Other days

100 YEARS AGO Jan. 16, 1918

RUSSELLVILLE — Russellville has experienced the severest long cold spell on record. The principal damage resulting from the cold has been burst water pipes and kitchen tanks and since the thaw started yesterday practically every business house in town has leaked badly and stocks of merchandise have been damaged to the extent of thousands of dollars. At the Palace hotel Sunday morning the kitchen stove exploded after the water pipes had been frozen.

50 YEARS AGO Jan. 16, 1968

Opponents of a housing authority at Eureka Springs won an Arkansas Supreme Court decision Monday forcing a referendum on a resolution creating a housing authority. The city commissioners at Eureka Springs adopted a resolution March 31, 1966, declaring the need for a housing authority, and published the resolution in the local newspaper on May 18, 1967. Less than a month later. Bruce Brightman and several other residents filed a petition calling for a referendum on the resolution.

25 YEARS AGO Jan. 16, 1993

Arkansas will have a couple of firsts next week, one the result of the other: A native will become president and a black man will be governor. Senate President Pro Tempore Jerry Jewell of Little Rock will serve as the state’s chief executive during the absence of Gov. Jim Guy Tucker, who leaves Sunday to attend the presidential inauguration of his predecessor, Bill Clinton. Jewell on Tuesday became the first black formally elected as the leader of the Senate. Because there is no lieutenant governor — that was Tucker’s job until he succeeded Clinton — Jewell fills in for Tucker when the governor leaves the state.

10 YEARS AGO Jan. 16, 2008

HAMBURG — Prosecutors accusing a MeGehee-area trucker in the death of Casey Crowder played for jurors Tuesday a video confession to the killing and abduction of the Pine Bluff teen. In the interview, Kenneth Ray Osburn told authorities that he watched Crowder try to loosen a zip tie around her neck as she stumbled into the patch of woods where authorities later found her body. The 48-year-old’s interview with authorities, which was played for jurors in Ashley County Circuit Court, offered some details about the crime and a confession, according to a transcript of the video given to jurors.