Mercer County

HARRODSBURG - A boil-water advisory for the city of Harrodsburg was lifted Friday afternoon and all remaining Mercer County advisories were lifted by Saturday afternoon. Harrodsburg Water Treatment Plant Supervisor Walter Bottoms said no further water projects requiring advisories are planned at this time.

Mercer County students will begin classes for the 2013-2014 year on Aug. 7, one day earlier than last year, according to a plan approved by the board during the regular February meeting. The first student holiday will be Labor Day, Sept. 2, followed by Fall break from Oct. 4 to Oct. 11.  Nov. 27 will be offered as professional development days for teachers, while students will be out from Nov. 27 through Nov. 29 for Thanksgiving break.  Students will have an early release day on Dec. 20, the last day of classes before Christmas break.

SALVISA - A Harrodsburg man died early Sunday morning in a single-vehicle crash on U.S. 127, according to the Mercer County Sheriff's Department. Calvin Lee Wiley III, 54,  lost control of his vehicle near the Family Affair Restaurant in Salvisa near Anderson County, Mercer County Chief Deputy Scott Elder said this morning.  Wiley's vehicle ran off Louisville Road and into a concrete culvert. Elder did not know what type of vehicle Wiley was driving. Anderson and Mercer county officials responded to a passerby's 911 call about 3:20 a.m. Sunday.

HARRODSBURG - Harrodsburg is asking its water customers in the city, along with those in North Mercer, Lake Village and the city of Burgin, to begin voluntary water conservation. With the dry weather conditions, heat and construction at the water treatment plant, the facility is running 24 hours a day. At this time, the city is issuing only a voluntary conservation request; however, the weather forecast shows no relief in sight over the next few days. Contact plant superintendent Walter Bottoms with any questions at (859)

The name of the 5-year-old boy who died Sunday of injuries received in a horseback riding accident at Eagles Nest Trail Farm in Mercer County has not yet been officially released. “I think they still had some family to notify,” said Mercer County Deputy Sheriff Carol Matt Swaby. Swaby said the boy reportedly was on a horse being led by his grandfather, Ricky Peyton of Harrodsburg, when the accident occurred. “We got the call from dispatch at about 6:20,” Swaby said.

SALVISA — A Mercer County man lost his home to fire Tuesday afternoon, according to WKYT’s website. Jimmy Desponett, a 73-year old retired builder, says the house along McCouns Ferry Road in Salvisa went up in flames within minutes. Desponett told WKYT that the incident was even harder to grasp than getting diagnosed with cancer years ago. The fire burst into uncontrollable flames in mere minutes, Desponett said. Fire investigators were on the scene for much of Tuesday morning to see what caused this fire.

HARRODSBURG - The following people were recently indicted by a Mercer County grand jury:  Jess L. Hatfield, 33, of Tecunceh, Okla., alleged possession of methamphetamine on Dec. 4. Bond was set at $5,000. Harrodsburg officer Brian Hislope testified before the grand jury. Angela Leigh Moore, 24, of 150 Motley Lane and Michael Devine, 32, Boyle County Detention Center, burglary and theft for allegedly breaking into Melinda Wofford's home on March 20 and taking a laptop computer.

HARRODSBURG -- The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, Department of Highways, says the Deep Creek Road Bridge in Mercer County is eligible for relocation. The bridge was determined eligible for the National Register of Historic Places by the Kentucky State Historic Preservation Office. The bridge is between Mackville and Harrodsburg near the Rose Hill community. The bridge over the Chaplin River was built by the Empire Bridge Co. in 1915. It is about 244 feet long and 11.5 feet wide.

HARRODSBURG — Lightning struck Farmers National Bank on South College Street Thursday afternoon, downing the bank's servers and leaving a softball-sized hole in the roof. No one was injured and fire officials said there is no remaining risk of fire. See tomorrow's Advocate-Messenger for the complete story.

Dakota Jarman shot a 40 to earn medalist honors, but Mercer County won the Bruce Brown Cup title Tuesday on a wet and windy day at Danville Country Club. Mercer edged the Rebels 187-190. “This is the first time Mercer County has won, so it was a good win for the Titans,” Mercer coach Jay Anderson said. “The course played very difficult, more difficult than Saturday (at the Danville Invitational). The rough was wet and thick, the wind made it more difficult and it was cool.” Tyler Bennett led the Titans with a 43 and Austin Satterly shot 44. Ben Kendrick shot 43 for Boyle.

