Home Care In Holmes, PA

The five-week-old is Blackpool Zoo’s first Bornean orangutan baby for more than 20 years.

A “very special” baby orangutan, whose birth could kickstart a new generation of the critically endangered species, has been shown off by his proud mother.

The five-week-old, yet to be named, is Blackpool Zoo’s first Bornean orangutan baby for more than 20 years and has boosted conservation efforts.

On Saturday his mother, Jingga, 13, thrilled visitors to the Lancashire tourist attraction by holding him towards the viewing windows with her arms outstretched and head bowed.

The baby, who will stay with his mother until he is about seven years old so he can develop the skills needed to be independent, smiled through the glass as visitors murmured excitedly and filmed on their mobile phones.

He was born as part of the European Endangered Species Programme (EEP) and described as “very special” by keepers when they announced his birth in June.

Zoo boss Darren Webster said: “The arrival of this very special baby is wonderful news, not just for us here at Blackpool Zoo, but for the species too.”

He added: “The Bornean orangutan was classified as critically endangered in July 2016 by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

“This means that this species now faces an extremely high risk of extinction in the wild.

“This makes breeding programmes such as the EEP absolutely vital, and we are hoping that this is the start of a new generation of beautiful Bornean orangutans here at Blackpool Zoo.”

Jingga arrived at the zoo from her birthplace, Barcelona, in 2017.

The baby’s father, Kawan, also 13, arrived from a Dutch zoo in 2022 and was picked to form a breeding group after talks with EEP experts and specialist keepers.

Blackpool Zoo has been at the centre of several big conservation projects recently.

In May it welcomed three new lionesses to keep its sole lion Khari company in a new £1.5 million big cat habitat, where a male tiger also joined tigress Alyona earlier this month.

In 2019 it introduced male Asian elephant Emmett to its parade of females in the hope of generating a “multi-generational herd”.

YORK, Pa. — Joshua Holmes never let his physical condition interfere with anything he put his mind to, including achieving a black belt in martial arts.

“I stuck to it and didn’t quit. I never gave up. So, it’s a reminder to me [of] the way I need to continue to live," said Holmes, who was diagnosed with cerebral palsy and epilepsy at a young age.

The 43-year-old athlete is continuously breaking down the barriers inside the walls of Soaring Eagle Taekwondo. “Every time I had a chance to prolong my [degenerative] condition, I took advantage of that," recalled Holmes.

Holmes has been training in Taekwondo for seven years. Originally participating for three years, he took a short break before returning to finish four straight years, which included advancing from his orange belt to his first-degree black belt.

“Master Winter has been a great friend and inspiration to me. [He] believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself. I think that’s important to have in a teacher, and he’s embodied that," expressed Holmes.

“When I first sparred [with] him, I felt one of the most powerful jump roundhouse kicks I’ve felt in a long time. So, he had me there," said Soaring Eagle's Master Taekwondo Instructor Michael Winter. "I just saw a young man that obviously had been dealt a bad hand of cards. [But,] he controlled where he went with it,"

In July, Holmes traveled to Orlando for Nationals, where he tested and received his first-degree black belt certification.

The movements are harder for him to do. Cerebral palsy causes the athlete to lack strength and movement on his right side; he also can only see out of one eye after having surgery to remove part of his brain to help with seizures.

“He gets frustrated, but nothing holds him back. I think a lot of people, that have his condition, have only one thing that’s keeping them from attaining what Josh has attained, [and it's] that spirit," said Winter.

Holmes recalled sticking to the same repetitions has helped retain his movement, “I do rehab here three times a week."

Just because he reached his first-degree black belt doesn't mean he's done. Holmes' current goals include working towards becoming a second-degree black belt, becoming an instructor and achieving his long-term dream of becoming a fourth-degree taekwondo associate master.

If you think earning his black belt is quite an accomplishment, Holmes has three different academic degrees, which include a Master's in Education from Penn State University. He's also an artist and the publishing author of 16 books.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's fictional character, Sherlock Holmes, first appeared in A Study in Scarlet in 1887. Four novels and 56 short st ...

