By JASON KING
Leader sportswriter
When Cabot junior Legion head coach Andy Runyan leads his Centennial Bank team onto the field in Sheridan this weekend for the state tournament, it will be his last time wearing Cabot red.
Runyan is headed to Hot Springs Lakeside to take over the baseball head-coaching job recently vacated by J.R. Folds.
Runyan served as an assistant to Cabot High School head coach Jay Fitch and helped run the summer Legion programs for five years. He coached the AAA/senior Legion teams for the first two summers before taking over the junior program in 2008, leading Cabot to state-tournament berths in 2008 and 2010.
“I can’t express how much I owe to Cabot and to coach Fitch for giving me an opportunity to get into the high-school game,” Runyan said. “I’ve learned a lot from Jay, and there’s going to be a lot of things we do alike at Lakeside.
“If people from Cabot came down and watched, they would see some similar things. There are a lot of things I’m going to take from him as a mentor and as a coach.”
Once Runyan expressed interest in the Lakeside job in late June, the process moved quickly.
He applied on a Thursday, interviewed the following Monday, and the school board approved him at a meeting the following day.
Runyan made it final by signing his contract one week after applying.
“I’m extremely, extremely exited about the opportunity down there,” Runyan said. “Those guys have got great facilities, they support baseball, they’ve got tradition — they’ve won four conference championships since 2000 and won state Legion championships. Just excited to be able to run my own program.”
Runyan began his high school baseball career at Little Rock Mills, where he played three years before his father, legendary football coach Pip Runyan, took the head-coaching job at Greene Co. Tech in Paragould. That’s where Andy Runyan played his senior year before signing with the University of Missouri.
Runyan redshirted, then transferred to Arkansas State midway through his sophomore year and played all four seasons he was eligible.
Runyan coached Legion baseball in Paragould for three years while in college and played for the Salinas Packers of the California Coastal Collegiate League before moving to Cabot to be Fitch’s assistant.
“First of all, you couldn’t ask for a better place for fan support,” Runyan said. “Our fans do a great job. Our kids have a baseball background because their parents afford them those opportunities, which makes our job easier as coaches.”
Runyan will lead the Lakeside Rams in a stout 5A-Southwest Conference that includes private-school powerhouses Central Arkansas Christian and Little Rock Christian, as well as Magnolia, Arkadelphia and Hope.
But Runyan said his five years with Cabot in the 7A Central Conference was good preparation for any level of competition in the state.
A number of 7A Central players were taken in the recent Major League Baseball draft, including former Cabot Panthers/Centennial Bank infielder Sam Bates and Bryant pitcher Benjamin Wells.
Both players have also signed with the Arkansas Razorbacks.
“The biggest thing I’m going to take away from Cabot was the opportunity to be exposed to big-time baseball,” Runyan said.
“You go back and look, 7A Central this year were all four semifinal teams. Bryant won a state championship and had a kid drafted in the seventh round.
“There were four players drafted this year in the Major-League Baseball draft who were former players from the 7A Central.
You’re not going to find a higher level of baseball than what we play day in and day out at Cabot High School.”
Friday, July 09, 2010
SPORTS>>Cabot’s Runyan heads to Lakeside
By JASON KING
Leader sportswriter
When Cabot junior Legion head coach Andy Runyan leads his Centennial Bank team onto the field in Sheridan this weekend for the state tournament, it will be his last time wearing Cabot red.
Runyan is headed to Hot Springs Lakeside to take over the baseball head-coaching job recently vacated by J.R. Folds.
Runyan served as an assistant to Cabot High School head coach Jay Fitch and helped run the summer Legion programs for five years. He coached the AAA/senior Legion teams for the first two summers before taking over the junior program in 2008, leading Cabot to state-tournament berths in 2008 and 2010.
“I can’t express how much I owe to Cabot and to coach Fitch for giving me an opportunity to get into the high-school game,” Runyan said. “I’ve learned a lot from Jay, and there’s going to be a lot of things we do alike at Lakeside.
“If people from Cabot came down and watched, they would see some similar things. There are a lot of things I’m going to take from him as a mentor and as a coach.”
Once Runyan expressed interest in the Lakeside job in late June, the process moved quickly.
He applied on a Thursday, interviewed the following Monday, and the school board approved him at a meeting the following day.
Runyan made it final by signing his contract one week after applying.
“I’m extremely, extremely exited about the opportunity down there,” Runyan said. “Those guys have got great facilities, they support baseball, they’ve got tradition — they’ve won four conference championships since 2000 and won state Legion championships. Just excited to be able to run my own program.”
Runyan began his high school baseball career at Little Rock Mills, where he played three years before his father, legendary football coach Pip Runyan, took the head-coaching job at Greene Co. Tech in Paragould. That’s where Andy Runyan played his senior year before signing with the University of Missouri.
Runyan redshirted, then transferred to Arkansas State midway through his sophomore year and played all four seasons he was eligible.
Runyan coached Legion baseball in Paragould for three years while in college and played for the Salinas Packers of the California Coastal Collegiate League before moving to Cabot to be Fitch’s assistant.
“First of all, you couldn’t ask for a better place for fan support,” Runyan said. “Our fans do a great job. Our kids have a baseball background because their parents afford them those opportunities, which makes our job easier as coaches.”
Runyan will lead the Lakeside Rams in a stout 5A-Southwest Conference that includes private-school powerhouses Central Arkansas Christian and Little Rock Christian, as well as Magnolia, Arkadelphia and Hope.
But Runyan said his five years with Cabot in the 7A Central Conference was good preparation for any level of competition in the state.
A number of 7A Central players were taken in the recent Major League Baseball draft, including former Cabot Panthers/Centennial Bank infielder Sam Bates and Bryant pitcher Benjamin Wells.
Both players have also signed with the Arkansas Razorbacks.
“The biggest thing I’m going to take away from Cabot was the opportunity to be exposed to big-time baseball,” Runyan said.
“You go back and look, 7A Central this year were all four semifinal teams. Bryant won a state championship and had a kid drafted in the seventh round.
“There were four players drafted this year in the Major-League Baseball draft who were former players from the 7A Central.
You’re not going to find a higher level of baseball than what we play day in and day out at Cabot High School.”
Leader sportswriter
When Cabot junior Legion head coach Andy Runyan leads his Centennial Bank team onto the field in Sheridan this weekend for the state tournament, it will be his last time wearing Cabot red.
Runyan is headed to Hot Springs Lakeside to take over the baseball head-coaching job recently vacated by J.R. Folds.
Runyan served as an assistant to Cabot High School head coach Jay Fitch and helped run the summer Legion programs for five years. He coached the AAA/senior Legion teams for the first two summers before taking over the junior program in 2008, leading Cabot to state-tournament berths in 2008 and 2010.
“I can’t express how much I owe to Cabot and to coach Fitch for giving me an opportunity to get into the high-school game,” Runyan said. “I’ve learned a lot from Jay, and there’s going to be a lot of things we do alike at Lakeside.
“If people from Cabot came down and watched, they would see some similar things. There are a lot of things I’m going to take from him as a mentor and as a coach.”
Once Runyan expressed interest in the Lakeside job in late June, the process moved quickly.
He applied on a Thursday, interviewed the following Monday, and the school board approved him at a meeting the following day.
Runyan made it final by signing his contract one week after applying.
“I’m extremely, extremely exited about the opportunity down there,” Runyan said. “Those guys have got great facilities, they support baseball, they’ve got tradition — they’ve won four conference championships since 2000 and won state Legion championships. Just excited to be able to run my own program.”
Runyan began his high school baseball career at Little Rock Mills, where he played three years before his father, legendary football coach Pip Runyan, took the head-coaching job at Greene Co. Tech in Paragould. That’s where Andy Runyan played his senior year before signing with the University of Missouri.
Runyan redshirted, then transferred to Arkansas State midway through his sophomore year and played all four seasons he was eligible.
Runyan coached Legion baseball in Paragould for three years while in college and played for the Salinas Packers of the California Coastal Collegiate League before moving to Cabot to be Fitch’s assistant.
“First of all, you couldn’t ask for a better place for fan support,” Runyan said. “Our fans do a great job. Our kids have a baseball background because their parents afford them those opportunities, which makes our job easier as coaches.”
Runyan will lead the Lakeside Rams in a stout 5A-Southwest Conference that includes private-school powerhouses Central Arkansas Christian and Little Rock Christian, as well as Magnolia, Arkadelphia and Hope.
But Runyan said his five years with Cabot in the 7A Central Conference was good preparation for any level of competition in the state.
A number of 7A Central players were taken in the recent Major League Baseball draft, including former Cabot Panthers/Centennial Bank infielder Sam Bates and Bryant pitcher Benjamin Wells.
Both players have also signed with the Arkansas Razorbacks.
“The biggest thing I’m going to take away from Cabot was the opportunity to be exposed to big-time baseball,” Runyan said.
“You go back and look, 7A Central this year were all four semifinal teams. Bryant won a state championship and had a kid drafted in the seventh round.
“There were four players drafted this year in the Major-League Baseball draft who were former players from the 7A Central.
You’re not going to find a higher level of baseball than what we play day in and day out at Cabot High School.”
SPORTS>>Jacksonville expected to announce new coaches soon
By TODD TRAUB
Leader sports editor
Jacksonville athletic director Jerry Wilson said the school should be naming coaches to fill multiple vacancies, including that of head football coach, Tuesday morning.
“Hopefully, I’ll try to give you all the new hires,” Wilson said.
Football coach Mark Whatley announced late last month he was leaving to become offensive coordinator at Springdale High School under new coach Shane Patrick. Whatley, a Jacksonville alumnus, took over for veteran coach Johnny Watson after the 2004 season.
Whatley, 23-31 with three playoff appearances at Jacksonville and 114-105-2 overall, is not the athletic program’s only departure.
Volleyball coach Justine Rial has stepped down to focus on elementary school teaching after leading the team to the 6A state tournament in her two seasons. Rial was also a softball assistant.
Head softball coach Tanya Ganey recently gave up her volleyball assistant’s job, while the girls basketball program under Katrina Mimms is looking for an assistant to take over for Roy Jackson.
Jackson was an interim assistant to Mimms but is also the freshman boys head coach and an assistant to varsity basketball coach Vic Joyner.
As a public school in the Pul-aski County Special School District, Jacksonville was required to advertise its vacancies for a set period of time unless promoting a coach on an interim basis.
Former Jacksonville assistant and current North Pulaski head coach Rick Russell has been mentioned as a candidate for the Red Devils’ football job. Attempts to reach Russell on his cell phone Friday were unsuccessful.
Wilson had said earlier that he didn’t expect any action to be taken on the coaching jobs until the advertising period elapses on July 13, which is Tuesday. If there were any urgency, it would be in filling the football and volleyball jobs, as both sports begin in the fall.
“From head football to head volleyball to assistant basketball. It will be about six or seven of them,” Wilson said.
Leader sports editor
Jacksonville athletic director Jerry Wilson said the school should be naming coaches to fill multiple vacancies, including that of head football coach, Tuesday morning.
“Hopefully, I’ll try to give you all the new hires,” Wilson said.
Football coach Mark Whatley announced late last month he was leaving to become offensive coordinator at Springdale High School under new coach Shane Patrick. Whatley, a Jacksonville alumnus, took over for veteran coach Johnny Watson after the 2004 season.
Whatley, 23-31 with three playoff appearances at Jacksonville and 114-105-2 overall, is not the athletic program’s only departure.
Volleyball coach Justine Rial has stepped down to focus on elementary school teaching after leading the team to the 6A state tournament in her two seasons. Rial was also a softball assistant.
Head softball coach Tanya Ganey recently gave up her volleyball assistant’s job, while the girls basketball program under Katrina Mimms is looking for an assistant to take over for Roy Jackson.
Jackson was an interim assistant to Mimms but is also the freshman boys head coach and an assistant to varsity basketball coach Vic Joyner.
As a public school in the Pul-aski County Special School District, Jacksonville was required to advertise its vacancies for a set period of time unless promoting a coach on an interim basis.
Former Jacksonville assistant and current North Pulaski head coach Rick Russell has been mentioned as a candidate for the Red Devils’ football job. Attempts to reach Russell on his cell phone Friday were unsuccessful.
Wilson had said earlier that he didn’t expect any action to be taken on the coaching jobs until the advertising period elapses on July 13, which is Tuesday. If there were any urgency, it would be in filling the football and volleyball jobs, as both sports begin in the fall.
“From head football to head volleyball to assistant basketball. It will be about six or seven of them,” Wilson said.
SPORTS>>Cabot Centennial Bank fights way to state
By TODD TRAUB
Leader sportswriter
A seven-inning game does not necessarily imply a need for endurance, unless it’s a game with a combined 19 runs, 17 hits and 10 errors.
That’s what North Little Rock had to endure in order to beat Cabot Centennial Bank 11-8 in the American Legion junior Area 3 tournament at Burns Park on Tuesday. The tournament host Optimist Colts took an early 7-1 lead but Cabot came back to tie, and North Little Rock needed a four-run rally in the bottom of the sixth to hand Cabot its first tournament loss.
The Colts went 5-0 through the tournament, including another victory over Cabot on Wednesday, to earn the No. 1 seed in the junior Legion state tournament at Sheridan beginning today.
“Hats off to those guys,” Cabot coach Andy Runyan said. “North Little Rock got clutch hits when they needed clutch hits. We had a chance there in the top of the fifth with two guys getting on to lead off, then we went pop-up, strikeout, strikeout.
“They banged a couple in the gaps, and that’s where they scored their runs.”
Centennial Bank took a 1-0 lead in the top of the third inning when leadoff hitter Cole Thomas tripled to center field and scored when Conner Vocque hit into a fielder’s choice. The Colts took what appeared to be a commanding 7-1 lead with the help of four Cabot errors in the bottom of the third.
But Cabot made up the deficit in the top of the fifth and held North Little Rock scoreless in the bottom half to enter the sixth tied, and the Colts struck again in the bottom of the inning.
“That’s the thing — you see games like that,” Runyan said. “If you can’t capitalize on the initial push, and then you get down again, it’s really hard to mount a second comeback in a game a lot of times.
“Hats off to our kids being down six and even getting back to a situation where we had a chance to win the ballgame. We didn’t end up on the right side of the scoreboard, but I thought our kids played extremely hard today.”
Cabot’s fifth-inning rally started with a pop-up to right field by No. 8 batter Robert Rankin, but Ryan Logan followed with a double to right.
That brought up the top of Centennial Bank’s order, and Thomas reached on an error.
Vocque beat out an infield single to load the bases and Casey Vaughan drove in the first two runs with a single down the third-base line.
Cleanup hitter Rob White loaded the bases again when he reached on a grounder to Colts shortstop Blake Manning.
North Little Rock starter Darion Lewis walked Kason Kimbrell to make it 7-4 and was replaced on the mound by Drew Potter, who walked James McCraine and Zach Patterson for two more Cabot runs and a 7-6 score.
That forced the Colts into another pitching change. Second baseman Jaleel Tyler relieved Potter, and finally got the second out when he induced Ranking to fly out to center. But Kimbrell tagged up at third and scored the tying run.
Cabot starter Dustin Morris lasted until the bottom of the sixth when Ryan Logan relieved him after Morris gave up a leadoff single to Lewis. Logan then gave up a single, misplayed Wesley Moore’s bunt and gave up another single to load the bases and give the Colts the first of their four runs in the inning.
Cabot got back one of those runs in the top of the seventh when McCraine walked and Patterson drove him in with a single, but Matthew Himstedt, the Colts’ fourth pitcher, shut Cabot down to preserve the victory.
Patterson was 2 for 3 for Cabot with an RBI, while Thomas was 2 for 4 with a triple and Vaughan was 2 for 4 with two RBI.
Manning led North Little Rock, going 2 for 4 with a double.
The loss dropped Centennial Bank into a semifinal matchup with Sylvan Hills. Cabot won that game Wednesday to clinch a state- tournament berth and a rematch with North Little Rock to determine seeding.
The Colts won the rematch to give Cabot the No. 2 seed.
“We were very proud of our boys because of their youth,” Runyan said. “We had a bunch of eighth and ninth-graders in a 17-and-under tournament. We said all along that we were not going to use age as an excuse.
“But it’s part of the maturation process for them to finish top two, so we’re really proud of these guys.”
Leader sportswriter
A seven-inning game does not necessarily imply a need for endurance, unless it’s a game with a combined 19 runs, 17 hits and 10 errors.
That’s what North Little Rock had to endure in order to beat Cabot Centennial Bank 11-8 in the American Legion junior Area 3 tournament at Burns Park on Tuesday. The tournament host Optimist Colts took an early 7-1 lead but Cabot came back to tie, and North Little Rock needed a four-run rally in the bottom of the sixth to hand Cabot its first tournament loss.
The Colts went 5-0 through the tournament, including another victory over Cabot on Wednesday, to earn the No. 1 seed in the junior Legion state tournament at Sheridan beginning today.
“Hats off to those guys,” Cabot coach Andy Runyan said. “North Little Rock got clutch hits when they needed clutch hits. We had a chance there in the top of the fifth with two guys getting on to lead off, then we went pop-up, strikeout, strikeout.
“They banged a couple in the gaps, and that’s where they scored their runs.”
