at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass., and a postdoctoral fellow at the Social Sciences Research Council in New York City, Lumpkin spent the next two decades as a director of research, first at Smith College's Council of Industrial Studies (1932-39), then at the Institute of Labor Studies (1940-53), both in Northampton, Mass.

During this time, her scholarly output was prodigious. The South in Progress (1940) saw a return to Lumpkin's southern roots that continued in her next work, The Making of a Southerner (1947). Part family history, part autobiography, and part sociological study, the book describes Lumpkin's transition from passive inheritance of white supremacy to conscious rejection of the racial values of a segregated South.

After a year as a lecturer at Mills College in Oakland, Calif., (1956-57), Lumpkin took a position in 1957 as professor of sociology at Wells College in Aurora, N.Y. For the next decade she remained at Wells, where she taught a course, "The Negro Minority in American Life," that often focused on contemporary events in the civil rights struggle. In 1967 she retired to Charlottesville, Va., where she taught extension courses at the University of Virginia and was active in the League of Women Voters. She continued to lecture and write and in 1974 published The Emancipation of Angelina Grimké, a study of the important 19th-century abolitionist from South Carolina. In 1979 she moved to Chapel Hill, N.C., where she died on May 5, 1988.

• Click here to access the Georgia Encyclopedia

GwinnettForum is provided to you at no charge every Tuesday and Friday. If you would like to serve as an underwriter, click here to learn more.

• MORE: Contact Editor and Publisher Elliott Brack at: elliott@gwinnettforum.com

UNSUBSCRIBE

We hope you'll keep receiving the great news and information from GwinnettForum, but if you need to unsubscribe, click here.

SISTER PUBLICATIONS

We encourage you to check out our sister publications:

© 2011, Gwinnett Forum.com. Gwinnett Forum is an online community commentary for exploring pragmatic and sensible social, political and economic approaches to improve life in Gwinnett County, Ga. USA.

TODAY'S QUOTE
No wonder London survived the bombing by the Nazis

"Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm."

-- Former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (1874-1965).

SEARCH GWINNETT FORUM

GWINNETT CALENDAR

Life Is Short, a series of plays around a theme of funerals at the Lionheart Theatre: June 2 through June 12, 10 College Street, Norcross. Visit online for more information.

(NEW) Locomotive Celebration: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., June 4-5, at the Southeastern Railway Museum, Duluth. Enjoy special crafts and other activities amid rail cars and locomotives. The Junior Model Railroad Club will exhibit their modular railroad, and winners of the 2011 Photo Contest will be announced at 3 p.m.

(NEW) Peachtree Corners Festival: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., June 11. To be held on the tree-shaded The Corners Parkway, one block west of Peachtree Parkway between Holcomb Bridge Road and Crooked Creek Road. It offers a juried arts and craft show, live music, a car show and showcases the restaurants of the area. For more information, visit www.peachtreecornersfestival.org.

Success Lives Here Breakfast, 7:30 a.m., June 23, 1818 Club, 6500 Sugarloaf Parkway, Duluth. Speaker will be Cynthia B. Kaye, CEO of Logical Choice Technologies of Lawrenceville.

MORE EEB PERSPECTIVE

MORE RECENT COMMENTARY

CONTACT US TODAY

© 2001-2011, Gwinnett Forum.com is Gwinnett County's online community forum for commentary that explores pragmatic and sensible social, political and economic approaches to improve life in Gwinnett County, Ga. USA.

PHONE: 770.840.1003
EMAIL: elliott@gwinnettforum.com

Site designed and maintained by
The Brack Group.