Joan Timmons
November 22, 1928 – August 13, 2025
Service: Monday, August 18, 2025, 9am at One Life Church, Alexandria. 

Mary Louise Juneau Duhon
January 10, 1936 – August 12, 2025
Service: Saturday August 23, 2025, 2pm at St. Francis Xavier Cathedral, Alexandria. 

Jeanne Ellen Harris
September 26, 1929 – August 10, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 1pm the Ball Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witnesses, Ball.

Henry Hamilton Bledsoe
October 1, 1937 – August 9, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 2pm at Hixson Brothers Funeral Home, Pineville.

Mary Weatherly Gough
March 21, 1944 – August 9, 2025
Service: Friday, August 15, 2025, 2pm at Gallagher Funeral Home, Ball. 

Charles R. Satcher
June 30, 1945 – August 8, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 11am at Kramer & Son Funeral Home, Alexandria.

Hilda Sherman Nelson
June 28, 1941 – August 7, 2025
Service: Thursday, August 14, 2025, 11am at Gallagher Funeral Home, Ball. 

Carroll H. Gates
December 31, 1938 – August 4, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 12pm at Hixson Brothers Funeral Home, Pineville.

Dawn Marie Foster
December 1, 1961 – August 3, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 1pm at Trinity Baptist Church, Pineville.

Cora Lee West
September 1, 1943 – August 2, 2025
Service: Friday, August 15, 2025, 11am at First Evening Star Baptist Church, Alexandria. 

The Rapides Parish Journal publishes paid obituaries – unlimited words and a photo, as well as unlimited access – $95. Contact your funeral provider or RPJNewsla@gmail.com . Must be paid in advance of publication. (Notice of Death shown above are FREE of charge. You may email them to RPJNewsla@gmail.com)

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By JIM BUTLER

Alexandria’s crime rate hasn’t drawn a White House response but it is getting attention.

Two different media reports place the city as the third most-dangerous in Louisiana. Both cite the Federal Uniform Crime Reporting system though they give different numbers.

The city ranks higher than several larger ones, including New Orleans and Baton Rouge, on both lists. (Incidentally, Marksville tops one of the lists and is fourth on the other.) Only in Louisiana touts good and bad on its reports; Reolink postings are most often related to the security equipment company field of enterprise.

According to Only in Louisiana, an Alexandria resident has a 1 in 68 chance of being a violent crime victim and a 1 in 12 chance of being a property crime victim.

Reolink puts those odds at 1 in 50 and 1 in 16.

Numbers in the FBI report are from information submitted by local law enforcement agencies.

The totals are a global view, not taking into account time of a crime or location within the jurisdiction, nor how many are committed by repeat offenders.

The numbers reflect complaints responded to, not charges made in connection with them.

The Rapides Regional Medical Center is partnering with LifeShare Blood Center – Alexandria to host a community blood drive TODAY from 9am to 6pm in the South Tower Lobby.

Every blood type is needed, especially types O positive and O negative, as well as platelet donations. Donors can help as many as three different people with just one donation.

Local citizens are being targeted by phone calls threatening them with arrest and prosecution for failing to comply with jury service in federal or state courts.

In the calls, recipients are pressured to bring a “fine payment” for missing jury duty to the Parish or Federal Courthouse in Alexandria. Then the victim receives a phone call to “expedite the process” to put the money on a Green Dot Visa Card or go to a kiosk that converts cash TO electronic currency like Bitcoin.

Neither the Rapides Parish Sheriff’s Office nor any other law enforcement agency will EVER attempt to collect any monies and instruct the person to get a Green Dot Visa Card or Bitcoin.

Additionally, several of citizens have received text messages about State of Louisiana Department of Vehicles (DMV) Final Notice: Enforcement Penalties Begin on August 12.

The Louisiana State Administrative Code 15C-16.003 that they reference is not even real, and a quick Google search reveals this is a scam.

