Saturday
75 years ago
Dec. 9, 1948
• The undefeated Poplar Bluff Mules high school football team was honored at the Poplar Bluff Letter Club’s annual football banquet held last night (Dec. 8) at the Dunn Hotel and attended by 134 people. Tom Minetree was honored as the conference’s leading scorer after scoring 103 points this season and Harry Smith, line coach at the University of Missouri, was the featured speaker.
• Eighteen neighbors of Tom Sparkman pulled 500 bushels of corn and placed it in a crib at the Sparkman farm Tuesday, Dec. 7, following a recent fire which raised his family’s eight-room farmhouse and an outbuilding. The Sparkman farm is located on Miller Road, three miles from the Green Forest Church.
Dec. 9, 1923, and Dec. 9, 1973 — No editions available.
Sunday
100 years ago
Dec. 10, 1923
• It seems a certainty the Patterson Bank, which is now in the hands of the State Finance Commissioner, is going to be reorganized. Those interested in the bank are planning the reopening of the institution and are considering a proper man to be cashier of the reorganized bank. A reopening date has not been determined.
• In a related story, C.T. Kinder, the former cashier of the Patterson Bank who was apprehended in California, will be returned Saturday, Dec. 15 to Greenville. It is the latest information on when Kinder will be returned to Wayne County.
• Aubrey Barton, a 16-year-old youth, was arrested Sunday afternoon (Dec. 9) by Poplar Bluff Police Chief Ward Hendrickson for being drunk and disorderly. He was turned over to the juvenile court and lodged in the county jail until late last night when he was released to go home on the promise to return for trial in juvenile court today.
75 years ago
Dec. 10, 1948
• The work of installing the new parking meters started this morning, Poplar Bluff Police Chief N.H. Massie said, and it is expected all of them will be operation within a week. The first installations will be on Main Street and some of the meters should be in operation within a day or two. The meters are constructed for a two-hour parking limit, but can be used for parking as short of a time as 12 minutes. The meters charge a penny for each 12 minutes of parking.
• Black River has about 17,000 more game fish today than it did early yesterday. The Indian Trail Hatchery sent 15,000 bass and channel catfish yesterday, the cleanup of the year’s hatch. Columbus Clark, a local bait dealer, aided the Southeast Missouri Sportsman’s Group in taking 2,000 bass from the rearing pond and placing them in the river. Bill Toellner, president of the Sportsman’s Group, said they put fish in the river north and south of Poplar Bluff.
50 years ago
Dec. 10, 1973
• The Coby Glass Products Company, a Rhode Island firm that produces the bulk of the glass Christmas tree ornaments used in the United States, announced today they would be opening a plant in Poplar Bluff. The plant will be located in the Poplar Bluff Industrial Park on Highway 142 and operate as Noelle Decorations, Inc. It is expected to employ 55-60 persons at peak production, said John R. Reinhard, a company official.
• Mrs. Juanita Baxter, a teller at Commerce Bank in Poplar Bluff, has been named campaign treasurer for the Poplar Bluff 1973 March Against Dystrophy. This announcement was made today by Thomas V. Neels, district director for Muscular Dystrophy Associations of America, Inc. for the Mississippi Valley Area. Volunteer marchers will conduct a house-to-house appeal tomorrow (Dec. 11) for funds to fight muscular dystrophy and related neuromuscular diseases.
Monday
100 years ago
Dec. 11, 1923
• Several persons last night (Dec. 10) heard President Calvin Coolidge’s message broadcast over radio from Washington, D.C. Laster Harwell, who heard the message over the radio set at the home of Dr. B.H. Selvidge, said it was as distinct as if the president had been speaking in the same room.
Editor’s note: Radio was still a relatively new thing in 1923.
• Lawrence and Clarence Trostel, Lone Hill youths who were convicted some weeks ago of the theft of a wagon load of cotton from Jim Brannum, were taken off to Jefferson City last night by county judge Charles Calvin of Qulin. The Trostels were sentenced to serve two years in the penitentiary for their crime.
75 years ago
Dec. 11, 1948
• The Poplar Bluff Jaycees have completed plans for the collection of Christmas gifts for needy families. The collection will be made at 1 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 19. Usable clothing, bedding, canned foods, toys and playthings are needed for distribution among the city’s needy, but the Jaycees emphasized all articles must be in good condition. No junk should be included.
• The Rotary Club will have nearly $400 to be used in starting development of Bacon Memorial Park, thanks to the recent Chili Day the Rotarians held. The results of Chili Day were announced in the club’s most recent meeting on Wednesday (Dec. 8).
50 years ago
Dec. 11, 1973
• Elmo Turner, St. Louis area director for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, traced the progress of public housing in America when he addressed members of the Greater Poplar Bluff Area Chamber of Commerce Monday at the Hickory House Restaurant. Turner said the average rent paid for public housing is $37 for the elderly and $60 for non-elderly and called the housing accomplishments of recent decades “dramatic.”
• Mrs. Henrietta Metz, cooperative occupational education coordinator for the Poplar Bluff R-I school district, has received a commendation for her services and earned recognition for the district’s vocational guidance program through participation in activities of related professional teaching organizations. Metz was awarded the Outstanding Service Award for 1973 at a meeting of the Missouri Cooperative Industrial and Distributive Education Association in St. Louis for her contributions.