In this installment of A Look Back in Time, the Friday, Jan. 10, 1936, edition of The Chronicle featured a story about Grand opera singer Virginia LeRae, originally from Centralia with her parents still living there, set to perform in Chehalis before embarking on an international performance tour in South America.
Four Canadian teenagers apparently bound for Hollywood were arrested in Centralia in a stolen car after escaping a British Columbia reformatory school, according to the Thursday, Jan. 10, 1946, edition of The Chronicle.
And in the Saturday, Jan. 10, 1976, edition of The Chronicle, it was reported The Rock Country Express, a four-person band made up of Lewis County residents, was chosen to perform for Canadian soldiers and residents of Massel, located in the Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia
A Look Back in Time is compiled using Chronicle archives stored at the Lewis County Historical Museum — located at 599 NW Front St. in Chehalis — along with digital archives on newspapers.com.
Friday, Jan. 10, 1936
• Grand opera singer Virginia LeRae was set to give a performance that night at the United Methodist Church in Chehalis, The Chronicle reported. “The concert is being sponsored by the ladies of the church. Miss LeRae appeared in opera in the east during the past winter and also made a tour of the larger Canadian cities. She was the soloist with the Portland Symphony Orchestra a year ago. She will go to New York the first of February, where she will sail for South America to give concerts for the next four months. Her parents live near Centralia.”
• Centralia College students were preparing to put on a live stage performance of the mystery comedy play “Out of the Night,” The Chronicle reported. “The mystery comedy being presented tonight by the Centralia Junior College in the high school auditorium, has enough thrills packed into it to stock half a dozen haunted houses. The play was presented before grade school students at a matinee yesterday afternoon. This afternoon it will be given before the high school. Tonight’s performance is for the public. The action of the mystery, which centers around the murder of a man in his mountain lodge, with a Hindu servant, a county constable and several others sharing the suspicions of the audience, is brought to a stirring and ingenious climax. The cast includes Russell Webster, Ione Towner, Kathleen McCutcheon, Vincent Voegele, Harry Arnst, Bill Brines, John Ghormley, Keith Roeber, Frank Watson and Betty McNeely.”
• Morton Mayor George Patterson and Toledo Mayor John Bickford were both sworn in as heads of their respective community governments, The Chronicle reported. “Newly elected Mayor Patterson of Morton took office Tuesday evening, and immediately made appointments for the ensuing year. He retained as clerk Leola Lampkin, and appointed as water superintendent Edmund B. Barnum (and) town marshall, Garland Ward.” Patterson also appointed Morton city councilors to various committees and duties including building inspector and police judge. He also raised Lampkin’s salary to $10 a month. In Toledo, “Bickford, a former member of the council, was duly installed as mayor; F.J. Mietzke and Wendell Lyon are the councilmen for a one-year term; Elmer Yates, Alexander C. Shives and Dr. Gaither H. Mathis for the two-year term of office … Willard J. Hilligoss was appointed marshall, water superintendent and town clerk. Mrs. Alberta M. Layton, re-elected as treasurer, was present to fill her position, which she has efficiently held for the past several years.”
• A 1928 Chrysler Coupe 52 was listed for sale in The Chronicle’s classifieds for $125.
Thursday, Jan. 10, 1946
• Four Canadian teenagers apparently bound for Hollywood were arrested in Centralia in a stolen car after escaping a reformatory school in British Columbia, The Chronicle reported. All four were escapees from the Port Coquitlam Reformatory. “Ordered out of the car by officers were Earl Casemore, Earl Cooper and Alex Elder, all 15, and Ronnie Zerelli, 13. After questioning, the youngsters were given into the custody of Floyd Green, Lewis County juvenile officer … (Centralia) Police Chief Milton Jastram said officers were warned by the state patrol the stolen car was headed south from Olympia, and they halted the machine at the Skookumchuck Bridge shortly after 10 p.m.” After escaping from the reformatory, the teens broke into the Canadian store and robbed it, then “somehow they managed to get across the international boundary to Blaine, where they stole a car and sped southward. Found in the machine was a quantity of cigarettes and other merchandise. The youngsters told Centralia officers they were on their way to Hollywood.”
• The names of four suspects in the “mysterious” death of Morton resident Einar “Moon” Mullins were released in a hearing as a result of an inquest made by Lewis County Coroner Dr. C. Grant Bain, The Chronicle reported. Mullins was a millworker in East Lewis County whose lifeless body was found on a Morton roadside on Christmas Eve with multiple head wounds including a skull fracture. “The only surprise of the hearing up to the early afternoon came when (the) prosecuting attorney disclosed the four persons held in the Lewis County Jail during the investigation of the death including Mrs. Mullins, widow of the deceased. Also held in connection with the investigation have been Waino Bay, and Mr. and Mrs. Adrian Goheen, all residing near Morton.” According to Jack Weefman, a witness in the case, Mullins was killed as a result of a quarrel between the Mullins and Goheen families. “Weefman also implicated Bay, who lived at the Mullins’ home. Weefman told the jury Mullins had related the trouble to him, asking that he accept their three-year-old child because of the quarreling. ‘Mullins told me if the situation continued, there was going to be a death,’ Weefman declared. He also testified that on Christmas Eve, between 6 and 6:30 p.m., he had talked to Mullins on a street corner in Morton. Mullins, he said, had been drinking, but was not drunk. The witness explained Mullins disclosed to him he had just had a fight with Goheen and Bay, and exhibited facial bruises.”
