Lake City grad always finishes what she starts

When Mary Morse first showed up at the Iron Wood Throwers Center in Rathdrum, Bart Templeman didn’t quite know what to make of her.

At 5-foot-2, Morse was many inches shorter than the typical thrower of shots, javelins or hammers, and she appeared to lack the strength to be successful at throwing heavy objects great distances.

“I thought, ‘What are we gonna do with her?’” said Templeman, who founded Iron Wood in 1989. “She’s so tiny.”

But Morse was undeterred. Three and a half years later, as a Lake City High School senior, she had not become the best thrower, but she surely was the most dedicated, Templeman said, continuing on when so many others would have quit.

“She is really hard working and really dynamic personality-wise, and she hasn’t got a drop of athletic ability,” Templeman said. “She’s just the best. … She comes to practice every day. She does everything you ask her to do. She’s just an exceptional young lady.”

Morse, who plans to attend Washington State University in the fall to pursue a degree in veterinary medicine, has bounced around the idea of walking on with the Cougars’ track and field team, but admitted her first foray into throwing wasn’t particularly calculated.

“It was more of a whim,” Morse said of throwing. “I wanted to start doing something outside of everything school-related.”

It seems, though, that whatever Morse starts, she tends to see through to the finish as well.

She is a Girl Scout – Templeman said he recently bought “a whole lot of Girl Scout cookies” from her – and a regular farm hand with her dad, as well as a volunteer in various organizations.

Morse is also a member of the LCHS Concert Choir, the culmination of a love that blossomed during her time at Sorensen Magnet School of the Arts and Humanities in her elementary years.

“I’ve always had a musical family,” Morse said. “It brings joy.”

Morse’s music teacher at Sorensen, Charlene Babb, said Morse brought that joy to others, too, even as a third grader.

“When she was in choir, she would just do exactly what I asked her to do,” Babb said. “You could tell it was something she enjoyed so much.”

Babb said she attended one of Lake City’s choir concerts earlier this year, saw Morse singing and “bawled like a baby” to see her.

“You never know when they leave elementary school what happens,” Babb said, “and to be able to see her singing in that choir was like ‘yes, right on.’ ”

As the end of her senior year neared, Morse reached out to as many of her previous teachers as she could contact – including Babb – in order to thank them and give them a graduation announcement.

Some teachers, like those who no longer taught in the same school, were trickier to find, she said, but in those cases she asked other teachers to forward along the announcement and her thanks.

Morse has managed to stay busy during distance learning, doing plenty of hands-on work at her father’s family farm in Malden, just west of Rosalia.

“I’ve been a farm kid all my life,” Morse said, running tractors, combines and repairing all sorts of machinery.

Being a farm kid also led her to keep horses, cows and pigs, which led Morse to pursue veterinary medicine.

“I’ve always been good with animals. It’s more of a calling,” Morse said. “As my dad says, I can talk to any animal and calm it down.”

Morse said she has used the extra time during the COVID-19 stay-home orders to finish projects she’s been wanting to do for years. She and her dad rebuilt an International Harvester Scout, and she completed a T-shirt quilt.

“It’s been kind of nice to sit down and talk with my family, talk with my teachers, and just have a moment of rest,” Morse said, “because I know that the next upcoming years are gonna get crazy.”