Two organizations with a shared vision to meet the health care needs of the people of Piscataquis County have officially come together. Northern Light Health and Mayo Regional Hospital completed their merger agreement on Sunday, March 1. On Monday morning, Michelle Hood, president and CEO of Northern Light Health, joined with Marie Vienneau, president and CEO of the newly named Northern Light Mayo Hospital, for a press conference and celebration at  the hospital with employees.

Spectators gathered at the finish line at Lonesome Pine Trails in Fort Kent to cheer on mushers as they arrived at the end of their 30-mile trek through Fort Kent at the Can-Am Sled Dog Races on Feb. 29. Race winner was racer No. 25 Rico Portalatin of Milo with a time of 2:24:11; second place, No. 2 Julie Albert with a time of 2:49:19; and third place, No. 24, Alexander Theriault with a time of 2:52:21. 

Valley Grange of Guilford is sponsoring a blanket-making event from 9 a.m. to noon on Saturday, March 28 and volunteers are needed. Organizer Pat Engstrom notes “no sewing skills are needed. If you can measure, cut a straight line with scissors and tie a simple knot you can become a ‘blanketeer’ and help support Project Linus.”

When Maine achieved statehood in 1820, it was home to a number of wild creatures that are no longer seen in the region today. Wolves, caribou, panthers and rattlesnakes are among the animals found roaming the woods and waters of Maine 200 years ago. 

Sometimes, a day of ice fishing ends with nothing more than an unsolved mystery, as fish steal bait without getting hooked, and a frustrated angler heads home empty-handed.

Agents from the company’s 34 offices in New Hampshire, Maine, and Vermont were recognized for their achievements in real estate sales including Betty Ann Richardson, Grover Kilpatrick and Donna Vainio of the Dover-Foxcroft office.

The U.S. Postal Service will celebrate Maine’s bicentennial with the issuance of a new Forever stamp and a dedication ceremony on the actual anniversary of Maine’s statehood, March 15.

Anglers are invited to Sebec Lake for the ninth annual Dover-Foxcroft Firefighters Association Ice Fishing Derby on Saturday, Feb. 29 and Sunday, March 1.

Sen. Paul Davis, R-Sangerville and Rep. Paul Stearns, R-Guilford hosted Ben Beverly’s history class from Greenville High School at the Statehouse on Feb. 26.

“We have current conditions drafted,” Town Manager Jack Clukey said about a Dover-Foxcroft Urban Area Transportation Study during a Feb. 24 selectmen’s meeting. “Now Gorrill Palmer is working on the future alternate analysis.”

The Wiscasset man who died Sunday was the seventh person to be killed in a snowmobile crash in Maine in a little more than a month, and the third in three days, making this winter an above-average season for snowmobile-related deaths.

The General Federation of Women’s Clubs (GFWC)/Miosac Club is conducting its 2020 Sebec Lake Ice Out Contest for the 44th consecutive year.  Tickets may be purchased from any club member through March 31. Monies raised will be used to maintain a variety of club projects in the Dover-Foxcroft area.

A lawsuit seeking to block the merger of Mayo Regional Hospital with Northern Light Health is heading to court late next month after the Maine attorney general’s office and both health care organizations all filed motions seeking to dismiss the case.

A Wiscasset man died on Sunday, Feb. 23 following a fatal snowmobile crash on Moosehead Lake. Gregory Lemar, 59 from Wiscasset, was operating a late model Arctic Cat 800 snowmobile toward Rockwood from Greenville shortly after 5 p.m.

An owner of the largest employer in Piscataquis County has sued his cousin and fellow co-owner over a deep disagreement about the direction of the manufacturing business that has been in their family for generations -- Hardwood Products Company LP of Guilford -- and that could be sold to a new owner depending on the outcome of the suit.

Pine Tree Hospice brings you Trivia Night at 7 p.m. on Saturday, March 14 at The Commons at Central Hall.

The Maine attorney general’s office has asked a federal judge to dismiss an ex-police officer’s lawsuit against the Penobscot County district attorney on the same grounds that an appeals court threw out a similar lawsuit in 1992 against the man who was then the county’s top prosecutor. 

The American Red Cross of Maine and the Dexter Fire Department  are teaming up to make town residents safer by installing free smoke alarms in their homes, helping them create escape plans and providing other fire safety tips.