THE TIME MACHINE

From past files of The Star News

10 YEARS AGO

July 29, 2010

Once upon a time there were three chickens. The first one was named Big Mama because of her size, the second was named Chicken because she was afraid of everything and the third one was named Girlfriend because sometimes she gets an attitude.

For the past year and a half, the three birds have lived with the Kohn family at 209 South Park Avenue in Medford.

For the Kohns the birds have become less like pets and more like members of the family and Joe Kohn notes that none of his immediate neighbors have raised any complaints about the birds.

Despite that, the days of Big Mama, Chicken and Girlfriend being able to spend time with the Kohns in Medford could be numbered if the city council’s plan to enact an anti-chicken ordinance is approved.

25 YEARS AGO

August 2, 1995

The son of the Illinois man whose body was found in Taylor County three years ago has admitted dumping his 85-year-old father’s corpse in a wooded area in the Town of Westboro so he could continue to collect the dead man’s retirement checks.

The skeletal remains of Ralph F.

Stramaglio, Sr. of McHenry, Illinois was found by two hunters in the Chequamegon Forest in October 1992.

Until last month, the body had remained unidentified, although photos of a clay “skull sculpture” and drawings of what forensic investigators believed the victim looked like had been widely distributed.

Then, about three weeks ago, Ralph Stramaglio Jr., 43, called his attorney and asked him to arrange a meeting with City of McHenry police so he could confess.

50 YEARS AGO

July 30, 1970

Stanley Kowalewski, Medford, chairman of the Taylor county board of supervisors’ finance committee, announced Friday that the county’s overall economic development program (OEDP) plan received state approval. Philip Sundal, acting deputy administrator of the state department of local affairs and development, forwarded a copy of the state approval which was sent to the area director of the federal economic development administration at Duluth, Minn.

75 YEARS AGO

July 26, 1945

In 1942, there was started at Rib Lake, by O. R. Thompson, Victor Kohn, and Clifford Curran, of that village—a cheesemaker, a feed man, and a bankerattorney— and J. F. Pinion, Marshfield, at that time an accountant for various cheese factories, a small cheese marketing organization that has seen a very remarkable growth. It has come to be a big institution.

The volume of cheese handles has now reached over 10 million pounds a year. The former Blatz warehouse at Medford, purchased and much enlarged, now has a capacity of 20 carloads of cheese.

100 YEARS AGO

July 28, 1920

John Hardy, who farms on the Meridian Road, at the corner a mile north of the Clark County line where you turn east if you are wise and keep on north and wish you had turned if you are not wise, has started a skunk ranch. He has three of the little pets now, as docile and odorless as you could wish. The other five of the skunk family also will soon leave their native den to occupy the pen with their fellows, as Mr. Hardy knows how to capture them. He meets Mr. Skunk in a ditch, retreats, stops, and then reaches over and grabs the skunk by the tail and stuffs him in a sack. And all odorless he claims.

125 YEARS AGO

July 27, 1895

Kenosha, Wis., July 20.—All strike difficulties and labor troubles have been laid aside today and laborers of all kinds with their employers, the merchants, bankers and professional men have joined together to do honor to the occasion which in Kenosha is recognized as the starting point in a new era of prosperity and the opening of a new epoch. The events of the day, clustered around the picnic of the Sterling bicycle employes, who came up from Chicago in a special train which arrived here at 10 o’clock.

Remember When — 2004