News

By WENDI ZONGKER
wendi.zongker@mynassausun.com

FERNANDINA BEACH — It started as a class project. And now a video created by three Fernandina Beach High School students — Jake Coombs, Chris Igou, and Mariah Jarrett, — is one of five finalists in a statewide contest searching for the next Ask a Librarian commercial.
Ask a Librarian is a free online service allowing users to chat live with a Florida reference librarian. If the librarian can’t answer the question, he or she will e-mail the answer once it is found. Users also can e-mail questions to their local library from the site.
Recently Ask a Librarian sponsored a contest asking Florida high school students to create a video promoting Ask a Librarian and submit it online using YouTube, a video-sharing Web site.
TV production instructor Rob Hicks decided to turn the contest into a class assignment. When Hicks told his students to divide into groups and make a video, Coombs, Igou and Jarrett, all 16, immediately knew they wanted to work together, Coombs said.
While the students hadn’t previously heard of Ask a Librarian before the assignment, all three said they now use it often, including in making their commercial.
Jarrett said she uses the site for help with history class while Coombs said he uses the Web site for research papers.
The students said the video concept grew out of simple brainstorming.
“We all kind of pitched in and threw ideas in and went with one and kept going with it,” Coombs said.
The FBHS students’ video features a librarian named Gertrude who pops out of the computer when Igou visits the Ask a Librarian Web site. Gertrude answers his questions while completing tasks around the house, such as cleaning the pool and jogging on a treadmill.
More than 20 video commercials were submitted to YouTube, but those videos were narrowed down to only five finalists. Videos were judged on creativity, promotion of the service, accuracy and overall appeal.
Coombs, Igou and Jarrett all said they were surprised to be finalists, considering they took much less than the given five days to complete their video.
And while they are happy with the final product, Jarrett said she wishes it could have been longer. Video submissions had to be between 25- and 30-seconds long.
“It was a much better video at 55 seconds,” Igou said.
Voting is on-going and the video with the most votes will be announced Tuesday, Feb. 12. The winning director will receive a video camera while second place gets a Nintendo Wii gaming console and third place receives an MP3 player.
And with three team members, it’s up to the students to decide who wins the prize if their video garners the most votes.
“The director gets the prize,” Igou said. “I’m just an actor.”
But Coombs said while he is the director, Jarrett did all the camera work.
“We’ll figure it out,” Jarrett said.

Workers load a wheelchair onto a tow truck Jan. 17, after a Nassau County school bus carrying disabled students struck an SUV. An elderly passenger in the van was killed, but none of the students were injured.

By Wendi Zongker

and Kevin Turner

mynassausun.com

YULEE — A 73-year-old Zephyr Hills man was killed Jan. 17 when the SUV in which he rode turned into the path of an oncoming Nassau County school bus at the intersection of Florida A1A and Interstate 95.

AMELIA HART/Staff
Roadwork and intersection improvement projects, coupled with Yulee’s booming growth, are transforming the intersection at Florida A1A, Chester Road and the Amelia Concourse.

By KEVIN TURNER
kevin.turner@mynassausun.com

YULEE —With residential and retail development continuing to pour into this booming community, the intersection of Chester Road and Florida A1A is becoming its epicenter.

“I would rate Chester Road and A1A as the No. 1-impacted intersection in the county,” Nassau County Director of Engineering Services Douglas Seaman said Monday.

KEVIN TURNER/Staff
Former Nassau County Property Appraiser James Page receives a certificate commemorating the renaming of the Nassau County Governmental Complex.

KEVIN TURNER/Staff

Nassau County officials with longtime property appraiser James Pages, seated at left, at his Callahan home Wednesday, July 18. Seated next to Page is Jimmy L. Higginbotham. Rear row, from left, Commissioner Tom Branan, Tax Collector John Drew, Commissioner Marianne Marshall, Judge Granville "Doc" Burgess, Judge Robert Foster, Clerk of Courts John Crawford, Commissioner Jim B. Higginbotham, Supervisor of Elections Vicki Cannon and Property Appraiser Greg Haddock.

KEVIN TURNER/Staff

The county’s new building department building is to include better storage facilities for records that have to be kept in hard copy.

By KEVIN TURNER
kevin.turner@mynassausun.com

YULEE — The Nassau County Building Department soon will be issuing permits for its own new building.

Building Department officials say they’ve outgrown their current facility, which they share with Growth Management and Engineering Services. But thanks to several years of brisk building permit sales, the department has saved enough money to have its own building.

By KEVIN TURNER
kevin.turner@mynassausun.com

NASSAU COUNTY — Police officials say they still are investigating the assaults of five Nassau County women between Dec. 10 and June 14.

Two of the women died. Four were attacked in their homes, and one was at work. No arrests have been made.

Capt. David Bishop of the Fernandina Beach Police Department said police are still investigating the most recent attack, a 56-year-old woman’s rape in her home, and the April 20 death of Eleanor Lassiter Colborn, 76. The Medical Examiner’s Office ruled Colburn’s death a homicide.

AMELIA ISLAND —A sudden storm July 14 left 17 small racing sailboats beached on Cumberland and Amelia islands, the Nassau County Sheriff’s Office reported in a release Tuesday.

The Old Town Dingy Club had sponsored a sailboat race in Cumberland Sound, but a sudden storm brought 40- to 45-mph wind gusts and 3- to 5-foot sea swells, swamping many of the participating boats and blowing all ashore on the two islands.

Eleven of the small craft washed onto the beaches of Cumberland Island and six were beached between Fort Clinch and the Dee Dee Bartel Boat Ramp on the north end of Amelia Island, officers reported. Some boats were towed to Tiger Point Marina, but most were seaworthy enough to sail back to the marina.

YULEE — A 42-year-old Georgia truck driver was found dead on Florida A1A next to his running tractor-trailer Thursday morning.

A deputy stopped at 5:17 a.m. to investigate the truck, which was pulled over to the side of the road on westbound Florida A1A near Jean Lasserre Boulevard. The truck’s emergency flashers were on and its engine was running.

The deputy found Donald Michael Carter of Sumner, Ga., on the road’s paved shoulder under the right side of the truck.

Investigators are working with the Jacksonville Medical Examiner’s office to find out what killed Carter, Nassau County Sheriff Tommy Seagraves said Thursday.

William Shane Anderson
William Shane Anderson, born Dec. 9, 1974, died of cancer July 12 at Community Hospice Hadlow Center.

He is survived by his beloved partner Mario Barcelo; mother Jean Anderson; Sherry Egolf, Grandma Bates, Uncle Chuck, step-parents Bruce and Nancy Wells, Grandma Wells, sisters Brenda Combs and Linda (Kelly) Gallagher; brother-in-law, Pate Wells and family; nephews, David, Robert, Michael, Jamie and James; a niece, Shannon; one great nephew, Darien; and numerous other family and friends.

Funeral was Monday at Callahan Funeral Home with burial in Jones Cemetery in Callahan.

AMELIA A. HART/My Nassau Sun -- 7.18.07 -- Stephanie Hamilton described riding the dirt roads in Swallowfork as "horrific." A decade-long dispute between Callahan and Nassau County over who should maintain the roads is expected to be resolved next week.

By AMELIA A. HART
amelia.hart@mynassausun.com

CALLAHAN — Stephanie Hamilton said Swallowfork residents have a standing joke about the ride on the rough, rutted roads in their neighborhood just west of Callahan off U.S. 301.