MID-SOUTH MEMORIES
25 years ago — 1995
When Rush Limbaugh speaks, his loyal listeners jump. The conservative radio talk show host, saying the media has distorted Republican proposals to transfer the federal school lunch program to the states, urged listeners Friday to call news outlets, say “Stop lying about the school lunch program” and then hang up. Thousands followed his instructions, many of them to the letter. Within minutes of the call to action on Limbaugh’s syndicated radio show, switchboards started lighting up at newspapers, TV stations and network offices nationwide. During his show, Limbaugh expressed disgust with how the “insidethe-beltway news system” has mischaracterized Republican plans to end the federal school lunch program and fund school lunches instead through block grants to the states. Limbaugh said it was time for people to voice their discontent with the media.
50 years ago — 1970
HERNANDO, Miss. – The Desoto County boards of education and supervisors have reached an “informal agreement” to push plans for stepped-up construction at a junior-senior high school at Southaven. County school officials had decided earlier this year to delay building a physical education and a vocational technical education building at the school going up on Rasco Road when interest rates prompted delays in selling portions of the $1.9 million school bond issue voters approved last August. 75 years ago — 1945
An estimated 10,000 acres of Dyer County farmland along the Mississippi River, 75 miles north of Memphis, was under water last night as the result of an unexpected 300-foot break in a county-owned levee at 9 o’clock yesterday morning and indications were that the spreading brown flood would cover from 30,000 to 40,000 acres by nightfall tomorrow.
100 years ago — 1920
President Wilson called the U.S. to war to save a civilization that had existed for thousands of years. We went into the war with a high ideal – that other peoples should be as free as we are. Under Wilson we saved the world from slavery. Wilson’s dream of a league of nations was acclaimed while the fighting raged, but after the victory the diplomats became “practical,” each out for what he could get. Now our own Senate is hostile, mostly piqued because the president is a poor politician – tactless and taciturn. Even the people have become indifferent. Where are the ideals our boys died for? Shattered and forgotten. In Congress there are not enough brains to build a constructive program.
125 years ago — 1895
Paul Alexander Johnstone, the world famous mindreader, amazed and bewildered thousands of Memphians yesterday with his most electrifying trick. He demonstrated his skill at mindreading as a crowd of thousands watched.