Jace Randel, a 16 year-old sophomore at Northfield High School student, received recognition as the 2020 Riley Champion and was honored at the Metropolitan School Board meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 8.

People are able to nominate patients of Riley Children’s Hospital between the ages of 8-18 to be considered to be Riley Champions.

The patients who are selected are Riley advocated and they must demonstrate the spirit of Chad Keown, a young man who passed away while serving as a Riley Champion. Keown overcame many obstacles and challenges, all while keeping a positive attitude and a giving and helpful heart.

“A Touch of Arc” art show and reception, featuring works created by the South Miami Street Artists, will be on Friday, Nov. 1, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Borders and Beyond Gallery located at 24 West Canal Street in downtown Wabash during November’s First Friday event.

The art works featured in this show were created by 26 people with disabilities who receive services at Arc of Wabash County.

Art classes are made available for those exhibiting an interest in learning to express themselves through art. The classes are taught by Arc staff who have backgrounds in art and are artists in their own right.

Most of the paintings are collaborations between Arc staff and persons served by Arc.

“The artists take a lot of pride in what they do and they are very talented,” said Lindsay Swihart, Senior Vice President of Programs and Services.

Recently, citizens of Wabash have been creating neighborhood crime watch pages in order to band people together to keep an eye on neighborhoods and report any suspicious activity to the page to make others aware.

Amelia Delcamp, a worried mother in Wabash, has started a Facebook page called Neighborhood Watch In or Around Wabash, Indiana.

Delcamp is hoping that this page will aide in creating a safer community for the children of Wabash to grown up in.

“When I was a kid I could go outside and not have to worry about empty drug needles,” said Delcamp.

“I also didn’t have to worry about strangers coming up to me and trying to talk to me. I could just be a kid playing outside until the street lights came on. I want my two kids and everyone’s kids in Wabash County and surrounding areas to be safe to play outside again like it was when I was a kid and not have to worry about the dangers that come with playing outside.”

The page is set up to be secure and safe for people to post about dangerous situations and suspicions that they have. 

Delcamp has made it so that people who want to join the page have to answer a series of questions before being able to join the group. She did this so that the people who are joining the group are joining for the right reasons.

The world premiere of “Whelm,” a movie written and directed by a Southwood High School graduate and filmed in and around Wabash County, will take place during the Heartland Film Festival in October.

The film will premiere at 7:45 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 13, at the Toby Theatre at Newfields in the Indianapolis Museum of Art, according to writer and director Skyler Lawson. A second screening is planned for 7:10 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 17.

“The entire cast and crew will be there,” he said.

In addition, a panel discussion entitled “The Making of the Indiana Epic on Film” will take place at 1 p.m. Oct. 13.

Panelists will include Lawson, cinematographer Ed Herrera, co-composer Chris Dudley and Delil Baran, one of the lead actors in the film.

“Whelm” is set in the Great Depression where two brothers get tangled in a rivalry between a legendary bank robber and an eccentric young criminal.

“Wabash looks absolutely stunning in the movie,” Lawson told The Paper of Wabash County. “It was such a pleasure capturing my hometown in such an epic scope. It deserves it.

The Wabash Elks Lodge No.471 will host a benefit trivia night on Friday, Oct. 4, at 7 p.m. in honor of 5-year-old Elliot Culwell who was recently diagnosed with B Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL).

Proceeds will go to his family to help with the costs of his weekly visits to Riley Children’s Hospital and treatment. The cost to participate in the trivia night is $10 per person and teams can consist of up to 10 people. There will be 10 rounds of trivia plus fun games and a silent auction.

The Elks will also have a pulled pork dinner available for purchase, beginning at 5:30 p.m.

On July 5, Elliot went to see his pediatrician for some weakness and leg and back pain that he was experiencing.

A check up for some pain quickly turned into a more serious diagnosis when his doctor recognized his symptoms and ordered immediate blood work.

Elliott and his parents were sent directly to Lutheran Hospital in Fort Wayne to see an oncologist who in turn sent them to 

Riley Hospital for Children to get his diagnosis confirmed.

More than 40 years ago, a group of session musicians decided to form a band. Toto hit the scene in the mid ‘70s to mixed reviews. The band, with various members in the lineup, stayed together until 2008. It reformed in 2010 and has been going strong ever since.

It will be bringing its current tour, “40 Trips Around the Sun,” to the Honeywell Center’s Ford Theater on Saturday, Oct. 12.

“Man, we didn’t see it coming,” vocalist and guitarist Steve “Luke” Lukather said of the band’s longevity. “When we started out, we thought if we got eight to 10 years, that would be insanely cool. Never in a million years did we think we’d be sitting her 43 years later, despite every possible good and horrible think happening to us.

“On the other hand, we just kept going. I never really think about how much time has gone by unless it’s brought up to me. Lately it’s been brought up a lot because of what it is.”

In the early days, the band wasn’t a fan of music critics around the country. However, in recent years, Toto’s popularity has, as Luke notes, “blown up again in the last three to four years.”

“Mamma Mia!” will be on stage at the Ford Theater at the Honeywell Center throughout the weekend of Sept. 27.

This musical is put on by Wabash Area Community Theater, and features the hit songs of ABBA.

“Mamma Mia!” tells the story of a young woman approaching her wedding day. In anticipation, she invites three men who could possibly be her father. With three possible fathers and three past flames of her mother’s, comes a lot of drama and comedy. 

The performance is directed by Wabash native AJ Morrison.

For the past 10 years, Morrison has lived in Indianapolis working as a performer and an educator. He now lives in Chicago where he does the same thing.

“This is really cool for me to having grown up in this town, having left and worked professionally as a performer, worked in various situations as an educator, and then coming back here and really seeing how integral to the community this organization is,” said Morrison.

The Honeywell Center hosted the band Foreigner for a concert on Sept. 4.

Foreigner is a strong advocate for public school music education, and at every show, they invite choir students from local high schools to perform on stage with them for the chorus of a song.

This year, they invited students from all public schools in the county to join them.

These students were selected from the group of County Honor Choir students.

“They needed 25 students and we had 55 in County Honor choir,” said Susan Keefer, the choir director at Southwood High School.