100 Years Ago: 1924
“If Wilton village and Bridgton village are not twins in scenic attractions and general appearance, I’ll leave to anyone,” declared a visitor there recently. “Both have thrifty business houses on a side hill, a lake close at hand and plenty of mountain scenery in the distance. But the view across Wilson Lake suggests that across Lake Pennesseewassee at Norway, with the lake surface somewhat reduced and the hills somewhat enlarged.”
50 Years Ago: 1974
Three Lewiston youngsters flirted with death Monday afternoon when they sloshed along the top of the dam at Lewiston Falls removing and discarding heavy pins holding flash board in place on top of the dam.
One of the lads, a 13-year-old, was nabbed by William M. Grove, Union Water Power Co. agent engineer, who noticed the trio while driving across North Bridge. The lad was taken to the Auburn police station.
According to Grove, several of the pins were removed causing water to pour over the top of the dam because of the loosening of the flash boards.
25 Years Ago: 1999
When 17-year-old Ryan Bridges of Auburn opened his Dr Pepper bottle and peeked under the cap, he thought he’d just won a toy car.
It read “winner race car.”
Then he peeled away the bottle’s label. It said the same thing. And it pictured a 1999 Chevy, painted and polished for NASCAR.
“I started breathing real hard,” Bridges said Thursday. He’d been working as a groundskeeper at Beaver Brook Campground in North Monmouth and spent a dollar on a 20-ounce soda.
It was a soda he never drank. …and he called his parents, Peter and Laurie Gambino, who didn’t believe him when he told them he won a race car. But he opted for cash instead of the car.
On Thursday, about two months after Bridges found the cap, executives from Dr Pepper and Auburn soda bottler Seltzer & Rydholm instead gave him a $25,000 check, his choice over the shiny, red-and-black Monte Carlo valued at the same amount.
The material used in Looking Back is produced exactly as it originally appeared although misspellings and errors may be corrected.
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