75 years ago

Dec. 6, 1941

An extensive well-supervised recreational program for Aberdeen children is the best means of combatting this city’s juvenile delinquency problem was recommended yesterday by speakers of a panel discussion staged before Aberdeen Kiwanis club.

“In this day children are confronted with many temptations that never confront adults,” said Miss Bess Dawes, county juvenile officer, “yet we expect them to have the stability and emotional balance to overcome them. Today’s children have so little opportunity to express themselves by healthy physical and mental effort. If we could allow them to spend their leisure time in using up the excess energy in well-supervised, wholesome work and play, the problem of juvenile delinquency would be much nearer a solution.”

Dec. 7, 1941

Sunday, no newspaper published

50 years ago

Dec. 6, 1966

Eighty-one boxes, containing 1,000 toys, 248 toothbrushes, 118 pounds of bulk candy and 240 candy canes were on their way to two orphanages in Viet Nam as volunteers of “Operation Snowball” began mailing the parcels this morning.

Mrs. Janet Trommer and Mrs. Francis Burton said today that the group still needs bar soap, towels, light weight clothing and money to mail the goods.

Capt. Paul Fournier Jr. sent the ladies a letter thanking them for their hard work. “I know that you all don’t do these things for reward or praise — the same as the GIs. The need is here Now! And our small corner of the world in the states need take a second place to none. I’ve not heard of any other project like this.”

Dec. 7, 1966

A gala “bank-warming” will be held Saturday to celebrate the approved merger of National Bank of Washington and Timbermens National Bank of Hoquiam. One of the many highlights will be a treasure chest filled with silver and all persons holding keys which will open the lock will be able to reach in and take as much money as their hand can hold.

Transistor radios and a color television will be given away during the day.

25 years ago

Dec. 6, 1991

Just upstream from where the Wishkah joins the Chehalis there was once a wooden bridge, Aberdeen’s first over the Wishkah. No one is sure when that bridge connecting F Street to East Aberdeen was built but thanks to a faded photograph, local historians do know it was completed prior to 1900.

On Sunday, the Aberdeen Museum of History will dedicate a mural of that bridge, painted by Bob McCausland of Tokeland on a huge door at the museum.

The mural is one of two new displays the museum is ready to show off this weekend. Right next to it is a display of the switchboard operators once used in Aberdeen. This display is chiefly the work of Lynn Daneker of Aberdeen, a master carpenter who serves as the museum board’s vice president.

Now, Daneker says, “I want to build a replica of a barn. We’re looking for any barns that fell down this winter.”

Dec. 7, 1991

• Friends of John Edward Lemieux Sr. are grieving the loss of a man who was a “sweetheart who’d give you the shirt off his back and not ask questions.”

Skeletal remains were found in the charred rubble of the travel trailer he was living in near Crane Creek north of Amanda Park after it burned in a “suspicious fire” Thursday night. He lived there alone. Friends said he was in his 70s.

They described the retired steel and construction worker as a gentle person who loved to read.

After the blaze broke out a man in his 20s was arrested on an unrelated misdemeanor warrant and is being held as a “person of interest” in connection with the fire, said Robbin Rhoades, Quinault Tribal Police Chief.

• The Rev. Mikkel Christian Thompson will be installed as pastor of Aberdeen’s Trinity Lutheran Church during a celebration of Holy Communion at 11 a.m. Sunday.

Thompson previously served as a pastor in Moscow, Idaho and on Bainbridge Island. A musician and composer, he writes musical worship material for the Evangelical Lutheran Church. He also plays the cello with the Grays Harbor Symphony Orchestra.

Compiled from the archives of The Daily World by Karen Barkstrom