It's not too early to think about when to ship holiday gifts.
FedEx, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service all expect to deliver a record number of packages this holiday season, which is Read more..
This past Thursday my Daughter Ashlynn had her wisdom teeth removed at Foothills Oral Surgery. Not only did I get some great laughs at her expense but Dr. Richardson and his assistant took really good care of her during the procedure. She is recovering well and everything seems to be healing nicely. She is still having some headaches and pain but has managed to get back to school and work yesterday. If you are looking for an Oral Surgeon here is the link to their website. Read More...
A 12-year-old girl has come up with an ingenious little toy to ease the anxieties of young hospital patients just like her.
Ella Casano was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease called idiopathic thrombocytopenia purpura when she was just 7 years old.
The disease means that Ella’s...Read More
Many Americans are moving because they want more space, according to a new survey of 1,000 consumers from Porch.com, a home remodeling website. Read More
A decade ago, when the real-estate bubble was reaching its peak and homeowners were giddy about the rise in home values, plugging in addresses at the new website Zillow became a national pastime.
“People ‘Zillowed’ their Christmas list. They would go and look up the home value of their boss and ex-girlfriend and ex-wife and their neighbors,” said Spencer Rascoff, Zillow’s CEO. The site was originally built around these automated valuations (or “Zestimates”)—in 2006, not a single for-sale listing was posted on the site. It now has millions of listings and agent reviews, among other features.
Knowing the estimated value of a home was power—or at the very least, juicy gossip. That’s why it was so surprising that Rascoff sold a Seattle investment property earlier this year for $1.1 million—far less than its Zestimate of $1.7 million. This particular house, he said, was located on a major arterial street, a fact that wasn’t baked into the Zestimate...Read more
Friends of Hickory will celebrate the groundbreaking of a visionary new park in Downtown Hickory on Wednesday, May 11 at noon. The park, located just west of Union Square on the corner of Third Street and Main Avenue NW, is the culmination of over two years of planning and fundraising by the non-profit group.
Friends of Hickory board members collaborated with representatives from Lowes Foods, CommScope, and Corning, as well as additional donors, to symbolically transform the present overflow parking lot into a new community gathering space. “The front door of any city is its downtown,” says Co-Chair and Founder, Allison Holtzman. “We want to make a strong first impression by highlighting the many strengths of Hickory’s community and region.”
The park
If you're shopping around for some new furniture to go with your new home, Hickory has all you need to outfit your digs in style. At the Hickory Furniture Mart, you'll find everything from handcrafted Amish dining tables to the latest in contemporary designs. When the winter weather sets in, you can hit the slopes at nearby Sugar Mountain, and during the summer, tour the Catawba River by canoe. Commute times here are among the shortest, and residents have more than 200 dining options to choose from in their off hours.
Did You Know: In June 1944, Hickory experienced a polio outbreak so large that residents banded together to build a hospital in 54 hours just to accommodate the sick patients.
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BY SHARON MCBRAYER smcbrayer@hickoryrecord.com
HICKORY, NC — Like many Americans, Russ Perkins will be at home Friday night watching the opening ceremonies of the Winter Olympics.
He will watch the American athletes enter the stadium in Russia wearing their red, white and blue uniforms.
But unlike most of his countrymen, Perkins has a special connection to the uniforms.
Perkins and his 11 employees at Longview Yarns dyed the yarn used in the sweaters the athletes will wear during the opening ceremonies.
That’s more than 6,000 pounds, or three tons, of yarn Perkins’ employees dyed that is part of 650 uniforms.
“That was a big order for us,” Perkins said.
The wool was harvested at the Imperial Stock Ranch in Oregon, and then moved to Kraemer Yarns in Nazareth, Pa., to be spun into yarn. It was then sent to Long View to Longview Yarns to be dyed. From there, the yarn was sent to Ball of Cotton in California to be turned into the Olympic sweaters, according to a video on Ralph Lauren’s website.
The uniforms were made in the U.S. for the 2014 Winter Olympics. Ralph Lauren got some backlash after word got out the uniforms for the 2012 London games were outsourced to places such as China. The designer vowed the 2014 Olympic clothing would be made in the U.S. Forty vendors in the U.S. were used to create the clothing, Perkins said.
Perkins got the call around September 2012 and his company started matching shades.
“That process took a while, and Polo was helpful and patient with us,” Perkins said.
Longview Yarns got the yarn in late December 2012 and January 2013 in several shipments.
Working one shift, it took Longview Yarns employees four to five weeks from start to finish to complete the job, Perkins said. It was a lot of red, white and blue, he said. Perkins’ father, Cecil, started the business in 1955, the year Russ was born.
“We’re really proud and honored to have been asked,” Perkins said. “And we’re proud to have been able to do it and proud that our athletes are going to be wearing them in the opening ceremonies.”
So Perkins will be in front of his TV and admitted he might even shed some tears of pride.
“My hope is we have a safe Olympics and America can do well — bring back the gold,” Perkins said.ROBERT C. REEDRuss Perkins, owner of Longview Yarns, displays cones of red,white and blue yarn at his plant. Perkins' facility dyed 6,000 pounds of wool yarn for the United States Olympic sweaters that will be worn during the opening ceremonies tonight.
ROBERT C. REED
Russ Perkins, owner of Longview Yarns, displays cones of red,white and blue yarn at his plant. Perkins' facility dyed 6,000 pounds of wool yarn for the United States Olympic sweaters that will be worn during the opening ceremonies tonight.