Heard on the Street

AND THE WINNER IS

Springfield Business Journal announced 39 of its 2001 40 Under 40 honorees in this space in the Feb. 26 issue, promising to announce the final name in a future issue. The anxiously awaited final member of the SBJ 40 Under 40 is Dwight Leigh of Leigh Environmental. A special event to celebrate these accomplished up-and-comers will be held 5:30-8:30 p.m. April 19 at Springfield Brewing Company, 301 S. Market Ave. Live entertainment and light hors d'oeuvres are on the agenda, and a limited number of tickets to the event are available at $10 each. For more information, call Debra Fickbohm at 831-3238, or e-mail dfickbohm@sbj.net.

E-FARMING

Eight area farmers, including one Springfieldian, have been awarded grants to fund innovative projects to protect and conserve natural resources. Malissa Nowack of Springfield will be developing a Web-based global information system for organic farm networking and farmland preservation, according to a news release from the Missouri Department of Agriculture. In all 30 grants of $4500 each were awarded recently. Jerome Rader, of Willard, will develop an innovative bush and weed herbicide applicator. Kip Glass, of Bois D'Arc, will evaluate labor savings, feed conversion and pasture use by comparing two pastured poultry production models. Three Seymour farmers also received the grants. Dave Kensinger will bottle milk in glass containers for a value-added ecologically-sound product. Joseph Lapierre will produce shiitake and oyster mushrooms. Sharon Lee will investigate the practicality and profitability of using sheep to weed orchards and to provide other benefits. Jeannette Allen Johnson, of Pierce City, will work to improve a multi-animal flexible pasture system. Dale Dintaman, of Carthage, will try to enhance the value of poor-quality hay. The grant program is also administered by the Sustainable Agriculture Extension Program of the University of Missouri and Lincoln University. The grants also are meant to encourage farmers to reduce dependence on non-renewable resources, including pesticides, fertilizers and fuel.

ALL ABOUT NIXA

Nixa businesses will be on display at the Nixa Area Chamber of Commerce Nixpo, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. March 31 at Nixa Junior High School, 205 North Street. Each company represented will give away door prizes and product samples. "This year's Nixpo is shaping up to be the best ever," said Ron Shawgo, committee chairman. "We feel we are providing a service not only to the businesses we serve through the chamber, but also to the residents of Nixa. When you buy locally, you not only save time and money, but you also help support those businesses established in the community," Shawgo said. The chamber will give away a grand prize, balloons for children and trees for adults. For more information and reservation forms call 725-1545.

SEE WHAT NASA'S HUBBLE SEES

With a simple click of a mouse, anyone with World Wide Web access can see through the world's first eye in space, the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope. Named after a Marshfield native, Edwin Hubble, the telescope was launched in 1990, according to a news release from the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md. The new Web site, "Hubble Space Telescope: New Views of the Universe," simulates a visit to the Smithsonian exhibit of the telescope. Each day the telescope collects enough information and images to fill five encyclopedias. The new Web site provides unprecedented photographs of the universe at http://hstexhibit.stsc.edu. The new Web site is a special feature of the HubbleSite. Click on it at http://hubble.stsci.edu.