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VOL. 105 NO. 19
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Starting next school year, random checks will
be made with hand-held metal detectors of students
suspected of carrying weapons to Kings Mountain
Middle School and Kings Mountain High School and
video cameras will record activities on the school
bus.
Modern computers will also be installed in all
elementary classrooms and in a lab at Kings
Mountain Middle School.
_ The two safety and security measures and the big
ticket item for computers were approved
unanimously by Kings Mountain Board of Education
Monday night. Officials said they hope the hand-
held metal detectors will discourage students from
taking weapons to school and the new video cameras
Information
network will
be big boost
Plugging into a statewide infor-
mation network would pay off for
Kings Mountain residents, says
Kings Mountain resident Billy
King, long an education proponent
who has been associated with
Southern Bell in the Regulatory
and External Affairs Department
24 years.
King said the announcement by
Governor Hunt Monday that the
state will build the world's most
\ advanced phone system is good
news for education.
Kings Mountain students would
be able, for instance, to take advan-
tage of distance learning through
ing without traveling long dis.
tances to Charlotte and Chapel
Hill, all over a sophisticated net-
work.
Telemedicine applications could
also be transmitted over the net-
work to Kings Mountain Hospital
and high tech industry and eco-
nomic development are prospective
big applications.
"The new fiber operated system
will mean as much to the nation as
the interstate highway system did
for this country in the 1940's after
World War II," said King.
"The system will bring things
closer to us and will, in fact, be an
informational highway to bring eg-
uity to education," he said.
King said this new network dis-
tance learning will bring equity to
the school systems and smaller dis-
tricts in the state will share in the
same opportunities as the larger
systems who can afford to have
teachers of advanced courses.
It will be up to companies and
individuals to learn how to use the
system to their advantage, King
said. He said many roads were
started in past generations without
dreaming how people would use
them in coming decades.
Southern Bell operates a pilot
project in Charlotte called Vision
Carolina. Area schools and Gaston
College have used special phone
lines for video and audio links be-
tween schools.
Government will be able to cut
down on paperwork and travel by
using the system and the advanced
phone system can be used by doc-
tors to consult on treatment of pa-
tients, by law enforcement and
court officials to check on records
and by government to cut down on
"See Network, 10-A
Pharmacist Wiesener retires
Carl Vernon Wiesener filled his
last prescription at Mountaineer
Pharmacy this week, retiring from
a profession in which five mem-
bers of his family served for over
100 years. J
The Kings Mountain man is the
last living pharmacist in his family.
Wiesener, 74, is retiring after a
quarter of a century in pharmacy to
travel and enjoy his grandchildren.
Wiesener has filled more than
200,000 prescriptions since he and
Dennis Beatty of Shelby opened
the local pharmacy on July 16,
1969. Before that he helped open
the first Eckerd Drug in Gastonia's
Thursday, May 13, 1993
will cut down on discipline problems.
"We don't have a terrible problem in our schools
but our community deserves and expects that we
everything we can do to ensure the safety of our
students,” said Supt. Dr. Bob McRae in making the
recommendation that the school spend $4,000 for the
hand-held metal detectors and $8,485 to buy four
video cameras and 38 small metal boxes for each
bus.
Associate Supt. Dr. Larry Allen said the principals
middle school and high school and two will be
available for the five elementary schools. Monitors
will also be available for principals.
Responding to question of Shearra Miller, Allen
said he saw no potential for lawsuits in using the
camera.
Guidelines for use of the metal detectors are to be
developed this summer. The plan is for searches to
only be conducted away from other students when a
weapon is suspected.
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violence. McRae said that gl z y the
state but a second grant is in| =< local
school violence task force is! mer.
McRae said that the presenct hool
grounds had been instrumental "the
program. \
McRae said that the metal device could be used at
ball games in suspicious circumstances but he does
not see the system doing a random search of
dvance courses that they might
will circulate the VHS Panasonic cameras among the
buses. The little green box is equipped with a two-
way mirror and a red light that stays lit all the time.
It is designed so that students don't know which bus
contains the camera. One camera each will go to the
Leigh Anne, Kayla and Steve Newton
Young couple's first child
fights three rare diseases
By Jim Heffner
The first thing you notice about Steve and Leigh
Anne Newton is how they tend to sit close together
when they are in the same room, and how they hold
hands frequently.
