August 2023 Timeline

100 Years Ago: August 1923

• Clement Criddle arrived Saturday at Hampton Roads Virginia after a two month cruise with the class from Annapolis.  He will be home shortly for a month’s vacation.
• Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Madsen and son Forrest motored last week to Ettrick, where they spent several days with their son, Homer, who was recently married.
• MASONS TO HONOR REVOLUTIONARY SOLDIER:  On August 30 at the Oregon Cemetery, the Masons will honor the memory of Nathanial Ames.  Ames was a  soldier of the Revolutionary war.  He was buried with Masonic honors.  He died August 30, 1863.

50 Years Ago: August 1973

• The latest addition to the Oregon Fire Protection District’s fleet of firefighting equipment is an 1800 gallon tanker truck.  The new truck was purchased through Lappley Chevrolet and the equipment was mounted by Welch Fire Equipment Corp of Marion Wisconsin.  The cost of the entire unit was approximately $18,000.  
• Mr. and Mrs. Alvin Joyner entertained, from Thursday to Sunday, their son Lee and two of his friends.  Jack Murphy of Columbus, Ohio and Rube Zayale of Kent Ohio visited with Lee.  The boys have completed basic training in the U.S. Navy, Chicago and are now in transit to their schools.
• The big weekend in Oregon has arrived. . . the retail committee of the Chamber is busy making plans for the biggest combined fun and bargain days the area has ever seen, with its annual Penny Days which takes place this Friday evening and all day Saturday.
• A special feature of Penny Days this year is  a big community auction to be held at the downtown triangle park, with Ray Lawry conducting the sale.
• Oregon’s AFS student for the coming school year is Osamu Amano.  He will be living with the Tom Brown family.  Osamu, 18, will be an OHS Senior.  He is a resident of Yao, a suburb of Osaka, Japan.
• Oregon Fire District volunteers had a busy week this past week.  On August 5 the department answered  five calls beginning with a grass and woods fire on the Joe Stokstad property on Sunrise Rd.  Then they responded to several fires on the railroad tracks that had been started by a train, recalled to the scene of one of the track fires because it had rekindled, and also to a car fire.  On Monday they were called to the Kenneth Hoard residence on Maple Avenue in Fitchburg.  Oil in a pan being used to pap corn ignited and burned window curtains and scorched window framing.  Thursday afternoon the Fire Dept. answered a call to the Walter Peterson farm on County Highway CC where a small fire in insulation and siding was extinguished.  A painter using a torch to remove paint was the cause of the blaze.  Damages in both house fires were major

25 Years Ago: August 1998

• Plywood to Art: When you saw outdoor advertising, it was usually in the form of a huge billboard with little eye appeal. One woman in Oregon, however, took advertising to a new level. She was actually beautifying the community through her efforts. “I thought that this wall could use some sprucing up, and that it would also be a good way to make the downtown look better in addition to boosting business,” said Sandy Johnson, owner of Day Dreams Stencil Co. “It is a perfect place to show people the unlimited things you can do with stencils.”
• Changes in the Village of Oregon’s governmental structure were made as the board adopted a charter ordinance redefining the Clerk Treasurer/Administrator’s role and created a separate Village Administrator’s role. Also changed was a requirement to reauthorize the clerk/treasurer, public works director and senior center director’s position each year. Employees in those positions would serve indefinite terms, until they retire, take a position elsewhere, or were fired by the Village board.
• Nell Mally, retired director of the Oregon Senior Center, was elected to chair the Dane County Commission on Aging. The Commission on Aging, created in 1972, is the policy, planning and advocacy arm of county government. The commission, appointed by the County Executive, advises the County Executive and the Health and Human Needs Committee of the county board on issues of aging.
• Oregon’s rapid residential growth in recent years had not only stressed the village’s infrastructure in the sense of water, sewer, police and fire service needs, but the growth had also meant the village offices and departments must grow. The Oregon Village Board authorized Phase II of their Space Needs Study and to pull together ideas and costs for a plan for the village to increase the physical size of the police and public works departments, the municipal court, village hall and to provide for additional space in the form of a community center.
• The Oregon School District’s site-based management system called Partners in Education wasn’t eliminated as some had feared, but rather transformed into a more useful conduit of communication. It was clear after listening to a report compiled by a board member that five of the six Oregon Board of Education members favored keeping the district’s five-year-old site based management system. It was also clear that they wanted to see one of the components of P.I.E., the Oversight Council, improved.

10 Years Ago: August 2013

• Both Mike Caine (first photo) and Kathye Caine (second photo) took top honors at the Stoughton Junior Fair and will continue to show their horses in Madison and Milwaukee this year.
  
  
  
• Oregon Middle School’s summer growing class involving the hoop house, an extension of  the school’s science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) curriculum finished its inaugural session last month.  The class grew produce in the hoop house and sold it at the Oregon Farmer’s Market.  They also donated much of the leftover produce to the Oregon Food Pantry.
• Business Briefs:  Promodern Salon relocates downtown;  Lundgren’s Sign Service moved to a new location at 854 Janesville St.;  Senor Peppers was granted more outdoor seating;  Express Automotive is now selling mopeds; and US Cellular moves to a larger location next door.
• Netherwood Knoll fourth-grader, Ethan Johnson sits in a suite at Wrigley Field after winning a contest to be an honorary bat boy for the Chicago Cubs.  Johnson received an autographed baseball and was able to sit in the dugout and walk the field before and at the start of the game.
  
• Ace family farm hits century mark.  Wayne and Dee Ace are the fifth generation of Aces to operate the family farm on County Highway D that was purchased in 1913 by Wayne’s great-great grandfather, William Hull Ace.