• OpenTable Diners’ Choice has awarded 2Johns Steak and Seafood as one of the Top 100 Steakhouses in America; the only one in North Louisiana to receive this honor. The list of honorees is determined after analyzing more than five million reviews of more than 20,000 restaurants across the country – all submitted by verified diners. With this sampling, the Top 100 can attest to being the top 1/2 percent in America. The award highlights restaurants that deliver a high‐end dining experience which includes an overall score and number of qualifying reviews for experience and food ratings. 2Johns maintains high review ratings and has been awarded in multiple categories over the five years of operation in their location in Bossier City. These categories have included Best Food, Best Ambiance, Special Occasion, Best Overall Restaurant, Best Service and Most Booked 1000‐Point Table Restaurants. 2Johns holds a three-time position for the Best Overall Restaurant title in the state. This Overall Award recognizes food, service and ambience. 

 • After having written and edited more than a dozen books on military and political history, Dr. Alexander Mikaberidze has published yet another exceptional book. “Russian Eyewitness Accounts of the Campaign in 1807” was published Jan. 14 and is the third volume in Mikaberidze’s ongoing anthology of Russian memoirs. This volume brings together for the first time in English dozens of Russian letters memoirs and diaries, with authors ranging from the commander-in-chief to NCOs. Readers hear of the brutal conditions of the winter campaign at first hand, and gain fresh insight into the infamous Treaty of Tiltsit and the diplomatic maneuvering that followed it. With his first book being published in 2000 at the young age of 22, Mikaberidze has proven to be not only successful but extremely knowledgeable in the field as well. 

• The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas has named James R. Barlow of Shreveport a member of its Community Depository Institutions Advisory Council. The council is composed of 12 representatives from financial institutions of various sizes in Texas, northern Louisiana and southern New Mexico. The council provides senior Dallas Fed officials grassroots information on a variety of topics, including economic and banking conditions, regulatory policies and payments issues. Barlow is president and CEO of Home Federal Bank in Shreveport, where he has worked since February 2009. Before joining Home Federal, he served as executive vice president and area manager of the Arkansas-Louisiana-Texas area commercial real estate operations of a regional bank.