ONE YEAR AGO
• Canyon Ski Area, one of Central Alberta’s most prized recreation areas, could close forever because no solid offer to purchase the hill had been made. Lorraine Martinek, one of the eight owners of Canyon, announced the Red Deer area hill would close at the end of its 42nd ski season if a new owner/operator wasn’t found.
• Two men and a 13-year-old boy, all from Sundre, were charged with shooting and killing a wild horse. Charges were also pending against a 35-year-old man from Calgary, RCMP said Wednesday. The charges were laid as part of an ongoing joint investigation by RCMP in Sundre and Didsbury, and K Division’s livestock section.
FIVE YEARS AGO
• Central Alberta non-profit and commercial retailers anticipated more dollars would come their way from local residents eager to share some of the $400-bonus they had received in their mailboxes from the surplus-rich Alberta government.
• A CBC-TV crew came calling to Eckville to film a segment for the Kraft Hockeyville series. More than 100 fans packed the stands to watch the hometown peewee team tangle in a tournament game with a team from Castor.
10 YEARS AGO
• The Alberta SPCA declined to charge anyone with animal abuse after 194 cattle died at a Ponoka-area feedlot. A veterinarian’s report concluded an “inadvertent” change in feeding rations killed the cattle. Former feedlot manager Rick Bonnett and the receivers, Deloitte and Touche of Calgary, had blamed each other for the deaths.
• The City of Red Deer’s municipal planning commission gave a greenlight to a 40-bed detox centre and shelter program. But some neighbourhood residents and business owners continued to protest plans to locate the centre at a site across from the Saputo dairy plant.
25 YEARS AGO
• A 20-year master plan for Red Deer Industrial Airport called for a tower, fire hall and lengthened runways to handle medium-sized jetliners. The plan, unveiled by federal-provincial authorities and approved by the Red Deer airport commission, called for $2.5 million to improvements over the next two decades. On advice from the city, the airport commission amended the plan to facilitate water and sewage services for a projected air park, a commercial area comprising aircraft-related businesses in the southeast are.
• A uniquely smooth style of western dancing was sweeping Central Alberta. It was called East Texas dancing and unlike most arm-pumping western two-steps, it was not bouncy. “Texas or western style dancing is really, appealing to people,” said dance instructor Ellie Braun of Innisfail. “Maybe it’s because the cowboy is the last touch with the romantic west.” Whatever the reason, East Texas dancing had captured the imaginations of Central Alberta dancers.
50 YEARS AGO
• Central Alberta should start to boost tourism in the area, the provincial president of the Junior Chamber of Commerce said in Red Deer. President Dave Pogue of Calgary said in an interview, “Boosting the tourist trade is the greatest single need of Central Alberta.” “It is a big job. It needs the co-ordinated effort of all Central Alberta’s communities.” “A co-ordinated drive for tourists should have been started years ago.”
• A full-time Juvenile and Family court system would be established in Red Deer the Advocate learned. In a telephone interview with J.A. Cameron of Edmonton, superintendent of the Juvenile offenders’ Branch, it was confirmed that the courts would be set up within the city Court House to be operated separately from the existing magistrate system. Mr. Cameron told the Advocate that a chief probation officer and full-time Juvenile and Family court judge would be appointed to head the new facilities.
90 YEARS AGO
• The G.W.V.A. held a complimentary luncheon and smoker to be tendered to Provincial President Comrade W. J. Botterill, thus (Friday) evening to the Armouries. A good programme of old trench songs and others had been arranged. All returned men in the district were invited.
• Mr. F. W. Denison, an esteemed resident of the Edwell district, had a sudden call on Tuesday afternoon. He had stepped out to saw some wood, and fell over the sawhorse — dead.
He had been warned some eight years ago that his end would probably come that way, and he has practically been living under sentence of death ever since.
The shock of finding him dead was none the less a sore blow to Mrs. Denison, and to the grandson living with them, Mr. Victor Ellis. Mr. and Mrs. Denison came to Edwell some 20 ago from Port Credit, Ont. and has farmed there ever since. He was a member of the Church of England, and was buried at the Pine Lake cemetery.
Rev. Mr. Fraser conducting the service in the absence of a Church of England clergyman. Mr. Denison was survived by his widow: none of his children were living. Coroner Dr. George found that death was due to natural causes.
100 YEARS AGO
• The Town of Red Deer purchased the Exhibition Park property for $10,000, the amount still owing on it by the Red Deer Exhibition Association and the Red Deer Agricultural Society.