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Senators voted 27-16 in favor of the cigarette tax law amendment and debated how to spend the $159 million expected to be raised by the increase. Further amendments to the House bill were to be discussed Wednesday as the Senate considers hiking the state's tobacco tax for the first time since 1977.

"It's a workable compromise and a great many South Carolinians will be helped dramatically," Sen. Thomas Alexander, R-Walhalla, said of plans to spend the money on health programs and efforts to curb smoking.

Alexander says the plan could make health care available to as many as 200,000 residents who don't now qualify for Medicaid, don't have insurance through their employers or can't afford it.

The proposed 57-cent tax would be about half the $1.13 national average but at least 20 cents more than either Georgia's or North Carolina's tax.

The South Carolina House is expected on Wednesday to debate legislation that would severely punish employers who knowingly hire illegal workers.

The proposal, as passed last week by the Senate, would require that employers verify their workers through a federal online database called E-Verify, a new paper-based system to be created by the state, or a South Carolina driver's license. Employers who knowingly break the law could be fined for each illegal immigrant on the payroll, up to $10,000 each on a third offense.

Critics, including Gov. Mark Sanford, want the House to delete the paper-based verification option, saying it's unenforceable. House Republicans will try to make that change, said House Judiciary Chairman Jim Harrison.

While farmers agree the current system is seriously flawed, they say anything the state comes up with won't fix it.

The cuts were announced Tuesday.

The College of Charleston lost scholarships in men's basketball and baseball. South Carolina lost a scholarship in men's basketball, but its athletic department says the team played with one fewer scholarships a year ago and will have a full 13 next fall.

The men's outdoor track team at Coastal Carolina was docked part of a scholarship.

Winthrop's men's cross country team was also penalized part of a scholarship.

The report by a city-appointed panel of outside experts is expected to explain the circumstances of the June 18 Sofa Super Store fire.

Riley had announced last week he would delay its release until two federal probes into the blaze were complete, upsetting firefighters and families of the men who died. The head of the International Association of Fire Fighters told The (Charleston) Post and Courier that the mayor was orchestrating a "cover-up" that endangered firefighters' lives.

On Tuesday, Riley relented and said the report would be released May 15. He said the victims' families and those still on the job couldn't wait any longer for answers.

The "disappointment that I sensed in our fire department and from the families of our fallen firefighters was so substantial, and the skepticism and potential distrust that could result" made it imperative not to delay the release, Riley said.

Wal-Mart officials said Tuesday they will identify engineering experts to perform energy audits at the capitols.

Wal-Mart has worked to cut down on energy usage at its stores and suppliers during the past three years. Through its Greening State Capitols partnership with the National Governors Association, Wal-Mart will offer its services in an outreach effort and to market its audit services.

The other states included are Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Iowa, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. The company also will partner with Puerto Rico.

District spokeswoman Karen York said a family pet of a student who boarded a bus at 1343 Goffman Road followed the youngster onto the bus around 6:35 a.m., setting off panic among the other passengers.

The dog, identified in a Richland County Sheriff’s Department incident report as a black and white pit bull, apparently became excited and bit a frightened child on the leg. The extent of the injuries was not known. York said word that she received was the child was treated at a local hospital, released and was at home recovering.

A sheriff’s department spokesman said the case has been handed over to the county’s animal control officer for further investigation.

— Bill Robinson, brobinson@thestate.com

A judge agreed to reduce the sentence for Mark Miller after prosecutors say he cooperated with the government in a related case.

An attorney for the former chief executive of the Oakwood Deposit Bank says he could now be released in three and a half years.

Miller pleaded guilty in 2003 to charges of embezzling and money laundering. He later testified against the gambling boat operators.

Five candidates visited the campus last week.

They included two university academic officers, the interim chief of a nonprofit economic development foundation, a U.S. Department of Agriculture administrator and a university chief planning officer.

Trustees are looking for a president who can raise money and improve academic standards at the 4,400-student state-assisted school.

In December, trustees voted to remove then-president Andrew Hugine after they said he failed to make improvements in those areas.

Jerry Pennington works for a South Carolina company that federal prosecutors say made millions running an illegal gambling operations in western North Carolina.

