Posted: Monday, January 7, 2008 12:00 am
Daniel Sandoval
Folded in with the ordinary newspaper reports there are sometimes articles about occurrences that crowd the limits of sanity, but even the madness has a certain, human familiarity. Bizarre happenings were in the news for the first week of January, with a fan in 1908, glass in 1933, a booby trap in 1958 and a bill in 1983.
100 years ago
Hooliganism - A Glenrock man who had been on the lam for four months was finally captured and taken to Douglas where he would face justice in early January 1908. Bud Masterson was apprehended in southern Colorado.
Masterson was wanted for charges stemming from undue passion and failure to use his words. Specifically, Masterson was at a Glenrock tavern discussing the Casper-Lander baseball game with J.C. "Mickey" McMahan.
As the topic got around to whether or not a Lander runner was out for interfering with the Casper shortstop, a shortstop fielding the ball, McMahan's refusal to acquiesce to reason became too much for Masterson.
Masterson ended the argument abruptly by planting a knife in McMahan's forehead, just above McMahan's left eye. Masterson dashed out of the tavern. McMahan was looking around on the floor for the knife, which he couldn't find because the knife was still stuck in his forehead.
A friend helped pull the knife free and McMahan insisted he was fine. Masterson stole a horse and quit town. The Jan. 8, 1908, Natrona County Tribune suggested the judge in Masterson's trial should also rule on the disputed baseball game.
Progress reigns - The Jan. 8, 1908, Natrona County Tribune carried encouraging speeches from the state's governor and Casper's mayor, both talking about the progress citizens were enjoying.
What the politicians mentioned was true; there had been significant investments in infrastructure and the quality of life had improved for many of the state's inhabitants.
Yet an unheralded sign of progress was the fact that the Jan. 8 Tribune published a news photograph, perhaps its first, of a herd of sheep crossing the bridge at Alcova.
This was a time when most of the illustrations were engravings and the rare photograph could only be found in the preprinted pages that were shipped in from back East.
So a real photograph of a local subject, on the front page which was composed in Casper, this was inexorable progress.
75 years ago
Invisible force - A Cheyenne man was supervising the off-loading of a crate of glass when a gust of wind pushed the crate upon him in the first week of January 1933. John Spence suffered fractures in both legs and was taken by ambulance to Denver. Spence was returned to his home Jan. 7.
Wind gusts were wreaking havoc throughout the state. In Casper, wind removed a large window pane from Evan's Jewelry Store at Second Street and Wolcott. The sheet of glass was carried along for about a quarter of a block. No injuries were reported.
Saturday night - Brawlers at a party in Casper forgot to keep their hands empty and two men ended up needing medical treatment after a fight Jan. 7, 1933. Mike Glumac and Pete Skonich employed the use of broken bottles to try and settle their differences.
Glumac was stitched up at the hospital and Skonich was treated at police headquarters by City Physician N.C. Geis.
On the phone - With confusing lack of segue, the Jan. 8, 1933, Casper Tribune-Herald reported the status of the sheriff, who was in Denver for medical treatment. Sheriff Gilbert O. Housley had undergone sinus surgery and was recovering at St. Luke's Hospital.
The article then mentioned Albert Morris, former undersheriff in Natrona County, who had been in Fitzsimmon's Hospital, also in Denver, Morris a resident of Denver, and the only connection between the two cases was that they were in Denver, or associated with the sheriff's office, or Casper, or whatever.
50 years ago
Random cruelty - A Casper girl was burned by an incendiary device left in a yard in the first week of January 1958. Virginia Parsons, 3, found a small tube lying on the lawn of her home in the 1100 block of South David.
Virginia picked it up and took it into the house to show her grandmother, Clara Parsons. When Virginia pulled a string coming out of the tube, a jet of flame shot out from the tube and burned her hand.
The Jan. 8, 1958, Casper Morning Star shows a front-page photograph of Virginia with a bandaged left hand.
Epiphany - The Casper tradition of gathering the Christmas trees and burning them on the 12th day of Christmas was photographed and published in the Jan. 7, 1958, Casper Morning Star, which shows an enormous bonfire and people standing at a safe distance.
25 years ago
Computer glitch - Bonnie Blowers opened her utility bill in early January 1983 and knew there had to have been a mistake. According to the bill, she owed $23,707.49 to the city of Casper for water, sewer and landfill.
As best as anyone could surmise, the computer billed the Blowers for services retroactive back to 1918 because that number was a part of their address before they moved.
"A Look Back in Time" is made possible with the help of Western History Archivist Kevin S. Anderson at the Casper College Western History Center.