Pioneer Portraits

Ten Years Ago

August 29, 2009

Wheat harvest should be done by early next week. Several farmers around Waitsburg reported some fields yielding 100-plus bushels per acre, McCaw added. Yield and quality reports-quite good yields and good test weights with low dockages-remain as previously reported. “It appears the rains did not hurt the quality in the area,” he said.

Photo caption: Waitsburg High School student Alex Leathers spends some of his summer vacation on Dan Leathers’ “The Kisutch” a 35-foot fishing/sightseeing boat based out of Ketchikan, AK. Alex was reading the Times and hoisting one of the day’s catch-trying figure out why a fine paper such as The Times won’t wrap an Alaska-sized fish.

Twenty-Five Years Ago

August 11, 1994

Wearing a campaign-style button saying, ‘Call me Madam,” Councilwoman Bette Chase was ready to vote on what she called the “wall” at last week’s City Council meeting. The wall was really 50-foot long fence-8 feet tall- that a resident on Preston Avenue wanted to build to provide privacy from the next door neighbors. The resident, Dona Little Wolf and her daughter, Markita, has asked the council to approve a permit to allow them to put up the fence, which they wanted to build three feet above the city’s backyard fence maximum height of five feet.

The 1994 wheat harvest is almost history. Overall, the consensus is yields are down about 40 percent from last year in Walla Walla and Columbia counties. Winter wheat yields in the Waitsburg-Prescott areas, according to J. E. McCaw, assistant manager of Touchet Valley Grain Growers in Waitsburg, ranged from around 40-70 bushels per acre. In the same locations are anywhere from 60-80 bushels an acre, he said. Last year’s bountiful crop produced ranges in the two vicinities from 70 to 100-plus bushels per acre.

Fifty Years Ago

August 14, 1969

Glen Hofer reports: Dear Wheatgrower, It takes a very keen and optimistic eye to find any ray of light shining on the wheat scene this first day of August. The world wheat exporters appear to be trembling on the verge of an all-out price war, movement of wheat has virtually stopped in both the export and domestic markets, allotment announcements are six weeks overdue and still hung up in the bureaucratic maze across town and the Sept. wheat future in Kansas fell to its lowest point since 1942.

Photo caption: The top photo shows the rock hill north of town as the first blast of the explosive lifts the rock and dirt about 6 feet into the air. At left in the pickup is County Engineer B. Loyal Smith while Times photographer Charles Baker is at the right of the pickup. The blast, which felt to many in town like an earthquake, took place at about 3:30 last Friday afternoon.

Seventy-Five Years Ago

August 18, 1944

Waitsburg Schools will start Tuesday, Sept 5 with a full teaching staff. The faculty includes Homer Reed, Myron Colburn, Mary Dion, Mrs. J. W. Carson, Ruth Gray, Ruth Lampharter, Josephine Gordon, Cal Malone, Paul Koper, Henry Reimers, Daisy Wale, Margaret Ward, Mildred Minnick, Gladys Williamson, Gladys Keve, Miss Kingsman and Aleta Combs.

Helen Lloyd was honored at a surprise birthday supper Monday night when a group of her friends arrived at her country home for a hamburger and watermelon feed. Guests were Pat Hirsch, Mary Frances Dunn, Maxine Attebury, Hazel Harkins, Elizabeth Sutton, Thelma Webber, Erma Crall and Frances Craig.

One Hundred Years Ago

August 22, 1919

A fire started about 12 o’clock Saturday in the field belonging to Hollis Conover and burned about 350 acres of grain, some threshed, but most of it standing and nine head of good work mules.

The season on blue grouse and native pheasants opened in Walla Walla county Friday and will be open until Oct 1.

The new Adventist College in College Place, which is nearing completion, is one of the handsome buildings of the county and adds distinction to a group of attractive buildings which comprise the institution.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith Hoops left Tuesday for Barnesville, Ohio for an extended visit to visit relatives and friends. They expect to be absent until the first of October.

One Hundred Twenty-Five Years Ago

August 17, 1894

While working about a threshing machine near Walla Walla on Saturday last, Teen Mikkelsen got his left arm caught in the machinery in such a manner as to break it just below the elbow.

Adelle Morgan and Maud Johnson had a narrow escape from a watery grave on Monday. They were swimming in the Touchet and got beyond their depth. Fannie Weller, who was on the bank had the presence of mind to extend some willows to the sinking girls and thus aid them to shore, which they reached in a semi-conscious condition.

W. B. Shaffer and wife celebrated their fifth wedding anniversary at their mountain camp last Sunday night. A pleasant time is reported and ‘tis said their presents were numerous and unique.