5 feel-good Fresno Bee stories of 2019: Caring kids, 100-year-old loves, Yosemite joy
A lot happened in 2019, and a lot of it was real good!
Here are five feel-good Fresno Bee stories from the past year to hopefully boost your jolly this holiday season.
Lasting love: 100-year-olds still ‘treat each other special’
Malcolm and LaVerne Masten of Fresno, married for the past 76 years, both turned 100 years old in 2019.
They met playing the clarinet in junior high school. The couple sat side-by-side holding hands during an interview in October, sharing their enduring love and admiration for each other.
“The women around here are really jealous,” their daughter Marlene Masten said about their senior living community, The Terraces at San Joaquin Gardens, “because he’ll be sitting there and say, ‘Look at her, she’s my girl. Isn’t she beautiful?’”
LaVerne shared some love advice: It’s very important to “treat each other special.”
Woman waves at Fresno traffic to give joy and hope
The joyful Cheryl “Monique” Turks has been waving at motorists on Fresno highways for more than 15 years. She also prays and sings as she waves for hours at a time.
“A symbol of joy, that’s what I want to be!” Turks said in January from an overpass above Highway 41. “I want to be like that cup of joe everybody have to get every morning! … Honey, here it is! Let me be that cup of joe.”
The Fresno mother and grandmother said her waving is to “give hope.”
“If I just affect one person, I’ve done a lot.”
Sixth-graders rally to give teacher with cancer ‘year of a lifetime’
The sixth-grade class of Allison Vargas at Bud Rank Elementary School in Clovis made a GoFundMe donation account for her called “Mrs. Vargas’ Year of a Lifetime” when they learned she had stage 4 colon cancer. Her last day of teaching was March 29.
Earlier this month, Vargas learned her tumors have grown and she likely has only one or two more months to live.
She said thanks to her students and the community – the GoFundMe raised more than $21,000 – she was able to spend the rest of the year traveling with her husband and their young daughter. They went to Disneyland, San Francisco and Solvang in California; visited Hawaii and Arizona; and were able to start a clinical trial at a USC cancer center.
“We all love her so much,” her students wrote this spring, “and want her daughter to have amazing memories with her mommy.”
Vargas’ family recently made another GoFundMe to help with her funeral expenses.
Fire captain comes to the rescue while on vacation
Justin Corley, a Kern County Fire Department captain who lives in Clovis, found himself in the midst of another emergency while trying to enjoy a Thanksgiving camping trip in Arizona with his family.
He awoke in the middle of the night near Havasu Falls during a flash flood, then trudged miles – at times in several feet of water – to get help, wake up sleeping campers and help people safely evacuate.
His fellow campers later took to Facebook to share their thanks for the then-unknown man. They soon learned his name.
“I realize that being humble comes with the territory of being a first responder,” said one fellow camper, “but he and his family were an integral part of ensuring the safety and comfort of so many during and after the flash flood.”
Historic Yosemite names are back
Beloved historic names of Yosemite National Park properties returned this summer.
That followed years of litigation with the park’s old concessionaire, which claimed it owned the names and that they couldn’t be used without paying more for intellectual property rights. Around $12 million was paid in a civil settlement.
That irked a lot of people, but the celebrations to follow in Yosemite Valley were sweet.
The old Curry Village sign – which had been covered by a sign that said Half Dome Village – was among the first to return. It was switched back within hours of the civil settlement.
“Places like Curry Village that opened in 1899 and The Ahwahnee in 1927 – these place names go with these iconic buildings here in Yosemite National Park,” park spokesman Scott Gediman said. “They have continued to be tremendously important to the American people. … Ultimately these names will remain with these places in Yosemite National Park.”
This story was originally published December 24, 2019 at 5:45 AM.