Centennial Bank took a 1-0 lead in the top of the third inning when leadoff hitter Cole Thomas tripled to center field and scored when Conner Vocque hit into a fielder’s choice. The Colts took what appeared to be a commanding 7-1 lead with the help of four Cabot errors in the bottom of the third.
But Cabot made up the deficit in the top of the fifth and held North Little Rock scoreless in the bottom half to enter the sixth tied, and the Colts struck again in the bottom of the inning.
“That’s the thing — you see games like that,” Runyan said. “If you can’t capitalize on the initial push, and then you get down again, it’s really hard to mount a second comeback in a game a lot of times.
“Hats off to our kids being down six and even getting back to a situation where we had a chance to win the ballgame. We didn’t end up on the right side of the scoreboard, but I thought our kids played extremely hard today.”
Cabot’s fifth-inning rally started with a pop-up to right field by No. 8 batter Robert Rankin, but Ryan Logan followed with a double to right.
That brought up the top of Centennial Bank’s order, and Thomas reached on an error.
Vocque beat out an infield single to load the bases and Casey Vaughan drove in the first two runs with a single down the third-base line.
Cleanup hitter Rob White loaded the bases again when he reached on a grounder to Colts shortstop Blake Manning.
North Little Rock starter Darion Lewis walked Kason Kimbrell to make it 7-4 and was replaced on the mound by Drew Potter, who walked James McCraine and Zach Patterson for two more Cabot runs and a 7-6 score.
That forced the Colts into another pitching change. Second baseman Jaleel Tyler relieved Potter, and finally got the second out when he induced Ranking to fly out to center. But Kimbrell tagged up at third and scored the tying run.
Cabot starter Dustin Morris lasted until the bottom of the sixth when Ryan Logan relieved him after Morris gave up a leadoff single to Lewis. Logan then gave up a single, misplayed Wesley Moore’s bunt and gave up another single to load the bases and give the Colts the first of their four runs in the inning.
Cabot got back one of those runs in the top of the seventh when McCraine walked and Patterson drove him in with a single, but Matthew Himstedt, the Colts’ fourth pitcher, shut Cabot down to preserve the victory.
Patterson was 2 for 3 for Cabot with an RBI, while Thomas was 2 for 4 with a triple and Vaughan was 2 for 4 with two RBI.
Manning led North Little Rock, going 2 for 4 with a double.
The loss dropped Centennial Bank into a semifinal matchup with Sylvan Hills. Cabot won that game Wednesday to clinch a state- tournament berth and a rematch with North Little Rock to determine seeding.
The Colts won the rematch to give Cabot the No. 2 seed.
“We were very proud of our boys because of their youth,” Runyan said. “We had a bunch of eighth and ninth-graders in a 17-and-under tournament. We said all along that we were not going to use age as an excuse.
“But it’s part of the maturation process for them to finish top two, so we’re really proud of these guys.”
SPORTS>>Questions still follow as Ballard awaits trial
By JASON KING
Leader sportswriter
Children’s education is a subject almost as touchy as politics and religion — and too often just as scandalous these days.
Former Abundant Life coach and principal Tim Ballard’s trial for sexual assault has been set for Oct. 27. Ballard was arrested in early March and released on bond after an anonymous tip to Sherwood police in late February indicated he had been suspended from the school for alleged misconduct with a number of female students.
When Leader sports editor Todd Traub assigned me to cover Abundant Life’s first-round 2A regional game against Clarendon at White County Central High School on Feb. 25, I had no clue to the firestorm surrounding the school or Ballard that was lurking around the corner.
I obviously found it odd a coach would miss a state tournament qualifier — especially a coach who almost single-handedly built one of the best 2A programs in the state as Ballard had done.
I sat in the stands with the Owls fans in the second half of the game after shooting photos on the floor in the first half.
There were no whispers of Ballard’s whereabouts or what had happened the day before, but then again, many of the parents and fans from Abundant Life at least know I work as a sportswriter with one of the local papers. I’m sure there is a good chance many of the conversations were being carefully screened in my area of the bleachers and at that point there was no clue to the alarming nature of the charges against Ballard, so I didn’t quiz any of the parents.
My post-game interviews were only the start of a confusing week spent trying to figure out what the heck was going on.
Assistant (now interim) coach Chris Horton would only say Ballard had “family issues” and could not attend the game. A phone call to athletic director and senior girls coach Justin Moseley the following day garnered an almost identical response.
But what the administrators did not understand in their attempt to keep things under wraps as they looked more carefully into Ballard’s behavior was that vague, abstract answers like the ones I was receiving only increase media suspicions.
If there had been a death in the family, they would have simply said he had a death in the family. A sick child would not have kept him away from a game this important unless the child was gravely ill, and again, I likely would have been told the child was in the hospital.
But saying there is a family issue with no details gives an immediate impression something is not kosher.
As if that wasn’t enough, the pastor at the Sylvan Hills First Baptist Church days later sent a press release regarding Ballard’s suspension exclusively to another newspaper, despite The Leader’s great er circulation area and more extensive coverage of the Abundant Life programs through the years.
And now look at the mess the school and church are in.
Even if Ballard ends up exonerated, he will most likely never hold a whistle as a coach again as long as he lives.
And, regardless of the outcome, the school may not survive. A scandal this big at a school that small will be a difficult thing to overcome, especially if the alleged number of abuse victims turns out to be accurate.
Part of what makes this situation so shocking to us all is that there is no real opportunity to say, “Where were the parents?” This was a guy who was in charge of nearly all extra-curricular activities, who professed to having a deep religious conviction and was the high school’s primary administrator.
I can see how a parent could find it easy to trust someone like Tim Ballard. I took over the Abundant Life beat for The Leader in 2005, and was instantly impressed.
At first glance he appeared to have everything going his way — from an appealing, apparently stable family to a great job at the same, cozy, faith-based private school he graduated from years earlier.
But, if the allegations facing Ballard are proven in court, something went terribly wrong for him along the way.
And, if my worst fears concerning the identity of the original student turned whistle blower prove correct, many of the school’s top athletic accomplishments will be forever tarnished.
Someone from that school should have talked sooner. They were bound by law to talk to the police in 1999 when the first report of inappropriate behavior came to light.
But the school should have also been more forthright with the media, and especially with the parents.
Trust is not an easy thing for anyone to attain. And in Abundant Life’s case, 33 years of trust built within the community, and with parents and media, came crashing down on March 1 when the criminal investigation into Ballard’s actions began.
But, as questions how, why and how many are answered in the coming months, let us remember a few things. Remember how unfair this situation has been to the students of Abundant Life and how terrifying it must be to their poor parents.
My dealings with the administrators and parents at that school have been nothing but positive the past six years. I hope they are finding comfort and healing in their prayers.
Leader sportswriter
Children’s education is a subject almost as touchy as politics and religion — and too often just as scandalous these days.
Former Abundant Life coach and principal Tim Ballard’s trial for sexual assault has been set for Oct. 27. Ballard was arrested in early March and released on bond after an anonymous tip to Sherwood police in late February indicated he had been suspended from the school for alleged misconduct with a number of female students.
When Leader sports editor Todd Traub assigned me to cover Abundant Life’s first-round 2A regional game against Clarendon at White County Central High School on Feb. 25, I had no clue to the firestorm surrounding the school or Ballard that was lurking around the corner.
I obviously found it odd a coach would miss a state tournament qualifier — especially a coach who almost single-handedly built one of the best 2A programs in the state as Ballard had done.
I sat in the stands with the Owls fans in the second half of the game after shooting photos on the floor in the first half.
There were no whispers of Ballard’s whereabouts or what had happened the day before, but then again, many of the parents and fans from Abundant Life at least know I work as a sportswriter with one of the local papers. I’m sure there is a good chance many of the conversations were being carefully screened in my area of the bleachers and at that point there was no clue to the alarming nature of the charges against Ballard, so I didn’t quiz any of the parents.
My post-game interviews were only the start of a confusing week spent trying to figure out what the heck was going on.
Assistant (now interim) coach Chris Horton would only say Ballard had “family issues” and could not attend the game. A phone call to athletic director and senior girls coach Justin Moseley the following day garnered an almost identical response.
But what the administrators did not understand in their attempt to keep things under wraps as they looked more carefully into Ballard’s behavior was that vague, abstract answers like the ones I was receiving only increase media suspicions.
If there had been a death in the family, they would have simply said he had a death in the family. A sick child would not have kept him away from a game this important unless the child was gravely ill, and again, I likely would have been told the child was in the hospital.
But saying there is a family issue with no details gives an immediate impression something is not kosher.
As if that wasn’t enough, the pastor at the Sylvan Hills First Baptist Church days later sent a press release regarding Ballard’s suspension exclusively to another newspaper, despite The Leader’s great er circulation area and more extensive coverage of the Abundant Life programs through the years.
And now look at the mess the school and church are in.
Even if Ballard ends up exonerated, he will most likely never hold a whistle as a coach again as long as he lives.
And, regardless of the outcome, the school may not survive. A scandal this big at a school that small will be a difficult thing to overcome, especially if the alleged number of abuse victims turns out to be accurate.
Part of what makes this situation so shocking to us all is that there is no real opportunity to say, “Where were the parents?” This was a guy who was in charge of nearly all extra-curricular activities, who professed to having a deep religious conviction and was the high school’s primary administrator.
I can see how a parent could find it easy to trust someone like Tim Ballard. I took over the Abundant Life beat for The Leader in 2005, and was instantly impressed.
At first glance he appeared to have everything going his way — from an appealing, apparently stable family to a great job at the same, cozy, faith-based private school he graduated from years earlier.
But, if the allegations facing Ballard are proven in court, something went terribly wrong for him along the way.
And, if my worst fears concerning the identity of the original student turned whistle blower prove correct, many of the school’s top athletic accomplishments will be forever tarnished.
Someone from that school should have talked sooner. They were bound by law to talk to the police in 1999 when the first report of inappropriate behavior came to light.
But the school should have also been more forthright with the media, and especially with the parents.
Trust is not an easy thing for anyone to attain. And in Abundant Life’s case, 33 years of trust built within the community, and with parents and media, came crashing down on March 1 when the criminal investigation into Ballard’s actions began.
But, as questions how, why and how many are answered in the coming months, let us remember a few things. Remember how unfair this situation has been to the students of Abundant Life and how terrifying it must be to their poor parents.
My dealings with the administrators and parents at that school have been nothing but positive the past six years. I hope they are finding comfort and healing in their prayers.
SPORTS>>Injury mars game
By JASON KING
Leader sportswriter
It was a terrifying end to a humdrum season.
Jacksonville Gwatney Chevrolet started its American Legion Area 3 junior tournament game against Sylvan Hills just after 5:30 p.m. at Burns Park on Tuesday, but there was no rest for Gwatney until Zach Traylor’s release from Arkansas Children’s Hospital sometime around 3 a.m. the next morning.
Sylvan Hills won 7-1 after Jacksonville, with only 10 players on its roster, was forced to forfeit when Traylor sustained a frightening facial injury that left the Chevy Boys a man short.
Traylor moved to third base from his starting position in center field during a pitching change in the top of the fourth inning.
His first chance came on a short hopper by Sylvan Hills leadoff batter Greg Atchinson in the top of the fifth, and as Traylor got into position, the ball took a violent side hop and smashed into his left cheekbone.
“That’s the first one I’ve had like that,” Gwatney coach Bob Hickingbotham said. “I mean, I’ve had other injuries, there’s been broken noses before when someone got hit with a hit ball or a thrown ball. But that one was basically in the neighborhood of one or two others.”
Traylor stood dazed for a moment before collapsing to the ground, and paramedics were immediately called to the field. Sylvan Hills coach Billy Sims was stationed at the third-base line and came immediately to Traylor’s aid, and tournament officials brought out ice for the severe swelling under Traylor’s left eye.
Children’s Hospital doctors were concerned about Traylor’s eye movement and possible fractures to his cheekbone, but Hickingbotham said Traylor began moving his eye before his release. Hickingbotham said he believed more tests for fractures will be run after some of the swelling subsides.
“I was concerned that something was possibly wrong with his neck the way it popped back,” Hickingbotham said. “It kind of knocked him groggy, but I guess some of the X-rays and other things they did revealed that it wasn’t quite as bad as we originally thought.”
It was Gwatney’s second loss of the round-robin tournament, which ended the Chevy Boys’ season short of a state-tournament berth. Sylvan Hills advanced to play Cabot Centennial Bank on Wednesday, and the Bruins fell to Cabot for a second time in the tourney to end their year.
The Bruins were in command before Traylor’s accident with a 7-1 lead heading into the fifth inning.
They took a 5-0 lead in the top of the second when Gwatney starter Alex Tucker gave up a leadoff walk to Conner Eller and three straight singles.
Blake Hill drove in the first run with a single to right, followed by a sacrifice fly to center by J.D. Miller.
Atchinson followed with a sacrifice fly to right that scored Sammy Pittman, and Lance Hunter walked to load the bases again for the Bruins.
Tucker hit cleanup man Forrest Harrison to score Dalton Freeling and make it 5-0.
Harrison drove in the next run for Sylvan Hills in the top of the fourth when he doubled to left to score Freeling. Harrison later scored on a passed ball.
Jacksonville’s only run came in the bottom of the third when No. 9 hitter Brandon Whitmore walked and scored on an RBI single to left by Traylor.
Aaron Sarna was 2 for 2 with a double for Sylvan Hills while Harrison had a double and two RBI.
Leader sportswriter
It was a terrifying end to a humdrum season.
Jacksonville Gwatney Chevrolet started its American Legion Area 3 junior tournament game against Sylvan Hills just after 5:30 p.m. at Burns Park on Tuesday, but there was no rest for Gwatney until Zach Traylor’s release from Arkansas Children’s Hospital sometime around 3 a.m. the next morning.
Sylvan Hills won 7-1 after Jacksonville, with only 10 players on its roster, was forced to forfeit when Traylor sustained a frightening facial injury that left the Chevy Boys a man short.
Traylor moved to third base from his starting position in center field during a pitching change in the top of the fourth inning.
His first chance came on a short hopper by Sylvan Hills leadoff batter Greg Atchinson in the top of the fifth, and as Traylor got into position, the ball took a violent side hop and smashed into his left cheekbone.
“That’s the first one I’ve had like that,” Gwatney coach Bob Hickingbotham said. “I mean, I’ve had other injuries, there’s been broken noses before when someone got hit with a hit ball or a thrown ball. But that one was basically in the neighborhood of one or two others.”
Traylor stood dazed for a moment before collapsing to the ground, and paramedics were immediately called to the field. Sylvan Hills coach Billy Sims was stationed at the third-base line and came immediately to Traylor’s aid, and tournament officials brought out ice for the severe swelling under Traylor’s left eye.
Children’s Hospital doctors were concerned about Traylor’s eye movement and possible fractures to his cheekbone, but Hickingbotham said Traylor began moving his eye before his release. Hickingbotham said he believed more tests for fractures will be run after some of the swelling subsides.
“I was concerned that something was possibly wrong with his neck the way it popped back,” Hickingbotham said. “It kind of knocked him groggy, but I guess some of the X-rays and other things they did revealed that it wasn’t quite as bad as we originally thought.”
It was Gwatney’s second loss of the round-robin tournament, which ended the Chevy Boys’ season short of a state-tournament berth. Sylvan Hills advanced to play Cabot Centennial Bank on Wednesday, and the Bruins fell to Cabot for a second time in the tourney to end their year.
The Bruins were in command before Traylor’s accident with a 7-1 lead heading into the fifth inning.
They took a 5-0 lead in the top of the second when Gwatney starter Alex Tucker gave up a leadoff walk to Conner Eller and three straight singles.
Blake Hill drove in the first run with a single to right, followed by a sacrifice fly to center by J.D. Miller.
Atchinson followed with a sacrifice fly to right that scored Sammy Pittman, and Lance Hunter walked to load the bases again for the Bruins.
Tucker hit cleanup man Forrest Harrison to score Dalton Freeling and make it 5-0.
Harrison drove in the next run for Sylvan Hills in the top of the fourth when he doubled to left to score Freeling. Harrison later scored on a passed ball.
Jacksonville’s only run came in the bottom of the third when No. 9 hitter Brandon Whitmore walked and scored on an RBI single to left by Traylor.
Aaron Sarna was 2 for 2 with a double for Sylvan Hills while Harrison had a double and two RBI.
EDITORIAL >> AG breaks state law
He is a mean grinch who will question a good deed, but sometimes someone must do the thankless. Attorney General Dustin McDaniel the other day donated $100,000 to a private fund to build a memorial to fallen firefighters on the grounds of the state Capitol and he shouldn’t have.
General McDaniel eloquently explained why he was doing it. The Capitol ought to be the host for a “permanent reminder of our fallen firefighters’ heroic efforts,” he said. We like the idea of a firefighters’ memorial, too, although it ought to be privately funded like some of the other memorials. The monument is to cost $1.1 million and McDaniel’s generosity puts the fund within $64,000 of the goal.
But the $100,000 did not come from McDaniel’s personal checkbook. While the cash did not come directly from taxpayers it was state money, and it should have been spent like your sales-tax dollars —according to the most urgent needs of the state.
