The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts announced plans Tuesday to expand its crisis consulting for arts organizations that are struggling to survive the recession, an effort championed by first lady Michelle Obama and congressional leaders.

today through sunday

25th Annual Chisholm Trail Festival • variety of locations in Newton. Events include Newton Idol, turtle races, historical bus tours, pie-eating contest, watermelon seed spitting contest, parade, hot dog-eating contest and Christian rock concert.

People are clamoring to see Michael Jackson’s old videos in the wake of his death — especially “Thriller.”

“You have a cousin in Iowa looking for you!”

A fateful 2004 phone call sent LaVern Lyon, a member of central Kansas’ Swedish community, on a journey across the ocean to discover a family he had never known.

Michael Jackson’s 7-year-old will was filed Wednesday in a Los Angeles court, giving his entire estate to a family trust while making his mother the guardian of his children and cutting out his former wife Debbie Rowe.

Spring Lake RV Resort near Halstead is having its monthly jam session from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Saturday in the clubhouse.

Everyone is welcome.

The restoration of Michelangelo’s frescoes in the Vatican’s Pauline Chapel may have produced a special prize — a previously unknown self-portrait of the artist.

City officials are scrambling over the holiday weekend to try to figure out how to accommodate a public memorial service for Michael Jackson at a venue that can hold no more than 20,000 people.

Farrah Fawcett, the “Charlie’s Angels” star whose feathered blond hair and dazzling smile made her one of the biggest sex symbols of the 1970s, died Thursday after battling cancer. She was 62.

The Academy Awards are doubling the number of best-picture nominees from five to 10.