• A partly furnished seven-room home in downtown Centralia was listed for sale in The Chronicle’s classifieds for $3,600.
Tuesday, Jan. 10, 1956
• Centralia High School alumni Grant Plummer, also a head mailer in The Chronicle’s circulation department, had received an appointment from U.S. Rep. Russell Mack and been selected to attend the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, The Chronicle reported. “News of the appointment came as almost a complete surprise to the 18-year-old Centralian, a 1955 graduate of the Centralia High School and currently enrolled in a pre-engineering course at Centralia Junior College. ‘I applied for the appointment a year ago in November, and I had almost forgotten about it,’ Plummer said Monday while at work in The Daily Chronicle circulation department.” Grant’s parents, Arthur and Marjorie Plummer, along with his siblings, were excited to learn of Grant’s appointment to Annapolis. “The youth, a native of Centralia, isn’t quite in the Navy yet. He still must pass highly competitive examinations and a rigid physical test, but if all goes well he could possibly be called to Annapolis for the start of the summer term in July.”
• Lewis County commissioners were discussing construction of a new county road between upper Winston Creek and the Swofford Valley area near Mossyrock, The Chronicle reported. “Engineer Charles Neville was directed to survey a former logging road which lies east of Mayfield for the purpose of seeing if it can be utilized by the county. Commissioners said that if the proposed route is feasible, it will mean building a three-mile-long road, and such a road would be the first through the central Lewis County area. The tentative road width is 60 feet.”
• A two-bedroom home on 30 acres of land with an attached garage, barn and other outbuildings “one mile north of Rochester” was listed for sale in The Chronicle’s classifieds for $3,750. Two- and three-bedroom apartments at the Centralia Apartment Hotel were listed for rent for starting at $20 a month.
Monday, Jan. 10, 1966
• Construction work was underway at the Chehalis-Centralia Airport to build a lunch counter in the main hangar and modernize and expand the office lounge, according to Airport Manager Jack Hocker, The Chronicle reported. “He said the work is expected to be completed in about two weeks and will provide food service and a seating area for airport visitors … The airport manager also announced the installment of a windometer. It will accurately gauge the speed and direction of the win and is for use in advising pilots.”
• A total of seven Lewis and Pacific counties’ students were on the fall honor roll at Central Washington State College at Ellensburg, The Chronicle reported. “Among the honor students are Harry Fletcher, Adna; Janice Bangs and David Lentz, South Bend; Susan Schafer, Toledo; Susan Harms, Chehalis; Sara Schriver, Raymond, and Erin Caldwell, Winlock. Caldwell had an all-A average.”
• Washington Gov. Daniel Evans was set to be the Lincoln Day dinner speaker for the Grays Harbor Republican Central Committee according to committee Chair J.L. McClintock, The Chronicle reported. “The dinner will be served at the Aberdeen Elks Club at 6:30 p.m. The governor will spend most of the day on the harbor, speaking at Grays Harbor College and at a joint service club luncheon at the Morek Hotel, touring the port dock and industrial plant, visiting a nursing home and touring downtown Aberdeen.”
• An “older” four-bedroom home with a full basement next to a school in Centralia was listed for sale in The Chronicle’s classifieds for $8,500. A furnished two-bedroom apartment in downtown Chehalis was listed for rent for $50 a month.
Saturday, Jan. 10, 1976
• The Rock Country Express, a four-person band made up of Lewis County residents, was chosen to perform for Canadian soldiers and residents of Massel, located in the Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia, The Chronicle reported. “The group played six nights in Massel on a tour that started Dec. 21. During the engagement, the musicians played for pre-teens, teenagers, servicemen and their families and a Canadian veterans’ organization. ‘We had a ball,’ said Freddie D. Hornquist, Chehalis, leader of the group. ‘They were ready for a live band. Every year they all chip in and get a band to entertain them for a week before Christmas. It is the biggest social event of the year.’ … Massel has a three-story hotel, post office, gas station, bowling alley, a few stores and a bank.” Along with Hornquist, The Rock Country Express was made up of Jimmie Fadness, Butch Gerrits and Dave Rodriguez.
• Steilacoom resident Michele Zimmerman was recovering in a Chehalis hospital after being trapped for more than half an hour in the wreckage of her car when she hit an Interstate 5 overpass abutment at the White Pass Highway exit, The Chronicle reported. “The woman was extracted from the vehicle by Centralia firemen using an extracting device and transported to St. Helen Hospital by ambulance. She was listed in stable condition at the hospital late Saturday morning, suffering from possible broken ribs and a broken pelvis, according to the state patrol … The mishap occurred at about 7:30. The woman lost control of the vehicle while she was southbound on the freeway. Two Centralia firemen responded with an aid unit. They said the impact of the collision rolled the floorboard over the woman’s feet, pinning her.”
• A partly remodeled three-bedroom home with a large barn, outbuildings and an artist studio on 20 acres of land in Silver Creek was listed for sale in The Chronicle’s classifieds for $40,900. A four-bedroom unfurnished home in Centralia was listed for rent for $180 a month.
