Nov. 24, 1970: ‘Plant A Tree For Christmas’

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 24, 1970.

‘Plant A Tree For Christmas’

CHESTERTON ー With a different twist to its annual Christmas lighting contest, the Westchester Chamber of Commerce this year is urging residents of the township to plant a tree for Christmas.

The chamber has two goals in its new Christmas lighting contest ー beautification and improvement of environment.

Trees beautify a home and improve community environment, chamber officials said. Presence of living things such as trees are of great importance to air quality.

With these thoughts in mind the chamber is seeking to make the entire Westchester Township area beautiful and provide a continued better environment. The chamber, therefore, is asking that residents decorate living trees in their yards for the contest. Those not having trees are asked to plant one and decorate it.

It was noted that cut trees placed in yards will be judged, but use of living trees is urged.

Local persons will judge homes, business places, schools and churches. Winners will be awarded plaques.

Formal entry blanks will not be awarded plaques.

Formal entry blanks will not be used. Instead, all lighted trees in the entire community will be judged. Persons residing in remote areas who think they may be missed in the judging, are asked to call the chamber office.

The chamber is asking that everyone in Chesterton, Porter, Burns Harbor and rural areas participate by planting a tree for Christmas.

Nov. 23, 1935: Porter County Once Was Site of Thriving Cheese Plant; Pioneer Ell Pinney Relates Is History

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 23, 1935.

Porter County Once Was Site of Thriving Cheese Plant; Pioneer Ell Pinney Relates Is History

(BY ROBERT ALLETT)

Few people living today can remember when east Porter county was the center of a thriving cheese industry that annually converted thousands of pounds of milk from herds in that vicinity into a delicacy that served the middle west.

Located on Crooked Creek on Snake Island, one and a half miles north of where State Road 30 now runs, and slightly to the northwest of Wanatah, the “cheese factory” is an institution long since forgotten even by Porter county’s oldest residents. No written record of the business is available, and no landmark remains to designate the exact spot where the factory stood. A wealthy landholder named Ruell Starr owned Snake Island and Joe Cromer was the manager of the establishment which was at least partly controlled by James McGill. Beyond that, names of men who ran the establishment have faded from memory of Porter county’s earlier historians.

Ell Pinney yesterday recalled the time when he, accompanied by his father, Horace Pinney, and his brothers, Kay and Jay, whose names, Mr. Pinney explained smiling, were the result of a large family in which there “were so many children we had to use the alphabet to name them.” made daily trips to the cheese factory to dispose of their milk. This was at least ten years before the death of the elder Pinney which occurred in 1880.

“Sixty-five years is a long time for a man to remember names of people he wasn’t interested in,” said Mr. Pinney when asked about the men who ran the cheese concern. Mrs. Oresta Freer, a neighbor, supplied much of the information obtained. Mrs. Freer, not as old as Mr. Pinney, held faint recollections of the old timers and their activities. In her youth Mrs. Freer taught in a one-room school near here and remembers Dr. G.H. Stoner as “a bright little shaver.”

It was agreed by Mrs. Freer and Mr. Pinney that the cheese factory was built on the site of a mill race which had been installed by Mr. Starr but never used. No one knows just what became of the factory, but it is believed that when Harry Dolson started a similar business at Wanatah in about 1875 he took over the Crooked Creek concern. This venture lasted only a few years, however, and cheese making in Porter county was a thing of the past. Individual farmers turned their milk into butter, selling large quantities to the Chicago area.

Mrs. Freer told of hearing her father, Elias Sherman, one of the county’s earliest known settlers, speak of buying cattle at the Crooked Creek center which was evidently used as a sort of livestock trading post.

Mr. Pinney, interested in the coming Centennial celebration next year, remarked that one of the stories his father, who settled here just 100 years ago, told was of meeting a band of Indians being driven west as he was returning to his farm from a trip to Valparaiso. Swamps and underbrush made the journey to the county seat an affair of major proportions in those days.

An interesting sidelight into the first years of Valparaiso university was given by Mr. Pinney who attended the Valparaiso university was given by Mr. Pinney who attended the Valparaiso Normal School under Brown and Kinsey in 1878. Unlike the system today under which text books in all schools are changed almost annually, Mr. Pinney remembers that at that time one used any volume he could lay his hands on and it was a rare occurrence when two students in a class possessed the same text by the same author.

Asked how Thanksgiving was celebrated in those days, Mr. Pinney replied with a twinkle in his eye, “Same as we do knowーate all we could!”

