THEY’RE BACK!: If you’ve been dragging your feet on getting out
the hummingbird feeder, it’s time to get moving!

Right on schedule, the first hummingbirds of the season were
spotted Monday at the home of Victor Lantz in Mount Jewett.

May 1 is consider “the” standard day of arrival for hummingbirds
in Pennsylvania but it still seems early for the northern portion
of the state.

Whatever… they’re back!

Victor also reported that a rose-breasted grosbeak arrived at
his feeder Monday and Baltimore orioles on Sunday. “The Baltimore
orioles are here a couple of weeks early,” he said.

Victor is the retired postmaster in Mount Jewett.

ON TOUR: A Bradford “tourist” tells us he had the unusual
experience last month of returning from Washington, D.C., where he
took in the beautiful cherry blossoms and later the same day passed
through “the Pennsylvania wilds” where he saw two herd of elk in
Benezette. Now that’s America!

THE ICEBOX: Bill Weisenfluh confirms by email our thought about
which McKean County community is the “real” icebox of Pennsylvania:
“Kane was always known as the coldest spot in Pennsylvania until
the National Weather Service started taking the temperatures from
the Bradford Regional Airport.”

On the same subject, we hear from Neil Hoffmier: “Numerous years
of recording ‘official’ temperatures at the Bradford-McKean County
airport (in the good old days) for Allegheny Airlines and the FSS,
us ‘hilltoppers’ found that Kane always had us beat by several
degrees.”

“The ‘valley folks’ like Bradford/Smethport/Limestone were a few
degrees warmer than the airport (elevation 2,140 feet).

“Most ‘out-of-towners’ never heard of Mount Jewett /Rew /Mount
Alton /Ormsby /Mac Caldwell’s farm etc. … so give it to Kane.

“‘Course on a clear night (without fog) the records went to the
valley folks. We used to plan on rain every New Year’s eve followed
by below zero temps for several weeks thereafter.

“Often the high temps for the day would be 8 to 10 below zero.
Then came global warming … hmmm.”

ANOTHER ONE: Margie Burns of Bradford writes, “I read with
interest your article of Ben Franklin. My favorite quote is ‘Three
can keep a secret if two of them are dead.'”

TODAY’S QUOTE: “The rights of the best of us are only assured by
the rights afforded to the worst of us,” according to Jeff Stein,
journalist, educator, attorney, in 1999.