Glance Back

(From The Washington Evening Journal, Friday, Oct. 29, 2004)

10 YEARS AGO

Four local young ladies from Girl Scout Troop 1755 spoke to Scouts across the nation, Oct. 16, joining the national ?Jamboree on the Air 2004.?

Several departments of Washington County Hospital (WCH) are not only taking care of patients, but are providing hands-on instruction to students from Kirkwood Community College, Indian Hills Community College and University of Iowa Hospitals.

The Washington County Supervisors and WEDG director Ed Raber conducted the first of this week?s town meetings, last night.

The purpose of the meetings is to inform the public about the proposed correctional facility that will be voted on in Tuesday?s general election. Raber said that, if built, the jail is expected to be up and running in the 2007-2008 fiscal year.

20 YEARS AGO

After a 47-year tenure as a Kalona physician, Dr. Charles W. Beckman has hung up his stethoscope. He will be honored with an open house for friends and former patients on Nov. 5 at the Kalona Area Chamber of Commerce building in Kalona.

KALONA ? In what was a record for the county, and probably a statewide record, 112.5 acres of Amish-owned choice farmland between Wellman and Kalona sold for $5,500 an acre, Saturday. ?I pert near fainted,? said auctioneer Chester Miller. Bidding opened at $2,500, what two farmers farther north went for recently.

A proposal to provide disability insurance for county employees was put on hold, but a suggestion that a biennial employee physical be paid for the by the county?s insurance plan was approved at Tuesday?s meeting of the Washington County Board of Supervisors.

30 YEARS AGO

A new food product known as ?pizza on a stick? may become popular through the efforts of Mary F. Horras of rural Brighton. Horras, a junior in the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at Drake University in Des Moines, is one of 71 students who are helping to develop an advertising campaign for the pizza product.

Although a nearly drought-like August followed by a wet autumn dashed hopes that 1984 would bring a bumper crop, a sampling of Washington County farmers say corn production is better than earlier expected. The soybean harvest is, so far, average at best.

WAYLAND ? Volunteer firemen answered a call to the Bob Butcher farm north of Coppock, Sunday evening when a combine burned. Officials said the fire started in shucks around the exhaust, caused by a possible electrical short.

40 YEARS AGO

Mrs. James (Karen) Gorham was named ?Woman of the Year? by the Business and Professional Women at its dinner meeting at The Captain?s Table, Tuesday evening.

Permission for improving the ball diamond on the junior high school site to make room for a new girls summer softball program was granted by the Washington Community School District?s board in an unusually brief session, Monday night.

WELLMAN ? The population count conducted by the U.S. Bureau of the Census in the town of Wellman in August of this year shows the official population of the town to be 1,134. This is an increase of 157 people over the last official census conducted in 1970, or an increase of 16.1 percent.

50 YEARS AGO

Pat Farrell, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Walt Farrell Jr., has been elected vice president of Harris Hall, one of the five residence halls at Northeast Louisiana State College in Monroe, La.

The Joe Jones family was in Ames, Saturday to attend homecoming activities at Iowa State University and to visit their son, Joe. Mrs. Jones is now acting treasurer-secretary of the Mothers? Club of Delta Sigma Chi, Joe?s fraternity.

Mr. and Mrs. Vernon Wittrig left today for Waterloo to attend Grand Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows until Friday. Mr. Wittrig is a past Grand Master of Iowa.