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Festival holds early hour for young riders
SugarExpress4833
Kids enjoy the Sugar Express train ride Friday morning at the Great Ogeechee Seafood Festivals carnival in J.F. Gregory Park during an exclusive opening for children with special needs. (Crissie Elrick)
Crissie Elric
Bryan County News
Updated: Oct 15, 2011, 12:00 PM
Published: Oct 14, 2011, 9:09 PM

Dozens of kids and their families filed into J.F. Gregory Park Friday morning where they were greeted by Ronald McDonald, Elmo, Spiderman and others as they helped officially kick off the13th annual Great Ogeechee Seafood Festival.
Each year, children with special needs and their families are invited to the festival before the official opening for a few hours of free carnival rides and free lunch compliments of local businesses, according to Brianne Yontz, executive director of the Richmond Hill-Bryan County Chamber of Commerce.
But the children weren’t the only ones beaming with smiles. Their parents were as well.
“The kids were really excited about coming and so are we as parents,” Staycee Thomas, who brought her two sons out for the event, said. “Having special needs kids, you’re weary of bringing them to things like this, but (the special opening) makes it so easy.”
Kristy Gyer and her family came out for the special day and she said her kids were enjoying the rides and having a blast – and also enjoying the day out of school.
“There needs to be more things (like this) for the kids,” she said.
Tricia Skaggs watched her son, Justin Skaggs, on a ride as he smiled and waved. She said this was the first time they’d attended the special day. But she was enjoying it just as much as her son was, she said.
“It’s awesome just seeing him smile – it almost made me cry,” she said. “Just to see him smile is great because they can’t do this normally because they can’t wait in line.”
Yontz said the chamber reaches out to area schools and offers for them to attend. She described the early opening as one of the philanthropic aspects of the festival.
Gates opened to the public at 5 p.m. Friday, and the festival and carnival rides continue through Sunday afternoon. The festival is open today until 11 p.m. and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.
Admission to the festival is cash only, though there will be ATMs on site. The cost of admission is $5 for adults except from 4-11 p.m. today, when the cost for increases to $15. Children ages 4-12 get in for $3 and all children 3 and under are free.
Some vendors may have their own credit card machines, Yontz said, but the majority of the festival will be cash only. Additionally, anyone who plans to purchase beer or wine at the festival should bring a valid government-issued photo I.D.
Although there is no on-site parking, Yontz said free parking will be in the old Kroger parking lot near the intersection of highways 17 and 144; at Richmond Hill Primary and Richmond Hill Elementary schools off of Hwy. 144; and at Hobart Corp. on Hwy. 17.
And a complimentary shuttle service will run continuous routes during festival hours.
For more information, please visit www.goseafoodfestival.com, or call the Richmond Hill-Bryan County Chamber of Commerce at 756-3444.

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Later yall, its been fun
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Ted O'Neil
Updated: May 23, 2018, 6:03 PM
Published: May 23, 2018, 6:05 PM

This is among the last pieces I’ll ever write for the Bryan County News.

Friday is my last day with the paper, and come June 1 I’m headed back to my native Michigan.

I moved here in 2015 from the Great Lake State due to my wife’s job. It’s amicable, but she has since moved on to a different life in a different state, and it’s time for me to do the same.

My son Thomas, an RHHS grad as of Saturday, also is headed back to Michigan to play basketball for a small school near Ann Arbor called Concordia University. My daughter, Erin, is in law school at University of Toledo. She had already begun her college volleyball career at Lourdes University in Ohio when we moved down here and had no desire to leave the Midwest.

With both of them and the rest of my family up north, there’s no reason for me to stay here. I haven’t missed winter one bit, but I’m sure I won’t miss the sand gnats, either.

Shortly after we arrived here in 2015, I got a job in communications with a certain art school in Savannah for a few short months. It was both personally and professionally toxic and I’ll leave it at that.

In March 2016 I signed on with the Bryan County News as assistant editor and I’ve loved every minute of it. My “first” newspaper career, in the late 80s and early 90s, was great. But when I left it to work in politics and later with a free-market think tank, I never pictured myself as an ink-stained wretch again.

Like they say, never say never.

During my time here at the News, I’ve covered everything that came along. That’s one big difference between working for a weekly as opposed to a daily paper. Reporters at a daily paper have a “beat” to cover. At a weekly paper like this, you cover … life. Sports, features, government meetings, crime, fundraisers, parades, festivals, successes, failures and everything in between. Oh, and hurricanes. Two of them. I’ll take a winter blizzard over that any day.

Along the way I’ve met a lot of great people. Volunteers, business owners, pastors, students, athletes, teachers, coaches, co-workers, first responders, veterans, soldiers and yes, even some politicians.

And I learned that the same adrenalin rush from covering “breaking news” that I experienced right out of college is still just as exciting nearly 30 years later.

With as much as I’ve written about the population increase and traffic problems, at least for a few short minutes my departure means there will be one less vehicle clogging up local roads. At least until I pass three or four moving vans headed this way as I get on northbound I-95.

The hub-bub over growth here can be humorous, unintentional and ironic all at once. We often get comments on our Facebook page that go something like this: “I’ve lived here for (usually less than five years) and the growth is out of control! We need a moratorium on new construction.”

It’s like people who move into phase I of “Walden Woods” subdivision after all the trees are cleared out and then complain about trees being cut down for phase II.

Bryan County will always hold a special place in my heart and I definitely plan on visiting again someday. My hope is that my boss, Jeff Whitten (one of the best I’ve ever had), will let me continue to be part of the Pembroke Mafia Football League from afar. If the Corleone family could expand to Vegas, there’s no reason the PMFL can’t expand to Michigan.

But the main reason I want to return someday is about that traffic issue. After all, I’ll need to see it with my own eyes before I’ll believe that Highway 144 actually got widened.

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