Bonham's first annual Jazz Festival is scheduled for Friday, June 14 from 6 to 10 PM and will be held at the Creative Arts Center in Bonham. This tribute to the music of Charlie Christian will feature some of the same musicians who played during last year's concert and new artists as well. Linda and Larry Petty will also perform and food and drink are included in the ticket price.

The Wari civilization formed in the wake of a late-sixth-century drought that ravaged the central Andean region of what is today Peru and parts of adjacent countries. It was a new cultural experiment that, over the next four centuries, produced a society of such unprecedented complexity that many today regard it as South America’s first empire. As predecessors of the Inca Empire, which fell to Spanish forces after 1532, the Wari had no previous examples of expansionist states to draw upon and thus represent a major development in Andean civilization. Figurine of a Standing Dignitary, Wari culture, Peru, 600-1000, Wood, shell, stone, and silver, 4 x 2 ½ x 1 in. (10.2 x 6.4 x 2.5 cm). Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth photo by Robert LaPrelle

Ralph French, Chairman of the McKinney Armed Services Memorial Board, has announced that a new tradition will begin at the Collin County Veterans Memorial Park in McKinney, with the first annual Memorial Day Wreath Ceremony. The event will take place Saturday, May 25, at 10:00 a.m., when Gold Star Mothers Gina Trovillian and Jackie Hlastan will dedicate two wreaths in honor of the 350 names inscribed on the Wall of Honor, the Collin County heroes who have given their lives in the service of our country.

Visitors will come face to face with the majestic colors and brilliant patterns of more than 40 species of butterflies and moths at Frisco’s first outdoor butterfly exhibit at the Frisco Discovery Center near downtown Frisco. This popular outdoor attraction will open June 7 through June 17, 2013.

The Powder Creek Community Playground Committee has been planning and fundraising to see the dream of local children become a reality since 2008. Local children from Finley-Oates Elementary, IW Evans Intermediate, and Forerunner Christian Academy assisted in providing inspiration for the design of the playground.

2011 – An EF5 Tornado strikes Joplin, Missouri killing 161 people, the single deadliest tornado in the United States since modern record keeping began in 1950. On May 22, 2011, an EF-5 tornado first touched down near the western edge of the city among large, newer homes, at about 5:34 pm CDT (22:34 UTC) and tracked eastward across the city and across Interstate 44 into rural portions of Newton and Lawrence counties. Its track was reported to have been about 0.75 miles in width and 22.1 miles long. About 8,400 houses, 18,000 cars, and 450 businesses were flattened or blown away in Joplin, particularly in the section between 13th and 32nd Streets across the southern part of the city. The tornado narrowly missed the downtown area. St. John's Regional Medical Center was completely destroyed and demolished in 2012. The local high school, Joplin High School was totally destroyed as well. A total of 189 people died from tornado-related injuries as of the end of July 2011. The Weather Channel video showed entire neighborhoods flattened. Communications were lost and power was knocked out to many areas. An official statement from the National Weather Service has categorized the Joplin tornado as an EF5. On Sunday, May 29, 2011, President Barack Obama, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon, and Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Craig Fugate visited and toured Joplin to see what the damage looked like and attended a memorial service for the deceased. Later that day, the city held a moment of silence at 5:41 p.m., to mark the time the tornado struck. The area was declared a federal disaster area.