Farmers throughout Marlboro County are busy gathering their crops.  Above, John Rhett Covington pilots a cotton picker through a field off Highway 381 on Tuesday, while a tractor begins the harvesting process in a nearby peanut field.
 

COVID just won't leave us alone, not even for seven weeks so the high school football season can go on.
Friday morning, the Lake City High School athletic director Matt Apicella called Marlboro County head coach Bobby Collins to give him bad news.
A Panther player had tested positive for the virus and the whole team had to go into quarantine.  Thus, the Bulldogs' homecoming game had to be postponed.
"They called at about 8 a.m. Friday morning, so it was too late to try to arrange a quick replacement game.  We'll just put our gameplan in the drawer and pull it back out next week," said Collins.
The Bulldogs and Panthers are hardly the only teams to have to rearrange to the pandemic.  Only Crestwood among Region 6-AAA teams has played their season as planned.  Cheraw had only played one game prior to Monday night when they defeated Chesterfield 55-24.  

If you are considering restoring or improving a building in Bennettsville and would like to save on your taxes at the same time, a program next week is for you.
Main Street Bennettsville, Marlboro County Historic Preservation Commission, City of Bennettsville Planning and Zoning Department, and Marlboro Chamber of Commerce will be co-hosting a historic preservation tax credits and incentives question and answer session. The event is free to the public and will be held at The Skye on Monday, October 26 at 5:30 p.m.
This information session is being offered to encourage local historic preservation and economic development. Dan Elswick, Senior Historic Architectural Consultant with the SC Department of Archives and History; Jenny Boulware, Main Street South Carolina manager; and Bennettsville native Chris Rogers, an attorney with Rogers, Lewis, Jackson, Mann & Quinn, LLC in Columbia who specializes in the use of historic tax credits, will all present valuable data and guidance.

Halloween will look different this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Various events will be held in the county and surrounding areas.
Northeastern Technical College will have a Halloween Drive-Thru from 5-9 p.m. on Thursday, October 29 at its various campuses. They are NETC Marlboro Campus, 1120 Oakwood Street in Bennettsville; NETC Cheraw Campus, 1201 Chesterfield Highway in Cheraw (the drive-thru will be in the parking lot located off Tech Road); NETC Pageland Campus, 815 South Pearl Street in Pageland; and NETC Dillon Campus, 2204 Highway 301 South in Dillon.

McCOLL  —  The Marlboro County Sheriff’s Office has arrested a McColl man in connection with a double shooting on Sunday (Oct. 18) in McColl.
According to Lt. Trevor Murphy, deputies were dispatched to the Circle B gas station in McColl after two males were just shot at a nearby residence.
Both victims advised that an argument with the defendant led to him presenting a firearm and shooting both.
One victim was airlifted to an area hospital and the other was rushed to an area hospital for emergency surgery.
Murphy said both victims are in stable yet critical condition at this time.