The Citizen-Times of Asheville reports that Pennington didn't cite Haywood County Sheriff Tom Alexander by name during his Monday testimony. Alexander says he's never met Pennington.

Federal prosecutors have said they are investigating other current and former law enforcement officials. Alexander has not been charged with a crime or listed in any court papers. He's been in office since 1987.

Judge Craig Brown was criticized for the comments, made during an initial court hearing for a Durham teen accused of killing two college students.

The News & Observer of Raleigh reported Tuesday that Brown told Chief District Court Judge Elaine Bushfan on Friday he planned to resign.

Brown made his comments about gangs in March at a hearing for Laurence Lovette. The 17-year-old is charged with killing University of North Carolina student body president Eve Carson and Duke University graduate student Abhijit Mahato.

Authorities have not said Lovette was a gang member, and Lovette's attorney has said the comments could prejudice jurors.

Organizers say the annual F-D-N-Y tournament in Myrtle Beach will be dedicated to the nine Charleston firefighters who died fighting a furniture store fire last June.

More than 600 firefighters from across the nation and Canada will play on 30 Myrtle Beach-area courses later this month.

One of the fallen Charleston firefighters was Capt. Louis Mulkey. In the past he brought other firefighters from Charleston who volunteered to cook at the tournament's picnic and awards ceremony.

Arriving at the college Monday after an interlude with her sponsor family in Virginia, she talked about the difference in terms that might seem cliche to people living in the United States.

But her life in war-torn Palestine has been anything but idyllic since the Hamas faction launched its intifada, or uprising, against the ruling Fatah Party and the Israeli military.

“Freedom feels much different. I appreciate it so much,” Ashour said in an interview after two hours on campus, getting her Columbia College identification card, seeing her room already decorated by fellow students, and eating lunch in the cafeteria.

Fahim Qubain, founder of The Hope Fund, said Ashour was visiting his home recently in Lexington, Va., when an Air Force fighter jet flew low overhead. Her instant reaction, without even thinking about it, was to dive under the table, Qubain said.

Anthony D. Glover, 21, Anthony T. Glover, 34, and Michael Glover, 37, all of Columbia, are charged with assault and battery with intent to kill, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years.

Brown, 33, was home Monday recuperating after being released from Palmetto Health Richland, said S.C. Department of Public Safety spokesman Sid Gaulden.

Pascoe said he asked the judge, Orangeburg County Magistrate Peggy Doremus, to deny bail for the suspects, contending all have “extensive criminal records and are flight risks.”

Pascoe, whose circuit covers Orangeburg, Calhoun and Dorchester counties, identified Anthony D. Glover, who was a passenger in the vehicle Brown stopped, as the trigger man.

This week, it will come down, signaling the end of Sgt. 1st Class Todd Griffith’s deployment to Afghanistan.

Griffith called his wife Saturday morning to announce that he had arrived at Fort Bragg in Fayetteville, N.C.

There, he will go through the military’s demobilization process for National Guard troops making the transition from active-duty to regular Guard soldiers. He is expected to return to Newberry County later in the week.

“I’ll be so glad when he’s home,” said his wife, Kim.

County Council members will consider a ban tonight that would apply to all workplaces in all unincorporated parts of the county — a proposal that is expected to pass, council chairman Joe McEachern said.

That would include bars.

McEachern, who is sponsoring the county’s ban, said he’s hoping the city and county will pass the same law.

“It’s just something we need to do,” said McEachern, who said that, for the ban to be effective, bars must be included.

Instead of voting Wednesday, council will conduct a public hearing on the parking contract with 5 Points South developers Stan Harpe and Ron Swinson.

A final vote now will be held at council’s May 21 meeting. It had been planned for Wednesday, but the date was in error in a local publication and the city wanted to avoid any confusion, council member Anne Sinclair said.

“And I think there is much to be said for having additional feedback on the contract,” said Sinclair, who represents the section of Five Points where the project is to be built.

The building would be located in a high-profile block bounded by Saluda and Santee avenues and Blossom and Devine streets.