Even though many people rely on smartphones for almost everything, neither law enforcement nor the Rapides Parish Sheriff’s Office will EVER attempt to collect any monies and instruct the person to take financial action in a text or e-mail.

Never click on a link sent by an unknown sender. 

The Alexandria Police Department responded to the 2300 block of Alma Street in reference to a drive-by shooting where a residence was struck on Tuesday, Aug. 12, at approximately 11:40am. No one was injured during this incident.

This is currently an ongoing investigation.

If anyone has any information about this incident or any other type of crime in the Alexandria area, contact the Alexandria Police Detective Division at the phone number 318-441-6416 or APD Dispatch 318-441-6559. Information can also be emailed to detectives at APDDetectives@cityofalex.com.

For a cash reward, call Crime Stoppers of CenLa at 318-443-7867. The Crime Stoppers P3 Tipster App can also be downloaded to leave tips and get a claim number for a cash reward at www.p3tips.com/community/mobile.

Notice of a Public Meeting

Date: Monday, August 18, 2025

Time: 6:00 p.m.

Location: Tunk’s Cypress Inn, 9507 LA-28 West

SAVE MY LOUISIANA

Mission Statement: Informing, educating, and empowering citizens to protect our public safety, natural resources, and foundational rights. We advocate for transparency, stewardship, and the preservation of freedoms—ensuring that the voices of Louisiana’s people are heard.

Paid Content

Vehicle Purchase Intention Survey
Current Attitudes Toward Buying a
New Car or Truck
(within the next 4 months)

The Rapides Foundation is promoting its Healthy Lifestyle Program, a free service it funds that is administered by CMAP. Individuals living in Central Louisiana can ask their doctors about a referral to the program which provides personalized guidance, proper nutrition, and physical activity recommendations. 

Clients are counseled for six months, learning behavior changes they can take with them when they complete the program. Central Louisiana physicians enjoy having somewhere to send their patients for follow-up and consistent nutrition and exercise education. Doctors also say that diseases become easier to control when patients modify their diets and increase their physical activity.

For more information, check out the Health Lifestyle Program website. 

August 13 is a day steeped in historical and pop culture moments—but perhaps none as delightfully irreverent as the debut of South Park on Comedy Central in 1997. What started as a series of crude animated shorts shot to fame and evolved into one of the most iconic, boundary-pushing shows in television history.

On that summer night, four foul-mouthed third-graders—Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny—introduced themselves to the world through the show’s debut episode, Cartman Gets an Anal Probe. With shock value dialed to eleven, the humor was raw, unfiltered, and cartoonishly absurd. That first episode, and many that followed, quickly established South Park as the new heavyweight champion of satirical animation, a legacy that still resonates after more than two decades.

The show, known for causing controversy, has also drawn reactions from figures associated with the Trump administration, some of whom have criticized recent episodes of South Park for satirizing President Donald Trump. In the episodes, a Trump-like character is portrayed in absurd scenarios, culminating in a scene that depicts him “getting in bed with the devil.” While the show’s creators have long targeted political figures across the spectrum, supporters of the president have expressed frustration over what they see as an intentional effort to demean him.

From skewering the news headlines of the day to ranting about everything from politics to pop culture, South Park redefined what an animated series could do. Its biting satire, theatricality, and fearless commentary became staples of its identity. Over time, the show pushed the envelope in storytelling, garnering awards, notoriety, and a die-hard (if often offended) fan base.

By lampooning social norms and taking on topics most shows wouldn’t dare touch, South Park broke barriers—and nerves—with gleeful irreverence and surprising insight. Creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone turned animated bathroom humor into a platform that dissected cultural absurdities with surgical wit.

In 2025, South Park is more than a TV show—it’s a cultural phenomenon, a mirror for societal satire, and often a lightning rod for debate.

Happy Anniversary, South Park. It’s your world. The rest of us just live in it.

Jeanne Ellen Harris
September 26, 1929 – August 10, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 1pm the Ball Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witnesses, Ball.

