Good Old Days

125 years ago

January 21, 1887

The Chinese of this city are preparing to celebrate the advent of their new year, which begins Saturday night at 12 o’clock. Firecrackers play an important part in this celebration which lasts several days.

Spokane and Palouse branch railroad surveyors ran a preliminary line through town Monday, selecting the Mill or back street route, passing in the rear of the public school building, crossing the South Palouse a few rods above the Cooper Lake bridge and continuing up Spring Flat on the hillside, thus securing a very easy grade. If this route is adopted, the bridge across the South Palouse will be a high one.

Don. Morrison, baggage master at the depot and engineer of Colfax Engine Co. No. 1, has decided to return to his old home in Kentucky and will take his departure a couple of weeks hence. Chas. J. Moore of Portland succeeds him at the depot.

H.C. Goodridge, affable traveler for the Sarsfield Remedies Co. of San Francisco, was in the city this week in the interest of the house he represents.

100 years ago

January 19, 1912

A sensation was created in Pullman a few days ago when it became known that a gypsy woman had hypnotized Mrs. Anna Both and secured about $1550.

Public dances at Wilcox have been receiving more than usual notoriety of late. A neighborhood quarrel, bad language and booze became so thoroughly mixed that the dances were becoming a disgrace.

Directors of the Elberton State Bank declared a ten per cent dividend and authorized the purchase of the building which they have been renting for a banking room.

W.H. Hite, Diamond’s merchant and RR agent, is taking his layoff and Fred Norton has taken his place as agent for the time being.

75 years ago

January 15, 1937

A daily average of 80 children are served a hot dish prepared by Mrs. Agnes Chilton in the Martha Washington Grade School’s newly opened hot lunch room. The food is donated by parents and the salary paid Mrs. Chilton as cook is from a fund allotted by the Works Progress Administration.

H.E. Kincaid of the Freshland Farms will hatch over half a million Leghorn and New Hampshire red chicks this season. He has installed 16 new electric incubators which are capable of handling 185,000 eggs for hatching. About 3,000 chicks are expected to be hatched this Sunday.

Fire which destroyed the bed of Art Rodey in the front room above the Smith bakery at 3 a.m. Thursday was caused by a cigarette in the opinion of H.W. Walker, fire captain. Rodey, awakened by the heat, escaped after the flames had burned a hole in his trousers, which he neglected to remove upon retiring. Regular tenant of the room is F.L. (Slim) LaVerne, night dish washer at the Model Cafe.

50 years ago

January 18, 1962

Industrious Colfax sixth-grader Ronnie LaVerne has found a new use for old coffee cans - they make workable cameras! Ronnie devised the ingenious instrument from plans printed in Boy’s Life magazine, a publication of the Boys Scouts.

Colfax citizens would save more than $500,000 under plans devised by a Spokane architect to renovate the former high school building into city hall, instead of building a brand new structure. Cost is estimated at $115,000. An entirely new building would run upward of $650,000.

Steps to bring dial service to customers of the St. John Telephone and Telegraph Co. within the next two years were taken last Friday when stockholders voted to begin work on the change.

Mr. and Mrs. Dan L. Swannack, formerly of Lamont, and son, Wesley, recently moved to Rancho Cordova, Calif, a suburb of Sacramento, where Dan was transferred by Douglas Aircraft to be on the team testing the Saturn S-IV space vehicle for one to two years. Dan is a mechanical engineer who first started with Douglas Aircraft in their space division in Los Angeles.

25 years ago

January 15, 1987

Colfax students topped state averages in almost all subject areas on state achievement test scores, showing greatest strength in reading at all tested levels.

Whitman Community Hospital’s application for 17 nursing home beds in one wing of the facility has met with approval through the first rounds of review.

Don Moore of La Crosse and George Peringer of Belmont were named conservation farmers of the year by the Whitman and Pine Creek Conservation districts, respectively.

Ewan Neighbor’s Club met at the home of Muriel Albertson and watched Arlene Bailey demonstrate the technique of wheat weaving.

10 years ago

January 17, 2002

Last Wednesday, 34 people met to decide the future of the Palouse Community Center. By evening’s end, participants decided to pursue acquisition of the now vacant Palouse Market for a new community center.

Steve Appel of Dusty was re-elected to a two-year term as vice president of the American Farm Bureau.

U.S. Department of Agriculture opened up extensions for 128 CRP contracts covering 20,131 acres of land in Whitman County that expire Sept. 30.