Susan Road, 1000 block: Police were called to a home at 2:30 p.m. Friday after a man reported an intruder who refused to leave. The man told deputies that the man came to his home and looked disorientated and seemed delusional. When police approached the intruder, he told them he lived nearby. Police went to the house with the man, and when they got there, they smelled a strong aroma of marijuana and found a container holding several bags of the drug along with paraphernalia used to smoke it. The man told police that he was on several drugs for seizures but his doctor had told him not to smoke pot with his prescription medications so he stopped the medications so he could smoke the pot.

Key Road, 1300 block: A man called police at 9:30 a.m. Friday to report that another man had stolen a company van. The man told deputies an employee was loading the van in the company parking lot with the doors open and the keys in the ignition when the man jumped into the driver’s seat and drove away.

Cunningham Road, 1800 block: A man was arrested at 8 a.m. Sunday after neighbors complained that he was causing a disturbance. Deputies found the man in his front yard, where he was using extremely foul language. When he refused to stop, police charged him with breach of peace and took him to jail.

IRMO POLICE

The Senate is expected to begin debating the bill today.

Senators have floated at least a half-dozen versions of the bill over the past year, but advocates believe they have settled on a compromise that would help some businesses buy health insurance and expand medical coverage for the poor.

That proposal would include a 50-cents-a-pack increase, raising the total per-pack state tax to 57 cents. In comparison, North Carolina’s tax is 35 cents a pack while Georgia’s is 37 cents a pack. The national average is $1.14 a pack.

“We’re gearing up,” said Kelly Davis, spokeswoman for the S.C. Tobacco Collaborative, a coalition of health care and public advocacy groups supporting a higher tax. “We’re excited that we’re finally getting around to something.”

Lynd, 53, still has an appeal pending before the Georgia Supreme Court seeking to stay his execution, which is scheduled for 7 p.m. today. It is unclear when the state’s top court will act on that request.

Lynd’s lawyer, Tom Dunn, appealed to the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles, arguing that medical testimony presented at Lynd’s 1990 trial was flawed and the jury that sentenced him to death never learned of a possible mitigating factor: He had been sexually molested by neighbors at age 8.

The five-member board rejected his plea on Monday.

Lynd’s execution would be the first since the U.S. Supreme Court last month upheld Kentucky’s lethal injection protocol, clearing the way for executions to resume in the roughly three dozen states that use that method.

The district’s school board is playing host to a one-hour meet-and-greet event at 6 p.m. at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center.

The gathering will complete a busy day for the three educators, who will go through private interviews with trustees and tour a sampling of Richland 1 schools.

Gerald D. Dawkins of Saginaw, Mich., will be the first to meet with the board. He will be followed by Craig Witherspoon of Edgecombe County, N.C., and then Gerald A. Mack of Dayton, Ohio. All three are superintendents of their respective public school systems.

• Race and tolerance meeting is Thursday

Tim Duke dreamed of sweaty summers in an aluminum truck, bringing sweets and smiles to children like himself.

“Growing up here, we didn’t have an ice cream truck — we had the milkman, who delivered little pieces of ice cream,” he said Wednesday inside Sweet Pea, a 1989 Snap-on tools van converted to hold frozen treats. “He had maybe one or two things ... and he came around about once a week. But when he did come around, I would be scrambling for change.

“I remember saying, ‘One day, I’m going to be an ice cream man.’”

Some dreams come true.

West Columbia officers Friday night broke into a motel room rented by James Priester Jr., 48, the Police Department said. They were acting on a tip from a 14-year-old girl’s mother, who told police she believed her daughter was in the room with Priester.

Police say Priester, a registered sex offender, was assaulting the girl when they entered the American Inn room at 1617 Charleston Highway. A search also turned up a bag of cocaine and alcohol, leading to additional charges of possession of cocaine and contributing to the delinquency of a minor, police say.

Priester’s bail was set at $75,000 on the sexual conduct charge and $5,000 on the other charges, police said.

— Kelly Davis

Youssef Samir Megahed, 22, was released on $200,000 bail later Monday, the day his trial had been set to begin. It is the first time he has been free since he and a fellow student were arrested in August near Charleston.

Deputies say they found explosives in the trunk of the students’ car. Attorneys for Megahed and Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed say the materials were merely ingredients for homemade fireworks.

Prosecutors are appealing a judge’s ruling made Friday that excluded certain video evidence from the trial.