The money was part of Arkansas’ share of the proceeds from the settlement of a lawsuit against Pfizer Inc. brought by 33 states, including Arkansas, over the company’s marketing of the drugs Bextra and Celebrex. The settlement followed a five-year investigation going back early in the decade. The state has participated in a number of such multistate lawsuits the past 40 years and reaped many millions of dollars in judgments and settlements from wayward corporations, the tobacco companies being the most famous ones.
McDaniel did not claim that it was his personal gift, although he would later suggest that it came about because of his good lawyering. He might have mentioned the lawyering of his predecessor and the attorneys general of 32 other states and the District of Columbia. But he got lots of political credit for the gesture. Will firefighters, their families and admirers forget his gesture at the next election?
But a little politicking with state money is not our big concern. The governor, mayors, federal and state lawmakers do it all the time. After all, it is for a cause, which, though private, many people will support.
Our problem is that it is unconstitutional and, even if it were constitutional, poor public policy. The Constitution says not once but twice that the state cannot pay any money out of the state treasury without an appropriation. An appropriation is an act passed by the state legislature and signed by the governor that determines what the state can spend money on and how much.
Yes, yes, we know that the Arkansas Supreme Court made a screwball decision in 1949 that said if state money somehow did not actually find its way into the treasury in the first place it could be spent without an appropriation and pretty much however the person or agency that got their hands on the money wanted to spend it. It’s called the “cash funds case” and state colleges and universities and some other institutions have loved it. The chief justice, Griffin Smith, was appalled at his colleagues’ decision and predicted great mischief as a result. He was right.
As you could have anticipated, the ruling was an invitation to create cash funds and avoid the controls on their spending. Now cash funds total some $6.5 billion a year, although the legislature over the years has forced agencies and institutions to submit most of it to the appropriation process. That is good because the legislature, for better or worse, is the body all of us depend upon to weigh the vast needs of the state and to distribute the state’s assets according to those needs.
McDaniel’s little subsidy to the firefighters makes a perfect example of the need to bring the cash funds under control. Not because more statuary on the Capitol’s grounds is a bad idea, although some argue that there is too much already, but because the state has vast unmet needs and the firefighters’ statue ought to be measured against the rest.
The attorneys generals of the states have been racking up some big settlements, and we can’t say that McDaniel has been spending Arkansas’ share of them foolishly. Millions have gone to Medicaid, which has helped shore up the Medicaid fund during the fiscal crisis. But the Constitution did not anticipate that the attorney general would determine how a big share of the state’s money is spent. He’s the state’s lawyer, nothing more. We invest the legislature with the power to determine state needs. We don’t always like its priorities, but that is the system the founders came up with. We should live with it.
General McDaniel eloquently explained why he was doing it. The Capitol ought to be the host for a “permanent reminder of our fallen firefighters’ heroic efforts,” he said. We like the idea of a firefighters’ memorial, too, although it ought to be privately funded like some of the other memorials. The monument is to cost $1.1 million and McDaniel’s generosity puts the fund within $64,000 of the goal.
But the $100,000 did not come from McDaniel’s personal checkbook. While the cash did not come directly from taxpayers it was state money, and it should have been spent like your sales-tax dollars —according to the most urgent needs of the state.
The money was part of Arkansas’ share of the proceeds from the settlement of a lawsuit against Pfizer Inc. brought by 33 states, including Arkansas, over the company’s marketing of the drugs Bextra and Celebrex. The settlement followed a five-year investigation going back early in the decade. The state has participated in a number of such multistate lawsuits the past 40 years and reaped many millions of dollars in judgments and settlements from wayward corporations, the tobacco companies being the most famous ones.
McDaniel did not claim that it was his personal gift, although he would later suggest that it came about because of his good lawyering. He might have mentioned the lawyering of his predecessor and the attorneys general of 32 other states and the District of Columbia. But he got lots of political credit for the gesture. Will firefighters, their families and admirers forget his gesture at the next election?
But a little politicking with state money is not our big concern. The governor, mayors, federal and state lawmakers do it all the time. After all, it is for a cause, which, though private, many people will support.
Our problem is that it is unconstitutional and, even if it were constitutional, poor public policy. The Constitution says not once but twice that the state cannot pay any money out of the state treasury without an appropriation. An appropriation is an act passed by the state legislature and signed by the governor that determines what the state can spend money on and how much.
Yes, yes, we know that the Arkansas Supreme Court made a screwball decision in 1949 that said if state money somehow did not actually find its way into the treasury in the first place it could be spent without an appropriation and pretty much however the person or agency that got their hands on the money wanted to spend it. It’s called the “cash funds case” and state colleges and universities and some other institutions have loved it. The chief justice, Griffin Smith, was appalled at his colleagues’ decision and predicted great mischief as a result. He was right.
As you could have anticipated, the ruling was an invitation to create cash funds and avoid the controls on their spending. Now cash funds total some $6.5 billion a year, although the legislature over the years has forced agencies and institutions to submit most of it to the appropriation process. That is good because the legislature, for better or worse, is the body all of us depend upon to weigh the vast needs of the state and to distribute the state’s assets according to those needs.
McDaniel’s little subsidy to the firefighters makes a perfect example of the need to bring the cash funds under control. Not because more statuary on the Capitol’s grounds is a bad idea, although some argue that there is too much already, but because the state has vast unmet needs and the firefighters’ statue ought to be measured against the rest.
The attorneys generals of the states have been racking up some big settlements, and we can’t say that McDaniel has been spending Arkansas’ share of them foolishly. Millions have gone to Medicaid, which has helped shore up the Medicaid fund during the fiscal crisis. But the Constitution did not anticipate that the attorney general would determine how a big share of the state’s money is spent. He’s the state’s lawyer, nothing more. We invest the legislature with the power to determine state needs. We don’t always like its priorities, but that is the system the founders came up with. We should live with it.
Tuesday, July 06, 2010
TOP STORY>>Jacksonville plans two major street projects
By RICK KRON
Leader staff writer
Jacksonville will spend slightly more than $1 million to revamp two major intersections.
Aldermen last week agreed to a trimmed-down redesign of the James-Main-Dupree downtown intersection and a roundabout to solve backup and speeding problems at Main Street and Harris Road.
At the regular council meeting, City Engineer Jay Whisker presented a $512,000 plan for the downtown intersection.
The new plan includes trees, greenery, new fluted street lights, brick-lined crosswalks, a pedestrian light, sidewalks, a rebuilt retaining wall and the removal of old wooden telephone poles.
“Some people may question why we are pouring money into this intersection,” Mayor Gary Fletcher said.
“It’s because a vibrant downtown is a key to bringing in new development. “We don’t want our downtown saying we’ve seen our better days,” the mayor said. “Just look at what North Little Rock has done with its Argenta area.”
The project originally went out for bid in March. “But the numbers came in too high and we had to reduce what we wanted,” explained Whisker.
Township Building of Little Rock was awarded the contract and should start work later this summer.
Whisker said residents should expect some delays and detours while the work is being done.
The city will use a $35,000 beautification grant it received to help buy and install additional streetlights for the project.
Whisker presented three ideas to solve the traffic problems at Harris and Main, especially when North Pulaski High School and Tolleson Elementary are in session. The costs ranged from $130,000 to $590,000.
The city has a bottleneck problem at this intersection especially when school is in session. “We have to safely keep traffic moving,” Whisker said.
The cheapest fix was just to put up a signal, but no turn lanes for school traffic. “Without the turn lanes, the signal is just a Band-Aid solution,” Whisker said.
Adding the turn lanes would take property away from at least four homeowners and raise the cost from $130,000 to $585,000.
Whisker recommended a roundabout, at a cost of between $570,000 and $590,000, depending on the size of the roundabout.
“It keeps the traffic flowing, minimizes the delays and is the greenest approach,” Whisker said. The council agreed.
Whisker said once work starts it will take about 180 days to complete the project.
In other council business:
Taria Dodge, with Waste Management, presented the city with $25,000 for scholarships. The company has been supporting scholarships through the city’s education foundation for more than 10 years and has contributed over $400,000.
Alderman Bob Stroud said, “This money goes to help students who would not normally qualify for a scholarship get a taste of college and hopefully continue with their education.” This year’s donation will help about three dozen young people.
The council approved a resolution supporting the city’s efforts to obtain 50/50 matching grants from the Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism’s outdoor grant program.
If the city receives a grant, it will be required to match the fund. The city’s parks and recreation department wants to use the grant to improve the entrance to Dupree Park now that the city has torn down the boarded up Manor House Apartments next to the park’s entrance.
In his monthly report to the council, Police Chief Gary Sipes said his department responded to 4,395 compliant calls in May, compared to 2,979 a year ago.
The police made 323 adult arrests and 44 juvenile arrests during the month.
Going through the chart of violent crimes, the city had no murders in May (and none for the year to date), five rapes or sexual assault cases, eight robberies, 10 felony assaults, 19 burglaries, 78 thefts, 12 vehicle thefts and no arson cases.
Fire Chief John Vanderhoof, in his monthly report, said his department responded to 116 rescue calls, 54 still alarms, 22 general alarms and had 236 ambulance runs during May.
Estimated fire loss was put at $500 for the month, while fire savings was estimated at $65,500.
In his monthly report to the council, Public Works Director Jim Oakley said the animal shelter received 126 dogs and 82 cats in May. The shelter returned 32 dogs and two cats to their owners, adopted out 43 dogs and 49 cats and euthanized 28 dogs and 72 cats.
There were three dog and two cat bites reported during May.
The dog attacks (all minor) included a Lab mix, a heeler and a Chihuahua. Both cats were stray kittens that individuals tried to catch.
The council approved the final plat for Base Meadows, Phase III which will allow the construction of 14 additional single-family homes in the subdivision off Hwy. 107 near the back gate of the air base.
Aldermen also approved rezoning property at the corner of Stanphill Road and Lemac Drive from mobile-home status to R-1A for single-family homes on small lots.
Finance director Paul Mushrush asked the council permission to close the library-construction account.
“All the bills have been paid for the new library and the account has a zero balance,” he explained. The council approved his request.
The council reappointed Fred Belote to the city’s sewer commission. His new term will expire in 2015.
Leader staff writer
Jacksonville will spend slightly more than $1 million to revamp two major intersections.
Aldermen last week agreed to a trimmed-down redesign of the James-Main-Dupree downtown intersection and a roundabout to solve backup and speeding problems at Main Street and Harris Road.
At the regular council meeting, City Engineer Jay Whisker presented a $512,000 plan for the downtown intersection.
The new plan includes trees, greenery, new fluted street lights, brick-lined crosswalks, a pedestrian light, sidewalks, a rebuilt retaining wall and the removal of old wooden telephone poles.
“Some people may question why we are pouring money into this intersection,” Mayor Gary Fletcher said.
“It’s because a vibrant downtown is a key to bringing in new development. “We don’t want our downtown saying we’ve seen our better days,” the mayor said. “Just look at what North Little Rock has done with its Argenta area.”
The project originally went out for bid in March. “But the numbers came in too high and we had to reduce what we wanted,” explained Whisker.
Township Building of Little Rock was awarded the contract and should start work later this summer.
Whisker said residents should expect some delays and detours while the work is being done.
The city will use a $35,000 beautification grant it received to help buy and install additional streetlights for the project.
Whisker presented three ideas to solve the traffic problems at Harris and Main, especially when North Pulaski High School and Tolleson Elementary are in session. The costs ranged from $130,000 to $590,000.
The city has a bottleneck problem at this intersection especially when school is in session. “We have to safely keep traffic moving,” Whisker said.
The cheapest fix was just to put up a signal, but no turn lanes for school traffic. “Without the turn lanes, the signal is just a Band-Aid solution,” Whisker said.
Adding the turn lanes would take property away from at least four homeowners and raise the cost from $130,000 to $585,000.
Whisker recommended a roundabout, at a cost of between $570,000 and $590,000, depending on the size of the roundabout.
“It keeps the traffic flowing, minimizes the delays and is the greenest approach,” Whisker said. The council agreed.
Whisker said once work starts it will take about 180 days to complete the project.
In other council business:
Taria Dodge, with Waste Management, presented the city with $25,000 for scholarships. The company has been supporting scholarships through the city’s education foundation for more than 10 years and has contributed over $400,000.
Alderman Bob Stroud said, “This money goes to help students who would not normally qualify for a scholarship get a taste of college and hopefully continue with their education.” This year’s donation will help about three dozen young people.
The council approved a resolution supporting the city’s efforts to obtain 50/50 matching grants from the Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism’s outdoor grant program.
If the city receives a grant, it will be required to match the fund. The city’s parks and recreation department wants to use the grant to improve the entrance to Dupree Park now that the city has torn down the boarded up Manor House Apartments next to the park’s entrance.
In his monthly report to the council, Police Chief Gary Sipes said his department responded to 4,395 compliant calls in May, compared to 2,979 a year ago.
The police made 323 adult arrests and 44 juvenile arrests during the month.
Going through the chart of violent crimes, the city had no murders in May (and none for the year to date), five rapes or sexual assault cases, eight robberies, 10 felony assaults, 19 burglaries, 78 thefts, 12 vehicle thefts and no arson cases.
Fire Chief John Vanderhoof, in his monthly report, said his department responded to 116 rescue calls, 54 still alarms, 22 general alarms and had 236 ambulance runs during May.
Estimated fire loss was put at $500 for the month, while fire savings was estimated at $65,500.
In his monthly report to the council, Public Works Director Jim Oakley said the animal shelter received 126 dogs and 82 cats in May. The shelter returned 32 dogs and two cats to their owners, adopted out 43 dogs and 49 cats and euthanized 28 dogs and 72 cats.
There were three dog and two cat bites reported during May.
The dog attacks (all minor) included a Lab mix, a heeler and a Chihuahua. Both cats were stray kittens that individuals tried to catch.
The council approved the final plat for Base Meadows, Phase III which will allow the construction of 14 additional single-family homes in the subdivision off Hwy. 107 near the back gate of the air base.
Aldermen also approved rezoning property at the corner of Stanphill Road and Lemac Drive from mobile-home status to R-1A for single-family homes on small lots.
Finance director Paul Mushrush asked the council permission to close the library-construction account.
“All the bills have been paid for the new library and the account has a zero balance,” he explained. The council approved his request.
The council reappointed Fred Belote to the city’s sewer commission. His new term will expire in 2015.
TOP STORY>>Coping with blindness in midlife
By JEFFREY SMITH
Leader staff writer
The Jacksonville Lions Club recently hosted special guest Roger Echols, a retired Army Ranger who became blind three years ago after battling ulcers.
Echols and his wife Tracey, who also attended the meeting at the Bar-B-Que Shack, moved to Jacksonville in May from Long Beach, Calif. They moved into their own home in Sunnyside last week. “I wanted to be around family,” he said, referring to his sister, Zsa Nean Jones-Lee, of Jacksonville.
They moved when their rent increased along with crime in southern California. Tracey spends much of her time helping her husband.
“Once you go blind, the biggest hurt is losing your independence. You have to depend on someone for help,” he said. “You
can’t cook. It’s like going back to kindergarten and learning all over again.
“You’ve got to learn how to read to know what you are doing, or trust someone for everything until you’re trained to operate on your own. (I) can’t go anywhere without assistance,” he said.
“It’s hard being in a new place, where you don’t know where things are,” Echols said, noting that he has knots on his shins from falling.
His blindness came from complications related to bleeding stomach ulcers. He said he had ulcers for four months without knowing.
Echols said one day he fell, got up and took a couple of more steps and then woke up in a hospital two months later. He spent the next year and half in the hospital. He suffered partial brain damage from blood loss and a lack of oxygen.
Along with the ulcers doctors found he had a cyst the size of a softball in his back.
He spent two months at a convalescent home.
During that time he worked as a freelance computer technician installing a computer system at a house in Los Angeles. On the third day of programming the system, he said everything went black for 10 minutes. Every day the darkness grew, and four months later, his vision was completely gone. His optic nerves had died.
“On good days I can see light and dark. Most of the time I see black,” Echols said.
He wears dark sunglasses because ultraviolet light hurts his eyes. He said that sunlight makes him feel as if he had been hit with a bat.
Now he touches everything in a room to make a topographical map in his head.
“If someone moves something, it feels like I’m lost again. It throws you way off. You are following the map in your head,” he said.
“I’m his eyes,” Tracey said. “I’m very protective.” She’s also still getting adjusted to his blindness. “He holds on to me for balance. I have to let him know about stairs and where they are.”
Her husband said, “She has to tell me to step up, step down, when to duck and how far to go.”
The VA paid for a folding walking stick for him, a clock for his home and a digital book reader. He wears an atomic wristwatch that reads him the time.
Echols is learning to read Braille.
He encourages veterans who have sight problems to contact the VA or the Braille Institute. “Please seek them, they have so many services for the visually impaired,” he said.
He discussed the frustrations of being visually impaired, but he’s faced tough challenges before as an Army ranger.
“In a crowded room I hear everything coming at me at once,” he said. “You have to learn how to pick out what to listen to out of the jumble.
“Touching is a trip,” he said, “Anything that touches your face is spooky.”
He said, “I didn’t want to be a bum and pick up cans. I didn’t want to be a burden on nobody. I felt worthless. I felt like Captain Dunsel.”
“I want to earn a living instead of have it handed to me,” possibly teaching those who are recently blinded, he said.
