New faces were chosen last Tuesday to take over positions long held by incumbents.

The Hampton-Dumont and CAL Community School Districts will remain fully on-site but school officials are keeping an eye on rising COVID-19 cases in the area.
Superintendent Todd Lettow said cases within the buildings have remained low enough and without proven spread where administration felt comfortable to remain in the on-site model.

This year’s Hampton-Dumont-CAL fall production combines the stage and screen into one night.
This weekend, the H-D-CAL drama department will present a live performance of Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest,” a comedy set in Victorian London.
Prior to the live play will be two recorded Carol Barnett comedy sketches.

Construction on three bridges in the Rockwell area is drawing to an end.
Pete Hjelmstad, field services coordinator with the Iowa Department of Transportation, said the three bridge replacement projects on Highway 65 through Rockwell “remain on schedule” for later this month.
“We’re still looking at mid- to late-November,” he said, regarding a completion date.

Local agricultural professionals recently gave area students a look into the ins-and-outs of the industry.
In celebration of American Education Week last month, Franklin County Farm Bureau and North Central Iowa Ag in the Classroom sponsored a series of Farm-Chats, which brought area farmers into the classroom via livestream.

Local 4-H chapters are teaming together to collect food for those in need and are asking for the public’s help.
Throughout the state, chapters in all 99 counties are working to raise 10,000 non-perishable food items to donate to food banks in communities across Iowa.

The Franklin County Fair Board on Tuesday announced that country music legend Trace Adkins will perform at the 2021 Franklin County Fair in Hampton.
Adkins, who has been in the music scene for 25 years and has amassed 20 chart topping singles, will headline the grandstand on Friday, July 16.

The Iowa Office of the State Medical Examiner has officially identified human remains found in rural Hampton as Ethan Kazmerzak.

Sietsema Family Monument Sales now has a new home in Hampton.
Patrick Sietsema, owner, recently moved the business into the newly opened Sietsema-Atkinson Funeral Home on Highway 65 between Wood Vision Clinic and Pralle City Wash.

The last day of school before Halloween was the perfect time to incorporate pig lungs with a lesson that may already be a little spooky for young children and their guardians.
Community and Family Resources, Prairie Ridge Integrated Behavioral Healthcare and Franklin County Family Focus last week teamed up for a Red Ribbon Week presentation at CAL Elementary School for fifth and sixth graders.

On an otherwise quiet Mon-day afternoon, the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office received a call with information they had been seeking for seven years.
Oregon-based diver and YouTube personality Jared Leisek, a founder of Adventures with Purpose, was on the other side of the phone to deliver news regarding the disappearance of Hampton resident Ethan Kazmerzak.

After nearly three years of planning and fundraising, improvements and renovations to the Franklin County Convention Center are underway.
The Franklin County Fair Board last week announced last week that exterior work on the building started earlier in October.

Riley Kock’s childhood walks past a law office in his native Greene have led him to life as an attorney.
Kock in September began working as an associate attorney at Miller and Miller, PC in Hampton, where he had summer internships in 2018, 2019 and 2020 while he worked his way through law school at Drake University.

Each feature of the new – and recently completed – Sietsema-Atkinson Funeral Home in Hampton has already proven to be valuable assets to guests and the directors alike.
Last Saturday, October 17, the new Sietsema-Atkinson Funeral Home, located on Highway 65, between Pralle City Wash and Wood Vision Clinic, opened its doors for its first visitation hosted at the new location.

Rick and Julie Salvesen see the founding and growth of MID:COM and Midwest Meter, Inc. as their “love story,” and the page of that story has been turned to the next chapter.