10 years ago this week — 2014

WARRENTON — A rodeo of sorts took over an abandoned runway at the Astoria Regional Airport Saturday.

But it was school buses, not bulls, that lumbered their way up and down an abandoned airstrip. Drivers traversed serpentines, parallel parked and loaded a real-live first grader, among other simulations of their everyday job.

The School Bus Safety Rodeo, as it’s known, tested drivers from across northern Oregon to see who is the safest.

The event visited the North Coast for the first time, and the Astoria School District fielded a team of drivers for the first time in more than 15 years.

An American white pelican has been seen swimming near the Astoria Bridge this week.

Sharnelle Fee, executive director of the Wildlife Center of the North Coast, believes the juvenile may be a wayward pelican from a colony on Miller Sands, north of Svensen in the Columbia River.

Though the white pelicans are more commonly seen much farther east on the Columbia River, they have been observed nesting there for the past two to three years and may be establishing themselves as a new species on the North Coast, according to Fee.

Hundreds of Clatsop County’s high school students ended up in court Wednesday.

The Oregon Supreme Court, the highest level of state law, adjudicated two cases Wednesday at Astoria High School’s auditorium. Hundreds of area high school and Tongue Point Job Corps Center students listened to the arguments in cases involving the endangerment of minors and liability waivers.

“This is exactly the way it would be if you were to come to our courthouse … in Salem,” said Chief Justice Thomas Balmer. As part of an outreach effort, he said, justices have held hearings at high schools and colleges around the state for the last 10 to 15 years.

The Dragon Dancers set the tone for the opening day of the Astoria Sunday Market. Colorful, energetic, laughing and noisy.

At the Astoria Parks and Recreation booth, director Angela Cosby said the dragons came by and buzzed their stall earlier and were great.

She said the department plans to have a booth every Sunday to answer questions about the programs.

“It’s nice because, for nonprofits, there is no charge, as long as you are not selling anything,” she said. “It’s a great spot for us.”

“The Northwest Dragon and Lion Dancers had their best performance ever with 24 dancers arriving and really interacting with the crowd,” Cyndi Mudge, Astoria Sunday Market executive director, said. “Their presence is always a special way to kick off opening day.”

50 years ago — 1974

More than 400 persons of all ages shrugged the early morning blahs Sunday and jumped on their bikes to pedal 21 miles to raise funds for the Clatsop County Association Of Retarded Citizens.

Organizers estimate some $3,000 to $4,000 will be raised by the Bike-Hike when pledged donations are secured in the next two weeks.

That makes the Bike-Hike more successful than the March of Dimes Walkathon just a week earlier, which raised more than $1,000.

The 21-mile course included a number of hills and is listed in at least one Oregon bicycle trail book as one of the most rigorous in the state.

Nevertheless, one eager youngster pedaled his way through it in just a little more than one hour.

Some adults who weren’t in that good of shape made it in slightly more than 2 1/2 hours.

There was a news story the other day about the completion of restoration work on the USS Constitution, the “Old Ironsides” of War of 1812 fame.

This recalls to mind the visit made by the historic frigate to Astoria in May 1932, and the battle fought between its commanding officer and the staff of the Evening Astorian-Budget, as the newspaper was called in those days.

The story was not published in detail at the time, as the staff of the newspaper did not consider it seemly to mar the public enjoyment of the famous ship’s visit by spreading the story of a bitter row over the town.

The Constitution had been restored, the third such restoration since its construction, and the Navy conceived the scheme of sending the proud old ship on a tour of the whole U.S. coastline, visiting all major ports to give a maximum number of citizens the chance to see the vessel. The voyage was made in tow of the minesweeper Grebe.

The Astorian-Budget made plans for a special edition honoring the ship and the occasion, and on the day of Old Ironsides’ arrival, the special edition appeared as a 10-page supplement to that day’s regular edition. The supplement was filled with stories and pictures of the ship and its career, most of the material supplied by the U.S. Navy itself.

That special edition caused unexpected turmoil. The Astorian-Budget had set up a booth on Pier 2 near the berth assigned to the Constitution and newsboys manned it to offer the special edition to all comers at 5 cents a copy.

But, unbeknownst to the newspaper publisher and staff, the commanding officer of the Constitution was selling a small booklet at 25 cents a copy to visitors, which contained considerably less material than the Budget’s publication. Proceeds from the sale of the booklet were destined for a sailors’ relief fund.

When Cmdr. Louis J. Gulliver, the captain of the Constitution, saw the lads selling newspapers on the dock, he exploded in wrath.

He charged the newspaper with trying to commercialize a historic occasion, demanded that city and Port officials expel the newsboys from the pier, and forbid sale of the special edition. He demanded the arrest of the newsboys, and no sale of the paper within 3,000 feet of the Port.

It’s billed as the biggest this side of Portland, but biggest or not, the new lathe at Warrenton’s West Coast Propeller Service is definitely on the large side.

It stretches 28 feet from one end to the other.

Owner John Kalander said the machine enables his shop to handle even the biggest boat props.

In addition to re-pitching props and such, West Coast Propeller Service builds rudders and winches, welds pieces of marine or logging equipment and sells and services new props.

75 years ago — 1949

The 1948 flood in the lower Columbia River was far more deadly and costly than earlier larger floods in the area, the geological survey reported today.

Fifty-one persons perished and property damage totaled $100 million in the 1948 flood. The floods of 1894 and 1876 were of greater magnitude but were less costly because the territory had not been developed generally nor industry expanded.

Another of the cases of teenage vandalism and drinking parties that have been reported from various points throughout the state was reported today by the Astoria office of the Oregon State Police.

Sgt. Kenneth Healea said that a party of about five girls and 20 boys from Gresham and Portland had arrived in Cannon Beach Sunday, where the youths engaged in a drinking party and then went on a window-breaking spree about 2 a.m. Monday morning.

Logging has been a major factor in depletion of salmon spawning areas in Columbia River tributaries between the sea and the Klickitat River on the Washington shore, according to a special scientific report just issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Seattle.

The report is written by Floyd G. Bryant, an aquatic biologist, based on a stream survey made by him during the past several years.

Bryant is well known in Astoria, having spent the past several summers here engaged in the stream survey work and in fish-marking experiments.

Bryant said in the report that denudation of forest cover, building of splash dams, depositing of mill waste and other logging effects have damaged fish production potentialities of the streams in the area materially.

He said, however, that most of these streams supported good runs of fish in the past and can, with good management, be restored to important productivity.

A city patrolman in plainclothes walked into Wing Lee’s establishment on Astor Street Thursday night and came away with Wing and 10 customers of the place.

Lee, 74, was booked at the police station on a charge of operating a lottery house.

Lee was released on $50 bail. The others were released on bail of $10 apiece.

The men were caught in the act of playing Chinese lottery by R.K. Lewis, city police patrolman, who wore plainclothes to obtain admittance. Upon sighting the operations being carried on, Lewis summoned Police Sgt. C.N. Monsen, who was waiting nearby.

The Astorian-Budget advertising department, which for two years has tried futilely to educate the New York office of the Metro service in the anatomy of the Dungeness crab, is going to send an iced jumbo crab to the service’s artist to see it that will help.

The Metro service supplies newspapers throughout the nation with “mats” of pictures of all sorts of commodities for use in preparing advertisements.

The only crab pictures it has ever supplied depict the soft-shelled eastern crab.

The Astoria city administration is exploring the possibility of acquiring the $2 million naval hospital property as a last resort to prevent its sale for junking, city officials revealed Friday.

The city entered the naval hospital picture after the state board of control had declared itself legally powerless to acquire the 900-bed hospital plant for state purposes.