Stories from Wednesday, May 4, 2005

It was a birthday party for a 12-year-old girl. On a dare, a young boy kissed the birthday girl on the cheek. The result was beyond my imagination. Two adult females at the party took offense with the innocent peck on the cheek. So they agitated other young girls at the party to attack the 12-year-...

DEXTER - Kenneth and Ashley Burns of Dexter are the parents of their second daughter born at 8:18 a.m. March 18, 2005. Kayden Leeann Burns was 8 pounds, 15.6 ounces and at birth was 19.5 inches long. Mrs. Burns, daughter of Kathy Cook and Rick Bone, is a housewife...

SIKESTON -- Two Sikeston competitors, Daniel Pharris and Jeremy Harper, finished in the top two in their respective classes at the Sikeston Drag Strip on Saturday. Jim Wade of Bertrand ran away with the Super Pro class, averaging 130.35 mph in an elapsed time of 5.254 seconds with a dial-in of 5.27 and a reaction time of .548 seconds...

SIKESTON - Former Sikeston Bulldog baseball standout Billy Puckett was drafted by the Gateway Grizzlies baseball team Sunday. The Grizzlies, who are members of the Frontier League, selected him with their first pick. Puckett, a right-handed pitcher who graduated from Blackburn College last May, finished his collegiate career with a 6-5 record with a 3.41 earned run average...

Kelly High School basketball standout Kendal Deason signed a letter of intent to play at Three Rivers Community College. Deason, a first team All-Standard Democrat performer, led Kelly to a 21-6 record this season and a district finals appearance. The 5-foot-11 guard averaged 21 points, 4.0 assists, 4.0 rebounds and shot 89 percent from the free throw line. ...

Sikeston Senior High wrestling all-stater Joe Johnson signed a letter of intent to wrestle for Missouri Baptist University in St. Louis. From left are: Ashley Johnson, sister; Joe Johnson and Bridgette Applewhite, mother. Standing are: Claude Robinson, assistant coach; Ivan Robison, Sikeston wrestling coach; Brian Jackson, head wrestling coach for Missouri Baptist and Brent Keefer, SHS athletic director...

DEXTER - The Sikeston Bulldogs tennis team fell to 8-6 on the season as they lost to Dexter on the road, 6-3. "I think we compete pretty well with them, we just fall a little short in too many of the matches," said Sikeston coach Brian James. "We did not have a good day with our doubles. ...

BENTON - Scott County Water District No. 4 is organized and ready to take on the next piece of business: securing funding for construction of a water supply system. Phil Lyon, president of the district's board of directors, provided Scott County commissioners with an update on the district during the regular County Commission meeting Tuesday...

BENTON -- Kelly maximized its scoring opportunities while Oran sputtered. That was the difference as the Hawks dealt the Eagles a 4-0 road loss on Tuesday. Two-out hits by the Nos. 8 and 9 hitters in the lineup, Spencer Ayers and Jordan Felter, were the big blows for the Hawks, who scored all of their runs in the fourth inning...

Richard Yang, left, is escorted to his 10 a.m. court appearance by Scott County Sheriff Rick Walter Tuesday. Yang skipped out on his bond and fled from the county in 1999 after entering a guilty plea to the charge of second degree murder in Scott County for the stabbing death of his estranged wife, Louise Yang, on July 4, 1998. ...

DEXTER -- Proposed changes to high school graduation requirements in Missouri sparked discussion and raised questions of concern and approval as regional educators met Tuesday at the Dexter High School auditorium. Stan Johnson, assistant commissioner for the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, briefed over 100 Southeast Missouri administrators on the recommendations made by a task force that has spent the past year studying high school improvement issues...

The woman that put in there about the people talking about them being on Medicaid. There are a lot of people that need Medicaid but there are a lot of people who are getting that don't need it. They get their heat bill partly paid, they get their insurance, they get their medicine for nothing. ...

SIKESTON - Construction was started Monday on a building at Harvey Parks Airport to serve as a storage warehouse for airplane parts, which will be sold here in a manner similar to the present sale of surplus aircraft. The building being construction of concrete blocks will be 800 feet long by 125 feet wide...

On April 23, 2005, the Sons of the American Legion Post 114 in Sikeston held a poker run for St. Jude Children's Hospital. The weather was less than we had hoped for and we appreciate all cycle riders who participated. The event included a raffle, auction, dinner and dance...

BERNIE -- Rosie Terrill, 57, died May 2, 2005, at Missouri Southern Healthcare in Dexter. Born Feb. 3, 1948, in Robstown, Texas, daughter of the late Miquel and Louise Reyes Trevino, she had been a resident of Parma for 20 years before moving to Bernie where she was a member of the Church of Christ...

TUCSON, Ariz. -- Lorene Aslin, 90, died April 25, 2005, in Tucson. Born Jan. 23, 1915, in St. Louis, daughter of the late Benjamin and Zella Whitledge Moore, she had spent most of her life in Bloomfield but had been a resident of Tucson the past few years. A member of the First Baptist Church in Bloomfield, she was a 50-year member of the Bloomfield Order of Eastern Star Chapter 385...

SIKESTON - Curtis Bernard Walden, 46, died at 11:20 p.m. May 1, 2005, at the Sikeston Convalescent Center. He was born Jan. 1, 1959, in Woodland, N.C., to Mary Walden of Woodlawn and the late Preston Walden. On Sept. 15, 1989, in Sikeston, he married Wanda Robinson, who survives...

DUDLEY -- Alberta Mae Hayes, 83, died May 2, 2005, at Cypress Point Healthcare in Dexter. Born Aug. 17, 1921, in Broseley, daughter of the late Charles Clinton and Lavena Ray Nation Thomas, she had lived in Dudley most of her life and was a member of the Dudley Community Church...

BERNIE -- Virginia Battles, 82, died May 2, 2005, at Beverly Health and Rehabilitation Center in Bloomfield. Born Feb. 21, 1923, in Bernie, daughter of the late Albert Sidney and Anna Mae Smith Johnson Sr., she was a former employee of the Rainey Funeral Home in Bernie and had previously worked at Brown Shoe Co. and Elder Manufacturing Co. She was also a member of the Bernie Christian Church...

SIKESTON - Claudine Hensley, 88, died at 7:12 p.m. May 3, 2005, at Missouri Delta Medical Center in Sikeston. Nunnelee Funeral Chapel is in charge of arrangements which are incomplete.

SIKESTON - Dorothy Evelyn James, 75, died April 29, 2005, at Missouri Delta Medical Center in Sikeston. Born May 17, 1929, in Hickman, Ky., to the late Walter Fisher and Alzadie Haglar Moore, she was the valedictorian of the Riverview High School at Hickman, Ky., and attended Kentucky State University earning a Bachelor of Science in vocational home economics in 1952. ...