KMIS students
attend career fair
Left, Eleven-year-old Taylor Shipman and
Daisie Hullender, 10, both from KM Interme-
diate enjoy the recent Clevsiand County
Schools career fair.
Page 5A
Volume 121 © Issue 11 ¢ Wednesday, March 18, 2000
i
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4
d
BUILDING A DREAM
Historic resort, theme park on the way?
By ELIZABETH STEWART
staff writer
GROVER — Martin CJ Mongiello, the.
proprietor of the Inn of the Patriots in
Grover, is a Yankee by birth but a true
Southerner at heart.
His dream to build a Living History
Center Resort and Theme Park in Cleve-
land County as a top tourist attraction
could be considered “a dream” by some
skeptics but Mongiello is pitching the proj-
ect to the Cleveland Chamber, city, county
and Shelby elected officials, as well as of-
ficials of the Kings Mountain National
Military Park, and any other interested cit-
izens and history buffs.
A new resort and theme park would fea-
ture cannons, dueling with sabers, trials,
live battles with the British, painting,
music, weaving, blacksmithing, and
horsemen charging across the foothills at
a full gallop towards war with sabers
drawn. Modern, full luxury accommodations
would be provided complete with Jacuzzi
and king-sized beds.
Says Mongiello, “Just look at the success
of Old Salem in Winston-Salem as a tourist
attraction and envision what could be done
for this area because Kings Mountain is
where freedom rang for all to see, > he said
this week.
Mongiello is talking to pelle about in-
vesting in the project he estimates to take 2-
5 years to complete and is looking for up to
25-50 acres of land to build a 12-room
Colonel Frederick Hambright Inn, a Colonel
‘Cleaveland Museum, and Phifer Hall, facili-
ties which would also accommodate wed-
dings and other events.
Committees are
looking at minimum sites of 10 acres in this
area and also in nearby South Carolina.
Some 51 people would be employed but
many others would reenactors in volunteer
roles. :
Behind the proposed lodge he envisions
putting up three camps: one for the South
Fork Boys, a NC militia that Frederick
Hambright/Hambrecht belonged to where
characters on scene would depict those
mountain men from the Battle of Kings
Mountain; the middle camp an Indian camp,
with bare-chested characters in Indian attire
and on the right of the encampment would be
the British camp. Guests at the Inn would not
pay to visit the location but tickets to the pub-
lic would be as low as five dollars. ‘Addition-
ally, visitors would have opportunity to sign
a legal waiver to fire a flintlock rifle. At the
Indian camp visitors could throw a toma-
Provided by Marti Mongiello, the photo of this log cabin is similar to the appearance
of his proposed resort,
hawk or spear, fire a blowgun or shoot bow
and arrow. At the British camp cannon firing
would be the drawing card.
“The unique aspect of our resort is that
you can live inside it for a week, a day or
year round. You can also dress in our cos-
_tume department and command armies on
the battlefield to make and execute war as a i
private or General. Should you lose the day’s
battles, you may have to dine across the table
See PARK, Page 3A
- nual Easter season presentation of
Ci
seeks
$1.4
million
grant
By ELIZABETH STEWART
"Staff writer
By unanimous vote,
Kings Mountain City Coun-
cil voted Monday to move
ahead on plans for improve-
ments at the water plant by
seeking $1.4 million from
the state in the latest eco-
nomic stimulus package,
the 2009 American Recov-
ery and Reinvestment Plan,
to pay for emergency gener-
ators at the water plant and
the booster pump station.
In a related action, the
board also filed for the
county application for fund-
ing of $850,000 for con-
struction of a 12-inch water
line to serve Southern
Power, the new electric
plant proposed in Grover.
The catch is that if the
city gets the money it will
have to pay back half the
cost of the state loan
($700,000) over a 20-year
period with zero interest.
Several city council |
members had reservations.
“How will we pay back the
money? Are the generators
necessary?”
“How many times has
the city run out of water?”
asked Councilman Rick
Moore, the most vocal of
the commissioners who
asked questions. “How
many times has the power
See GRANT, Page 7A
By ELIZABETH STEWART
Kings Mountain city officials are looking at a new
piece of equipment — Hydra-Stop-Insta-Valve-Plus that
could save time, is safe, and will result in no cut off of
water service while workers are making repairs. :
Installation is as easy as 1-2-3, according to the
demonstration Tuesday morning by company officials
who told Water Supt. Dennis Wells, Mayor Rick Mur-
phrey, City Manager Marilyn Sellers and City Council-
man Dean Spears that ’you just install the fitting, make
the tap, then install the valve. It’s really that simple.”
Once installed, Insta- Valve Plus operates with a stan-
Bank&Trust
Building C ommunities
NO DISRUPTIONS
Staff writer
City looks at new equipment
EMILY WEAVER/HERALD
Left to right, Mayor Rick Murphrey, City Manager Marilyn Sellers and Councilman Dean Spears
look at new equpment water utility workers Duane Knaperak (left) and Willie Inman were trying
out Tuesday morning on a water line along E. Gold Street.
dard valve key. This revolutionary valving system
works with existing Hydra-Stop equipment or as a
stand-alone system. It can be inserted practically any-
where, giving the professionals the control over distri-
bution systems.
Insta-Valve-Plus requires only one cut, no reaming
and causes no excessive pipe strength loss. The ma-
chinery costs $35,000.
“It’s the easy way to install valves and not dig up
lines and no disruption of service,”
said the new equipment would replace the need for
maintenance crews to shut down in order to repair or
service under-pressure water lines.
Visit us today at
209 S. Battleground Avenue
~ Kings Mountain
704.739.5411 ¢ www.alliancebankandtrust.com
MEMBER FDIC
says the mayor. He
NR aed AoA A AB A Rah
A AL A a Sa Sl A At a A,
CROSSWALK
Jim Belt as
“The Centurion”
Easter |
drama |
begins |
March27 |
By ELIZABETH STEWART
Staff writer
The passion of Jesus Christ on
~~ Calvary’s cross will come alive for
crowds expected to see the 9th an-
Cross Walk two weekends — Friday
“and Saturday, March 27 and 28 and
Friday and Saturday, April 3 and 4 ~ By
— in downtown Kings Mountain.
Regal Ventures Creative Min-
istries, the event planning organiza-
tion directed by Reg Alexander,
combines the dramatic events dur-
ing Holy Week in a passion play ,
that has been hailed as the South’s Nl
“most unusual Passion Play.”
A pre-show by the musical fam-
ily, Cross Reference, will open the
show each evening. Tickets at $5
are available at Regal Ventures, 104 ih,
E. Gold Street. No tickets are nec-
essary for children preschool age or
younger. Due to restraints in the
size of the audience, advance ticket
purchase is encouraged because
See DRAMA, Page 3A
[elz{e)V 3]
‘Gall
before |
youdig'
Grover council
learns pipeline
safety, gets audit
By EMILY WEAVER
Editor
————,
GROVER - The town
learned valuable lessons on
pipeline safety during the
Grover council meeting Monday
night. But the first item "down
the pipe" was an audit report.
Shane Fox, with Martin
Starnes & Associates, CPAs, {
said that the audit looked "very
healthy" despite a true total
deficit of about $4,000.
Mayor Robert Sides told
council members during the
See SAFETY, Page 3A
le aa