Vol. 118 No. 50 THE BACK MOUNTAIN'S NEWSPAPER SINCE 1889 December 16 - 22, 2007 ! The DALLAS P 50¢ SERVING THE COMMUNITIES OF THE DALLAS AND LAKE-LEHMAN SCHOOL DISTRICTS Wyoming Seminary tudents Or in filming of movie about life of Frances Slocum By DOTTY MARTIN Editor It may be a little unnerving to Jake Chielli — or to his parents, for that matter — that he fits the profile of a young boy who was killed. But, it’s that profile that earned Chielli a part in the documentary film about the life of Frances Slocum. The 14-year-old Chielli is just the right age, has just the right color hair and just the right length of hair to play the part of Nathan Kingsley who, along with his brother Ware- ham, lived with the Slocum family while their parents were away. The son of Jack and Deborah writing to i} 3 0 “Frances Slocum: Child of Two Americas” Sunday, Dec. 16 3 p.m. - Sold out 7 p.m. - Tickets (priced at $5) available Wilkes-Barre Movies 14 Northampton Street Chielli, of Emily Lane in Dallas, Chielli is an eighth grade student at the Wyoming Seminary Lower School in Forty Fort. Although he has never acted before, he spoke a few lines in the movie but will be best remembered for falling over a meat grinder after being shot. “I only had to instruct Jake once,” said Bill Bachman, a resident of Dal- las and a full-time professor at Penn State Wilkes-Barre who wrote the story and produced the film. “And he played the part perfectly.” The feature-length project, which was scheduled to debut last night at Wilkes-Barre Movies 14, details the time line of when Frances Slocum was kidnapped in Wilkes-Barre on November 2, 1778. Eventually, she was taken to Ohio where she lived with a family of De- laware Indians. When Slocum got ol- der, she married a Miami Indian chief and, from that point, went on i Cassandra Swingle writes some wishes down for Santa to consider this Christmas. i | A Second-grader Mikayla Kidd holds up her Dear Santa letter for con- sideration at the Lake-Noxen Elementary School. CHARLOTTE BARTIZEK PHOTOS/ FOR THE DALLAS POST They're waiting for the jolly, round man with rosy cheeks to fill their stockings and leave presents. Second- graders at Lake-Noxen Elementary School have written letters to Santa Claus to inform him of what they would like for Christmas. The letters are printed exactly as each child has written them, com- plete with spelling and grammatical errors, After being published in The Dallas Post, the letters are being sent directly to the North Pole for Santa Claus to read. PAGE 6 to live a comfortable and prosperous life in Indiana until the time of her death. Chielli was joined in the movie venture with three other Wyoming Seminary students. Joseph Ridilla, of Shavertown, played the part of Wareham Kingsley while Malcolm and Duncan Lumia of Dallas por- trayed Benjamin and Ebenezer Slo- cum, brothers of Frances Slocum. Admitting to knowing nothing about the life of Frances Slocum pri- or to his participation in the movie, Chielli now has a better understand- Despite getting shot, Chielli learns a lot CHARLOTTE BARTIZEK/ FOR THE DALLAS POST Jake Chielli, of Dallas, plays the part of Nathan Kingsley who is See SLOCUM, Page 5 May the best holiday tree win shot in a film re-enactment of the life of Frances Slocum. By REBECCA BRIA rbria@timesleader.com “Oh Christmas tree, oh Christ- mas tree, of all the trees most lovely.” Christmas trees and holiday decorations are quickly disap- pearing from public schools across the country, but not in the Dallas School District. Students in all six first-grade sections at the Dallas Elementary School recently helped decorate one of 28 Christmas trees in the 12th Annual Parade of Trees at Grotto Pizza at Harveys Lake. The students held a penny drive November 8 and 9 and raised $125 to enter their tree in the con- test, needing only two days to raise the necessary money. Heather Pitcavage, a first- grade teacher and the organizer of the project, says the children painted pine cones and sprinkled them with glitter. At night, the six first-grade teachers went to Grotto Pizza and decorated the tree. Grotto Pizza patrons can vote for their favorite trees by making a monetary donation in the amount of their choice. Each tree has a charity associated with it that will benefit from the vote money. From each entry fee, half of the money goes toward the or- The Dallas Elementary tree ganization designated by the dec- orators of that tree. The other half will be split among the char- ities of the top three winning trees. The Dallas Elementary Christ- mas tree at Grotto Pizza will ben- efit autism awareness. The teachers chose autism awareness because several chil- dren in the school have autism, although Pitcavage is unaware of any first-graders with autism. “We do a lot of charitable things around here and we just thought this would be a great thing to do with the kids,” Pitcav- age said. Voting for the 12th Annual Pa- rade of Trees at Grotto Pizza at Harveys Lake began November 22 and will continue through Ja- nuary 1. CHARLOTTE BARTIZEK/ FOR THE DALLAS POST Blake Cunningham, left, and Michael Putnam suit up at the Dallas Fire and Ambulance station. The company has received a grant to buy new helmets and equipment for its personnel. Grant will buy equipment By REBECCA BRIA rbria@timesleader.com Firefighting equipment isn’t cheap. But with the help of a federal grant, one fire company in the Back Mountain will be better suited and prepared for fires. Dallas Fire and Ambulance re- cently learned it will receive $70,480 through a Fiscal Year 2007 Fire Grant. The grant is ad- ministered by the Department of Homeland Security’s Federal Emergency Management Agen- cy in cooperation with the U.S. Fire Administration’s Assist- ance to Firefighters Grant Pro- gram. “These fire prevention and safety programs will help pro- tect the citizens of Pennsylvania and the firefighters who risk See GRANMT, Page 8 wv
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