Sports Raiders beat Shelby......7A Pigskin Picks ...............8A
Serving Belmont, Mount Holly, Stanley, Cramerton, and McAdenville
Council accepts petition for annexation..............3A Opinions.......................4A
Volume 78 • Issue 37 • Wednesday, September 11, 2013
75¢
Friends helping friends ALAN HODGE alan.bannernews@gmail.com
Friends helping friends is what makes the world go around, and in the Adams Bluff neighborhood in East Belmont, there’s enough love between 11-year-old Chris Rhom and his 2 ½-year-old pal Murphy Clark to keep it spinning for quite a while. A big part of the bond between the two boys revolves around the fact that Murphy has a condition known as hypoplastic left heart syndrome- meaning the left side of his heart is for all intents and purposes underdeveloped. One in 10,000 babies have it. Murphy has already undergone two operations for the defect, one at just six days old and the other when he was four months old. The procedures were done at Levine’s Children’s Hospital. On Friday, September 13, Mur-
phy is scheduled for his third procedure. “The operations are meant to make the right side of his heart work for both sides,� said Murphy’s mom, Casey Clark. “This should be the last operation, but he will never be released from his cardiologist and will need life long care.� Murphy will also likely never play sports. “He tires out and gets winded,� Casey said. “Hopefully the last operation will help with that as well.� See CLARK, 8A Photo by Alan Hodge
Pals 11-year-old Chris Rhom and 2 1/2- year-old Murphy Clark spend a lot of quality time together. Chris recently held a fundraiser to help Murphy’s parents with medical bills associated with his upcoming third heart procedure.
Mercy Heritage Center preserving and protecting history
It’s all about the kids
Lineberger in SC Hall of Fame
By Alan Hodge Alan.bannernews@gmail.com
Photo by Alan Hodge
Archivist Grant Gerlich is seen looking over some of the materials housed in the Mercy Heritage Center. The facility is scheduled to officially open in 2016 with a special Sisters of Mercy in the Civil War exhibition. By Alan Hodge Alan.bannernews@gmail.com
There’s a building on the Sisters of Mercy’s former Sacred Heart campus in Belmont that’s been useful but now is poised for greatness. Located at 501 Mercy Drive, the tan brick structure has at various times served as a library, YMCA outpost, and adult day care center. Now, following a $1 million interior renovation, the building is being transformed into the national archives repository for the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas. Known officially as the Mercy Heritage Center, the facility is under the direction
of Archivist Grant Gerlich who took on the job in January 2011. “The Heritage Center is the central repository for the collections of the Sisters of Mercy of the America’s from throughout the country,� Gerlich said. “In addition to a research, Mercy Heritage Center is a museum that chronicles the history of the Sisters of Mercy in the United States from 1843 to present.� Sisters of Mercy materials being collected in the Heritage Center are an eclectic blend. Items date back to the mid-19th century up to more modern times and include books, meeting minutes, photos, artwork, furniture, manuscripts, lectures, and much more. One of the more interesting items in the collection are the original 1863 hand written notes of a Sister of Mercy she penned serving as a nurse during the Civil War siege of
Vicksburg. The majority of the materials are stored on the bottom floor of the Heritage Center building where they currently occupy about 4,000 ft. of the 5,700 feet of linear shelf space that’s available. The materials have come from every area of the U.S. with one exception. “We are currently waiting on the Midwest Community to send its materials,� said Gerlich. An upstairs room houses paintings and other art, as well as personal items from Sisters of Mercy including a small traveling desk inlaid with mother of pearl dating to the 1800s. To preserve and protect the collection now and in the future, extensive efforts were given to temperature and humidity control. This included the installation of thermo hygrometers, hygrometers, and See ARCHIVES, 10A
Twice a day for over a decade while school is in session, in all kinds of weather, 58-year-old crossing guard Ted Caldwell of Catawba Heights has reported for duty at North Belmont Elementary, where he has shepherded kids across busy Woodlawn St.– and he does it mainly for the love of the young’uns. “There’s not a lot of money in this type of work,� Caldwell said. “It’s all about the kids.� Caldwell is just one of many school crossing guards in Gaston County, but he’s been a familiar figure at the corner of School St. and Woodlawn for quite a while. He says former Belmont police chief Charlie Flowers signed him up for his first crossing guard job at Belmont Central, then he transferred to North Belmont Elementary where he seems to have found his niche directing traffic and halting cars on Woodlawn so kids can cross into the adjoining neighborhood. Caldwell usually has a smile on his face, but some things he sees during his shifts get under his skin. “I have to constantly stop people from trying to turn onto School St. against the one-way traffic,� he said. “It’s dangerous.’ He also sees plenty of bad driving habits that put kids on foot at risk. “People come by talking on their phones, fixing their makeup, and slapping at the kids in the backseat,� he said. “It is very irritating.� Then there’s the fact that the flashing school-zone lights on Woodlawn at North Belmont Elementary seem to have minds of their own. “Right now they’re not working,� said Caldwell. Another traffic situation at North Belmont that’s caught Caldwell’s attention is the fact that there is no sign indicating “right turn only� coming out of the school parking lot. “Some people turn left and create a hazard,� Caldwell said. In addition, there’s not a sidewalk on School St. going back towards Acme St. for the kids that go that way. “I wish the county or city would do something about building a sidewalk for the kids,� he said. “Now, they have to walk in the grass and dirt.� In addition to those challenges, the other one that Caldwell, and all his fellow crossing guards face, is the weather. Rain or shine they are on duty. “You have to take it as you get it, brother,� he said. “Rain, snow, twelve or ninety degrees.� So, why does Caldwell and others that do his job stick with it? The answer can be summed up in a word –
Lewis Lineberger Lewis Lineberger, brother of South Point High head football coach Mickey Lineberger, has been inducted into the South Carolina Athletic Coaches Association Hall of Fame. The honor was bestowed on Lineberger during the SCACA’s 21st annual state banquet and awards ceremony held July 28 at the TD Convention Center in Greenville. A 1973 graduate of South Point, Lineberger has been athletic director and head football coach at Hartsville High for 21 years and Johnsonville High for eight years. His teams have won 229 games and Div. II AAAA State Championships in 1987 and 1988. In 1984, 1992, 1997, and 2012 Lineberger’s teams were state finalists. Lineberger was also an assistant coach in the 1989 NorthSouth All Star game and the 1997 Shrine Bowl. He was the head coach in the 1998 North-South and the 2009 Shrine Bowl. Lineberger has been named Regional Coach of the Year six times and was named Coach of the Year in 1987 and 1998 by the SCACA, the Greenville News, and the High School
See CALDWELL, 10A
See LINEBERGER, 10A
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