Other days

100 YEARS AGO Jan. 2, 1924

■ The twentieth annual New Year’s program of the Lincoln Emancipation Club, negro, was held yesterday in the Mosaic Temple. Despite the cold weather, the largest crowd in the history of the event was present. Prof. Isaac Fisher, negro of Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn., was the principal speaker. The program opened with music by a chorus from the Wesley chapel. The Rev. D. B. Gaines offered prayer. President R. J. Meaddoughs of the club spoke briefly and Alice Lucile Brown read Lincoln’s emancipation proclamation. J. H. McConico introduced Prof Fisher. Students of Philander Smith College sang. “The Open Door”, the subject of the address, dealt with opportunities in the world for negroes. The speaker emphasized the importance of higher education and a broader vision for members of the race. “There can be no closed door against any man,” he declared.

50 YEARS AGO Jan. 2, 1974

■ W. R. “Witt” Stephens, 66, of Prattsville, former head of Arkansas Louisiana Gas Company, says he decided two weeks ago not to run for governor this year because “I’d get the hell beat out of me.” He had told newsmen last fall that he was thinking about making the race and that he had long dreamed of being governor. A number of friends who talked with Stephens in the interim advised him not to run, sources said. The friends told Stephens his chance of winning would be extremely slim.

25 YEARS AGO Jan. 2, 1999

DES ARC — Prairie County jail inmate David Lively, 40, escaped Thursday while being let out to the exercise yard but was back in jail Friday afternoon, the sheriff’s office said. Des Arc police and Prairie County sheriff’s deputies caught Lively at a Des Arc residence at 2:38 p.m. Friday. Sheriff’s deputy Mike Corley said Friday that Lively was dropped off at the residence by accident and someone at the home called the police. Lively, jailed for about one day on charges of aggravated assault, refusal to submit to a blood test and felony fleeing, climbed a 10-foot fence with three strands of barbed wire at 8:41 a.m. Thursday, officials said. Police found Lively’s orange jail uniform in a large trash bin behind the jail.

10 YEARS AGO Jan. 2, 2014

LEPANTO—Two up close encounters with police work in the past 10 years have led a former substitute English teacher into a police career of her own as Lepanto’s first full-time female patrol officer. Mary Rolland, 30, will begin her certification courses at the Law Enforcement Training Academy in Pocahontas later this month. She’s been working the third shift as an officer for the Poinsett County town’s Police Department since May 21. “I would never in a million years think I’d be where I am today,” Rolland said after completing a recent 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. patrol shift. “I was ready to teach high school English full time. But I was the daredevil of the family, and this job is more suited to my personality.”