It wasn’t clear when Megahed’s trial will start.

Melrose Heights Neighborhood

1224 Fairview Drive

Evoking a sense of an earlier time and another place, 1224 Fairview Drive is a prime example of the Colonial Revival architectural movement that enjoyed widespread popularity throughout the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The influence of Dutch colonial building design is apparent in the structure’s distinctive gambrel, or dual-pitched, roofline. Featuring two full stories, this circa-1930 residence is one of only a few homes of that stature erected on along Fairview Drive, one of the Melrose Heights neighborhood’s earliest developed streets.

Though similar in basic form to its 18th-century northeastern counterparts, this Dutch Colonial Revival style home incorporates several design elements that reveal its true era of construction. Clues to the property’s 20th-century origin lie within its front facade. Most notable is the presence of a continuous dormer, which pierces the majority of the roofline. Additionally, the presence of tripartite six-over-six paned windows and the use of yellow brick, speak to trends prevalent in revival style design.

COLUMBIA CHILDREN’S THEATRE: Season auditions, 6:30-8:30 p.m. May 15, 1-4 p.m. May 17, Booker Washington Heights Cultural Arts Center, 2611 Grant St. Ages 15 and older. Prepare a one-minute comic monologue and 16 bars of a song to be sung a cappella. (803) 681-4548

ARTS

LUNCH AND LISTEN MUSIC SERIES: Classical guitarist Marina Alexandra, 12:30 p.m. May 15; Richland County Public Library, 1431 Assembly St. (803) 929-3450; www.myrcpl.com

“DAMN YANKEES”: Friday through May 31, 8 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays, 3 p.m. May 18 and 25, Town Theatre, 1012 Sumter St. Adults, $18; seniors/military/college, $15; ages 17 and younger, $12. (803) 799-2510; www.towntheatre.com

That was 38-year-old Juan Venerable’s reaction after being baptized by Jonathan Phillip Arnold Jr., 20, at Finlay Park in Columbia.

Every Wednesday evening for the past four years, Christians have gathered at Finlay Park with a desire to serve Columbia’s inner-city homeless. They come from different churches and a variety of denominations.

On break at work one day, Arnold of Columbia said he prayed, “‘Lord, I fed ’em. I’ve loved them. I fellowshipped with them. I’ve washed their feet. What more can I do to these people that would just praise you?”

“One word came to mind,” Arnold recalled. “Baptism.”

It was the second shooting of a law enforcement officer in Orangeburg County in two days.

Anthony D. Glover was arrested Sunday four hours after he is accused offleeing the scene of the shooting on foot, Gaulden said. Charges were pending Sunday evening.

Cpl. Q. M. Brown stopped a silver four-door sedan with North Carolina license plates between 4 and 4:30 p.m. Sunday on U.S. 176 near the intersection of U.S. 301.

After the vehicle pulled into an El Cheapo convenience store parking lot, Brown was fired on through the rear passenger window, Gaulden said.

“I’ll give this to my friend,” the woman said. “She is just so mad at Lindsey Graham she’ll be happy to vote for you.”

It is that discontent with the state’s senior senator that Witherspoon, a Lexington orthodontist, is pinning his unlikely run for U.S. Senate on. Tall and balding, Witherspoon, 69, is a fast talker who ticks off criticisms of state leadership in rapid fire, punctuated with a sly sense of humor.

Graham has a number of advantages over Witherspoon: he’s the incumbent; he has raised millions of dollars; he enjoys nearly unlimited exposure as a close confidante of presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain.

But none of that deters Witherspoon. He thinks it works to his advantage. Graham, he said, has become “magnetized” by Washington, D.C., culture and is failing to serve S.C. residents.

The visit also includes an interview with school board members and a public meeting with potential constituents.

Gerald Dawkins of Saginaw, Mich., will be the first to meet privately with the seven-member board. He will be followed by Craig Witherspoon of Edgecombe County, N.C., and then Gerald Mack of Dayton, Ohio. All three are superintendents of their respective public school systems.

After each of the interview sessions, which are expected to last an hour, a Richland 1 public relations staff member will take the candidates separately to five schools, picked to provide a snapshot of the district’s diversity, according to board chairwoman Wendy Brawley.

