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1961: Panthers continue to roar
Comments 0 | Recommend 01961: Panthers continue to roar
The Panthers continued to improve on their young football program in 1961 with a season record of 9-1.
The Panthers also bested rivals Odessa High 34-8.
In other local news from 1961, in March, the "Kiss of Death" slaying of Elizabeth Jean Williams, a 17-year-old Odessa High student, made the most sensational headlines of the year. Mack Herring, an Odessa High football letterman and the victim's former boyfriend, confessed to killing Williams with a single gunshot to the temple.
He led officers to the body, which he had weighed down with 50 pounds of lead and dumped in a stock pond near Notrees. What gave the case a macabre twist was Herrings insistence that Williams had asked him to kill her.
"She was cheerful and chatted about how happy she was going to be dead," Herring told the Odessa American. Classmates lent some credence to his version of events, some of them attesting that she had previously asked them to kill her as well.
Odessa Voters approved a $270,000 bond issue for a new Odessa College library. The project had been defeated in two previous elections, including one in February in which the measure failed by 85 votes. County voters approved a $1.5 million bond issue to finance renovation of the Courthouse, 2,558-1,751. City voters rejected a $1 million bond issue for a new City Hall, 3,739-1,806.
On March 25, seven Odessans were killed in a two-car collision on Crane Highway. The wreck bucked the trend in 1961, during which traffic deaths dropped 50 percent in comparison to the previous year. Twelve fatat accidents, accounting for 17 deaths, were recorded in the county In 1960, 35 people were killed in auto wrecks.
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