Talk of the Town: Birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and more

Community activist June Wortman celebrated her 80th birthday with 54 friends and her husband, Richard, at Lavender Restaurant on June 10, which was also the Wortmans’ 42nd wedding anniversary. The well-wishers also celebrated Richard’s birthday, which was June 14th. The multiple celebration was organized by Alma Sychuk.

Wortman was born in the Philippines and spent three years from 1941 to 1945 in a World War II Japanese detention center. There was much to celebrate according to the attendees and to make the occasion extraordinary was U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ representative Ron Barber, Tucson district director. Gov. Jan Brewer sent a notice of congratulations also.

Jim Woodbrey, vice president of the Democratic Club of the Santa Ritas: Laurie Cirricione, president of Democratic Women in Action; and Andrea Dalessandro, candidate for Legislative District 30; were also special guests and paid generous tribute.

Many guests publicly paid tributes to June. Guests Claire Coon sang and DD Jay jokingly roasted June, using an actual beef roast to demonstrate. Jay noted that June made it acceptable to wear a dinner dress with tennis shoes.

The first Tubac-Tumac‡cori Music Festival weekend starts Friday and runs through Sunday with events in Tubac and at Avalon Organic Gardens Farm and Ranch. There will be camping, fresh organic food, live music and entertainment, plus independent films, activist theater, eco-conscious speakers and a Sacred Global CosmoPop Concert with Gabriel of Urantia and his 11-piece Bright & Morning Star Band. Festival events will also be taking place in Tubac.

On Friday, the Tubac Plaza main stage near the Village Shops at 26 Tubac Plaza will host live music at 7 p.m. featuring Van’s Guard and at 7:45 p.m., live skits with the Global Change Theater Company.

On Saturday, visitors can view the film “The Future of Food” at the Village Shops (29 Tubac Plaza), followed at 2:30 p.m. with a talk about organic gardening presented by Master Gardeners. At 7 p.m., visitors can hear The Agents of Change Band, followed at 8 p.m. by the Starseed Acoustic Ensemble.

On Sunday, the film “Blue Gold: World Water Wars” will be shown at the Village Shops, followed by the 2 p.m. showing of “The End of Suburbia.” At 6 p.m., attendees can hear Comic Roots Hip Hop with D-Vibe followed at 6:30 p.m. with the Sacred CosmoPop Concert at Avalon Gardens. The events are free, but contributions are accepted.

For more info visit: www.globalchangemusic.org or call (520) 398-2542.

Kay and Ronnie Hester of Green Valley were honored to attend the wedding of their daughter Kathryn Marie Bihss to James Thomas Wolstenholme on May 16 at the Chapelle Du Paradis in the Paris Hotel, Las Vegas, Nev. Guests attended from Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, Minnesota, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin. The reception was at Wellington Place where the bride’s 90-year-old grandmother and the groom’s 91-year-old grandmother, both in attendance, were honored with caring words and a special bouquet. The newlyweds live in Buford, Ga., which is in the greater metropolitan area of Atlanta.

Green Valley’s Jackie DeHart and her daughter Cheryl Mollison recently returned from England, where they attended the 13th Combat Wing “Somewhere in England” Reunion 2009, which also included members of the 390th and 100th Bomb Groups.

Jackie said the “somewhere in England” term was used during World War II to keep the enemy guessing where the troops were located.

The reunion attendees joined the 95th Bomb Group Heritage Association team at Framlingham College, making this reunion the first where all the groups were together.

The 95th is based at the Red Feather Club in Horham, England, where the mighty 8th Army Air Force was once based.

Since the war, the former airfields have returned back to farming, although the Red Feather Club has been busy fund-raising over the years to restore the Noncommissioned Officers Club, which was dedicated when Jackie was visiting.

“The last time I was in Horham was with my late husband Ted in 1989 when the 95th dedicated the bells to St. Mary’s Church,” Jackie recalled.

“The bells are the oldest peal of eight bells anywhere in the world and they were restored with money donated by the men and families of the 95th Bomb Group.”

Jackie and the other reunion attendees stayed with host families during their visit. Jackie stayed with David Johnson and his family, longtime friends. During her stay, she visited, among other places, the Parham Airfield Museum which comprises the 390th Bomb Group Memorial Air Museum and the British Resistance Organization.

The 95th Bomb Group spent a short time at Parham before moving to Horham for the rest of the war. It flew 321 combat missions, the first B-17 Flying Fortresses over Berlin and was awarded three Distinguished Presidential Unit Citations, losing 617 men.

Also attending the reunion banquet was Tom Drugan, executive director of the 390th Memorial Museum in Tucson at the Pima Air Museum, which also houses the houses a 95th Bomb Group exhibit.

The Green Valley Chapter of the Military Officers Association plays an active role in military personnel matters and especially proposed legislation affecting the career force, the retired community, and veterans of the uniformed services. The Green Valley Chapter is led by a board of directors and elected officers.

Each MOAA chapter organizes committees to serve the community and its members.

The local chapter is proud of its special projects including Food for Families and the Scholarship and Military Assistance Fund.

rford@gvnews.com Ç 547-9740