There was a good turn out for the Christmas Parade Tuesday night. The event featured a number of floats followed by the lighting of the downtown Christmas tree and a living Nativity presentation by Bethel Church.

A number of organizations were setup offering hot chocolate and downtown stores stayed open late to provide shopping opportunities for the crowd.

The Larkin Witt Financial Group will be holding an open house from 10 to 2 on Thursday December 1st. Their offices are located at 207 E. 1st Street. The public is welcome and refreshments will be served.

The Lyons Twin Mansions started out as a single mansion catering to bed and breakfast clients, but has evolved into a boutique hotel.  Pat Lyons said that the younger generation of customers prefer the freedom of choosing when, what and if they eat. The traditional approach of making one big breakfast for all the guests didn’t work well with the changes in the market. This required a shift away from serving a family style breakfast to a restaurant oriented service and led to the opening of a restaurant in the South mansion.

See below to enter the Lyon’s Twin Mansion Month of Brunch Giveaway!

Not only does this provide guests with an experience more in line with the needs of todays visitors, but it also provides locals with a wonderful place to eat breakfast and lunch in a unique historic setting.

The restaurant is open for walk in service 9 to 2 Tuesday through Friday and 8 to 2 on the weekends and there is no need to make reservations. The full-service lounge is open from 5 to 8pm on Thursdays and Fridays and while there is no kitchen service during those hours, customers are welcome to carry in food.

The kitchen is run by Nate Lyons and Pete Collins while Marianne Avett serves the tables. The setting is designed to be quiet and relaxing and every item on the menu is priced below $10 (sunrise menu, midday menu). Miss Pat said that the goal was to provide great food at a reasonable price and to get people to come and enjoy a comfortable environment that encourages visitors to stay and visit.

The back room of the restaurant has a pool table setup and ready for a game. Across the hall from the main dining area in the library is a large screen television that Miss Pat says the kids enjoy when parents want to stay and talk for awhile.

For business people, the large tables and quiet environment in the dining area make it an idea place to talk with clients or just get out of the office for a meeting. For larger groups or when more privacy is necessary, there are meeting areas available. Miss Pat said, “Our meeting space is free if you dine with us.” Additionally both mansions have wireless internet access, large screens, digital projectors, and phone conference equipment available for use.

The Lyons Mansions also offers free tours and Miss Pat said that it is a great place for locals to bring visiting out of towners who are interested in hearing about some of the history in the area.

The Lyon’s Twin Mansion Restaurant is offering a special give away to subscribers of FortScott.Biz. They are offering a “Month of Brunch.” The winner will be chosen from subscribers to FortScott.Biz and will be given coupons for a weekly brunch meal at the restaurant for the month (taxes not included). So make sure you signup by clicking here if you don’t already get our emails.

We’ll draw a winner in a week. Be sure to watch your emails because you’ll have 48 hours to respond before we select a new winner.

Over a decade ago Mercy had a picnic in the park. I recently found a bunch of photographs I had taken of the event and thought some people in Fort Scott, might enjoy seeing them.

Click on any of the small images below to the larger image. Clicking on the larger image will take you to the next photo in the list. If you recognize someone, please consider emailing them a link or sharing it with them on Facebook.  Also don’t hesitate to leave a message in the comments on this post or the individual pictures.

This week’s Chamber Coffee was held at The Iron Star Antiques & Such at Main and Wall Street. The Iron Star is owned by Barbara Trimbure and is run as a coop with several  departments with both old and new items. One of the Iron Star’s specialties is taking old furniture and giving it new life. The upstairs in the building hosts the resale shop and they also have a section of baby gifts.

Barbara said the most people think that stores like the Iron Star get the majority of their sales from tourists, but in reality is it the local customers that keep coming back again and again. To cater to local customers, they are constantly changing things around and bringing in different items to keep the store fresh and interesting.

Barbara said that they will be having an open house on December 20th for last minute Christmas shoppers.

Other news and announcements:

The Gala Committee presented the Fort Scott Area Community Foundation with a check for $16,952. Two thirds of this came from the Gala and the rest came from a 50% matching program.

• The Citizen’s Bank Bowl has selected Trinity Valley Texas and Butler as the two teams for the Bowl game coming up on December 4th. (more details)
• Candlelight Tours at the Fort will be on December 2nd and 3rd. The theme is Fort Scott in 1861.
• The 300th performance of Life In A Jar will take place in Lebanon, MO at 6pm on December 4th.
• The Kiwanis Pancake feed will be on December 8th.
• The Beacon’ Christmas Adopt a Child program will be wrapping up this Friday.
• The Middle School is hosting their VIP Fall Extravaganza on November 21st. It is a “one-stop shopping and dining experience” and a great way to pickup some baked goods for Thanksgiving.

Seven employers had tables at the Fort Scott Job Fair at the performing arts building of FSCC today.  Here is a little about each company.

Carlisle

They didn’t want to say anything about their company without having it approved by their corporate office, but it is reasonable to assume they have at least one position open.

