75 years ago
September 7, 1942
Jack Unrue, Cosmopolis, log trucker, escaped with painful but minor injuries today from a truck-train collision which left his logging vehicle valuable only as scrap.
The impact between Unrue’s truck and a Union Pacific log train this morning at Blue Slough broke the truck in half and smashed the engine so badly that the train crew struggled for 25 minutes to free the driver’s body from the twisted wreckage. As they worked, the gas tank broke into flame, and part of the crew flung sand on the flames to quench them before they reached Unrue’s unconscious form.
When he regained consciousness at Aberdeen General hospital, Unrue, despite a deep cut over one eye and numerous contusions and abrasions, asked to be sent home, but was kept in bed for observation.
September 8, 1942
Army life has taken 50 pounds off the fame of A.E. “Al” Martinson, former Aberdeen traffic officer, and put him in “fine fettle.”
Mrs. Martinson, Aberdeen nurse, who recently visited her husband at Fort Warren, Wyoming, said Al now weighs about 165 pounds, the rest having been worked off mostly by “crawling on his stomach through the Wyoming sage brush.”
The ex-patrolman now is drilling newcomers at the fort.
50 years ago
September 7, 1967
Ralph Burbs, new head football mentor at Wishkah High School, is likely to need all the enthusiasm that goes with an initial coaching assignment.
The Logggers are making the jump from 8-man to 11-man ball this year, and they’ll be doing it with a squad that currently numbers 16.
“I think it’ll probably get up to 18 or maybe 19,” the Western Washington grad speculated hopefully.
The Loggers, who open Saturday afternoon against Monte’s JVs, are further crippled by a recent tonsillectomy on veteran end Ron Moodenbaugh and a knee injury to promising freshman quarterback Keith Eager.
September 8, 1967
“The bigger they are the harder they fall!” Hoquiam Mayor Rolland (Omar) Youmans said defiantly as he laced on his calk-soled birling shoes.
“Humph!” snarled burly Walt Failor, mayor of Aberdeen. “That runt from the north end is going to make quite a splash.”
This tension-packed exchange took place this morning as the rival mayors practiced for their crucial Saturday night log rolling bout, which should be one of the highlights of Hoquiam’s third annual Logger’s Playday lumberjack show.
“It will be a two-out-of-three fall match,” playday show emcee Bill Anthony noted as he attempted to calm down the two men. “With all due respect to our mayors, this bout should really be hilarious,” Anthony said.
25 years ago
September 7, 1992
In this day of computerized spell-checking programs, kids might be wondering if grown-ups can spell such simple words as “hystricomorphic” or “quinquefoliolate” without punching a few computer keys.
They’ll get a chance to find out during the adult spelling bee planned for Sept. 29 in Aberdeen.
For a mere $150 tax-deductible donation, teams can sign up to compete in the “Bee For Literacy” contest, sponsored by Twin Harbor Literacy in cooperation with The Daily World and Grays Harbor College.
September 8, 1992
Longtime Grays Harbor Pupil Services employee Ed Liedtke, 42, is now in charge of the Hopkins building and overseeing the Aberdeen School District’s programs located within its walls. And there are a lot.
His job description includes being in charge of Harbor High School, a fast-growing alternative high school housed in the former junior high building, as well as overseeing the developmental preschool, the Teen Parenting Program and the community based programs for students with developmental disabilities who are high school age or young adults.
Compiled from the archives of The Daily World by Karen Barkstrom
