35 years ago: April 19, 1979
Celebration plans are being finalized
Officials involved in planning “Stagecoach Days,” Bartlett’s first arts and crafts festival, are anticipating upwards of 20,000 people in Bartlett City Park on Sycamore view May 5 and 6 for an extravaganza they anticipate will be looked forward to annually by people throughout the Mid-South. Gary Thomas, chairman and organizer of the recently formed Bartlett Celebration Association, said Stagecoach Days will feature music by jazz flutist Edwin Hubbard, The Settlers and Tom White.
“We will have hot air balloon rides, a children’s theater, stage coach rides, back yard Olympic games, an antique car show, a pet parade and much, much more all centered in the park,” Thomas noted, “and that’s not to mention at least 50 booths of arts and crafts from around the South.”
20 years ago: April 14, 1994
Board sets discipline guidelines
The Shelby County School System is growing rapidly, and administrators are seeing violent, disruptive behavior in the schools, said Dr. Rhetta Massey, administrative assistant to Shelby County Schools Superintendent James W. Anderson. Dr. Massey, who spoke at a disciplinary hearing April 4 at BartlettElementary School, also said that the county schools were seeing legal actions and threats of legal action in response to disciplinary actions. She said that a disciplinary review committee had been formed to produce a discipline guide book for the schools.
10 years ago: April 15, 2004
Bartlett grad pays ultimate price for what he loved
Marine Corps Captain Brent Morel, a 1994 graduate of Bartlett High School, was killed when his platoon was ambushed during heavy fighting in Iraq on Wednesday, April 7. Morel was the commander of Bravo Company , 2nd Platoon, part of the Marine 1st Reconnaissance Battalion., And while other members of his unit were wounded, he was the only fatality. This was no surprise to his father.
“He was a leader,” Mike Morel said from his home, now in McKenzie, Tenn. “He put his men first. They were his responsibility. He led from the front.”
1 year ago: April 18, 2013
Suburbs plan for schools
Smaller, better districts that spend less money. That was the consensus of suburban Shelby County officials who weighed in on the need to create municipal school districts here.
“I think it’s great,” said David Reaves, a Shelby County School Board member and Bartlett resident following the passage of two bills in the state legislature that will allow new suburban districts. “I believe we’ll have small, quality districts that will end up spending less money.”
The bills that passed Monday and Tuesday in the House and Senate were the most recent victories for suburban school proponents who have been fighting to create new districts for several years. All six municipalities in Shelby County — Bartlett, Arlington, Collierville, Germantown, Lakeland and Millington — tried to create districts last year. But after a federal judge ruled the new districts were unconstitutional, suburban school cheerleaders and lawmakers alike went back to the drawing board.
