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SPORTS — PAGE B4
WEEKEND EDITION
Red Deer Advocate SATURDAY, OCT.24, 2015
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Love and prayers for Withrow
MORE THAN 1,500 CENTRAL ALBERTANS ATTEND THE FUNERAL SERVICE FOR CATIE, JANA AND DARA BOTT
If it seemed that it took a long time to get to Friday, it did. In fact it took three lifetimes — so sadly, suddenly, unfathomably, cut short. The heartache, the cherishing of memories, the absences to go on forever in this world until a higher one opens up — its glory deeply believed in by Bonita and Roger Bott — and they are all reunited. Ten days after their daughters — Catie, Jana and Dara — died in a farm accident, the Botts and their one remaining child, son Caleb, said farewell during a funeral service that drew over 1,500 people to CrossRoads Church, Central Alberta’s largest church. The Withrow Gospel Mission, where the Bott family both worship and helps lead the congregation, would have been much too small. In the days right after the girls died, and leading up to Friday, family, friends and neighbours, fellow parishioners, and thousands of others who did not even know the Botts, wanted to offer anything they could to help and comfort the grieving family. So they collectively rolled up their sleeves, helping with the harvest and other farm chores, releasing hundreds of colourful balloons, and raising thousands of dollars by way of motorcycle rides, cattle auctions and online donations. On Oct. 13, Catie, 13, and twins Jana, and Dara, 11, were somehow buried and smothered in a truck loaded with canola seed at the Bott farm, about 60 kms west of Red Deer.
Please see FUNERAL on Page A2
Photos by JEFF STOKOE/Advocate staff
ABOVE: Bonita and Roger Bott, centre, along with family and friends, watch as the three caskets containing their daughters Catriona (Catie), Jana and Dara Bott are taken from the Crossroads Church in Red Deer on Friday. LEFT: Pallbearers carry the three caskets containing Catriona (Catie) Jana and Dara Bott from the Crossroads Church in Red Deer Friday after the funeral service for the three sisters, who died in a farming accident Oct. 13.
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Strang creates Tesla series Red Deer-raised filmmaker Ian Strang has created an online series about real-life mysterious inventor Nikola Tesla.
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