This ad seeking members for the Ku Klux Klan ran in the Brookville Star for a few weeks in January 1974. It’s not known how many responses it received.
Kay Dawson | Register-Herald
(This column will begin with 1934, as the copies of the paper 100 years ago are too delicate to handle.)
The Depression seemed to be easing in 1934. Forty-two local men worked for the Civil Works Administration, cleaning and straightening Wolf Creek, and the CWA promised work for 84 men for 40 days.
Banks advertised that under the new Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, deposits were insured for up to $2,500.
Over the years, news stories indicated interest in the printed word. In 1934, the county library supplied library books to the schools every two weeks.
The Brookville Star offered 15 coupons worth 10 cents each at many businesses in town with a subscription costing $1.50 a year.
In 1974, Joe Gordon, publisher of the Star, was to be listed in Who’s Who in Ohio.
In 2023, Brookville Schools responded to parental complaints by removing Me, Earl and the Dying Girl from the intermediate/high school library, but the new Northmont branch of the Dayton Metro Library opened.
There was steady news about health. Montgomery County conducted diphtheria immunizations in January 1934. In 1949, American Legion Post 289 took over of the annual polio fundraising drive, and Brookville students were scheduled to receive hearing tests.
By January 1974, Brookville Fire Department personnel were receiving medical. Logan Parr of Lewisburg didn’t wait for the hospital and was born in his parents’ car on the side of I-75.
Mayor Chuck Letner wanted to name 17-year-old Alex Stierwalt, making his first blood donation as soon as eligible, as “Citizen of the Month” in January 2023.
Weather was a special concern in 1974 and 1999. In 1974, a prank bomb threat evacuated Brookville schools on a cold day. The district said in the future, elementary students would be bused to nearby churches and high school students would wait out the search on the buses.
During a bad snow that year, Councilwoman Jody Williamson offered to help the overworked crews “but they wouldn’t give her a plow.”
A five-hour power outage due to high winds called off a basketball game at the high school, and the winds flattened a mobile home at Brookville Lake Estates.
Twenty-five years later, eight inches of snow fell on Jan. 2, 1999, and the schools used up their snow days. An ice storm closed westbound I-70 from Brookville to Indianapolis. Ninety-seven trucks were parked in areas in Brookville. The weather cost Brookville 300 hours in overtime.
A week later, Preble Country experienced flooding.
In 2023 Brookville city Manager Sonja Keaton praised the snowplow drivers for their work during the cold and snow on Christmas weekend in 2022, when workers had to pull into the garage to let the salt thaw.
Fire departments made news. In 1949 Brookville council provided funds for the new fire truck when the fire department couldn’t, and solicitations already received were returned to the donors.
Brookville agreed to answer all calls in southern Clay Township until a survey determined what property owners had paid for membership in the fire system. Contracts with Brookville and New Lebanon fire departments protected all of Perry Township, but a fire levy in Clay Township had been defeated.
A 1974 ad soliciting membership in the Ku Klux Klan may have startled some readers.
But at the same time, the drive to raise $33,000 to save the Spitler House began.
