Alyssa Shepherd was convicted on five counts on Friday, Oct. 18.

The 12-person jury presented its unanimous verdict at 6:48 p.m. after about three hours of deliberation at the Fulton County Courthouse.

Shepherd was convicted of striking four children at a Fulton County school bus stop on Oct. 30, 2018, killing three and critically injuring the fourth.

She faced three counts of reckless homicide, a Level 5 felony, one count of criminal recklessness, a Level 6 felony, and one Class A misdemeanor count of passing a school bus with its stop arm extended, causing bodily injury.

Shepherd was convicted of killing Alivia Stahl and her twin brothers, Mason and Xvavier Ingle while they crossed State Road 25 to board the bus. She also was convicted of critically injuring a fourth child, Maverik Lowe.

“I’m extremely happy,” Brittany Ingle, mother of the three deceased children, told The Paper of Wabash County. “It should have went that way. I kind of had a feeling it would, based on all the evidence.

“I’m really glad that they held her accountable.”

The children’s grandfather, Michael Schwab, echoed Ingle’s thoughts.

Students, parents and teachers arrived to O.J. Neighbours on Thursday, Oct. 17, for the 31st annual Pioneer Re-enactment.

The re-enactment took place in the David F. Sodervick Outdoor Education Center, where OJN students demonstrated what life was like in the 1800’s for Native Americans and pioneers.

The event was free to the public, but donations were accepted to help with the costs for next year’s re-enactment.

Kindergarten students demonstrated pioneer songs and dances, first graders reenacted pioneer games, the second-grade classes reenacted Native American dances and blessings, third graders talked about Native American life in various tribes during the settlement period, and fourth graders presented about pioneer life.

On Wednesday, Oct. 13, at the hot dog and ice cream emporium in Lagro, Richard Monce sat in silence on a bench dedicated to his late wife, Anita, looking at the high school photo of her propped up next to him, holding back tears.

Anita Elward Monce grew up in Lagro, married Richard Monce, lived in Fort Wayne for a few years, and then returned to the home she grew up in where she lived out the rest of her life.

Anita stayed close with her school mates from the time she was seven to the day she passed away.

At the dedication of the bench on Wednesday, Anita’s husband was joined by two of those friends, Cheryl Stewart Teague and Becki Behny Wagoner.

Teague and Wagoner, along with six other lifelong friends Cathy Poole Herrell, Rita Rehak Muellyer, Ruthanne Treska Richwine, Linda Clark Mallow, Shirley Gilbert Shellenbarger, and Peggy Schlemmer Ballschmidt joined in raising money to have a bench with a plaque on it placed in Lagro, where their friendship began.

A new type of entertainment has made its way into Wabash in the form of a Virtual Reality studio.

Uptown Virtual Reality (VR) is located on 59 S. Wabash St. and is open Monday through Thursday from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m., Friday and Saturday from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m., and closed on Sunday.

Ben Holbrook and Ethan Ryder are co-founders of the new business.

“I met Ben through working together at Zoomers RV,” Ryder told The Paper of Wabash County.

“We ended up having good chemistry and decided to start this, which was awesome.”

Virtual Reality is a type of video game where the player wears a headset that makes them feel as if they are in another world, and holding controllers that are often viewed as other things by the player when the headset is on.

“I prefer to call them experiences instead of games, because that is really what they are, experiences,” said Ryder.

Uptown VR offers many different experiences for people of all ages and interests.

Thousands are expected to converge on Paradise Spring Historical Park on Saturday for the 17th annual Wabash Cannonball Chili for Charity Chili Cook-off.

“Our team count and our pre-event fundraising is right on part with last year,” Cook-off Committee chair Todd Titus told The Paper of Wabash County. “I think we’ll be somewhere around 90 teams the day of.

“They can still register that day. If anyone is interested, we’ll have room.”

Teams will be located both north and south of the Norfolk Southern Railroad track.

In addition to eating chili, there will be several other things for participants to do.
ABATE will have its interactive display for youngsters, Titus said, and Jeannie Cooper will have arts and crafts projects for youngsters to do.

John Corso, a Wabash High School graduate who went on to become one of the leading production designers in Hollywood, has passed away.

Mr. Corso passed away Oct. 9 at Parkview Huntington Hospital. He was 89.

A 1948 WHS graduate, Mr. Corso was nominated for an Academy Award for his work in the Loretta Lynn biopic “Coal Miner’s Daughter.” He also won an Emmy Award for his work on “Tales of the Gold Monkey.”

Mr. Corso attended Indiana University and received a bachelor’s degree in theater arts from UCLA in Los Angeles, Calif.

He worked as production designer for several Alfred Hitchcock movies, and several John Hughes films including “Uncle Buck,” “Ferris Bueller's Day Off,” “Pretty in Pink,” “Breakfast Club,” “Weird Science,” “16 Candles,” and “Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.” He also worked as art director on television shows “Ironside” and “Columbo” and worked with Sylvester Stallone in “Paradise Alley” and on “Xanadu,” with Gene Kelly as the director.

Eager members of the Wabash community gathered in winter coats, hats and gloves early on Saturday, Oct. 12, for the launch party and dedication of The Fitness Court.

Guests were encouraged to arrive in workout attire to take part in demonstrations of exercises and equipment.

Nutritious snacks, provided by Cathy’s Natural Market, and swag, including hats and bandanas, provided by Visit Wabash County were all available to guests until they ran out.

Back in May, $30,000 was awarded to the city of Wabash from the National Fitness Campaign (NFC) through its annual grant program in the 2019 Healthy Cities Campaign.

This grant program exists to place outdoor gym facilities in cities to bring free, world-class fitness to everyone.

Through donations from other corporations and individuals, the Wabash Fitness Court was made a reality in Wabash, located at River Front Plaza.

Southwood High School teacher Kari Johnson gave a presentation Tuesday, Oct. 8, to the Metropolitan School District board about an externship she did in order to better understand the field she teaches about.

Johnson is a Business Teacher at Southwood High School and chose to do her internship at The Progress House in Indianapolis. The Progress House is not for profit men’s residential home for men recovering from addiction.

Johnson said she chose a not for profit for her externship because there are more than 1.5 million not for profits in the United States.

“The current business curriculum that we have at Southwood doesn’t really address not for profits at all,” said Johnson.

“I have always really struggled with that because I think that they are a huge part of our economy, it’s a great way for people to give back to the community, and there are tons of opportunities that exist in that field.”

Johnson expressed that it was a struggle to get her choice of business approved for the externship because it was not what was originally envisioned for the program.