Pomeroy Pioneer Portraits

Ten Years Ago

April 10, 2013

Nine ladies from Holy Rosary Church gathered recently to make pillowcase dresses. According to Julie Claassen, they made 22 dresses in one day and sent them, along with $100, to be distributed to little girls in Africa. Throughout Africa, three of every 10 children will die before they reach the age of five, and 30% of the remaining number will die before age ten. "In spite of many health threats, they cheerfully go about their lives without the basic necessities we take for granted," Julie said.

Lewis-Clark State College dental hygiene students Connie Druffel, Danika Spindler, and Lexie Turner will present a program on "Diabetes and Oral Health Making the Connection," at the Senior Center.

Twenty Five Years Ago

April 8, 1998

Microfilm of early issues of the East Washingtonian that the Museum has been searching for have finally been located. Years ago, Barbara Bartels led a project to have copies of the papers taken to Washington State University to be preserved on microfilm. At that time, the Museum was just getting started and had no money to contribute to this. Now, however, thanks to the generosity of the Shepherd Foundation and efforts to trace the film by David Ruark, we can fill in the gaps in our files.

Tucannon River Road will be busy this year with timber harvest and road repaving from April through December, according to Pomeroy District Ranger Monte Fujishin. Drivers in the district's Umatilla National Forest should expect increased traffic and minor delays. The School Timber Sale began cutting April 1 and helicopter logging will start April 13.

Fifty Years Ago

April 5, 1973

A change at Lower Granite Lock and Dam project took place last Friday as the swing shift was eliminated. Some 100 men were laid off, reducing the crew to 700. Employment level will stay fairly constant until the contractor completes concrete placement, projected for June.

Despite the uproar nationally, the meat situation and meat boycott are apparently having little effect here as yet. Local buying habits seem unchanged, little comment has been heard, and no "retaliation" has been planned either. Betty Paris of the Garfield County CowBelles noted her group plans no action at this time, but farmers in the county echo the comments made by cattlemen nationally that the idea of a "meat boycott" and price ceiling are self-defeating in that they do not encourage the farmers to build up herds to increase the meat supply.

Seventy Five Years Ago

April 8, 1948

At a meeting of the Pomeroy Golf club, plans were made to remodel the old Burt home, situated on the course, into as modern a club house as possible. Plans call for a sales room and work shop, locker and shower room, a modern kitchen and dining room. Materials for the improvements will be purchased but most of the work it is expected will be donated by club members and others.

What might be called a preview in racing talent for the 1948 turf season will be viewed on Pomeroy Downs, May 8-9. With some 120 horses on the way, the two-day meet will have most of the thoroughbreds on the program that will run later at other meets in the Blue Mountain circuit, and finally at Longacres and Playfair.

One Hundred Years Ago

April 7, 1922

The first baseball game of the season for the town team will be played Sunday afternoon, April 6. The game will be with Dayton and as both teams are showing up well for early baseball, a good game is expected. Over twenty were out for practice Sunday and with the exception of one or two positions, the personnel will be the same as that of last year, Manager Claude Buchet states.

In establishing a state fish hatchery, a survey of the Tucannon will be made in June. John S. Cobb, director of fisheries of the University of Washington, will make the survey to determine the food value of the stream and its suitability for raising different kinds of fish.

One Hundred Twenty Five Years Ago

April 9, 1922

Company E.N.G.W., of Pomeroy, is in fighting trim, their ranks full, and confidently expecting moving orders in the near future. The company has a muster roll of 43 officers and men, and every man in the company is ready to go to the front and take a shot at the enemy. The commissioned officers of the company are: Harry St. George, Capt .; 1st Lieut., E.W. Gibson; 2nd Lieut., W.E. Greene.

The drying of clothes in frosty weather is sometimes, in the case of delicate fabrics, attended with tearing because of the quick stiffening in the very cold air. A simple precaution which will prevent any such trouble is to dissolve three or four handfuls of coarse salt in the last rinsing water, thus making it, in fact, a weak brine. Articles so rinsed will not suffer from or stiffen with the cold.