Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-09
Anyone who remembers the events of what happened on July 18, 1969, on the Chappaquiddick section of Martha’s Vineyard probably still has their own version of those events rattling in their head. The story goes that Senator Ted Kennedy, not exactly sober, behind the wheel of his Oldsmobile, with Mary Jo Kopechne, a former campaign worker for his late brother Bobby, in the passenger seat, plunged off a wooden bridge and into a pond. The car turned upside down. Kennedy escaped. Kopechne drow
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-09
The filmmakers behind this HBO documentary, which begins airing on April 10 at 10 p.m. (ET), really wanted to get the story right. But it’s about professional wrestling, and one of its major stars. Wrestling is a sport that, while featuring remarkable athletes performing astounding feats — just about all of them carefully choreographed — is brimming with mythology, with tales about those performers that could never be true.     Andre the Giant was a prime exam
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-09
Call the prosecutor! I want to charge the people behind the deafening man vs. machine actioner “Pacific Rim: Uprising” with assault and battery — on my senses. That includes my nose, which was offended by the odious odor emanating from this inferior sequel to Guillermo del Toro’s original. In the hands of director and co-writer Stephen S. DeKnight — and three more scribes — the insipid “Uprising” does nothing but pander to its Asian oversea
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-09
In the name of the almighty “Porky’s,” “American Pie,” “Risky Business” and “Superbad,” teenage lust as the focus of a sex-comedy is far from virgin territory. Yet, “Blockers,” the directing debut of “Pitch Perfect” scribe Kay Cannon, flips the script by changing the perspective from the guys to the gals. The result is so freshly funny it almost feels like the first time. It features a trio of overprotecti
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Are dead people like ice cream? According to Southern Oregon historian Ben Truwe they are: When asked, he has a hard time picking out his most interesting interred subject at Eastwood Cemetery in Medford. “It’s like choosing your favorite ice cream,” Truwe says. And in a sense he’s absolutely right. There are many stories at the cemetery that span generations and even serve as a microcosm to bigger events played out on history’s stage far outside this community
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Gov. Kate Brown made her debut visit to the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument Sunday before meeting with Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to “relay her strong support for the expanded monument.” However, the one-hour meeting left Brown with no indication of what Zinke’s recommendation might be to President Trump in regard to the monument’s designation and current boundaries. “I urged [Zinke] and the federal administration to not backtrack on the monument and to n
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
TRAIL — To Cole Rivers Hatchery workers over the years, a small pool at the base of the hatchery's outflow to the Rogue River is known as the Grate Hole for the metal grates cloaking the water pipe. To the occasional poacher over the years, it's been the Great Hole unless they get busted for illegally pulling spring chinook salmon out of this Rogue side-channel. This year, however, that hole could very well be dubbed Saving Grace, because it may be the last chance for this year's dro
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
When a start-up's goal is raising the bar in any field, the task can be daunting. When it's a new custom crush winery, it's nearly a foreboding endeavor. Naumes Custom Crush & Fermentation has reached the two-year mark and appears well on its way to developing premium wines for the region's vineyard owners. Mike and Laura Naumes, whose family company was once the largest pear grower in the world, has branched into Southern Oregon's vino scene, planting vineyards where orchards once stood. The cu
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Alex Franklin was only about 5 years old the first time he lined up shoulder-to-shoulder with other runners and felt his heart race as he waited for the sound of the gun. It was the Ashland All-Comers Track Meet, circa 2006, and Franklin was set to run the 200-meter dash — quite a stretch for a little guy still working on his ABCs, but Franklin was excited. He was excited because at the All-Comers, his speed would be put to the test in front of parents, peers and official-looking adults a
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
GOLD BEACH — At first, the tap-tap-tap felt like the possible bite of one of those pesky surfperch that have been snatching anchovies trolled through the Rogue River Bay intended for fall chinook, and then it didn't. Brian Winkler of Jacksonville snapped his rod skyward and the fight was on, with the fresh 18-pound fall chinook eventually netted and plopped into his boat. "Look at those big, bright black spots on her back," Winkler says. "They're beautiful." Expect many more of these
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
