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Annabelle Day retains her spelling title
Spelling Bee Champion
Video
Annabelle Day representing WillowCreek Learning Center won the Vindicator Spelling Bee for the second year in a row
82nd Annual Spelling Bee
Gallery
Anabelle Bee of Willowcreek Learning Center bested over 50 spellers to repeat winning THE VINDICATOR Spelling Bee.
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
Willow Creek Learning Center eighth-grader Annabelle Day did it again.
Annabelle, 13, the daughter of Alan and Dr. Trang Day of Boardman is the grand champion of The Vindicator 82nd Regional Spelling Bee, outspelling 51 other contestants Saturday in the Chestnut Room of Youngstown State University’s Kilcawley Center. She won last year’s bee, too.
Annabelle correctly spelled refocillate for the win. It’s a verb, defined by Webster’s Third New International Dictionary as “refresh: revive.”
She said it was the most difficult word she spelled in Saturday’s contest.
“I didn’t know it,” Annabelle said. “I just pictured it in my head.”
Jessica Lee, an eighth-grader from Canfield Village Middle School, was the runner-up, and Ryan Staton, a Jackson-Milton Middle School seventh-grader took third.
The bee started with 52 spellers, each of whom earned entry by winning the spelling bees at their individual school.
After the first round, the number of contestants dropped to 18, then to only nine for the third round. One more got knocked out before round four where two more spellers fell.
The event was not without controversy.
At the beginning of the fifth round, six spellers remained: Annabelle, Jessica, Ryan and Marisa Mohapatra, a sixth-grader at Akiva Academy; Luke Martinucci, a fifth-grader from Youngstown Christian/the Lewis School; and Molly Bury, an eighth-grader from St. Rose School in Girard.
Luke misspelled renvoi, Marisa misspelled alnico and Molly misspelled fusiform before Ryan misspelled omoplate. The judges then declared Ryan the winner of third place.
Annabelle and Jessica correctly spelled inion and stomatitis, respectively, to advance to the sixth round.
That prompted an appeal at the end of the bee from Luke’s father, Dr. Patrick Martinucci, who contended that all of the competitors who misspelled words in the fifth round tied.
Bee rules allow judges to decide whether to conduct spell-offs, and the judges opted not to do that, keeping Ryan as the sole third-place winner.
Judges, all of whom are volunteers, are the Rev. Lewis Macklin of Holy Trinity Missionary Baptist Church; John Rozzo, retired principal of St. Joseph and Immaculate Heart of Mary; and Carol Ryan, office manager at St. Christine Parish.
In round six, Annabelle correctly spelled graphologist while Jessica missed barognosis. Annabelle then had to correctly spell refocillate to win.
Annabelle found the words a bit tougher this year than last.
That’s because the contest started with Fred Owens, bee pronouncer, using words from the school list, Annabelle said. As the competition continued, he moved to words from the Spell-It list, she said.
“I didn’t study the words from the school list,” Annabelle said.
She plans to keep her trophy in her bedroom at home, next to the trophy she earned in last year’s bee,
For good luck, she brought two stuffed Winnie the Pooh bears with her to the event. She’s had both as long as she can remember.
“This one my uncle gave me when I was a baby,” she said.
She’s unsure of the other’s origin.
As the grand champion, Annabelle won an all-expense-paid trip to Washington, D.C., for herself and one of her parents. She’ll represent the region in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in May. The Vindicator underwrites the trip.
She also wins gift cards from the Rotary Club of Youngstown and the Downtown Kiwanis Club, “These Hundred Years” from the newspaper, the Samuel Louis Sugarman Award, a Webster’s Third New International Dictionary from Merriam-Webster and a floral arrangement by Burkland Flowers of Youngstown.
The last round race-off was familiar territory for both the Day and Lee families.
Max Lee, Jessica’s older brother, won the bee in 2012 and 2013, and Tamsin Day, Annabelle’s older sister, was runner-up those two years.