Echols plans to write a book about serving in the military.
“Before I went blind I started it. Page one to the end is in my head,” he said.
He was in the Army for 22 years and served three years in the Reserves. He retired from the Army in 1999 as a master sergeant. He was in the 101st Airborne Air Assault Division.
He said he started out as a missile technician, but joined the infantry. When he re-enlisted three years later he moved to the Rangers.
He explained that Rangers rescue other teams if negotiations have been unsuccessful.
He said he had 1,700 parachute jumps as a Ranger and 16 HALO (high-altitude low-opening) jumps. The HALO jumps required oxygen when jumping from the plane.
“You can see the curve of the Earth and the stars. I miss it all so much,” he said.
Echols was involved in 19 peacekeeping missions in South America during the 1980s.
He fought child soldiers in the Colombian jungles before Desert Storm. He spoke about having to kill a child who had a C-4 and an AK-47 on a suicide mission.
“Either I drop him, or he would drop our team,” Echols said.
“I still see that little boy’s face. It was about survival,” he said.
“These people are willing to kill you. It will change you. War definitely changes you,” he said.
Echols has flashbacks from fighting.
He served in Iraq and in Kuwait during Desert Storm.
“It was fun and dangerous, because of a lot of friendly-fire accidents,” he said.
He said the Army had a lot of new equipment but not enough old soldiers to train the younger ones as much of the older military staff had retired.
He continued, “As rangers we can crawl in the sands for days. When you get to your objective, kill everything in sight, except the package.
“I would always call my mom before each mission and she said, ‘I don’t care what it takes or what you have to do, come home.
Don’t die over there,” Echols said.
He said over his career, he rescued a couple hundred people. During the Gulf War, he said he rescued about 30 people, including officers.
After getting out of the service, he earned a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering.
He worked at Forsythe Inter-national for a year and half before working for himself as a computer technician and repairman.
He has seven children from a previous relationship. He is going to be a grandfather next month. Tracey has four children.
Leader staff writer
The Jacksonville Lions Club recently hosted special guest Roger Echols, a retired Army Ranger who became blind three years ago after battling ulcers.
Echols and his wife Tracey, who also attended the meeting at the Bar-B-Que Shack, moved to Jacksonville in May from Long Beach, Calif. They moved into their own home in Sunnyside last week. “I wanted to be around family,” he said, referring to his sister, Zsa Nean Jones-Lee, of Jacksonville.
They moved when their rent increased along with crime in southern California. Tracey spends much of her time helping her husband.
“Once you go blind, the biggest hurt is losing your independence. You have to depend on someone for help,” he said. “You
can’t cook. It’s like going back to kindergarten and learning all over again.
“You’ve got to learn how to read to know what you are doing, or trust someone for everything until you’re trained to operate on your own. (I) can’t go anywhere without assistance,” he said.
“It’s hard being in a new place, where you don’t know where things are,” Echols said, noting that he has knots on his shins from falling.
His blindness came from complications related to bleeding stomach ulcers. He said he had ulcers for four months without knowing.
Echols said one day he fell, got up and took a couple of more steps and then woke up in a hospital two months later. He spent the next year and half in the hospital. He suffered partial brain damage from blood loss and a lack of oxygen.
Along with the ulcers doctors found he had a cyst the size of a softball in his back.
He spent two months at a convalescent home.
During that time he worked as a freelance computer technician installing a computer system at a house in Los Angeles. On the third day of programming the system, he said everything went black for 10 minutes. Every day the darkness grew, and four months later, his vision was completely gone. His optic nerves had died.
“On good days I can see light and dark. Most of the time I see black,” Echols said.
He wears dark sunglasses because ultraviolet light hurts his eyes. He said that sunlight makes him feel as if he had been hit with a bat.
Now he touches everything in a room to make a topographical map in his head.
“If someone moves something, it feels like I’m lost again. It throws you way off. You are following the map in your head,” he said.
“I’m his eyes,” Tracey said. “I’m very protective.” She’s also still getting adjusted to his blindness. “He holds on to me for balance. I have to let him know about stairs and where they are.”
Her husband said, “She has to tell me to step up, step down, when to duck and how far to go.”
The VA paid for a folding walking stick for him, a clock for his home and a digital book reader. He wears an atomic wristwatch that reads him the time.
Echols is learning to read Braille.
He encourages veterans who have sight problems to contact the VA or the Braille Institute. “Please seek them, they have so many services for the visually impaired,” he said.
He discussed the frustrations of being visually impaired, but he’s faced tough challenges before as an Army ranger.
“In a crowded room I hear everything coming at me at once,” he said. “You have to learn how to pick out what to listen to out of the jumble.
“Touching is a trip,” he said, “Anything that touches your face is spooky.”
He said, “I didn’t want to be a bum and pick up cans. I didn’t want to be a burden on nobody. I felt worthless. I felt like Captain Dunsel.”
“I want to earn a living instead of have it handed to me,” possibly teaching those who are recently blinded, he said.
Echols plans to write a book about serving in the military.
“Before I went blind I started it. Page one to the end is in my head,” he said.
He was in the Army for 22 years and served three years in the Reserves. He retired from the Army in 1999 as a master sergeant. He was in the 101st Airborne Air Assault Division.
He said he started out as a missile technician, but joined the infantry. When he re-enlisted three years later he moved to the Rangers.
He explained that Rangers rescue other teams if negotiations have been unsuccessful.
He said he had 1,700 parachute jumps as a Ranger and 16 HALO (high-altitude low-opening) jumps. The HALO jumps required oxygen when jumping from the plane.
“You can see the curve of the Earth and the stars. I miss it all so much,” he said.
Echols was involved in 19 peacekeeping missions in South America during the 1980s.
He fought child soldiers in the Colombian jungles before Desert Storm. He spoke about having to kill a child who had a C-4 and an AK-47 on a suicide mission.
“Either I drop him, or he would drop our team,” Echols said.
“I still see that little boy’s face. It was about survival,” he said.
“These people are willing to kill you. It will change you. War definitely changes you,” he said.
Echols has flashbacks from fighting.
He served in Iraq and in Kuwait during Desert Storm.
“It was fun and dangerous, because of a lot of friendly-fire accidents,” he said.
He said the Army had a lot of new equipment but not enough old soldiers to train the younger ones as much of the older military staff had retired.
He continued, “As rangers we can crawl in the sands for days. When you get to your objective, kill everything in sight, except the package.
“I would always call my mom before each mission and she said, ‘I don’t care what it takes or what you have to do, come home.
Don’t die over there,” Echols said.
He said over his career, he rescued a couple hundred people. During the Gulf War, he said he rescued about 30 people, including officers.
After getting out of the service, he earned a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering.
He worked at Forsythe Inter-national for a year and half before working for himself as a computer technician and repairman.
He has seven children from a previous relationship. He is going to be a grandfather next month. Tracey has four children.
TOP STORY>>Districts given test results at year-end
By RICK KRON
Leader staff writer
Several area schools were perfect or near perfect on end-of-year testing in math, but they all scored below average in biology.
Only 21 Lonoke Middle School students took the federally mandated algebra end-of-course exam this spring, but all 21 scored advanced.
They join all 109 Cabot Junior High School North students, who scored proficient or advanced on the geometry end-of-course exam, and 99 percent of Cabot Junior High South’s 72 students taking the test also did the same. In Cabot, 88 percent of the students taking the algebra end-of-course exam scored proficient or advanced.
Students completing algebra I, geometry or biology had to take state and federally required end-of-course exams.
By scoring advanced on the algebra exam, the Lonoke students won’t have to worry about any remediation or retakes as this is the first year that students take some of the responsibility for their test scores.
Overall, 76 percent of students across the state taking the algebra exam scored proficient or advanced, 69 percent did so on the geometry exam and just 40 percent scored proficient or advanced on the biology exam.
Beebe, Cabot, Lonoke and Searcy all surpassed the state average on the algebra exam. England and Lisa Academy-North tied with the state.
Pulaski County Special School District was five points below the state average, and Jacksonville High School, with just 49 percent of the students scoring proficient or better, had the second worst passing rate in the district.
The high school had the worst passing rate in PCSSD on the geometry end-of-course exam at 37 percent proficient or advanced. Only 9 percent scored proficient (and none advanced) on the biology end-of-course exam.
Student scores on the algebra and geometry exam are used to determine if a school is in need of improvement under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
The algebra end-of-course exam is now called a high-stakes exam, meaning that ninth-graders and younger who took the exam this past school year had passed the test. Those who failed their first try will have two opportunities to undergo remediation and then retake the exam. If they still fail after three attempts, an alternative for remediation will be made available and they will take an alternative computer-based exam, explained Julie Thompson, with the state Education Department.
Statewide, more than 90 percent of the seventh-, eighth- and ninth-graders taking the algebra end-of-course exam passed.
The cutoff for passing the test is slightly lower than the cut-off considered proficient.
ALGEBRA
In Beebe, 144 junior high school students took the exam and 87 percent scored proficient or advanced. At the high school level, 105 students took the test and 43 percent made the cut, giving the district an average of 79 percent proficient or advanced.
In Cabot, 372 students from Cabot Junior High North took the exam and 89 percent scored proficient or advanced. At Cabot Junior High South, 334 students took the exam and 86 percent made the cut, while 19 students took the end-of-course exam at the Academic Center of Excellence and 89 percent scored proficient and advanced.
Overall, 732 Cabot students took the exam and 88 percent made the cut.
At Lisa’s Academy-North in Sherwood, 34 students took the exam and 76 percent scored proficient or advanced.
In Lonoke, 21 middle school students took the exam and all scored advanced. At the high school, 108 students took the algebra test and 79 percent made the cut, giving the district an average of 82 percent scoring proficient or advanced.
In Pulaski County, 1,079 students took the exam and 71 percent scored proficient or advanced.
At Jacksonville Middle School, 53 students took the test and 75 percent made the cut; 98 percent of the 59 students at Sylvan Hills Middle School scored proficient or better, while 89 percent of the 72 Northwood students did the same.
Sylvan Hills High School had 126 students take the algebra exam and 71 percent scored proficient or advanced, 71 percent of 139 North Pulaski High students also made the cut, while just 49 percent of Jacksonville High School’s 173 students scored proficient or advanced.
GEOMETRY
In the Beebe School District, 237 students took the end-of-course exam in the spring and 76 percent scored proficient or advanced. The state average was 69 percent.
Of the 107 students taking the exam at Cabot Junior High North, all of them—100 percent—scored proficient or advanced. At Cabot Junior High South, 72 students took the exam and 99 percent made the grade.
At Cabot High School, 425 students took the exam with 79 percent scoring proficient or advanced, bringing the district average to 84 percent making the cut.
At Lisa Academy-North, 23 students took the exam and all of them—100 percent—scored proficient or advanced.
Lonoke School District had 98 students take the geometry end-of-course exam and 70 percent scored proficient or advanced.
In the PCSSD, 870 students took the exam and 59 percent scored proficient or advanced.
At Sylvan Hills High School, 143 students took the exam and 65 percent made the cut, 62 percent of the 171 students at North Pulaski High scored proficient or advanced, while just 37 percent of Jacksonville High School’s 181 students taking the test made the cut.
BIOLOGY
All schools and districts did worse in biology than in the math exams. The state average for scoring proficient or advanced on the spring biology exam was just 36 percent.
In Beebe, 218 students took the exam and 45 percent scored proficient or advanced.
Lisa Academy-North had 22 students take the test and 46 percent made the cut.
In Lonoke, 109 students took the test and just 27 percent scored proficient or advanced.
PCSSD had 1,000 students take the biology end-of-course exam and just 21 percent scored proficient or advanced.
North Pulaski High had 180 students taking the test with 28 percent making the grade. Sylvan Hills had 22 percent of its 196 students score proficient or advanced. Jacksonville High School had 238 students take the test, but just 9 percent scored proficient (none scored advanced).
Leader staff writer
Several area schools were perfect or near perfect on end-of-year testing in math, but they all scored below average in biology.
Only 21 Lonoke Middle School students took the federally mandated algebra end-of-course exam this spring, but all 21 scored advanced.
They join all 109 Cabot Junior High School North students, who scored proficient or advanced on the geometry end-of-course exam, and 99 percent of Cabot Junior High South’s 72 students taking the test also did the same. In Cabot, 88 percent of the students taking the algebra end-of-course exam scored proficient or advanced.
Students completing algebra I, geometry or biology had to take state and federally required end-of-course exams.
By scoring advanced on the algebra exam, the Lonoke students won’t have to worry about any remediation or retakes as this is the first year that students take some of the responsibility for their test scores.
Overall, 76 percent of students across the state taking the algebra exam scored proficient or advanced, 69 percent did so on the geometry exam and just 40 percent scored proficient or advanced on the biology exam.
Beebe, Cabot, Lonoke and Searcy all surpassed the state average on the algebra exam. England and Lisa Academy-North tied with the state.
Pulaski County Special School District was five points below the state average, and Jacksonville High School, with just 49 percent of the students scoring proficient or better, had the second worst passing rate in the district.
The high school had the worst passing rate in PCSSD on the geometry end-of-course exam at 37 percent proficient or advanced. Only 9 percent scored proficient (and none advanced) on the biology end-of-course exam.
Student scores on the algebra and geometry exam are used to determine if a school is in need of improvement under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
The algebra end-of-course exam is now called a high-stakes exam, meaning that ninth-graders and younger who took the exam this past school year had passed the test. Those who failed their first try will have two opportunities to undergo remediation and then retake the exam. If they still fail after three attempts, an alternative for remediation will be made available and they will take an alternative computer-based exam, explained Julie Thompson, with the state Education Department.
Statewide, more than 90 percent of the seventh-, eighth- and ninth-graders taking the algebra end-of-course exam passed.
The cutoff for passing the test is slightly lower than the cut-off considered proficient.
ALGEBRA
In Beebe, 144 junior high school students took the exam and 87 percent scored proficient or advanced. At the high school level, 105 students took the test and 43 percent made the cut, giving the district an average of 79 percent proficient or advanced.
In Cabot, 372 students from Cabot Junior High North took the exam and 89 percent scored proficient or advanced. At Cabot Junior High South, 334 students took the exam and 86 percent made the cut, while 19 students took the end-of-course exam at the Academic Center of Excellence and 89 percent scored proficient and advanced.
Overall, 732 Cabot students took the exam and 88 percent made the cut.
At Lisa’s Academy-North in Sherwood, 34 students took the exam and 76 percent scored proficient or advanced.
In Lonoke, 21 middle school students took the exam and all scored advanced. At the high school, 108 students took the algebra test and 79 percent made the cut, giving the district an average of 82 percent scoring proficient or advanced.
In Pulaski County, 1,079 students took the exam and 71 percent scored proficient or advanced.
At Jacksonville Middle School, 53 students took the test and 75 percent made the cut; 98 percent of the 59 students at Sylvan Hills Middle School scored proficient or better, while 89 percent of the 72 Northwood students did the same.
Sylvan Hills High School had 126 students take the algebra exam and 71 percent scored proficient or advanced, 71 percent of 139 North Pulaski High students also made the cut, while just 49 percent of Jacksonville High School’s 173 students scored proficient or advanced.
GEOMETRY
In the Beebe School District, 237 students took the end-of-course exam in the spring and 76 percent scored proficient or advanced. The state average was 69 percent.
Of the 107 students taking the exam at Cabot Junior High North, all of them—100 percent—scored proficient or advanced. At Cabot Junior High South, 72 students took the exam and 99 percent made the grade.
At Cabot High School, 425 students took the exam with 79 percent scoring proficient or advanced, bringing the district average to 84 percent making the cut.
At Lisa Academy-North, 23 students took the exam and all of them—100 percent—scored proficient or advanced.
Lonoke School District had 98 students take the geometry end-of-course exam and 70 percent scored proficient or advanced.
In the PCSSD, 870 students took the exam and 59 percent scored proficient or advanced.
At Sylvan Hills High School, 143 students took the exam and 65 percent made the cut, 62 percent of the 171 students at North Pulaski High scored proficient or advanced, while just 37 percent of Jacksonville High School’s 181 students taking the test made the cut.
BIOLOGY
All schools and districts did worse in biology than in the math exams. The state average for scoring proficient or advanced on the spring biology exam was just 36 percent.
In Beebe, 218 students took the exam and 45 percent scored proficient or advanced.
Lisa Academy-North had 22 students take the test and 46 percent made the cut.
In Lonoke, 109 students took the test and just 27 percent scored proficient or advanced.
PCSSD had 1,000 students take the biology end-of-course exam and just 21 percent scored proficient or advanced.
North Pulaski High had 180 students taking the test with 28 percent making the grade. Sylvan Hills had 22 percent of its 196 students score proficient or advanced. Jacksonville High School had 238 students take the test, but just 9 percent scored proficient (none scored advanced).
SPORTS>>Points standings making classes close at Beebe
By JASON KING
Leader sportswriter
With less than three months to go on the Beebe Speedway racing schedule, some interesting battles in the season points standings are taking shape.
Many drivers do not run for season championships and opt to simply take their programs week-to-week, but the drivers who do compete for track titles are also contenders for weekly race victories in most cases.
Consistency is as important as winning when it comes to points, and Danny Garringer’s sizeable lead in the factory-stock points is proof.
