Friends of Mary Davis will hold a benefit for the 47-year-old wife and mother to help her as she fights another bout against breast cancer.

The benefit will be from 5-9 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 18, at Blackhawk College, 6600 34^th Ave., Building 3, Moline.

All proceeds will help offset the bills being incurred since Davis' relapse of cancer. The Erie woman had been cancer-free since June 2004, when the disease returned April 2012. She is married to Bob Davis and mother of Emma 8yrs old. She has coached 21 years at Blackhawk College for women's volleyball. She also has worked 21 yrs in Nov as a hairdresser and owner of The Hair Center in Erie Ill.

Cost of the benefit is $5 per person and includes a walking taco dinner, dessert and a chance to win a 40"flat screen TV. The event also will include live entertainment, raffles, a 50/50 raffle, silent auction/basket raffle and bake sale.

Tickets can be purchased at the door. They also are available in advance at these locations: The Hair Doctors, 2942 Harrison St., Davenport; The Hair Center, 908 Albany St., Erie, Ill.; or Blackhawk College Athletic Department, Bldg 3, Moline.

Donations also may be made to Mary Davis Benefit Fund, First Trust, Erie.

For more information, call Kathie Heaps at 563-322-1844.

Thank you for packing downtown with record crowds last weekend!  Bix events continue this week with the 41st Annual Bix Beiderbecke Memorial Jazz Festival at the RiverCenter/Adler Theatre and LeClaire Park!  Bands include : Wally's Warehouse Waifs, Allred's Classic Jazz Band, Dave Bennett Quartet, Jim Cullum's Jazz Band, Andy Schumm and The Flatland Gang, and many more.

The Quad City River Bandits are home this week at Modern Woodmen Park.   Tonight is another Thirst-Day Thursday, and tomorrow will feature fireworks as the Bandits wrap up a set against the Chiefs.  The defending Midwest League champs return home on Wednesday for the first of two replica Cardinals Championship ring giveaways!

A big congratulations is in order to Hotel Blackhawk for achieving AAA's Four Diamond Award!  Hotel Blackhawk is one of only three hotels in the state of Iowa to earn this esteemed designation and only a select group earns this honor nationwide.  Restoration St. Louis is hard at work renovating the Renwick Building, too.

Art Talk at the Figge Art Museum tonight features a lecture about The Challenges of Reaching Space.  Check out Wine & Art tonight as well during Thursdays at the Figge.  Youngsters are sure to enjoy Fridays at the Figge and make sure to sneak a peek at the museum tour and film series over the weekend.

Banshee takes the Redstone Room stage tonight at 8:00 p.m. at RME!  The Kansas City based metal band is touring again with their original bass player after the release of their fourth album.  RME's live lunch series this week includes Lars Rehnberg, Jake Donelson, and Brent Feuerbach.  Check out Open Mic Night and RME Guitar Circle, too.

Friday Live at 5 returns to the RME Courtyard this week!  Come wind down after a busy week downtown while listening to the L.T. Eckles Blues Band, a Des Moines and Newton based band with a rooted sense of blues, jazz, and funk.  Other RME shows this week include : MASQC, Rootless Experience, River Prairie Minstrels, Quad City Phoenix Festival, Firesale, and Blues Cafe.

Brian "Fox" Ellis will make another appearance at the German American Heritage Center as Wilhelm Grimm.  Ellis will perform selections from Grimm's Fairy Tales on Sunday afternoon.

See you downtown!

Art Talk Highlights the CHallenges of Reaching Space

Davenport, IOWA (July 2012) The Figge Art Museum presents the art talk "Physics 101: The Challenges of Reaching Space" at 7 pm Thursday, August 2.  Brett McCarty will lead the talk and focus on the obstacles that NASA has had to overcome in their quest to explore outer space. The talk is offered in conjunction with the special exhibition NASA | ART: 50 Years of Exploration and is free with Figge membership or paid admission.

Mr. McCarty's talk will look at some of the scientific and economic challenges that have faced the NASA program, including the high cost of sending material to space, the challenges of gravity, the biological effects of zero-gravity, sustaining life in orbit and the hazards of radiation and space debris. The talk will also focus the technologies and studies that assisted in NASA's missions to space.

