Yesterday LH Today put the spotlight on Lake Highlanders Kathryn Elmore and Shannon Carlton, both intrinsically part of the world famous Kilgore Rangerettes.

Elmore, a recent LHHS grad and Highlandette, is one of the 36 new recruits to the 70th Rangerette line and will perform with the group for the next two years.

Carlton, former director of the Highlandettes, performed on the Rangerette line from 1998 to 2000 and now serves as the Board President of Rangerettes Forever.

While Carlton was certainly instrumental in Kathryn's goal of becoming a Rangerette, her mother Kim was also a great inspiration to her. It was Kim who began the Elmore family Rangerette tradition by performing with the team from 1974 to 1976.

Add to the Lake Highlands connection neighbors Cindy Carey and Mazie Jamison, both Rangerettes in the 1960's.

Cindy Carey is the popular P.E. Coach at Lake Highlands Elementary, but long before her gym days she was on the line in Kilgore from 1969 to 1971, and she maintains a tremendous fondness for her years as a Rangerette. "My two years at Kilgore were some of the best years of my life," says Carey. "That's where I met my husband who was a football player, and we've now been married 36 years!"

Carey was one of 30 young women selected from the 100 who tried out and remembers hugging her mom in tears and disbelief. On the practical side, Carey says the girls only wore red lipstick - no other make-up - and she remembers the heat. "We practiced in a gym in full leotards for hours at a time, with no air conditioning!" The highlights of her two years on the line were trips to the famous Macy's Day Parade in New York City and performing in the Cotton Bowl on New Year's Day.

Two years before Carey's run, Mazie Jamison, another LH native was on the line from 1967 to 1969. Jamison is now the Corporate Public Policy Officer for Children's Medical Center.

She also served as the Rangerettes Forever Board President from '81 to '83 and just finished a stint as Board Secretary this year. "Our alumni group, Rangerettes Forever, was in its infancy when I was President," says Jamison. "To indicate how new the organization was, my group of Forever officers wrote our By-Laws."

"We saw great membership growth because we'd never had an alumni group of our own. The pent-up demand was overwhelming!" Jamison enjoys talking about her time as a Rangerette and the lessons she learned from Rangerette founder and director, Gussie Nell Davis.

"Ms. Davis was a unique individual with high standards, attention to detail and intense focus on her girls," Jamison explains. "She demanded perfection and precision, and she certainly taught us more than just dance steps and high kicks."

"To this day, when I'm in a tough situation I remind myself of the sense of direction Ms. Davis gave me," she says. "If I can step onto the Cotton Bowl field in 17 degree weather with 70,000 fans watching, I can do almost anything."

When it comes to the very technical and physically demanding routines the Rangerettes perform, Jamison is specific about the differences between her day and now, commenting that today's Rangerettes need to be prepared to perform extraordinary physical tasks like kicking the front brims of their hats. "Those high kicks were unheard of in my day," says Jamison. "And the jump-splits that conclude many of the routines had not even been introduced yet!"

And finally, bringing the Lake Highlands/Kilgore Rangerette connection full circle, there's Alice Stultz. In 1938, Ms. Stultz was a Greenville Texas Flaming Flash under the direction of none other than Ms. Gussie Nell Davis!

Although Stultz didn't go on to become a Rangerette, she has kept up with the group because of the common thread of class, precision and perfection that Davis exemplified from the Flaming Flashes to the Kilgore Rangerettes. "We both had Gussie Nell Davis running the show!" says Stultz.

Now in her eighties, Stultz says she hears the same adjectives used about Davis today as she did back then - charming, polite and friendly. "Ms. Davis was always in charge," she says. "Not a sergeant, but rather a confident master teacher and sponsor. We girls just held her in awe."

Among the biggest changes Stultz has seen in the Rangerettes from 70 years ago are the skirt lengths and the high kicks, which she says, "were definitely a no-no back then!" But she adds, "Ms. Davis was certainly able to change with the times."

And one final Lake Highlands connection?

70 years later, Alice Stultz and Kathryn Elmore live just under three miles from one another! The LH Highlandette-Kilgore Rangerette legacy continues...

Special thanks to Cindy Carey for providing Rangerette photos from her college days in 1970.