25 Years Ago — Jan. 24, 1990
The Allegan County Fair Board of Directors has decided to drop local affiliation with the Miss Michigan pageant and return to the traditional Harvest Queen contests, like the ones held before 1987
Wayland Area Emergency Services had a surprise mock disaster drill for 11 Wayland High School students. A gas leak routing members of a church meeting was staged.
Several Allegan County school district superintendents were very critical of the Allegan County Road Commission because they had to call off school on Monday unnecessarily. Dr. Craig Misner of Hopkins said the Road Commission did not properly maintain and sand roads that became icy.
Dorothy Jackson, in a letter to the editor, took to task Road Commission Safety Director Burl Ghastin for his recent comments that there were no deaths associated with the intersection of Bass Road and Patterson Avenue on the Barry-Allegan County line. She and other citizens have been clamoring for a four-way stop at the intersection, insisting it is dangerous.
Roy Anderson’s abilities to bribe citizens was credited for his election as the first Gun Lake Mayor, polling 1,015 “votes.” He will preside over the upcoming Gun Lake Winterfest activities.
Ray and Jill Anderson of Shelbyville wrote a letter to the editor praising the performances of Wayland High School and Middle School students in the production of Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town,” directed by Don Mackey.
A $100,000 satellite system will be installed this spring at Wayland schools, enabling students to receive signals from the educational network. There was some controversy because a part of the program is the presentation of commercials to a captive audience, but Supt. Robert Brenner said marketing and advertising is ubiquitous anyway.
A $300 grant from the Lansing-based Prevention Network will fund a drug prevention program for St. Therese School that emphasizes self-esteem. The grant is through “Project Charlie,” which stands Chemical Abuse Resolution Lies in Education.
Led by Julie Ainsworth and Jenny Ritz, the Wayland High School volleyball team won its own invitational, taking out Catholic Central, Hastings, Hamilton, Caledonia and Middleville, and then Hamilton again in the finals.
O-K Gold Conference leader Hudsonville ended Wayland’s three-game basketball winning streak with a 79-63 verdict. Earlier in the week, Eric VandenBerg pumped in 32 points and Matt Morse had 14 and 10 assists in an 88-82 victory over Godwin.
Hopkins has been accepted into the River Valley Conference, which includes Saugatuck, Allendale, Grand Rapids Baptist, Covenant Christian, Tri-Unity Christian and West Michigan Christian. Unfortunately, only Hopkins, Saugatuck and Allendale play football. Hopkins now has ended four years as an independent.
Decatur pinned a 78-64 loss on the Martin basketball team to take over first place in the Southwest Athletic Conference. Dan Herp scored 22 points and gathered 17 rebounds for the Clippers.
50 Years Ago — Jan. 20, 1965
Wayland High School sophomore Dennis DeHaan used the six-inch telescope he constructed to take a picture of the moon and had the photo published on the front page of the Globe this week.
The Wayland High School honor roll was announced and receiving all-As were junior Scott Chesebro and sophomores Richard Blok, Dennis DeHaan, Gary Finkbeiner and Connie Smith.
Local student being awarded degrees at mid-winter commencement at Western Michigan University were Gladys Alexiuk, Winona Calkins, Joan VanderLeest Morris, Shirley Boysen and David Colvin.
The Allegan County budget for 1964 was reported to include $426,227.51 in revenue and $472,566.25 in expenditures during a presentation from the clerk’s office to the County Board of Supervisors.
Herman Houseman has sold his aircraft parts business he’d had here since 1945 to James C. Henning of Kalamazoo. Houseman plans to remain as an employee.
The Wayland Village Council decided to halt the spraying program for elm trees that has been implemented for the last eight years. More than 300 trees have been killed by Dutch Elm’s Disease, it was learned.
The Wayland High School basketball team, fresh from its first victory of the season the previous week, has lost twice since. The Wildcats dropped a 77-51 non-league verdict to Plainwell, as Terry Parks scored 13 points. They lost 78-54 to Hamilton, as Gordon Hudson scored 14 points, Scott Hilbert 11 and Lee Pepper 10. The ‘Cats now are 1-8 for the campaign.
St. Therese, coached by David VanEerden, now is 5-0 after victories over Moline and Allegan Blessed Sacrament. Jerry LaValley scored 19 and 17 points in the two games, backed by scoring from Richard Tolan and Tom Latondress.
Rich Jordan drilled in 48 points to lead Fennville to an 85-42 victory over Hopkins. Bill Nicolai had 17 points, Dick Church 10 and Jim Gilder eight.
The Disney movie “So Dear to My Heart” and featurette “The Golden Horseshoe Review” were being shown at the Wayland Theatre.
Petula Clark took over the No. 1 song slot in the nation from the Beatles with “Downtown.”
75 Years Ago — Jan. 26, 1940
We have had zero weather and plenty of it. And they say there is more on the way.
The boys who were feeding birds last Saturday report seeing many dogs running loose and killing much game in the snow. It is unlawful to let dogs out of control. And some of the boys are pretty much incensed about it. So watch your pup if he runs away from home. It may save trouble — or the dog.
Among the nominations sent to the senate for confirmation was the appointment of Morris R. Ehle for another four-year term as the postmaster of Wayland. At the same time, nomination of Merland Pepper of Moline and Kenneth Potter of Shelbyville also were sent to the senate, both as postmasters of their communities.
The residents of the village have collected dividends several times this winter on an investment they made a few years ago in their power snow plow, and it has been doing a good job keeping the sidewalks plowed out when the snow is deep and the walking bad.
Last Sunday a number of local sportsmen had their first fling at fox hunting and from what we can learn, they had a lot of fun. The dogs picked up the trail of at least one vixen, which they ran for a greater part of the day, having had lots of exercise but no fox.
100 Years Ago — Jan. 22, 1915
Mr. Latro and family have moved into the house lately owned by Mr. Murray and he is putting a sawmill in Mr. Molewyk’s woods.
Ice harvest is in full blast. Skating is fine on Gun Lake.
Henry Delp of Grand Rapids is here glazing the sash windows of the new con-densery building.
August Hardy, proprietor of the new Wayland House, is having his ice house filled with ice.
Frank Delp has leased his pool and billiard room to Earl Ewing and has gone to Grand Rapids to remain for a time.
The ice harvest commenced this week.
L.W. Mortford, the local ice cream manufacturer, has commenced filling his large house, which has the capacity of more than 7,000 cakes.
