STORIES FROM THE PAST

50 years ago

Declarations filed yesterday predicted ruin for businesses operated at Salton Bay Marina in the event of failure of “don’t fence-us-in” suit of the owners. The suit will get its first court airing in Imperial County’s Superior Court on Thursday.

It is for an injunction restraining Salton Community Services District from maintaining a six-foot chain link fence all around the so-called “Middle Marina” operated by Walter F. and Annette Southard.

40 years ago

MEXICALI — Odette Gratianne, the San Diego State University student abducted by three men early Thursday, was back with her parents today.

Miss Gratianne, 21, was reported in “good health” and had been “well-treated” by her abductors.

Still unclear today, however, was why the young woman, daughter of a prominent Mexicali family, was kidnapped.

Miss Gratianne was released at 12:45 a.m. today near her parents’ home in the vicinity of CETYS University in Mexicali. She told her parents she was “treated well” but could not identify her abductors because they kept her eyes bandaged.

Thursday at 7:15 a.m., Miss Gratianne was forced into a car by three men on a Mexicali side street. The incident occurred shortly after an accident in which Miss Gratianne’s sports car was involved.

A witness told police Miss Gratianne, after the collision, pursued the other car, occupied by one man, and caught up with it. An argument between the two ensued. Then a third car pulled up and its two male occupants aided the third man in forcing Miss Gratianne into one of the cars.

30 years ago

In a move that may have implications for the Imperial Irrigation District’s attempts to sell conserved water to the Metropolitan Water District, the IID Board of Directors on Tuesday night approved the sale of 100 acre-feet of water to the IT Corp.

While the agreement is designed primarily to furnish water needed at IT’s Westmorland hazardous waste disposal site, it may also provide a test of the district’s contention that it has the right to sell conserved water, IID General Manager Charles Shreves said.