EDITOR’S NOTE: The material from the 100 Years Ago section was not available because of a technical error. It will resume next week
(Taken from the archives at the Then & Now Historical Library in downtown Dorr)
25 Years Ago — March 22, 1995
Editor Nila Aamoth wrote and extensive “Soapbox” piece about discussion at at recent school board meeting on reproductive health and some local parents who oppose sex education. Her editorial concluded, “Our kids are not learning how to learn.”
Nancy Smith’s letter the week before apparently started a robust debate about how special needs students are treated in the Wayland school system. Letters were sent by Kathy Vist of Martin, Debbie Straub of Wayland and Supt. Robert Brenner.
Lewis Dewey, a 1945 graduate of Wayland High School and research chemist for U.S. Rubber, died at his home in California. He was 67.
The Dorr Township Board decided to grant a tax abatement to Wonderland Tire to attempt to attract the company to establish business here.
The Dorr Township Board voted to close the Moline Library in the next year rather than continue to support both the Dorr and Moline libraries after 20 years.
Hopkins Board of Education member Chris Schwartz explained her opposition to a proposal to arrange for mobile classrooms because of overcrowding thusly: “This motion is holding a hammer over the head of the public to vote yes or no or go to split sessions… I can’t support this.” The school board narrowly approved the plan.
Gerald Eberlein plans to construct a drive-through car wash, Auto Care Car Wash, on West Superior Street to the immediate west of Burger King.
It was a historic day at Gun Lake when the iconic Joe’s Grocery building was razed at the corner of Patterson Avenue and Chief Noonday Road. Jim Panyrek watched from his Joe’s LP Gas business across the street, noting his father established the landmark grocery in 1946.
Marisa Parker and Karryn Bilski combined efforts to finish sixth in the State Interscholastic Forensics Tournament.
The Wayland High School band, under the direction of Michelle Fecker and Steve Working, earned a Division 1 superior rating the Michigan School Boad and Orchestra Association festival at Lowell.
Wayland High School graduate Mat Miller had the unusual pleasure of watching in New York a presentation of a play he wrote and produced, “Two Jacks and a Box.” The production was performed at a small theater on 42nd Street.
Burr Wright opened Lovin Oven in downtown Wayland.
Hopkins students Erica Snyder, Bethany Klunder and Angela Vogt have entries in the Michigan Education Association Art Show in Lansing.
50 Years Ago — March 18, 1970
The Martin varsity basketball team captured its first-ever regional championship by defeating Galien. Coach Herb Johnson, who took over the reins of the team in January when head coach Tom Morrissey died suddenly, guided the Clippers, who were led by Dennis Mills, Robert Zumbrink and Rob Larson. They will face Camden-Frontier in the Class D quarterfinals at Comstock High School.
The Botsford Building, a fixture for nearly 100 years at the corner of 142nd Avenue and Cedar Street, was being razed. The general store was opened in 1877 and purchased not long afterward by William Sproat. Elton Botsford, a pharmacist, bought it before the turn of the century. The last business at the site was a furniture outlet.
State Rep. James Farnsworth has introduced a bill to make fees for doctors uniform under Medicaid.
The Wayland City Council tabled a request to establish a helicopter landing strip on a playground north of the airport.
Gerald Omness, who has been had coach at Shelby High School for the past four seasons, has been hired as new head football coach at Wayland. Omness, who had a 19-13 record at Shelby, succeeds Eugene Knobloch.
George Hampel, who runs the local ambulance service, told the City Council he must raise his yearly fee of $1,000 and those for Leighton, Wayland, Dorr and Hopkins townships, $365 annually.
A funeral was held at Fountrain Street Church in Grand Rapids for Richard Hooker, 43, a 1945 Wayland High School graduate who went on co-found the law firm of Miller Canfield, Snell and Cummiskey.
The Wayland Junior High band received a superior Division 1 rating at the district festival at Jenison High School.
Vandals caused extensive damage in a break-in at the Monterey Baptist Church. The havoc included overturned flowers and plants, smashed windows and lights, pews overturned and uprooted, and the trampling of the Christian flag.
Wayland High School Principal JC Clyma attended a special two-day seminar on teen drug abuse in Chicago.
Barry Brower, in his weekly “Vietnam Diary” column, wrote about unwanted guests such as scorpions and viper snakes who visited soldiers taking showers with makeshift outdoor facilities.
Fred Hilbert Sr., in a letter to the editor about concerns over the new city manager’s salary, suggested the old “horse and buggy days” perhaps weren’t so bad after all.
Lance Cpl. Alex Liceaga of Shelbyville was promoted to his current rank while serving with the First Marines in Vietnam.
Harold Schumaker of Dorr was promoted to specialist-four while serving in Pleiku, Vietnam.
Now showing at the Wayland Theatre: “This Is My Alaska.”
Don Klein and Mark Schipper both were named to the last Expressway Conference all-league basketball team. Wayland in the fall will begin competing in the newly-formed O-K Blue Conference, which also will include Caledonia, Middleville and Hamilton.
75 Years Ago — March 23, 1945
Editor-Publisher Rollo G. Mosher, in his weekly “Observations” column, wrote, “The Grim Reaper certainly has been making inroads on families of Wayland businesses,” noting the deaths in just one week of Mrs. Charles Ayers, Carl Blue and Charles H. Ward.
Blue died at the age of 65 at St. Mary’s Hospital of complications from pneumonia. He and his son, Clayton, had formed Wayland Oil in 1926. Ward was a barber in Wayland Township for 64 years and had been born in 1860 in a log cabin at Selkirk Lake.
The Michigan Highway Department has been busy installing a traffic light downtown at the corner of Superior and Main Streets. The light will switch to flashing in the evening when traffic numbers are smaller.
Pfc. Ward Welsh of Wayland earned a Combat Infantry Badge while serving in the Battle of Zig Zag Pass, Bataan, in the Philppines.
Murray Houseman of Wayland has been assigned to the 93rd Bombardment Group as co-pilot on a B-24Liberator from Norway to Romania.
Reuben Curie, partner for 25 years in the Curie Brothers threshing outfit and a former highway commissioner for Wayland Township, died at age 79 at his home in Shelbyville.
Violinist Donna Jean Blue and flutist Gene Weber both earned Division 1 superior ratings at the State Solo and Ensemble Festival, with Merlyn Kellogg as their director.
WAC Marie Buskirk won a good conduct medal at the Second Air Force Base in Winfield, Kansas.
Pvt. Hubert Niemchick, a 1938 Wayland High School graduate, was wounded by shrapnel in his chest in battle in Germany and was recovering in a hospital in England.
Sgt. Jay Hazen was serving as an aerial gunner in Italy and is responsible for minor plane repairs in flight.
Winona Calkins led a discussion at the local Grange on “Shall We Can It, Smoke It, or Freeze It?”
Now showing at the Wayland Theatre:
- Roy Acuff and Lulubelle and Scotty in “Sing, Neighbor Sing.”
- Jack Haley and Bela Lugosi in “One Body Too Many.”
- Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer in “Together Again.”
- Joan Fontaine and Arturo deCordova in “Frenchmen’s Creek.