Forum Flashbacks: April 7-13
FORUM FILE PHOTO
25 YEARS AGO: Reading Fair Friends – Danielle Render, daughter of Val and Wayne Render of Guilford, makes a new friend at the Parent and Child Reading Fair held at South Nodaway Elementary School in Guilford on Saturday. Throughout the school on Saturday morning, volunteer readers read stories to interested youngsters of all ages. Refreshments were served and door prizes were given away. The event was sponsored by the Northwest International Reading Association.
5 years ago
This past weekend, individuals from the Maryville 4-H Club and Northwest Missouri State University took part in cleaning up the Nodaway County Courthouse in Maryville.
On Friday, the Maryville 4-H group had 32 members show up to take part in cleanup efforts as part of a community service program.
The group spent nearly two hours Friday evening picking up trash and leaves around the courthouse, in preparation for the Northwest football players to add mulch to the grounds of the courthouse.
The 4-H group loaded a truck full of leaves and dead shrubs, while filling a dumpster with trash.
“It is a lot of work but with that many families, we were able to split it up,” said Belinda Hess, who is in her first year as the Maryville 4-H coleader with Terri Lager. “We have an amazing group, and we are very proud of all the hard work our young members do.”
15 years ago
Jerry Dew unexpectedly had his lost wallet returned to him Thursday afternoon. It was a surreal experience.
What’s strange about it? When Dew’s lost wallet was returned to him, he already had his wallet in his pocket.
That’s because the wallet returned to him was one he lost in 1963, when he was 17 years old.
The billfold was found by Kirby Goslee, who, for the last several weeks, has been reconditioning his house in Skidmore, which was built in 1918.
Goslee said he discovered the wallet when he was removing a large water tank in “a small wasted closet space.” …
Like an archeologist discovering a lost treasure, Goslee carefully opened the aged wallet —a time capsule of someone else’s life. …
And when he looked through the contents of the wallet, past the Boy Scout second rank card issued in 1958, a money order for $1.80 dated May 9, 1960, a 10-cent ticket stub from a show, two cards for a gallon of A&W Root Beer (“collect 20 and get a free gallon of delicious, refreshing A&W Root Beer, kids!”), several black and white photographs and a Red Cross certification card for a “beginner in swimming,” Goslee found Jerry Dew’s drivers license — the one that disappeared when he was 17.
25 years ago
The Nodaway County Ambulance Service recently moved its facility at St. Francis Hospital to the building that was formerly home to O’Riley Brothers Construction at 103 W. Thunderbird Dr. in Maryville.
The service’s new base of operation is approximately four times the size of the old facility.
“We only had about 2,000 square feet compared to the almost 8,000 we have here,” Director of Services George R. Duff said. …
With all the extra space, the EMTs get to enjoy a few added luxuries to help them pass some of the time on their 12 hour shifts. They have a spacious lounge with a television and a couch. They also have access to an exercise room with a stationary bicycle, weights and a weight machine.
However, the big bonus to the EMTs is their new culinary freedom.
“We have a kitchen facility here, and we never had a kitchen at the old base,” Duff said. “Of course we always had the hospital next to the old base where we could get something to eat, but it will be great to be able to fix our own meals.”
100 years ago
HEAVY DAMAGE BY CYCLONES MONDAY
Three Twisters Hit Northwestern Part of County Late Yesterday Afternoon — Farm Buildings and Livestock Destroyed — Property Loss Is High
HOUSES AND BARNS ARE BLOWN OVER
Wire Communication To Clearmont Is Impossible Yet This Afternoon and Extent of Damage East on Farms In Path of the Big Storms
Three cyclones which swept across the northwestern half of Nodaway County about 4 o’clock yesterday afternoon did thousands of dollars worth of damage to farm homes and buildings, uprooted trees and fences and killed livestock. Wire communication is partially destroyed, and, although it is being rapidly restored, details of the storm are meager.
One of the cyclones went up the Nodaway River valley west of Burlington Junction, another went north about four miles southeast of Burlington Junction and swung around toward Clearmont and Braddyville, and a third went northwest of Maryville through the Workman Chapel neighborhood and north, lifting about two and a half miles north of Braddyville.
From the amount of damage done, the storm northwest of Maryville was evidently the worst of the three. It first struck the hay barn on the H. A. Lemon place, tearing the structure to pieces and taking parts with it.
Probably the nearest the storm came to Maryville was the Jerry Vaughn farm, about five and a half miles northwest. …
The place belonging to Mrs. Sarah E. Thornhill of Maryville and occupied by Tom Schoonover was badly damaged. The storm hit the house and moved it about eight feet off its foundation. All of the outbuildings were destroyed, a tenant house was blown away, and some livestock killed. The Schoonover family was in the cave when the twister hit. …
The Ray Miller home, about three miles southeast of Burlington Junction, was fairly in the path of the storm. The house was practically torn down and outbuildings destroyed. Mr. Miller was the only member of the family at home when the storm came. He said he didn’t want to go into the house, so he just laid down on the ground, grabbed a fence post and hung on and the cyclone didn’t hurt him a bit.
The 100-year flashback is courtesy of the Missouri Digital Newspaper Project from the State Historical Society of Missouri, viewable at shsmo.org/collections/newspapers/mdnp. The original article ran in the April 11, 1922, edition of The Maryville Tribune, a predecessor of The Maryville Forum.