Patch Staff

Press release from the Bucks County Free Library:

January 6, 2024

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s fictional character, Sherlock Holmes, first appeared in A Study in Scarlet in 1887. Four novels and 56 short stories later, the popularity of Sherlock Holmes continues into the 21st century and has inspired several movies and TV shows. In honor of his “birthday” on January 6, we are highlighting some of the novels written based on Holmes and/or characters from his stories.

More series that might interest you:

Sherlock’s brother, Mycroft, is featured in the Mycroft Holmes Novels by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anna Waterhouse. The first book, Mycroft Holmes.

Find out what's happening in Doylestownwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

The little sister of Sherlock and Mycroft is the main character in the very popular teen series, Enola Holmes Mysteries. The most recent book in this series, Enola Holmes and the Mark of the Mongoose.

Sherlock Holmes retires and takes on a new partner in the Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series by Laurie R. King. The most recent edition to this series is Castle Shade and can be found here:

(If you enjoy this series, keep an eye out for The Lantern’s Dance, book #18 in this series which will be coming out in late February 2024).

In this twist of Conan Doyle’s tales, Charlotte Holmes is solving crimes under the name Sherlock Holmes, with the help of Mrs. Watson. A Study in Scarlet Women is the first in the series by Sherry Thomas.

For digital copies of these titles and more, be sure to check out shelf in cloudLibrary!

This press release was produced by the Bucks County Free Library. The views expressed here are the author’s own.

The Colorado Department of Corrections on Wednesday said James Holmes, sentenced to life in prison for murdering 12 people and wounding dozens of others, has been transferred to federal prison.

“The State sought to place the inmate in the Federal System several months ago, but placement required finding space at a facility that could provide appropriate security,” the department said in a news release. “That space recently became available and the move to the Federal prison was secured.”

Late Wednesday, the federal Bureau of Prisons had not announced where Holmes was transferred. Early Thursday morning, Holmes’ location was updated to USP Allenwood, a high-security federal prison in Pennsylvania, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons inmate tracker.

Holmes, who is serving 12 consecutive life sentences plus more than 3,000 years extra, was transferred out of state in January 2016, a few months after he was attacked at a maximum-security prison in Colorado in an incident that also injured a guard.

Holmes was sentenced in August 2015 for the Aurora theater shooting.

Holmes was housed at the Colorado State Penitentiary, where he was assaulted on Oct. 8, 2015. After moving Holmes out of state, Colorado prison officials refused to disclose where he was being held, causing public controversy and deep concern for survivors and their families.

In June 2016, after two hours of debate, the Department of Public Safety’s Victims Rights Act Subcommittee split 3-3 over whether the Colorado corrections was breaking the law by refusing to tell theater shooting victims of Holmes’ location. The deadlock kept the secretive location at status quo.

At that point, state prison officials would say only that Holmes had been moved to an out-of-state prison to protect his and correctional officers’ safety.

Theresa Hoover, mother of Alexander “AJ” Boik, an 18-year-old murdered by Holmes, at the subcommittee meeting referred to the non-disclosure as “unconscionable.”

“I don’t think it’s right,” she said at the time. “I don’t think it’s fair for the victims not to know.”

Arapahoe County District Attorney George Brauchler, the lead prosecutor in the Aurora theater shooting case, said Wednesday night that he hopes Holmes will be back in Colorado.

“My great hope is he’ll be moved to Colorado in federal custody,” Brauchler said. “He can serve out the remainder of his life under Colorado skies, where he committed his crimes.”

Brauchler doesn’t want to see Holmes serve his sentence in California, where the inmate’s family lives.

“I’m pleased that after all these many, many months of obfuscation by the state government here that these family victims are finally going to get the peace of mind, knowing that the guy who murdered their loved ones, they’ll know where he is,” Brauchler said.

Brauchler said he’d like to now know where Holmes has been since he dropped off the radar screen.

