100 years ago, 1917
The upwards or 50,000 people who are now busy in Lewiston and Auburn will be glad to hear that the new Cushman-Hollis factory is practically completed, and will begin next week turning out 30,000 pairs of shoes per day. Enough shoes are produced in Auburn every week to shoe every man, woman and child in all of Maine. The gigantic development of the Auburn shoe industry is one of the happy signs of the times. Some factories start on double shift next week. Delay completing the Cushman-Hollis factory has been due to delay in getting materials to work with.

50 years ago, 1967
(Photo Caption) The new ultra-modern Northwood Park Cinema holding up to 1000 persons is scheduled for opening in mid-February. The theater, located in a former bowling establishment, will have pushback seats designed for both retraction and pushback movement providing 25 per cent more room than found in conventional seating arrangements. The walls and ceiling are of corrugated aluminum backed with fiberglass and the latest in sound equipment will be utilized. Here’s an overall shot of the seats now in place in the former bowling establishment.

25 years ago, 1992
The score: Vandals, 2; Coutures, 1. After losing two mailboxes to vandals over the past few years, Gerard and Ruth Couture of Lisbon decided to strike back in the game known as “mailbox baseball” — one that is regularly played out in rural communities all over Maine. So when a pair of vandals wielding baseball bats tried to pick off the Couture’s mailbox earlier this month, they were met with some resistance. While Couture’s red, barn-shaped mailbox looks like the ordinary plastic variety found in hardware stores, it’s deceptive. The big difference is that it’s made of ¼ inch steel plate and weighs 65 pounds. And that’s sturdy enough to withstand drive-by beatings with a baseball bat and send the basher home with sore and swollen hands.

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