MAY 2011

105429

Published monthly for customers of SkyLine Membership Corporation and SkyBest Communications

SkyLine Heart Walk RaffleSponsored by the SkyLine Heart Walk Team

You can support the fight against heart disease by supporting our team raffle for thisyear’s Ashe County Heart Walk. All proceeds

from the raffle and donations to our team will benefit theAmerican Heart Association.

The 30 items in our raffle include cash prizes, uniqueitems and gift certificates from area retail shops andpopular restaurants!

Tickets for the raffle are $1 each or six for $5 and can be purchased at SkyLine’s West Jefferson CustomerService Center. The drawing will be held on Thursday, May 26. Winners will be contacted by phone.

The Ashe County Heart Walk event is scheduled forSaturday, June 4, at the 1904 Courthouse in Jefferson.

Call 118 or visit our website (www.SkyLine.org) formore information about our raffle.

www.SkyLine.orgwww.SkyBest.com

I.S. “Buck” Cooper Retires fromSkyLine Board

Mr. I.S. “Buck” Cooper, a member of SkyLine’s Boardof Directors since 1983, retired officially on April 5, the28th anniversary of his service to the cooperative.

Mr. Cooper’s board tenure began when he was appointed to fill the seat formerly held by the coopera-tive’s first president and leader in the rural telephone cooperative movement, Mr. G. W. Edwards. Since 2003,Mr. Cooper also served as board treasurer.

At the board’s April meeting, SkyLine President R.C.Mitchell reflected on Mr. Cooper’s faithful service to SkyLine, speaking of his good judgment and commonsense, traits that are indicative of a good leader andboard member. “It has been an honor and real pleasure to serve with you, Buck, and your dedication to family,community and SkyLine is admired and much appreciated,” Mr. Mitchell said.

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SkyBest Will Sponsor Mountain Heart with Tony Rice atAn Appalachian Summer Festival

SkyBest is pleased to announce that it will be amongthe local corporate sponsors of An Appalachian SummerFestival, the monthlong summer arts program that fea-tures a variety of music, dance, theatre, visual arts andfilm on the campus of Appalachian State University inBoone. Presented annually by the University’s Office ofArts and Cultural Programs, An Appalachian SummerFestival is attended by more than 25,000 people, and hasemerged as one of the nation's most innovative andhighly regarded regional, multidisciplinary arts festivals.The festival has been named one of the “Top 20 Events inthe Southeast” in 2011 by the Southeast Tourism Society.

This year, SkyBest will be the lead corporate sponsorof Mountain Heart with Tony Rice on Friday, July 29, atFarthing Auditorium. Here’s a quick preview of thesegroundbreaking artists, as they share their innovativeways of altering traditional acoustic music to make asound all their own.

Tony Rice spans the range of acoustic music, frombluegrass to jazz, to songwriter-oriented folk. He is oneof the greatest innovators in acoustic flat-picked guitar,and he has collaborated and recorded albums with manybluegrass and folk icons of this generation, includingJoni Mitchell, Bobby Hicks, Doyle Lawson and Todd

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CUSTOMER SERVICEALLEGHANY

372-1350ASHE

877-1350846-1350

AVERY

898-1350WATAUGA

963-1350865-1350

JOHNSON

739-1350OUTSIDE

LOCAL SERVICE AREA

1-800-759-2226

REPAIR SERVICELOCAL CALLS

611

WORTH NOTING:

Monday, May 30SkyLine Closes for

Memorial Day Holiday

Saturday, June 4Ashe County Heart Walk

1904 Courthouse, Jefferson, NC

STAFF:Jimmy Blevins

Chief Executive Officer

Kim ShepherdCustomer Service & Sales Manager

Karen P. PowellPublic Relations Director & Editor

60 Years of Great ConnectionsThis month, we move forward to the 1970s, a time of

steady growth for the cooperative. A few highlights fromthe early part of this decade find SkyLine constructingtwo new buildings in Avery County beginning in 1970.The first was a new facility to house central office switching equipment for the Banner Elk exchange to serve up to 1,800 subscribers. The original central office housed just 100 lines. The new Beech Mountain exchange also was constructed and represented the final

of 12 telephone exchanges established to serve the coop-erative’s members.

By 1976, SkyLine announced plans to ex-pand its headquarters building in WestJefferson, adding approximately 7,500square feet of floor space for offices forthe 19 employees, plus a new boardroom and a conference room with a seat-ing capacity of 75.

Shown at the open house inside thenewly expanded area of headquartersare then-SkyLine employees Janie Ashleyand Jessie Hill.

SkyLine’s Commemorative

CookbookCelebrating 60 Years

Submit Your Favorite Recipe

Mr. I.S. “Buck” Cooper, at center, was presented a plaque of appreciationfor his 28 years of service to the Board of Directors by SkyLine President

R.C. Mitchell and SkyLine Chief Executive Officer Jimmy Blevins.

