Kirsten Rae Scharnberg and William Joseph Hampton IV

Mr. and Mrs. Mark Scharnberg of Everly are delighted to announce the engagement of their daughter, Kirsten Rae Scharnberg to Major William Joseph Hampton IV, United States Army.

The bride-to-be is a 1992 graduate of Clay Central-Everly High School and a 1997 graduate of the University of Iowa.

The groom-to-be is the son of Mr. William J. Hampton III of Brookhaven, Penn., and Mr. and Mrs. Robert Stone of Tustin, Calif. Bill is a 1994 graduate of Arizona State University.

Kirsten is a national and international correspondent for the Chicago Tribune. Bill is an Infantry officer in the United States Army. The couple met in Kirkuk, Iraq, where Bill served during Operation Iraqi Freedom from January 2004 until February 2005, and where Kirsten has been assigned multiple times by the paper to cover the ongoing war.

The couple is planning a July 7 wedding in Iowa City. They will reside in Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas, Bill's next duty assignment. The couple has one daughter, Savannah, 7, from Bill's first marriage with his late wife.