This Week in Odessa History

100 years ago

Mar. 25, 1921

At a meeting of the executive committee of the Lincoln and Adams County Pioneer and Hostorical Association appointed sub-committees and made plans for the 29th annual pioneer picnic and fair on the association grounds at Crab Creek to be held June 21, 22 and 23. The committee is planning for five horse races each day with a $150 minimum purse for each race. There will also be athletic contests, band concerts, side shows and other concessions, talks by prominent pioneers, airplane stunts and a grand windup ball at the dance pavilion. The old Crab Creek post office building, built in 1871, will be moved to the grounds and made into a restroom for the pioneers. More than 300 tents were pitched on the camping grounds last year, and arrangements are being made to accommodate that many again this year.

Superintendent E.R. Jinnett received the final standings of the different teams that entered the high school debars for this section of the state. There were 12 entries and of those only two schools, Odessa and Reardan, won four straight debates, but Odessa was awarded the championship on points, having won 11 out of a possible 12 points, a feat that has not before been approached in this district in the history of high school debating.

75 years ago

Mar. 28, 1946

Property changed hands in Odessa recently, with Henry Michaelsen, Jr. purchasing a building lot just east of the new Jacob Walter, Jr. home from W.C. Raugust. Mrs. Con Schauerman sold her former residence to Mr. and Mrs. Carl Dammel. Building permits have also been issued to John Berreth for construction of a new home, to Leon Walter for additions and alterations to his present home and to Mrs. Amelia Finkbeiner for an addition to her home. Basements have also been dug on lots where houses are planned by Gies Brothers, A.J. Luiten, John Hopp, Jr. and Mrs. Erna Roberts.

Grain elevators in the area are being unloaded steadily ass the huge export demand continues. The Jantz and Lauer elevators of the Odessa Union are entirely empty, the Lauer structure for the first time in 15 years. The Odessa Trading Company’s elevators at Moody and Wheeler are practically empty and all elevators of both companies are expected to be empty by harvest. This will provide 2 million bushels of capacity in the Odessa Union’s warehouses and 620,000 of storage in OTC’s plants.

50 years ago

Mar. 25, 1971.

Odessa music students rate high at Bi-County festival. Odessa students oplaced second in total ratings in the Bi-County Solo and Ensemble session at Sprague Saturday with eight superiors and 10 excellents, according to music instructors Karen Williams and Gilbert Good. Superior ratings went to the Lied Singers, Boys Double Quartet, Girls Quartet, Vocal Duet (Jennifer Beck and Steve Horak, Vocal Solo (Steve Horak), Clarinet Quartet, Brass Sextet and Sax Trio.

Spring sports were set to begin, with the school offering tennis, coached by Dick Green and Elizabeth Dorsey; boys track, coached by Lee Boyk; girls track, coached by Karen Williams and baseball, (no coach’s name stated).

25 years ago

Mar. 28, 1996

Odessa Pride Day, the town’s annual cleanup day, is ready to roll on March 29. Students from elementary through high school and the staff and faculty of the Odessa schools will participate in the event, sponsored jointly by the Town of Odessa, the Odessa Chamber of Commerce and the school. Sprucing up the town will be a day-long effort, beginning shortly after students report for classes in the morning. Junio and senior high school students fan out throughout the community to load onto trucks refuse and tree branches and other trash to be hauled to the old town dump at no charge to residents. Elementary pupils will pick up litter at Finney Field, on the school grounds and other public places.