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at the three-day gathering that runs through Tuesday.
• The convention is featuring seminars including one on the new federal health care law, along with a cake-decorating contest and an awards banquet. Exhibitors are displaying their products during the trade show. A golf tournament in neighboring Moorhead, Minn., concludes the event on Tuesday.
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• PIERRE, S.D. (AP) -- Besides its major tourist attractions, South Dakota is also known for its rich variety of fossils.
• Even Lewis and Clark documented a creature they found on Sept. 10, 1804, along the Missouri River in what is now most likely Gregory County.
• They noted the discovery of what they thought was the backbone of a fish that was 45 feet long.
• The Capital Journal reports (http://bit.ly/15GGb08 ) that many scientists believe it was probably not a fish but an ancient sea-going reptile called a mosasaur.
• Science will never know for sure because the fossilized bones the explorers sent back to Washington are now lost.
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• PIERRE, S.D. (AP) -- The South Dakota Retirement System has used investment earnings on its assets to pay off the system's unfunded obligations.
• The Retirement System earned 19 percent on investments of its assets in the year that ended June 30. That left the system nearly 104 percent funded, meaning its current assets exceed all benefits earned to date.
• Retirement System Board Chairman Elmer Brinkman says the investment earnings allowed the system to pay off its relatively small debt. He says the board must manage the system prudently for its members, public agencies and the state's taxpayers.
• The Retirement System has 77,500 members, and most of them are still working. It includes employees of state government, cities, counties and school districts.
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