A Mexican fiesta will greet ticket holders at the Old Jail Art Center’s spring fundraiser Fiesta Cárcel! next Saturday, April 6, from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m., and there is still time for everyone to join the party in exchange for a contribution to the local art outreach program.  

“Tickets are still available,” said OJAC marketing director Susan Montgomery. “It will be a fun event, and everyone is welcome.”

Tickets are $50 for members of the OJAC or $65 for non-members, and include food and drinks. 

Albany made major headlines last week after a Big Country snake removal company posted a video on its Facebook page that went viral within a day.

Most of the news reports, which included both area and nationwide networks, started out with the phrase, “A Texas homeowner who reported seeing ‘a few’ snakes under his home actually had dozens of rattlesnakes living beneath his house.”

Many of the reporters also said that the house was “in Albany,” but according to Big Country Snake Removal’s post, the site is actually located between Albany and Baird.

The Chamber of Commerce has reduced the price of vendor sites for “Wild West Day” on Saturday, April 27 from $50 to $25.

“We felt that maybe $50 was a little too much for some vendors, so we decided to lower it to draw larger numbers,” treasurer Lisa Barton explained.

Chamber manager Mary Beth Jones added that Chamber directors want to make sure that vendors will be glad they came and will want to return again next year.

“This is the first annual Wild West Day,” Jones said.

The 2019 Shackelford County Youth and Livestock Association Buyer-Seller Banquet will be held at the Nancy Smith Elementary School Cafe-teria at 6:00 p.m. on Saturday, April 6, and a meeting of the SCYLA will take place the following Tuesday, April 9 at 6:00 p.m. in the Albany High School ag building.

“Exhibitors’ thank you notes should be turned in by this Friday!” said county agent Michaela Bradford.

Thursday, April 4 is the last day to register to vote or make a change of address effective for the May 4 local board elections. 

Voter registration applications can be found online at votetexas.gov, or filled out in person at the Tax Assessor-Collector office at the Shackelford County Courthouse.

Shackelford County voters who wish to vote by mail ballot for the Albany city council or the Albany ISD election can submit applications. However, the vote by mail applications for this election should not be sent to the courthouse.

Fandangle practices move outside next week, with the next scheduled rehearsal set for 7:30 p.m. on Monday, April 1, at the Bank Park.

The Membership Sampler is barely three weeks away, and starting next week, rehearsals will also take place on Thursdays, with a practice set for 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, April 4, at the Bank Park.

Veterans and those who have never been in the Fandangle before can still come and join the cast.

If you were watching Fox News this past week, you may have seen that our little town of Albany, Texas landed a place on their broadcast. 

The story was about a homeowner near Albany having trouble with his cable system. He crawled under his house looking for the problem. What he found was definitely not a cable problem but a rattlesnake problem.

The rattlesnake experts came and cleared out 45 snakes. 

I guess that could be called a real RATTLESNAKE ROUNDUP.

Jillian Guinn and Joshua Dyer were crowned queen and king during the Albany High School Junior-Senior Prom held March 23 at the Whitney Theatre.

The king and queen are selected by the members of the junior and senior classes. 

This year the winners were chosen by a direct vote instead of from a slate of nominees as has been done in the past.

Several members of the Albany chapter of the Future Farmers of America went to the Cisco College Invitational CDEs contest on Tuesday, March 19, and competed in FBM, Horse, Range Plant ID, Vet Science, and Wildlife contests, placing in several contests and winning district in both Plant ID and Wildlife.

The local FFA chapter also sent a Livestock team and a Horse team to the Tarleton Invitational CDEs on Thursday, March 21.

Practice meets help students prepare for upcoming district, area, regional, and state competitions.

The Albany High School band will compete in the UIL Region 6, East Zone band concert and sightreading contest in Abilene next week.

The contest takes place at Cooper High School over two days, and Albany is scheduled to play on the second day, Wednesday, April 3.

“We have 26 band members in grades eight through 12, and we are coming along pretty well,” said Albany band instructor John Stockdale. “We have a good program; we just need to polish it. I am hoping that we can get in three or four more practices with everybody there.”