YESTERYEARS: Ross, Daphne Hukari Animal Shelter opens in 2007

This year’s class of Union High School District No. 1 in Parkdale held commencement exercises Saturday evening in McIsaac’s Hall. The excellent program was enjoyed by the large number in attendance.

Odell and Parkdale were tied for league leadership of the Hood River Valley Baseball circuit last Sunday. Odell downed the Hood River Heights on the Hood River diamond 6-4, and Parkdale outlasted the Nisei Nine 12-10 at Parkdale.

First baseman Ed Eilertson pulled out a four-ply home run in the seventh for Odell that provided a game-winning margin.

The Parkdale-Nisei contest was a slugfest in which 30 hits were swatted out by batters of the two teams. Parkdale collected 16 safeties off of Nisei hurler Kay Kiyokawa and the losers pounded Parkdale hurlers Jack Culbertson and McLain for 14. Kiyokawa struck out seven and walked three. Culbertson and McLain whiffed seven Niseis and allowed six walks.

The Odell-Heights game was highlighted by close plays throughout the game. Odell tallied one run in the first inning and held the Heights team checked until their half of the fourth, when Slack, Heights shortstop, hit a screaming triple into left field but over slid third base to be tagged out by Mohr, Odell third baseman. The Heights team scored their four runs in the fourth inning outburst, and carried their 4-1 lead thru until the first half of the seventh, when Eilertson smacked his homer.

With the score of 5-4, Odell used a well-executed squeeze play to push over their final tally in the first half of the ninth.

Heights came through in the last half of the ninth to threaten the Odell lead. With two men on base, Captain, Odell pitcher, struck out eight Heights batters and allowed eight hits. Washington, Heights pitcher, struck out five batters and allowed nine hits.

— Hood River News, May 23, 1947

1927 — 90 years ago

A special meeting of the Crag Rats was held at the Chamber of Commerce on Thursday evening of last week to meet Mr. Carter, W.S. Wheeler, Stanley Walters and Albert Weisendanger, all of the U.S. Forest Service. Mr. Carter outlined the cooperation which is now being extended by various organizations to the Forest Service in the fighting of timber and brush fires and also in the campaign to prevent forest fires. Mr. Carter stated that records since 1908 show that 60 percent of the forest fires are manmade.

1937 — 80 years ago

At a largely-attended meeting of the Crag Rats Thursday night of last week, members of the well-known alpine organization unanimously decided to again cooperate with the Forest Service in firefighting during the coming season, as in the past several years. Each member of the Crag Rats will be given a card, which will be Forest Service authorization for Crag Rats to check law violators in the Mt. Hood National Forest. At the meeting were District Rangers S.W. Waters and Weeman and Ranger Albert Weisendanger.

Hood River High School will hold its commencement in the high school auditorium May 26 at 8:15 p.m. Students will receive their diplomas for the completion of four year’s work. The class of 1937 — 89 members — is one of the largest to graduate from Hood River.

1947 — 70 years ago

By a vote of 69 to 37, with two votes challenged, Apple Growers Association, Friday of last week, rejected an invitation to have the FTA-CIO represent them in their labor relations with the big cooperative, and decided to conduct their own relations with the association without the aid of the union.

The city council, Monday night of this week, instructed the city attorney, John N. Mohr, to prepare for submission at the first council meeting in June, all data concerning a special city election, at a date to be announced later, to enable voters to express themselves by ballot for or against another bond issue of $40,000 for swimming pool and park purposes.

1957 — 60 years ago

Final exercises for seniors at Wy’east and Cascade Locks high schools are scheduled this weekend. Commencement for the Locks will be held at 8 p.m. Saturday in the auditorium. The Wy’east baccalaureate and commencement will be held at 2 p.m. on Saturday. Mark Hatfield, secretary of state, will give the address at the combined Wy’east exercises. His subject is “Unto Whomsoever Much Is Given.”

Most Hood River water users were unaware that the main line from Cold Springs ruptured at 11 a.m. Tuesday and was out of order for 9 and a half hours while a new section of the line was replaced. Engineer Bob Crichton reports that the break occurred south of the Hukari crossing. The city’s new 5-million-gallon reservoir supplied water to local customers without any change in service until the repair was completed.

1967 — 50 years ago

City government in Hood River underwent a complete change — the first since it was formed in 1901 — at the polls here Tuesday. The quiet revolution probably won’t be noticed by more than a handful of citizens, and scarcely more than that turned out to vote the change into effect. Only 128 voters cast ballots in the special election on the new city charter, which passed easily 116-12. Virtually no controversy developed when a city council committee submitted a completely new charter to replace the original document issued by a special act of the state legislature in 1901. The new document was drafted after councilmen had initially set out to make new revisions for modernizing the old charter, which hasn’t been amended since 1956. When they got into it, council committeemen decided to try scrapping the old charter, which had grown to a cumbersome 56 pages. The new book has nine pages and goes into effect July 1.

1977 — 40 years ago

About 175 tassels in shades of blue will switch sides on mortar boards here Thursday, symbolic of gradation for the Hood River Valley High School class of 1977. The class chose shades of blue as its colors, so girls will wear light blue caps and gowns, boys will don royal blue colors for the 8 p.m. ceremony.

1987 — 30 years ago

At 12:01 a.m. on May 28, most Odell residents will be sleeping soundly. However, at United Telephone’s central office, company technicians will be wide awake, making the change to a new computerized call switching system. According to Dale Carter, customer service manager, the state of the art switching equipment will bring customers more reliable service, accompanied with faster call connections and clearer voice transmissions. Odell is the first of 11 communities in the Gorge scheduled to receive new digital technology this year.

1997 — 20 years ago

Hood River residents facing a strict new downtown parking plan and burgeoning traffic created by flocks of summer tourists will soon have an alternative way to move around the city. A new fixed-route bus service is scheduled to begin in less than three weeks, with regular stops five days a week. The program has been developed by the Hood River County Transportation District. On June 9, Columbia Area Transit (CAT) will start offering six routes within the city. One-way fares will be 75 cents for adults and 50 cents for youth, seniors and the disabled.

2007 — 10 years ago

Camille Hukari wore her “I love my dog and my dog loves me” t-shirt to Thursday’s dedication of an animal shelter named after her parents. She said the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Ross and Daphne Hukari Animal Shelter fulfilled their wishes. The elder Hukaris, both of whom are now deceased, left a significant amount of money in their wills for construction of the facility.

Hood River County Administrator David Meriwether is relieved that federal funding has been revived — at least temporarily — for communities hurt by logging cutbacks. “Everyone can now breathe a little easier, but this is certainly a wakeup call,” he said. “I think we all need to brace for a re-distribution in these revenues down the road. We need to get away from this level of dependency.” On Thursday, Congress approved a one-year extension of the Secure Rural Schools and Self-Determination Act.

— Compiled by Trisha Walker, News staff writer