July 5, 1951
No local holiday celebrations marked the Fourth of July in the past nine years in Sweet Home. In 1946, three grade school boys sold fireworks outside city limits, which is now illegal. The mayor began allowance of fireworks in 1948. In 1949, sparks from a firecracker were thought to have caused the total destruction by fire of the Santiam Feed store warehouse at 11th and L streets. A free fireworks display was in front of Raleigh’s grocery when a stand was ignited by a carelessly thrown firecracker.
A grand opening next week for Sweet Home’s newest business venture, Dairy Queen ice cream store, promises free cones all day. Co-partners are L. C. Thomas and E. L. Greig, originally from Corvallis but also manages the Dairy Queen in Lebanon. The pumice-type block building was built by Raleigh Middleton.
Sweet Home Jaycees were ordered to wear at least one day’s growth of whiskers for their next meeting, an edict determined necessary to get a headstart on the Frontier Days tradition. Full beards, Van Dykes, mutachios, etc. will be the order of the day for all males until the city event next month. “Sissy cards” will be sold to those who cannot or will not forget the razor for a month.
The initial turnout for the Sweet Home summer band was termed a “rousing success,” with 40 musicians attending the first rehearsal. Most were high school students, but some older musicians also joined. The program director and high school’s new band instructor, Dan Keefe, said they could use more bass and horn players.
July 1, 1976
Jerry Wooley, volunteer firefighter for 25 years and assistant chief for 15, was named fire chief this week. He succeeds Ivan Hoy, who was a member of the original volunteer fire department when it formed in 1939, and served as chief for 24 years.
The opening of the East Linn Museum was dedicated in a ceremony with Amos Horner as guest speaker. The effort to form the museum began in 1972 when Lois Rice offered her historical items as a memorial to the pioneers of the Sweet Home area. In 1973 the Area Beautification Committee held a meeting to form a museum society. The rest is history.
Willis L. Lowe’s Mack truck racked up more than two million miles in the last quarter century. Lowe started working in the woods at age 16. After military service, he acquired the L.J. Mack truck in 1951. He sold it once for a replacement, but bought it back four years later. It carries 78,000 pounds, has been continually rebuilt and the 1963 engine outlasted two sets of rear ends. Lowe calls his truck “the toughest thing on wheels,” and they both survived accidents together. In 1966 his truck tipped over a load of logs and Lowe was pinned in the cab for hours with battery acid dripping near his face.
Rev. David Harwood moved to Sweet Home from Santa Cruz in 1971 and started his Pentecostal Church of God in Union Hall until he could convert his old truck shed into a church on Rowell Hill Road. He works at Lebanon Plywood and spends all his spare time building his church, which is the seventh one of its kind in the Central Valley.
July 4, 2001
SHFAD’s fire chief is concerned more than usual about fireworks this year. Late season rains made grass grow, and now windy, dry conditions are causing that grass to dry. Some fires last year were caused by fireworks.
Master Gardener Bud Liberatore said beautification of Sweet Home’s median strips are progressing. Watering timers are ordered, mulch will be spread and lamp posts will be added soon. He said the reason past median planting project failed because no one was able to care for the plants.
Dan Dee Sales owner Jack Legg Jr. pitched an idea protecting both the trout fishery at Foster Reservoir and juvenile winter steelhead to ODFW and NMFS. He proposed stocking the lake with 10-inch trout and increasing the minimum size anglers may keep to 10 inches for wild and hatchery trout as an alternative to proposed restrictions on wild juvenile and adult steelhead.