Newspaper Page Text
T NUws
Vol. 99, No. 79
m
Photo/Submitted
Victoria Gibson, right, of
Forsyth County and Ruth
Collins are Wild Floney.
Musicians
hope they
can ‘duet’
Local woman part
of pair that’s still
playing on CMT
By Ben Holcombe
Associate Editor
Nashville is a place where
demo discs and dreams bloom like
flowers and fall like leaves.
Victoria Gibson and Ruth
Collins knew that when they left
their homes, hoping, praying, play
ing for a shot at making it on
Music Row.
They met while waiting tables
at a Cheesecake Factory restaurant
by day, writing and playing songs
by night. Right off, Gibson, from
Cumming, and Collins, from
Fredonia, N.Y., could tell that
though their addresses and accents
were different, together they just
might have the right sound.
Almost a year later, that sound
is Wild Honey, the Collins-Gibson
duo competing on CMT’s “Can
You Duet?” for a recording con¬
tract with Sony BMG Nashville.
The pair has turned several comers
so far, advancing to the show's
final eight duet competitors.
“Keep watchin’,” Gibson said
in a telephone interview Friday.
“We’re still kind of in disbelief
watching it,” Collins said in the
same interview. “I think that when
we were living it, we couldn’t real¬
ly believe it was happening and we
said, ‘Oh, when we see it on TV,
then we’ll really believe it.' But
now we see it on TV, and it’s
almost like it’s not really you up
there.”
The show is produced by the
creators of “American Idol” and
was the country music television
network’s highest rated premier
ever. All 11 episodes were record¬
ed earlier this year, but the out¬
come is a closely guarded secret.
At age 20, Gibson is the show’s
youngest musician, but she’s no
stranger to televised country music
competition shows. In 2007, when
she was a contestant on the USA
Network’s “Nashville Star,” the
Forsyth County native and her par¬
ents moved to the Music City area.
After growing up on a grape
farm in upstate New York, Collins,
24, moved to Nashville in 2006
with her sister Leah, 27, a librarian
who also works in a record store.
Though Gibson and Collins are
limited in what they can say at this
point in the show’s progression,
they can talk about the work they
put in to keep making the cuts.
“Ruth and I practiced basically
every second that we could up until
See 'DUET, Page 2A
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Copyright © 2007 Forsyth County News
0 7
Your "Hometown Paper" Since
SUNDAY May 18, 2008
CSI: Forsyth
-
i Aletlia Ellis
with finger¬
printing dust
11 pm and duster
1 Ai used at
* crimes
IeS scenes by
the Forsyth
X County CSI.
■
Photos/Emity 1
Saunders '
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Crime scene unit
honored for
in Emerson case
By Julie Arrington
Staff Writer
Digging through a Dumpster in the
search for clues is all in a day’s work
for Aletha Ellis and Katrina Murdock.
Ellis is a specialist in the Forsyth.
County Sheriff’s Office crime scene
unit and Murdock is the supervisor.
The two were honored recently by
the Atlanta Metropol Board for their
work in the investigation of the disap¬
pearance of Buford hiker Meredith
Emerson.
According to a letter from the
board to Forsyth County Sheriff Ted
Paxton, their actions “definitely con¬
tributed to the arrest and conviction of
a murder suspect because of their ini¬
tiative and willingness to go above
and beyond the call of duty.”
Murdock is also the recipient of
the 2008 Forsyth-Cumming Law
Enforcement Optimist Award. She
See CSI, Page 4A
Three Medal of Honor
recipients visit schools
Vietnam vets recount times service
By Lara Moore
Staff Writer
At first, the third-graders seemed
puzzled when Vietnam veteran John
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Medal of Humor
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INDEX
Abby ,6B
Births............ 4B
Classifieds. :2C
Deaths......... 2A
Forsyth Life ...IB
Horoscope 6B
Opinion ...... 14A
Sports.......... 1C
a / think it puts us in a position to be
role models for other women and
young girls that want to work in afield
like this. Y>
- Forsyth sheriff’s CSI supervisor Katrina Murdock
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Katrina Murdock receives a hug and a handshake
f rom Forsyth County Sheriff Ted Paxton after he
announces her as the 2008 recipient of the Forsyth
Cumming Law Enforcement Optimist Award at the
recent Law Day luncheon.
Baker proclaimed that the Medal of
Honor wasn’t actually his.
“This medal on my neck, it’s not
mine,” Baker told Sawnee
Elementary School students.
“It belongs to every recipient, and
the men and the women that fight for
the U.S.” he said. “This medal is
theirs. This is one of the big reasons
the recipients wear the medal — it’s
not ours.”
Baker, an Army vet, rs one of
only 105 living recipients of the
Medal of Honor, and one of three
who visited area schools Thursday.
Recipients David McNerney
spoke at South Forsyth Middle and
Richard Pittman at Little Mill
Middle.
“We try not to tell war stories,”
said Pittman, adding that part of the
purpose for his visiting was to pro-
Local
Blind storyteller brings
message, morals to
elementary school.
Page7A
m
Photos/Jim Dean
Many Medal of Fionor recipients prefer to wear a duplicate medal, leav¬
ing the original safely locked away, but Richard Pittman says he prefers
to wear the real thing, above. Left, Pittman and other medal recipients,
tour the country giving copies of this book to school libraries.
mote a book that called “Medal of
Honor.
The book has detailed stories and
accounts of Medal of Honor recipi
ents. He, Baker and McNerney all
presented the book to the respective
Forsyth Life
Rotarians meet vital
needs when disasters
strike worldwide.
Page IB
Jl
i \
SPORTS, 1C
Region’s player of the year
Board
tinkers
with
zones
Students shuffled
as redistricting
process nears end
By Lara Moore
Staff Writer
Some residents whose children
attend Coal Mountain Elementary
School may have a different com¬
mute for the 2009-10 school year.
To relieve overcrowding at
Coal Mountain, and as part of the
systemwide redistricting process,
the Board of Education voted
Thursday to move children living
east of Ga. 400 to Chestatee
Elementary.
At this point in the process,
the move to Chestatee is just a
recommendation. Final lines will
not be approved until the school
board’s next meeting, which is set
for 6 p.m. May 29.
Feedback can be submitted
online at the school system’s Web
site from through May 25 and a
public forum, the final opportuni¬
ty to appeal before the board, is
scheduled for May 29.
The new attendance zones will
shift several thousand students to
different schools. The move is
needed to accommodate the five
new schools — three elementary,
one middle and one high the
fast-growing system plans to open
in the 2009-10 school year.
It also appears some high
school students will get to stay
put, as the board voted Thursday
to allow underclassmen in the
central and southern parts of the
county to remain ^t the campus
they attend for the 2008-09 school
year.
Board member Mike Dudgeon
expressed at multiple meetings
See ZONES, Page 4A
schools they visited.
We’re trying to put them in
every middle school in the United
States,” Pittman said. His other hope
See HONOR, Page 2A
Possible Storms
LAKE LANIER LEVELS
Date Level
May 12 1057.64 ft
lihiill May 13 1057.65 ft
May 14 1057.68 ft
May 15 1057.75 ft
Full 1071.00 ft
High in the mid-70s.
Low in the mid-50s.