City Personals
The Marshall Academy class of 2012 celebrated an entire decade of being grownups Saturday night. They held their class reunion at Montrose. A wonderful time was had catching up and enjoying one another’s company. Friday night, Heath Barnett field at Marshall Academy was lit up like a Christmas tree for the Patriots homecoming football game. Pregame festivities began first thing Friday morning with a parade around our historic square. The theme was “Road Trip to Victory”. Grades 7-12 had floats decorated to go with themes from each city: New York, Lexington, Honolulu, Nashville, Hollywood and New Orleans.
The 8th grade knocked it out of the park ~ their theme was Nashville. The students dressed in Sadie Hawkins fashion, each a different country music star with a replica of the Grand Ole Opry stage behind them.
The seniors city was New Orleans and, in true Mardi Gras style, they brought it hard and heavy. You could hear their float long before you saw it, as they had a trumpeter belting out “When the Saints come marching in” riding with them. Their float was decked out from front to back with all things Mardi Gras ~ feather masks, beads the size Dolly Parton would acquire and a sea of purple, green and gold. They even had a King and Queen of the “Senior Krewe”, Bryannah Houston and Maddox Vanzant. Behind the float, they had “walkers” dressed as jesters passing out beads to parade goers. It was a sight to behold and will be hard to top. The Student Council did a phenomenal job with fun games all morning long at the football field following their class picnics. Maddox Vanzant stole the show when he emceed dodge ball. The best was when he and Addison Potts won the “sing that line” game…the duo they were against did not know the next line to the Barney theme song. Addison jumped up and down and ran over to get the microphone knowing that she and Maddox had that one in the bag. Sure enough, Maddox paid homage to his Momma for making him watch Barney as he belted out the chorus line!
The end of every homecoming morning is always the senior skit. Jack Whaley Smith, senior class President, and Molly Burch worked tirelessly with their classmates to make sure everyone was represented well in the skit with fond memories they all had during their reign at Marshall Academy.
When you attend Marshall Academy then have your children matriculate there as well, not to mention have a Momma who taught there twice (and finally retiring), all of the children still in school feel like they are your own. It is truly like being in one big family so I was very humbled when I was asked fo narrate their skit. What I failed to say Friday (it was not written in, so I certainly was not going to throw it in and feel any kind of looks coming my way ha ha) was that the parents of this class of seniors should be so proud of themselves. I worked with them well past dark one night and into a morning on their skit. Each and every one of them were more than nice and definitely respectful to this old goat. One always wonders how their children behave outside of their presence. The senior class’s parents do not need to worry ~ their bunch is one of a kind and will be more than ready to enter this world as young adults come May, no doubt about it.
Historically, the homecoming court has been photographed at Montrose. This year, the backdrop was the beautiful home of Judge and Mrs. Kent Smith. The property alone is like something out of Garden and Gun magazine. The front doors were accented by a swag hand strung by Irene Strickland. It was a gorgeous backdrop for the photographs. Senior maids were Molly Burch, Addison Potts and Ava Rodgers. At halftime, the homecoming queen was announced, Molly Burch. She was crowned by Judge Kent Smith midfield and sashed by last year’s queen, Grace