Work on Maine rail making progress BANGOR ( AP) — A $ 10.5 million project to repair 233 miles of state-owned railroad line in northern Maine is progressing but there is still plenty of work to be done. Nate Moulton, director of the Maine Department of Transportation’s rail program, says about half of the 7,500 […]

Italy seeking women with breast implants ROME (AP) — Italy’s health ministry is asking hospitals to track down women who received silicone breast implants made by a suspect French company due to concerns the implants may be unsafe. The ministry’s health council also suggested that women with Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP, implants contact their […]

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — When Czech playwright Vaclav Havel was thrown in prison for his anti-communist writings, life for people across the East Bloc was shaped by the soul-crushing repression of rigged elections, tapped phones and isolation behind the Iron Curtain. Today all that has changed for 10 excommunist states who threw off Moscow’s rule […]

Man tried driving hurt deer to hospital GREECE, N. Y. ( AP) — Police say a drunken New York man struck a deer with his vehicle, then tried driving the injured animal to a nearby hospital — for humans. Police say 29- year- old Andrew Caswell hit the deer early Monday in the suburban Rochester […]

MIAMI (AP) — Authorities conducting a six-week counterfeit sweep in three countries seized 327,000 phony items, including fake Hello Kitty clothing and cheap imitation Casio G-Shock sport watches that if legitimate carry suggested retail prices of more than $76 million, federal investigators said Thursday. “Counterfeiting remains a significant problem that demands strong enforcement efforts both […]

Santa already is piling up big numbers on social networking sites this season, so the volunteer Santa trackers at NORAD are bracing for tens of thousands of calls and emails when their operations center goes live on Christmas Eve. “We expect our numbers to be very high this year,” said Joyce Creech, project leader for […]

NEW YORK ( AP) — An artist known for turning automotive scrap metal into sculpture has died in New York City. John Chamberlain was 84. The Gagosian Gallery represented Chamberlain and says he died Wednesday in Manhattan. Chamberlain’s career spanned decades. He started working with junked car metal in the late 1950s, gaining admirers and […]

Bettye Danoff, one of the LPGA Tour’s 13 founding members, has died. She was 88. The LPGA Tour said Danoff ’s family confirmed she died Thursday in Texas. At 5-foot-2 and barely 100 pounds, Danoff earned the nickname “Mighty Mite” and was the first grandmother to play the tour. Before the formation of the LPGA […]

LAS VEGAS (AP) — As a guitar-maker for the stars, Ed Roman found a platform for fierce opinions about his commercially manufactured competition, exhorting musicians to drop what he called “misdirected ignorant brand loyalty.” His own guitars found their way into the hands of everyone from Ted Nugent to British rockers Eric Burdon of The […]