Showing posts with label Wyoming (Casper). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wyoming (Casper). Show all posts

Thursday, November 27, 2025

Friday, November 27, 1925. Hill Packing.

The Casper Tribune reported on major events of the day, but what drew my attention was the horse packing plant.  I was completely unaware that Casper had every had one.


A little digging shows the company was still in business in February 1928, and doing well enough to have a full page ad.


By that time it was then packing everything, including poultry.  Horses were still noted, however, with the reference to wild horses, "outlaws of the range".  The company advertised into the 1930s, and there were newspaper reports of it taking in huge numbers of horses.

What happened to it?

Of interest on this story, the plant was owned by Hill Milling Company, which still exists.  It's Hill's Pet Nutrition today.  Apparently in the 1930s it was a major supplier of horse meat to Europe.

The Soviet Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars.established Gostrudsberkassy, the savings bank for workers in the Soviet Union.

On the same day, the USSR and the Emirate of Afghanistan went to war over control of the island of Urta Tagay.  

The small war over the island resulted from Imperial Russian troops having to abandon the island in 1920 in order to aid the White cause, with the island, long claimed by Afghanistan, then occupied.  The fight drew the attention of western nations, and amazingly Afghanistan won.

The Reichstag approved the Locarno Treaties.

Last edition:

Thursday, November 26, 1925. Thanksgiving Day.

Saturday, November 27, 1915. Casper's Fr. McGee passes.

It was a Saturday.


An illustration by James Montgomery Flagg graced the cover of the comedic Judge, making sport of November weather, and sports.

The Saturday Evening Post just went with an illustration of contemporary beauty.


Country Gentleman had an illustration of a white turkey, but I can't find a good image of it to post.

The British government introduced legislation to restrict housing rents to their pre Great War levels  following Glasgow rent strikes.

A second KKK chapter was established in Stone Mountain, Georgia, showing the rapid growth of the racist organization.  Of note, a newspaper in Colorado that was black owned and operated campaigned on this day for keeping Birth of a Nation out of Colorado.

In Casper, a tragedy struck the local Catholic community with the death of Fr. McGee, who was just 27 years old.



I'd heard or read of Fr. McGee, but I didn't know anything about him, including that he died so young.

The local paper also reported that troops were headed to the border in light of the Second Battle of Nogales having just occured.

A rather grim photograph was taken of French soldiers gathering up battlefield dead, French and German.

Weather at Gallipoli continued to be bad.

The Great Blizzard at Gallipoli

Last edition:

Friday, November 26, 1915. Battle of Nogales.

Sunday, November 23, 2025

Monday, November 23, 1925. USS Wyoming commences an overhaul.

Today In Wyoming's History: November 231925   The USS Wyoming commences an overhaul at the New York Navy Yard.

Not wanting that to be the only item for the day, we offer the following (note, this was in error, this is a paper from 1923):


The paper noted that it was for the whole family, clean, and unbiased.  It might have been all of those things, but what a bunch of horrible news.

Note the big collection of drug charges.

A surplus store in Casper was going out of business.


The building that business occupied is still there.  It's an office building today, right between the Rib & Chop House and the Ugly Bug Fly Shop, both of which occupy old buildings that were also there, but neither of which were in operation at the time.

Rib & Chop is going out of business with the conclusion of the year.  The most famous occupant of that building was The Wonder Bar which opened in 1937 and which was a Casper institution, with ups and downs, for decades.

Last edition:  

Thursday, November 20, 2025

Thursday, November 19, 1925. First lighted high school football game.

 The first nighttime lighted football game in the US was played between Midwest and Casper.

Let There Be Light!: 1st Prep Football Night Game

Midwest was a football titan at the time.

Out Our Way for the day:

That cartoon hits hard, in a way.

Footnotes:

Yes, this was published a day late.

Last edition:

Thursday, October 30, 2025

Tuesday, October 30, 1945. Rushing the Nationalist North.

The Sheridan Press reported that the Nationalist Army, whom they reported as "regulars", were being rushed to Mongolia to fight the Communists.

That was correct.  The U.S. was aiding in that effort through air lifting.



A local brewer that no longer exists advertised in the issue:


The common belief is that most local breweries didn't survive the Great Depression, but Sherida Brewing did.  Casper Brewing did as well.

Out Our Way for this day:


This shows how rural the country remained at the time.  Out Our Way was a nationally syndicated cartoon, but you'd have to be a hunter to really understand the cartoon.  

Finally, from that front page:


Father 31?  Son 18.

That would mean the father was 13 when the son was born. . . 

Shoot, the father was well within the conscription age himself.

Last edition:

Monday, October 29, 1945. Noting the Chinese Civil War.


Thursday, September 25, 2025

Escalators.


Yesterday, we had a post featuring elevators.

I'm not hugely keen on elevators, quite frankly, and I won't take one if I can avoid it.  I used to basically figure if a building was only three stories, I was taking the stairs.  Laziness would allow me to take one up if the structure was higher than that, but I have rethought that after being in an uncontrolled elevator fall (of three stories), something that puts me in a very unique category.  

I don't recommend it.

I dislike escalators even more than elevators.

Elevators generally don't scare me, I just don't like waiting for them and I don't like being packed into them like sardines in a can.  Escalatores, on the other hand, cause me some degree of trepidation.  They always have.

When I was growing up there were three escalators in the entire State of Wyoming, and they were all in Casper.  The J. C. Penny's building downtown had one, the 1st Interstate Bank building had one, and the airport had one.  

None of those escalators are still around.  

