140 Years Ago
Snowshoes for horses: The proprietor of the Downieville stage lines have shod their horses with snow shoes. They are able to travel over the snowbanks without sinking into them ... It is an 8-by-12-inch shoe made of malleable iron and covered on one side with India rubber ...
130 Years Ago
Poisoning: A female prisoner in jail at Carson, Nevada, sings all hours of the day. She is in jail for poisoning her husband. This crime does not seem to have affected her spirits, but her singing has depressed the Chinese in jail to a marked extent. It might be a good idea to bring her down here (San Francisco) and let her try her powers on our gang of unhanged murderers ... By all means let us have them sung to death (San Francisco Chronicle).
120 Years Ago
Birth: The wife of Charles Slingerland of Shaw’s Hot Springs presented him with a girl, and Charles is consequently happy. This shows the beneficial results of the Hot Springs.
70 Years Ago
Putting on the dog collar: The teen crowd has been wearing dog and cat collars of all sorts as accessories — from anklets to belts and necklaces. The fad carries on, and here are new angles: wear your dog collar on your left ankle if you’re going steady. Boys are attaching their long watch chains to their partner’s dog collar anklets to discourage cut-ins when dancing. Three dog collars fastened together make a belt, and girls can wear it over their skirt waistband with tuck-in blouses.
50 Years Ago
Photo caption: Family of eight practice survival — Mr. and Mrs. Bill O. Smith and their six children joined many local volunteers in the Civil Defense survival practice. The group spent 22 hours in a fallout shelter and ate nothing but survival rations, slept on cots, listened to air raid warning and experienced blackouts ...
30 Years Ago
Jonny Weissmuller: The world champion swimmer who won gold metals a two Olympics and came to picture fame in “Tarzan” died of a lung blockage. He was 79.
Sue Ballew is the daughter of Bill Dolan, who wrote this column for the Nevada Appeal from 1947 until his death in 2006.