Garringer has not won a race all year, but his string of finishes in the top five has him in the factory-standings lead with 1,000 points, 84 ahead of Beebe’s Jacob Kurtz, who has three victories.
In fact, Beebe drivers have dominated the class.
Larry Wise has won a division-leading four races, while Kurtz and fellow Beebe racer Ricky Wilhite each have three. Wise sits third in the standings with 795 points while Wilhite, who missed a month of competition, is fourth with 716 points.
Blake Jones was leading the E-mod points before the weekend, but sat out last week to compete in the modified event in Randy Weaver’s backup F1 car.
Jones entered the weekend with 1,030 points, while Cabot’s Todd Joslin had 999 and Augusta driver Robert Woodard had 994.
Woodard, the defending E-mod champion at Beebe, led for the first part of the season after he won four of the first five races.
But since May 7, Woodard has not been able to return to victory lane and has failed to finish three times.
That has allowed Jones and Joslin to move past Woodard, but Joslin was a no-show last weekend, and with Jones competing in another class, Woodard was in a position to retake the points lead.
Woodard had just five points to make up on Joslin, which he did simply by starting the race. But he struggled to an 11th-place finish to make his points battle with Jones very close.
Woodard and Jones are also tied for most race victories in the economy class with four each. Lane Cullum is the only other multiple-race winner with two victories in the economies.
Joslin, Kevin Conway and Tommy Burkhead are the other winners in the class.
Little Rock’s Paul Shackleford holds a commanding 1,168 points in the mini-stock season standings after winning the last two feature events. Cabot’s Doyle Blankenship is second with 1,090 points, but Shackleford’s toughest competition of late has been Mike Millwood, also of Cabot.
Millwood reeled off three straight victories beginning in June, which moved him up to third in points with 1,050.
The street-stock division has competed five times at Beebe this season, with Hensley driver Willy Gillam winning three of those races to take the points lead with 597. Scotty Misenheimer is close behind with 588 points and one race victory, while late model and modified veteran Chuck McGinty of Conway won the first street race of the year.
More proof consistency is as effective as winning can be found in the hobby-stock class, where Searcy driver Gage Raines holds a lead of more than 150 points over Benton’s Jeff Porterfield. Raines has a feature victory under his belt, but Porterfield has dominated the class with seven victories in 13 nights of racing.
In fact, Porterfield is the only driver with more than one victory this season. Derek Goshein, Danny Campbell, Greg Carlin, Jeremy Kester, Brody Welcher and Raines each have one victory.
A couple of no-shows and a couple of nights of bad luck have Porterfield second in the standings with 944 points to Raines’ 1,117. Cody Kierre sits third with 894 points.
Randy Weaver’s bid to win three straight modified championships and become the division’s first five-time track champion at Beebe is a go. The Little Rock driver holds a 116-point lead over Curtis Cook.
Weaver has won six features and has a string of consistent top-five finishes that has given him 1,014 points to Cook’s 898.
Romance’s Todd Greer is third in points with 875 despite missing a couple of weeks.
Weaver’s six victories put him three ahead of Cook, who has three, while Mike Bowers has two. The only other driver to win in modifieds this season is Patrick Linn of Little Rock.
Leader sportswriter
With less than three months to go on the Beebe Speedway racing schedule, some interesting battles in the season points standings are taking shape.
Many drivers do not run for season championships and opt to simply take their programs week-to-week, but the drivers who do compete for track titles are also contenders for weekly race victories in most cases.
Consistency is as important as winning when it comes to points, and Danny Garringer’s sizeable lead in the factory-stock points is proof.
Garringer has not won a race all year, but his string of finishes in the top five has him in the factory-standings lead with 1,000 points, 84 ahead of Beebe’s Jacob Kurtz, who has three victories.
In fact, Beebe drivers have dominated the class.
Larry Wise has won a division-leading four races, while Kurtz and fellow Beebe racer Ricky Wilhite each have three. Wise sits third in the standings with 795 points while Wilhite, who missed a month of competition, is fourth with 716 points.
Blake Jones was leading the E-mod points before the weekend, but sat out last week to compete in the modified event in Randy Weaver’s backup F1 car.
Jones entered the weekend with 1,030 points, while Cabot’s Todd Joslin had 999 and Augusta driver Robert Woodard had 994.
Woodard, the defending E-mod champion at Beebe, led for the first part of the season after he won four of the first five races.
But since May 7, Woodard has not been able to return to victory lane and has failed to finish three times.
That has allowed Jones and Joslin to move past Woodard, but Joslin was a no-show last weekend, and with Jones competing in another class, Woodard was in a position to retake the points lead.
Woodard had just five points to make up on Joslin, which he did simply by starting the race. But he struggled to an 11th-place finish to make his points battle with Jones very close.
Woodard and Jones are also tied for most race victories in the economy class with four each. Lane Cullum is the only other multiple-race winner with two victories in the economies.
Joslin, Kevin Conway and Tommy Burkhead are the other winners in the class.
Little Rock’s Paul Shackleford holds a commanding 1,168 points in the mini-stock season standings after winning the last two feature events. Cabot’s Doyle Blankenship is second with 1,090 points, but Shackleford’s toughest competition of late has been Mike Millwood, also of Cabot.
Millwood reeled off three straight victories beginning in June, which moved him up to third in points with 1,050.
The street-stock division has competed five times at Beebe this season, with Hensley driver Willy Gillam winning three of those races to take the points lead with 597. Scotty Misenheimer is close behind with 588 points and one race victory, while late model and modified veteran Chuck McGinty of Conway won the first street race of the year.
More proof consistency is as effective as winning can be found in the hobby-stock class, where Searcy driver Gage Raines holds a lead of more than 150 points over Benton’s Jeff Porterfield. Raines has a feature victory under his belt, but Porterfield has dominated the class with seven victories in 13 nights of racing.
In fact, Porterfield is the only driver with more than one victory this season. Derek Goshein, Danny Campbell, Greg Carlin, Jeremy Kester, Brody Welcher and Raines each have one victory.
A couple of no-shows and a couple of nights of bad luck have Porterfield second in the standings with 944 points to Raines’ 1,117. Cody Kierre sits third with 894 points.
Randy Weaver’s bid to win three straight modified championships and become the division’s first five-time track champion at Beebe is a go. The Little Rock driver holds a 116-point lead over Curtis Cook.
Weaver has won six features and has a string of consistent top-five finishes that has given him 1,014 points to Cook’s 898.
Romance’s Todd Greer is third in points with 875 despite missing a couple of weeks.
Weaver’s six victories put him three ahead of Cook, who has three, while Mike Bowers has two. The only other driver to win in modifieds this season is Patrick Linn of Little Rock.
SPORTS>>Fast finish comes from humble start
By TODD TRAUB
Leader sports editor
I don’t do anything in the morning without having my coffee first, and that includes running a 5K.
But my daily ritual cost me in the Firecracker 5K in Little Rock on Saturday.
In fact I can safely say, thanks to a pre-race, coffee-induced pit stop, I was the very last man to start the annual, 3.2-mile downhill run.
The race has been held on or near the Fourth of July since 1976, and thanks to the mostly downhill course it is the fastest 5K in Arkansas. Records aren’t official because of the steep layout, but among the past competitors are some noteworthy names:
Bill Rogers, Joan Benoit Samuelson and Frank Shorter.
It has been a bit of a tough year for me, and I wanted to do something in the form of exercise and goal setting to give my esteem, not to mention my heart, a boost. So after a couple months of training, I signed up the Monday before the race.
Steaming coffee mug in hand I drove from Cabot — the unofficial strip-mall capitol of the world — to the Capitol City for the 7:30 a.m. start. The goal I kept in mind on the way was simple —run the entire race, no walking — and finish strong.
I found the registration table just off Kavanaugh Boulevard and affixed my race number 330 to my shirt, idly wondering if I’d finish in 33 minutes. It seemed like a possibility based on nothing I’d done while training.
I never timed myself on the 1 ½-mile up- and downhill course I have been running at Cabot. I just figured if I ran uphill in 90-degree temperatures in the late afternoon, I should be able to go downhill in the relative cool of the early morning.
In line with race etiquette and tradition I took my place near the back of the pack, several blocks behind the start line. The front was for the fast people with the low numbers, you know, the ones for whom it was really going to be a race.
I stretched and did a few warmup jogs, then I began to worry, thanks to my two big cups of Colombia’s finest, that I ought to go before I went. But where?
Short of knocking on some stranger’s door, I was at a loss. Then I saw a home under renovation and the portable facility the construction crew had left at the site.
Salvation.
But while I was in the little fiberglass booth, the race began, and when I burst out I saw the rearest of the rear echelon had passed by and even the trailing police car was rolling.
I had to sprint across lawns and hurdle hedges just to take my place at the last of the column before crossing the start line. I worried someone would think I was trying to sneak into the competition, like those marathon runners who cheat by joining a race after it starts.
Except who, besides me, would join the pack at the very end?
Soon I was hearing the cheers and encouragement from the local residents, some still in their pajamas, who were out on their porches. My split time at the first mile was close to 12:00, but the clock started for the lead runners, not those of us in the back of the pack, or the restroom.
The decline got steeper and the course faster. I attempted to drink a cup of water after the second mile, like a real runner, and poured half of it down my front before giving up.
With War Memorial Stadium in sight I began to see skinny runners trotting back UP the hill holding what looked like sticks of dynamite. Either they were in hot pursuit of the Road Runner, or these were the top 100 finishers who had received firecracker replica trophies and were already running back to their cars, or showing off, as I liked to think of it.
A left off Fair Park leads to the Firecracker’s dirty little secret: It’s not all downhill; there is a steady climb just before the finish, right past the zoo and its assorted odors.
But I had paced myself for this reason and I chugged up the hill through the perfume of the monkey house, took my final left and cruised to the finish in an unofficial time of 34:00, roughly 10:30 per mile.
Men’s winner Josephat Boit, who finished in 13:48.43, was probably home and showered by the time I came in, but if I hadn’t started my race in the outhouse I’m sure I could have given him a real challenge.
Yet I still had something in common with Boit, women’s winner Leah Thorvilson and all those reedy whippets clinging to their sticks of fake dynamite.
I finished, with my heart and self esteem intact.
Leader sports editor
I don’t do anything in the morning without having my coffee first, and that includes running a 5K.
But my daily ritual cost me in the Firecracker 5K in Little Rock on Saturday.
In fact I can safely say, thanks to a pre-race, coffee-induced pit stop, I was the very last man to start the annual, 3.2-mile downhill run.
The race has been held on or near the Fourth of July since 1976, and thanks to the mostly downhill course it is the fastest 5K in Arkansas. Records aren’t official because of the steep layout, but among the past competitors are some noteworthy names:
Bill Rogers, Joan Benoit Samuelson and Frank Shorter.
It has been a bit of a tough year for me, and I wanted to do something in the form of exercise and goal setting to give my esteem, not to mention my heart, a boost. So after a couple months of training, I signed up the Monday before the race.
Steaming coffee mug in hand I drove from Cabot — the unofficial strip-mall capitol of the world — to the Capitol City for the 7:30 a.m. start. The goal I kept in mind on the way was simple —run the entire race, no walking — and finish strong.
I found the registration table just off Kavanaugh Boulevard and affixed my race number 330 to my shirt, idly wondering if I’d finish in 33 minutes. It seemed like a possibility based on nothing I’d done while training.
I never timed myself on the 1 ½-mile up- and downhill course I have been running at Cabot. I just figured if I ran uphill in 90-degree temperatures in the late afternoon, I should be able to go downhill in the relative cool of the early morning.
In line with race etiquette and tradition I took my place near the back of the pack, several blocks behind the start line. The front was for the fast people with the low numbers, you know, the ones for whom it was really going to be a race.
I stretched and did a few warmup jogs, then I began to worry, thanks to my two big cups of Colombia’s finest, that I ought to go before I went. But where?
Short of knocking on some stranger’s door, I was at a loss. Then I saw a home under renovation and the portable facility the construction crew had left at the site.
Salvation.
But while I was in the little fiberglass booth, the race began, and when I burst out I saw the rearest of the rear echelon had passed by and even the trailing police car was rolling.
I had to sprint across lawns and hurdle hedges just to take my place at the last of the column before crossing the start line. I worried someone would think I was trying to sneak into the competition, like those marathon runners who cheat by joining a race after it starts.
Except who, besides me, would join the pack at the very end?
Soon I was hearing the cheers and encouragement from the local residents, some still in their pajamas, who were out on their porches. My split time at the first mile was close to 12:00, but the clock started for the lead runners, not those of us in the back of the pack, or the restroom.
The decline got steeper and the course faster. I attempted to drink a cup of water after the second mile, like a real runner, and poured half of it down my front before giving up.
With War Memorial Stadium in sight I began to see skinny runners trotting back UP the hill holding what looked like sticks of dynamite. Either they were in hot pursuit of the Road Runner, or these were the top 100 finishers who had received firecracker replica trophies and were already running back to their cars, or showing off, as I liked to think of it.
A left off Fair Park leads to the Firecracker’s dirty little secret: It’s not all downhill; there is a steady climb just before the finish, right past the zoo and its assorted odors.
But I had paced myself for this reason and I chugged up the hill through the perfume of the monkey house, took my final left and cruised to the finish in an unofficial time of 34:00, roughly 10:30 per mile.
Men’s winner Josephat Boit, who finished in 13:48.43, was probably home and showered by the time I came in, but if I hadn’t started my race in the outhouse I’m sure I could have given him a real challenge.
Yet I still had something in common with Boit, women’s winner Leah Thorvilson and all those reedy whippets clinging to their sticks of fake dynamite.
I finished, with my heart and self esteem intact.
SPORTS>>Pitching propels Cabot to victory
By TODD TRAUB
Leader sports editor
A fifth-inning rally and a strong start by Chase Beasely lifted Cabot Centennial Bank to a 4-2 victory over Searcy Crain Team in the Fourth of July American Legion Classic at Dupree Park on Sunday.
“That was a real baseball game and I was happy that we were able to win a close ballgame,” Cabot coach Jay Darr said.
Cabot scored three runs in the fifth to overcome a 2-1 deficit and Beasley pitched a complete, seven-inning game.
“Our pitching has been pretty strong,” Darr said. “That’s his third time to throw this week.”
Cabot took a 1-0 lead when shortstop Matt Evans walked to lead off the fourth and, after a sacrifice by Tyler Erickson and a balk, Evans scored from third on catcher Andrew Reynolds’ single to left.
“Our team, so far this year, we’ve really been striking out a lot,” Darr said. “And so I think our approach lately has been that we just don’t give away at-bats. We put the ball in play and put the pressure on the defense, and when you do that, good things will happen.”
Searcy did the same thing to Cabot in the bottom of the fourth, putting the ball in play and getting a pair of runs aided by Cabot miscues. Beasley, who gave up two hits in the first two innings, ran into his roughest patch in the fourth.
Beasley hit Nate Leonard tolead off the inning and advanced him with a wild pitch. After Josh Spears’ groundout, Leonard scored from third when right fielder Justin Tyler dropped A.J. Chesser’s fly ball for an error.
Chesser advanced to second on Hayden Mercer’s infield hit and took third on Evans’ throwing error from shortstop on the same play as Mercer moved up to second.
Chesser scored the go-ahead run when Jacob Holland hit into a fielder’s choice.
Cabot, which loaded the bases but couldn’t score in the first, came back with its three-run fifth for the 4-2 lead.
Powell Bryant beat out an infield hit and later scored when Ty Steele hit into a fielder’s choice. Matt Turner singled to advance Steele and Steele scored on Evans’ single, and Turner scored on Erickson’s sacrifice fly.
“We’ve been hitting the ball real well up until today, that we haven’t been doing throughout the season,” Darr said. “We’ve peaked right now.”
Beasley gave up four hits and struck out seven while walking one in seven innings. He faced the minimum over the final three innings, helping himself by throwing out Hunter Mason at home on a steal attempt, and struck out three of his final six hitters.
“He was strong. He struggled early on,” Darr said. “Good pitchers a lot of times will struggle early. But he found his niche later on as we got into the game.”
Searcy starter Ross Harrison worked 4 2/3 innings, giving up Cabot’s big fifth and taking the loss after striking out three and walking two. Right fielder Bryson Scott relieved Harrison in the fifth and pitched 2 ½ hitless innings with four strikeouts and no walks.
Leader sports editor
A fifth-inning rally and a strong start by Chase Beasely lifted Cabot Centennial Bank to a 4-2 victory over Searcy Crain Team in the Fourth of July American Legion Classic at Dupree Park on Sunday.
“That was a real baseball game and I was happy that we were able to win a close ballgame,” Cabot coach Jay Darr said.
Cabot scored three runs in the fifth to overcome a 2-1 deficit and Beasley pitched a complete, seven-inning game.
“Our pitching has been pretty strong,” Darr said. “That’s his third time to throw this week.”
Cabot took a 1-0 lead when shortstop Matt Evans walked to lead off the fourth and, after a sacrifice by Tyler Erickson and a balk, Evans scored from third on catcher Andrew Reynolds’ single to left.
“Our team, so far this year, we’ve really been striking out a lot,” Darr said. “And so I think our approach lately has been that we just don’t give away at-bats. We put the ball in play and put the pressure on the defense, and when you do that, good things will happen.”
