Latest news with #Ellenburg
Yahoo
02-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
First Responder Friday: Wyatt the Weightlifter
PICKENS, SC (WSPA) – Wyatt the Weightlifter, the Pickens County Sheriff's Office therapy dog, has become quite a celebrity. 'I make jokes all the time that even as a captain, Wyatt has more appointments on my calendar than I do for myself,' Captain Shannon Ellenburg, who handles the dog, said. Wyatt is a two-year-old golden doodle. Ellenburg said the dog was donated to the sheriff's office by Double U Doodles. We're told this breed of dog doesn't shed and is hypoallergenic. That makes Wyatt perfect to serve as a therapy dog. 'I can't take a lot of credit for how well behaved he is,' according to Ellenburg. 'Because I really ended up with a dog that already had a really great personality.' Ellenburg said she gave Wyatt his nickname from her time working out. 'I would carry him out to the gym to desensitize him to loud noises. And for whatever reason, one day, while I was throwing weights around and desensitizing him, I thought, He's the weight lifter.' He lifts the emotional weights off of people.' Wyatt's services have been needed over the past several months. He was a regular visitor to Pickens County Emergency Management during the recovery from Hurricane Helene last September and October. More recently, Ellenburg brought the therapy dog to meet crews that faced the Table Rock Complex wildfire for two weeks. 'We were there all but one day for basically 14-to-16-hour days,' Ellenburg told 7NEWS. 'He would just run around the command post and let the firefighters and all the different personnel that were there shower love on him.' Pickens County Sheriff Tommy Blankenship saw the same thing. 'They (firefighters) would come in, and even if their hands were full of their gear, they would drop it. They would sit down on the ground and pet Wyatt. You could just see the weight and the stress of what they were dealing with were lifted for that, for that moment.' Wyatt is always greeted with open arms at the sheriff's office. In fact, the dog is a hit across Pickens County. 'He has treats everywhere, not just in this building, but in the courthouse, the county administration building, the tax office, just about everywhere we go,' according to Ellenburg. That includes inside Sheriff Blankenship's office. 'He is that calming presence. And the idea is that it's a service, right?' asks Blankenship. 'The sheriff's office exists to share and to serve the citizens.' 'It's not just about us making arrests.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
21-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
At St. Petersburg's historic Tramor building, plans for indoor golf club stall
ST. PETERSBURG — After Hurricane Milton sent a construction crane crashing through the Tramor's neighboring building at 490 First Ave. S., the historic building that once served lunches to soldiers in World War II also has a questionable future. The nearly 100-year-old building that was last known as the German beer hall Hofbrauhaus was pegged as a future social club, with big screens, computerized simulations of famous golf courses and high-end dining. GolfSuites CEO Jerry Ellenburg fell in love with the Art Deco interior and Mediterranean architecture of the building and had plans to break the mold of his rapidly growing series of indoor golf simulator clubs. He planned to spend twice as much as he usually does to make it a high-end restaurant and club in downtown St. Petersburg. But even before the hurricanes, which inflicted a small amount of roof damage, Ellenburg said, the cost of capital was rising rapidly and threatening the project he originally planned to open this summer. 'We have been terribly delayed by capital,' Ellenburg said. 'It has grown so heavy, it's like I've been in a purgatory.' His original plans called for spending about $5 million, but now it's looking more like $9 million. Ellenburg said he is weighing his options and will have a decision in May about moving forward. Built in 1929, the building is a prime example of the Mediterranean Revival style of architecture that was all the rage in the roaring '20s during St. Petersburg's first boom period. It sits at the intersection of First Avenue S. and Fourth Street, with a barrel tile roof and towering corners. It has an intricately tiled lobby with thick cypress beams overhead that opens into an expansive interior designed to create the illusion of a Spanish hacienda. The project snagged Kevin Harrington, an original Shark on the ABC show 'Shark Tank.' The inventor of the infomercial joined GolfSuites City Club, a Brandon-based company, as board director and is 'brand ambassador' for the brand nationwide as it expands. The St. Pete spot was set to be GolfSuites' newest concept, called the City Club. The company, which already operates outdoor driving range entertainment facilities in Oklahoma, Texas and Louisiana, likened the newest concept to a country club.
