News and Notes

Mt. Daniel Elementary School kindergarten students will soon be learning about Mexico from local book artist Kathy Kaplan, thanks to a $275 grant from the Washington Post Grants in the Arts Program. The “Poetry with Words/Poetry Without Words” project will enhance students’ awareness of Mexican Art, culture and photography, all the while meeting several specific Virginia art and kindergarten classroom Standards of Learning requirements.

Kaplan will start working with the students in April of 2005, the books will be displayed at Mt. Daniel’s Art Show in the spring. Falls Church-based General Dynamics was awarded a $5.8 million contract to provide analysis, design and implement for the Acquisition Wide Area Network procurement system for the National Security Agency. General Dynamics has enlisted Lockheed Martin to assist in the areas of system engineering, architecture development and implementation.

A wedding reception was held Friday evening, December 17 at the home of Gerald Filbin in Falls Church for Michael Kessler and Buckley Jeppson.  Mr. Kessler, a former Falls Church resident, was married to Mr. Jeppson on August 27th by a city magistrate in Toronto, Canada.  Messrs. Jeppson and Kessler have been a couple for eight years and currently reside in Washington, D.C.  Over 50 friends and family, including Jeppson’s daughter, Olivia and her husband Scott Carter joined the couple to celebrate their marriage.

Long time Falls Church resident Lou Olom recently made a generous gift to the Falls Church Education Foundation to be used to purchase science equipment for George Mason High School. The purchase will include items such as a thermal cycler and a microcentrifuge capable of molecular biology applications.

Acacia Federal Savings Bank, based in Falls Church, was recently named “Associate of the Year” for 2004 by the Maryland-National Capital Building Industry Association. The Associate award marks Acacia as “the best MNCBIA affiliate in an industry related to the building and real estate development by its 740 members.”

It might be freezing outside, but there’s nothing like a little baseball to warm your hearts. McLean Little League is holding signups for the spring beginning Thursday, Jan. 6 from 7 – 9:30 p.m. at the McLean Little League Complex in the upper level of the Clubhouse. For registration help and a list of costs, contact Holley Remer at hremer@cox.net.

It was an adventure at CNN for News-Press editor Nicholas F. Benton, whose appearance in a live debate on the Anderson Cooper 360 show was cancelled at the last minute Tuesday when his debating opponent failed to appear. Benton was in CNN’s Washington, D.C., studio, having done through make-up, a stint in the Green Room (which isn’t green), wired for sound and positioned on a chair in a dark studio staring at a TV camera, less than a minute from going on the air when the call came in from the network’s Sacramento, Calif., studio that the author of the “SaveMerryChristmas.org” website was a no-show. Based on his column, “Happy Holidays,” in last week’s News-Press, Benton was invited to debate the proponent of a boycott of Federated Stores because they greet customers with “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” “Are We Taking Christ Out of Christmas?” was the title of the swiftly-cancelled Anderson Cooper segment. Benton insists that when his debating opponent read his column on line, if scared him off. No other explanation was offered.