100 years ago, 1915
Crows are flying north. Early strawberries are delicious. Country roads are getting miry. Pretty dusty for the spring house-cleaner. April Fool!

50 years ago, 1965
The manager of the Lewiston branch of the Maine Employment Security Commission last night told members of les Vigalants that the Lewiston-Auburn Metropolitan Area must create a total of 2,742 new jobs this year if the area is to achieve a healthy economic growth. Paul E. Belanger, addressing the club at its regular monthly meeting held at Friends Hall, stated that “The Lewiston-Auburn Metropolitan area, which includes the three Lisbons, has suffered a continuous deterioration in its labor market since 1958.

25 years ago, 1990
They are the lost, the stolen, the abandoned. They are the bruised, the battered and the beaten. They are bicycles without a home, sheltered temporarily at the Auburn police station garage where they hang from the ceiling. They’ve been fished out of the river, pulled out of the gutter and plucked off people’s lawns — more than 100 of them. “We really start getting a lot of them beginning in the fall and leading up to Christmas,” quipped Lt. Richard Keene of the traffic division, speculating that some are intentionally abandoned. “Some kids want new bikes for Christmas.” Next September, however, many of these old bikes will find new homes. That’s the month the police are planning on holding a bicycle auction. They can’t hold one any sooner because, by state law, the old bikes must languish for a while and can be auctioned no sooner than five months after a list has been published in the legal notices of the local newspaper. That list appeared two weeks ago. “We haven’t had an auction for about two years,” Keene said. “We usually pick up about 50 bikes a year that don’t get claimed. A lot will be picked up on the short term, for violations, then given back.” The rest enter bicycle limbo and wait.

The material in Looking Back is reproduced exactly as it originally appeared, although misspellings and errors made at that time may be edited.

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