Volusia News Now

Photo for Headline Surfer / Videos produced by Multimedia Editor Serafina Frederick / Alyssa Bellows of Ormond Beach shines up bikes for extra cash during Bike Week in greater Daytona as shown in this 2012 image.

DAYTONA BEACH -- It's a rite of passage -- a change of the seasons -- special events that is, in greater Daytona Beach. We're transitioning from the Rolex 24 and the Daytona 500 (and its Speed Weeks) to Bike Week, and eventually Spring Break, or what's left of the college experience on the World's Most Famous Beach.

Headline Surfer videos by Multimedia Editor Sera Frederick / The Golden Knights entertain the crowd in March at the New Smyrna Beach Balloon and SkyFest at the New Smyrna Beach Municipal Airport.  The 24/7 Internet newspaper editor/publisher Henry Frederick and wife, Sera Frederick, went up in crazy plane rides.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- Under bright sunny skies Saturday, people craned their heads upwards for a once-in-a-lifetime view of an elite group of parachuters with their precision landings at the fourth annual New Smyrna Beach Balloon and SkyFest.

Chipper Jones, shown here in a photo from his website, was all smiles at the 2012 Major League Baseball All-Star Game in Kansas City, Mo., hitting a single in the 6th inning.

PIERSON -- Chipper Jones -- the pride of Pierson, Florida --  and a future Hall of Famer for the Atlanta Braves rallied his National League All-Stars in a pre-game speech before they took to the field in Kansas City and shut out their American League counterparts, 8-0.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- Progress is something New Smyrna Beach says it wants and encourages, just not in the back yards of anyone influential. The way they see it, it should only be allowed in certain sections of the city like way out west on State Road 44. There is always a group that rises up and protests: “Not in my back yard!”

Headline Surfer videos/photos by Sera Frederick / Thousands enjoy Edgewater's July 4th fireworks off Riverside Drive.

Edgewater -- Riley Wood was decked out with a homemade Independence Day hat as he arrived wih his parents for the Fourth of July fireworks. Asked if he made the hat," the 6-year-old New Smyrna Beach boy answered, "Yeah, with mommy."

DAYTONA BEACH -- Bill Nelson, the Sunshine State's senior senator and highest ranking Democrat, easily won re-election to a third six-year term over Republican Congressman Connie Mack, IV, garnering more than 55 percent of the votes. But he didn't take Volusia County for granted in the waning weeks of the elction, making a pitstop in Daytona Beach.

Photos for Headline Surfer / Robert Fortner, a Republican state committeeman from DeLand, cheers during Mitt Romney's acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in Tampa.

TAMPA -- Robert Fortner, a GOP state committeeman from DeLand, liked what he heard from Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney in his acceptance speech at the convention.

The impressions of Volusia County Republicans who attended the convention comes in No. 50 in Headline Surfer's countdown of the top 100 local stories of 2012.

"He gave us what we wanted to hear," the 68-year-old retired custom automotive car and boat manufacturer said on his way back to his hotel. "He had a job to do to accept the nomination and he delivered. He was very positive for the country's future."

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Daytona Beach's most renowned hotelier, Thomas William Staed, the chairman and chief executive of the family owned Staed Family Associates, died peacefully, in his sleep on Tuesday, Feb. 26, 2013. He was 81 years old.