(AP) — Famed chimpanzee expert and conservationist Jane Goodall will speak at the University of Nebraska at Kearney later this month.

Goodall will speak on March 20 at 7 p.m. The lecture is free, but anyone interested in attending must get tickets beforehand.

Goodall will share some of her early observations of chimpanzees, and her current work to help protect them and their habitat.

Her Jane Goodall Institute celebrated its 35th anniversary in 2012. Goodall has traveled the world advocating for apes, their habitats and saving the planet for decades.

(AP) — Scotts Bluff County prosecutors have appealed a judge’s dismissal of a hate crime count against a teen accused of writing a racial epithet on a classmate’s car window.

Scotts Bluff County Attorney Jeremy Anderson appeared at a hearing on his appeal Friday, and will later submit a brief outlining his arguments against County Judge James Worden’s dismissal of the case.

Last month, Worden ended a trial and dismissed the case against 18-year-old Alysha Schwartzkopf, of Gering.

Prosecutors say that Schwartzkopf scrawled a racial epithet in 2013 on the car windows of a Gering High School senior who is biracial.

But Worden agreed with Schwartzkopf’s attorney, who said state law regarding graffiti applied only to buildings and other structures, not car windows.

(AP) — A 19-year-old Wyoming woman had died in a one-vehicle crash in western Nebraska.

Scotts Bluff County Sheriff Mark Overman tells the Scottsbluff Star-Herald (https://bit.ly/1nthPlY) that Kaylie Rae Haun, of Torrington, Wyo., died in the Friday night crash near Lyman.

Authorities pronounced Haun, a former Mitchell resident, dead at the scene.

The Scotts Bluff County Sheriff’s Department says Haun had been traveling northbound on a county between Lyman and Henry when she lost control of her vehicle, ran off the road into a ditch and rolled several times.

Investigators say Haun was not wearing a seat belt and was thrown from the vehicle.

(AP) — A group of historians is warning of the loss of Middle America’s contemporary history and calling for a revival of academic study of the Midwest.

The group is launching a new academic journal of Midwest history next month and a new Midwest history association in the fall — the first in decades with that sole focus.

Jon Lauck is the chairman of the Midwest History Working Group and author of “The Lost Region: Toward a Revival of Midwestern History.”

He says that with no Midwest-focused academic association or journal, there is “a huge disincentive to write any kind of formal academic research about the Midwest, because there’s no place to send it.”

It’s time to spring forward again, as the country makes the switch to daylight-saving time.

Like those in almost all other states, Nebraskans will trade an hour of sleep starting Sunday morning for an extra hour of sunlight in the evening.

The government expanded daylight-saving time in 2007 in an effort to save energy. It now begins on the second Sunday in March and continues until the first Sunday in November.

The official change occurs at 2 a.m. Sunday, local time.

Daylight-saving time ends Nov. 2.

Courtesy of the Lincoln County Clerk

• Joshua Michael Bodenus, 27, North Platte and Kaila Renee’ Barrett, 21, North Platte

 

• Charles Fredirick Lashley 3^rd, 32, North Platte and Crystal Michelle Pouk, 21, North Platte

 

• Daniel Eugene Hill, 33, North Platte and Melissa Anne Belitz, 33, North Platte

 

• Timothy Joseph Schmit, 24, North Platte and Nicole Lynn Cox, 22, North Platte

 

• Austin Robert Thompson, 20, North Platte and Nellie Maye Ambrose, 19, North Platte

 

• Eugene Thomas Herman Jr., 44, Sallisaw OK and Jeana Colleen James, 37, North Platte

 

• Donald Eugene Cottrill Jr., 31, Maxwell NE and Michelle Ann Grimsley, 20, Maxwell NE

(AP) — A new report says Nebraska’s preliminary unemployment rate in January hit 3.5 percent, its lowest mark since September 2008.

The rate was a tenth of a point under the 3.6 percent in December and four-tenths of a point below the January 2013 rate of 3.9 percent.

The state Department of Labor released the employment data on Friday.

The new Nebraska figure remained well below the national unemployment rate of 6.6 percent in January.

(AP) — Local flooding and washed-out roads have prompted travel warnings from Kimball County officials.

County highway superintendent Dave Hottell blames the mess on runoff from melting snow in the southern Nebraska Panhandle county and adjacent parts of Wyoming. He says roughly half of his county’s gravel roads are washed out “and the other half are not in good shape.”

Some stretches of U.S. Highway 30 have been closed as well because of local flooding.

The U.S. Geological Survey says a gauge in the county’s Lodgepole Creek has recorded its highest flows in more than 30 years.

Banner County and Sioux County officials have issued travel advisories for their county roads, too.

Troopers with the Nebraska State Patrol seized nearly 47 lbs of marijuana on I-80 in Keith County on Thursday.

Just before 10:30 a.m., (MT), Thursday, March 6, a trooper stopped an eastbound 2004 Chevy pickup for Failure to Signal near the Roscoe exit on I-80. An NSP canine alerted to the odor of drugs coming from the vehicle. A search of the pickup led to the seizure of 32.4 lbs. of marijuana. The marijuana contained in 39 packages was located in two duffel bags in a tool box in the bed of the pickup.

The driver of the pickup, Joseph Causey, 38,  of Muscatine, Iowa, was lodged in the Keith County Jail on a charge of Possession of Marijuana with Intent to Deliver.

The second seizure occurred around 1:15 p.m., (MT), during a consensual encounter at an I-80 rest area approximately two miles west of the Roscoe exit. An NSP canine alerted to the odor of drugs coming from the rear of a 2014 Mazda. A search of the car led to the seizure of 14.7 lbs., of marijuana. The marijuana was located in two suitcases in the trunk of the vehicle.

A passenger in the vehicle, John Peregrine, 30, of Madison, Wis., was lodged in the Keith County Jail on a charge of Possession of Marijuana with Intent to Deliver