COARSEGOLD – Aaron Draper loves being a pharmacist. It’s something he says he was born to do, and now he’s bringing that passion for his profession to a new venture in Coarsegold. Draper has leased the building where the Coarsegold Village Thrift Shoppe used to be, and work is underway to prepare for opening a full-service pharmacy and drug store ...

OAKHURST – Tea Party members, veterans and mountain area citizens gathered at the corner of Highways 41 & 49 on Saturday, Feb. 23, as part of the national Day of Resistance, protesting any potential threats against Americans’ 2nd Amendment rights. Local Tea Party chairman John Pero said he was pleased with the turnout, with nearly 60 people joining in the ...

COARSEGOLD – Power was knocked out to a swath of homes along Road 400 near Yosemite Lakes Park on Saturday, Feb. 23, when a pickup crashed into two power poles. Tamara Gurgel, 50, of North Fork, was driving a Ford Ranger pickup north on Road 400 at what is presumed by CHP to be an unsafe speed. For unknown reasons, ...

After establishing our home on Malum Ridge overlooking Peckinpah Mountain, I heard from neighbors about the logging history in our town and was curious about the Peckinpah name. Being a bit of a history buff, I decided to dig a bit further and this is what I found.

NORTH FORK – Hansel Kern has been selected to receive the honor of North Fork’s Citizen of the Year for 2012. At a dinner at the Town Hall on Saturday, Feb. 2, Hansel Kern, owner and master gardener at the Kern Family Farm, was honored with the distinction for, among other things, his work with the kids at the North ...

In response to Alan Cheah’s “The Gun Economy” Sierra Star 1/31/13 Some factual “counterpoint” to Mr. Cheah’s latest “For Your Consideration” The FBI’s recent Crime Report, noted a nearly 50 percent DROP in both violent crime and the murder rate between 1992 and 2011. This occurred at the same time the number of firearms INCREASED dramatically – including the sale ...

NORTH FORK – Singles and couples alike are invited to an evening of music, dining and dancing as the Squirrel Cage Theatre Co. presents a Valentine’s Dinner & Dance, at the North Fork Town Hall on Friday, Feb. 15. Dinner will be a sit-down affair, complete with personal service, in an elegant setting created by the theater group. Guests can ...

BASS LAKE – A Madera County sewage truck rolled over on Road 274 about a mile east of Fawn Point this afternoon, dumping the entire load into the roadway and down towards the lake. Christopher Mosher, 55, or Oakhurst, driver of the truck, apparently allowed the right front tire of his truck to travel over the concrete ridge on the ...

NORTH FORK – A North Fork man was headed home about 9 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 14, when, due to his “high level of intoxication,” he veered off the road and crashed some 80 feet down into a field, according to the CHP. Robert Swain, Sr., 65, was driving his 2006 Jeep Wrangler eastbound on Road 200 approaching Quail Creek ...

Letter to the Editor: For anyone who has read Alan Cheah’s column, “Thirty Rounds” in the Sierra Star (1/17/13), please consider my response before buying into his imaginary world, absent of all reality. Mr. Cheah spends considerable words having you imagine the senseless deaths of the children in Newtown and how a smaller magazine capacity on his Mom’s gun would ...