100 years ago, 1917
“At the time of the Spanish war,” remarked a Lewiston woman Sunday, “my husband hung out the flag and declared as he did so that it would stay out until the war ended, and it did.” The Stars and Stripes float from the same house today.

50 years ago, 1967
The first public folk Mass to be held in northern New England will be held tomorrow afternoon at St. Joseph’s School Auditorium under the sponsorship of the Newman Club of Bates College. Dennis Albert, a spokesman for the Bates organization, said the public is invited to attend the mass which will be said by Rev. Francis Kane of St. Joseph’s Church. The musical program for the Mass includes the Entrance to the tune of “Michael, Row Your Boat”; the Offertory to the tune of “Five Hundred Miles”; and ‘Kumbaya”; Communion Hymn to the tune of “Blowing in the Wind”; Communion Hymn No. 2 to the tune of “Where Have All the Flowers Gone”; and the Recessional Hymn to the tune of “We Shall Overcome.”

25 years ago, 1992
For years, the 5-foot space between the original ceiling and newer dropped ceiling at Webster Intermediate School was much better lit than the classrooms below. While students and teachers worked in a dimness they came to accept as normal, most of the light produced by the building’s 1916-vintage electrical fixtures was illuminating the sealed-off space over-head. The waste was the result of an apparently ill-conceived renovation of the 1970s. “When the energy crunch hit in the late 70s, three-quarters of the windows in each classroom were boarded but the lighting was never changed,” School Department Business Manager Jude Cyr explained. When a suspended ceiling was put in, the fixtures weren’t adapted adequately, “so a lot of light diffusion was above the new ceiling.” New, effectively installed lighting fixtures have brightened the building considerably.

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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