Looking Back 3.6.24

1909To “encourage beautifying Fairbury, 'Heart of Blue Valley'," for the best-kept lawn, J.W. McDonnell offered $10 cash, Vine Pease, 10 pounds of blue grass seed, and Dan Kavanaugh, a lawn mower.Second prize in The Journal's subscription contest, was a top buggy.1912Vine Pease, drug store proprietor, was advertising seed corn at $1.60 a bushel. This was before the era of hybrids.1919Delegates from Nebraska City to Oxford met at Fairbury to boost a proposed “Goldenrod” highway.Figures supplied by County Clerk Clyde Marthis showed it was cheaper to grade highways with tractors than with horses.Though World War I had been over since November 11, there still was a $390,000 quota for Jefferson County in War Savings Stamps.Three Farmers Union Locals near Diller started a co-op store in that town. It was to be in the first floor of the opera house building.1922Superintendent William Morton and the board of the Fairbury schools promised a budget reduction of $6,000 to $8,000, by abrogating a rule that raised teacher salaries after a certain length of service.DeWitt Hansen of Fairbury had offered a $200 "wireless plant" complete with amplifiers but was having to wait two months for delivery on account of demand.1928Ernst Kriesel, who lived about six miles west of Fairbury, nearly lost his eyes by a powder explosion. He was using black powder to blow dirt out of a pipe connecting two water tanks. While putting the powder in the pipe, he spilled some on the ground. He lit a match to ignite the powder in the pipe and the powder on the ground exploded and struck him in the face.On March 15, Fairbury News and Gazette began running the serialized novel, “The Ward of Robbers' Roost”, by Crittenden Marriott.The legendary lost silent film, “London After Midnight,” starring Lon Chaney, played at the Bonham Theatre.1929President Orville Brickell of the Chamber of Commerce said membership had grown to 128, and the budget goal of $3,000 was “in sight.”Dave Melcher and S.K. Titterington incorporated as local Dodge automobile dealers.Another new firm was the contracting business of John Aasen and Charles Lien.Nested Company offices and Uhley 81 Diller men's store was moving back to the rebuilt Steele Building on the east side of the square.1932Dirt roads were so bad in Kansas, just south of the Nebraska line, that horses and wagons were needed to carry the body and some of the people at the funeral to the cemetery. In this county, the same condition caused the commissioners to offer farmers $1 an hour to harrow the roads and speed their drying. Later, figuring the farmers themselves also were benefitting, the rate was dropped to 50 cents.Local unemployed were to benefit from a "Prosperity Marstrels" home talent show, sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce, Rotarians, Kiwanians and American Legion. Dr. George Ainley was director.Fred Carpenter opened his "popcorn palace" at the curb north of the Spear-Buswell drug store, near the Fifth and E street intersection.1933Franklin D. Roosevelt addresses the nation for the first time as President of the United States during the first of his “fireside chats.”1939Fire destroyed the Herman Fairchild home near Endicott.Fairbury City Council voted to buy the Cornhusker Electric Co. for $90,000. It had 120 rural customers, also 99 in Jansen, 31 in Harbine, 28 in Gladstone and 25 in Ellis.Lloyd Jackson, FHS senior, was in the top 10 in a nationwide high school journalism contest.1942Only 13 new cars were permitted by rationing for the month in the county. The Fairbury Journal doubted if there were than many eligible buyers.1945One of the largest amounts that Jefferson county ever raised for the infantile paralysis campaign was when $1,046 was collected. Miss Ruth Wallace, county chairman, and Miss Olive Halek served as treasurer.Mrs. Joyce Snyder, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Snyder, was crowned FFA queen by Delmar Wittier, president.Russell McCord, son of Mr. and Mrs. Ralph McCord, received a bronze star for action on the Luzon invasion.1949Mary Hawes was selected as housemother for the Fairbury Junior College Women's dormitory. It occupied the upper floor of the YWCA building at 615 Sixth Street.Marion Campbell, daughter of the R.E. Campbells, was crowned queen by the FHS Future Farmers chapter. Stanley Snyder was chapter president.George P. Burger was chairman of the county Red Cross chapter.1952Chris Milius, formerly a farmer living near Daykin, was re-elected Nebraska Farmers Union president.1955Mark Walsh of Beatrice, former Fairburian who was associated with his father, the late J.W. Walsh, in the Mary-Etta hotel here and later manager of the Paddock hotel at Beatrice, moved to California, where he was to be associated with the Lawrence H. Lee Hotels Co., which operated four hotels in southern California. His office was to be at the Hollywood Plaza, the headquarters.1959Homer Mudge was elected Fairbury Rotary Club president.Ken Howe was elected vice president and Erwin Schroeder was re-elected secretary-treasurer.Harry Stearns, People Progressive, and George Bliss, Citizens Non-Partisan, were nominees for Fairbury mayor. Caucus chairmen had been Robert V. Denney and Melvin Moss.Fairbury board of education nominees were Mmes. Stanley Lea, Kenneth Shelburne, Leonard Vondra and William Yoachim.Bob Galiamore, son of the Samuel Gallamores, was a member of the Nebraska “all-state scholastic team,” as one of the top 12 in the state in the University of Nebraska regent exams.1969Capacity crowds saw three nights' presentations of the Kiwanis Club-sponsored1979Paul Schelstraete, deputy Saline County attorney, was to be acting county attorney in Jefferson County until a successor to Peter Burger, resigned, was picked.Veterans Service and Highway Department offices had moved into the courthouse basement from previously rented quarters.Tri County, Hebron and Byron won boys district high school basketball championships. Fairbury bowed out in the Class B district to Nebraska City. Andy Snyder and Dave Sprague had been top FHS wrestlers.

Delven Dale Schipper

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