100 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

April 13, 1913

Sewer strike gets nothing

Last Friday, a number of workmen on the municipal sewer job “struck.” After walking out, they came to Engineer Koon and demanded an increase in their pay from 25 to 30 cents an hour. Mr. Koon told them there was nothing doing.

Saturday, the strikers presented to the mayor a petition demanding the wage increase, better protection from danger and a guarantee of steady employment. At a meeting of the council Monday, the petition was read and laid on the table. In commenting upon it, the council made it clear that they saw no reason why the city should be obliged to pay higher wages than anyone else. It was stated that 25 cents is about the maximum throughout the Northwest, much of the labor nearby being on a 22 ½ cent basis. The raise demanded would involve the expenditure of some $5,000 extra on the sewer job. As regards the other complaints, full satisfaction with Engineer Koon’s administration of the work was expressed by the council. In effect, the council said, “Koon is being paid to run this job, we stand behind him while he runs it.”

In connection with the eight-hour state law on public works, it was decided to pay sewer workers 25 cents an hour for an eight-hour day and time and a half, or 37 ½ cents for the ninth hour.

Lumber mills are busy

With 69 men on the payroll, and its mill working with a full crew and to full capacity, The Bend Company finds itself facing lumber orders from the East that promise to keep it “snowed under” almost indefinitely. The same is true of the Miller Lumber Company, which is employing about 35 men and is shipping about five carloads a week.

Give up what?

In the Portland Oregonian last Wednesday, we read of a young man of Chicago who, having set his clothes afire while smoking a cigarette in bed jumped into a tub of water to extinguish the flames and was drowned. In his rush to the tub he hit against a gas cock, turned on the gas which lighted, flared up and set the house on fire.

After reading this we began to wonder, and are still wondering, whether we ought (1) to give up smoking, (2) to give up smoking in bed, (3) to keep away from the bathtub, (4) to light the house with electricity or (5) to stop reading dispatches from Chicago.

75 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

April 13, 1938

Jackie Coogan, grown up, suing for millions earned as ‘The Kid’

Jackie Coogan, the kid who grew up, only to be forced to win his bride on $6.25 per week, sued his mother and stepfather today for the millions he earned but contended he never saw.

Jackie, once advertised as the cutest child ever to smile through tears for benefit of film fans, now is 22 years old, shiny-haired, nearly six feet tall, the husband of beauteous Betty Grable — and broke.

He told Superior Court Judge Emmet H. Wilson that his mother and his stepfather, Arthur L. Bernstein had withheld the $4 million he had earned as one of the highest salaried child actors and that now he figured they should give him his bank book.

Judge Wilson ordered a receiver for Jackie’s assets, including his film producing company which he accused his stepfather of turning into a beer establishment. The judge set April 20 as the date for hearing on Coogan’s plea for an accounting of his fortune.

Jackie’s mother and stepfather indicated through their attorney they would have a reply ready by then.

Jackie informed the judge that his late father, Jack Coogan Sr., set his allowance at $6.25 a week while he was in his teens. Then the elder Coogan died in an automobile crash three years ago, and Jackie’s mother married Bernstein, who had been the Coogan business manager.

Young Coogan said his $6.25 allowance continued until he was 21 years old, when even that stopped. This left him on the spot because he was courting Miss Grable.

Jackie didn’t even have dimes to take his girl to the movies, so he asked his mother for his money. He quoted her as saying, “You haven’t got a cent. There never has been one cent belonging to you. It’s all mine and Arthur’s.”

The “Kid,” who achieved his greatest fame in Charlie Chaplin’s picture of that name 18 years ago, said then he went to the offices of Jackie Coogan Productions, Inc., to look at the books, but was ordered out.

Before retreating from his business headquarters, he said that he discovered that his stepfather apparently had converted the premises from a film producing center to a wholesale beer plant.

He accused Bernstein of losing money on the ponies in $100 chunks, and charging his loses to Jackie’s $4 million. Furthermore, he said Bernstein still wore a $2,000 platinum wrist watch which an admirer had sent to Jackie.

Bernstein, Coogan said, before his father’s death, was the family’s “trusted associate, agent and employee.”

Jackie said when he was a boy his father explained he was to have only $6.25 a week spending money so he would “grow up like other boys.” This was fine, Jackie said, but it wasn’t so good when Bernstein continued the same allowance upon his father’s death.

When Jackie found himself without funds, he organized a jazz band. This was no success.

Then Jackie got work in the movies and last November he married Miss Grable.

50 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

April 13, 1963

Lava Bears win Hayward Class A title in upset

Hoot Moore, the track coach for the Bend Lava Bears, brought a team to Eugene four years ago for the Hayward Relays and did not score a point. Saturday, Moore brought back the champions.

The new champs, trailing by 20 points, had to win the two final events, the mile relay and the shuttle hurdles to take away the title.

The last event, the mile relay, was run on a sloppy track, but the Bruins turned in a record smashing time of 3:32.5 with the team of Duane Radke, Herb Hickman, Mike Westfall and Craig Usher.

The Bruins also won another first place in the two mile relay when the team of Mike Donley, Randy Slate, Mark Miller and Herb Hickman toured the track in 8:19.2. The shuttle hurdles were won by Bob Nosler, Jim Tye and Bill Hutton in 37.2.

The victory, Bend’s first in the history of the school, brought defending champions Cottage Grove to its knees after a seven year monopoly at Hayward. The Bruins finished second for the past two years.

Bend coach Hoot Moore felt it was a real honor to win the championship.

25 YEARS AGO

For the week ending

April 13, 1988

Healy has given his all to Mount Bachelor

While the Mount Bachelor ski area muscled its way to the forefront of Northwest ski areas, a nerve disease slowly sapped the strength of the man most responsible for the success of the Central Oregon resort.

Bill Healy, who stepped down as President and General Manager of Mount Bachelor Inc. must take satisfaction that he has given his all to the ski area and a small group of investors founded 30 years ago.

Today he is 63 years old and suffering from a neuromuscular disease that makes it nearly impossible to walk and talk. Mount Bachelor, meanwhile matured into one of the best-known ski areas in the West and a powerful force in the Central Oregon economy.

Healy, however, insists that neither he or his work at Mount Bachelor is finished. In response to a question about retirement he said, “Let me explain one thing right now, I plan to be as active as I have been.”

Healy’s “vision” and determination to lead and not follow are common themes raised when friends and co-workers describe his contribution to Mount Bachelor and the rest of Central Oregon. He is a man of deep vision and a man of persuading others to see things his way,” said Dean Pape, who has been a board member of Mount Bachelor Inc. for 16 years. “There isn’t a member of the board who doesn’t love and respect him.”

“He has the most marvelous enthusiasm for everything that he does and just a tremendous ability to work with people,” said U.S. District Judge Owen Panner, who served as Mount Bachelor’s lawyer for a number of years.

The neuromuscular disease has robbed him of his speech and his mobility, but Healy’s enthusiasm and love for his work have not been dampened. He still is determined to play a key role in guiding Mount Bachelor, and those who know him well are certain that he will.

“He will until the day he dies be 100 percent involved in the planning of the future of Mount Bachelor,” said Kathy Degree, Vice President of Marketing for the ski corporation.

Healy rarely speaks of his health, but he emphasized in a written statement that there is much more that he would like to accomplish at Mount Bachelor.

“Nobody seems to want to speculate on when I will die,” Healy said. “What appears to keep me alive is that I am far too busy and don’t have the time to die.

“There is still much to do.”