The Mountain Eagle
WHITESBURG WEATHER

The way we were

Clips from Mountain Eagle front pages over the past 50 years



 

 

Aug. 9, 1962

A large number of Letcher County youngsters will be unable to go to school this year unless someone finds clothing for them. Members of the Whitesburg Woman’s Club are collecting clothing of all sizes and types to distribute to children. Shoes are especially hard to obtain.

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The Mount Haven Children’s Home at Van, an institution of the Old Regula2r Baptist Church, has closed its doors. Church officials say they cannot obtain sufficient money to continue operating. Children housed there have been turned over the Kentucky Welfare Department.

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Elvis Presley is starring in “Follow That Dream” at the Alene Theater in Whitesburg..

Aug. 10, 1972

A group of Letcher County citizens plans to ask Letcher Fiscal Court to adopt a resolution which in effect will circumvent the power of the “broad form deed” in Letcher County. If the resolution passes, the court will use powers granted it by the 1972 Kentucky General Assembly to prohibit mineral owners from strip or auger mining the surface of the surface owner’s land without that owner’s written consent.

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Funeral services were held in Whitesburg for former Kentucky Court of Appeals Judge Astor Hogg, 70, who died at his home in Frankfort after a long illness. A Letcher County native, Hogg practiced law in Whitesburg from 1924 until 1935. He was mayor of Whitesburg for one year and Letcher County attorney one term. He was an attorney for the Federal Trade Commission in Washington, and later was an attorney with the U.S. Attorney General’s office.

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The proposed comprehensive development plan for Letcher County was voted down at a special meeting of Letcher Fiscal Court. In the same motion, the Fleming, Neon, Jenkins and Letcher County Planning Commission, which developed and subsequently approved the controversial document, was abolished.

Aug. 12, 1982

The Letcher County Board of Education indicated it would continue attempts to purchase a tract of land from the L&N Railroad as the site of a new Whitesburg High School.

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For the last time, Carol Jean Adams locked up the Cow Branch School where she had taught all elementary grades for the past five years. The school, one of the last one-teacher schools in Kentucky, will not re-open. Mrs. Adams, who attended Cow Branch School and taught there for 23 years, will teach at Cowan.

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Officials of Fleming-Neon say the turnout of citizens at a public meeting last week will aid the city in its quest for $6.1 million for a proposed sewer project. The project has been in the planning stages for about 10 years and the federal Economic Development Agency is threatening to withdraw its original grant of $4.4 million awarded four years ago unless other agencies commit money for the project.

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Ranie Caudill of Jeremiah has more than 30 bushels of beans drying in her attic.

Aug. 12, 1992

With a transfer station in operation, new garbage haulers under contract and the old landfill closed, Letcher County is still in danger of running afoul of state garbage disposal laws.

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Roadside dumps are growing again in Letcher County. State officials said Judge/Executive Ruben Watts should be working to include items such as shredded tires, appliances and construction waste in the county’s garage plan. The landfill now in use will not accept such items and they are beginning to show up along roadsides.

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West Whitesburg Elementary School Council members are protesting cuts in the number of teachers at the school.

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Two weeks after a Letcher County truck driver died in a fiery collision with a train, CSX Railroad officials are attempting to make truckers more conscious of the dangers at railroad crossings.

Aug. 14, 2002

The Letcher County Board of Education has released money to pay for all of the property it needs to build a new high school at Ermine. In all, the property will cost the school board about $1,547,300.

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State reclamation officials are reviewing the permits of all active surface mine sediment ponds in eastern Kentucky after discovering that one coal company did not follow the computer-generated “hydrology model” it used in obtaining a permit for a pond at Chopping Branch in McRoberts.

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An insurance company representing the bankrupt Golden Oak Mining Company has reportedly settled a suit filed by 29 residents of the Camp Branch area who claimed the company had destroyed their water supply.


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