One of two local teams with designs on earning a trip to the state baseball tournament won't survive the first game of the regional. Boyle County and Mercer County will kick off the 12th Region Tournament when they meet Monday in the first of four first-round games. Pairings for the regional baseball and softball tournaments were drawn Friday in Mount Vernon, where Rockcastle County will host both tournaments on adjacent fields. Mercer will be bidding for its third consecutive baseball title, while a few yards away Boyle will try to win the softball title for the second straight year.

Chris Souder's Olympic games are just two weeks away. For all the big basketball games in which Souder has coached at Mercer County and elsewhere during his career, he knows there won't be many as big as the two games in which he'll coach the Kentucky All-Stars next month. In fact, The Mercer County girls coach likened the opportunity he has to coach in the Kentucky-Indiana series to a college or professional coach getting the chance to coach the national team. “Other than going to the state tournament with my team in 2003, this'll be the highlight of my coaching career,” Souder said.

Whether it's called a championship, title, crown or gold, West Jessamine has it and district foes East Jessamine, Mercer County and Burgin don't. That “it” would be the ability to call themselves the 46th District winners, as the Colts baseball team (24-10) can now do after defeating Mercer 5-1 Tuesday. “It's always been us and Mercer, and since Jeremy (Shope) has been over there, we've split districts,” West head coach Jody Hamilton said. “I knew it was going to be a tough game today.

East Jessamine baseball entered Monday's 46th District tournament on a six-game winning streak as part of a season of change. The Jaguars and head coach Kevin Clary won 13 games last season and turned that around with a 22-12 record in 2013 that included wins over many of the state's top teams. Mercer County, riding a four-game winning streak of its own, did little to prevent East from continuing that trek with its early game defense on Monday. Led off in the first inning by senior Forrest Baldwin, the Jags connected for back-to-back singles and a successful bunt to open the game.

Connor Blevins slugged three home runs and Casey Whittle added another Monday as Boyle County blanked Lincoln County 7-0 in a 45th Distirct Tournament semifinal at Danville. Blevins hit his first home run in the second inning to give Boyle a 1-0 lead. He hit a two-run homer in the fourth to make it 3-0 and added another solo homer in the fifth for the Rebels' final run. Whittle's 11th home run of the season also came in the Rebels' four-run fifth inning. Boyle (17-13) will face Danville tonight in the championship game.

East and West Jessamine softball's Monday night rout's have yet again pitted the foes against one another. The Lady Colts (13-21) opened the 46th District softball tournament with a 17-1 win over Mercer County in five innings. West's 10-run explosion in the first inning provided the Lady Colts an early opportunity for the onset of the mercy rule with defensive aid. Through the following two innings, the Lady Titans failed to score while West tacked on an additional three runs in the third.

LOUISVILLE - The Mercer County boys said their repeat state championship in the 3,200-meter relay was not as easy as it looked. But it sure seemed that way Friday as Bryant Qualls, Dean Tayler and Jawan Smith built a huge lead for Landon Souder and the Titans won their second straight Class AA boys title in a time of 8 minutes, 8.49 seconds at the University of Louisville. “We knew we had a job to do when we came here. We had to defend that title. That's our race, the 4-by-8 is our race,” said Souder, a member of last year's team along with Tyler.

Mason Stamm and Tyler Whitehouse hit home runs Friday and Danville closed out its regular season with an 11-4 win over Model on senior night. Stamm finished 2-for-3 and added a double and drove in three runs, while Whitehouse hit a two-run blast. Cole Phillips was 2-for-4, Kyle Lange drove in two runs and Chase Ransdell walked three times for the Admirals (23-13). “It was a good all-around game to finish the regular season on,” Danville coach Paul Morse said. “It was senior night and all eight seniors got to start.

Three area doubles teams won first-round matches Thursday in the state tennis championships at Lexington. Anna Duncan and Nikol Pluess of Boyle County, Sara Coffman and Chelsey Lynn of Casey County and Christy Ingram and Kyleigh Murray of Mercer County advanced to the second round of the rain-delayed tournament. The Boyle and Casey duos won in straight sets; the Mercer duo won by default. All were scheduled to play second-round matches later in the day, but those matches were pushed back to today due to the backlog created when matches were moved indoors.

HARRODSBURG - Mercer County students will see changes happening to the high school as soon as July, according to Superintendent Dennis Davis.  Following the months-long process of submitting and approving a plan from the school district's Local Planning Committee, the board heard a presentation from architect Leonard Bowers with RossTarrant Architects in Lexington at a special meeting May 9 for the changes to be made to the high school, which consists...