By Mary Margaret Halfordmhalford@vicksburgpost.com

W hen Jamie Creel leaves his house each morning for

work, he says goodbye to his three children. Then, as he walks through the doors of Warren Central High School, he greets about 1,300 other kids he also considers to be his own.

“I really care about every student here,” said Creel, the 41-year-old principal of Warren Central. “I try to listen to them, I have an open-door policy to listen to every issue they have if they want to share it with me.”

As soon as he gets off work, he picks up his two boys, Chandler, 6, and Cooper, 5, and his 3-year-old daughter, Camille.

“It’s never a break, consid-ering how young my kids are,” Creel said.

“It’s like when you’re coaching, you never stop, you’re coaching the admin-istration, the student body and the faculty at all times,” said Creel, a former base-ball coach at rival Vicksburg HIgh. “You’re trying to help people along and be there to lend an ear.”

Creel got his start in coach-ing when he was 19 at Uni-versity Christian School in Flowood, and he’s been in education ever since.

“I got into it and just started to care about the kids so much,” Creel said.

As a child, Creel lived with his grandmother but had six uncles he looked to as male role models.

“I got to see the roads they chose, and they pushed me along to better myself,” Creel said. “I could have gone the wrong way numerous times, but there’s been a male that’s been infl uential throughout

my life.”From there, Creel took it

upon himself to be a stable fi gure in the lives of his chil-dren and his students.

“So many kids like myself come from split homes, you try to understand that, you try to be there for them,” Creel said. “It’s important

to know the students and where they come from, what they’re about. It’s the

TOPIC • C1THE SOUTH • A6

BACK IN THE SADDLEON THE RI$ERaner is more than a horsewomanJuco costs headed skyward

• S U N D A Y, J U N E 16, 2013 • $ 1 . 5 0 W W W. V I C K S B U R G P O S T. C O M E V E R Y D A Y S I N C E 1883

WEATHERToday:

partly sunny, slight chance of rain, highs in the

lower 90sTonight:

mostly cloudy, chance of rain, lows in the lower 70s

Mississippi River:40.8 feet

Rose: 0.3 footFlood stage: 43 feet

A7DEATHS

• Florence Cockrell• Nellie B. Osborne • Sara Park Senter• Sherrell Jean Wright

A7TODAY IN HISTORY

1567: Mary, Queen of Scots, is imprisoned in Lochleven Castle in Scot-land. She escaped almost a year later but ended up imprisoned again.1858: Accepting the Illi-nois Republican Party’s nomination for the U.S. Senate, Abraham Lincoln says the slavery issue had to be resolved, declaring, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”1903: Ford Motor Co. is incorporated.1959: Actor George Reeves, TV’s “Superman,” is found dead of an appar-ently self-inflicted gunshot wound in his Beverly Hills, Calif., home. He was 45.

INDEXBusiness ............................... B7Classifieds ............................ C7Puzzles .................................. C9Dear Abby ........................... C3Editorial ................................A4

CONTACT USCall us

Advertising ...601-636-4545Classifieds ...... 601-636-SELLCirculation .....601-636-4545News................601-636-4545

Email usSee A2 for email addresses

ONLINEwww.vicksburgpost.com

VOLUME 131NUMBER 1673 SECTIONS

SPORTS

MSU WINSCWS OPENERBulldogs advance

to play IndianaMonday night at 7

B1

Creel knows kids take priorityCreel knows kids take priority

‘FATHER’to hundreds

Warren Central High School principal Jamie Creel and his wife, E.J., stand with their chil-dren in front of Warren Central High School.

The children are, from left, Chandler, 6, Camille, 3, and Cooper, 5.

ELI BAYLIS•THE VICKSBURG POST

See Creel, Page A3.

VWSDlookingto solvebudget

shortfall

By Matt Stuartmstuart@vicksburgpost.com

With two weeks left before the state-mandated deadline for the Vicksburg Warren School District to adopt a budget, three of fi ve board members have said they will not support a tax increase to make up for a potential $7.7 million defi cit for the 2013-14 school year.

“We’re going to let Mr. Oakes advise us and then we will make the fi nal decision,” Board Presi-dent Jim Stirgus Jr. said of interim Superin-tendent Donald Oakes, whose term as interim superintendent began Friday as three-year Superintendent Eliza-beth Swinford’s resigna-tion became effective. “I’m going to leave that up to the superintendent.”

“I do not support a tax increase,” Stirgus said.

Vicksburg and Warren County residents will be able to have their voices heard Thursday at a public hear-ing on the 2013-14 budget, an annual state requirement as the board discusses the budget and ad valorem tax rates.

The budget hearing will be at 5 p.m. Thursday at the cen-tral offi ce, 1500 Mission 66.

“I would try to do every-thing possible before we do

Oakes, whose term as

If you goThe Vicksburg Warren School District’s pub-lic hearing on the budget for the 2013-14 school year will begin at 5 p.m. Thursday at the district’s headquarters, 1500 Mission 66.