Participants can also expect to have Mr. McCarty dispel some common misconceptions during the talk. "Despite the popular belief, the gravity in space is not actually 'zero gravity.' Instead, it is more accurately described as micro-gravity and orbiting the earth is actually like skydiving only you never hit the earth," explained Mr. McCarty

Brett McCarty is an adjunct physics instructor, specializing in condensed matter physics, at St. Ambrose University. He received his master's in science from Iowa State University.

About NASA | ART: 50 Years of Exploration 

In celebration of its 50th anniversary in 2008, NASA collaborated with the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service and the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum on the exhibition NASA | ART: 50 Years of Exploration. Drawn from the collections of NASA and the National Air and Space Museum, the exhibition features 72 works of art commissioned by the NASA Art Program. Established soon after the inception of the U.S. space program in 1958, NASA's Art Program provides a unique way to communicate the accomplishments, setbacks, and sheer excitement of space exploration to the public. The selected works span the entire history of NASA and include paintings, drawings, photographs, sculptures, and other media by such artists as Annie Leibovitz, Nam June Paik, Robert Rauschenberg, Norman Rockwell, Andy Warhol, William Wegman and Jamie Wyeth.

NASA | ART at the Figge Art Museum is generously sponsored by the ALCOA Foundation, John Deere, Genesis Health Systems and Cobham, plc.

NASA | ART was organized by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in cooperation with the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. The Smithsonian Community Grant program, funded by MetLife Foundation, is a proud sponsor of "NASA | ART" public programs.

Davenport, IA / July 16, 2012 - Local residents will have a chance to tour Living Lands & Waters' new Teamwork Barge Thursday, August 9^th from 5:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m at the Lake Davenport Sailing Club at Oneida Avenue and River Drive.  The 150-foot long barge features a handicapped-accessible classroom, which can host up to 60 students at a time, as well as sleeping quarters for an 8 person Living Lands & Waters crew.  The LL&W crew will be providing tours of the new classroom during the annual Barge Party, a celebration and appreciation event for volunteers and supporters of the environmental group.  Chad Pregracke and his Living Lands & Waters' staff and crew will be on hand to celebrate fifteen years of river cleanups, environmental education workshops, the MillionTrees project and engaging communities in river stewardship. 

The menu for this year's Barge Party will feature a fish fry & shrimp boil and Root Beer floats featuring River Rat Root Beer and Whitey's Ice cream.  The Barge Party will also feature live music by Alan Sweet and Justin Morrissey and a silent art auction, featuring the works of nearly a dozen regional artists who donated river-inspired pieces, including salvaged material sculptures, mixed media painting, folk art, driftwood pieces, quilts and glass art.  Chad Pregracke will update guests on the progress they've made this year. "We couldn't keep these barges running, making the river a cleaner place, without the support of Quad-Citians who volunteer and support Living Lands & Waters. It all makes a difference and we are so grateful," said Chad Pregracke, Founder & President of Living Lands & Waters. Tickets for the event are $35 per person. Reservations can be made by calling the office at (309) 496-9848 or going to their website www.livinglandsandwaters.org. Spots are limited, so please make your reservation soon to guarantee a seat.

Teachers interested in exploring a workshop for their students should contact Tammy Becker at LL&W:  tammy@livinglandsandwaters.org. "We have had over 1,600 teachers in our Educational Workshops dating back to 2003.  The new barge will create an opportunity for thousands of students to experience the river first hand" said Pregracke.   Also on display at the barge party will be LL&W's new one-thousand horse power tow boat which is needed to push the new floating classroom.  The floating classroom was made possible by the generous support of five of LL&W's long-term partners:  Cargill, ADM, Caterpillar, AEP River Operations and Ingram Barge Company, as well as hundreds of area union carpenters and skilled tradesmen.

The Living Lands & Waters Barge Party is held in appreciation of volunteers, supporters and fans of LL&W's efforts, as a celebration of the power of committed staff, volunteers and sponsors working together to meet an important need.

Chad Pregracke started Living Lands & Waters in 1998 as a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the beautification and restoration of America's major rivers and to the education of people about environmental issues. From his single boat beginning, LL&W has grown into an internationally known organization with a fleet of barges and workboats.  LL&W engages thousands of volunteers each year in river cleanups, hands-on environmental education workshops, the Great Mississippi River Cleanup, Adopt-a- River-Mile programs and the MillionTrees Project.