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On Sunday when the sunny skies might have just drawn some cyclists to the roads of Carroll County, many were instead drawn inside to the Carroll County Agricultural Center in Westminster for a bicycle swap and consumer expo: "Stop, Swap, and Save."

"We had about 3,500 attendees," said Robin Culver, a New Windsor resident who runs the event with husband Bruce. "We were busy."

The event on Sunday drew vendors to about 200 spaces, and included vintage bike displays, cycling advocacy groups and consumer seminars. A large amount of the people come to buy or sell.

The couple, cyclists themselves who used to own a bike shop in Eldersburg, both have other jobs, but organize the event, as well as others in Pennsylvania and Virginia.

"There's a lot of late nights sitting in bed with a laptop," she laughed.

Culver said the "The Stop, Swap, and Save" was started 12 years ago by her husband and a friend as an attempt to get cyclists together during the coldest part of the year.

"When it first started it was about 20 spaces," she said. "It just kind of grew from there."

Culver said she thought the area was fantastic for bike riding. She said some roads were travelled less and were good for road riders, but the scenery and community among the cyclists was also encouraging.

"Carroll County offers some kind of riding for everybody," she said. "I used to live in Baltimore City and I never went biking there."

Culver, who has been a resident of the county since 1987, said the sport has definitely grown in her time here. "To me, it's amazing," she said. "I guess once you're in the community, you're more aware of it."

She said people from the mid-Atlantic region attended the event, but also had people from New York and Utah, among other places, drawn to the event.

Making the grade

- Congratulations to Mount Airy students who made the 2008 fall dean's list at Salisbury University. Those students include: Tracy Belaski, Elizabeth Benson, Katherine Brois, Katrina Burdette, Ashley Clark, Beverly Dettor, Sarah Griffin, Mary Kneebone, Matthew Molesworth, Nicholas Pasch and Brian Shea.

The group are 11 of the 73 Frederick County area students to make the dean's list at the Eastern Shore university that has around 7,800 students for the semester.

- Mount Airy resident Steven J. Trester has made the dean's list for the fall 2008 semester at Northern Michigan University. Trester qualified with a grade point average of 3.25-3.99.

Mount Airy student

joins ‘Senate'

Mount Airy resident Nicholas Dahl was chosen out of hundreds of applicants to be one of two Maryland students selected as delegates to the 47th Annual United States Senate Youth Program.

Dahl, and fellow Maryland representative, Michael Appau of Catonsville will be two of the 104 students who will attend the program. The program will be for a week in March. Its purpose is to increase young Americans' understanding of the interrelationships of the three branches of government, the responsibilities of elected officials and the process of democratic decision making.

As part of the program, Dahl also received a $5,000 college scholarship with the encouragement to continue coursework in government, history and pubic affairs, while also receiving an intensive week long study of the federal government and those who lead it.

Dahl is a student at South Carroll High School where he is vice president of the Student Government Association. He is also involved in cross county, drama club, debate team, Spanish club and choir, while also serving as a youth correspondent with the Carroll County times. He is also involved in the National Honors Society, International Thespians and a recipient of the Maryland Athletic Associations Athlete Award. He plans to attend college and earn a degree in political science and international relations, and hopes to join the Peace Corps and eventually work for the government or a nonprofit organization.

Preschoolers gather food, pennies for food bank

At Friends Meeting School, preschool students are learning to count to 100 in a meaningful way.

Jane Mabry, who teaches a class of 16 preschoolers at the private Quaker school in Ijamsville, said that for the 100th day of school, students in each class have to do a project involving that number. Her class decided to collect 100 cans of food as a class, and for each student to collect 100 pennies, which the class will donate to the Frederick Food Bank.

Because the school also instills the Quaker value of helping others, Mabry said a charitable project would have more meaning and teach a lesson beyond knowing how to count to 100.

"Counting out 100 pennies [for charity] was more meaningful than making a poster with 100 Cheerios," Mabry said.

Today is the 100th day of school for Mabry's class – preschool classes run on a slightly different schedule at Friends Meeting School – and the class will take a field trip to the Frederick Food Bank at 1:30 p.m. to drop off their food and pennies.

Mabry said that each student had to collect 100 pennies from his or her house, and six cans of food. By Monday morning, the class had already gathered 70 cans, and she was confident that they would be up to 100 by this morning.

The project did include a counting component, and each student had to stack his or her pennies in groups of five, 10 and 20 to make sure the amount was right.

While the each student will present 100 pennies to the Frederick Food Bank, Mabry said she would likely take the $16 worth of pennies to a coin counter, and return with a lump sum for the actual donation.

Guardsman, New Market native participates in inauguration

Steven C. Hartman, a New Market native and sergeant in the Army National Guard, participated in the 56th Presidential Inauguration Jan. 20.

More than 7,000 Army and Air National Guard members from 31 states and territories, the largest contingent of National Guard members ever to serve in an inauguration, provided military working dogs, planning, medical, ceremonial and logistical support to the ceremony.

National Guard members were also active in crowd and traffic control and provided emergency services in coordination with local authorities in Washington, D.C.

The secretary of defense convenes the Armed Forces Inaugural Committee every four years to coordinate various branches of the military to prepare for and support the presidential inauguration. Hartman is an infantryman, in the 1st Battalion of the 175th Infantry Regiment based in Frederick. He has served in the military for seven years.

Hartman is the son of Jenny Hartman of New Market.

He is a 2000 graduate of Linganore High School, and graduated from York College of Pennsylvania in 2005.

Ijamsville residents

make deans' lists

Several Ijamsville natives have been named to deans' lists at various colleges for the fall semester of 2008.

- Frederick Community College named Gerald M. Burge, Thomas P. Carroll, Mark T. Casagrande, Aimee S. Cheng, Barbara C. Conrad, Lanita M. Goodman, Earl C. Jones, Laura M. Jones, Brittany M. Kline, Pamela A. Manstof, Micah Parsons, Shaina B. Parsons, Michael W. Reed, John W. Roche, and Timothy R. Smith to its fall 2008 dean's list.

- Salisbury University in Salisbury, Md. named Daniel Lefever and Robert Roche II, both of Ijamsville, to its fall semester dean's list.

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