Recipe of the Month

Fruited Chicken SaladCombine and Refrigerate:

3/4 cup mayonnaise1/4 teaspoon salt1/4 teaspoon pepper1/4 teaspoon dry mustard1/2 teaspoon sugar1 teaspoon vinegar

Combine and Refrigerate:1 cup cubed red apples-unpeeled1 tablespoon lemon juice3 cups cubed cooked and cooledchicked breast1 cup celery, chopped1 cup seedless grapes, halved1/4 cup pecan or walnut halves

Instructions:In a large bowl sprinkle apple cubeswith lemon juice. Toss and set aside.Cut up remaining items and add toapples. Add mayonnaise mixture tofruit and chicken. Toss to coat well.Refrigerate. Serve with crackers on a bed of lettuce.

Recipe submitted by SkyLine memberJean Ervin of Watauga County.

APPALACHIAN SUMMER FESTIVAL CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Phillips. Rice remains one of bluegrass’top instrumentalists and singers, bring-ing originality and vitality to everythinghe plays.

Mountain Heart has fearlessly revolu-tionized the way acoustic music can bepresented and played by combining elements of rock, country, blues, jazz and bluegrass into an unmistakable high-energy sound. The band has appearedon the revered stage of the Grand OleOpry more than 100 times and hasshared the stage with acts ranging fromLynyrd Skynyrd and Brad Paisley to Alison Krauss and Patty Loveless.

“We are glad to support Appalachianin this community and region-wide out-reach as it brings a great variety ofevents to the High Country,” said JimmyBlevins, SkyLine Chief Executive Officer.Complementing the Festival’s relaxedmountain setting and scenic beauty is a program filled with world-renownedperformers, artists and musicians. TheFestival’s corporate sponsorships madepossible by several organizations, including SkyBest, have historicallyhelped to keep ticket prices for theseevents at a more affordable level.

To learn more about this year’s Festi-val program, visit www.appsummer.org,and to order tickets, contact the Ap-palachian State University's Farthing Auditorium Box Office at 1-800.841.ARTS (2787).

Support Relay for LifeEvents in Your Area

Watauga County: June 17Alleghany County: June 24Ashe County: July 15Johnson County: July 15Avery County: August 5

I.S. “BUCK” COOPER RETIRES CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Mr. Cooper is a retired dairy farmer from the CranberrySprings community of Ashe County. He served for manyyears on the Yadkin Valley Dairy Milk Board of Directors andlater the Dairy Farmers of America Board of Directors. Formore than a decade, he was a member of the Deep GapVolunteer Fire Department Board of Directors. His familyfarm, known as Cooper Farm at Brownwood, is listed on theNational and N.C. Registers of Historic Places, and hasbeen the subject of artists and photographers over theyears, including local renowned artist Stephen Shoemaker.

He and his wife Shirley have two sons and one granddaughter.

Jerry Roten Appointed to Board of DirectorsWith the retirement of Mr. Cooper

from the SkyLine Board of Directors,Jerry Roten has been appointed to fillthe open board seat for Ashe County.At the time of Mr. Cooper’s retirement,he was serving the second year of athree-year term.

A native of Ashe County, JerryRoten served as Ashe County Clerk ofCourt from 1986 until his retirement in

2006. He was a magistrate for eight years, and before hisservice to Ashe County, he worked with his father Theodore“Thed” Roten in the family business, Northwest Food Mar-ket in Warrensville.

Since 1998, Roten has been a member of the Board ofDirectors for SkyBest Communications, Inc., SkyLine’swholly-owned subsidiary. He also is a board member ofLifeStore Financial Group and Northwest Trading Post.

A graduate of Riverview High School, Roten served inthe U.S. Air Force from 1966 to 1970, including two years inVietnam. He and his wife Margie have one daughter, Tyler.The Rotens are members of Bald Mountain Baptist Church,and they reside in West Jefferson.

Welcome Summer Residents!Check Your Local Dial-Up Internet

Connection NumberThis month, we welcome the return of summer

residents across our service area. SkyLine would like to offer a reminder to part-time residents who subscribe toother national Internet providers for their dial-up Internetservice.

Make sure the number you use to connect to the Internet is a local number; otherwise, you will be charged a long-distance rate. If there is not a local access number offered in your area, call us locally at 118 and find out howyou can get local access to the Internet and avoid long-distance charges. Call us today and find out more aboutSkyBest’s Internet services.

Need a Phone Book for Your Residence?In case you received your 2010-11 SkyLine telephone

directory at your winter address, we can provide you with adirectory for your residence here. Simply drop by one of our

Customer Service Center locations and pickup an extra directory or call us at 118, andwe’ll send you one.

Alleghany: 199 Grayson Street, SpartaAshe: 1079 Highway 194 North, West JeffersonAvery/Watauga: 157 Seven Devils Road(near Foscoe)

Directory Listing CorrectionRiverside Restaurant at Brownwood7181 Railroad Grade Road, Todd336-877-4847