Searcy did the same thing to Cabot in the bottom of the fourth, putting the ball in play and getting a pair of runs aided by Cabot miscues. Beasley, who gave up two hits in the first two innings, ran into his roughest patch in the fourth.
Beasley hit Nate Leonard tolead off the inning and advanced him with a wild pitch. After Josh Spears’ groundout, Leonard scored from third when right fielder Justin Tyler dropped A.J. Chesser’s fly ball for an error.
Chesser advanced to second on Hayden Mercer’s infield hit and took third on Evans’ throwing error from shortstop on the same play as Mercer moved up to second.
Chesser scored the go-ahead run when Jacob Holland hit into a fielder’s choice.
Cabot, which loaded the bases but couldn’t score in the first, came back with its three-run fifth for the 4-2 lead.
Powell Bryant beat out an infield hit and later scored when Ty Steele hit into a fielder’s choice. Matt Turner singled to advance Steele and Steele scored on Evans’ single, and Turner scored on Erickson’s sacrifice fly.
“We’ve been hitting the ball real well up until today, that we haven’t been doing throughout the season,” Darr said. “We’ve peaked right now.”
Beasley gave up four hits and struck out seven while walking one in seven innings. He faced the minimum over the final three innings, helping himself by throwing out Hunter Mason at home on a steal attempt, and struck out three of his final six hitters.
“He was strong. He struggled early on,” Darr said. “Good pitchers a lot of times will struggle early. But he found his niche later on as we got into the game.”
Searcy starter Ross Harrison worked 4 2/3 innings, giving up Cabot’s big fifth and taking the loss after striking out three and walking two. Right fielder Bryson Scott relieved Harrison in the fifth and pitched 2 ½ hitless innings with four strikeouts and no walks.
SPORTS>>Bigger purse entices cars out to track in modifieds
By JASON KING
Leader sportswriter
An increased payout led to an increased car count in the modified division at Beebe Speedway on Friday.
The weekly feature paid $1,000 to the winner, and brought 26 modifieds to the track for the biggest field of cars this season.
But in the end it was points leader Randy Weaver in his F1 Shaw chassis winning in dominant fashion over North Little Rock’s
Mike Bowers and Keith Craft.
Most of the support classes struggled on the dry-slick racing surface, but the mods ran a clean show with only three cautions, one of which caused the race to end under caution when Cabot’s Jason Flory spun in turn four just after Weaver had taken the white flag.
Weaver started the 25-lap feature from the outside pole alongside fast qualifier Donnie Stringfellow. The two former state IMCA champs had a drag race to the green flag, and Weaver took the hole shot on the outside entering turn one.
Bowers and Craft started the feature from the second row, but disposed of Stringfellow by lap 12. Their window to make up ground on Weaver was small, as the leader had already hit backmarkers by the 11th circuit and quickly began to lap cars.
The driver on the move was Robert Baker, who started seventh but quickly began to work on Blake Burns for sixth. He took the spot from Burns just before the first caution on lap eight that came because of a spin by Jim Freeman and local driver Jody Jackson.
Baker took fifth from Robert Davis on the restart and followed Craft past Stringfellow two laps later for fourth, but the front three cars proved to be too stout. Baker settled into the fourth spot and had a front-row seat for Craft’s battle with Bowers for the second spot in the final laps.
The biggest incident of the night came on lap 15, when Jackson and Freeman spun again, this time hitting Flory and Dale Proctor. The crash ended the night for Jackson and Freeman as Flory and Proctor rejoined the race in the rear of the field.
Weaver handled the lapped cars with ease and cruised to his second-straight modified victory and his sixth of the season at Beebe.
Bowers held off Craft for second while Baker finished fourth and Stringfellow fifth. Searcy’s Davis held on for sixth while Little Rock driver Patrick Linn was seventh.
Vilonia’s Curtis Cook was hard charger with an eighth-place finish. Cook did not finish his heat and had to earn a transfer spot in the B-main by winning the consolation race to start the main event in the 17th spot.
Burns’s quiet run resulted in a ninth-place finish and Todd Greer rounded out the top ten in the K1 car.
Benton’s Jeff Porterfield won in the hobby-stock division while Willy Gillam beat Scotty Miesenheimer in the street-stock feature. Paul Shackleford held off a race-long challenge by Cabot driver Mike Millwood to win the mini-stock feature.
The E-mod division had its share of yellow flags and came down to another green-white-checkers finish, and it was Lane Cullum taking the victory in his No. 15 car over Bald Knob’s Kevin Conway and Ryan Redman of Beebe.
Augusta’s Robert Woodard struggled to an 11th-place finish after getting caught up in a pair of early accidents, but was still able to reclaim the points lead with leader Blake Jones and second-place points man Todd Joslin of Cabot both absent from the field on Friday.
Beebe driver Larry Wise took the most dominant victory of the night in the factory-stock feature. Wise, a veteran of the hobby-stock class, held a smooth, consistent line around the low line in his black No. 23 car and left the rest of the field to struggle through the slippery corners.
Glen Melton and Danny Garringer battled for the second spot most of the race, well behind Wise. They were never able to get close enough to the leader to contest, as the hometown favorite cruised to his fourth victory of the year.
Melton hung on for second while Garringer stayed atop the point standings with another consistent third-place run. Johnny Brown finished fourth and Beebe’s Jacob Kurtz was fifth.
The USCS is scheduled to make its second stop at Beebe this year for another modified Speedweek on Friday.
Leader sportswriter
An increased payout led to an increased car count in the modified division at Beebe Speedway on Friday.
The weekly feature paid $1,000 to the winner, and brought 26 modifieds to the track for the biggest field of cars this season.
But in the end it was points leader Randy Weaver in his F1 Shaw chassis winning in dominant fashion over North Little Rock’s
Mike Bowers and Keith Craft.
Most of the support classes struggled on the dry-slick racing surface, but the mods ran a clean show with only three cautions, one of which caused the race to end under caution when Cabot’s Jason Flory spun in turn four just after Weaver had taken the white flag.
Weaver started the 25-lap feature from the outside pole alongside fast qualifier Donnie Stringfellow. The two former state IMCA champs had a drag race to the green flag, and Weaver took the hole shot on the outside entering turn one.
Bowers and Craft started the feature from the second row, but disposed of Stringfellow by lap 12. Their window to make up ground on Weaver was small, as the leader had already hit backmarkers by the 11th circuit and quickly began to lap cars.
The driver on the move was Robert Baker, who started seventh but quickly began to work on Blake Burns for sixth. He took the spot from Burns just before the first caution on lap eight that came because of a spin by Jim Freeman and local driver Jody Jackson.
Baker took fifth from Robert Davis on the restart and followed Craft past Stringfellow two laps later for fourth, but the front three cars proved to be too stout. Baker settled into the fourth spot and had a front-row seat for Craft’s battle with Bowers for the second spot in the final laps.
The biggest incident of the night came on lap 15, when Jackson and Freeman spun again, this time hitting Flory and Dale Proctor. The crash ended the night for Jackson and Freeman as Flory and Proctor rejoined the race in the rear of the field.
Weaver handled the lapped cars with ease and cruised to his second-straight modified victory and his sixth of the season at Beebe.
Bowers held off Craft for second while Baker finished fourth and Stringfellow fifth. Searcy’s Davis held on for sixth while Little Rock driver Patrick Linn was seventh.
Vilonia’s Curtis Cook was hard charger with an eighth-place finish. Cook did not finish his heat and had to earn a transfer spot in the B-main by winning the consolation race to start the main event in the 17th spot.
Burns’s quiet run resulted in a ninth-place finish and Todd Greer rounded out the top ten in the K1 car.
Benton’s Jeff Porterfield won in the hobby-stock division while Willy Gillam beat Scotty Miesenheimer in the street-stock feature. Paul Shackleford held off a race-long challenge by Cabot driver Mike Millwood to win the mini-stock feature.
The E-mod division had its share of yellow flags and came down to another green-white-checkers finish, and it was Lane Cullum taking the victory in his No. 15 car over Bald Knob’s Kevin Conway and Ryan Redman of Beebe.
Augusta’s Robert Woodard struggled to an 11th-place finish after getting caught up in a pair of early accidents, but was still able to reclaim the points lead with leader Blake Jones and second-place points man Todd Joslin of Cabot both absent from the field on Friday.
Beebe driver Larry Wise took the most dominant victory of the night in the factory-stock feature. Wise, a veteran of the hobby-stock class, held a smooth, consistent line around the low line in his black No. 23 car and left the rest of the field to struggle through the slippery corners.
Glen Melton and Danny Garringer battled for the second spot most of the race, well behind Wise. They were never able to get close enough to the leader to contest, as the hometown favorite cruised to his fourth victory of the year.
Melton hung on for second while Garringer stayed atop the point standings with another consistent third-place run. Johnny Brown finished fourth and Beebe’s Jacob Kurtz was fifth.
The USCS is scheduled to make its second stop at Beebe this year for another modified Speedweek on Friday.
SPORTS>>Benton holds off Gwatney
By TODD TRAUB
Leader sports editor
Slow-starting Jacksonville Gwat-ney Chevrolet made it interesting, but Benton was able to hold on for an 11-8 victory in the Fourth of July American Legion Classic at Dupree Park on Sunday.
Gwatney rallied from a 4-0 deficit to tie it, and cut a 9-4 lead to 9-8 with a big fifth inning. But Benton got a pair of insurance runs in the seventh to outlast the host team.
“We made a little change on our approach at the plate,” Benton coach Russell Goodwin said. “We wanted the fly balls done away with, and we hit it hard too.”
“We just ran out of pitching,” said Gwatney coach Bob Hickingbotham, who left starter Jared Toney in for the whole game.
Gwatney tied it with a two-run fourth in which catcher Daniel Thurman hit an RBI single and scored when shortstop Kenny Cummings hit into a fielder’s choice.
Benton responded with a five-run fifth in which Jacksonville committed two errors and Blake Childress hit an RBI double and Chase Southworth hit a two-run home run over the left-field fence.
But Jacksonville wasn’t finished as it batted 10 in the bottom of the fifth. Caleb Mitchell, Jared Toney and Alex Tucker all singled and scored, with Tucker driving in a run and chasing starter Nathan Pirl from the game.
Daniel Thurman walked and scored, and D’Vone McClure drove in a run with an infield hit and Cummings drew a bases-loaded walk from reliever Cory Fitzhugh to drive in another. But Fitzhugh got Patrick Castleberry to fly out and Mitchell to ground out to finally end the inning and leave Benton clinging to its 9-8 lead.
“We hit the ball extremely well,” Hickingbotham said. “I was real proud of that. I would say that it was probably, in the last two weeks, that’s probably the best we’ve played.”
Fitzhugh collected himself to retire Gwatney in order over the final two innings. Neither he nor Pirl had pitched in the tournament.
“We’ve got the pitching, probably as strong as anybody in the state,” Goodwin said. “We’ve just got to be smarter as coaches and get the right ones in at the right time.”
Benton tacked on its final two runs in the seventh. Gene Duncan led off with an infield hit and Steven Brocks followed with a single to drive in Duncan, who advanced to third on an error and a wild pitch by Toney.
Brocks, who got to third on a throwing error by Toney, scored on Toney’s second wild pitch of the inning. Hickingbotham was about to pull Toney after he walked Southworthwith two down in the inning, but Toney signaled for one more hitter and got Austin Pfeiffer to fly out.
“That’s all you can ask them to do. That’s all I could ask them to do,” Hickingbotham said. “And again, we’re just totally out of pitching, that’s what killed us. And the kid did a great job on the mound. He stayed out there.”
Ashton Wilson walked and later took home on a double steal in the Benton first and Gene Duncan reached on a fielder’s choice and scored when Childress doubled to left. Wilson and Ethan Holicer hit RBI singles to make it 4-0 in the second.
Jacksonville, which got two on in the first and couldn’t score, cut it to 4-2 in the third when Castleberry hit an RBI double and scored on a throwing error to first by the catcher Holicer after Pirl threw a wild pitch.
“Jacksonville is swinging the bat real well,” Goodwin said. “They look good at the plate.”
Leader sports editor
Slow-starting Jacksonville Gwat-ney Chevrolet made it interesting, but Benton was able to hold on for an 11-8 victory in the Fourth of July American Legion Classic at Dupree Park on Sunday.
Gwatney rallied from a 4-0 deficit to tie it, and cut a 9-4 lead to 9-8 with a big fifth inning. But Benton got a pair of insurance runs in the seventh to outlast the host team.
“We made a little change on our approach at the plate,” Benton coach Russell Goodwin said. “We wanted the fly balls done away with, and we hit it hard too.”
“We just ran out of pitching,” said Gwatney coach Bob Hickingbotham, who left starter Jared Toney in for the whole game.
Gwatney tied it with a two-run fourth in which catcher Daniel Thurman hit an RBI single and scored when shortstop Kenny Cummings hit into a fielder’s choice.
Benton responded with a five-run fifth in which Jacksonville committed two errors and Blake Childress hit an RBI double and Chase Southworth hit a two-run home run over the left-field fence.
But Jacksonville wasn’t finished as it batted 10 in the bottom of the fifth. Caleb Mitchell, Jared Toney and Alex Tucker all singled and scored, with Tucker driving in a run and chasing starter Nathan Pirl from the game.
Daniel Thurman walked and scored, and D’Vone McClure drove in a run with an infield hit and Cummings drew a bases-loaded walk from reliever Cory Fitzhugh to drive in another. But Fitzhugh got Patrick Castleberry to fly out and Mitchell to ground out to finally end the inning and leave Benton clinging to its 9-8 lead.
“We hit the ball extremely well,” Hickingbotham said. “I was real proud of that. I would say that it was probably, in the last two weeks, that’s probably the best we’ve played.”
Fitzhugh collected himself to retire Gwatney in order over the final two innings. Neither he nor Pirl had pitched in the tournament.
“We’ve got the pitching, probably as strong as anybody in the state,” Goodwin said. “We’ve just got to be smarter as coaches and get the right ones in at the right time.”
Benton tacked on its final two runs in the seventh. Gene Duncan led off with an infield hit and Steven Brocks followed with a single to drive in Duncan, who advanced to third on an error and a wild pitch by Toney.
Brocks, who got to third on a throwing error by Toney, scored on Toney’s second wild pitch of the inning. Hickingbotham was about to pull Toney after he walked Southworthwith two down in the inning, but Toney signaled for one more hitter and got Austin Pfeiffer to fly out.
“That’s all you can ask them to do. That’s all I could ask them to do,” Hickingbotham said. “And again, we’re just totally out of pitching, that’s what killed us. And the kid did a great job on the mound. He stayed out there.”
Ashton Wilson walked and later took home on a double steal in the Benton first and Gene Duncan reached on a fielder’s choice and scored when Childress doubled to left. Wilson and Ethan Holicer hit RBI singles to make it 4-0 in the second.
Jacksonville, which got two on in the first and couldn’t score, cut it to 4-2 in the third when Castleberry hit an RBI double and scored on a throwing error to first by the catcher Holicer after Pirl threw a wild pitch.
“Jacksonville is swinging the bat real well,” Goodwin said. “They look good at the plate.”
EDITORIAL >> Would Huck lie to us?
Mike Huckabee, the Florida TV emcee, former and maybe future presidential wannabe and, yes, former governor of a poor, insular Southern state, was in Charlotte, N. C., Sunday for a July Fourth sermon at the First Baptist Church. The Charlotte Observer, the state’s largest newspaper, collared him before the service and published a long verbatim interview Monday.
He talked about how he would have handled the nation’s problems differently than George W. Bush and Barack Obama if he had been elected president or if they occur in the future when he is president. He would have allowed the banking system and U.S. automakers to crash, made people thrown out of their jobs go back to work by stopping unemployment checks and really done something about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. We can’t possibly know what he would have done about any of those problems, so we wouldn’t quarrel with anything he said.
But we pay attention when Huckabee talks about the actual past and his own part in it. He has always needed a truth squad, not because his was such a terrible record (we like lots of it) but because he has a convenient memory. The Charlotte reporter asked him how he could get the support of the tea-party crowd in the next presidential race when he had raised taxes so much in Arkansas. Huckabee replied that he was the original tea-party guy. When he started running for president in 2007 and 2008, he said, he was criticized for the very things that form the tea-party message— cutting taxes and spending. (We recall no one who ever criticized him for cutting taxes and spending, and certainly none of his Republican opponents did.)
He boasted that he had balanced the state’s budget back in Arkansas and implied that it was something unusual and very hard to do. He continued: “I lowered more taxes than I ever was a part of raising. And I raised taxes only as a part of a court-ordered issue of dealing with an education crisis.”
True and not true. Huckabee balanced the state’s budget because every Arkansas governor has no choice. The state treasurer balances the budget automatically by stopping checks to state workers and suppliers when the state’s money runs out. That is the law. The governor’s role is to plan ahead and avoid the cataclysm by ordering reductions in spending across the board well ahead so that the fiscal year ends smoothly. Or else the governor can ask the legislature to raise taxes to cover the revenue gap.
