About 4,800 Spartanburg homes, businesses to lose power Sunday morning

About 4,800 homes and businesses in the city of Spartanburg will lose power early Sunday.

Duke Energy said it will be making improvements to the electrical system, and its customers can expect to have their service interrupted for about two or three hours starting at 2:15 a.m.

The Charlotte, N.C.-based utility said the affected areas will be Park Hills, Wofford Street, Converse Heights, South Church Street, Reidville Road, Collins Avenue, Lincoln Heights, Summer Hill and Bell Hill.

Jason Walls, Duke Energy spokesman, said the company began informing customers about four weeks ago so they could make "arrangements." Walls said the utility has scheduled the repairs at a time when it would have the least amount of impact.

The outages will be a problem for unprepared customers who rely on electricity for medical devices, air conditioning, refrigeration, alarms and a plethora of other uses.

"We make repairs like this to ensure the reliability of service for all of our customers," Walls said. "We try to provide them with accurate and timely information, so they can make informed decisions about what they need to do."

Safety concerns eased at West Columbia plant

Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2012/07/13/2352756/safety-concerns-eased-at-west.html#storylink=cpy

Concerns about possible fires at a West Columbia recycling plant are being resolved and employees could be back at work as soon as Monday, Mayor Joe Owens said.

Owens said Friday the city has an agreement with Global Plastic Grinders LLC that should ensure safety while allowing the business to reopen. About 50 people were put out of work by the city’s stop-work order, company officials said.

The West Columbia Fire Department ordered Global Plastic to close Wednesday amid questions about possible fires and explosions. Company officials said they run a safe operation, but the fire department said it needed more assurances that dust inside the building would not ignite.

Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2012/07/13/2352756/safety-concerns-eased-at-west.html#storylink=cpy

Film producer Richard D. Zanuck dies, age 77

Hollywood movie producer Richard D. Zanuck, whose films include Oscar winner "Driving Miss Daisy," died on Friday of a heart attack, his spokesman said in a statement. He was 77.

"Richard D. Zanuck, one of the film industry's most progressive and distinguished leaders died today (Friday, July 13th) of a heart attack in Los Angeles at age 77," spokesman Jeff Sanderson said in a statement.

Zanuck, the son of early Hollywood mogul Darryl Zanuck, earned numerous awards over more than 50 years of making movies, and he ran the 20th Century Fox film studio at a time when it cranked out hits such as "The Sound of Music," "Patton" and "The French Connection," which all went on to win best film Oscars.

Legacy of Booker Wright, waiter murdered after speaking out on ‘whites only’ restaurant in Mississippi

In 1965, filmmaker Frank De Felitta produced an NBC News documentary about white attitudes towards race in the American South and the tensions of life in the Mississippi Delta during the Civil Rights struggle.  The film outraged some Southern viewers, in part, because of a candid and unforgettable scene featuring Booker Wright, a local African-American waiter in Greenwood, MS.  Wright, who worked at a local “whites only” restaurant, went on national television to deliver a stunning and heartfelt monologue about his true feelings about serving the white community, and about his aspirations for his children, who he hoped would grow up free from the prejudice he faced.  The repercussions for Booker Wright’s courageous candidness were extreme.  He lost his job and was beaten and ostracized by those who considered him “one of their own.”

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