Julia Robinson photo

Spirit Riders  Vernita Chapman hugs the fence rail as yearling mustangs Prada, left, and Rudy race around the arena. Chapman and three other women from Columbia’s Granny’s House trained wild mustangs for 100 days as part of the Extreme Mustang Makeover. •  Read the Article •  See the Slide Show

Local News Stories
Tombstone mission holds on to rural heritage
By T.J. GREANEY of the Tribune’s staff
In the shadow of the Kraft Foods plant in northeast Columbia, with the odor of factory exhaust hanging the air, Myra and Wayne Smith honored their forebears.

Feds allege e-files had child porn
By JOE MEYER of the Tribune’s staff
A Columbia man faces federal child pornography charges stemming from an arrest in May after he allegedly drove to a Carthage hotel to meet someone he thought was a 13-year-old girl for sex.

Town desperate for starling solution
By T.J. GREANEY of the Tribune’s staff
It started about a month ago when a cloud of starlings descended on a Centralia neighborhood. The homes around Lee Street have some of the lushest trees in town, residents said, and the birds began roosting in the boughs. It was annoying at first. Now it’s insufferable.

Festival fling
Dancing Wheels Company & School dancers Kristen Stilwell, Jenny Sikora and Robby Cecil perform yesterday on a stage on the Courthouse Square during the Columbia Festival of the Arts. The Cleveland-based troupe is the first modern dance company to integrate stand-up and sit-down, or wheelchair-using, dancers in professional roles.

Grand jury indicts in fatal child abuse
A Boone County grand jury on Friday handed down indictments naming the parents of a 2-year-old boy, accusing them of felony murder in the toddler’s death earlier this year.

Two-year-long Callaway drug case results in 23 arrests
By the Tribune’s staff
Twenty-three people, including a Columbia man, face felony drug charges after a multi-agency drug investigation in Callaway County, according to a news release Friday from the Callaway County Sheriff’s Department.

Cleanup of Hinkson yields 2 tons of trash
A record number of volunteers collected a record amount of garbage from Hinkson Creek yesterday during the fifth annual Hinkson Clean Sweep, organizers said.