You will recall the series of sharp budget cuts that Gov. Mike Beebe ordered last year and this year to adjust spending to sharply declining tax revenues. How did Huckabee handle the same situation in 2003? He assembled the legislature in special session for a 3 percent surtax on individual and corporate incomes. That was a gutsy thing to do in hard times, but it is not a tea-party value.
Far more tax cuts than tax increases? Taxes were cut twice under Huckabee. In 1997, Democrats in the legislature proposed a sweeping income-tax cut planned by the former governor, Jim Guy Tucker, before he was forced to resign. It was the Democratic Party’s highest legislative priority in 1997 and every Democrat in the House signed on as a sponsor. The Democrats passed it and Huckabee did not veto it. As time passed and memories faded, Huckabee began to claim the tax cut as his idea, though rarely while he was in Arkansas. He did later support a reduction in taxes on income from stocks, bonds and other investments, the rich man’s tax. That is the extent of his tax-cutting record.
His tax increases are the largest in Arkansas history. For the record, here are the rest of his tax increases: a 1/8th of 1 percent increase in the sales tax for recreational programs in 1998 (he rode a bass boat down the Arkansas River to solicit support for the tax), an increase in the general sales tax by one-half of 1 percent in 1999, an increase in the sales tax of 7/8ths of 1 percent in 2003, a 2 percent tax on tobacco products in 1997, a 7 percent excise tax on tobacco in 2003, a higher tax on cigarette and tobacco permits in 1997, an increase in cigarette and tobacco taxes in 1997, a 25-cent-a-pack tax on cigarettes in 2003, a 3 percent excise tax on retail beer sales in 2001 (continued in 2003 and 2005), a 4 percent tax on mixed drinks and private clubs in 2005, an increase in the gasoline tax of 3 cents a gallon in 1999, an increase of 4 cents a gallon in the tax on diesel in 1999 (No, Arkansas voters never approved the gasoline and diesel taxes as Huckabee repeatedly insisted in 2008) and an increase in drivers’ license fees from $14 to $20 in 2001.
The Supreme Court did not direct the state to raise taxes for the schools, as Huckabee suggested at Charlotte. The court said the state needed to follow its Constitution and provide an equal and suitable education to all its children. Higher taxes and school consolidation were Huckabee’s ways to do that. Texas met the same kind of mandate entirely differently, but we thought Huckabee had it about right. If he doesn’t think he can brag about his fiscal record in a Republican milieu, at least he can be truthful. People like that in a politician.
We sometimes think that it is good that Huckabee renounced his Arkansas home and took up official residency in Florida, even if it is for tax purposes. Otherwise, Arkansas might get a reputation for shading the truth. We don’t need that. Thankfully, that’s Florida’s problem now.
He talked about how he would have handled the nation’s problems differently than George W. Bush and Barack Obama if he had been elected president or if they occur in the future when he is president. He would have allowed the banking system and U.S. automakers to crash, made people thrown out of their jobs go back to work by stopping unemployment checks and really done something about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. We can’t possibly know what he would have done about any of those problems, so we wouldn’t quarrel with anything he said.
But we pay attention when Huckabee talks about the actual past and his own part in it. He has always needed a truth squad, not because his was such a terrible record (we like lots of it) but because he has a convenient memory. The Charlotte reporter asked him how he could get the support of the tea-party crowd in the next presidential race when he had raised taxes so much in Arkansas. Huckabee replied that he was the original tea-party guy. When he started running for president in 2007 and 2008, he said, he was criticized for the very things that form the tea-party message— cutting taxes and spending. (We recall no one who ever criticized him for cutting taxes and spending, and certainly none of his Republican opponents did.)
He boasted that he had balanced the state’s budget back in Arkansas and implied that it was something unusual and very hard to do. He continued: “I lowered more taxes than I ever was a part of raising. And I raised taxes only as a part of a court-ordered issue of dealing with an education crisis.”
True and not true. Huckabee balanced the state’s budget because every Arkansas governor has no choice. The state treasurer balances the budget automatically by stopping checks to state workers and suppliers when the state’s money runs out. That is the law. The governor’s role is to plan ahead and avoid the cataclysm by ordering reductions in spending across the board well ahead so that the fiscal year ends smoothly. Or else the governor can ask the legislature to raise taxes to cover the revenue gap.
You will recall the series of sharp budget cuts that Gov. Mike Beebe ordered last year and this year to adjust spending to sharply declining tax revenues. How did Huckabee handle the same situation in 2003? He assembled the legislature in special session for a 3 percent surtax on individual and corporate incomes. That was a gutsy thing to do in hard times, but it is not a tea-party value.
Far more tax cuts than tax increases? Taxes were cut twice under Huckabee. In 1997, Democrats in the legislature proposed a sweeping income-tax cut planned by the former governor, Jim Guy Tucker, before he was forced to resign. It was the Democratic Party’s highest legislative priority in 1997 and every Democrat in the House signed on as a sponsor. The Democrats passed it and Huckabee did not veto it. As time passed and memories faded, Huckabee began to claim the tax cut as his idea, though rarely while he was in Arkansas. He did later support a reduction in taxes on income from stocks, bonds and other investments, the rich man’s tax. That is the extent of his tax-cutting record.
His tax increases are the largest in Arkansas history. For the record, here are the rest of his tax increases: a 1/8th of 1 percent increase in the sales tax for recreational programs in 1998 (he rode a bass boat down the Arkansas River to solicit support for the tax), an increase in the general sales tax by one-half of 1 percent in 1999, an increase in the sales tax of 7/8ths of 1 percent in 2003, a 2 percent tax on tobacco products in 1997, a 7 percent excise tax on tobacco in 2003, a higher tax on cigarette and tobacco permits in 1997, an increase in cigarette and tobacco taxes in 1997, a 25-cent-a-pack tax on cigarettes in 2003, a 3 percent excise tax on retail beer sales in 2001 (continued in 2003 and 2005), a 4 percent tax on mixed drinks and private clubs in 2005, an increase in the gasoline tax of 3 cents a gallon in 1999, an increase of 4 cents a gallon in the tax on diesel in 1999 (No, Arkansas voters never approved the gasoline and diesel taxes as Huckabee repeatedly insisted in 2008) and an increase in drivers’ license fees from $14 to $20 in 2001.
The Supreme Court did not direct the state to raise taxes for the schools, as Huckabee suggested at Charlotte. The court said the state needed to follow its Constitution and provide an equal and suitable education to all its children. Higher taxes and school consolidation were Huckabee’s ways to do that. Texas met the same kind of mandate entirely differently, but we thought Huckabee had it about right. If he doesn’t think he can brag about his fiscal record in a Republican milieu, at least he can be truthful. People like that in a politician.
We sometimes think that it is good that Huckabee renounced his Arkansas home and took up official residency in Florida, even if it is for tax purposes. Otherwise, Arkansas might get a reputation for shading the truth. We don’t need that. Thankfully, that’s Florida’s problem now.
Friday, July 02, 2010
TOP STORY>>Health board outlaws drug
By JOAN McCOY
Leader staff writer
The Arkansas Board of Health met Friday morning and voted for an immediate ban on the sale and distribution of the synthetic marijuana commonly called K2. The ban became effective when the governor signed it shortly after it was approved by the board.
The ban was approved according to an emergency rule, which means it is only good for 120 days. However, the board also voted to begin a ban under the regular rule-making process, which could take over when the emergency ban ends. For approval under the regular rule-making process, the ban must go through a 30-day public-comment period and review by two legislative committees, the Public Health and Welfare Committee and the Rules and Regulations Committee, legislative sub-committees that represent both the state House and Senate. That process takes about 90 days.
Asked how a board overseeing a state agency can make law, Ed Barham, spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Health, said the Health Department is authorized to protect the public health and the ban on synthetic marijuana is not so different from rules regulating, for example, septic tanks and vaccinations.
“We have pretty broad authority when it comes to protecting the public health,” Barham said.
In The Leader’s coverage area, Austin and Beebe had already banned K2 before the board of heath ban was approved. In Cabot, the city council’s fire and police committee voted this week to send an ordinance banning K2 to the full council.
Manufactured primarily in China and named for the mountain on the border of China and Pakistan that is second in height to Mt. Everest, K2 is one of several brands of synthetic pot that was included in the ban. The drug was developed during the 1990s by a team of researchers working under Dr. John Huffman, a researcher at Clemson University in South Carolina who was studying marijuana as a treatment for the nausea and loss of appetite associated with cancer drugs, Barham said. A synthetic version of the drug was needed because marijuana was illegal. It was tested on mice and never intended for humans, he said.
Barham said the Health Department banned it because its potentially harmful effects, especially to children, are not known. He added that some users have ended up in hospital emergency rooms.
Paul Halverson, doctor of public health, state health officer and director of the Arkansas Department of Health, said in a press release after the Friday morning meeting that the new regulation represents a partnership with the criminal-justice system for purposes of enforcement.
“This new law is not intended to place people into the criminal-justice system,” Halverson said. “This regulation is intended to educate the public about the dangers of this drug and illicit drug use, especially by minors. Enforcement responsibilities will fall primarily to local law enforcement and prosecutors.”
Violation of the new law will be a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not less than $100 nor more than $500 or by imprisonment not exceeding one month, or both. Each day of violation shall constitute a separate offense. Every firm, person, or corporation who violates this rule may also be assessed a civil penalty by the board. The penalty shall not exceed $1,000 for each violation. Each day of a continuing violation may be deemed a separate violation for purposes of penalty assessments.
Dr. Joe Bates, deputy state health officer and chief science officer, said that the active ingredient in K2 does not show up on any standard drug screens in use today. “However, we have found a way to test urine samples from individuals who have used the substance that will indicate whether K2 has been used by someone or not,” Bates said. “Until now, we didn’t have a way to prove that.”
Leader staff writer
The Arkansas Board of Health met Friday morning and voted for an immediate ban on the sale and distribution of the synthetic marijuana commonly called K2. The ban became effective when the governor signed it shortly after it was approved by the board.
The ban was approved according to an emergency rule, which means it is only good for 120 days. However, the board also voted to begin a ban under the regular rule-making process, which could take over when the emergency ban ends. For approval under the regular rule-making process, the ban must go through a 30-day public-comment period and review by two legislative committees, the Public Health and Welfare Committee and the Rules and Regulations Committee, legislative sub-committees that represent both the state House and Senate. That process takes about 90 days.
Asked how a board overseeing a state agency can make law, Ed Barham, spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Health, said the Health Department is authorized to protect the public health and the ban on synthetic marijuana is not so different from rules regulating, for example, septic tanks and vaccinations.
“We have pretty broad authority when it comes to protecting the public health,” Barham said.
In The Leader’s coverage area, Austin and Beebe had already banned K2 before the board of heath ban was approved. In Cabot, the city council’s fire and police committee voted this week to send an ordinance banning K2 to the full council.
Manufactured primarily in China and named for the mountain on the border of China and Pakistan that is second in height to Mt. Everest, K2 is one of several brands of synthetic pot that was included in the ban. The drug was developed during the 1990s by a team of researchers working under Dr. John Huffman, a researcher at Clemson University in South Carolina who was studying marijuana as a treatment for the nausea and loss of appetite associated with cancer drugs, Barham said. A synthetic version of the drug was needed because marijuana was illegal. It was tested on mice and never intended for humans, he said.
Barham said the Health Department banned it because its potentially harmful effects, especially to children, are not known. He added that some users have ended up in hospital emergency rooms.
Paul Halverson, doctor of public health, state health officer and director of the Arkansas Department of Health, said in a press release after the Friday morning meeting that the new regulation represents a partnership with the criminal-justice system for purposes of enforcement.
“This new law is not intended to place people into the criminal-justice system,” Halverson said. “This regulation is intended to educate the public about the dangers of this drug and illicit drug use, especially by minors. Enforcement responsibilities will fall primarily to local law enforcement and prosecutors.”
Violation of the new law will be a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not less than $100 nor more than $500 or by imprisonment not exceeding one month, or both. Each day of violation shall constitute a separate offense. Every firm, person, or corporation who violates this rule may also be assessed a civil penalty by the board. The penalty shall not exceed $1,000 for each violation. Each day of a continuing violation may be deemed a separate violation for purposes of penalty assessments.
Dr. Joe Bates, deputy state health officer and chief science officer, said that the active ingredient in K2 does not show up on any standard drug screens in use today. “However, we have found a way to test urine samples from individuals who have used the substance that will indicate whether K2 has been used by someone or not,” Bates said. “Until now, we didn’t have a way to prove that.”
TOP STORY>>Airmen make drops at Pope
By JEFFREY SMITH
Leader staff writer
POPE AIR FORCE BASE, N.C. — There was more hard work for the four crews from the 19th Airlift Wing at Little Rock Air Force Base during the recent joint forcible-entry exercise with the Army.
This Leader reporter went along with a crew from LRAFB’s 53rd Airlift Squadron. The crew flying a C-130 E-model was part of an 18-plane formation of C-130s and C-17s carrying 1,000 Army paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, N.C., jumping out of the planes or dropping Humvees from the sky to the designated drop zone during the night all within 13 minutes.
Before each exercise, the flight crews would meet for pre-flight briefings. One briefing was held with the crews flying both C-130s and C-17s and the other was held separately for C-130s. Pilots, co-pilots and navigators learned the latest weather conditions, what position their plane was flying in the line-up and what they were carrying. Then the individual flight crews would head to smaller meeting rooms to discuss and study their flight routes and timing.
After the flights, the C-130 crews returned to Pope and held post-flight briefings. Crews discussed how the flights went and how to improve the next exercise.
The crew from the 53rd Airlift Squadron had 60 paratroopers bail out on both sides of the C-130 in less than 30 seconds.
The C-130 was loaded with two Humvees instead of transporting paratroopers. The planned heavy- equipment drop had a snafu when the stairs to the toilet fell down in the cargo area. A loadmaster noticed the problem and told the crew to cancel the drop for safety and to not risk damaging the plane when the Humvees were pulled out of the cargo ramp.
Work continued late into the night for the crew. After landing back at Pope to unload the Humvees on the ground, the C-130 was flown to Mackall Army Airfield, N.C., where a large heavy truck was loaded onto the plane.
The C-130 crew was worried about fuel usage. They were unable to shut down the engines because a compressor had broke.
They were not sure if they could be restarted.
The control tower finally allowed the plane to take off. The C-130 then flew for 15 minutes to a dirt landing strip near the drop zone. In the black of night, Maj. Lars Johnsen briefly touched the C-130’s wheels down for a second, before forcing the plane back into the air.
The C-130 circled around and made a second landing.
With the C-130’s engines running, the Army truck was unloaded and driven off the plane’s cargo ramp.
With a light fuel load and short runway, Johnsen revved the C-130’s engines high and sped down the dirt strip. The C-130 pushed the passengers hard back into their seats as it rose into the air and flew back to Pope.
THE FINAL DAY
On the last day of the joint exercise, this Leader reporter was going to experience a high-altitude drop of a pallet of materials weighing 1,140 pounds from a C-130 during an improved-container delivery system drop. This was a daytime flight instead of being in 18 plane formation of C-130s and C-17s at night earlier in the week.
The ride was with a new crew in a second C-130 E-model from LRAFB. The flight crew comprised of Capt. Lauren Johnican, aircraft commander with the 50th Airlift Squadron; Capt. Christopher Smith, co-pilot; Capt. Sanam Qadri, navigator; Staff Sgt. Joseph Langer, flight engineer; Senior Airman Robert Wilson, loadmaster, all members of the 61st Airlift Squadron, and Staff
Sgt. Tristan Smith and Airman 1st Class Patrick Thompson, both loadmasters with the 53rd Airlift Squadron.
Unfortunately an equipment malfunction occurred before the C-130’s engines were even started. A computer on the C-130s would not sync up with the dropsondes and make a connection. The dropsonde, resembling a lawn dart, is an instrument attached to a small parachute and is thrown by the loadmaster from the plane. The dropsonde measures wind velocity and wind direction as it travels to the ground.
The instrument relays the information to a computer on the C-130. The measurements tell the aircrew where to drop the cargo from the plane so the cargo reaches the drop zone.
After working on the problem for nearly two hours, the time for the scheduled drop had passed. The planned drop was cancelled. A K-loader cargo-transport vehicle was driven to the rear of the plane. The pallet was then rolled off the C-130 straight onto the vehicle.
If the drop exercise had occurred the C-130 would have made a first pass over the drop zone at 7,000 feet. A loadmaster would have tossed a dropsonde from the plane. When the C-130 made a second pass of the drop zone it would be flying at a lower height of 6,000 feet. The pilot flies at a seven degree angle to make the cargo deck have an incline. The cargo door and the cargo ramp are opened. Gravity pulls on the loaded pallet and it rolls out the back of the C-130.
OPPORTUNITY TO SEE THE WORLD
During the flight back to Jacksonville, Capt. Michael Kis-singer, a pilot with the 53rd Airlift Squadron, talked about why he joined the Air Force. Kissinger, who lives in Ward, is in his fifth year with the service. He is qualified to fly C-130 E-models and C-130 H3s.
He said as a 5-year-old, he knew he wanted to be in the military. In the eighth grade, he wanted to be in the Air Force.
“I wanted to see the world. My first year flying I went to seven different countries,” Kissinger said.
By his second year, he went to 15 countries. He has flown to Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Chad, Romania, Germany, England, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Croatia.
