Past Tense: January 18, 2018
file photo/NORWOOD HAZARD
70 years ago – 1948
Idyllwild was deciding if it should join the Hemet School District.
65 years ago – 1953
Martin Aguirre was in charge of the Lions Club project to raise funds for recreation equipment at Town Hall. Plans called for developing a playground adjacent to the building.
60 years ago – 1958
The Town Crier began publishing the newspaper weekly. Since its start in 1946, the newspaper had maintained an every other week schedule during the winter season.
55 years ago – 1963
Bill Poates, working on the Idyllwild Arts housing unit, received a jolt of electricity as he attempted to connect his power saw. It burned a hole in his right hand. Pushed from the electrical contact by a fellow workman, he fell on some concrete blocks, causing injuries to his face and hands.
50 years ago – 1968
A federal grant of $71,400 for Idyllwild’s sewer disposal project was approved by the Water Pollution Control Administration.
45 years ago – 1973
The realty office building first owned by Mary Nelson, later by Bob Johnson, was undergoing a metamorphosis. Peter Rogers and Paul Pound were transforming it into a restaurant to be called Gastrognome.
40 years ago – 1978
Heavy rains led the California Division of Forestry to issue 11,563 sandbags in a one-month period to area residents. Snowplows turned into “mudplows.”
35 years ago – 1983
Riverside Mountain Rescue members rescued two Riverside County men after they had fallen about 700 feet down a cliff at Long Valley in the Mt. San Jacinto State Park Wilderness.
30 years ago – 1988
Two Idyllwild men and a Pine Cove man and woman were in Riverside County jail after being arrested and charged with manufacturing methamphetamine and possession for sale of methamphetamine.
25 years ago – 1993
The Hill was cut off from the rest of the world when highways 74, 243 and 371 were closed due to boulders, mud and trees on the roads caused by heavy rainstorms that had pummelled the Hill for 12 consecutive days.
20 years ago – 1998
Hill resident and mild-mannered realtor Bill Sperling had a photo he took published in National Geographic magazine.
15 years ago – 2003
Astrocamp, an educational camp teaching science and astronomy to thousands of children each year, got the good news that it would benefit from a $4.1 million bond issued by Gov. Gray Davis.
10 years ago – 2008
Statewide budget cuts were requiring the possible closure of state parks, including Mt. San Jacinto State Park.
5 years ago – 2013
The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department reported a break in the case of recent commerical burglaries when two vehicles were chased with occupants possibly in the process of committing more burglaries. The vehicles escaped due to ice on the highway.
1 year ago – 2017
“Standpoint” starred local musician and performer Analia Lenchantin, who won Best Supporting Actress, Short Film at the Idyllwild International Festival of Cinema awards ceremony at the Rustic Theatre.