Steve has a habit of slipping his arm around Leigh
Anne's shoulder and pulling her a little closer to him.
Leigh Anne gazes at Steve a lot, and that look is
filled with tenderness.
The Newtons met at a church function in Kings
Mountain three years ago, when she was 17 and he 19.
Two years later they were married.
Both will tell you it was love at first sight.
Leigh Anne's parents are Gary and Mary Jo
Stewart. Gary is the long-time editor of the Kings
Mountain Herald, and Mary Jo is a nurse at Cleveland
Home Health in Shelby.
Steve is the son of John and Faye Newton of
Shelby. Mr. Newton is employed by PPG.
After the marriage, the Newtons settled into a nor-
mal pattern for newlyweds. They moved into a mobile
home, provided by a relative, and went about the ev-
eryday routine of building a life together.
Their baby, Kayla Leanne Newton, was born
January 26, at Cleveland Memorial Hospital, at 4:28
p.m. An hour later, Leigh Anne came out of the
birthing room and was told she'd had a girl.
Shortly after the birth, Kayla was presented to her
father, and, for Steve, the first little chunk of his world
crumbled.
"When the nurse brought the baby to me, I could
see the left eye and the left side of its little mouth were
slightly drawn. I began to suspect there might be
something wrong," said Steve.
He was right. Less than an hour after birth, Kayla
began having trouble breathing. Four hours later, her
condition was deemed serious enough to warrant trans-
fer to the Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte. Life
support systems were attached and the doctors began
conducting tests.
Before long they discovered that Kayla was afflict-
ed with a rare disease called Ondine's Curse. Further
tests indicated the presence of two other diseases;
Moebius Syndrome and Hirschsprung's Digease, botll
at least as rare as Ondine's Curse. |
The principle symptom of Ondine's Chrse is hy-
poventilation, that is oxygen doesn't flow easily to the
area of the lungs because of shallow breathing. The re-
sult is low oxygen and high carbon dioxide and acids
in the blood. The body's apparatus simply doesn't get
the proper signal to breathe. These symptoms occur
more severely during periods of sleep. The cause of
Ondine's is unknown.
Moebius Syndrome is a hereditary disorder charac-
terized by paralysis of the face. Facial nerve develop-
ment is absent or diminished resulting in difficulty in
feeding and may spawn further problems in the area of
speech. Defective jaw and tongue development are re-
lated symptoms.
The medical community describes Moebius
Syndrome as a very rare birth defect.
Hirschsprung's Disease is a malfunction of the
colon, The malady may result from a defect in early
fetal development as a result of high fever or it may be
inherited. Major symptoms include constipation, dis-
tention of the bowel and vomiting. Bacterial toxins and
obstructions in the bowel can be fatal if not monitored
closely and corrected.
There is no cure for either of the diseases. The
Charlotte doctors are convinced that there has never
been another case of these three disorders occurring in
a single individual. Less than 30 cases of Ondine's
See Kayla, 11-A
McRae said that two students took guns to Kings
Mountain Middle School last fall. After the
incidents, he said parents and local police held
several meetings about gun control and Kings
Mountain Police applied for a grant to target school
Akers Center and at Dixie Village.
He moved to Kings Mountain from
Tennessee in the early 1940's as a
medical service representative for
Abbott Laboratories. He decided to
stay after he met and married
Nancy "Pete" Suber. He left Abbott
after about 10 years. He acquired
the full stock in Mountaineer in
January 1974.
"Deebie” Suber died suddenly of
a brain hemorrhage in 1978. They
had three children; Carl Jr., an
electrical engineer; Reb, manager
of the new Denny's Restaurant in
Shelby; and Nancy Henley of
Mount Holly, who has taught chil-
dren's special education at Webb
School in Gastonia for 16 years.
There are two grandsons, Matthew,
12, and Ben, 4.
Carl may do some relief work on
occasion for druggist friends in the
area and he plans to visit old
school mates in the Tennessee area.
A graduate of the Class of 1942 of
the University of Tennessee in
Memphis, he hopes to attend his
51st anniversary reunion.
Wiescner served in the Navy
during World War II, as a licu-
tenant 18 months in the Pacific and
See Wiesener, 10-A
CARL WIESENER
students. "We're not at that point that we need to
walks our kids through a metal detector at school and
we hope we never get to that point.”
