Other days
100 YEARS AGO Jan. 3, 1918
HOT SPRINGS — Explanation of the loss of thousands of dollars worth of fine shipments from the Missouri Pacific railroad and the Wells Fargo Express Company was made here today when Detective Dave Young returned from Texarkana, where he and Special Agent O. F. Suggs of Little Rock uncovered one of the most pretentious plants for stolen goods that has been found in this section in a long time. At the home of Mrs. T. L. Hill, Detective Young says he found what he had been looking for. He says that a secret closet in the home revealed a rich find of stolen goods, costly silks, in bolts and made up, five handsome dresses, 15 or 20 silk underskirts, three dozen pairs of men’s silk hose, together with dozens of fine silk kimonos, a quantity of liquors and some syrup.
50 YEARS AGO Jan. 3, 1968
MORRILTON — Attorneys for Conway County Sheriff Marlin Hawkins have filed a routine motion for dismissal of a taxpayers suit against the sheriff. Former Lieutenant Governor Nathan Gordon of Morrilton and former Assistant Attorney General Jack L. Lessenberry of Little Rock, Hawkins’ lawyers, also filed an alternate motion asking Special Chancellor Bobby Steel of Nashville, a circuit judge, to invoke the statute of limitations in the case. The suit, filed by 15 taxpayers in 1965, alleges that Hawkins converted “substantial sums” of Conway County funds to his own use.
25 YEARS AGO Jan. 3, 1993
DERMOTT — A handful of black residents in this southeastern Arkansas community in Chicot County have organized to try to overturn the public school’s long-held practice of not offering seniors a prom. Frustrated that neither Superintendent Alton Gaston nor the school board has pressed forcefully for a prom, about 10 residents recently asked the state Equity Assistance Center, a part of the state Education Department, to help them get a prom. There’s been no prom in this predominantly black community since the black and white schools were integrated in the late 1960s. Instead, the students have had separate events, privately financed, away from the school.
10 YEARS AGO Jan. 3, 2008
HELENA-WEST HELENA — Phillips County Road Department mechanic Clarence Townsel normally spends most mornings tuning up the county’s fleet of trucks, road graders and backhoes. On Wednesday, however, he spent his morning debating whether to visit the Phillips County unemployment office. Townsel and about 80 other Phillips County workers woke up temporarily jobless Tuesday because of the Quorum Court’s inability to pass a 2008 budget. County Judge Don Gentry locked the doors at all county facilities except the sheriff’s office and the jail. State law forbids him from allowing any spending without a budget in place.