The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.

Meet Your Neighbor

by Christy Kienast, The Qull

Meet your neighbor Billie Kirby who lives in the country between Carthage and Ft. Green.

Billie was born on September 30th, 1996 in Macomb, the daughter of Tiana (Campbell) and Bill Kirby. Bill is the owner of Kirby Construction and Tiana is a Preschool Classroom Aide in Bowen.

Billie has two older brothers, Kyle and Levi. Kyle, 22, attends Western Illinois in Macomb and Levi,19, attends Spoon River College. Both Kyle and Levi have worked for their dad in the family construction business and Levi still does.

Bill built the house the family currently resides in before Billie was born. She loves living in the country.

Billie is the granddaughter of Dick and Katey Lunt of Carthage. Dick is an insurance salesman, and Katey is a retired TLC employee, the late Jim Campbell of Ft. Green who was a farmer and race car driver, Norm Kirby of Texas who retired from construction and Linda Swaney of Bowen who is a retired factory worker.

She works at Rasmussen & Dittmer Law office in La Harpe. She started there last summer and will co-op this school year with them as well.

Billie will be a senior at Illini West High school in the fall. She enjoys playing softball for Illini West, although she broke her collar bone at the start of the season after colliding with Connor Smith, hanging out with her friends and swimming. She loves animals and they have a lot of animals they have rescued. Luckily, both of her parents love animals too.

Billie is the junior class president, and is currently in the International Club. While in middle school she was also in the builders club and student council.

Her favorite family vacation was going to California to visit family, and they went to Colorado to zip line and also went white water rafting. This summer she is looking forward to visiting her aunt and uncle (her dad's brother) in California. She plans to climb Mt. Whitney. Her brother, Levi climbed Mt. Whitney a few years ago and said it was a great experience.

Billie is also looking forward to her senior year and graduating in the class of 2015.