■Girl Scouts from Troop 88 of Huntington launched balloons to which messages of peace and friendship were attached. The Scouts are keeping their fingers crossed that the balloons will travel far and that finders will write and tell the troop of their final landing. Some of the balloons were caught in tree branches.
■Vivian Reed, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Charles A. Reed of Butler Place, was presented a $25 savings bond award yesterday as the Daily Hampshire Gazette “Newsgirl of the Month.” An 11th grader at St. Michael’s School, Vivian says the thing she likes best about the job is getting outdoors meeting people every day.
■For a few seconds Saturday afternoon, a thunderstorm sweeping through the Valley brought a powerful wind that had “windows singing” on Mount Tom. Scientists there said they recorded the highest wind speed so far in a four-year project. About 2 p.m., a strong gust out of the west was recorded traveling at 96.1 mph.
■Anna Main, one of Northampton’s most beloved senior citizens and the grand dame of the Young at Heart Chorus, died yesterday, a few months shy of her 101st birthday. Just months before her 100th birthday last year, she took to the stage at the Academy of Music to accept a Second Century Award from the Northampton Arts Council.
■Ina A. Kapitan, 90, a woman whose kindness and good humor made her a Northampton institution over the three decades she waited tables at the Miss Florence Diner, died Thursday. Kapitan and her husband, Charles, moved to Northampton in 1953. They opened the College Diner in 1958 and ran it together until 1969. Both she and Charles then went on to work at Miss Flo’s.
■Civil rights activist Mary Pittman Wyatt was remembered with music and her legacy of relentlessly pursuing social justice during a memorial service Saturday at the Wesley United Methodist Church in Hadley. About 150 friends, family and admirers gathered in the church where Wyatt, who died in November, had been a soloist.