The Red Raiders of Portland traveled to Charlotte this past Friday. Games like this are what I call a trap game. A trap game is one played the week before your biggest game of the year. I call it a trap game because if you overlook your opponent while thinking too much about the future, you may get trapped in a loss. That wasn’t the case for the Red Raiders, as they brought the heat to Charlotte. Carson Simon got the scoring started for the Raiders, taking one into the end zo

Diane E. Russell, age 86, of Lansing formerly of Portland, passed away on Friday, October 16, 2026. She was born on November 8, 1939 the daughter of Walter and Phyllis (Koelzer) Holly. Diane was a graduate of St. Patrick High School Class of 1958 and attended church for there for many years. She enjoyed crocheting and even made hundreds of blankets for parish functions, her family and for those in need. She was preceded in death by her parents; daughter, Marie Russell; grea

Libby has added a password to their login process, and because sometimes things are twisty and weird, this will also change the way that you log into our PDL catalog (to place holds, renew, etc). Your new password for both of these applications will be the four-digit year of your birth. For example, Libby will be your library card number and YYYY, while our catalog will be first initial and last name and then YYYY. PLEASE NOTE: We have not always asked for DOB on our libr

The City of Portland is conducting free of charge leaf cleanup now until December 1. Throughout the leaf season, the Department of Public Works is out daily picking up leaves, but not daily in every area of the city. City officials ask that residents place leaves in long narrow rows next to the curb of the street. They ask that there be no limbs, branches, or other debris mixed into the leaves. Another option for residents who do not wish to place loose leaves by the ro

Gerald Neil Wells, age 83, of Portland, passed away on Tuesday, October 13, 2026. He was born on August 2, 1943 in Portland, the son of Paul and Rhea (Dutcher) Wells. Jerry is retired from General Motors after many years of service, and was a veteran of the U.S. Army. He enjoyed farming and collecting tractors and farm equipment. He was preceded in death by his seven siblings. Surviving are his children, Jennifer (Mike) Alspaugh and David Wells; grandchildren, Emily and And

More than 1,880 students from Saginaw Valley State University earned a spot on the winter 2026 semester Deans' List. To be eligible for the Deans' List, a student must take at least 12 credit hours and carry a semester GPA of 3.4 or better. Among those honored from Portland were: Lydia Meredith Bryce Wendling Leah Nelson Kyle Edlund Ellayna Meredith Saginaw Valley State University is a comprehensive university with more than 90 programs of study for 7,000 students. Located

On October 1st, we publish a piece including reader submitted questions and answers from five candidates running for open seats on the Portland Public schools Board of Education. You can find that piece HERE. Since then, Joe Polasek has announced that he will be running as a write-in candidate for the election. To allow readers to learn a bit about Polasek, we posed the same set of 16 questions to him as we did to the other five candidates. Below you can see the questi

“Louie Spitzley owned the bowling alley and his daughter, Marie, ran it for her dad. There were three alleys when I was a young girl. You sat in the chairs on this little rise built in the floor and could look out over Kent Street. That was a wonderful era.” (Gina Larson) Tuesday night, October 27th at 6:30 the Portland Area Historical Society will be hosting Gene Spitzley who is the son of Louie Spitzley. He will be talking about the Barton Building and his father Louie

On Saturday, October 10th, the Portland St. Patrick Shamrocks travelled to Middleton to take on the 4-2 Fulton Pirates. Despite some early challenges, the Shamrocks handily defeated the Pirates 48-21. In the First quarter the Shamrocks shut out the Pirates and in businesslike fashion, scored twice. Sam Mustapha punched it in on two 13 yard runs and Tyler Thelen made both extra points to make the score 14-0 after one quarter. In the second quarter, Sam Mustapha again bro

Friday night was a party at Portland High School as the Raiders played for the CAAC White title while celebrating Homecoming. The Portland community showed up and showed out to support its Raiders football team. Before the game, there was what I would call a small parade recognizing Raiders athletes and their accomplishments. It was a great way to kick off the Homecoming football game. From the very beginning, Portland looked like the stronger squad. The Raiders were able