Year in Review: Something to cheer about

According to police, the boy was longboarding while holding onto a vehicle. Diehl fell and was run over by the rear wheel of the Jeep. He sustained major trauma to the head, police said, and was unconscious when emergency services arrived.

Shortly after Diehl’s accident, the community rallied together to show support for the teen and his family. A fundraiser was held during Diehl’s recovery, with 50-plus people packing into Jam Street Music downtown. Among the crowd were two of Diehl’s aunts, Roni Novotny and Jamie Buchinski. Both were overwhelmed and touched by the generosity and outpouring of support from the community.

“It is really amazing that the arts community really came together to support him,” Novotny said. “He truly is a rising star in this community. His ability to write and emit emotion in his music is just amazing.”

Months later in October of this year, École St. Mary hosted a special graduation ceremony for Jake. He had been unable to graduate with his classmates earlier in the year because of his injuries.

The ceremony took place in the school’s chapel, which was filled almost to capacity with just over 70 people on hand for the event. Many people were standing, as only limited seating was available. When Diehl entered the chapel, he was greeted with a standing ovation.

Afterwards, he talked to paNOW about his recovery.

“I’m seeing way better, I’m talking way better, I’m hearing way better, it’s all slowly but surely getting better,” said Diehl.

Playing around

In June, young patients in Prince Albert seeking treatment for mental health issues received were gifted with a new outlet for their energy with the unveiling of a new playground on the grounds of the Victoria Hospital.

The new children’s area is located outside the child and youth unit at the Victoria Hospital and includes a play structure, rubber paving and new fencing.

Trudy Hamilton, nursing manager of the mental health child and youth inpatient unit, said the new playground will allow kids to take a break from their struggles. The child and youth inpatient unit houses 10 beds and two overcapacity beds for young people who are dealing with issues such as suicidal thoughts, psychosis, depression and anxiety, she said.

“The kids come to us with very, very adult problems, and I’m not talking what their diagnosis is on admission,” Hamilton added. “They very frequently have worries that should be left to the adults. They can’t be kids.”

A number of groups contributed toward the creation of the new playground, which was led by the Victoria Hospital Foundation, including local-area members of the Elks and Royal Purple District Two.

Man’s crime-fighting best friend

In September, Prince Albert Police Service Dog Daxa stole the show when she arrived to cheers from the crowd at the 2018 BOB Awards.

Daxa received the 2018 BOB award for Prince Albert’s Best Police Officer. It marked the first time an animal has taken home a Best of the Best honour.

“If she could talk, she’d say thanks for the nominations and all the votes,” her handler Kelsey Bighetty said. “These dogs do a lot for the police service … to get this recognition here in Prince Albert, it’s pretty amazing, it’s nice to show support for our service dogs.”

The celebrations at the Ches Leach Lounge honoured Best of the Best winners in all categories and featured food and entertainment from various winning establishments around town.

“It’s awesome for Daxa to get nominated and then get the votes to win the BOB Award,” Bighetty told paNOW. “I think it’s kind of cool for a four-legged animal to win for Best Police Officer, and it shows she has a lot of fans. People enjoy having her around and working the streets of P.A.”

Daxa’s exploits are well-chronicled in paNOW’s news coverage and garner plenty of positive reactions from readers whenever she helps chase down a criminal or sniff out evidence. Daxa retired at the end of the 2018.

Reunited and it feels so good

A sad story about the disappearance of a champion show dog near Prince Albert during the summer ended up being a happy story, thanks to a host of volunteer searchers and the power of social media.

Ian, a champion sheltie, had a tough recovery after fending for himself in the rural area east of Prince Albert for two months. Just two days after moving to a new home, Ian was startled by a thunderstorm on July 9 and escaped his yard.

Ian is a Canadian Grand Champion show dog and was ranked Number 4 in the country at the time of his disappearance. The two-year-old had just moved in with a new family after retiring as a show dog.

Liana Maloney, who has been breeding shelties since 1980, told paNOW that although she might like to, she can’t keep every dog she breeds and takes to shows, so they are retired early so they can enjoy a full life with another family.

“We have had great success with that. This was just one time that Ian decided he didn’t want to go.”

Over the two months he was missing, various sightings were reported, and pictures and information about Ian were posted all over local buy and sell and social media pages.

Maloney decided to follow up on a sighting of Ian from a family harvesting their wheat field east of the city. She told paNOW she picked up some Kentucky Fried Chicken on the way out, hoping to draw Ian out from the woods.

Nearly 70 kilometres outside the city, she said she caught a glimpse of Ian, although he was too frightened to come close.

“I sat there on the river, on the ridge for about 40 minutes … and all of a sudden, this little paw came up on my shoulder and he barked in my ear and he started licking my ear. I couldn’t believe it,” Maloney said.

At just two years old, Ian seemed to be adjusting to his new family, although since the escape, his adoptive family has decided to allow Ian to go back to live with Maloney’s family long-term.

“They’re very sad, I mean they loved him already [but] they did what’s best for Ian which just proves what a great family they are,” she said.

The bells rang out

In November, bells rang out across the country. This year marked 100 years since armistice that ended the First World War. As the bells rang out then, they rang out 100 years later.

Prince Albert’s Sacred Heart Cathedral was one of many churches throughout the country participating in the ceremony, and tolled their bells 100 times over five-second intervals. Ken Guedo, a parishioner with Sacred Heart told paNOW about the event.

“I can imagine all the bells in the world would have been ringing on November 11, 1918 because the war was over and I guess this is sort of a re-enactment of that,” Guedo said. “I imagine 100 years ago there would have been millions of happy people in the world because the war was over.”

In cooperation with the Prince Albert Royal Canadian Legion, the bells at the Prince Albert Arts Centre downtown were also tolled as part of the Royal Canadian Legion’s Bells of Peace initiative.

Bells were used as a celebratory announcement that the war had ended. This was common at the end of both the First and Second World Wars. The Legion’s intent was to have every bell in every community across Canada ring in unison or independently [within each community] 100 times at sunset.

The First World War, often referred to as the war to end all wars, saw the mobilization of more than 70 million military personnel from July 1914 to November 1918. An estimated nine million combatants and seven million civilians died as a result of the war, making it one of the deadliest conflicts in history.

brady.bateman@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @TheDigitalBirdy

by Brady Bateman

Year in Review: Something to cheer about

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