MID-SOUTH MEMORIES
25 years ago — 1998
In getting their public water supplies, Memphis and neighboring communities in Mississippi are like a group of people drinking out of the same glass at a soda fountain. Only Memphis has the bigger straw. In fact, though its wells lie entirely in Tennessee, the Bluff City is the largest user of Mississippi’s ground water, according to that state’s regulators.
50 years ago — 1973
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – The Skylab 3 astronauts took a final jaunt around Florida in T38 jets Thursday to
hone their flying skills and help ward off motion sickness when they blast off for America’s orbiting laboratory Friday at 8:01 a.m. (Memphis time).
75 years ago — 1948 WASHINGTON – A new car salesman readily admitted Monday that he got $500 cash tips when he sold automobiles and said he thought the practice was countrywide. A House committee, investigating what it says is nearly a $500,000,000 “racket” in new cars, heard a series of Washington car buyers testify they forked over $500 as a “present” when they made their purchases.
100 years ago — 1923
Satire and sunshine were scattered with reckless abandon and the great and near-great of Memphis trembled as the newspaper writers of Memphis last night staged their first annual “gridiron dinner” at Hotel Gayoso. The main dining room of the hotel was taxed to overflowing with more than 600 of the city’s and section’s most prominent men, who gathered as guests of the writers to hear themselves and associates “panned” in a manner that only a newspaper reporter can do it.