Other days

100 YEARS AGO Jan. 12, 1924

■ Mrs. Audie F. Hunter Steakley, 27, bride of six weeks and postmistress at Casa, Perry county, until January 1, was arraigned yesterday on the federal charge of opening and rifling mail, before United States Commissioner O. D. Longstretch here. Mrs. Steakley pleaded guilty and waived preliminary examination, and was released on bond to await action of the federal Grand Jury. Two confessions of purloining contents of mail have been made by the woman, and $105 of the total taken has been returned, according to statements made at the arraignment.

50 YEARS AGO Jan. 12, 1974

■ David L. Parr of North Little Rock, former general manager of the Arkansas Division of Associated Milk Producers, Inc., (AMPI) and Keifer Howard of Little Rock, his assistant, pleaded guilty Friday in federal court at Little Rock to conspiring to make $22,000 in illegal campaign contributions to the 1968 Humphrey Muskie campaign. Federal Judge J. Smith Henley accepted the pleas and deferred sentencing for about three weeks to await a federal probation office report. … Parr has been implicated in charges being investigated by the Senate Watergate committee and special prosecutor Leon Jaworski that President Nixon granted favors to milk producers in 1971 in return for a promise of $2 million in political contributions.

25 YEARS AGO Jan. 12, 1999

■ Thousands of acres in Arkansas will be reforested “into their natural pristine state,” because of a $1 million settlement involving the Vertac Superfund site in Jacksonville, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced Monday. The settlement — in the form of a consent decree — closes another chapter of litigation regarding Vertac Chemical Corp., a former herbicide and manufacturing plant. The settlement won’t be official until it is signed by U.S. District Judge George Howard Jr. In October, a month after the U.S. Environment Protection Agency declared the Jacksonville site “officially clean,” Howard ordered Hercules Inc. and Uniroyal Chemical Limited to reimburse the government $102 million for the cost of the cleanup. … The site became contaminated with dioxin, a hazardous pollutant, while it was operated by Hercules and Vertac from the 1960s to the 1980s. Wastes from the site migrated into nearby Bayou Meto and contributed to chemical and biological degradation of the bayou, according to the Wildlife Service.

JAN. 12, 2014

■ Plans for a proposed plaza in North Little Rock’s downtown are ready to move forward to help create a public space for a variety of activities, as well as to spur other development nearby, Mayor Joe Smith said. The mayor is sponsoring a resolution for the City Council to consider at its 6:30 p.m. meeting Monday that would authorize entering into a $19,500 contract with Thomas Engineering Co. of North Little Rock for design work on Argenta Plaza at 510 Main St. Creating a “market square” on Main Street for public use was included in a downtown master development plan approved by the City Council in August 2010.