State-mandated deadlinefor budget is June 30;public meeting Thursday

See Budget, Page A7.

Arkansas woman dies in fi ery I-20 wreck

AbrahamLincoln

SUBMITTED TO THE VICKSBURG POST

By Josh Edwardsjedwards@vicksburgpost.com

An Arkansas woman was killed in a fi ery six-vehicle pileup near Flowers Saturday that closed Interstate 20 for more than three hours.

Mississippi Highway Safety Patrol spokesman Odis Easterling identifi ed the woman as 49-year-old Barbara Goff. She was pronounced dead at the crash site about 2 miles east of Flowers at 5:31 p.m. by Deputy Coroner Ronald C. Regan.

The cause of death is pending an autopsy, Regan said. “They don’t do autopsies on Sunday, so it will be

Monday before we know,” Regan said.No charges have been fi led and the wreck is still

under investigation, Easterling said.Goff was a passenger in a Cadillac sports utility vehi-

cle driven by Craig E. Goff, 49, of Vilonia, Ark., said Mis-sissippi Highway Safety Patrol trooper Timothy Fuller.

Autopsy planned for Monday

Warren County volunteer firefighters extin-guish a fire during a six-car pileup on Inter-

state 20 Saturday that claimed the life of an Arkansas woman.See Wreck, Page A3.

A1 Main

The Vicksburg Post Sunday, June 16, 2013 A3

Poll shows most men aspire to be fathersBy The Associated Press

A recent Associated Press-WE tv poll found more than 8 in 10 men said they have always wanted to be fathers or think they’d like to be one someday.

Debates about the different ways women approach moth-erhood dominate news cover-age about parenthood these days, with fathers’ experi-ences often left unexamined.

A look at what the poll found on how men view fatherhood, and the changes it has brought for those who have become dads:

Becoming a dadAbout 8 in 10 fathers sur-

veyed said they always knew they wanted to have chil-dren, compared with about 7 in 10 mothers, and 69 per-cent of dads called that long-standing desire to have chil-dren an important factor in their decision to have kids.

Dads were more likely than moms in the poll to say they saw positive effects from fatherhood on their love life

and career, and they are just as likely as moms to say it improved their overall hap-piness, sense of accomplish-ment and sense of purpose.

When weighing whether to become a parent, moth-ers and fathers placed simi-lar levels of importance on where they stood in their career and the impact having kids might have on their social life, and like mothers, saw having found the right person to have a child with and the joy of having chil-dren as the most important considerations.

Fatherly aspirationsMen who do not have chil-

dren were just as likely as women without kids to say they want them someday. Among men under age 35, 91 percent are dads already or say they think they would like to have children someday.

Men were more likely than women to say the main reason they’d like to become fathers someday is to carry on traditions or family his-

tory. According to the poll, 14 percent of men called that a top reason compared with 4 percent of women. Women place greater emphasis on wanting to be a parent, to care for and raise a child — 22 percent among women who want children compared with 2 percent among men.

Married, with kidsThree-quarters of dads

said they were married when their first child was born. Among those men who aren’t married and who would like to have children, about one-quarter say they would consider having or adopting a child without a partner, though 88 per-cent within this group say they do want to get married someday.

Men are a bit more skepti-cal than women that a single mother can do as good a job raising a child as two parents can, and men are more likely to say an increase in the number of single mothers is bad for society. Still, about half of men in the survey

said the growing variety in family arrangements these days ultimately doesn’t make much difference.

The AP-WE tv poll was con-ducted May 15-23, 2013, using KnowledgePanel, GfK’s prob-ability-based online panel. It involved online interviews with 1,277 people age 18-49, including interviews with 637 men. The survey has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.8 percentage points for all respondents; it is larger for subgroups.

KnowledgePanel is con-structed using traditional telephone and mail sampling methods to randomly recruit respondents. People selected who had no Internet access were given it for free.

CreelContinued from Page A1.

WreckContinued from Page A1.

only way we can get better together.”

On this Father’s Day, Jona-than Bedford, a 17-year-old rising senior at Warren Cen-tral and the son of Brenda Smith and Willis Bedford, said for him, Creel has been a great role model.

“If I had a problem right now I could call him and he would do his best to fix it,” Jonathan said. “We’re pretty close, he’s never let me down.”

Creel is preparing to enter his second full year as prin-cipal of Warren Central, and his wife, E.J., resigned this year after eight years as basketball coach at Porters Chapel Academy to focus on having more time for her family in the evenings. She’s continued her work as a dental assistant, but she and

her husband share a hands-on role in their children’s lives.

“We just do a little more sharing of the responsibility now. He was Mr. Mom there for a long time, and to them, time is what matters,” E.J. Creel said of their children.

“He’s a great disciplinarian, but he’ll get out in the yard with them and play,” E.J. Creel said. “He’s the fun one, and they really care about his opinion, even though they’re little.”

E.J. Creel said she loves seeing her husband in his school environment.

