Compiled by Don Hoiness from archived copies of The Bulletin at the Des Chutes Historical Museum.

100 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

May 3, 1914

Son is in Marine Corps

George Lowell, who lives 7 miles out on the Bend-Burns road is especially interested in the recent developments in the Mexican trouble by reason of the fact that one of his sons is in the United States Marine Corps now stationed on an American war vessel in Mexican waters. This son, Byrd Lowell, went up to Walla Walla for the harvest last fall and while there enlisted.

According to Mr. Lowell the family has been represented on the American side in every war the United States has been engaged in. He himself was in the Civil War and another son was in the hospital corps in the Philippines during the war with Spain.

Ice Plant Progresses

Good progress has been made on the new refrigerating plant in the past week. Already the frame work is up and the ice making machinery is on the road. At present indications the plant will be in operation on April 25, the date set in the contracts.

The building in its final dimensions is 40×65 feet, a room 24×46 having been provided for the creamery in case it accepts the power company’s offer for the room rent free. There will be in addition space for cold storage and ice storage as well as that occupied by machinery.

The work is employing 12 men and with the other construction now going on means a substantial addition to the ordinary pay roll disbursements in the town.

75 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

May 3, 1939

Nazis elated over Hitler’s speech today

Nazis hailed the “utter defeat” of President Roosevelt by Adolph Hitler today as Hitler himself studied world reaction to his Reichstag speech and prepared, another important address, this one for a gigantic May Day demonstration of workers Monday.

Whatever the world view was of Hitler’s speech it was evident that inspired Nazi opinion was that he had completely demolished President Roosevelt’s peace appeal.

The speech was called “the political execution of Roosevelt.” The president was invited to resign because of his “conviction of such a maze of historic untruths, political errors and palpable absurdities.”

Diplomatic quarters watched the Polish situation. In Hitler’s statements revealing his demands for Danzig and for a strategic right of way across the Polish corridor, in his comparing Poland to Czechoslovakia, they saw the outstanding problems in German relations.

The view was taken that Hitler had implied a non-military solution of his demands against Poland. But diplomatic informants expressed belief that Hitler was obviously angry because Poland had rejected his demands.

Comment of the Voelkischer Beobachter, the official Nazi party newspaper, and hence authoritative in its comment, said of the Hitler speech:

“One thing is clear: Roosevelt’s role as Europe’s guardian angel is over.” The fuehrer’s speech was not only documentary proof of his dialectic mastership but was also an historic expression of the sovereignty of the German spirit as compared with the bumptiousness of those who think themselves overlords of the world.”

Operetta to be given tonight

“The Pirates of Penzance,” a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, will be presented by Bend High School students at 8 o’clock tonight under the direction of Homer Waltz. The high school orchestra, the only orchestra to receive a “superior” rating in the recent music contest in Salem, will provide the accompaniment, with Helen Hansen as pianist.

Leading roles in the operetta are taken by Mary Ellen Banks, Shirley Meland, Marcille Tillman, Mary Ellen Runge, Edna Fisher, Ken Sawyer, Dick Miller, Paul Danielson, Don Pederson and Jim Whisenand. Two girls chorus of about twenty members, a pirates chorus of 20 and a policeman’s chorus of eight have parts in the operetta.

Several faculty members are assisting in the direction of the performance. Miss Moe is helping with stage direction, Miss Sandine with dances, Miss Hessler with costumes and Miss Kaser with ticket selling and publicity.

50 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

May 3, 1964

Phil Brogan draws Grand Marshal role

“East of the Cascades” is to be the theme of the 1964 Crooked River Roundup, and the author of that book, Phil F, Brogan, Bend newspaperman, science writer and geologist, is to be the grand marshal of the annual parade.

Gary Romine, parade chairman, said early plans aimed at making the roundup parade the biggest and liveliest in the history of the Prineville western show are in the making.

The theme selected for the parade, “East of the Cascades,” is also the name of Brogan’s book which has been the best seller in Oregon for more than three months and is now in its second edition with a third edition apparently in the near future.

Romine said the theme selected for the parade is expected to give the cue to many merchants and organizations for their floats and other entries. Questionnaires have been mailed to businesses, fraternal and other organizations in the parade.

A ride through the streets of Prineville will be nothing new for Brogan. He was raised on a Crook County ranch in the Ashwood community, now in Jefferson County.

Girls better ‘Keg’ record

The second round of the first beer keg derby ended Sunday when a group of Portland State College coeds plopped their metal keg into the surf at Seaside after rolling it from Portland.

The girls made the trip in 19 hours flat, 45 minutes better than the time made by PSC boys two weeks ago.

The girls, Nora Vissner, Jan Smith, Judy Bross, Linda Blohm and Chris Mitchell, took turns pushing the keg, one mile each, while the others rode along in a car.

Seaside residents treated the girls to a breakfast when they arrived.

25 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

May 3, 1989

Teens become family at boarding school (Continued from last week)

Sue-Dean Langlois considers herself lucky to have landed her first teaching at Crane last September.

“It’s a real well funded school,” she says, as her students peer at slides of protozoa under new microscopes. “I have everything I need.”

Langlois likewise has no complaints about class sizes which range from six to 20 students, or her commute to work. The triplex she lives in, located just across the street from the classroom, is part of the low-cost housing made available to district teachers.

She concedes that the isolation takes some adjustment on the part of newcomers, and she has made the transition to buying her clothes out of a catalog. Grocery shopping, on the other hand still means a trip to Burns. She notes that there is a small convenience store in Crane, adjoining the tavern, but it carries only such essentials as baked beans, toilet paper, milk and beer. About the only other building left over from more populous times is the post office.

Named for the sandhill cranes native to eastern Oregon, Crane once was a thriving community with a theater, several banks four hotels, three pool halls, four restaurants, numerous feed lots, a livery stable, a lumber yard, a store and a weekly newspaper.

The first school was built in nearby Lawen in 1918 and moved to Crane in 1920, at a time when the community of 3,000 marked the end of the line for the railroad.

In the late 1920s, however, the tracks were punched through to Burns. Old-timers say the town just slowly burned down over the years, and no one wanted to rebuild it.

That wasn’t true of the school, whose original buildings were destroyed by fire in 1967 and replaced a year later with new metal structures. That was just two years before Ed Goff came to Crane, choosing it over job offers at Salem, Eugene, Bend and Portland.

Goff, who teaches wood shop and drafting, admits there were times that he wished he had taken the job in Bend. Now, looking at the Bend-LaPine district’s financial woes after a year in the safety net, he’s glad he didn’t.

Like (Crane principal-cum-Superintendent Henry “Bill”) Thew, Goff was planning to stay only a year or two. Instead, he got hooked on having the best high school wood shop in Oregon, thanks to a district generous with its money.

Teaching at Crane also is easy, he says. There are no discipline problems, no dope. Asked to describe the typical student, Goff uses one word “polite.”

“If I ever left here, I wouldn’t teach anymore,” says Goff. “I’m spoiled here. I think you could look far and wide and not find a better place to teach.”