Klein

Klein makes water and fuel tanks that are then mounted on the back of large trucks. They are looking for welders, mechanics, drafts persons, and other positions. Klein is based in Fort Scott and the company has been around since the 1960s. They are looking for employees who can help them grow.

Epoch

Epoch is located in the old Western/Cigna building near Mercy Hospital. Epoch is part of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas City. They process claims for Blue Cross and other companies. They have claims and data entry positions coming available and plan to hire 20 to 50 people in the next 3 or 4 months. They also plan to have some customer service positions open the second half of 2012.

Since examining claims is something that takes training, they are partnering with FSCC to create an online course to train claims examiners.

AZZ Atkinson

Atkinson is located in the industrial park in Pittsburg. They make custom enclosures for electrical and waste water treatment facilities. They have a number of floor positions open (electricians, welders, painters, etc.) as well as some office positions. They are looking to hire a total of 25 to 30 people. They are currently running a day shift of 7 to 3:30 Monday-Friday and are getting ready to start a night shift from 8:30p to 7am Sunday – Thursday.

Peerless

Peerless makes architectural windows and doors and is based in Fort Scott. They are looking for an IT Programmer and a Production Supervisor. Peerless touts their competitive pay, good benefits and stable business history as benefits to potential employees.

H & H Publishing

H & H publishes the Deadline and other advertising. They have current openings for sales associates and are looking to expand business in the near future. With their expansion they will need investigative reporters, sports writers and other writers.

Hospice Care of Kansas

Hospice Care of Kansas provides hospice services to people with terminal illness and support for their families. This includes medical help, but also involves bereavement support and even a summer camp for kids who have lost a loved one. They are currently looking for LPNs and RNs. They have two full time positions available, but there are many opportunities for people who want part time work.

They are also looking for volunteers who can sit with patients or help answer phones in the office.

Kansas Works

While not an employer, Kansas Works had a table at the job fair to let potential employees and employers know about their services. For employees they offer many self service tools via their website. These tools include job search and online resume listing services. There is also a Local Workforce Center in Pittsburg where job seekers can go to get help with their resume and job hunting skills.

Kansas Works also has a number of grants available that allow them to offer in greater assistant for people in certain situations. This can include training and education. In some cases they can even offer on the job training where employers are reimbursed for a portion of the wages they pay a new employee as they learn the skills of a new position.

Kansas Works also offers programs for at risk kids and youth to help them acquire work experience and  gain some of the soft skills necessary to pursue a job in the market.

For employers, they offer a number of services that can help provide grants and tax savings for organizations that are looking to hire. Since they work with a large number of prospective employees they can provide many services for free such as screening, recruitment, and advertising available positions.

The weekly Chamber Coffee was held at the VFW Post 1165 this morning. VFW Chairman Clint Walker told a little about what the VFW is doing in the community and thanked the businesses for their support.  The VFW sponsors a Voice of Democracy scholarship contest where high school students make an audio essay. Theresa Schafer won for the state of Kansas. (You can listen to her audio essay here.)  The VFW also sponsors a contest for middle school age children called Patriot Pen.

The flags that line the road to the National Cemetery are done by the VFW. Most of them are given in honor of someone. You can buy a flag in honor of a loved one for $35 through the VFW.  Mr. Walker said he would be setting up the flags at 7am tomorrow morning if anyone would like to come out and help.

Mr. Walker told the story of when he was working as a recruiter at the beginning of the first Gulf War. He said a 70 year old woman came in to show him a bag of medals and a newspaper clipping from her son who had died in World War II. The woman said that if she had it all to do over, she would give her son for America again.

A few other announcements that were made at the meeting:

• There two veteran’s programs tomorrow at 11am and 2pm at the National Cemetery.
• Jamie Armstrong announced that her Edward D. Jones office is going to be opening next to Subway on Thursday.
• Everything Pets will be opening on Saturday.
• The downtown Christmas open house (pdf) is tonight and many businesses will be staying open until 8.
• Life + Style will have a number of food samples available downtown tonight.
• The Kiwanis chili feed is tonight.
• Mercy has a chili cookoff on the 15th.
• The Citizen’s Bank Bowl will be played in Pittsburg on December 4th.
• The Chamber Community Guide is looking for content about local businesses.

There will be a job fair held at the FSCC Danny & Willa Ellis Fine Arts Center on Thursday, November 10th from 10am to 2pm. If you are looking for a job, put it on your calendar. If you know of anyone looking for a job, please let them know about it.

The flyer lists six companies that will be at the fair:

• Atkinson Industries from Pittsburg
• Carlisle Transportation Products
• The Epoch Group
• H&H Publishing
• Klein Products
• Peerless Products

There are over 20 positions listed. You can download the flyer from here: Job Fair Flyer – Fall 2011

Members of Fort Scott Disc Gunners took advantage of the warmer weather late Friday afternoon to play some disc golf in Gunn Park.The Gunn Park disc golf course was originally installed with 9 “holes” in 1999 and in more recent years has been upgraded to 18 holes. Most have a regular and alternate location and they are regularly shifted between these positions to add variety. The course length varies between 4908 ft. and 6375 ft. depending on the configuration.