125 years ago
July 29, 1892
Next to the deep abiding interest which every man has in his individual possessions is the pride and satisfaction he feels in seeing his town prosper and its people happy. Too many men, selfish in the extreme, are envious of their neighbor’s prosperity, and hence we see many who patronize foreign establishments for everything they need rather than buy at home and help their own town.
Many articles that are bought elsewhere are no better or cheaper than those offered by home dealers. This shortsightedness does not permit them to see that their interests are identified with those with whom they are continually coming in contact in the everyday affairs of life.
Now it seems to us that a man in the community in which he lives can get anything good enough for himself without sending away to other places for it. Every resident should take sufficient interest in the town in which he lives to do his trading and thus keep the money in circulation in his own community.
100 years ago
June 29, 1917
The Montesano district in the big Red Cross drive which ended Monday rolled up a total subscription of $5,683, all but $128 of which has been collected. The uncollected subscriptions are good and will be paid soon. The district comprises the city of Montesano, the Wynooche valley, the Satsop valley and the south side of the Chehalis river from Satsop to Melbourne. This territory was allotted by the district committee the sum of $2,750 to be raised, and the sum has been over-subscribed 106 percent.
Few cities in the nation can show a better record than this compared to population and Montesano and its allied territory may well feel proud of its work in this patriotic and humanitarian cause.
75 years ago
July 30, 1942
Otto “Barney” Wolff, who is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Fred Wolff of Montesano, is mighty busy with commando raids, and nazis, and all such, right now, and on Vancouver island, of all places.
But it isn’t an invasion, actually, and you’ll see it all in the movies one of these days. Wolff is a special effects man with a film company and he is a key man in taking a motion picture called “The Commandos Come at Dawn,” which has to do with a British raid on a nazi airdrome.
Wolff blows things up. That doesn’t mean he makes big pictures out of little ones, but rather that he’s an expert on dynamite and other explosives and when they have a war going on in the movies they’re likely to call on Barney.
In this particular case, the war caused considerable trouble with the make believe commandos. Canada doesn’t permit more than a box of dynamite to be in a contractor’s possession at any one time, so when Wolff and his company arrived with a ton or more of explosives, the Canadian government conducted a two weeks’ investigation before they permitted the stuff and staff to cross the border.
That gave Wolff an opportunity to visit his parents here. He isn’t the only member of the Wolff family in the movies, for his younger brother, Fred, also is in the technical end of the business.
50 years ago
July 27, 1967
Suffering from blistered burn wounds which failed to respond to medical treatment, Capt. Paul C. Fournier was “one hour away from having both hands amputated” when his condition began to improve.
That was part of a candid, compelling report from the 32-year-old Army pilot’s father, Paul B. Fournier, presented at last Thursday’s luncheon meeting of the Montesano Chamber of Commerce in Ben Moore’s Broiler.
Elaborating, the speaker explained that the victim – “almost like a peeled onion” – had been able to “take” 95 per cent of the skin removed from the unburned portions of his own body and applied, after stretching, to the burned areas. The badly blistered hands were most painfully slow in showing improvement.
To complicate matters, the Monte attorney said, “Paul had pneumonia and another infection” during the lowest point of his worst days at Brooks Hospital, Ft. Sam Houston, Texas.
Fournier described the severe burns sustained by his son in a May 22 plane crash in Vietnam. In addition to the blistered hands and lips, second-degree burns extended from below his buttocks to the top of his neck and third-degree burns were experienced from his hands to above his elbows and from the knees down.
25 years ago
July 30, 1992
The price to ride in a Montesano ambulance will probably be going up soon and there may be more increases in store.
The city council asked City Attorney Dan Glenn Tuesday evening to come back in two weeks with a resolution which would increase the fees charged to people living inside and outside the city limits. The money is needed to balance the Ambulance Operations Fund.
The base price for people inside the city would go from $100 to $125, while the mileage fee for the first 50 miles would rise from $1.50 per mile to $5 per mile.
The base price for people outside the city would go from $300 to $325, while per mile charge for the first 50 miles would rise from $3.50 to $5.
The per mile charge over 50 miles for people both inside and outside the city limits would go from $3.50 to $8.
At the end of last year, the city was planning to use an increase in the household tax currently charged on the water bill to make up the deficit it anticipated in the Ambulance Operations fund. Councilman Richard Stone said projections are that the fund “will be $21,000 in the hole at the end of the fiscal year.” Discussion on making up the deficit led to the proposed increase in rates.
10 years ago
July 26, 2007
Nine years ago when Anchor Bank was casting about, so to speak, for a location in Montesano, then-president Jim Boora asked Jerry Shaw if he would talk with Chris Pickering at Pick-Rite Thriftway about a possible in-store location.
Shaw’s roots in the area were well known at Anchor. His mom used to be a bookkeeper at Pick-Rite, and Shaw grew up on a dairy farm in the Satsop valley.
Shaw, who has since succeeded Boora as the bank’s CEO and president, said he was proud to help put that deal together because it was always a pleasure dealing with the late Chris Pickering and his family.
“I had known Chris Pickering since I was a little kid,” Shaw said.
This week, it’s with even greater pleasure that Shaw is announcing Anchor Bank’s plans to build a $1.3 million, full-service branch at the site of the former Brumfield-Twidwell Ford dealership at Pioneer and Silvia streets—right across from the fire department.
Most attractive to Anchor, he says, is the fact that the corner lot is right across the street from Pick-Rite and the “symbiosis” that has been created between grocery shoppers and the bank’s customers can continue.
