Newspaper worker dies after car crash

Ad seller remembered for her smile

Kelly Morgan, an account executive at the Arkansas

Democrat-Gazette, died Saturday afternoon at the age of 38.

Morgan, of Sheridan, died at Baptist Health Medical Center in Little Rock from injuries suffered in a two-vehicle crash April 30. She was headed home to her two boys, Austin and Aaron, when the wreck occurred on Interstate 530 in southern Pulaski County.

Morgan started at the Democratin 2003, and she won multiple salesman awards over the years. She was a graduate of Sheridan High School and attended the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

“I’ve been thinking about Kelly all day after hearing of her death,” Lynn Hamilton, president of the Democrat-Gazette, said in an emailed statement. “She was a joy to be around. Her smile was infectious. Kelly was a wonderful person and a great sales representative for the Democrat-Gazette She will be sorely missed.”

Scott Holt and Morgan were engaged a week before her wreck, Holt said. The two had known each other for years before reconnecting in early 2014.

“She never met a stranger and always had a smile on her face,” Holt said. “She was the life of the party. She lit up a room. You could not be in a room and not know Kelly was in there with you.

“She was the funniest, happiest person I ever met in my life. She was a great mom to two teenage boys.”

Tweedie Mays, a fellow account executive at the Democrathad worked with Morgan for 12 years, but the two were more than just co-workers.

“Kelly just always made everybody laugh,” Mays said. “She would always say the most off-the-wall [things] and constant jokes. I mean just a really funny person.”

As much fun as Morgan was to be around, she was also a professional at her job, earning the respect and love of her co-workers and customers, Mays said.

“Kelly was great at what she did,” Mays said. “Her customers loved her; she always did a great job. She was always very good at what she did. She was just a joy to be around. She was just someone who was always happy and upbeat. We all had bad days, but she just always would rise above those.”

In addition to her two boys, Morgan is survived by her parents, Tommy and Donna Buck of Sheridan, and a sister, Amy Buck of Sheridan.