Two Auburn young men canoed up the lovely Nezinscot in Turner Sunday as far as Buckfield and drove to Streaked Mountain. The river, tho low, looked its prettiest, flowing lazily thru the forest of autumn leaves. The view from Streaked disclosed the forest fires in this section of the state. The one near No Name Pond, Lewiston, cast a blanket of smoke over the whole eastern horizon. A much smaller one was burning in the vicinity of Oxford. Rumors of a large fire on Black Mountain could not be verified by the appearance of smoke.

The return trip down the river was made after dark, and the sky being overcast with heavy clouds hanging low, the night was as black as they make ’em.

50 years ago, 1958

Lewiston firemen are going to be using a different type of mitten when out on call during the cold months ahead. The Fire Commission has given Chief Roland G. Dumais authority to buy a pair of new rubber mittens for each member of the department. These will replace the leather mittens with the wool inserts which the firefighters have been using.

The rubber-covered mittens, to be used for the first time here, although they are not new to fire fighting services, have a definite advantage over the old type in that they don’t become soaked and freeze up during cold fire fighting conditions, according to Chief Dumais.

25 years ago, 1983

Jail overcrowding, at least in Androscoggin County, is not related to an increase in crime, according to Sheriff Joseph P. Laliberte.

Laliberte has compiled statistics that show the population of the Androscoggin County Jail has continually increased over the last three years, while the number of crimes reported to police in the county dropped by 4 percent. Laliberte maintains that the reason for the continued growth in jail population is that the general population of Androscoggin County has also grown.

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