Free Republic

WILKESBORO, N.C. — Each month, Wilkesboro’s Irene Triplett collects $73.13 from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs as a pension payment for her father’s military service — in the Civil War. Triplett, 84, is the last living person collecting a pension payment for service in the Civil War. Pvt. Mose Triplett was born in 1846 and lived to the age of 92. After his first wife’s death, he married Elida Hall, nearly 50 years his junior, in 1924. In 1930, Irene Triplett was born when her father was 84 and her mother was 34.

An event set for June 5 on the campus of Wilkes Community College, featuring speeches by former first lady Laura Bush and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, has run into planning difficulties, WCC trustees were told last night during a meeting at the college's North Wilkesboro Center... WCC officials were initially told to expect between 5,000 and 8,000 people, but that that anticipated attendance has grown to 30,0000 (sic) or 40,000... Hagaman told board members that covering everything needed to address such a huge crowd "would require a Herculean effort for (BRERG) to pull this off safely and successfully by...