Nov. 23, 1985: Hobart student barred because of AIDS

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 23, 1985.

Hobart student barred because of AIDS

HOBART (AP) ー A Hobart Schools student diagnosed as having AIDS has been barred from attending class and is completing assignments at home, Superintendent Richard Abel said Friday.

Abel would not name the male high school student with acquired immune deficiency syndrome, but said the student has been ill and out of school since Oct. 30.

The student is a hemophiliac, as is 13-year-old Ryan White of Kokomo, who contracted AIDS through a blood transfusion. Ryan was barred from attending classes in the Western Hills schools system and has been taking instruction at home via a telephone hookup.

The Hobart school board adopted a policy Thursday night which also barrs students with AIDS from attending school.

Under the policy, Abel said, any student with AIDS “will be offered a continuation of their education only through a homebound teaching program.”

Abel said he believes the policy to be one of the first in the country.

“Now that the policy is official and the administration is charged with the responsibility of carrying it out, our next move will be to solicit volunteers from the teaching staff to go to the home and do what I will call the normal home-bound teaching assignment,” said Abel.

Abel, however, said he did not anticipate any teachers volunteering because of all the unknowns about AIDS. If there are no volunteers, he will go to the next step, he said.

Since the policy was adopted only Thursday, he has not yet asked for volunteers, said Abel, and the student has been completing assignments at home since he was diagnosed as having AIDS on Oct. 30.

“The student is not being denied an education,” said Abel. “It is continuing, but in a different form.”

Abel said the student’s parents have been cooperative and school staff members also have been supportive.

He also said he has received no negative reaction from other parents ー “just concern. There has been no panic,  none at all.”

Ryan White was discharged from Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis two weeks ago after being hospitalized more than six weeks with a respiratory problem.

Ryan’s mother, Jeanne White, is fighting the decision by school officials to keep her son out of class.

The Indiana Department of Education is expected to announce a decision Wednesday on whether Ryan, a seventh-grader, will be allowed to return to his school.

Nov. 22, 1930: CAPTURE LAST MEMBER GANG OF ROBBERS James Germano in Hiding Since Capture of Pals, Nabbed and Brought Here to County Jail. SKUBICH WAS ROBBERY PARTNER

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 22, 1930.

CAPTURE LAST MEMBER GANG OF ROBBERS

James Germano in Hiding Since Capture of Pals, Nabbed and Brought Here to County Jail.

SKUBICH WAS ROBBERY PARTNER

James Germano, 22, alleged member of the Stillinovich-Magdos-Dago Dan gang of bandits wich terrorized the Calumet region, including north Porter county resorts along Dunes Highway until their roundup several months ago, was brought here to Porter county jail early today by Sheriff Burney Maxwell and Deputy Sheriff Freeman Lane.

Germano was the last member of the gang at large. He was captured Friday when he sought to return to Gary from Chicago, where he had been in hiding since his pals were corralled in a big roundup by Lake and Porter county officers.

Sheriff Burney Maxwell has two robbery charges to press against Germano. One is the Wigwam barbecue on Dunes Highway; the other the theft of $135 from a bureau drawer at the Andrew Holmgren farm, east of Flint lake, during a fire which destroyed a barn on that place last summer. 

Willie Skubich, 19, of Gary, recently sentenced to Indiana reformatory for a period of one to ten years, was a partner of Germano in the two robberies. 

Dago Dan, former leader of the gang was killed early this summer in a holdup at Berwyn, Ill. Nick Marley, another member of the gang, was sentenced to fifteen years in prison several weeks ago in Lake criminal court at Crown Point. Other members of the gang are in Crown Point jail awaiting trial.

Nov. 21, 1955: Oily Lake Michigan Water Kills Birds

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 21, 1955.

Oily Lake Michigan Water Kills Birds

At least 200 water fowl have frozen to death along the Porter county shores of Lake Michigan, conservation officials said today.

Heavy oil in the water “gummed up” their feathers and prevented the birds from flying after alighting in the water, Conservation Officer Charles Black said.

Unable to leave the water by flying, the birds swam or were washed ashore where they froze to death.

Black and a party of seven men covered a four-mile stretch of the shoreline east and west of Dunes State park from late Saturday until 3 a.m. Sunday.

During this time, the party found 37 “grounded” birds which were still living. The men washed the fowl in a detergent and brought them to the Liberty township farm of Earl Hanrahan, where the animals are recuperating.

