Outlook for new Armory now looks much brighter

The new National Guard Armory may still be a year or two from actual completion, but at least the start on the road of red tape has been made.

The technical machinery for a new armory was put into motion earlier this month when Suffolk City Council signed a joint resolution to the effect that the city was desirous of a new armory in the area and that, with Nansemond County, it would supply a suitable site of approximately five acres and put up jointly with Nansemond County the sum of $25,000 toward construction costs and other expenses.

The Nansemond County Board of Supervisors is expected to sign the joint resolution officially and send it on its way to Richmond.

The armory has been a dream of local guardsmen for many years, Capt. Williams commented this week. Shortly after World War II, a Quonset-type building was erected for National Guard use. At that time, plans called for the building to be in use about two years while a new armory was under construction. Repeated hold-ups in the passing years, however, have kept the National Guard in the same building, although improvements have been made from time to time.

A general lack of drill and training space and storage space, in addition to lack of adequate facilities, had been a problem for several years. The problem became more acute when the local unit was named as a Selective Reserve Force and its personnel and equipment almost doubled.

Wing at JFK to be ready by September

Construction on the new wing at John F. Kennedy High School is expected to be finished in time for school opening next fall. At present only the foundation is visible.

Much of the building will be devoted to an automobile shop where students can train as mechanics.

This automobile shop will take up a 50 x 77 ft. area. The end wing is 121.4 x 77 ft.

A tool room, masonry shop and classroom will fill the other side of the addition.

This shop was in the original plan of the school building and was to have been added as soon as possible.

The shop is for a Day Trade Program, in which the students will be enrolled for three hours in one subject.

S. S. Kea and Sons of Ivor are the contractors.

Drive for new voters nears end

The voter registration drive of the Independent Voters League in Nansemond County and Suffolk will climax in the next two weeks with a concerted effort to put an additional 1,300 new voters on the books.

Moses A. Riddick Jr., executive secretary of the IVL, said Saturday that 100 canvassers in Nansemond County and Suffolk are working to get new voters on the books.

-Compiled by Jennifer Rose