This Tarkio fifth grade 2020 Battle of the Books group included Jax Peregrine, Easton Madron, and Ben Rolf.

Participants in the 2020 Battle of the Books included Tarkio fifth and sixth graders, from left to right: front row – Brody Wennihan and Danika Agnew; and back row – Bailey Wennihan, Velicity Hegstrom, and Finn Hurst.

Tarkio seventh graders who participated in the 2020 Battle of the Books included, from left to right: front row – Bo Peregrine, Zoe Madron, Dylan Drummond, Bresayda Jimenez, and Quin Staten; and back row – Rainy Nordhausen, Adrienne Phillips, and Olivia Schaefer.

Rock Port fifth and sixth graders who participated in the 2020 Battle of the Books included, from left to right, front row – Talyn Amthor, Brylea Shrader, and Mya Welch; and back row – Westyn Amthor, Jack Meyerkorth, and Desmond Chaney. Greyson Henning is not pictured.

Rock Port seventh graders who participated in the 2020 Battle of the Books included, from left to right, Ella Meyerkorth, Daytona Paris, Kinleigh Daugherty, Jadyn Lawrence, Pooja Patel, Emma Teten, and Dylan Lair. Tayden Cook and Grant Henning are not pictured.

Fairfax participants in the 2020 Battle of the Books, from left to right, included: front row – Johnny Pickard, Lexi Brown, Henry Smith, Carter Oswald, Mack Smith, Piper Morris, and Connor Miller; and back row – Tate Johnson, Austin Helfers, Mason Kingery, and Jaxson Smith. Amelia Larson and Chloe Vernon are not pictured.

Atchison County fourth-seventh graders who read the Mark Twain Award books selected for the Battle of the Books competition that was to be held in 2020 were recently recognized for their efforts and presented with prizes. Due to COVID-19, the event never took place. Each year, an Atchison County Development Corporation (ACDC) grant provides the necessary funds to make this event such a success. Also helping organize the event are the Mule Barn Theatre Guild, the Atchison County Library (each branch) and Tarkio Resource Center, and the libraries of each Atchison County school.

This year, the students picked prizes according to how many pages they had read. Each participant also received a bag with a beanie baby, a book, and a football as “Sports” was the theme for the 2020 event.

Finn Hurst read the most pages of the Tarkio participants (4,753), followed by Bailey Wennihan with 4,115 pages, Ben Rolf with 3,428 pages, and Rainy Nordhausen, Quin Staten, Bo Peregrine, Olivia Schaefer, and Brody Wennihan with 3,183 pages each. Other participants included Jax Peregrine (2,511 pages), Easton Madron (1,310 pages), Zoe Madron (952 pages), Adrienne Phillips (1,502 pages), Dylan Drummond (1,178 pages), Bresayda Jimenez (1,911 pages), Velicity Hegstrom (2,978 pages), and Danika Agnew (2,011 pages).

Fairfax students who participated in the 2019-2020 Battle of the Books celebrated on December 3, 2020, with pizza, drinks and dessert. Students were recognized for the number of pages that they read and the students who read the most were able to pick another prize. Mrs. Bredensteiner asked them questions about some of the books and they received an extra prize. This celebration was long overdue, but they all had fun.

Tate Johnson and Austin Helfers were recognized for being in Battle of the Books for all three years.

The top readers of the Fairfax participants were Tate Johnson (3,183 pages), Henry Smith (3,183 plus 243 – he read Restart twice – for a total of 3,426 pages), and Lexi Brown (3,183 pages). Other participants included Mason Kingery (2,641 pages), Austin Helfers (2,531 pages), Amelia Larson (2,081 pages), Mack Smith (1,969 pages), Piper Morris (1,929 pages), Carter Oswald (1,929 pages), Jaxson Smith (1,761 pages), Chloe Vernon (1,645 pages), Johnathan Pickard (1,362 pages), and Connor Miller (688 pages).

Pooja Patel read the most pages of the Rock Port participants (3,075), followed by Dylan Lair (2,573 pages), Jackson Meyerkorth (2,160 pages), and Emma Teten (2,084 pages). Other participants were: Brylea Shrader (462 pages), Mya Welch (1,205 pages), Desmond Chaney (1,370 pages), Gabriel Gebhards (1,181 pages), Talyn Amthor (492 pages), Ella Meyerkorth (1,583 pages), Tayden Cook (1,600 pages), Westyn Amthor (1,651 pages), Grant Henning (975 pages), Greyson Henning (1,467 pages), Daytona Paris (510 pages), Kinleigh Daugherty (1,352 pages), and Jadyn Lawrence (1,891 pages),