CENTRAL POINT — With no more signs of livestock or carnival rides from last month’s Jackson County Fair, The Expo on Thursday afternoon was a sea of cowboy boots, straw hats and country music fans. Country Crossings Music Festival, where the beer starts to flow at noon and the music goes on until midnight, debuts its first event in Central Point this week. Organizers expect a crowd of 20,000 people, including die-hard fans — and new faces from Southern Oregon. Veterans of count
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Cartwright's Market is preparing to re-enter Jackson County after a quarter-century absence.  The Grants Pass-based market aims to launch operations in late October or early November in the 30,000-square-foot former Foodland location at 745 Stewart Ave. "We've been looking to move to Medford for four or five years," said Jamie Cartwright, who oversees the family business. "We've looked for the right opportunity and felt like this is going to offer the ability to do a better job and be more
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Forecasters are predicting scorching hot weather as thousands of fans descend on the four-day Country Crossings Music Festival that begins Thursday on Jackson County's Expo grounds. But organizers say they've made plans in advance to account for Southern Oregon's typical July weather. The National Weather Service predicts highs in Central Point of 96 degrees on Thursday, 98 on Friday, 101 on Saturday and topping out at 102 on Sunday, the last day of the festival. At least 20,000 fans of Keith Ur
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
A family of geese and goslings caused a Monday morning traffic jam on Interstate 5 before being herded safely off the roadway. "It was a happy ending for the family of geese," said Oregon Department of Transportation spokesman Gary Leaming. The geese wandered onto I-5 not far from North Medford's Exit 30 after apparently passing through a breach in a fence that had been cut by someone, he said. An emergency call about the geese came in at 8:26 a.m., with the caller fearing the birds would be hit
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Thanks to an unblinking eye, a glance inside a car during an unrelated police stop cracked the case of a home-invasion robbery that terrified a family of three. The snippet of video from a camera mounted on a police officer responding to a complaint of marijuana smoke at Motel 6 helped send five people to prison on robbery convictions. The blink-and-you'll-miss-it key: a baseball bat lying on the front seat of Alejandro Medina-Mello's Honda Accord. The bat was spotted while the officer grabbed c
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
Medford sits in the eye of a hurricane of fires, with more than a dozen out-of-control blazes roaring through nearly 500 square miles of rough terrain in Southern Oregon and Northern California. The biggest and most difficult wildfire in the state remains the 117,669-acre Chetco Bar fire that threatened Brookings. In addition to major wildfires, there are many dozens of small fires burning in the region, ignited by lightning strikes The valley is ringed by
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
From more than 100,000 feet in the air, Crater Lake looks like a shallow puddle. Mount McLoughlin's wintry peak is a just-burst snowball, nearby clouds shreds of cotton batting. A group of 10 North Medford High School students and four advisers has seen such terrain-shrinking views in photos taken from the edge of space over the past two years. The students didn't actually hit the shutter button, but they launched the weather balloon cameras that did. Those launches have been prac
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
ASHLAND — Every time Chilli Swopes catches a Howard Prairie rainbow trout with a missing left ventral fin on its underbelly, he wonders two things: How did that fin disappear, and does it make the lopsided fish swim in circles? "We keep catching these fish and wondering why is this fin missing?" says Swopes, of Eagle Point. The clipped fin means it's a Cranebow, a descendant of bad-ass trout from Crane Prairie Reservoir that can grow to more than 10 pounds in its native reservoir. Cranebo
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
ASHLAND — Twilight came at 10 a.m. The crowd of spectators that packed the ScienceWorks Hands-On Museum lawn got to experience the phenomenon Monday morning as the moon's shadow masked most of the sun. Sitting on lawn chairs and blankets, many donning specialized sunglasses, they gazed skyward as the solar eclipse dropped the temperature about 7 degrees in less than an hour, making 10 a.m. seem more like 7 p.m. "I didn't think the temperature would change that much," said Ash Shepherd of A
Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)
· snapshot 2018-08-03
As the solar eclipse approaches on Aug. 21, emergency personnel are doing everything from preparing for overloaded cellphone systems to battling wildfires that could threaten residents and tourists. Fire and weather officials briefed Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., on those efforts as the senator visited Medford on Monday. With wildfires already burning across Oregon, National Weather Service Meteorologist Ryan Sandler said thunderstorms are in the forecast. Lightning can strike outside areas of rainfal