Black said that when the birds are able to preen their feathers with natural oil they will be released on inland lakes. The conservation officer also said today he did not know how long the birds would have to be kept at the Hanrahan’s before they could be released.

Most of the dead and rescued birds were of the inedible “fish duck” type, Black said. There were a few edible blue bills, he added. Among the birds found on the beach were cormorants, grebes and mergansers, which regularly inhabit the lake region.

Conservation officials said the source of the oil, which “is like a heavy No. 6 oil,” was not definitely known, although it may have come from industrial waste in the Gary area. Dead birds were found as far west as Michigan City.

Black said he first was notified of the condition Friday by persons at Dune Acres where youngsters were washing the grounded birds with a detergent.

Many of the surviving birds found by Black and his party Saturday night were unable to move when they were picked up and washed.

Floundering Birds Given Baths By Dunes State Park Officials

SOME OF THE 15 WATER FOWL found alive the shores of Lake Michigan’s Dune State park are shown being given a bath in a soapy detergent today to remove the gummy substance from their feathers, believed to have been caused by heavy oil in the water. The gummy condition prevented the fowl from flying, and washed them ashore. Park Supt. Max Dickey, left, reported that about one-half of the birds found along the shoreline Sunday were frozen to death. A check along the shore today revealed no floundering fowl. Helping in rehabilitation the fowl is parking employee Clarence Sederberg, of Chesterton.

Nov. 20, 1940: Turkey Dinner To Cost About Same As In 1939

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 20, 1940.

Turkey Dinner To Cost About Same As In 1939

BY UNITED PRESS

John Q. Public, the average American citizen who is the head of a family of four, will pay about $4.32 for his Thanksgiving dinner if he lives in one of the 32 states where the holiday will be celebrated tomorrow, a United Press survey showed.

The average price for the meal in 1939 was $4.46.

As in 1939, there are again two schools of thought on the celebration of the annual feast day. Governors of 16 states clung to the traditional last Thursday of the month, the others abided by the proclamation of President Roosevelt which for the second successive year moved the holiday up one week.

If Mr. Public lives in one of the states where tomorrow will be Thanksgiving, he can travel next week to Maine, New Hampshire Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, North Carolina, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Iowa, Kansas, Arkansas, Nevada or Idaho and have another feast. Those are the states which retained the traditional date. Kentucky will celebrate both days.

The average market basket which Mrs. John Q. Public carried after she had gone shopping for the family’s dinner contained an eight-pound turkey costing $2.26; one bunch of celery worth nine cents; a large jar of olives which cost 30 cents; four pounds of sweet potatoes, 18 cents; one-fourth peck white potatoes, eight cents; one pound of mince meat for a pie, 21 cents; four pounds of squash, 14 cents; two pounds of cranberry for sauce, 58 cents; two pounds of pumpkin for another pie, 22 cents and five pounds of apples for stuffing and baking, 27 cents.

Turkey prices generally were lower this year despite heavy losses in flocks during the severe cold weather recently. At New York, where the traditional bird cost 37 to 39 cents last year, the price was down to 29 to 31 cents per pound in 1940. In San Francisco the prices were 16 to 27 cents this year compared with 27 to 31 in 1939. But in Minneapolis, Minn., where turkey farmers suffered some of the most extensive losses, the price was up three cents per pound over the 1939 price of 30 cents.

At Omaha, Neb., provisioners reported the price of an average turkey was 28¼ cents compared with an average of 30 cents last year, all other staples for the meal were at approximately the same levels as last year except cranberries which were ip one to five cents depending upon the proximity to markets and pumpkin which was down slightly in most localities, seldom more than one cent.

The survey determined the cost of the meal only on the basis of the ordinary menu composed of the foods contained in the basket Mrs. Public brought home from the market. The “fixin’s” which may be added to this basic meal would increase the cost in proportion to the amounts considered necessary to make the meal complete.

However, some provisioners recommended that six cents be added to the total cost of even the basic mealーthe average price of a box of bicarbonate of soda.

Nov. 20, 1930: JURY LENIENT WITH SECOND TIME VIOLATOR Big Horace Lee, Once Convicted in Local Court on Liquor Charge, Gets Minimum Dose. COMPANION ENTERS PLEA OF GUILTY

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 20, 1930.

JURY LENIENT WITH SECOND TIME VIOLATOR

Big Horace Lee, Once Convicted in Local Court on Liquor Charge, Gets Minimum Dose.

