www.roanoke.com

The Roanoke Times

File 1958 The trophy for the Harvest Bowl was made in the Norfolk and Western Railway's Roanoke shops.

1998 (10 years ago)

n "Virginia Tech's unbeaten football team ranks among the nation's leaders in numerous statistical categories. Add the Hokies to a leaders' list they didn't care to join -- most different starting quarterbacks used."

n "Following in the footsteps of other food retailers, The Kroger Co. is testing the idea of selling gasoline along with peanut butter and paper towels."

n "The specialty coffee shop craze has perked into the Roanoke Valley. The good news is there are coffee houses in almost every part of town brimming with an increasingly sophisticated variety of selections."

1983 (25 years ago)

n "The natives are restless. So are commuters. Everyone streaming into Lord Botetourt High School Tuesday seemed on a collision course with the state Highway Department's plans to alter troublesome Exit 44 on Interstate 81."

n "Freedom of religion does not give church-operated schools the right to pay employees less than the minimum wage, a federal judge in Roanoke has ruled."

n "Quarterbacks for football teams that oppose Virginia Tech must all suffer from the same nightmare. ... The nightmare has a name -- Bruce Smith, junior defensive tackle from Norfolk."

n "William Golding, the English author who won this year's Nobel Prize for literature Thursday, was a writer-in-residence at Hollins College in the early 1960s when his first novel, 'Lord of the Flies,' caused a stir on campuses nationwide."

n "The Star City finally has a baseball star. Al Holland is the best relief pitcher in the National League. He is surely bigger, stronger, wiser and richer than when he left Roanoke, Va., as a high school sports legend."

n "Undaunted by the fact that virtually no one has the equipment to appreciate it, country music station WSLC-AM has begun broadcasting in stereo. It is the first AM station in the Roanoke area to begin stereo broadcasts."

1958 (50 years ago)

n "The new chapel at Hollins College will be named the Jessie Ball du Pont chapel in honor of Mrs. Alfred I. du Pont, a member of the board of trustees of Hollins College Corporation."

n "Roanoke has only one surviving widow of a Confederate veteran. She is Mrs. Lucy Carter King, who is approaching her 87th birthday."

n "The Virginia Advisory Committee on Civil Rights yesterday appointed fact-finding subcommittees on higher education and voting rights. Composing the subcommittee on voting rights are W. C. Daniel of Danville and Dr. L. C. Downing of Roanoke."

n "Royalty and high government officials are to be on hand tonight for the opening of the opera season in Athens, Greece. And a Roanoke dramatic soprano, Miss Jane Stuart Smith, has been given the evening's lead, Princess Turandot in Puccini's opera by the same name."

n "An old cemetery in the path of a super highway may not have to be moved after all. The city engineer's office has come up with a plan to 'loop' around the 2,700-grave cemetery at Orange avenue, NE, near Second street."

n "Stereophonic sound makes its bow on WDBJ and WDBJ-FM Sunday afternoon, the first to be heard in this area."

1933 (75 years ago)

n "City health officials today issued a warning to citizens to stop using water from a spring at Tenth street and Moorman Road, N.W. A typhoid case has been traced to water from the spring."

n "An epidemic of stealing of electric current from the Appalachian Electric Power Company has broken out in Roanoke."

n "Judge Harris S. Birchfield stated from the [Police Court] bench that he intended to make it rough on persons who operate bootlegging dives near school buildings."

n "With the completion of three projects -- purchase and equipping of a rescue truck, overhauling the crew car, and the outfitting of the metal boat into a trailer -- the Roanoke Life Saving and First Aid Crew feels that it is now equipped to give residents of Roanoke some real service in rescue work."

n "Appreciation for the assistance given the colored Y.M.C.A. by the white people of Roanoke was expressed by Dr. E. D. Downing, president of the colored branch, at the first workers' luncheon in the 1933 financial campaign."

1908 (100 years ago)

n "Since the beginning of the present year there have been sixteen deaths in Vinton and twelve of these were due to tuberculosis or some form of lung disease, as la grippe, pneumonia or pulmonary congestion."

n "Chief of Police Dyer says that complaints are being heard from citizens on every hand concerning the great dust raised by automobiles."

n "The sportsmen of Salem have banded together in an effort to protect the game in Roanoke county under the rigid game laws of the state."

n "The Virginia Polytechnic Institute football team was in the city yesterday, and they are a healthy dangerous looking team."

n "The Academy of Music was filled yesterday afternoon matinee and evening by a refined and appreciative audience to witness Dixon's latest and most successful production, 'The Traitor.' During this wonderful play there was silence until the climaxes were reached, then followed long and loud applause."

n "Roanoke College played its opening game of football on the local grounds Wednesday, defeating the Salem High School by the score of 27 to 0. The Collegians played rather listlessly in the first half, but braced up in the second and fairly swept the light team off its feet."

n "Salem has been visited during the past week by several frosts, which made the air of mornings very crisp and bracing for those who went out early."