Kissinger, originally from Kansas City, Mo., was home schooled through the eighth grade. He is the oldest of six siblings. He has two sisters and three brothers, but none are in the military. Kissinger’s parents were not in the service either.
Kissinger’s grandfather, Joseph Zollmann, was a pilot during the Vietnam War and flew C-123s. Kissinger’s uncle, Steve Zollmann, was a pilot and instructor at Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas, and flew C-144s.
He said he reason he joined the service was a combination of his grandfather talking about the Air Force and watching “Star Trek: The Next Generation.”
Kissinger took ROTC at University of Missouri at Colum-bia, Mo., where he earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts.
He spoke about why he likes to fly.
Kissinger said, “There is certain sense of freedom being in the air. It’s fun to work with the crew, manipulate the controls and execute a mission.
“Night is a challenge because it is dark and adds another (element) to navigation and coordination. With day flying, you get to see everything. It is preferred,” he said.
He spoke about flying the C-130 E-models, explaining, “These planes are 1963 Vietnam-era. There is not of lot of
automation. It is a very hands-on platform.”
Kissinger and his wife, Amanda, have two children, a daughter, Shyann, 5, who finished pre-K at Ward Central Elementary, and a son, Thomas, 2.
Leader staff writer
POPE AIR FORCE BASE, N.C. — There was more hard work for the four crews from the 19th Airlift Wing at Little Rock Air Force Base during the recent joint forcible-entry exercise with the Army.
This Leader reporter went along with a crew from LRAFB’s 53rd Airlift Squadron. The crew flying a C-130 E-model was part of an 18-plane formation of C-130s and C-17s carrying 1,000 Army paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, N.C., jumping out of the planes or dropping Humvees from the sky to the designated drop zone during the night all within 13 minutes.
Before each exercise, the flight crews would meet for pre-flight briefings. One briefing was held with the crews flying both C-130s and C-17s and the other was held separately for C-130s. Pilots, co-pilots and navigators learned the latest weather conditions, what position their plane was flying in the line-up and what they were carrying. Then the individual flight crews would head to smaller meeting rooms to discuss and study their flight routes and timing.
After the flights, the C-130 crews returned to Pope and held post-flight briefings. Crews discussed how the flights went and how to improve the next exercise.
The crew from the 53rd Airlift Squadron had 60 paratroopers bail out on both sides of the C-130 in less than 30 seconds.
The C-130 was loaded with two Humvees instead of transporting paratroopers. The planned heavy- equipment drop had a snafu when the stairs to the toilet fell down in the cargo area. A loadmaster noticed the problem and told the crew to cancel the drop for safety and to not risk damaging the plane when the Humvees were pulled out of the cargo ramp.
Work continued late into the night for the crew. After landing back at Pope to unload the Humvees on the ground, the C-130 was flown to Mackall Army Airfield, N.C., where a large heavy truck was loaded onto the plane.
The C-130 crew was worried about fuel usage. They were unable to shut down the engines because a compressor had broke.
They were not sure if they could be restarted.
The control tower finally allowed the plane to take off. The C-130 then flew for 15 minutes to a dirt landing strip near the drop zone. In the black of night, Maj. Lars Johnsen briefly touched the C-130’s wheels down for a second, before forcing the plane back into the air.
The C-130 circled around and made a second landing.
With the C-130’s engines running, the Army truck was unloaded and driven off the plane’s cargo ramp.
With a light fuel load and short runway, Johnsen revved the C-130’s engines high and sped down the dirt strip. The C-130 pushed the passengers hard back into their seats as it rose into the air and flew back to Pope.
THE FINAL DAY
On the last day of the joint exercise, this Leader reporter was going to experience a high-altitude drop of a pallet of materials weighing 1,140 pounds from a C-130 during an improved-container delivery system drop. This was a daytime flight instead of being in 18 plane formation of C-130s and C-17s at night earlier in the week.
The ride was with a new crew in a second C-130 E-model from LRAFB. The flight crew comprised of Capt. Lauren Johnican, aircraft commander with the 50th Airlift Squadron; Capt. Christopher Smith, co-pilot; Capt. Sanam Qadri, navigator; Staff Sgt. Joseph Langer, flight engineer; Senior Airman Robert Wilson, loadmaster, all members of the 61st Airlift Squadron, and Staff
Sgt. Tristan Smith and Airman 1st Class Patrick Thompson, both loadmasters with the 53rd Airlift Squadron.
Unfortunately an equipment malfunction occurred before the C-130’s engines were even started. A computer on the C-130s would not sync up with the dropsondes and make a connection. The dropsonde, resembling a lawn dart, is an instrument attached to a small parachute and is thrown by the loadmaster from the plane. The dropsonde measures wind velocity and wind direction as it travels to the ground.
The instrument relays the information to a computer on the C-130. The measurements tell the aircrew where to drop the cargo from the plane so the cargo reaches the drop zone.
After working on the problem for nearly two hours, the time for the scheduled drop had passed. The planned drop was cancelled. A K-loader cargo-transport vehicle was driven to the rear of the plane. The pallet was then rolled off the C-130 straight onto the vehicle.
If the drop exercise had occurred the C-130 would have made a first pass over the drop zone at 7,000 feet. A loadmaster would have tossed a dropsonde from the plane. When the C-130 made a second pass of the drop zone it would be flying at a lower height of 6,000 feet. The pilot flies at a seven degree angle to make the cargo deck have an incline. The cargo door and the cargo ramp are opened. Gravity pulls on the loaded pallet and it rolls out the back of the C-130.
OPPORTUNITY TO SEE THE WORLD
During the flight back to Jacksonville, Capt. Michael Kis-singer, a pilot with the 53rd Airlift Squadron, talked about why he joined the Air Force. Kissinger, who lives in Ward, is in his fifth year with the service. He is qualified to fly C-130 E-models and C-130 H3s.
He said as a 5-year-old, he knew he wanted to be in the military. In the eighth grade, he wanted to be in the Air Force.
“I wanted to see the world. My first year flying I went to seven different countries,” Kissinger said.
By his second year, he went to 15 countries. He has flown to Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Chad, Romania, Germany, England, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Croatia.
Kissinger, originally from Kansas City, Mo., was home schooled through the eighth grade. He is the oldest of six siblings. He has two sisters and three brothers, but none are in the military. Kissinger’s parents were not in the service either.
Kissinger’s grandfather, Joseph Zollmann, was a pilot during the Vietnam War and flew C-123s. Kissinger’s uncle, Steve Zollmann, was a pilot and instructor at Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas, and flew C-144s.
He said he reason he joined the service was a combination of his grandfather talking about the Air Force and watching “Star Trek: The Next Generation.”
Kissinger took ROTC at University of Missouri at Colum-bia, Mo., where he earned a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts.
He spoke about why he likes to fly.
Kissinger said, “There is certain sense of freedom being in the air. It’s fun to work with the crew, manipulate the controls and execute a mission.
“Night is a challenge because it is dark and adds another (element) to navigation and coordination. With day flying, you get to see everything. It is preferred,” he said.
He spoke about flying the C-130 E-models, explaining, “These planes are 1963 Vietnam-era. There is not of lot of
automation. It is a very hands-on platform.”
Kissinger and his wife, Amanda, have two children, a daughter, Shyann, 5, who finished pre-K at Ward Central Elementary, and a son, Thomas, 2.
TOP STORY>>Mob trial will start in fall
By JOAN MCCOY
Leader staff writer
The Cabot man indicted in Arkansas for illegal gambling and public corruption and later in Massachusetts for drug trafficking and supplying guns to the Mafia’s Columbo family, was scheduled for trial in federal court this week, but the trial date has been changed to Oct. 18.
George Wiley Thompson, 64, is at the center of Arkansas’ first case with ties to one of the big crime families, U. S. Attorney Jane Duke said when Thompson was indicted in Massachusetts late in 2009 for allegedly selling guns to alleged Colombo
Family street boss Ralph Francis Deleo, 64, who was indicted at the same time.
So far federal investigators have built cases against six men with connections to Thompson’s alleged illegal activities. In addition to Deleo, Edmond Kulesza, 56, and Ranklin M. Goldman, 66, were indicted in Massachusetts.
In Arkansas, North Little Rock aldermen Cary Gaines, 63, and Samuel Gaylon Baggett, 58, were indicted.
Gaines is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a kickback scheme involving contracts and projects for the city of North Little Rock. The profit from the scheme was allegedly intended to pay gambling debts owed to Thompson.
Gaines also is charged with making a false statement to FBI agents regarding conversations he had with Thompson concerning the preparation of Thompson’s tax returns.
The charges against Baggett relate to his role as a federally licensed firearms dealer. The indictment alleges that Baggett sold weapons to Thompson even knowing that he was a previously convicted felon, that he didn’t keep accurate records as required and that he made false statements to agents with the FBI and Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms investigating the case.
The latest indictment, in April, is against Thompson’s son, George Allen Thompson, 41, of Jacksonville, on firearms and drug distribution charges.
Specifically, the indictment charges one count of possession with intent to distribute marijuana, one count of felon in possession of a firearm and two counts of felon in possession of ammunition.
The younger Thompson was also charged with one count of acting as an accessory after the fact by helping his father avoid apprehension, trial and punishment by sending his father’s prescription medication to an individual who was to carry the medication to his father in Thailand where he went to evade federal authorities after a search warrant was executed at his home resulting in a seizure of more than 140 firearms, and 80,000 rounds of ammunition, which, as a felon, he illegally possessed.
George Wiley Thompson was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand, in November 2009 about a month after he was indicted on a multitude of federal charges including bookmaking, distribution of illegal drugs and conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with an alleged kickback scheme.
Thompson lived in the modest Oak Meadows subdivision in the central part of the city.
In addition to the Oct. 18 trial with Daleo, Thompson is scheduled for trial with Gaines on Aug. 14 and with Baggett on Dec. 7.
Leader staff writer
The Cabot man indicted in Arkansas for illegal gambling and public corruption and later in Massachusetts for drug trafficking and supplying guns to the Mafia’s Columbo family, was scheduled for trial in federal court this week, but the trial date has been changed to Oct. 18.
George Wiley Thompson, 64, is at the center of Arkansas’ first case with ties to one of the big crime families, U. S. Attorney Jane Duke said when Thompson was indicted in Massachusetts late in 2009 for allegedly selling guns to alleged Colombo
Family street boss Ralph Francis Deleo, 64, who was indicted at the same time.
So far federal investigators have built cases against six men with connections to Thompson’s alleged illegal activities. In addition to Deleo, Edmond Kulesza, 56, and Ranklin M. Goldman, 66, were indicted in Massachusetts.
In Arkansas, North Little Rock aldermen Cary Gaines, 63, and Samuel Gaylon Baggett, 58, were indicted.
Gaines is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a kickback scheme involving contracts and projects for the city of North Little Rock. The profit from the scheme was allegedly intended to pay gambling debts owed to Thompson.
Gaines also is charged with making a false statement to FBI agents regarding conversations he had with Thompson concerning the preparation of Thompson’s tax returns.
The charges against Baggett relate to his role as a federally licensed firearms dealer. The indictment alleges that Baggett sold weapons to Thompson even knowing that he was a previously convicted felon, that he didn’t keep accurate records as required and that he made false statements to agents with the FBI and Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms investigating the case.
The latest indictment, in April, is against Thompson’s son, George Allen Thompson, 41, of Jacksonville, on firearms and drug distribution charges.
Specifically, the indictment charges one count of possession with intent to distribute marijuana, one count of felon in possession of a firearm and two counts of felon in possession of ammunition.
The younger Thompson was also charged with one count of acting as an accessory after the fact by helping his father avoid apprehension, trial and punishment by sending his father’s prescription medication to an individual who was to carry the medication to his father in Thailand where he went to evade federal authorities after a search warrant was executed at his home resulting in a seizure of more than 140 firearms, and 80,000 rounds of ammunition, which, as a felon, he illegally possessed.
George Wiley Thompson was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand, in November 2009 about a month after he was indicted on a multitude of federal charges including bookmaking, distribution of illegal drugs and conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with an alleged kickback scheme.
Thompson lived in the modest Oak Meadows subdivision in the central part of the city.
In addition to the Oct. 18 trial with Daleo, Thompson is scheduled for trial with Gaines on Aug. 14 and with Baggett on Dec. 7.
TOP STORY>>Mob trial will start in fall
By JOAN MCCOY
Leader staff writer
The Cabot man indicted in Arkansas for illegal gambling and public corruption and later in Massachusetts for drug trafficking and supplying guns to the Mafia’s Columbo family, was scheduled for trial in federal court this week, but the trial date has been changed to Oct. 18.
George Wiley Thompson, 64, is at the center of Arkansas’ first case with ties to one of the big crime families, U. S. Attorney Jane Duke said when Thompson was indicted in Massachusetts late in 2009 for allegedly selling guns to alleged Colombo
Family street boss Ralph Francis Deleo, 64, who was indicted at the same time.
So far federal investigators have built cases against six men with connections to Thompson’s alleged illegal activities. In addition to Deleo, Edmond Kulesza, 56, and Ranklin M. Goldman, 66, were indicted in Massachusetts.
In Arkansas, North Little Rock aldermen Cary Gaines, 63, and Samuel Gaylon Baggett, 58, were indicted.
Gaines is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a kickback scheme involving contracts and projects for the city of North Little Rock. The profit from the scheme was allegedly intended to pay gambling debts owed to Thompson.
Gaines also is charged with making a false statement to FBI agents regarding conversations he had with Thompson concerning the preparation of Thompson’s tax returns.
The charges against Baggett relate to his role as a federally licensed firearms dealer. The indictment alleges that Baggett sold weapons to Thompson even knowing that he was a previously convicted felon, that he didn’t keep accurate records as required and that he made false statements to agents with the FBI and Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms investigating the case.
The latest indictment, in April, is against Thompson’s son, George Allen Thompson, 41, of Jacksonville, on firearms and drug distribution charges.
Specifically, the indictment charges one count of possession with intent to distribute marijuana, one count of felon in possession of a firearm and two counts of felon in possession of ammunition.
The younger Thompson was also charged with one count of acting as an accessory after the fact by helping his father avoid apprehension, trial and punishment by sending his father’s prescription medication to an individual who was to carry the medication to his father in Thailand where he went to evade federal authorities after a search warrant was executed at his home resulting in a seizure of more than 140 firearms, and 80,000 rounds of ammunition, which, as a felon, he illegally possessed.
George Wiley Thompson was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand, in November 2009 about a month after he was indicted on a multitude of federal charges including bookmaking, distribution of illegal drugs and conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with an alleged kickback scheme.
Thompson lived in the modest Oak Meadows subdivision in the central part of the city.
In addition to the Oct. 18 trial with Daleo, Thompson is scheduled for trial with Gaines on Aug. 14 and with Baggett on Dec. 7.
Leader staff writer
The Cabot man indicted in Arkansas for illegal gambling and public corruption and later in Massachusetts for drug trafficking and supplying guns to the Mafia’s Columbo family, was scheduled for trial in federal court this week, but the trial date has been changed to Oct. 18.
George Wiley Thompson, 64, is at the center of Arkansas’ first case with ties to one of the big crime families, U. S. Attorney Jane Duke said when Thompson was indicted in Massachusetts late in 2009 for allegedly selling guns to alleged Colombo
Family street boss Ralph Francis Deleo, 64, who was indicted at the same time.
So far federal investigators have built cases against six men with connections to Thompson’s alleged illegal activities. In addition to Deleo, Edmond Kulesza, 56, and Ranklin M. Goldman, 66, were indicted in Massachusetts.
In Arkansas, North Little Rock aldermen Cary Gaines, 63, and Samuel Gaylon Baggett, 58, were indicted.
Gaines is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a kickback scheme involving contracts and projects for the city of North Little Rock. The profit from the scheme was allegedly intended to pay gambling debts owed to Thompson.
Gaines also is charged with making a false statement to FBI agents regarding conversations he had with Thompson concerning the preparation of Thompson’s tax returns.
The charges against Baggett relate to his role as a federally licensed firearms dealer. The indictment alleges that Baggett sold weapons to Thompson even knowing that he was a previously convicted felon, that he didn’t keep accurate records as required and that he made false statements to agents with the FBI and Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms investigating the case.
The latest indictment, in April, is against Thompson’s son, George Allen Thompson, 41, of Jacksonville, on firearms and drug distribution charges.
Specifically, the indictment charges one count of possession with intent to distribute marijuana, one count of felon in possession of a firearm and two counts of felon in possession of ammunition.
The younger Thompson was also charged with one count of acting as an accessory after the fact by helping his father avoid apprehension, trial and punishment by sending his father’s prescription medication to an individual who was to carry the medication to his father in Thailand where he went to evade federal authorities after a search warrant was executed at his home resulting in a seizure of more than 140 firearms, and 80,000 rounds of ammunition, which, as a felon, he illegally possessed.
George Wiley Thompson was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand, in November 2009 about a month after he was indicted on a multitude of federal charges including bookmaking, distribution of illegal drugs and conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with an alleged kickback scheme.
Thompson lived in the modest Oak Meadows subdivision in the central part of the city.
In addition to the Oct. 18 trial with Daleo, Thompson is scheduled for trial with Gaines on Aug. 14 and with Baggett on Dec. 7.
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