Other days

100 YEARS AGO March 30, 1924

■ The severe wind and rain storms which swept all parts of Arkansas Friday night resulted in considerable property loss and much inconvenience through damage to telephone, telegraph and power services, but did not cause any loss of life, although several persons suffered minor injuries, according to reports from various sections of the state. The wind reached a velocity of 52 miles in many places, blowing down outbuildings and barns and killing some stock.

50 YEARS AGO March 30, 1974

■ State Insurance Commissioner Ark Monroe III ordered three major insurance companies Friday to reduce their rates on private automobile policies by 15.4 to 18.1 per cent effective May 1. The rate reductions were based not only on trends developed from the gasoline shortage but also on a new rate-making formula pioneered by New Jersey.

25 YEARS AGO March 30, 1999

■ Vulnerable Arkansas computer systems caught a virus over the weekend — but they’re feeling much better now. The virus, named “Melissa,” was first detected Friday. By Monday, hundreds of thousands of Internet e-mail accounts were creating havoc on computers around the world. Dan Schrader, spokesman for anti-virus company Trend Micro, said between 50,000 and 200,000 people in the nation had problems with e-mail systems because of the virus. Arkansas wasn’t immune. Michael Hipp, director of the state Department of Information Systems, said his agency’s systems were “widely infected, pretty heavily” over the weekend. Department employees worked through the weekend to control the virus. On Saturday, the agency shut down its affected servers — computers that handle e-mail — to stop the spreading of the virus. By Monday afternoon, agencies reported that their e-mail access was back to normal. A spot-check of Arkansas corporations didn’t find large problems.

10 YEARS AGO March 30, 2014

■ A Clinton landowner who constructed a 30-foot tall dam on a tributary of the South Fork of the Little Red River without a permit is challenging in court an order by federal regulators to remove it. Attorneys for the landowner, Dan Eoff, argue in federal court filings that removing the dam — and its 19 million-gallon reservoir — would be an “immense financial expense” for Eoff or would result in him having to pay up to $37,500 per day in fines under an order issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Eoff, a rancher known in Van Buren County as the host of the National Championship Chuckwagon Races, constructed the dam in June 2012 to water his livestock, his attorney Grant Ballard said. Within two months of it being built, Eoff received notice from the flood-plain manager of Van Buren County and a letter from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to remove it, stating that he had violated the federal Clean Water Act by not obtaining a permit to build it and that the dam could release excessive sediment into the waterway.