“I’m really impressed with how he deals with so many kids,” she said. “There’s not one time we’ve walked past a student or teacher and he’s not known their name. He knows how to mentor

each kid individually, and he knows his personnel.”

Clint Fuller, the 17-year-old son of Dwayne and Lana Fuller, agrees that Creel goes out of his way to know his students.

“Mr. Creel always greets me in the hallway by name and asks me how I’m doing,” Clint said. “He’s very involved in the student body and shows respect for his students by how he treats them.”

For Jamie Creel, spending time with his students and his family is the most impor-tant part of the relationships.

“Kids have to be the prior-ity,” Creel said. “I just try to make everyone feel that whatever their problems are, it’s bigger than what I’ve got going on and just be there for them.”

Firefighters advance containment on wildfireCOLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Fire

officials said crews have gained the upper hand on the most destructive wildfire in Colorado history and had more than half the blaze contained by late Saturday.

Incident commander Rich Harvey said containment of the Black Forest Fire was at 55 percent, up from 45 per-

cent earlier Saturday.

The wild-fire left behind

a grim landscape and El Paso County Sheriff Terry Maketa said that in some areas of the blaze’s path, it appeared as if “a nuclear bomb went off.”

The fire that exploded Tuesday out-side of Colorado Springs destroyed nearly 500 homes and killed two people who appeared ready to flee. It’s unknown what sparked the blaze.

Army IDs Rangerkilled in mishap

ATLANTA — The U.S. Army Ranger killed in an apparent parachuting mishap was a 21-year-old veteran from Massachusetts who recently returned from Afghanistan, officials said Saturday.

Pfc. Christopher P. Dona was found dead Thursday with parachute cords and canvas straps from a harness wrapped around his neck after a train-ing jump at Fort Stewart in southeast Georgia. It was not immediately clear what caused the fatality. Army authori-ties are investigating.

An Army spokesman earlier said

Dona’s parachute seemed to work nor-mally during the jump. When he landed, wind filled the parachute’s canopy, dragging Dona about 350 feet along the ground. Dona was unconscious by the time fellow soldiers reached him.

Dona served in the 1st Battalion of the 75th Ranger Regiment based at Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah.

Indianapolis fireforces evacuations

INDIANAPOLIS — A fire engulfed a sprawling mixed-use building near downtown Indianapolis filled with tires and wooden pallets Saturday, produc-ing a towering pillar of black smoke that prompted the evacuation of a five-block area surrounding the structure, authori-ties said.

Capt. Rita Burris of the Indianapolis Fire Department said about 100 fire-fighters from six departments were bat-tling the fire that was consuming the two-story brick building about one mile southwest of the city’s downtown.

Four injured inballpark accident

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Four people have been injured in Knoxville after a four-wheel-drive vehicle apparently went out of control.

The driver, a 66-year-old man who was helping organize a tournament, told officers that the vehicle accelerated immediately after being turned on and hit two adults and two children. All four were taken to area hospitals and did not appear to have life-threatening injuries.

nationBY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

The associaTed pressSmoke from a wildfire fire billows north of downtown Colorado Springs, Colo.

Craig Goff was taken by helicopter to University Med-ical Center in Jackson where his condition was being eval-uated late Saturday night.

The SUV was consumed by flames, Fuller said.

“Both of them were trapped, and the car was on fire,” Fuller said.

Fuller, Warren County Sgt. Ford Emery, volunteer firefighters and witnesses freed Craig Goff by push-ing another vehicle from the driver side door, and they attempted to pull Barbara Goff from the vehicle before the flames became too hot to touch the SUV.

“I was only able to get up to the window once, and I could see her face,” Emery said.

The wreck was caused when traffic slowed suddenly because of a minor wreck and grass fires near Bovina, Fuller said. A trolley car being hauled by a truck was dragging on the roadbed of I-20 and the sparks it caused ignited the grass, authori-ties said.

The six-car pileup started when a Ford Expedition driven by Albert Harris, no age available, of Jack-son, rear-ended a Chevro-let Malibu driven by Mar-

cella Young, 55, whose address was not available. The Malibu hit an Audi A4 driven by Rainer Schaefer, 38, of Charlotte, N.C. A Ford Explorer driven by Sophia Wren, 48, 1122 Cotton Wren Road, Pattison, hit the Expe-dition and the Goffs’ vehi-cle ran into the back of the Expedition, Fuller said. A tractor-trailer rig driven by Steve Howard, 43, of Chats-worth, Ga., hit the back of the Cadillac SUV causing it to burst into flames before the 18-wheeler hit the Explorer driven by Wren, Fuller said.

Wren and her passen-ger, Early Wren, 49, also of 1122 Cotton Wren Road, were taken by ambulance to River Region Medical Center where they were treated and released, a hospital spokes-man said.

Howard was taken by ambulance to University Medical Center in Jackson, Fuller said, but UMC had no record of him, a hospital spokesman said.

The conditions of the driv-ers and other passengers involved in the crash was unknown Saturday.

The fatal wreck is the ninth in Warren County this year.