THE TIME MACHINE

From past files of The Star News

10 YEARS AGO

April 8, 2010

A proposed water tower in the Village of Stetsonville cleared a final hurdle with county approval of a variance to allow the tower to exceed airport height limits Tuesday morning.

This is good news for residents in Stetsonville who can proceed with installation of a new water system in the village. For decades the village has been dealing with petroleum contaminated groundwater. The plume centers around Hwy 13 near CTH A and extends to the southeast eventually impacting much of the residential area of the village. According to Greg Brunner, village president, the plume is expanding and 15 wells are currently contaminated with five residences on bottled water only.

He explained the Department of Natural Resources previously paid for new wells to be drilled and even going down 400 or more feet, there are replacement wells that have become contaminated.

25 YEARS AGO

April 12, 1995

Taylor County voters, as did voters throughout the state, rejected three proposed changes to the state constitution last week.

Voters were asked to vote on whether or not to have a sports lottery to help pay for a new Milwaukee Brewers stadium, whether masculine pronouns such as “he”, “his” or “him” should be replaced in the Wisconsin Constitution by gender neutral language, and whether the constitution should be changed to allow a justice or judge to hold another public office after resigning or retiring from the bench during that term of office.

50 YEARS AGO

April 9, 1970

Efforts on the part of the Gilman area school district to upgrade school plants were turned back by voters for the fifth time Tuesday. A referendum calling for an $850,000 bond issue was defeated by a narrow 106-vote margin, the tally 699 against the proposal to 593 favoring it.

The affirmative was tallied in six of the 17 precincts in the district, carrying strongly in Gilman village and a fair plurality in Aurora, Ford, McKinley and Taft. Greatest opposition was shown in Pershing, Roosevelt, Cleveland, Grover and Lublin.

75 YEARS AGO

April 5, 1945

A labor saving caravan, sponsored by the University of Wisconsin as a means of showing labor-saving machinery and devices, will be in Medford at the county shop, Tuesday, April 10, between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. where Taylor county farmers may view the machinery, according to Wm. L. McFetridge, Taylor county agent.

The caravan consists of several trucks and trailers on which will be hauled machinery and devices, or small models which can be expected to help relieve to some extent the manpower shortage on the farms, when government demands for war food production are high and the farm labor supply is low.

100 YEARS AGO

April 7, 1920

M. N. Truax of the town of Cleveland reports that he is all out of entry cards. The Yellow River will drain more crops and less brush this year than it every did before.

News comes from the town of Roosevelt that farmers are ordering more dynamite than they have any previous year. It takes dynamite to take out the big ones, but removing the big ones lets the sunshine in.

A letter comes from the same town asking for money to borrow. This should be of interest to our bankers. How big a mortgage can you consider a good investment on a wild forty?

125 YEARS AGO

April 6, 1895

The Illinois Legislature has fixed the value of a human life at not more than $5,000. The average Chicago man apparently regards his life as worth just 5 cents.

This latter sum is the fare charged by the street car companies for carrying a man from the business center to the end of the line. It is presumed that the man who gives his nickel to the conductor is entitled to a safe passage, but this presumption is cast aside, and thousands every day bet their lives against the nickels they hand over to the street car companies that they will reach home with whole limbs and as live men.