100 YEARS AGO — 1917

As the sale of Liberty Bonds will close Thursday night, the patriotic people are bending every energy to induce the people to buy the bonds and help the United States finance for the war with Germany. Homer Wray, of the Danville telephone office said the big local fire bell rang last night four times, to signal the public there are only four days left to purchase the bonds. Tonight it will ring three taps. Listen for the bell. As it sounds, bells are also ringing in every town in America.

Aunt Jane Sallee, a colored woman, is celebrating her 101 birthday at her home on Russell Street. Aunt Jane came to Danville just after the war and has since made her home here. She is well known in town and highly respected by all.

Mrs. J.B. Willis of Crab Orchard Springs, was in Danville this week and said that indications were good for a large attendance at the resort this summer. Many people from other states have engaged rooms for July and August. The band will arrive on July 1. Mrs. Willis said she considers herself quite fortunate in having raised a fine garden as this will be of inestimable help in keeping up the table. She will manage the resort herself and hopes her friends will make Crab Orchard Springs their home this summer.

75 YEARS AGO — 1942

P.C. Mannini, of Danville, filed suit in Franklin Circuit Court Monday seeking a mandatory injunction against the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board. It has developed that an antiquated statute is still in existence which prohibits the sale of malt beverages in the same building in which a pool room is operated.

Miss Ada Edminston entertained friends with a hobo party in the lumber yard of Edminston Brothers. The setting for the party was a railroad car on a switch and prizes of Defense Stamps were awarded to Norris Armstrong Jr. and Gene Allen for being the most pitiful looking hoboes.

Effective immediately several physical requirements have been lowered for those who enter the U.S. Naval Reserves. Minimum height requirements are five feet two inches and maximum height is six feet four inches. Men with sufficient natural teeth or suitable prosthetic replacements for biting and eating will be accepted.

Shortly after President Roosevelt’s address asking that all scrap rubber be salvaged, the local citizens in charge of collecting scrap materials set to work to organize a scrap rubber collection campaign. Mayor Henry Nichols and County Judge M.J. Farris Jr. are calling upon Danville and Boyle County to participate in this drive. Persons collecting scrap metal are asked to take the scrap rubber to any filling station as all filling stations have been designated  as official collection agencies for rubber. In a combined statement, Nichols and Farris said, “We urge all residents to search their premises from cellars to attics and outbuildings and grounds and gather this scrap rubber for sale to appointed agencies…Let’s remember our part in the winning of this war and do our best to make this as big a collection of scrap rubber as possible.”

50 YEARS AGO — 1967

The state Health Department has started two investigations on whether food or water poisoning felled an American Legion baseball team from Corbin in Perryville. Suspect at the moment is a jug of water obtained at Perryville from which 10 or 11 high schoolers drank and then suffered stomach cramps a day later. The result has been an order that all drinking water in Perryville, a town of 450 near Danville, must be boiled.

R.C. Feather, owner and operator of a grocery store in Parksville where he lives, has been appointed by Gov. Edward Breathitt to fill the vacancy in Magisterial District No. 2 of Boyle County created by the recent death of of Magistrate Ralph Pierce. Mr. Feather, who served as magistrate from District 2 at an earlier period, did not seek the post again at the expiration of his term.

A court of honor for Boy Scout Troop 326 was held at the National Guard Armory. Gary Craig, son of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Craig, was promoted to Eagle Scout, the first one in this troop. Other advancements included: Tenderfoot to David Sparrow, Mark Birdseye, Charles Carroll, Mitch Clark, Wally Marshall and Junior Clarkson; second class to Steve Campbell and Tommy Byerly; star to Bruce Feather; and life to  Gary Huffman and Roy Bohon.

25 YEARS AGO — 1992

The Kentucky Pioneers play a brand of baseball from the mid 1800s, that looks only a little bit like the game of baseball today. It has attracted the interest of quite a few history buffs and baseball fans. Mike Wilder, of Perryville, became so interested that he went out for the team. Now he is spending his spare time practicing a game played with longer, thinner bats and baseballs so soft the fielders don’t need gloves to catch them. Wilder said baseball that was played at the time of the Civil War didn’t have any walks, stolen bases or sacrifice bunts. Also runners had to stay on their bases until the ball was hit, and so did the first, second and third basemen. Throwers (pitchers) threw to strikers (batters) by starting from a cross-legged stance and using an underhanded delivery.

George Foreman and Vincent DiMartino, who came up with the idea of the Great American Brass Band Festival in 1989, got this year’s celebration under way with a sold out lecture and recital at the Chautauqua Tea at The Tea Leaf restaurant.

The Kentucky Encyclopedia has sold like big blue, 5-pound hot cakes, and those selling the 1,080-page book are getting a taste of what Custer and the boys must have felt like when they were under siege 116 years ago. “We had 1,000 copies on the first day of sale and thought that would last us at least a couple of weeks. We sold those in one hour,” said a manager at Joseph-Beth Booksellers. Two local entries include Private First Class William Bernard Baugh of McKinney who won the Congressional Medal of Honor for bravely fighting in the Korean War in 1950. Another Medal of Honor went posthumously to Private George D. Scott of Lancaster, for fighting in vain against Native Americans during the Battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876.