20 years ago – 1997
The buzz of a low-flying airplane in the early hours of long summer days in The Dalles signals a new day in the aerial battle against crop-ruining insects. And equipment used by local cropdusters signals a new era in the science of agricultural aviation. Two pilots — John Shearer, Jr., and Ty Edling — fly two state-of-the-art turbine-powered planes that can cover 400 acres of orchard per trip. Specialized equipment on the airplane atomizes the concentrated Malathion insecticide to droplets the size of 40 to 50 microns — a micron is .001 of a millimeter.
Plans for a mural on the oldest building in downtown The Dalles may run afoul of Oregon’s laws about billboards. The Dalles Mural Society is pursuing plans to repaint an old sign on the 1867 Getchell building, city-owned since around the 1970s. The sign, on the building at First and Court streets, advertises $1 sternwheeler rides. But a June 19 letter from the state to The Dalles planning department says Oregon law doesn’t allow advertising an activity or service that no longer exists. Rusty Hampton, president of The Dalles Mural Society, would like to see the mural get a variance from the law, perhaps, because of its “great historic value.”
Bill La Marche, credited as instrumental in getting the Discovery Center and Museum opened, has taken work in Newport. La Marche, director of development for the two-museum complex, was picked from some 50 candidates to be public relations officer for the Oregon Coast Aquarium, home of Keiko the killer whale.
40 years ago – 1977
After a 15-year absence, Fire Engine 1 came back to the city of The Dalles Friday, but it won’t be in working fires. The truck, a 1934 Mack, was donated to the city by Martin Marietta Aluminum. It was the plant’s primary fire equipment until formation of the Wasco Rural District in 1969, and since then has been assigned reserve status.
SALEM, Ore. (UPI) – Legalized bingo received its final legislative approval today when the Senate passed HB2341 and sent it to the governor. Oregon voters approved a constitutional amendment allowing charitable, fraternal and religious organizations to hold bingo games last November, but the legislature had to pass the enabling legislation.
The Dalles City Police issued a public appeal shortly after noon on Friday for Karen Copper, 19, who was last seen at 1:30 p.m. Thursday when she left work for lunch. There has been no word from her since. Miss Copper was employed at the JC Penney Store on Second Street.
Increased patrols will be out in areas covered by the Wasco County Sheriff’s office during the Fourth of July holiday, Sheriff John Magill said. Magill noted that traffic accidents were up 62 per cent in the area patrolled by the sheriff’s office as of June 18.
60 years ago – 1957
The Ki-Ann Indian dancers from Cheyenne, Wyo., who appeared at three performances of the Old Fort Dalles Centurific which ended last night, will present their full program at Quinton Street ball park starting at 8:15 p.m. today.
Dalles Dam Pool To Rise 5 Feet – Raising of The Dalles dam pool to normal operating level of 160 feet above sea level will be completed in a two-day period this month.
“Development of foreign outlets for wheat is paying off,” Milan D. Smith, executive assistant to Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson, said today at Pendleton.
80 years ago – 1937
Petitions to refer three recently passed city health ordinances to voters were in circulation today, in an effort by restaurant operators, barber and beauty shop owners, beer parlors and other food handlers to halt immediate enforcement of the new sanitary regulations. Roscoe Krier, attorney for the petition sponsors, said he expected to have the required number of signatures to place the referendum on the next city ballot by nightfall.
SAN FRANCISCO, July 2. (UP) – Silence this afternoon enveloped progress of Amelia Earhart as she raced across the Pacific toward Howland island, tiny speck in the South Seas, on the most dangerous lap of her round-the-world flight. Miss Earhart and her navigator, Captain Fred Noonan, flying a single-motored Lockheed Electra, failed to reach Howland island at noon PST, their tentatively scheduled arrival time.
WASHINGTON, July 2. (UP) – Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins said today she was working on certain “indefinite” steps to arrange a man-to-man conference of steel operators and strikers in an attempt to settle the five weeks old labor controversy.
100 years ago – 1917
Today’s Chronicle, with the aid of the United Press, gives you the first news of the draft law. When it’s news The Chronicle gives it first.
Men of The Dalles who desire to get into the second Officers’ Reserve training camp, which will be opened at the Presidio, San Francisco, August 27, should apply to the local committee, Max A. Vogt, chairman; Floyd W. Sims; and J. C. Hostetler.
Copies of the cards which were signed by the 1171 citizens of Wasco county who registered for the war census June 5, were expressed to Adjutant General White at Portland today.
WASHINGTON, July 2. – The senate has amended the food bill to include the control of cotton and its products. The vote was 43 to 33. Then the senate voted to include wool, skins, hides and their products, thus placing control over all wearing apparel, including shoes.
GLASGOW, May 24. – (By mail.) – A day on the river Clyde helps explain Lloyd George’s confidence, that the submarine menace will be beaten. A snare-drum roar from thousands of steam riveters and a battlefield drumfire of crashing hydraulic hammers; unending miles of wooden and steel scaffoldings with workmen swarming over them like flies; towering cranes that look capable of lifting a county courthouse and setting it down in the next county; these are some of the reasons.
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