75 years ago
August 19, 1944
Two Aberdeen brothers, both serving in the navy — on different ships — in the South Pacific, had been praying for a long time for the day when they would meet again. Their prayers were answered July 30, after a hectic three-hour effort on the brothers’ part at a certain port where their ships docked.
While pulling into port, Aviation Ordnanceman Second Class Llewellyn (Lewie) Luce swept his gaze over the other ships in port and stopped on the name of the ship on which his brother, Aviation Machinist’s Mate Third Class Leonard Luce, was serving.
“First I tried to get in touch with him by blinker light from our ship to his,” wrote Llewellyn to his mother. “That failed and so I tried to telephone and that had the same result. I decided to see if the ship’s chaplain could help me. And he did. With little trouble this time, Leonard and I were soon together. I had four hours left on my liberty and we were together until I had to report back to duty.”
50 years ago
August 19, 1969
A nocturnal party led to a fire in the Central Park Elementary School and before volunteer firemen quelled the mysterious blaze, the Aberdeen School District building had absorbed an estimated $6,000 in damage early this morning.
Seventeen volunteer firemen from the Central Park Fire District responded to a call at 3:45 a.m. today. Yearout and Davis, insurance firm for the school district, reported that the multipurpose room and south wall of the building were damaged in the blaze.
“There was a party around the building,” the custodian reported this morning. “Beer and wine bottles were all over.”
25 years ago
August 19, 1994
Students at Hoquiam High School will have to rely on bookbags and back packs when school opens Sept. 1.
Their lockers are gone.
Principal Bob Miller has had them ripped out in a safety move.
“I was starting to find things that shouldn’t be here,” Miller told School Board members Thursday night. “We found some inappropriate utensils — there was a buck knife and things like that.”
No guns, mind you, but Miller described the contents of one locker as something that might belong to a “mercenary soldier.”
Most of the inappropriate articles discovered last year came from lockers without owners, so those responsible could not be disciplined, Miller said.
Compiled from the archives of The Daily World by Karen Barkstrom
