130 Years Ago
February 2, 1894
Monday evening, February 5th, will undoubtedly be the gala event in the history of Alliance. On that date Alliance businesses and official men will demonstrate what they can do when it comes to celebrating important epochs in the advancement of this, the coming city of the Northwest. The Alliance-Chadron Land District will be fittingly commemorated.
125 Years Ago
February 3, 1899
E. M. Martin’s dray team demolished one of the wheels of his vehicle Monday evening, but he was on the streets again the next morning ready as usual for business.
120 Years Ago
January 29, 1904
This community was shocked and stirred to the very depth by one of the most cruel and sudden casualties that has ever marked the history of the Alliance division. The lives of three of our good citizens are blotted out without warning or the opportunity to bid a last fond adieu to dear ones. This terrible accident occurred Thursday morning, January 28th, at 5:40 less than a mile west of Broken Bow.
The three Alliance people killed all occupied the cab of the engine on No. 46.
115 Years Ago
January 29, 1909
The sixteen gentlemen comprising the first grand jury Box Butte county has ever had, adjourned Wednesday evening, after nine days of secret investigation, and during which time they held many night sessions. About twenty-five indictments were returned and have been placed in the hands of Sheriff Wiker with instructions to make the arrest forthwith. It is not possible to secure a list of these until service has been made on the accused.
110 Years Ago
January 30, 1914
Messrs. Moist and Sallows, editors and proprietors of the Alliance Semi-Weekly Times, take pleasure in announcing to the people of Alliance and Western Nebraska, the purchase of the newest and most up-to-date type setting machine on the market today, the Merganthaler Standard Linotype No. 8. The contract was closed on Monday of this week and the manufacturers agree to ship it from New York and have it set up and in operation, within three weeks. The cost of the machine, together with the necessary motor, freight charges, cost of installation, extra devices not included into contract price, type metal is almost exactly $4,000.
105 Years Ago
January 31, 1919
He came into the First National Bank and looked around, evidently pleased with what he saw. The young man at the window smiled a becoming smile and asked if anything could be done to please him. “Yes,” replied the stranger. “I want to open an account here,” and he presented a fair-sized draft on the Big Timber, Mont., bank. “A checking account; you see I am here to attend the Lincoln automobile school and I will want to use it for my expenses.” “If you are going to attend the Lincoln auto school, why don’t you open an account in Lincoln?” asked the clerk. “Isn’t this Lincoln?” asked the astonished young man from Big Timer. He was told that this was Alliance, not Lincoln. He bounded out of the bank and ran down the street to the depot in an effort to catch the train that would have carried him on to the state capitol. It had gone and taken his ticket with it. “I wish there was an auto school here—I like this place,” he said.
100 Years Ago
January 29, 1924
A crimp was put in the practice of stealing from the farms northeast of Alliance, when I. L. Wheeler, hired man on the John R. Lawrence place, wounded a prowler with a charge of buckshot from a shotgun shortly after dark last night. That his aim was true was evidenced by a trail of blood around the barn to the spot where the men left their horses when they entered the barn.
95 Years Ago
January 29, 1929
Whether western Nebraska will secure any more state highway building will depend upon the fate of the four-cent gasoline tax measure now before the state legislature at Lincoln, stated E. D. Mallery in a talk before the Chamber of Commerce yesterday. The funds received from the present two-cent gas are absorbed in maintenance work, leaving nothing for continuing the state highway construction program as originally outlined.
90 Years Ago
January 30, 1934
This week’s CWA and CWS payday in Box Butte county on Thursday will move the total of federal funds which have been fed into the county for relief projected well over $30,000 according to totals available today in the office of Lloyd Mitchell, CWA supervisor for the county. The $30,000 total gives rise to some speculation as to just what this county would have done without federal relief this winter.
85 Years Ago
January 31, 1939
When the new light plant goes into service in August there should be a net earning of more than $100,000 a year. The city proposes to pay $30,000 a year on the bonds, leaving a net of something like $70,000 but no reduction in present burdensome rates is planned at that time. For the past 20 years the city has charged exorbitant rates for power, heat and lights and has used these earnings to pay off general obligation bonds and otherwise operate the city at the expense of electric customers. Now, with a new plant under construction, they do not propose to reduce rates a penny this year.
80 Years Ago
January 28, 1944
Alliance is “sitting pretty” in the post-war development program of aviation, according to City Manager C. H. Hoper, who, with Rex Myers, manager of the Municipal airport, returned last night from the aviation conference in Kansas City. Mr. Hoper will prepare a detailed report of his findings at the conference and will submit this to the council at an early date.
