A fire early Wednesday morning destroyed the residence of Thomas Bogle at 3467 Adamson Branch Road, Liberty.
DeKalb County Fire Chief Donny Green says members of the Liberty, Short Mountain Highway, and Blue Springs Stations along with a tanker truck responded to the fire call around 1:05 a.m.
Bogle and his son, who were at home when the fire started, escaped unharmed.
Green says according to Bogle, he awoke to the smell of smoke and discovered the blaze coming from the subfloor in a hallway at the center of the house.
The blaze was protruding through the roof by the time firefighters arrived on the scene, and the home could not be saved.
Bogle says he was able to salvage some clothes and a few other personal belongings.
The cause of the fire has not been determined.

DeKalb County Board of Education Federal Programs Supervisor Michelle Burklow along with committee members Kim Foutch, Jennifer Mitchell, Angela Johnson, Pamela Poss, Suzette Barnes, Clark Oakley, and Alan Hayes are planning a first of its kind for DeKalb County, a First Day of School Education Celebration to be held on August 4th from 5-8 P.M. downtown around the Court House Square.
This Education Celebration is nationally known as First Day of School America and is held annually in a lot of the bigger cities in the United States. Since 1997 the First Day Foundation organization has been assisting schools, families and communities to come together for a celebration on the First Day of each new school year to support education and begin a year-long partnership to promote student success. This is also a time that parents and students can become more familiar with the faculty, staff and PTO of the school that they are entering.
The community can support First Day in a number of ways. Community based organizations can provide materials and resources to parents to make them aware of services available to them in the community. Community leaders- mayors, city council members, clergy, businesses, corporate leaders and others can visit the schools and events and show their support. Local businesses partner with schools by donating products, services and volunteers to the First Day Celebration.
All five schools in DeKalb County will have a booth and will be displaying a photo board with their staff and their individual credentials during the First Day Celebration. Each school will also be represented by their school’s PTO about what the PTO does and how parents can help. The Lion’s Club Vision Screening van will be available that day for vision screenings, the DeKalb County Health Department will be there giving out information, Tennessee Voices for Children and many other organizations will be represented, and school bus shuttle rides will be provided(we are encouraging parents to park at Northside Elementary starting at 4:45pm. Refreshments, inflatable jumping balloons and FREE school supplies will also be available.
This event is still in the planning stages and volunteers are needed. Business sponsors are also needed. If you would like to help with this event please call Michelle Burklow at 215-2107.
This celebration is totally free of charge to those who attend so make plans now to attend in Downtown Smithville on August 4th.
The First Day of School American– Education Celebration committee would like to take to THANK the sponsors that are making this event possible:
Churches
Smithville Church of Christ
Tabernacle, The Baptist Church
Dowelltown Baptist Church
House of Prayer
St. Gregory’s Church
Keltonburg United Methodist
Indian Creek Baptist Church
Covenant Baptist Church
Gospel LightHouse Baptist Church
Snow Hill Baptist Church
Smithville First Free Will Baptist Church
Johnson’s Chapel
United Methodist Church
Peoples Missionary Baptist Church
Jacobs Pillar United Methodist Church
Smithville Seventh Day Adventist Church
Snow Hill Methodist
Grace Bible Church
New Hope Baptist Church
Walkers Chapel Primitive Baptist
Malone’s Chapel Baptist Church
Alexandria Church of Christ
Salem Baptist Church
Businesses
Middle Tenness Natural Gas Utility District
DeKalb Telephone
Dr. Cliff Duke DDS
Triple A Coating
Architectural Custom Cabinetry
Dr. David Foutch, OD
Tri Star Aluminum
DeKalb Community Bank
Liberty State Bank

