Good old days - Feb. 25, 2010

125 years ago

February 27, 1885

Last Sunday some eighteen converts were baptized in Cooper’s Lake by Rev. E.T. Trimble of the Baptist Church. Most of the people of town witnessed the ceremony.

Last Monday night about 1 o’clock in the residence of Mrs. E.W. Hull, in the south end, took fire from a defective flue and burned to the ground. Very little of the household effects were saved. The loss is about two thousand dollars, and the property was insured for one thousand in the Washington Company of Tacoma.

The proprietor of the Gazette has purchased from the Northwestern Telegraph & Telephone company the line between Colfax and Almota and will fit it up with the latest improved make of telephones. The line will be in readiness to accommodate the public in about two weeks. The project of continuing the line on to Pomeroy is in contemplation. It is not unlikely that the Palouse Gazette will own telephone lines connecting all the towns in the Palouse country before fall.

100 years ago

February 25, 1910

Practically the entire business part of Albion was destroyed Tuesday by a fire. The blaze was discovered by a telephone operator in the Albion Hotel. Within 10 minutes firefighters flocked to town from surrounding farms. Heavy snow on roofs checked the flames and enabled citizens to carry out practically all the contents of the buildings. The fire started from a defective flue, from which fires had started, but been luckily doused, three times in the last ten days. Albion voted to incorporate last week, and one of the first things the Town Council expected to take up was the installation of a water system and fire department.

75 years ago

February 22, 1935

His arm hanging by a thread and with a deep gash on the side of his head, Louis Moctelme, 33, a Coeur d’Alene Indian, was found beside the railroad track between Fairfield and Latah Wednesday by the crew of the Union Pacific passenger train from Spokane. He was brought by the crew here, where he died that evening.

On complaint of Ernest Lynch, Palouse, that he had lost a pair of overshoes valued at $3.65, Adrian Robers, Palouse, was brought to the county jail Monday on a charge of petit larceny.

50 years ago

February 25, 1960

No new leads have been discovered in the $3,200 burglary of the McGregor Co. store at Hooper last Thursday night. The robbery, which was called a “professional” job by Sheriff Mike Humphrey, is the largest in the county in the last five years.

Oakesdale teacher Mrs. Elva Calhoun feels her second grade students have advanced in their arithmetic work since she has instituted the help of an ancient Chinese abacus. Her 18 pupils began using abacus to learn their math, and now third graders are finding it difficult to stay ahead.

25 years ago

February 21, 1985

The 50,000 bushels of Washington grain collected in an Ethiopian relief effort over the past couple of months departed the Port of Olympia aboard Norwegian ship Hoegh Dene Monday.

“Lotto fever” hit Colfax Friday and Saturday with record lottery ticket sales tallied at the two local outlets, Star Foodland and Excell. Sales soared when a $6 million jackpot was announced.