“There is no longer any reason for the Department of Corrections to not disclose where he was,” Brauchler said. “I’d like to know what the conditions were.”

EASTON, Pa. — Throughout his boxing career, Larry Holmes was something of an afterthought. He was the heavyweight champion whose reign came after the fall of Muhammad Ali, the toughest of all acts to follow. He was the fighter who almost broke Rocky Marciano’s record for consecutive wins. He possessed one of the greatest jabs in boxing history, but it was still only a jab. It is the knockout punches — the hooks and uppercuts — that sell tickets and inspire fearsome nicknames.

But in Easton, Pa., Holmes has always been the greatest.

Holmes is 66, in pretty good shape for a fighter. He has been married 36 years (“To the same woman!” he brags), and he has lived almost his entire life in this city of about 30,000 where the Delaware and Lehigh rivers meet.

He owns a sports bar and a couple of office buildings in town, one of which includes a federal courtroom and a small jail.

“I got my own jail, and I ain’t in it!” he said, as if the joke summarized his life’s accomplishments.

Last Sunday, Easton dedicated a bronze statue of Holmes and sponsored a parade through the city’s streets in his honor. Men and women waved handmade signs. The mayor wore a red-and-white satin “Larry Holmes” jacket that he said he has owned since 1978. Another Holmes fan wore an old Larry Holmes belt buckle and a button that read, “You’re Our Super Star Larry Holmes.”

Holmes’s wife, Diane, a petite woman with a big voice, herded relatives and guests out of the Champ’s Corner restaurant and out onto the street. Assembled behind the Easton Area High School marching band were the promoter Don King; Muhammad Ali’s former manager Gene Kilroy; the boxers Gerry Cooney, Bobby Czyz and Earnie Shavers; as well as a gaggle of local politicians.

Diane had to pull Holmes back in line as he wandered off the parade route to say hello to friends. By the time everyone reached the riverfront park where the statue would be unveiled, about 2,000 Eastonians waited to hear from Holmes.

First, they had to listen to a lot of other speeches, but Eastonians know that crazy and sometimes wonderful things happen when Holmes speaks, so they were patient.

When it was Holmes’s turn, he stood up from his folding chair, removed the microphone from its stand and began strolling around the stage.

“This is great!” he said. “I never thought anything like this would happen. A Larry Holmes statue on Larry Holmes Drive!”

He laughed, almost girlishly. “How many people you know have a statue? How many people you know have a street named after them? Shout it out!”

No one shouted it out, but there was a good deal of laughter.

He thanked the mayor, Sal Panto Jr., who grew up with Holmes in the Delaware Terrace public housing project.

“You became our mayor, and I became rich,” Holmes said.

Then he thanked the people of Easton. When he started boxing professionally, Holmes said, he knew that everyone in Easton thought he would never be a champion. When he became champion, he knew that everyone in Easton thought he would never last. When he got rich, he knew that everyone in Easton thought he would blow his money in a week. All along the way, he worked hard to prove the doubters wrong.

“I tried to do the right thing,” he said. “I tried to be a good man.”

Holmes said he could have moved to New York or Las Vegas, but he was worried that those cities would chew him up. Easton was safer.

“I wanted to stay here, where I could be normal,” he said.

Holmes went on for about 20 minutes, telling jokes and spreading the thanks. But the statue had not yet been unveiled, and the television crews were getting anxious. Finally, someone on the stage, possibly Diane, yelled at Holmes to start wrapping it up.

Holmes did not take the hint. He had more jokes. He wanted to show the crowd his newest grandson.

“It’s getting dark!” someone — possibly Diane — shouted.

Finally, he got the message.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Holmes said. “We’re about to unveil the statue, but I don’t want to stop.

“You could’ve been anywhere in the world. You didn’t have to be here. But you came here to be with me, and I appreciate it. I ain’t ever gonna forget, and I ain’t ever gonna leave. If you ever see my house for sale, it’s because we’re downsizing. I ain’t leaving.”