The recent installation of three speed humps on West Main Street between Juniper Lane and the four way stop at North Mountain Street has become a controversial issue for the Smithville Board of Mayor and Aldermen.
The city board, earlier this year at the request of several residents in the area, voted to install the speed humps as a pilot project, but since they were put down most of the aldermen say they have heard nothing but complaints from the public, who often travel the street going to and from the downtown business district.
Based on those complaints, the city board decided to re-visit the issue Monday night during it’s regular board meeting.
Having learned that the matter was on the agenda for discussion, many of the residents in the neighborhood where the speed humps are located, showed up at the meeting to voice their support for the speed humps and to request that they remain in place.
No one opposed to the speed humps attended the meeting to express their views.
Residents in the neighborhood say the speed humps have been very effective in slowing traffic on a street where speeding has been a problem and the posted speed limit is 15 miles per hour.
Bert Driver, who lives on West Main Street, presented a petition in April signed by twenty three residents requesting the speed humps. During Monday night’s meeting, Driver re-stated the reasons he says the speed humps are needed..” The residences of historical West Main Street are gravely concerned about our safety. More importantly, we are concerned about the safety of our children and grandchildren. Motorists continually speed down our street with blatant disregard to the speed limits and caution signs (Children at Play). Many years ago, government officials recognized that West Main Street was not designed to accommodate such high rates of speed; therefore, West Broad Street was developed and continues to be the most direct and safest thoroughfare for motorists. We feel that speed humps need to be installed near the intersection of Juniper Lane and at the top of the hill near the intersection of Shady Lane. Although enforcement of speed limits by police departments is an effective means of reducing speeds, limited resources do not allow such enforcement on a regular and permanent basis. Please note that we are not in favor of flashing lights because they are ineffective and can be detrimental to the historical value of West Main Street. In brief, traffic calming measures need to be implemented now in order to protect all citizens, especially our children”.
Driver says if the speed humps are removed, the problem would only worsen, especially with the new Wal-Mart store coming soon on Broad Street. “West Main has become a collector street because of the city’s steady growth over the past ten years. As a result, many motorists use West Main as a cut through (a by pass) around the red lights on highway 56 and highway 70. This will only become more intense when the new red lights are installed on Broad Street in front of the new Wal-Mart Super Center. In brief, please leave the speed humps on West Main Street and continue to protect our right to safety and to protect the lives of our children.”
Alderman Steve White says he is also concerned about speeding on city streets but says the problem is not just on West Main Street and that if requests start coming in for speed humps all over town, the city could be creating another problem.
In fact, residents on South College Street and Smith Road, also present for Monday night’s meeting, asked that speed humps be put down on their streets.
White says he has further received requests or inquiries from residents on several other city streets about the city possibly installing speed humps in their neighborhoods.
The Mayor and Aldermen plan to schedule an informal workshop with the Police Chief to discuss the speeding problem city wide and to explore possible alternative solutions to the problem.
Alderman and Police Commissioner Aaron Meeks pointed out that the police department has issued more citations for speeding within the last couple of months, since Chief Gus Clemente took over as head of the department.
Meanwhile, in other business, Mayor Taft Hendrixson re-appointed Alderman Cecil Burger as the city’s representative on the Smithville Electric System Board. Anthony Hagan was appointed as a citizen member, succeeding Vester Parsley.
David Terrell was reappointed and John Daniels and George Davis were appointed to the Airport Committee and Glen Nichols, Jr. was named to the Civil Rights Committee.
All the appointments were approved by the aldermen.
In other business, the city board denied a request by Smithville Police Chief Gus Clemente to adopt a vehicle take-home policy for officers of the police department.
Alderman Aaron Meeks made a motion that the resolution be adopted, but it died for the lack of a second.
Under the proposal, each officer, who is already assigned a patrol car to drive while on duty, would have been permitted to take that cruiser home after work.
Some members of the city council had reservations about that proposal since most of the city police officers reside outside the city.
Under the proposed policy, only officers living within a 25 mile radius of the corporate city limits of the City of Smithville would have been allowed to drive the police vehicles home. All other officers would have been forced to park the vehicles at the police department headquarters.
Chief Clemente says the goals of this policy would have been to promote the security of the citizens of Smithville by greater visibility and presence of vehicles on the streets and highways; provide quicker response time to certain types of calls and therefore increase the opportunity to apprehend criminals; reduce the yearly mileage on each vehicle, therefore increasing vehicle life; reduce maintenance cost on each vehicle in the fleet; provide quicker response of off-duty personnel when called back to duty because of an emergency; provide increased incentive and morale of officers participating in the program; and maintain vehicles in top condition through preventive maintenance and personalized assignment.
Members of the council agree that the policy could have provided for quicker response time by some officers in the event of an emergency, but others argue that it would have added to the city’s fuel cost and potentially increased liability.
Some also questioned how that there could be greater visibility and presence of patrol cars on city streets, when most of the city patrol cars would be outside the city, when driven home by officers who live outside the city.

Five people were involved in a three vehicle accident around 9:15 a.m. Friday morning on Highway 56 north (Cookeville Highway)
Trooper Allen England of the Tennessee Highway Patrol says 62 year old Donna Lawson of Old Mill Hill Road, Dowelltown, driving a 1997 GMC Jimmy, was traveling north and slowing to make a left turn into a residence at 3195 Cookeville Highway when her vehicle was rear ended by a northbound 1999 Dodge Ram pickup truck, driven by 57 year old Kenneth Herman of Bessie Gribble Road, McMinnville. Herman’s truck was pulling a utility trailer.
According to Trooper England, the collision caused the Lawson vehicle to cross the southbound lane and make head-on impact with a 1995 Toyota 4 Runner, driven by 44 year old James Todd of Nashville.
The Smithville Volunteer Fire Department was called to the scene to perform extrication to get Lawson out of her vehicle. She was airlifted from near the scene by a Life Force helicopter ambulance and flown to Erlanger Hospital in Chattanooga.
67 year old Dorothy Smith of Old Mill Hill Road, a passenger of the Lawson vehicle, was taken by EMS to DeKalb Community Hospital.
Todd was also transported by ambulance to the hospital, where he was treated and released.
Herman and a passenger of his truck, 31 year old Chris Moss of McMinnville, were not transported to the hospital. They were apparently not injured.
Members of the Short Mountain Highway and Cookeville Highway stations of the DeKalb County Volunteer Fire Department and officers of the Sheriff’s Department were also on the scene to provide assistance.
Trooper England says the highway was closed to traffic for about two hours during the crash investigation and cleanup.