Looking Back with Lora Stull
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One Hundred Years Ago
(From the Mount Ayr Record News, Thursday, May 5, 1920.)
Ringgold County’s gift to France. It required only a few minutes to raise Ringgold County’s quota of the $250,000 which will be used to erect a statue on the river Marne to commemorate the valor of the American soldiers who helped stop the advance of the Prussian soldiery as they essayed to capture Paris. Members of the local committee called on the business and professional men in Mount Ayr and a freewill offering from those solicited raised a fund of $53.75, and the canvass was only just begun.
Marriages: April 28, Beidella Beal and Howard Nye…May 1, Lauretta Mix and James Worthington.
Obituary in this edition was, Anna Melissa Hamilton Hidlay.
Seventy-Five
Years Ago
(From the Mount Ayr Record News, Thursday, May 10, 1945.)
VE day quietly observed in Mount Ayr. A brief address was delivered by County Attorney, Grant L. Hayes, a veteran of World War I. “Some 26 1/2 years ago, it was my privilege to witness the end of the first World War; in fact, I had a ring side seat, some 5,000 miles east of Mount Ayr and about 10 miles from the heavily fortified and German held city of Metz. As we were moving up to the front, we had the report on the 7th day of November that the armistice had been signed. It proved to be false and when the word again came on the morning of the 11th that firing would cease at eleven o’clock, we had no faith in the report. We were to have joined in the all-out assault on Metz on the 13th. But this time it was to be true. Firing ceased promptly at eleven o’clock. We had no wild feeling of elation or even the desire to celebrate. We were still 5,000 miles from home, cold, wet and tired. Our feeling was only that of relief, of thankfulness that a Divine Creator had seen fit to bring an end to a war that should never have happened. That armistice was not to end wars, however. Germany proper was unharmed, her institutions and industries alive, her economy in such condition that it could and did survive. Germany merely took a good deep breath and began to prepare for the second world war. One that was to envelop the whole world and to plunge nation after nation into ruin and servitude, under the direction of a mad man, backed by Prussian Military Caste and rich industrialists with a consuming lust for power and world conquest. But today officially marks the end of this phase of war, the first half of a war so big, so far flung that even we of the first World War do not fully appreciate or comprehend the scope. Again today I have that same feeling of relief, of thankfulness. It is not yet quite time to celebrate. Japan is a powerful and a bitter enemy, with a far flung empire, well entrenched and with the will and purpose to fight to to the last man. We have a long hard struggle and after that an equally hard fight for peace that will be an enduring one. Out of the San Francisco conference may come a workable plan for world peace. It may result in a world police force. It may be that only force which will enable the world to live in peace and harmony. We dare not fail. It is for us at home to tighten our belts to get out of our own foxholes, to work, to save, to buy bonds and make ready to welcome home our fighting forces to a country of which we may all be justly proud and in which we will all want to live. Let us have victory, then an enduring peace.
Mrs. L.E. Butler received last week the good news that her son, Pvt. Leland Merle Butler, who had been missing in action in Germany since December 16, had been released from the prison camp, Stalag 4B, in Germany and is back with his unit.
Marriages: Frances Sheumaker became the bride of Richard Saltzman on May 2.
Births: May 1, a son, to Mr. and Mrs. Gene Laird.
Obituaries in this edition were: Ellen Marilla Grim Roush, Della Keel Shifflett, and Elizabeth Saltzman Kling.
Fifty Years Ago
(From the Mount Ayr Record News, Thursday, April 23, 1970.)
First steps toward housing project for senior citizens in the Mount Ayr community were taken Monday night at a meeting of the board of directors of the Mount Ayr Community Improvement Club.
Men ordered to report for physical examinations on April 15, by the Ringgold County Local Board of Selective Service System were, Jimmie Hoffman, Ronald Burgher, John Reasoner and Martin Taylor. Ordered to report for induction on April 22 are James Saville and Eugene Dillenburg, however both received postponements authorized by the state director.
Ed Defenbaugh scored 11 points in the Mustang Relays held Tuesday evening of last week at Shenandoah and earned for Mount Ayr 12th place in a 28 team field. He was first in the 440, second in the 220 and 5th in the 100. He was the only Raider to score. Defenbaugh remains unbeaten in the 440.
Births: April 20, a son, Stephen, to Mr. and Mrs. David Stuck.
Obituary in this edition was, Edna Marie Bear Stacy.
Twenty Five Years Ago
(From the Mount Ayr Record News, Thursday, April 20, 1995.)
A six day march from Lincoln Township, near Unionville, MO to Ames, site of the National Rural Conference to focus public attention on the negative impacts of large livestock operations was scheduled to have one of its nightly meetings in Mount Ayr. The march began April 19. The Missouri farmers will march to the Iowa state line where they will be met by Iowa farmers and rural residents. The march is being sponsored by the National Champaign for Family Farms and the Environment.
Bob Sickels of Mount Ayr recently retired from the Mount Ayr Volunteer Fire Department after 30 years of service. When Sickels began as a fireman, a building adjacent, to the south, of the Mount Ayr City Hall was the firehall. It housed 2 fire trucks. Then it moved to the building that has been used in recent years, across to the south, from the St. Joseph Catholic Church. Sickels was fire chief when the first tanker truck was purchased. Sickels remembers the fire on the east side of the square of Mount Ayr on June 7, 1977 as the biggest one that he and his fellow firemen fought during his tenure.
Births: April 10, a son, Taylor, to Mr. and Mrs. Daron Richie…April 12, a son, Braydon, to Mr. and Mrs. Dan Barber.
Obituaries in this edition were: John Tyler Wininger, Jim Tindle, and Lee Bastow.
Ten Years Ago
(From the Mount Ayr Record News, Thursday, April 15, 2010.)
Karen Bender of Mount Ayr was named manager of the Princess Theater when the Princess Theater Troupe board of directors held a meeting Monday night. Bender was chosen from a field of 17 applicants for the position.
FFA trap shooters third, Sobotka first in state. Both Alex Sobotka and his father, Gary Sobotka received first place awards in the State FFA trap shoot competition. Alex in the FFA member and Gary in the advisor chaperone shoot.
Obituaries in this edition were: Shirley Yvonne Rainey Davidson, Charles Billie Fifer and Elmer Carter Wolf.