Volunteers Find Child Missing in Woods

RISON - A two-year-old boy from the Glendale area spent more than 10 hours wandering alone through the woods in northeast Cleveland County before being found by a volunteer rescue team at about 11 p.m. Saturday night, Oct. 15. Aaron Tooke of the Rye community, who was searching for the boy along with Dillon and Ben Sowrheaver, said they discovered him in an a small clearing in a thicket about 100 yards beyond the end of a timber access road located off Parker Loop in the Woodlawn area. Tooke said he parked his truck to the end of the nearly milelong timber access road before continuing the search on foot, making it a point to check deer stands along the way. Tooke noted that not long after getting out of the truck, he heard a dog barking in the distance. From accounts posted on social media earlier in the day, the boy was believed to have one or two dogs with him. He said within about 10 minutes of following the sound of the barking dog, they found the boy with two dogs. “It was a good feeling,” Tooke said about coming up on the missing child. Tooke said the dogs did growl at him as they approached, but he was able to get to the boy and immediately gave him a bottle of water. “He chugged it down,” he said. He said the boy never said anything but simply began to cry when he shined his light on him. While he found the boy about 100 yards from the end of the timber access road, Tooke said the spot where he was at was only about 10 to 20 yards from a gravel road that ran through that area. Tooke said a truck actually drove by after they had found him. Tooke estimated the spot where he found the boy was about a mile and a half off Hwy. 63, and about three miles from the boy’s residence north of Glendale. The discovery of the boy brought an end to an extensive search effort that began Saturday afternoon and extended into the night involving local law en‐forcement and h...