We didn't have the occasion to use those much when I was a boy.  Occasionally I'd be with my mother when she'd go into the bank, and if she had to use the second floor, it meant taking the escalator.  She had no problem with it, but I stare at the steps coming up from the floor trying to time when to step, and it'd take me some time. The same is true for the rare occasions in which we wanted to go to the second story of Pennys, which wasn't often. Shoot, we didn't go to Penny's often at all.   And, suffice it to say, there was even less occasion to take the escalator at the airport, which lead to a second deck once used for boarding planes.

It no longer has that use.  Indeed, they hoest events, like wedding receptions there now.  You have to take the stairs, or an elevator.

As an adult, about the only place I encounter then now is at the Denver International Airport, where I don't always take them.  I no longer hesitate before getting on the escalator, but I still don't like them.

And apparently a lot of other people don't either, as there aren't as many of them here.

Escalators are on the news as Donald J. Trump walked up to an escalator at the UN building and it stopped working.  Apparently a videographer tripped a safety device, but the MAGA's are outraged and view that as sabotage.  He incorporated the incident humorlessly in his babble in front of the UN, where he also had to deliver his babble without a teleprompter due to some error on the Trump team as well

Sunday, September 7, 2025

Monday, September 7, 1925. Failed landing at Al Hoceima.

It was Labor Day.


Nolan Motors, I'd note, was still in business into the 1990s.

The Spanish Army attempted to make an amphibious landing at Alhucemas Bay at Spanish Morocco.  It was a complete and disastrous failure.

General Maurizio Ferrante Gonzaga was appointed by Prime Minister Mussolini as the Commandant-General of the Fascist Party's Voluntary Militia for National Security (MSVN),  the "Blackshirts".

British troops fired on Chinese protesters at Shanghai.

Last edition:

Saturday, September 5, 1925. Picnic Etiquette

Friday, August 15, 2025

Lex Anteinternet: Wyoming crowd boos Hageman retort that protections...

Lex Anteinternet: Wyoming crowd boos Hageman retort that protections...: Wyoming crowd boos Hageman retort that protections against greenhouse gases based on ‘false science’ : U.S. Rep. Hageman's comment didn...

And it appears she will be visiting Casper.

Dear Patrick,

 

As your Congresswoman, I will be holding a yearly town hall in every Wyoming county. I will be in Casper, Wyoming on Monday to uphold my commitment to Natrona County!

 

These town halls give me a chance to update you on what's happening in Washington, hear about the issues that concern you, and provide an open forum for you to share your ideas. Your feedback allows me to more effectively advocate on your behalf and represent the interest of Wyoming.

 

Will You Attend My Town Hall?

Taking this survey will sign you up for future news and updates from our office.

 

 

Rep. Harriet Hageman signature image

 

Tuesday, July 1, 2025

Sunday, April 13, 2025

Casper of the 1970s.

 

Casper mayor's son remembers him as an industrious leader and an unsettled father.

I don't remember this Mayor at all, but then in 1974, the year this is sort of tied to, I was eleven years old.

Still, this gives a really good glimpse at the Casper that was, even when it tries to portray the city as sort of a typical midwestern slow city, and its not a pretty picture at all.

“Casper in the ‘70s was pretty much an idyllic, all-American, apple pie, pickup truck, horse-riding, cowboy-hat-wearing type of community,” Cody said almost two months after his father died.

Charles came to Wyoming from Michigan. He shot guns and rode his motorcycle and took his kids up Casper Mountain. Under the all-Americanness, though, was the tender underbelly of a family fraying at the seams.

“He was the Hunter S. Thompson in the Casper world of mayoral politics,” Cody said of Charles. “He really was like the party mayor,” he added.

Charles spent his free time drinking, doing hard drugs and chasing women. Everything he did, he did to the fullest extent. He told Cody once that he never lost a case as a litigator. He had a “narcissistic” drive, Cody said, to be the best at what he did, even if it was at the expense of others.

On June 28, 1974, the Casper Star-Tribune reported that Charles had declared a bid for a state Senate seat as a Democrat. The mayor believed that “city and county officials are best equipped to solve impact growth problems.”

I think the "drinking, doing hard drugs and chasing women" was a lot more common amongst Casper's elite in the days than we might want to admit.  Not the slow little town some what to claim they remembers.

The author apparently went on to be a lawyer in the Southwest.

Saturday, April 5, 2025

Protests spread to Wyoming.

 


The "Hands Off" protest is a nationwide movement.  And it's showing up even in Casper, in central Wyoming.

Sunday, March 2, 2025

Blog Mirror: Drinking Wyoming: Frosty’s, A True Casper Dive Bar Proudly Serving Horrible Liquor

A Casper institution:

Drinking Wyoming: Frosty’s, A True Casper Dive Bar Proudly Serving Horrible Liquor

I used to occasionally order food through the drive through window when I was a sophomore in high school.  The cafeteria was being rebuilt at the time.

One of my aunts loved the place.  A cousin and I used to take her there for lunch. She's passed, but sometimes we still will eat there.

Tuesday, February 4, 2025

Tuesday, February 4, 1975. Prometheus

Robert Russin's Prometheus statute, which I've never liked, was placed in front of the Natrona County Library.

Russin also did the bust of Lincoln on Interstate 80 an the UW Family at the University of Wyoming.

Interesting to think that there was a time when an abstract work of art found acceptance in Central Wyoming.  I cannot imagine that occurring now.

The Haicheng earthquake killed 2,041 and injured 27,538 in Haicheng, Liaoning, China.  Warnings actually were given preceding the earthquake, perhaps saving thousands.

Edward Heath stepped down as head of the Conservative Party in favor of Margaret Thatcher.

Last edition:

Wednesday, February 3, 1915. Ottoman's held up.