Henry Hamilton Bledsoe
October 1, 1937 – August 9, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 2pm at Hixson Brothers Funeral Home, Pineville.

Mary Weatherly Gough
March 21, 1944 – August 9, 2025
Service: Friday, August 15, 2025, 2pm at Gallagher Funeral Home, Ball. 

Charles R. Satcher
June 30, 1945 – August 8, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 11am at Kramer & Son Funeral Home, Alexandria.

Hilda Sherman Nelson
June 28, 1941 – August 7, 2025
Service: Thursday, August 14, 2025, 11am at Gallagher Funeral Home, Ball. 

Carroll H. Gates
December 31, 1938 – August 4, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 12pm at Hixson Brothers Funeral Home, Pineville.

Dawn Marie Foster
December 1, 1961 – August 3, 2025
Service: Saturday, August 16, 2025, 1pm at Trinity Baptist Church, Pineville.

Cora Lee West
September 1, 1943 – August 2, 2025
Service: Friday, August 15, 2025, 11am at First Evening Star Baptist Church, Alexandria. 

The Rapides Parish Journal publishes paid obituaries – unlimited words and a photo, as well as unlimited access – $95. Contact your funeral provider or RPJNewsla@gmail.com . Must be paid in advance of publication. (Notice of Death shown above are FREE of charge. You may email them to RPJNewsla@gmail.com)

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By JIM BUTLER

Helping or harboring? The ultimate answer is key to JT Lindsey’s future, football or otherwise.

Lindsey, a coveted running back out of Alexandria Senior High, is accused of being an accessory after the fact to second-degree murder by allowing two friends/fugitives to hide in his LSU housing.

Instead of repetitions learning his role as a heralded freshman this month he is suspended while the case is open. Through his attorney, Lindsey, 18, asserts he was only trying to help Keldrick Jordan, 18, and Shemell Jacobs, 17, with a place to stay and had no knowledge of them being wanted on murder charges.

The state claims otherwise in its felony arrest warrant, saying Lindsey told acquaintances of the situation.

The accused killers allegedly shot Corey Brooks, 17, and two others in an ill-fated armed robbery attempt on the afternoon of May 21. Brooks died the next day.

A week later a suspect was arrested and police appealed for whereabouts information regarding Jordan and Jacobs.

The shooting happened on Clark Street, about a block from the fugitives’ residences.

Authorities have yet to comment on circumstances regarding the incident or identify the other two victims.

Lindsey graduated two days before the shooting, with a whirlwind summer ahead before reporting to Baton Rouge.

Was he aware of the killing and suspects search? Or out of touch with hometown matters?

Teens have their own telegraph. What, if anything, was it telling Lindsey about the murder of an ASH student?

At one point authorities seem convinced the fugitives were in the Lafayette area. The trail went cold and the search became Page 2 news.

That changed when an arrest warrant, claiming Lindsey had spoken with others about the matter, was issued and “Quick Six” turned himself in.

The fugitives are being held in Rapides lockup under $3 million bond. Lindsey posted $5,000 bond in Baton Rouge.

With summer basically over since school has started, I gazed back into summers of yore in Alexandria. The memory that gazed back was City Park Funland.

It was the Circle of Life. The Carousel went round and round. The boats went round and round. The planes rose up and down and went round and round.

Granted, this wasn’t the amusement park of my youth. That would’ve been Pontchartrain Beach in New Orleans. Comparing that to City Park Funland isn’t fair. It would be like comparing New Orleans to Alexandria. But Funland, thanks to the late Jimmie Thompson, found its niche in Central Louisiana for nearly four decades, and brought countless smiles to generations of youngsters in small town Americana.

It opened in 1953, and Thompson, after thinking about it for several years, shut it down in 1990 – 11 years before he died in 2001 at age 83.