The itinerary calls for stops at: Gadsden Elementary School, which features a Montessori curriculum, the new Dreher High School, the much-decorated Heyward Career and Technology Center, and Eau Claire High and Gibbes Middle schools, which have received additional resources this year to help both improve lackluster academic ratings.

When: 6 tonight

Where: Richland County Administration Building, 2020 Hampton St., Columbia

Columbia City Council

When: 9 a.m. Wednesday

Here’s a quiz about what is known about the hush-hush wedding plans — and presidential family weddings in general:

QUESTIONS

1. How many bridesmaids will be in Jenna Bush’s wedding?

2. Where will Jenna Bush and Henry Hager be married?

Deborah Jeane Palfrey, convicted last month of running an elite Washington prostitution ring, wrote to her mother that she could not “live the next 6-8 years behind bars for what you and I have come to regard as this ‘modern day lynching,’ only to come out of prison in my late 50s a broken, penniless and very much alone woman.”

The notes were released by police Monday.

Palfrey, 52, hanged herself with a nylon rope Thursday in a shed outside her mother’s mobile home in the Florida Gulf Coast community of Tarpon Springs, northwest of Tampa. Her mother, 76-year-old Blanche Palfrey, discovered the body.

Deborah Palfrey was convicted of running a prostitution service that catered to members of Washington’s political elite, including Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican. She denied her escort service engaged in prostitution, saying that if any of the women engaged in sex acts for money, they did so without her knowledge.

Harvard junior Daniel Demetri was outraged when he noticed the changes.

“It was like, who are they kidding?” he said.

Actually, the university with the roughly $35 billion endowment was just doing what many other schools are doing in these tight times. The nation’s rising food costs are stirring up problems for dining halls and cafeterias, and institutions serving thousands of people a day are trying to find ways to cut costs while maintaining quality.

At Harvard, it didn’t last. In the face of outraged students demanding their whole grains it restored most of the items. But other places have stuck with the changes or found more affordable ways to feed students.

Infectious microbes that used to be able to resist only one drug, such as penicillin or methicillin, now resist multiple drugs. Some can survive virtually every weapon in doctors’ medicine cabinets.

“This is very worrisome,” said Stuart Levy, a microbiologist at Tufts University in Boston. “In many cases, there might be only one or no drugs to treat (an infection). We are not keeping up with the bacteria.”

Two troubling recent developments:

• Some bacteria have acquired the ability to “eat” the very antibiotic medicines that are supposed to eat them.

1821: Napoleon Bonaparte, 51, died in exile on the island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic.

1891: Carnegie Hall (then named “Music Hall”) had its official opening night in New York City.

1904: Cy Young pitched the American League’s first perfect game as the Boston Americans defeated the Philadelphia Athletics, 3-0.

1925: John T. Scopes was arrested in Tennessee for teaching Darwin’s theory of evolution.

Individuals can now visit the district web site, www.lex5.k12.sc.us. Under the Fast Facts link on the left side of the page, click on GIS School Zone Locator.

Families or people considering moving can type in an address to determine which school cluster a home falls.

Although district officials have tried to make sure the information is correct, they recommend residents contact the schools identified to verify that the address is zoned for the school.

— Devon Copeland, dcopeland@thestate.com

"There's been no bizarre behavior that this defendant has evidenced since he has been in any procedure," federal public defender Bill Nettles told U.S. Magistrate Thomas Rogers III, who did not immediately rule.

"We submit to you that there is no reasonable cause to even hold a competency hearing in this case," Nettles said.

Schallenberger, who is being held in the local jail, attended the hearing wearing shackles and an orange jumpsuit but did not speak.

The teenager was arrested April 19 after his parents picked up a package addressed to the teen containing 20 pounds of ammonium nitrate. Police said the parents also found a cassette tape he wanted played after he died in the assault he planned on Chesterfield High School.

Gerald Dawkins of Saginaw, Mich., and Percy Mack of Dayton, Ohio, have headed their respective school districts long enough to see their ideas produce small but encouraging gains in the classroom that both say were hard-fought.

