100 years ago, 1916
Dr. J. A. Ness of Maple Grove farm, Auburn; A. B. Ricker of Poland Spring and Dr. Owen Smith of Portland left Saturday afternoon for Springfield, Mass., to attend the big banquet which will be held in that city Monday evening in the interests of the National Dairy show. A mass meeting will be held before the banquet. A big campaign will be started at once and boomed until the opening of the show which should mean so much to New England.

50 years ago, 1966
Mechanics of the Lewiston Public Works Department are busy checking out a large heavy-duty four-wheel drive snowplow which arrived in the city this week. A PWD spokesman reported today that the Oshkosh vehicle cost $21,295. It will join the army of city-owned vehicles as the heaviest and strongest plow. Public Works personnel are installing a “V” type plow and two wing plows on the vehicle. One feature of the vehicle is positive traction, which does not allow any of the four driving wheels to slip or lose traction. The city owns one other Oshkosh plow which is approximately 24 years old.

25 years ago, 1991
A Bates College effort to help female troops in the Persian Gulf War is taking off with a first shipment of soaps, skin conditioners and other personal care products bound for Saudi Arabia today. “When the whole war started everybody was really upset. My feeling was that everybody, myself included, felt really helpless,” said Bates Assistant Psychology Professor Elaine Makas, the organizer of TLC Lift. “Our largest response has been from the staff but the students are getting involved,” said Patricia McCracken, a Bates senior who works as the project’s student coordinator. “It’s become a unified campus effort.”

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