75 Years Ago
January 28, 1949
Frigid weather on the night of Jan. 16 is the only thing that kept a hardened criminal from escaping from the Box Butte county jail. The man, William Edgar Zurfluh, 20, could have had his choice of the sheriff’s guns to take with him, had he chosen to brave the cold.
70 Years Ago
January 30, 1954
Interior inspections of Alliance homes by Doane Agricultural Co. appraisers will begin either Monday or Tuesday, Jack Lay, supervisor said today. The reappraisal of all city and farm property in Box Butte County was ordered by the Board of Commissioners several months ago in an effort to correct inequalities in tax assessment.
65 Years Ago
January 31, 1959
Petitions are being circulated in Alliance for three businessmen who may become candidates for the Alliance Board of Education. The petitions being circulated would nominate Howard Wiseman, V. E. Lierk and Lyle Stephens for two available vacancies.
60 Years Ago
January 31, 1964
Miss Ruth Mitchell, a missionary nurse for the Seventh Day Adventist Church, is visiting at the Dr. Robert W. Bowen home in Alliance this week. She has just returned to the United States after spending four years at a 100-bed Adventist hospital in Karachi Pakistan. Her next duty will be at the new 400-bed Charles F. Kettering Memorial Hospital in Dayton, Ohio.
55 Years Ago
January 31, 1969
In a 45-minute long meeting Thursday evening the Alliance City Council repealed a food handlers ordinance, approved by resolution an Alliance-Box Butte County Civil Defense Agency and by motion the renewal of the Tower Plaza Trailer House Community license.
50 Years Ago
January 30, 1974
A door-to-door survey will be conducted Feb. 17-23 in Alliance to determine the community’s housing needs. The survey is being organized and conducted by the City of Alliance with technical assistance provided by the State Department of Economic Development and its field services representative, Patrick J. Mulloy of Scottsbluff.
45 Years Ago
January 31, 1979
Discussions of county roads and winter weather complications continued as dominant topics during a regular meeting of the Box Butte County commissioners Tuesday afternoon.
40 Years Ago
January 31, 1984
In 1983, there were 58 city fire calls, compared to 67 in the previous year, according to year-end statistics released by the fire department. The Alliance Area Fire and Emergency Center received 78 more calls in 1983 than in 1982, according to figures.
35 Years Ago
January 31, 1989
Alliance Airport Manager Lyle Lacy and others are expected to assess the damage at the Alliance Airport Terminal building this afternoon. The damage was caused by a Sunday afternoon fire.
30 Years Ago
January 31, 1994
Box Butte County Deputy Sheriff Jim Pittman has submitted his resignation, effective Feb. 1. Pittman is resigning due to ill health. He has been employed by the Sheriff’s Department for 15 years.
25 Years Ago
January 30, 1999
David Hicks, 13, an Alliance Times-Herald paper carrier, and his friend Brandon Grubbs, 12, were delivering papers at Good Samaritan Village on Thursday, Jan. 21, when they noticed Erma Roller, 74, frantically beckoning them from her doorway. She said that she had terrible pains here (in her chest), and that she couldn’t breathe,” said Grubbs. “We ran across the street and told the nurses,” Hicks said. “And then we ran back to stay with her until help came.”
20 Years Ago
January 30, 2004
Kelly L. Baldwin, 33, was sentenced in Box Butte County Court yesterday to one year with the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services at York for a probation violation. Baldwin had originally been charged with theft, a Class III felony, for taking $4,000 from Keep Alliance Beautiful while she was the executive director of the organization.
15 Years Ago
January 31, 2009
January is cervical cancer awareness month. According to information from the National Cervical Cancer Coalition (NCCC), about 10,000 American women will learn they have cervical cancer or human papillomavirus (HPV), a virus that is a single known cause of cervical cancer. Alliance Police Investigator Colleen Busch was diagnosed with cervical cancer Dec. 21, 2007. Busch said the scariest thing at the time of her diagnosis was that she was about eight to 10 weeks pregnant as well.
10 Years Ago
January 30, 2014
The Box Butte County Courthouse will be 100 years old in December, noted Judy Messersmith, Box Butte County Clerk, and therefore, due to time and usage of the building, it has been made apparent the need of assessment and improvements. The County Commissioners discussed the need for an assessment and a plan for improvements during their November meeting and passed a motion to approve the project to move forward, enlisting Berggren Architects from Lincoln to perform the job.
5 Years Ago
February 2, 2019
North on Highway 87, just across the Sheridan County line, firefighters from Hay Springs battled a blaze driven by high winds on Tuesday afternoon. According to Hay Springs Fire Department Chief Craig Housh, the report of the fire came in around 1:15 p.m. on Tuesday.