Craig Witherspoon has been superintendent of Edgecombe County schools in eastern North Carolina just two years, but takes credit for crafting a plan to fix financial problems that were waiting when he took the job.

All three will appear together at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center on Tuesday evening so the public can meet them and pass along impressions to the Richland 1 school board. The hourlong event begins at 6 p.m.

GERALD DAWKINS

Accountant Matthew Irick and Anna Stewart, who was appointed last month by County Council to fill an unexpired term for Seat 7, are running in the June 10 primary.

“It’s been on my mind for over a year now,” Irick said about running in the district that includes Camden, Springdale and the surrounding community. “It was something that I wanted to do.”

Stewart said she wants to be an advocate for children and parents but admits she’s not yet knowledgeable on district issues, adding she’s “only been to one meeting.”

School choice, a concept lauded by state education leaders, has resulted in transportation challenges and racial imbalance in some schools in Kershaw County — something the current school board has been trying to address in recent months.

Montessori coordinator Ginny Riga believes the one-on-one attention from teachers, as well as students' freedom to choose their lesson and whether to work independently or with another classmate, keeps the kids from becoming bored or frustrated. The method, named after Italian educator Maria Montessori, allows students to master skills at their own pace, rather than being taught en masse, proponents say.

"It makes it easier to learn than if I was at school in a desk and the teacher was just writing on the chalkboard," said 10-year-old Elliot Rosenfeld, a fifth-grader at Brockman Elementary. "School is fun."

More than a decade after the state's first public Montessori class opened, 33 programs are scattered across South Carolina. Riga's job is to expand that number, partly by dispelling the stereotypes.

Though the Montessori method has been around since 1907, many parents know little about it or mistakenly view it as religious schooling for gifted and higher-income students. That's largely because Montessori has been used mainly in private school education. There are about 40 private programs in the state.

South Carolina now charges 7 cents a pack and Georgia's rate is 37 cents. North Carolina's is 35 percent.

The debate expected to start Tuesday could last a couple of days. Supporters think they have enough votes to pass a bill that would raise $159 million. Most of the money split between expanding health care for the poor and tax credits to help employers make health insurance available to workers.

«Obituary posted: May 6, 2008»

Bostick-Tompkins Funeral Home, 2930 Colonial Drive, is in charge of the arrangements.

Born in Elloree, he was the beloved son of the late Sam A. Sr. and Rebecca Hart Haigler. He went home to be with the Lord on Saturday, May 3, 2008.

Sam or “Bubba” as he was affectionately called, was educated in the public schools of Orangeburg County. He continued his education at Benedict College, where he had a distinguished football career. His college career was interrupted by his service in the U.S. Army where he served in WWII from 1943 - 1945. Following his honorable service to our county, he returned to Benedict College and graduated with a Bachelors Degree in 1948. Following graduation from Benedict College, Sam began his career with the U.S. Government at the William Jennings Bryan Dorn Veterans Hospital from which he retired after more than thirty years of dedicated service.

Mr. Haigler was a devoted Christian and lifetime member of Shiloh AME Church in Elloree where he served as a Trustee. He was a distinguished member of the Omicron Phi Chapter of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc., and a loyal alumnus of Benedict College where he served as Treasurer of the Benedict College Junior Alumni Club for 16 years, Treasurer of the Benedict College National Alumni Association for 14 years and he was a 1990 inductee into the Benedict College Athletic Hall of Fame.

Born in Saluda County and a daughter of the late Eddie Eugene and Hope Bridges Dorn, she was the wife of Truman Ernest Trotter. Mrs. Trotter was a retired bookkeeper with Trotters Builders. She was a faithful and active charter member of Saluda Baptist Church and formerly involved with the GA’s.

Surviving are her husband, Truman Ernest Trotter of the home, a daughter and son-in-law, Suzanne T. and Charles R. Thomas of Statesville, NC, three sisters, Elma Dorn, Wofford Davis and Myrtis Dorn, all of Saluda, two grandsons, Russell Thomas and Nolan Thomas, a granddaughter, Beth Anne Thomas and many nieces and nephews.

A son, Ernest Eugene Trotter, preceded Mrs. Trotter in death.

The family will receive friends from 6 until 8 p.m. Tuesday evening at Ramey Funeral Home.

