INSIDE TODAY Community Photos
50 years ago
Virgil Pinkley, former publisher of this newspaper who resigned last month, is one of seven men named Wednesday by Gov. Ronald Reagan who would become acting governor in the event he and his constitutional successors were killed in an atomic attack.
In order of precedence, the seven are:
Carlyle Reed, publisher of the Sacramento Union, who succeeds George Killion, San Francisco.
Ralph Gwin Follis, San Francisco, head of Western operations for Standard Oil Co. of California, who succeeds Carl Greenberg, Los Angeles.
Y. Frank Freeman, Beverly Hills, head of Paramount Studios, who succeeds Harry M. Dougherty, Riverside.
Victor R. Lundy, San Diego, who succeeds Clinton D. McKinnon, San Diego.
Pinkley, of Palm Desert, who succeeds Joseph A. Ball, Long Beach.
Earl S. Smittcamp, Clovis, who succeeds James B. Smith, San Luis Obispo.
Alfred W. Bramwell, Chico, publisher of the Chico Enterprise, who succeeds Paul C. Bodenhamer, Reddding.
40 years ago
In what Councilman Henry Alarcon termed “the hardest decision I have had to make in eighth years of serving,” the El Centro City Council Wednesday night upheld a Planning Commission denial of a conditional use permit to the Valley Christian Heritage School.
Mayor Iris DeZarn, Rollie Wisbrock and Alarcon, the only council members present, voted unanimously to uphold a June 7 decision to shut down the school in its present location. The school, which had operated since last September without a conditional use permit, uses the facilities at the Baptist Tabernacle Church.
The school was asking for a permit for one year, until land could be bought for a new facility.
The commission earlier denied the request for the permit after residents cited noise problems, crowded conditions, property destruction and an increase in street traffic at the school.
30 years ago
The bombs that rocked Tripoli, Libya, last year, landed with a thud outside of Searchlight, Nev., Thursday morning, as the pilot of a crippled U.S. Navy bomber let them go to save his plane.
The bomber from the El Centro Naval Air Station was forced to unload its seven bombs, which did not explode, in the open desert after one of its engines was shutdown.
The A-6E jet bomber went on to land safely at Nellis Air Force Base an hour after it dropped the bombs north of Needles near the California-Nevada state line. There were no reports of injuries in the accident.
The bomber is one of 10 from Whidbey Island Naval Air Station, in Washington, that are finishing up two weeks of training at the El Centro NAF. Every two months eight to 10 planes from Whidbey Island come to El Centro for two weeks of training.
20 years ago
Business development planned for the Calexico East Port of Entry area is on the agenda for Tuesday’s county Board of Supervisors meeting, and it should be coming up regularly as its approval process moves ahead.
The major questions being answered now are what the four major land-owner groups should pay for as they work with the county Planning Department to turn 1,700 acres of desert and farm fields into the “Gateway of the Americas” commercial/ industrial center.
At Tuesday’s meeting at 9 a.m. in the County Administration Center at 940 W. Main St., in El Centro, county Planning Director Jurg Heuberger is expected to discuss with the supervisors how to coordinate plans for the building of roads, water and sewer plants and the location of a county fire/Sheriff’s Office substation.