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Butch Furse
With the pandemic dragging on it’s easy to slip in to depressive thoughts when you’re homebound with lots of time and nowhere to go. That’s when we said, “Enough of those thoughts” and turned to positive thinking.
We realized just how lucky we are living where we do and what a great progressive community we are fortunate to be living in. Our initial positive thoughts were triggered by a 78-page visitor and newcomer guide -- “Welcome to Aurora” -- that listed area attractions, entertainment, recreation, history and more.
Over 55 years living in Aurora we’ve witnessed population growth from approximately 2,500 to near 5,000. Quality of life has matched that growth as health-care, education, business and industrial aspects played vital roles in that expansion.
But, over the decades there were other players. They were the past and present citizens of our community jointly holding a progressive and cooperative attitude as well as reaching in their pocketbooks. Local city and county governing bodies cooperated with those same attitudes as our citizenry in helping spearhead that progress and growth. Now add the importance of the millions of dollars coming from over 17 local foundations whose contributions throughout the years reached successful goals.
Last week as we strolled through Streeter Park (one of over 90 acres inside Aurora devoted to a system of parks) we saw a beautiful, well-manicured park thanks to a city department dedicated to keeping up that beauty. It’s easy to find evidence for our of community pride not only in parks, but in other community attractions that are being maintained.
On another note we read in a daily newspaper where a $101 million science center featuring interactive technology will provide a particular exclamation point that would feature Omaha as an energetic, forward-looking city.
Now in our own community on a much smaller scale we question: “Doesn’t that Omaha description of their science center pretty well match the description of our own Edgerton Explorit Center that has been in existence here for over two decades?”
In conclusion, it appears our personal (slow-down) during the pandemic has given us time to reflect and how blessed we are to call Aurora and Hamilton County our home!
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Remember when contentment enters, progress ceases.
RL Furse is publisher emeritus of the News-Register
