Yesterdays: J. Edgar Hoover on the front page of the Hungry Horse News
Working on the penstock pipes for the Hungry Horse Dam, April 17, 1950. (Mel Ruder photo)
70 years ago
April 21, 1950
Logging in the Crystal Creek drainage of the North Fork by the Superior Lumber mill in Columbia Falls would be delayed. There was 9 feet of snow. A moose charged Glacier National Park plow crews in a pickup truck. The men were trying to drive to the plows when the angry moose wouldn’t let them by on the one-lane road. The crew put the truck in reverse fast and backed up, fearing a destroyed radiator. The moose finally ran past the truck.
60 years ago
April 22, 1960
Front page photo featured J. Edgar Hoover, the famous director the FBI, being inducted into the Blackfeet Tribe in 1937. Another photo featured at least 50 horsemen lined up in the meadow overlooking Cosley Lake in Glacier. The undated photo said at the time there were up to 1,000 horse parties in Glacier. Today backcountry camping is limited by a permit system.
50 years ago
April 24, 1970
The Columbia Falls High School concert band, 87 members total, was heading off to Germany on a field trip. They would spend three weeks in Europe, visit five countries and 11 cities. West Side Story was playing at the Park Theater.
40 years ago
April 24, 1980
Regional Forester Tom Coston denied a permit request to do seismic testing by a company looking for oil and gas in the Bob Marshall Wilderness. About 95% of the public comments were against the testing. He did, however, allow crews from Consolidated Georex Geophysics of Denver to explore outside the wilderness boundaries on Forest Service lands.
30 years ago
April 26, 1990
Casey McBurnett was lucky to be alive. She was trimming a tree in Columbia Falls when a branch fell on an electric line. She was shocked several times and fell 40 feet to the ground, but survived. The incident was also a good test of the new 911 phone system. Emergency personnel were on the scene to help her in just a few minutes.
20 years ago
April 27, 2000
The Hungry Horse News went digital, using a Nikon D1 to take most of its pictures. One of the first pictures taken was Sally Johnson, a graphic artist for the newspaper, holding an European grizzly bear cub in the office. At the time, the paper estimated that about 80 percent of its pictures would be taken digitally (slide film in many cases produced far better colors back then).
10 years ago
April 22, 2010
A medical marijuana march was set for May 1 in Columbia Falls to raise awareness about the benefits of marijuana for some people with chronic pain and other illnesses. Today, Columbia Falls has two medical marijuana shops.