Born in Saluda County and a son of the late Brooks and Eva Coleman Riley, he was the husband of Nannie Ruth Corley Riley. Mr. Riley was a U.S. Army veteran of WWII. He had retired from Park - Davis and was a member of Saluda Baptist Church.

Surviving are his wife, Nannie Ruth Corley Riley of the home, two daughters, Ann R. Wheeler of Saluda and Coleen Riley Garick of Columbia, two brothers, Hoyt Riley and Dewitt Riley, both of Saluda, a sister, Rosa Eva Rankin of Saluda, two grandchildren, Carol Rachels of Chester and Kevin Lloyd Wheeler of Saluda and three great-grandchildren, Katelyn Wheeler, Nicholas Rachels and Nolan Rachels.

Funeral services will be 4 p.m. Wednesday, May 7, 2008, at Ramey Funeral Home Chapel with Rev. Norman Rogers and Rev. Burton Campbell officiating. Interment will follow in West Travis Park Cemetery. The family will receive friends 1 hour prior to the service.

Memorials may be made to Saluda Baptist Church, 112 West Wheeler Circle, Saluda, SC 29138.

Surviving are her daughter, Ruth Stokes (James) Powers; son, Reverend Cleveland Stokes; brother, Jessie Cain; daughter-in-law, Linda Faye Stokes; grandchildren; great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren.

www.leevy.com

«Obituary posted: May 6, 2008»

Mrs. McKenzie was born January 7, 1922, in Williamsburg County, a daughter of Berton Taylor and Nellie Hughes Eaddy. She was a graduate of Indiantown High School, was a former employee of Kingstree Manufacturing and retired from Drexel Heritage. She was a member of Bethesda Methodist Church in Cades, SC. In addition to her husband and parents, Mrs. McKenzie was preceded in death by a son, W. Chris McKenzie; three sisters, Dora Mae Jowers, Pauline Bowles and Keith Thompson; one brother, Capers Eaddy.

Surviving are two daughters, Judy McKenzie Urga of Kingstree and Janis McKenzie Lane of Orlando, FL; grandchildren and great-grandchildren; six sisters, Moeaden E. McCrea and Wista E. Brown, both of Kingstree, Wannah E. Davis of Florence, Bert E. McCrea of Pawley’s Island, Annie E. McCants of Georgetown and Selma E. Malay of Moncks Corner.

Funeral services will be 11:00 a.m. Wednesday, May 7, 2008, in the chapel of Williamsburg Funeral Home with burial in Kingstree Memorial Gardens. The McKenzie family will receive friends from 6 to 8 p.m. Tuesday at Williamsburg Funeral Home.

«Obituary posted: May 6, 2008»

Mrs. McLendon was born in Lake City on September 27, 1911, a daughter of the late Will Kelly and LaUna Moore Kelly. She was a widow of Mr. Millon Murray McLendon. Mrs. McLendon was a life-long member of the Lake City United Methodist Church where she held numerous leadership positions including president of the Lula Shaw Epps Sunday School Class, life member and president of the Women’s Society, chairperson of the parsonage committee, vice-president and secretary of Christian social relations and local church activities, secretary of youth, circle leader, and board member. Mrs. McLendon was an organizer, charter member, and past-president of the Junior Book Club. She was a graduate of Winthrop College and taught school in Johnsonville for two years. Mrs. McLendon, or “Granny” to those close to her, was a loving wife, mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother and will be truly missed.

Survivors include a daughter, Constance McLendon Gimbel of Lake City; three granddaughters, Kelly Timmons (Edward) of Greeleyville, Jan Webster (Joby) of Chapin, and Melissa Gimbel of Columbia; a grandson, Murray McLendon III (Sharlene) of Lake City; ten great-grandchildren; a sister-in-law, Annie Laurie Nunn of Tallahassee, Florida; and life-long companion, Clara Lee Witherspoon of Lake City.

Mrs. McLendon is preceded in death by a son, M. Murry “Macky” McLendon Jr.; and two brothers, William Kelly and Howard Kelly.

The family of Mrs. McLendon will have visitation from 6 - 8 p.m. Tuesday, May 6, 2008, in the funeral home.