Vancouver’s Dan Dickau had a pretty good month as a Mad Ant.
More recently, Dickau has been using his basketball skills in a new way, but in a more familiar setting, by offering his insights during the Portland Trail Blazers’ final telecast of the year.
Dickau did some commentary when KGW-TV aired the Trail Blazers’ 99-90 loss to the Phoenix Suns. The Suns knocked Portland out of the playoffs.
The former Prairie High School star and Gonzaga University All-American had a couple of stints with the Trail Blazers earlier in his pro career.
Dickau’s most recent basketball action came this spring with the Mad Ants — a minor-league name that ranks up there with the Toledo Mudhens’ baseball team.
Dickau averaged 14.9 points and 7.1 assists in 13 games. The team, part of the NBA’s Development League, is based in Fort Wayne, Ind.
The city of Fort Wayne and the Mad Ants both draw their names from Revolutionary War general “Mad Anthony” Wayne.
Grant’s influence still felt
When a recent Columbian story explored historical connections between people who passed through Vancouver during the last 160 years, Ulysses S. Grant was the biggest name in the bunch.
While his roles as Civil War general and 18th president of the United States are well documented, Grant was part of something that still influences our lives every day.
In 1870, President Grant signed a joint resolution of Congress that created a national weather service.
That’s not what it was called back then, though. The agency made its debut as the Division of Telegrams and Reports for the Benefit of Commerce.
According to the history page on the National Weather Service’s website, it originally was made part of the Department of War “because military discipline would probably secure the greatest promptness, regularity and accuracy in the required observations.”
There’s another local historical link; the weather service has an official monitoring station at Vancouver’s Pearson Field — where Grant once planted potatoes.
Off Beat lets members of The Columbian news team step back from our newspaper beats to write the story behind the story, fill in the story or just tell a story.
