News

A pandemic can’t put a stop to everything. It may delay many events, and some of them may indeed be canceled. But when there’s a will there’s a way, and El Reno students are a perfect example.

They want to have fun. They want to dance. And they’re not giving up.

High school juniors and seniors have been working on their own prom. They’re calling it MORP 2020. Spelling prom backwards is a way to denote the event as an alternative to the usual tradition.

It’s by the students and for the students, and they’re getting help from a few parents.

Robert L. Allen is considered the pioneer of public television in Oklahoma. It’s doubtful you would be watching many of the programs on OETA if he hadn’t been the captain of the ship during the early years.

Allen is another shining example of the kind of person El Reno has produced. The town has a knack for cultivating a “can-do spirit.”

Growing up in El Reno, Bobby Lee Allen was all about El Reno. He was involved in every school activity including serving as chief photographer for the school district as well as covering sports for the El Reno Daily Tribune.

Cayden Buckner pulled this big snake out of the pond at Legion Park last week. It was one of several the youth tried to snag.

Walmart began making employees wear protective masks last week. The El Reno store has closed off its Tire and Lube Express entrance to customers and turned it into a screening entrance for employees. Each worker must have their temperature taken and wear a mask before entering the store. The store has installed protective shields in front of its registers like other retail sites in town. 

MARRIAGE LICENSES

Gage Dean Kingery, 24; Madison Emmalee Johnson, 23.

Thomas Gunner Moser, 26; Chelsea Lauren Parker, 25.

Zachary Tyler Millwee, 21; Autumn Gail Jones, 19.

Jason John Spanich, 48; Julee Summer Thummel, 41.

Carl Alan Garrison, 48; Sharon Orlena Moore, 40.

Calin Matthew Conley, 25; Kaitlyn Michelle Mason, 24.

Ryan Collin Bland, 46; Dasa Sharee Chrisman, 38.

Gene Aaron Pyle, 56; Michelett F. Rizzo, 56.

Benjamin Aaron Holt, 37; Erica Renee Lee, 31.

The number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Oklahoma broke through the 3,000 mark Thursday, reaching 3,017, and deaths climbed by nine to a total of 179, the Oklahoma State Department of Health reported.

Well over half of the coronavirus-related deaths have occurred in five counties – Tulsa, Cleveland, Oklahoma, Wagoner and Washington. More than 80 percent of people who have died were ages 65 or older, and as of Tuesday, more than a third had lived or worked in nursing homes.

Oklahomans are feeling widespread pain because of the nation’s economic shutdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic and a resulting glut in the demand for oil.

Economic recovery in the state will be slow through this summer and into the winter, according to economists at Oklahoma State University, who predict that as many as 10,000 jobs could be lost in the energy sector alone.

“It’s not a pretty picture,” said Dr. Dan Rickman, a Regents Professor in Economics and a researcher at the OSU Center for Applied Economic Research (CAER) at the Spears School of Business.

El Reno will wait a week longer before allowing certain businesses to open. This breaks from the guidelines set by Gov. Kevin Stitt who said some businesses could reopen Friday in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mayor Matt White decided Thursday that personal care businesses will remain closed in El Reno until April 30. That was the day originally set in El Reno’s emergency proclamation.

On Wednesday, Stitt announced the rollout of a three-step plan to reopen the state beginning April 24.

A 30-year-old El Reno man has been arrested in connection with the death of Robert James Meely, 40. Police said Andrew Keifer Beartrack, 30, was taken into custody in connection with the homicide investigation.

Beartrack is being held in the Canadian County jail and faces a charge of First Degree Murder, said Assistant Police Chief Kirk Dickerson.

The arrest came on Wednesday, the day after divers searched the pond at Legion Park. The divers, from the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, reportedly found items police described as “interesting.”

Elden Eichholz turned 96 last week. He spent the day waving at passing cars that were honking at the birthday signs in his front yard.

Throughout the day there were family members stopping by with presents and wanting to give him hugs. They shied away from the contact due to his increased vulnerability to the COVID-19 virus.

“I’ve got three great-grandkids that I wanted to get a hold of them and give them a hug because they are just so cute. That was the hard part, not getting a hug from anybody,” said Eichholz.