Flashback: Tracking NRV history

The Roanoke Times file 1981 Marvin Wimmer (left) and Bill Akers sack and weigh flour in Big Spring Mill sacks.

1987
(25 years ago)
-“Dave Braine was introduced Tuesday as Virginia Tech’s athletic director ….”
“The closure of the Cloyds Mountain landfill will continue even if the Radford City Council disapproves, the Board of Supervisors has -decided.”
“Big Spring Mill, on the banks of the Roanoke River, has withstood trial by fire, flood and even a runaway railroad car to remain the last working grist mill in Montgomery County.”
-“Please remain calm for an important news bulletin: Condoms have become available in the bookstores of Virginia Tech, Radford University and other universities across Virginia.”
-“Where Southern California calls home, Monday night’s basketball game at Cassell Coliseum would have registered on the Richter scale. Virginia Tech started wiping the recent tarnish from its decades of basketball glory with a shocking success in Frankie Allen’s first home game as the Hokies’ head coach.”

1962
(50 years ago)
-“The Graves Construction Co. of Blacksburg Tuesday was awarded the contract for the new Gilbert Linkous Elementary school in Blacksburg.”
-“The Christmas season will be officially opened here [Narrows] Saturday with the annual Junior Chamber of Commerce Christmas parade…Following the parade, Santa Claus will hand out treats for the children at the Municipal Parking Lot.”
-“A plea to save the life of Ricky – the Giles County German Shepherd pet dog accused of killing sheep – went Wednesday to the nation’s highest court.”
-“Santa Claus will be welcomed to Blacksburg by a 30-unit parade and jumps by an Army skydiving team Saturday afternoon.”

1937
-(75 years ago)
“Only about two miles remain unsurfaced on the last link in the all hard-surfaced road being constructed to provide a short route between here [Floyd] and Roanoke by way of Bent mountain.”
-“One of the attractions at the Thanksgiving Day game will be the largest cadet band that Virginia Tech has ever had in its 65 years of existence. The band, including the drum and bugle corps, has a membership of 103 this year.”
-“Carmen Venegas, 20-year-old Costa Rican Virginia Tech co-ed, will fly her own 40-horsepower airplane in the national cub convoy November 29 to December 7, to Miami, Fla.”
-“The [Pulaski] police department today started its empty stocking fund which will be used to provide Christmas cheer for the town and county’s underprivileged children.”
-“Radford experienced one of the quietest Thanksgiving Days ever observed.”

1912
(100 years ago)
-“Mr. James Harless [of Whitethorne] greeted the arrival of a new 12-pound visitor to his home Monday.”
-“The new hall for motion pictures in the Ellis building [in Christiansburg] was open to the public for the first time Saturday night. The building has been well crowded with appreciative audiences each evening since then.”
-“Nineteen members of the foot ball squad of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Coach Branch Bocock, Graduate Manger Lockhardt and Assistant Manager C. A. Hutchins, left Blacksburg Tuesday night for Washington where they will play Georgetown University on Thanksgiving Day.”
-“The local [Pulaski] Chamber of Commerce has reasons to believe that it has probably been successful in inducing a large silk manufacturing concern, of Hoboken, New Jersey, to establish a branch factory here.”
-“Thanksgiving Day was observed here [Christiansburg] by the general closing of stores, and a union service at 11 o’clock, in St. Paul’s Methodist church. Some three inches of snow fell Wednesday night, making the first white Thanksgiving Day seen here in years.”
-“Real winter weather came with Thanksgiving Day and the first snow of the season covered the face of the earth that morning [in Blacksburg].”

-Compiled by Roanoke Times librarian Belinda Harris

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