COMPANION ENTERS PLEA OF GUILTY

“Big” Horace Lee, notorious bootlegger of north Porter county, whose joint on the Porter-Lake county line was the rendezvous for holdup ganges and other like gentry, of the underworld, escaped with the minimum sentence Wednesday night when a jury in Judge pro tem Mark B. Rockwell’s Porter circuit court found him guilty of a charge of liquor possession and fined him $100 and costs and assessed a 30 days’ jail sentence.

It was the third appearance for Lee within the knowledge of Porter county authorities. Once he was fined and jailed in Federal court at Hammond, and again in the same court in which he dramatically made his appearance yesterday.

Attorney J.A. Fleshbein, for Lee, sought to show that Lee was not in possession of the premises, but Lee Dillion, also arrested by local authorities at the time of the raid on the alleged premises of Lee, held the lease to the property. According to Attorney Fleshbein, Lee leased the property. According to Attorney Fleshbein, Lee leased the property of Frank A. Turner, renting agent, but later leased it to Dillon. Both men were charged with the possession of liquor found by the officers.

Prosecutor W.W. Bozarth and Deputy Prosecutor Glenn Dye charged that Dillon was merely a catspaw for Lee, and was ready to take the “rap” in case of a raid of the joint. Dillon was merely a catspaw dor Lee, and was ready to take the “rap” in case of a raid of the joint. Dillon, who is known as “Little Lee,” because of his scrawny size, appears to be a man of 70 years of age, whereas he is only 57. This, the prosecutor said, would elicit the sympathy of the jury.

Lee’s case was given to the jury at 3:45 p.m. and a verdict was reached at 5:20 p.m.

Following the verdict, Dillon, when he saw the jury was lenient, changed his plea of not guilty to guilty, and Judge Rockwell assessed him $1000 and costs and gave him a suspended jail sentence.

The arrest of the two men followed a tip obtained by Sheriff Burney Maxwell from Otto Meier, Jr., and Sylvester Adams, nabbed for a series of holdups in Porter county, that they planned their robberies in the Lee place.

ー

Think It Over

Most of the shadows that cross the pathway in life are caused by standing in our own light.

Nov. 19, 1970: One Completed At Filtration Plant

Originally published in The Vidette-Messenger of Porter County on November 19, 1970.

One Completed At Filtration Plant

By BETTY MISCH

A two-year undertaking at Flint Lake Water Department is now well underway with the completion of one of four new rate controllers being built by the department, Philip Coote, chief engineer, has reported.

The rate controller is an automatic device that controls the amount of water flowing through the filters at the plant in relation to the cleaness of the filters. An indicator shows when filters need back washing. Don Ungurait, pumping station superintendent, explained.

The present manually-operated system has been in operation since 1950. The new automatic, more accurate system is designed to produce better quality water and at the same time, increase efficiency, Coote said.

Old valves are gate valves, Ungurait explained, while new ones being installed are butterfly valves, the newest thing in water works. “They should hold up better, last longer, and be more efficient,” he added.

Actual water flow of the new system will be regulated electronically. After flow rate is set, a signal from the metering device will automatically control the flow rate.

New control valves are operated by push buttons instead of the manually-turned wheels used in the old system, the men explained.

The project, approved by the Valparaiso Water Board in February, was begun as soon as valves were delivered by the Henry Pratt Co., Aurora, Ill., and electrical components were received from the Hayes Corp., Michigan City. Total cost of valves and electrical components for one rate controller was nearly $3,000.

A great deal of the cost of the new unit is saved by the department building it. If contracted for installation, each unit would cost an estimated $4,000, Coote noted.

The old manual type rate controllers which have been in use are no longer allowed by the State Board of Health. New valves will give a higher quality product and better control of water filtration.

Operation of the Valparaiso Water Department’s filtration plant at Flint Lake was started in 1907, only two years after the first filtration plant began operation in the United States.

At that time, two filter beds were built. A third bed was added in 127, and a fourth in 1950. With the increase in population, further expansion will be necessary in the future, Coote noted.

Installing 4 New Rate Controllers

Philip Coote, chief engineer of Valparaiso Water Department, (in photo at top) points out newly installed rate control valve, part of new filtration system being built by department.

Installing 4 New Rate Controllers

Coote explains how old water filtration system worked

Installing 4 New Rate Controllers

Don Ungurait, plant superintendent, explains new push-button control panel. New system, which will take two years to complete, will be more accurate than present system.