Past Tense: Sep. 3, 2020

70 years ago – 1950
Angling in the area had never been so good. More than 9,000 catchable-sized trout had been planted in lakes Hemet and Fulmor.

65 years ago – 1955
The Idyllwild Fire Protection District’s educational program was very effective. This year, the number of fire losses on the Hill was fewer than the year before.

60 years ago – 1960
At a press conference, writer Robert Balzer announced plans for an elaborate Buddhist meditation center in Fern Valley. The 13-acre site off Glen Road was to be the only one of its kind in the nation.

55 years ago – 1965
The fourth-annual Music Festival at the USC-ISOMATA (now Idyllwild Arts Academy) featured Randall Thompson’s new work and Robert Frost’s poems in a tribute to the late President John F. Kennedy.

50 years ago – 1970
The Department of Fish and Game reported that the heavy winter of 1968-69 and the moist but mild winter of 1969-70 had produced an improvement in most deer ranges.

45 years ago – 1975
Led by two County Park naturalists, a funeral parade of 26 cars proceeded slowly from Hurkey Creek to Garner Valley to inspect the Lake Hemet Fire’s burned area. About 130 people responded to the published invitation to take part in the tour.

40 years ago – 1980
Idyllwild Arts Director Robert Holmes announced an anonymous donor had offered to help construct an amphitheater on campus for crowds larger than the Bowman Theatre could accommodate.

35 years ago – 1985
In the Idyllwild area, the Riverside Mountain Rescue Unit was busy rescuing lost and injured hikers in four separate cases.

30 years ago – 1990
An amendment to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Safe Drinking Water Act required that water companies nationwide begin filtering water obtained from running streams. The Fern Valley Water District board of directors, faced with having to buy a filtration system, had no choice but to raise its rates.

25 years ago – 1995
A Laguna Hills man navigating a hang glider over the San Jacinto Mountains died after crashing his aircraft in Mountain Center.

20 years ago – 2000
The Army Corps of Engineers was conducting a detailed reconnaissance study of the entire 730-square-mile stretch of the San Jacinto River, hoping to find sufficient evidence of flood control and water management programs.

15 years ago – 2005
The Riverside County Department of Health Services proposed that all retailers who sell tobacco products have a county license as well as a state license.

10 years ago – 2010
The Riverside County Board of Supervisors approved an initial $1 million funding for the Idyllwild Library project.

5 years ago – 2015
The Idyllwild Historic Preservation District Review Board announced a community meeting to acquaint property owners within the district with The Mills Act. Enacted in California in 1972, it gives authority to local governments — on the Hill, the Riverside County Board of Supervisors and responsible agencies — to enter into contracts with private property owners to receive tax credits of up to 50% each year in return for owners restoring and maintaining their historic properties.

1 year ago – 2019
The Idyllwild Post Office lobby was closed for repairs and the repairs ran longer than expected due to asbestos abatement.