Old Time Notes from The Beacon
130 Years Ago Feb. 7, 1891
• The steamer Emily will call at this port three times a month on her way from San Francisco to Coos Bay and also on returning. Passengers and freight will be $10 and $12, and to San Francisco, $6 and $8. As soon as a schedule for her arrival and departure can be arranged it will be advertised in this paper.
• We are informed that a bridge will soon span the Gualala River on the coast road between Mendocino and Sonoma counties. It will be a welcome improvement as it has long been needed.
• Born: — At Mendocino, February 1, to the wife of A. R. Calder, a daughter.
• While the schooner Electra was beating her way up the coast bound for Humboldt, she was run down by the steamer Jeanie on Friday of last week when ten miles north-west of Point Arena. The schooner was struck on the port bow, carrying away her bowsprit and jibboom, cathead and topgallant sail. She returned to San Francisco, reaching that harbor Monday. The steamer sustained no injury.
• Fort Bragg had a narrow escape from a disastrous fire Saturday evening, a room on the third floor of the Johnson House being discovered in flames. The fire was speedily extinguished by willing workers, but not before considerable damage was done. M. J. Byrnes went up Tuesday in the interest of the insurance companies and fixed the damages at about $1000.
105 Years Ago Feb. 5, 1916
• William Andrew Jackson passed away last Thursday, at 4:45 a.m., aged 65 years, 6 months and 21 days.
• The Navarro grammar school opened last Monday with an attendance of about 45. Miss Martha Woods of Westport still has charge.
• A son was born to the wife of M. F. Lewis, nee Mamie Mendosa, in this place on January 31st.
• A baby girl was born to the wife of P. Guisti, near Elk on January 28th.
• A son was born to the wife of Theodore Renck at Noyo on January 26th.
• A daughter was born to the wife of Charles Salvador in Fort Bragg on January 28th.
• The C. W. Railroad Company at Fort Bragg, sent in several carloads of snow with the regular passenger train last Friday and Saturday and for awhile the youngsters had a fine time, snowballing. Everybody was pelted, regardless, and everybody took it good-naturedly.
• One of the heaviest snow storms the valley section of the county has ever witnessed, according to the old timers, held sway there last Friday night, leaving a depth of 9 ½ inches in Ukiah and throughout the valley section, while the surrounding mountains were covered with the white mantle to a depth of about four feet. In Potter Valley ten inches was on the ground Saturday morning.
75 Years Ago Jan. 26, 1946
• Bus service between Boonville and Williams via Ukiah and Upper Lake will be inaugurated by Mendocino Transit Company next Saturday.
• Etalio Sanini, who returned from a trip to Chicago last week, left for San Francisco Friday, where he will enter a radio school under the G.I. Bill of Rights.
• James M. Sansi of Albion has been honorably discharged from the Navy at the Navy Personnel Separation Center in Shoemaker, Calif.
• The big boilers at the old mill are being made ready for shipment this week and a crew of men have been engaged in getting them off their original foundations, and removing the old brick from the furnaces.
55 Years Ago Feb. 4, 1966
• Funeral services were held Thursday for Ward Ries, 82, who died at a Fort Bragg hospital Monday night. Mr. Ries was born in Goodrich, Mich., and attended school there, where he was a star baseball player on the team. His playing skill led to him playing on the Pittsburgh Pirate team in the National League. He broke his arm in 1903 in a game for Cincinnati, which ended his baseball career. He came to Fort Bragg aboard a schooner in 1907 and worked from then until 1911 for the Union Lumber Co. at which time he became a Mendocino County deputy sheriff, a position he retained until his retirement in 1954. During his term on the department, he served under three sheriffs. In 1927 he purchased stock in the Standard Bottling Co., which, he controlled. He was Grand Marshal of the Paul Bunyan Parade in 1954, was a member of the Fort Bragg Flying Club.
• At Little River Airport this week three licensed pilots checked out in the Luscombe of the Littleriver Flying Service, at various times, namely Joseph DuBois of the DuBois Grocery in Westport, Gil Roden of Fort Bragg, and Dr. George Miles of Mendocino.
30 Years Ago Jan. 31, 1991
• Charlie and Bev Di Pietro became the new owners of the Mendocino Chocolate Company Jan.
15. The Di Pietros have been local residents since December 1986. During their five year stay here, Charlie ran Fort Bragg’s Edward D. Jones investment office. The Mendocino Chocolate Company opened in 1985 on Main Street in Mendocino, later expanding to a second store on Main Street, Fort Bragg.
• Jack’s Corner By Jacques Helfer: Mendocino High School counselor Tom Pepper provided me with a list of the six MHS graduates he knows of who are presently serving in our armed forces in the Iraq war theater, “Desert Storm” operation. These are Paul Beldin, Andy Freeman, Rhonda McDonell, Sean Patrick, Jason Sanders and Rowdy Yates. I know that I speak for the community when I say we are all concerned about their safety, that we support them and that we hope for an early end to the war and their safe return to us.