75 years ago
February 22, 1943
Paul Banchero, communications petty officer third class aboard a cruiser, is home on leave in Aberdeen after taking part in seven major battles in the South Pacific during the past 10 months.
Of all the seven battles he has been in, the battle of Midway was the most exciting, Banchero said. Then it was the battle of Bougainville, in the Northern Solomons and again in the attack of Santa Cruz island where the carrier Hornet was lost. Later his ship took part in the battle of Tassafaronga off the north-western end of Guadalcanal. He was also in Guadalcanal when the marines were evacuated and the army took over. And finally the battle off Savo Island.
Banchero has been in the navy 11 months and is entitled to wear seven navy crosses.
February 23, 1943
The first use of military units as emergency farm labor was authorized today in an army order for troops in Arizona to help harvest cotton.
On Capitol Hill, Lieut. General Joseph McNarney assured farm state senators the army stands ready to furlough troops to meet “any farm production emergency.”
McNarney testified before a senate agriculture subcommittee that President Roosevelt yesterday approved the plan, submitted by Secretary of War Stimson for the furloughing of entire military units to gather seasonal crops.
50 years ago
February 22, 1968
Miller Junior High’s Bobkittens clinched the league championship and ran their 1967-68 basketball record to 9-1 yesterday with a high-scoring 65-41 triumph over Washington of Olympia.
Four of Coach Marty Chorba’s Kittens tallied in double figures with Eddie Smith and Bob Failor netting 13 each and Joe Chicano and Larry Godfrey getting 11 apiece.
February 23, 1968
Demolition of two Cosmopolis buildings — the old Marine Bank building and the abandoned post office —is expected to be completed by the middle of next week by Donald Friend of Friend & Rikalo said today.
The bank building, built in 1924, was used by the Grays Harbor Commercial Co. as an office after the Marine Bank merged with the National Bank of Commerce in 1936. It was used as a TV cable company office and as a grocery store before it was abandoned about three yeas ago.
The old post office building was also the home of the Driftwood Players. Built around 1906, it housed a variety of stores and was used as a construction office when the Weyerhaeuser Co. built its pulp mill during the 1950s.
25 years ago
February 22, 1993
Roberta Holmes-Devine is the new librarian at the Hoquiam Timberland Library. She had been the head librarian at the Raymond branch from 1982 to 1984 when she and her husband, Dave, moved to California. By 1987, the family was ready to give up the smog, in favor of cranberry bogs in the North Bay area.
Then about a year ago Hoquiam Librarian Chris Livingston asked Holmes-Devine if she would ever consider subbing. When Livingston announced late last year that she was moving on to the King County Library system, Holmes-Devine didn’t need to be asked if she wanted the job in Hoquiam.
“There wasn’t any question about wanting to apply for it,” she says. “I just feel like this is my library.”
February 23, 1993
After getting the news Monday that he’d been named to the prestigious Parade Magazine All-American high school basketball team, Aberdeen High School’s omm’A Givens celebrated by having an “O” painted on his chest by teammate Ryan Watkins. Then he and Watkins joined eight other young men — Doug Farmer, Chase Hood, Anthony Mizin, Ty Dixon, Brian Sullivan, Josh Parbon, Beau Beck and Kris Fykerud — spelling out “B-O-B-C-A-T-S A-H-S” as they rooted for the girls team as it played arch-rival Hoquiam last night.
Compiled from the archives of The Daily World by Karen Barkstrom