To know about Funland, you’ve got to know about Jimmie Thompson, an entrepreneur unmatched in my experience in Alexandria. He was into everything, it seemed, when it came to promoting, buying, selling or trading anything. He did it all with an optimism and confidence and seek-until-ye-find determination.

Don Thompson, one of his three sons who worked at the zoo as a youth, said his father, as a young adult, opened a skating rink on the corner of Rapides and Madison when Alexandria and the surrounding area overflowed with military personnel involved with the Louisiana Maneuvers, a large-scale military training exercise held in central Louisiana in 1941, involving approximately 400,000 troops. These exercises were crucial in preparing the US Army for World War II.

He and a friend got involved in the theater business, Don said, gradually expanding beyond Alexandria and Natchitoches to cover many theaters and drive-ins across the state, north of I-10. Then he opened the Jimmie Thompson Arena on North MacArthur Drive (site of the current Sai Convention Center) mostly to host professional wrestling, although a young Elvis performed there during his Louisiana Hayride days.

Then he got involved hosting rodeos. “The story is,” said Don, 66, “he went to a big rodeo in Texas and saw how much the cowboys were making, and he saw how many people were there to watch, and thought about what they paid to get in, and he did the math on what he figured might be the expenses, and decided to give it a shot.”      

Not one to go into anything cold cocked, Jimmie Thompson decided he must learn more about rodeoing first. He bought some livestock and property by Browns Bend Road. He learned how to rope and ride. “He even patented a stadium design,” said Don, “feeling there was a need for such stadiums that could be easily assembled. He sold stadiums all over the country. Some are still around.”

We’ll get back to Funland soon, but he and two other fellows started Bowlero Bowling Lanes, and when it didn’t go as expected, the other two wanted out, so Jimmie bought them out. This was in 1958. “He stumbled on a deal in Japan, which was having a big bowling boom,” said Don. “They were building several multi-storied bowling centers. They flooded the market, the popularity waned, and several went out of business.”

Thompson, then, started importing used bowling equipment from Japan and “sold it all over the country – pin setters, lanes, the whole shooting match.” He used an abandoned Sears warehouse as his base for shipping and building. He had a big shop with industrial type equipment where he could “build about anything,” Don said.

Bowlero eventually shut down, to be replaced by a honky tonk and then the current Surgical Center.

Back to Funland. It was initially named Kiddie Land. Oldtimers might remember Virgil Adams and his wife ran the place early on. Virgil was the general manager, and his wife ran the concession stand. Thompson’s daughter, Fay, and her husband John Day eventually took over.

If you’re wondering what inspired Thompson to open Kiddie Land, he told the Town Talk he did so at the behest of then Streets and Parks Commissioner Bill Lambdin. Lambdin said the city wanted some rides in City Park and wanted Thompson to help them, since he was a buyer and seller of carnival rides and park equipment at that time.

“The next time he met with me,” Thompson said, “he was saying, ‘We’re going to do this and we’ll do that.’ A few weeks later he came over and said, ‘When you put the rides in, you need to do this and that. It had gone from ‘us’ and ‘we’ to ‘you.’”

Anyway, against his better judgment Thompson agreed to put the rides in City Park. He’d have preferred putting the amusement park on MacArthur Drive, where he already owned land where it could have been built.

John and Fay Day’s daughter, Kitty, worked several years there, including when it was Kiddie Land.

“I was part of the park; I’m Kitty Lynn, and it was Kiddie Land,” she said, recalling her parents took over the management in 1962. “I worked there in the concession stand and moved up to the ticket booth after I learned how to count money and be responsible.”

Kitty, 60, said a benefit of the job was being able to ride all the rides for free, and there was a game room for a while, which was popular with teenagers.

The park’s longest surviving ride, the carousel, didn’t sell at auction for what Thompson was hoping. He said he turned down an offer of $65,000 when he thought he’d get a four-year lease on the park from the city and continue operating the park. When the City Council offered only a two-year lease, Thompson shut it down.

