2021 INDUCTEES
Steve Kowalewich
A 1967 graduate of Fair Grove, he was probably the best track athlete who had ever gone to Fair Grove High School at the time he was there, and although his school records have since been broken, he still ranks near the top among all-time FG track athletes. At the time he graduated, he held school records in the 100 yard dash, 220 yard dash, 440 yard dash, and long jump. His times in the sprints were also Greene County League records. At the Class S Missouri State Track Meet in the spring of 1967, he won all three sprint events, carrying Fair Grove to a second-place finish virtually single-handedly. Steve also played basketball at Fair Grove and was among the starting five his senior year. He was active in FFA, serving as vice president of the organization his senior year.
Truman Smith
From 1950 to 1954, Truman Smith played high school basketball at Sparta High School. During his senior year his team won the Gold Division in the Greenwood Tournament. Smith scored 87 points in the tournament that year which won him the honor of scoring champion for the tournament. This added to his 19 points he scored in the Greenwood Tournament his sophomore year and the 65 points he scored in it his junior year led to him becoming a member of the 150 point club.
The team also won the 23rd annual Tournament of Champions that year and Smith was the leading scorer in the final game with 26 points on the night. He was named 1st Team on the All-Stars teams for that tournament.
The team went on to beat an undefeated team in the Class B State Championship. Smith scored 24 points in the state championship game and was selected as an All-State Player.
Smith received a 4 year scholarship to play basketball at Southwest Missouri State and was a 4 year letterman there. After graduation, he was hired as basketball coach at Dadeville High School in 1958 and coached there for 4 years. During this time his team won over 20 games each year and won the Mid-West Conference all 4 years.
In 1962, Smith was hired as head basketball coach at Sparta High School in 1962. He had 2 winning seasons there and won over 20 games one season. In 1964, Smith was hired as head basketball coach at Clever High School in 1964 and coached there one year.
In 1965, Smith was hired as head basketball coach, track coach and baseball coach at Fair Grove High School. He coached there for 4 years, with winning seasons 3 of the 4 years. His best year the team had a record of 25 -5. (The 25 wins was a school record until recently when the team won 26 games.) They also won the Greene County League Tournament that year which was the first time Fair Grove had ever won it.
Also while coaching at Fair Grove one year his track team won 3rd in the state.
In 1969, Smith was hired as head basketball coach at Ava High School in 1969 and coached there for 5 years. The first year was a rebuilding year and he had a winning season the next four years. His team was District Champions 2 years, South-Central League Co-Champions one year and made it to the State Quarter Finals one year where they got beat by one point. That year their record was 27-2, which is still a school record. Smith was voted Coach of the Year in the South Central League two years.
In 1974, Smith was hired as head basketball coach at Salem High School and coached there 9 years. He was named Coach of the Year in the South Central Conference two years and his team won the South Central Conference one year with an undefeated conference season.
Smith served as Athletic Director for his last 4 years at Salem and retired in 1994.
During his 25 years of coaching high school basketball for 25 years, Smith had 414 wins. As a player he was listed in 2000 Springfield News-Leader article as one of the Best Of The Century Basketball Players for the 1950's decade. They listed only 10 players for each decade in the article.
Bethany Caudle (Kellogg)
A 2004 graduate of Fair Grove High School, she was a star track athlete as well as being valedictorian of her class and student body president. She was one of only two students in Missouri picked to go to Washington for a leadership conference her senior year, where the group got to meet President Bush. In track, she set school records in the 100 and 300 meter hurdle events. She placed 3rd in the state in Class 2 in the 300 hurdles her freshman year, and her senior year she placed 3rd in the pole vault and 6th in both hurdle events.
Dan and Betty Manning
Although both are Kansans by birth, Dan and Betty arrived in Fair Grove in the mid 1970s after having lived in Los Angeles for a few years following Dan’s service in the Navy during the VietNam conflict. Looking for a good place to raise their children, they bought the old Bell Hotel on S. Main Street which would become their residence for almost four decades.
Rumors initially buzzed about the “California hippies” who had come to town. But in 1978 the Mannings unknowingly became the ultimate Fair Grove insiders when they helped organize a gathering of 12 local craftspeople for a fall event. That humble beginning has grown into the Fair Grove Heritage Reunion and Fall Festival that draws throngs of visitors to our town over the last weekend of September each year.
Along with other notable townspeople, Dan and Betty were founding members of the Fair Grove Historical and Preservation Society that saved the Boegel-Hines /Womack Mill from certain ruin. Over the years the Mannings have given back in numerous additional ways via their service in a wide range of civic and volunteer organizations.