Skip to content

LOOKBACK: Deaths of four young people 10 years ago stunned Sylvan residents

Time ran out for Mirror School. Wolf Creek Public Schools trustees voted unanimously to close the school because of dwindling enrolment and high operating costs.

ONE YEAR AGO

• Time ran out for Mirror School. Wolf Creek Public Schools trustees voted unanimously to close the school because of dwindling enrolment and high operating costs. Beginning in September most students from the kindergarten to Grade 8 school would be bused to Alix, about 15 minutes away. Trustee Donna Peterson said the community tried its best to boost enrolment.

• Disciplinary action was underway for a city employee who mistreated a porcupine after he brought it into a city department and tied it up. City Manager Craig Curtis said a thorough investigation was conducted by the city’s Human Resources department in collaboration with the Electric Light and Power department and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. The investigation revealed that a porcupine was brought into the light and power department on March 16.

FIVE YEARS AGO

• Red Deer College announced it would trim its theatre studies costume program to cut costs. The 22 students in the 10-year-old program vowed not to go down without a fight

• Early autopsy results failed to pinpoint what killed a frenzied man who stopped breathing during an arrest in Rocky Mountain House. Teddy James Meiorin was the third person to die in police custody in Rocky since February 2000.

10 YEARS AGO

• The tragic deaths of four young people in two weeks stunned Sylvan Lake residents. Nicole Marie Selvidge, 8; Amanda Thompson, 20; Christopher Shaun Faber, 22; and Stephan Egli, 20, died in a string of coincidental accidents. A grief support group started by the ministerial association the year before helped residents mourn.

• A backhoe smashed through the last obstacle to the $1.4 million-expansion of the Central Alberta Women’s Emergency Shelter. An aging bungalow was razed.

25 YEARS AGO

• Council agreed to expropriate land in the path of the 67th Street Bridge project after months of negotiations with the owners failed to reach a selling price. City solicitor Tom Chapman said the city would send a notice of intent to expropriate to the landowners Al, Harry and Gerald Boomer. Council negotiated more than six months to acquire about three acres of land from the Boomers for the $17-million bridge project.

• Stockwell Day gambled and won as he seized the provincial nomination in Red Deer North on the first ballot. “I have gambled; I have put it all on the line,” he told 802 delegates at the Capri Centre.

50 YEARS AGO

• Don Messer and his Islanders stepped from a bus Thursday to be greeted by a highland reception at the Golden Matador. Piper Don MacArthur and six charming dancers from the Highland Dancing Association brought enthusiastic response from the group of 30 entertainers. It was an important event in the lives of dancers Judy Heisz, Penny Bill, Arlene Lupul, Jeanie Harvie, Dale Carter and Patty McEachren, and as expected, jovial Charlie Chamberlain mimicked the fling as he made he was to the main entrance.

90 YEARS AGO

• Manager Kenealy and the Telephone staff at Red Deer did the agreeable to their many friends at the Oddfellows hall on Thursday night, when a party of eighty or more thoroughly enjoyed their hospitality in the way of cards, dancing and refreshments. Miss Bone, Mr. Bone and Mr. Hurley most acceptably supplied the music. The whole party hope to see another successful event of the kind next winter.

• Through the courtesy of G. W. V. A. officers and Executive, and with the co-operation of Major Briscoe and other officers of the local militia, the Indoor Baseball League got off to a fine start and the armories, especially on Monday night, when the High and Public School rooters were in great evidence, were almost every evening the scene of interesting and amusing games. The players were somewhat green at the game yet, and the slippery floor was a terror for the runners and fielders, but practice would soon bring these obstacles into line.

100 YEARS AGO

• The first election of councillors for the Village of North Red Deer was held. W. Webb got 23 votes, L. Brennan 16 votes, and Steele (no initial or first name provided) three votes.

• Charlie Wong, who advertised himself as “a Chinaman with a high and holy passion for giving good service,” opened a restaurant on Ross Street.