The Union County Sheriff’s Office says two separate accidents took place Tuesday. Authorities say at around 11:32-p.m. Tuesday, a 2015 Ford F-150 pickup driven by 24-year-old Blaine Andrew Sportsman, of LaClede, Missouri, was traveling westbound on 140th Street in Union County. When Sportsman looked down at his cell phone GPS to see where he was going, the passenger side wheels of the camper his truck was pulling, began to go off the north side of the road, near the ditch. When he tried to get the camper back on the road, it continued towards the ditch before entering, and flipped onto its side.

The flipping action of the camper caused the pickup to flip over as well. Sportsman was wearing a seat belt and was able to safely extricate himself from the pickup. Damage from the accident amount to $20,000 altogether. No citations were issued. And, at around 5:34-p.m., Tuesday, a 1996 Oldsmobile Ciera driven by 42-year-old Jesse White, of Creston, was traveling north on Highway 25. As he was looking at the cornfields, he failed to notice the vehicle in front him, a 2015 RAM pickup – driven by 26-year-old Trevor Blake Luther, of Creston – was slowing down due to a semi hauling crops that was ahead of the pickup. When he finally saw the pickup, White slammed on his brakes, but struck the rear of the pickup truck. He complained of head pain and was transported by ambulance to the hospital in Creston, where he was examined and released. Damage to his car was estimated at $5,000. The pickup sustained $2,000 damage. No citations were issued.

And, the Creston Police Department reports a 2016 Chevy Colorado pickup truck was legally parked in the 100 block of E. Montgomery Street when it was struck on the driver’s side front panel by an unknown vehicle. The other vehicle transferred green paint to the pickup during the collision. The incident, which happened sometime over the previous 24-to 48 hours to Tuesday afternoon, caused an estimated $1,600 damage to the pickup.

(Radio Iowa) – Sioux City’s railroad museum is refurbishing a vintage boxcar purchase from an Atlantic man, to turn it into a replica of the cattle cars that the Nazis used to transport European Jews to concentration camps. The idea came out of the annual “Tolerance Week” — which for 17 years has annually brought Holocaust survivors to Sioux City to visit local schools to educate children about their history. Boardmember Kelli Erickson explains. “And we all thought, what if we brought a railcar up here, and create a Holocaust museum where it is not just one week? So we are going from one week of education to potentially nine months,” Erickson says.

File Photo – (Left) Matt Merke with the Sioux City Railroad Museum, and Keith Olsen, with Olsen’s BP.

The railcar – formerly owned by Keith Olsen, of Atlantic – will be part of a permanent museum exhibit known as “Holocaust Rails, Desperate Passage.” “And it’s very, very important education for us to share. How did this happen, who are these people, how did people let it happen?,” she says. “There are answers to all of these –and the survivors — the stories of the survivors, very inspiring.” The finished cattle car will be the centerpiece of the only Holocaust exhibit in the midwest. “One survivor has been quoted that the railcar symbolized their transition from being human beings to being numbers that could be disposed of at any time. It’s a hub, the very center of what we’d like to create,” she says.

Humanities Iowa and the National Endowment for the Humanities are partnering in the project. They plan a fundraising campaign for the overall project — and hope to have the exhibit ready by the fall of 2022.

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports an investigation into a disabled vehicle on Highway 34 at around 12:40-a.m. today (Wednesday), resulted in a felony drug arrest. Deputies found the vehicle broken down, in the 2900 block of Highway 34. Authorities say 40-year-old Austin Marie Schutt, of Creston, was arrested for Possession of a Controlled Substance (PCS)/3rd offense, a Class-D Felony. Schutt also had multiple warrants out of Missouri for PCS, four counts of illegal possession of an item in a county facility, and unlawful possession of drug paraphernalia.

She was transported to the Montgomery County Jail and held on a $15,000 bond.