Pomeroy Pioneer Portraits

Ten Years Ago

August 21, 2013

When students return to the classroom Monday, Aug 26, after summer vacation, Pomeroy School District will have a new superintendent and a new administrative format. Doug LaMunyan, the new superintendent and the former junior-senior high school principal, will lead an administration that doesn't have many role models. Mr. LaMunyan will be the only full-time administrator, in fact, the only administrator in the district and he will have two "lead teachers," Rachel Gwinn in the elementary building and Amy Miller in the high school building, performing administrative roles for half-days.

Twenty-Five Years Ago

August 19, 1998

Bob and Chuck Niebel of Niebel farms took out Bob's International Harvester-McCormick 160 pull combine last week to harvest fields on Linville Ridge. Bob found the combine in Walla Walla in 1992 and ran it just once, in 1993. His grandfather Oscar Niebel used one just like it. Bob said the 160, new in the 1950s, was the last pull combine made by IH. Bob operates the combine, "punchin' header", while Chuck pulls it with the Cat Diesel 40 "three-lunger" tractor from the 1940s.

Fifty Years Ago

August 16, 1973

The Pomeroy Post Office receives some strangely addressed letters, but the one received last Thursday takes the prize of all time, according to Postmaster Bill Young. The letter was addressed to a resident who was passing through, and the note "general delivery" would have been sufficient. However, the addresser wanted to make sure the letter got to its destination: "One block past Helke's Trailer Court. Turn right, cross a small bridge, turn right again-small Prowler camper trailer. Pomeroy, Washington" The Zip Code 99347 was added later.

Seventy-Five Years Ago

August 19, 1948

The people will decide whether the long-proposed and often-stymied county-city fire station will be built. County Commissioners meeting at their regular board meeting Monday evening in the courthouse decided to toss the building proposal directly at the people with a resolution calling for a special election on the building at the primary election September 14. A resolution was adopted calling for a levy of two mills for three years for the construction of the modern building to be built on Main Street on a lot already cleared for building.

One Hundred Years Ago

August 18, 1923

Word comes that Sam Carter's separator, operating in the Tammany section above Lewiston, was wrecked by a smut explosion, and that Mr. Carter immediately bought a new separator and is continuing to complete the harvesting which he contracted to do there.

One Hundred Twenty-Five Years Ago

August 20, 1898

The open season for chicken shooting began on the 15 inst, and our sportsmen have been polishing up their shotguns preparatory to making war on the "feathered tribe" and to the promulgation of big stories. The prediction is that chickens are too scarce this season to promise good shooting, but the stories will no doubt show up in usual ratio.