The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

Ten Years Ago

September 8, 2011

The new face behind the counter at the Weller Public Library is likely one you have seen before. Rosie Warehime, the new library manager, has lived in Waitsburg for 44 years. Her husband Walt found his first teaching job in Waitsburg. “We planned to stay 2 years and we never left,” she said. Warehime hadn’t ever worked at a library before, but she had been employed at the Cenex station and at local grain growers, making her a recognizable face in the community and the perfect person to lead the library, said Jim Leid, the chairman of the library board.

Twenty-Five Years Ago

September 12, 1996

Dorothy Mays’ roots run six generations deep in Columbia County’s soil. For 68 years, this benevolent octogenarian has maintained her home in Columbia County. For over half a century she as lived on the Starr homestead three miles east of Waitsburg on Highway 12. Honoring her rich historical background, the Waitsburg Historical Society has named her “Pioneer of the Year.” The award took Mays by surprise. “I said to Bettie Chase, (vice president and historian of the Historical Society), ‘Why me?’” Mays, 86, recalled. “We’re very common people, we’ve never put on the dog.”

Fifty Years Ago

September 9, 1971

Wait-Hi poets had several works published in international anthologies during the past school year, Sandy Jetton, English instructor announced this week. Jeff Peterson had one poem published and Sharon Sprankel two in “Young America Sings,” an anthology of high school poetry. Debbie Lingle and Jill Zuger each had poems published in the spring edition of this same work. Circulation for this magazine is national as is the competition, and it is considered quite an honor to have work printed there.

[Photo Caption] Orin Walker, retired Walla Walla County Commissioner was Parade Marshal at the SEW Frontier Days Parade last Saturday morning, September 4. Orin, a native of the valley, farms land on the Coppei south of Waitsburg. Several Waitsburg residents took part in the parade and in the activities of the Labor Day Weekend Fair.

Seventy-Five Years Ago

September 13, 1946

Howard Carson showed the champion shorthorn bull calf in the open class at the Southeastern Washington Fair and won first prize.

Vegetables, flowers, grains and other produce as well as hobbies and industrial displays will be shown at the annual Fair and Pet parade sponsored by the P.T.A. on Friday and Saturday.

Miss Betty Stovall of Prescott and Edward Mason of Dixie were united in marriage at the home of the brides’ parents Monday evening.

The new minister of the First Methodist Episcopal Church is Rev. Aubrey M. Winsor. Rev. Winsor comes here from the pastorate in Sunnyside.

One Hundred Years Ago

September 9, 1921

The Preston-Shaffer Milling Co. under the personal direction of Mr. W. B. Shaffer has just about completed the new dam across the Touchet River at the intake of their mill race.

The Sunday chicken dinners at the Bradley Inn are served family style and are 50 cents. A good investment. Try them. Sanitary baths, 25 cents. Women’s baths a specialty; see Mrs Bradley. Hot water all the time.

One Hundred Twenty-Five Years Ago

September 11, 1896

Charley Thompson caught 12 of the finest trout we have seen this year, one day this week.

The Huntsville public school commences Monday with Prof. J. N. Taggard and wife as teachers.

A $3,000 cut in teachers’ salaries has been made at North Yakima, and the term of school reduced to six months.

The electric light power house has been completed and the plant is being rapidly placed in position. Soon Waitsburg will be lighted by electricity and at a very reasonable rate.