See Detectors, 10-A
School Board
adds penny tax
Your taxes will go up a penny if
county commissioners approve the
Kings Mountain Board of
Education's plan to stop student
sales of school projects next year
in grades K-8.
After several months of discus-
sion, the board Monday night vot-
ed unanimously to hike the tax rate
from 17 cents to 18 cents per $100
property valuation.
Supt. Dr. Bob McRae said the
additional tax will bring in
$75,000. McRae said that public
opinion runs 4-1 in favor of the
vided among the schools as fol-
lows: $12,500, Kings Mountain
High School; $12,500, Kings
Mountain Middle School;
Bethware, $11,458; East, $8,830;
Grover, $10,850; North, $10,047;
and West, $8,817. The monies to
the elementary schools includes a
$5,000 base plus a per pupil allot-
ment,
The money could be used by the
schools as early as the start of next
school year. The plan is that funds
be distributed from the administra-
tive offices and individual schools
would have access to the funds via
purchase orders and signatures of
principals.
Kim Franks, president of East
School PTO, told the board that
she and all PTO officers at the vari-
ous schools support the plan. "This
keeps kids off the streets and gets
the PTO out of the fundraising
business so that we can do more
productive things like volunteering
in the classroom."
Chairman Ronnie Hawkins said
he favors ending all solicitation by
all school pupils. McRae said that
principals at Kings Mountain High
and Middle Schools will be en-
couraged to reduce fundraising
next year but that some events at
elementary schools like PTO bar-
becues and hot dog suppers could
be held but with parents conduct-
ing the events.
"The PTO's have taken much
burden off the schools in handling
these fundraising efforts and we
appreciate all they have done," said
McRae, praising the board for giv-
ing a Special Friends award recent-
ly to the PTO organizations in
town. He said that a plan will be
drafted for next month's meeting
$500,000 needed
for Central move
Kings Mountain School Board
got the bad news first and then the
good news Monday night.
The bad news from Associate
Supt. Dr. Larry Allen is that it will
take up to $500,000 to move the
present administrative offices into
the old Central School.
The good news from the board
"0 { SK Rey
Roger Holland to give a timetable |
for completion of the first phase of
the renovation project at the June
meeting.
The discussion of plans for
Central came during a lengthy dis-
cussion on where to prioritize
funds for next year. Vice Chairman
Priscilla Mauney asked McRae to
look at possible alternative histori-
cal preservation grants to help pay
for the extensive renovation but
leaned toward moving full speed
ahead on the project.
"We've talked this project for
three years now and it's time to do
it,’ said Chairman Ronnie
Hawkins.
McRae agreed that it is best to
move ahead on the project if the
board wants to move the adminis-
trative offices to the Central build-
ing but he said it will take
$100,000 to bring the building up
to accessibility before a certificate
of occupancy can be issued. The
building will require an elevator, a
$100,000 sprinkler system to com-
ply with codes, and a new roof, and
partitions but McRae said the sys-
tem has the money to move ahead
with the project this summer and to
do some first priority improve-
ments at several of the other plants.
Shearra Miller asked if any con-
sideration had been given to build-
ing a new administrative building.
McRae said that the Central site is
perfect for administrative offices
and that Kings Mountain people
want the building to be used for
school purposes. McRae said he
doubted that the system will get a
good price for the present adminis-
tration office building on Parker
Street.
See Tax, 10-A
See Central, 10-A
Woman missing near KM
Thirty searchers combed the
woods Monday on Farris Road but
found no trace of a former Dixon
Community resident reportedly
missing since Friday, according to
Cleveland County Fire Marshal
Bo Lovelace.
Lovelace and Cleveland County
Det. Bobby Steen led an initial
search party which turned up no
new information about the disap-
pearance of Linda Black. The in-
vestigation is continuing.
Lovelace said trained tracking
dogs aided the scarchers Monday
and other searchers were expected
to continuc combing rugged terrain
X
in a wide area of Farris Road and
east of Grover on Tuesday.
Steen said that Black and her
boyfriend, Keith Raymond
Whitworth, also of Gastonia, went
into the woods on Farris Road
Friday about 2 p.m. Authorities be-
lieve that is the last time the wom-
an was scen. Relatives of Mrs.
Black reported her missing Friday.
Officers say foul play has not been
ruled out.
Officers said Whitworth said the
pair was scarching for marijuana
plants allegedly planted in the area
and saw somcone and were scpa-
rated as they fled.