Other days

100 YEARS AGO Nov. 12, 1918

PINE BLUFF — While Pine Bluff boisterously celebrated peace in the early hours today, Cecil Copeland, aged 21, a deserter from the army at Camp Pike, became stricken with remorse for his action and committed suicide by drinking tincture of lobelle, mixed with chloroform. His wife, Lessie, aged 17, to whom he had been married only a few months, swallowed the remainder of the bottle of poison, after leaving a note to her mother saying that she did not care to live without her husband. The couple took the poison, it is believed, at 7:30 this morning while Copeland’s father and mother, with whom the two lived, were downtown attending the celebration. Both died within two hours in spite of medical attention which was rendered as soon as the family returned home, a short time after the act occurred.

50 YEARS AGO Nov. 12, 1968

■ A live hand grenade and an apparently disarmed bazooka projectile were found by Little Rock residents in different parts of the city Monday, the police reported. H.P. Primm… told Lt. Eugene L. Crist Jr., he was jogging in War Memorial Park near the construction of the new city Zoo parking lot when he found the grenade under a bush. He said he searched the area to see if he could find other weapons, but he said he didn’t find any. Crist said he called some demolition experts from the Pine Bluff Arsenal who examined the weapon and found it armed. They took it back to Pine Bluff with them, he said. Richard K. Heiney…told the police about 11:40 a.m. that he was painting a house at 217 Colonial Cove when a new occupant moving into the residence discovered the bazooka projectile in the attic. The police disposed of the weapon in the Arkansas River. They said it apparently was not armed.

25 YEARS AGO Nov. 12, 1993

■ House Minority Whip Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., predicted Thursday that the North American Free Trade Agreement will pass the House on Wednesday with “three to five votes” to spare. Gingrich, who was in Little Rock for a fund-raising reception and dinner for the Arkansas Republican Party, said NAFTA could pick up as many as eight additional supporters “the morning of the vote.”… “The facts are NAFTA will be good for America, it will be good for Arkansas,” Gingrich said.

10 YEARS AGO Nov. 12, 2008

JONESBORO — A videotaped deposition of Andrew Golden, one of the two boys who killed four students and a teacher at a Jonesboro middle school in 1998, will be released only after a civil lawsuit has been tried, a judge has ruled. Circuit Court Judge David Burnett ordered lawyers not to disclose the site, date or time of Golden’s deposition for the lawsuit… Golden and Mitchell Johnson are named in a civil suit filed on behalf of the victims’ relatives to stop the two from profiting from the slayings. After being served, lawyers representing Golden filed a motion seeking to keep the deposition sealed from public view. After the hearing, (Jonesboro attorney Bobby) McDaniel told reporters he still thought information about where Golden lives and what he does should be public information.