Illustrative of a harvest estimated at 90 percent complete, the grain trucks of local farmers stood idle Monday mid-morning at the Cooperative Grain & Supply elevator in Hillsboro while a semi-truck wheels around in the background to load up wheat for transport to the next destination. Elevator managers around the county reported slightly above average yields overall.

Grain-elevator managers throughout Marion County agreed Monday that wheat harvest is 90 percent complete with relatively abundant yields.

“We’re down to the short rows now,” said Mike Thomas, manager of the Cooperative Grain & Supply elevator at Marion. “We’ll be down to nothing but stubble by the Fourth of July.”

“We have just a few producers left to finish,” said Lyman Adams, CG&S general manager at the Hillsboro headquarters. “It’s been wheat harvest weather—hot and dry—and they have been out there cutting long hours every chance they got. Most have a day, a day and a half left.”

Viktoria Bichet and her grandmother: an experience of a lifetime.

Less than two weeks ago, Hillsboroan Viktoria Bichet made her Carnegie Hall singing debut, courtesy of her grandmother, Carol Bichet, and the Newman University Trouba­dours.

The Troubadours, joined by the Bichets, performed original compositions by John Leavitt, including “Symphony of Songs.”

Leavitt, a nationally known composer and conductor and former professor at Newman and Friends universities, directed their June 13 Carnegie Hall performance.

With overcast skies portending the approach of rain, Dale Klassen prepares to turn the corner on a wheat field he and his crew were cutting Friday afternoon near Marion Reservoir north of Hillsboro. A second machine, driven by Lane Dick, is unloading its payload into a tractor-pulled grain wagon driven by Klassen’s son, Aaron. Farmers began test cutting at midweek with reports of average to above-average yields. Weather forecasters proved to be accurate, though, as rainfall on Saturday forced a timeout in the 2009 harvest through much of the state. With this week’s forecast calling for sunshine and near triple-digit temperatures, farmers should make huge strides on the fields.

Dressed in the finery of the early 1900s, Olivia Stafford, 11, and Abigail Calam, 12, shared facts about life in 1909 at “Sunday Afternoon at the Schaefflers.” Aleen Ratzlaff

For the past two weeks, the front door of the Wm. F. Schaeffler House in Hillsboro has been open to visitors for “Sunday Afternoon at the Schaefflers,” held to commemorate the historic house’s centennial year.

Ida Gerstenkorn Schaeffler’s work as a millener—a maker of women’s hats—was the focus of Sunday’s presentation.