By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION – After the Civil War (a name that incorrectly identifies this pivotal historical event), many of the former Confederate Generals waged a war of ink and paper against each other, many in Northern newspapers, accusing one another of treason (of all things), incompetence, and several other personal traits that go beyond the full measure of battlefield decisions. If only these 19th Century Southern celebrities, who held the populace’

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION – Maybe I should run for office. If the man in the dress running for U.S. SENATE in Maine can say the reason he’s running for US SENATE is because, “I ran for office, I didn’t win. I’m a songwriter … and I write my own books” is all it takes to qualify to run for U.S. SENATE then I don’t see why I can’t run for something much more important and distinguished, such as CCS school board. Why start small? Go for the gold. What’s that

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION — Recently, I learned that in North Carolina it is illegal to play bingo for more than 5 hours in a row… My question is, why would anyone play bingo more than 5 hours in a row and what happened at the 5 hour mark to come up with that rule? So at 4 hours and 55 minutes, everything is fine, but at five hours Gertrude had a fit of rage and flipped the tables over? What’s with the 5 hours… Personally, I think it should be illegal to

By Jeff Yates | The Sunday Column | Special Guest Columnist Cleveland County Crime Stoppers Inc is a non-profit, 501(c)(3) corporation serving the residents of Cleveland County through our partnership with all four of our Law Enforcement Agencies: Cleveland County Sheriff’s Office, Shelby Police Department, Kings Mountain Police Department and Boiling Springs Police Department. Our partnership is based on technology that allows a person (tipster) to anonymously provide inform

By Wes Westmoreland | Special Guest Columnist for The Sunday Column Wes Westmoreland | The Sunday Column An excited John Adams wrote to his beloved Abigail: “The Second Day of July 1776… ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews (shows), Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever

By Lori Gordon Hendrick | The Sunday Column | Special to The Independent Opinion – In towns like ours, graduation season is more than a ceremony. It is a turning point that ripples through families, churches, ballfields, classrooms, and Main Street storefronts. We cheer as seniors cross the stage because we know the hard work behind that moment. But as we celebrate them, we should be honest about something too often left unsaid: there is no single right way to build a good li

By Wes Westmoreland | The Sunday Column Wes Westmoreland | The Sunday Column The Sunday Column – There may be nothing that swells the heart with a greater feeling of patriotism and pride than the Stars and Stripes. Immortalized in song and memory, will anyone forget the emotion brought on by the display of flags on September 12, 2001, the sound of the “Stars and Stripes Forever”, or standing for our National Anthem? Some generations ago, the flag that brought about similar pa

By Aaron Bridges | Guest writer for The Sunday Column OPINION – When you're a child, you often wish your life away. You can't wait to grow up because you want to do adult things and be able to make your own decisions without someone constantly telling you what to do. Then graduation arrives. You make it to 12th grade after traveling the long road from kindergarten through high school, and now you're preparing to graduate. When I think about graduation, I see it as the moment

By Chuck Thompson | The Shelby Independent OPINION – While not everyone is cremated, many people (and pets) most certainly are; my dog Yogi Bear is, too. Yogi Bear died at the ripe old age of 16 ½, five years ago, on June 13, 2021. I keep him on a shelf, in the memorial container I was given when I received his ashes. Some might think that’s weird, but anyone who has the ashes of a loved one wouldn’t think so. I just can’t bring myself to spread his ashes or bury them. The ot

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION — Memorial Day Weekend is the unofficial start to summer, with trips to the beach, a lake, the mountains, or just having friends and family over to your home to grill burgers and hotdogs in the back yard, and while most people seem to forget the 1,200,000 Americans who died while serving during conflicts, but they seem to remember them more than first responders who, while maybe not in combat, definitely in conflict, died protect

By Wes Westmoreland | The Sunday Column Wes Westmoreland Listen my children, and you shall hear Of the midnight ride of… Captain Jack? It was late May in 1775 when Captain James Jack left Charlotte Towne, North Carolina, and set out on a long journey on horseback to meet fellow North Carolinians in Philadelphia. The document he carried, dated May 20th, stowed inside his coat for protection, was of the utmost importance. And it was treasonous. By carrying the document, he ca

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION — Happy Typhoid Fever Day! You can thank Typhoid Fever for Mother’s Day. As grim as that sounds, it’s true; to an extent. The holiday, where we honor mothers and grandmothers across the United States, we can trace the origins of the holiday back to a typhoid outbreak during The American Civil War. Ann Jarvis, the mother of Anna Jarvis, who would later be given credit for creating what we know as Mother’s Day, organized Mother's Da

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION – With the war in Ukraine and the War in Iran, we are just one step away from World War 12. At least according to one U.S. House of Representative Member from Minnesota. Most others have laughed in astonishment and joked, "Where's World War 3-11, I never learned about those?" And history scholars might say "4-11" but that's because they know that World War II (that's a two, not an eleven) was mislabeled and technically the 3rd wor

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION – We all grow up learning what we can and cannot eat. We are educated by our family, friends, in the classroom, the news and because of those nifty little warning labels that have helped spread the survival of even the lowest intellectual among us (mainly me). ‘DO NOT CONSUME LYSOL.’ Unsurprisingly, there’s a history behind just about every warning label; even when food must be refrigerated or frozen. Directions on the food packag

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION — A few months ago, I wrote about the state-wide Five Hour Bingo play limit law. I can’t seem to let this one go. It still haunts me that nobody can explain why it’s illegal to play bingo for more than five hours. In North Carolina, you can drive barefoot and swim naked (Don't try it in public, but in seclusion at an uninhabited pond, or at home in your pool, is your business). You can eat while driving, you just can’t hold your p

By Wes Westmoreland | The Sunday Column | Special to The Shelby Independent Westmoreland April 12 marks the 250th anniversary of a largely forgotten, but significant date in American history. On this date in 1776, the Fourth Provincial Congress of North Carolina met in Halifax and unanimously passed a measure instructing its delegates to the Continental Congress to vote to declare independence from Great Britain. With the Halifax Resolves, North Carolina became the first co

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column Easter was always a big deal with my family when I was a kid. As a child, until maybe early teenage years, every Easter, my family would gather together in greater numbers than we would at Christmas. Everyone would come to my parents' or my grandparents' for Easter lunch / dinner. Aunts and Uncles, and cousins that we only saw at birthdays or funerals would come for Easter dinner. It was tradition for all the kids to go play outside; We w

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION / HUMOR — Recently, beaches across America have made the news for their ‘Spring Break’ uncouthness. Rowdy brawling drunk college kids acting a fool, having a great time, and ruining one favorite beach spot after another. It happens every year. Maybe it’s worse and maybe we’re all just getting older, but after looking back at some old news clips, there has always been news from college spring breaks where coeds who are briefly m

By A thankful educator | The Sunday Column | Special to The Shelby Independent OPINION – Some days come and go without much notice. And then there are days that stop you in your tracks, days that remind you just how fragile and how strong life can be at the very same time. Recently, our community experienced one of those days. What began like any other quickly turned into something none of us ever want to face. In a moment, routines were interrupted, classrooms grew silent, a

By Chuck Thompson | The Sunday Column OPINION – Feelings over facts seems to be the preferred way of doing things in media nowadays, but that's not journalism, although, that is what you see and read in the mainstream media every day and that is called 'propaganda' and 'activism' disguised as journalism, as many of you have learned over the years. Some seem to think journalism should be regulated based on what people do and do not like, because it actually does happen ever