At the closing auction, the carousel was sold to a buyer from Oregon for $27,000. The Funland Express Train sold for $15,500 to a man who ran a large amusement park in Fort Worth. The black “Octopus” ride was sold to a man from Bunkie for $5,000.

“It’ll make a lot of money for him,” said Thompson, who insisted he wouldn’t shed a tear about closing the park.

“”I am not a sentimentalist,” he said after closing the park. “I live for tomorrow and always have. I have just a little sentiment about the park because of the children who came to the park to ride the rides.”

I am a sentimentalist, and now, when you drive in the parking lot for the Alexandria Zoo, think for a moment of what used to be there, and thank Jimmie Thompson for bringing that fun place to our town.

Story and photos by KEVIN SHANNAHAN, Journal Services

Kevin’s Gallery

Season ticket pickup for the NSU Demons’ upcoming football season was a fun family-friendly event this year as the athletic department held “Fan Fest 25” at the Don Kelly Fieldhouse, Saturday, August 9.

Several hundred eager Demon fans came to campus to pick up their season tickets, enjoy a superb free jambalaya lunch, and meet the young men of the Northwestern football team. Two talented students from NSU’s Art Department painted children’s faces while members of NSU’ Tri-Sigma sorority helped children make NSU spirit bracelets.

Winnfield’s Deep Water Rehab performed their signature mix of classics and original songs. Frontman Thomas Little is a 2016 NSU alumni as well as a four year player on the Demon football squad as a two-year starting center, and his cousin Eli is a redshirt freshman offensive lineman on the current team.

The Demons’ extended scrimmage was the cornerstone event Saturday and contributed to the  palpable sense of excitement surrounding the rebuilding program as Coach Blaine McCorkle embarks upon his second year at the helm. This year’s team has a distinctly Louisiana flavor with many of the players coming from a 150-mile area around Natchitoches. In fact, 81 percent of the players McCorkle and staff have brought in are Louisiana natives.

ASH’s Jimmie Duncan and Jason Blackwell II and Pineville’s Jacob Miranda will be continuing their standout football careers at NSU. Be sure to watch for these parish products this fall and in future years at Turpin Stadium and on ESPN+ telecasts of all Demons’ games.

The 105 young men in practice are in high spirits and working hard. The intensity is easy to see. This team is gearing up to show progress this season.

The Demons’ home opener is Thursday, August 28 at 7:00 in Turpin Stadium against Alcorn State. For a modest admission price, you can watch some hard-hitting gridiron action, a superb halftime show from the Spirit of Northwestern Marching Band as well as enjoy a family friendly tailgate before the game.

The Journal Services family is donating access to the photographs from this Saturday’s event. Fans, players and families are welcome to download any photos they wish.

The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) advises motorists that on Sunday, August 17, 2025, the US 167 (Pineville Expressway) southbound bridge over Wadley St., railroad tracks, and 4th St. in the City of Pineville, Rapides Parish will be closed.

This bridge closure is scheduled to take place from approximately 7:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. for one day, and is necessary to allow DOTD crews to perform bridge maintenance work.

This bridge is located approximately 0.82 miles north of the Red River (see included map).

Permit/Detour section:
Detour will be via LA 1250/Melrose Street. Signage will be in place directing motorists through the detour.

Safety Reminder:
DOTD appreciates your patience and reminds you to please drive with caution around the construction sites and be on the lookout for work crews and their equipment.

Additional Information:
Motorists can access the latest updates on real-time traffic and road conditions using the 511 Traveler Information System by dialing 511 from their telephone and saying the route or region on which they are seeking information. Out-of-state travelers can call 1-888-ROAD-511 (1-888-762-3511). Travelers can also access this information by visiting the 511 Traveler Information Web site at http://www.511la.org. Additionally, you can follow the Traffic Management Center on Twitter: (@Alex Traffic). Motorists may also monitor the LA DOTD website @ http://www.dotd.la.gov and the DOTD Facebook page.