UDOT Fan of the Week:  Bill Child

Our UDOT fan of the week is Bill Child.  Bill Child, a native of Springville and SHS, was a member of the last SHS State Championship Basketball team, which won the State Championship in 1958.  Bill has provided service to the athletic programs through working in the Snack Shack flipping hamburgers for over 30-years, clear back to when there wasn’t a Snack Shack, just a barbeque and a table.  Bill has also been counted on to round up the stoves for the annual Red Devil Booster Breakfast.

Bill spent several years coaching little league baseball and youth football and he even taught and spent time with his kids running the youth football chain gang.  He and his wife Connie have raised four kids who are now raising sixteen grand-kids; all Red Devils through and through.

In his spare time Bill loves to be a cowboy, hangout with his grandkids, and go to ball games.

Congratulations, Bill, you are our UDOT Fan of the Week.

Mary Story-Our Own SHS Miracle Worker

By: Haley Brooksby, SHS Staff Writer
Pictures By: Lexi Trotter

Mary Story, dedicated student and extremely compassionate young woman, serves an internship at Oak Ridge School for the disabled.  She devotes much of her time (three days a week, three or four hours a day) to working with children in the medically fragile classroom. Three of the children are legally blind, most of them have feeding tubes and/or oxygen, and a few have been diagnosed with cerebral palsy.

Mr. Richard Kay, Oakridge Principal, commented on noticing Mary while she played with the children.  She was lying on her stomach on the floor, next to a little girl.  In her hands, she held a small blanket.  Mary would cover her head with the blanket and then flip it out toward the tiny child, making her laugh uncontrollably.

Mary serves these children with so much compassion and love, it’s no wonder they all adore her, even if they cannot physically express their affection. You can see it in their eyes, they love her so much.

Because Mary cares about these children, she is always looking for ways to help ease their pain and create less difficulty for issues that arise for them physically. One of these problems she noticed was when a physically disabled girl, named Tori, would try to walk with her small walker. Tori had to put all of her weight on both hands in order to get her feet to move; and, Mary could see what a struggle she was having. Because Mary was normally so quiet, says Mr. Kay, he was slightly surprised one day when she brought him a sketch and layout of a new idea that would help Tori and other kids like her.

The device was designed to help her on her daily walk next to the handrail, leading from the outside door, and then down the hall.  Her idea was to have one of their tiny hands on the railing, and the other on a device similar to a single walker, but fixed in order to help them walk straight. This way, the child could feel as though they were walking all on their own, with no outside help. She also came up with a few sketches to help anchor the hips and other joints in their proper order to help them move around as well.

“I have really been impressed with Mary right from the very first,”  Principal Kay states with affection shining in his eyes. “Though I don’t know much about her background, she has a real love, kindness and compassion for the kids.”   Mary, all of us here at Springville High recognize and appreciate your dedication, thank you.