Bee-peat winner

DALE CITY, VA. -- “Repeat” is probably too easy a word for a spelling bee, but it’s the best way to describe what happened at Godwin Middle School on Friday night.

That’s because Deborah Horton won the Prince William County Spelling Bee for a second straight year.

The homeschooled 14-year-old from Gainesville correctly spelled the word “ethnocentric” to put a cap on a multi-round battle with Marie Mach of Graham Park Middle School, who won the 2008 bee.

Deborah, representing the Home Organization of Parent Educators, is now bound for Washington to compete in the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee in May.

Last year, she successfully spelled “efficient” and “canitist” (someone who dyes hair) on stage at the big bee, but the judges decided she wouldn’t advance to the semifinal rounds.

On Friday, she was once again the most emotive speller of all the elementary- and middle-school aged students gathered at Godwin.

She offered a cheerful, “Hi!” when she stepped behind the lectern to spell “spectrum.”

And she literally jumped for joy after she was announced the winner.

“Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” she said.

A few minutes later, after being given her awards, she thanked God for her triumph.

“I can’t believe He gave this to me again,” Deborah said.

To win the competition, sponsored by the Bel Air Woman’s Club and the News & Messenger, she also had to make her way through these words: barrow, cleanser, stoic, alcohol, empanada, Olympian, luau, tortilla, khan, circumspectly, locoweed, excursion, longitudinal and graphitic.

When spelling, she slowly mouthed the letters, concentrating on each like one might expect Washington Capital Alex Ovechkin to focus on the hockey puck.

She appeared to have some trouble with the word “beauteous,” though she eventually put it together.

“Is this an adjective?” she asked the judges.

Twice, Marie misspelled words but Deborah was unable to spell her next word, which meant the bee had to go on in the manner of extra innings in a baseball game.

Half of the spellers were out of the competition in the first 40 minutes, but it would be roughly another 45 minutes until Deborah won her crown.

More than 100 total words were spelled by the contestants. The first really difficult one seemed to be “pitchblende,” a brown to black mineral that is the chief ore-mineral source of uranium, according to Merriam-Webster.

The bee was taped by Comcast Communications and will be broadcast on Channel 2 several times, beginning at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday.

About the bee

Friday’s competition was the 32nd annual spelling bee that the News & Messenger and the Bel Air Woman’s Club has put on.

The News & Messenger will send Deborah Horton and an official escort to Washington for the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee and will pay for their transportation, meals and hotel.

Deborah receives Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged, courtesy of Merriam-Webster.

Runner-up Marie Mach receives Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Edition, from Merriam-Webster.

Staff writer Jonathan Hunley can be reached at 703-369-5738.