100 years ago
Oct. 14, 1921
• PRESCOTT--Tar being heated on the kitchen stove by workmen to be used in repairing a roof, boiled over setting fire to and destroying the residence of Dio Lewis on East Main Street this afternoon. The two story residence of J. M. Kinser, adjoining, was also destroyed. Value of the property was about $10,000 partially insured. Efficient work of the firemen saved buildings close by, including the Park hotel, Park sanitarium, Catholic church, and residence of Jack Johnson, editor of Prescott Daily News. The residence of B. A. Hamilton caught fire from ciders five blocks away, but was saved.
50 years ago
Oct. 14, 1971
• OZARK--Lawrence McCalhan, junior high school teacher at Ozark, has been charged with assault and battery in the spanking of Robby Haynes, 13. According to court records, the spanking occurred September 23. The case will be heard Friday before Justice of the Peace Carl Caulk. School superintendent Lee Yarbrough said that the School Board supported the teacher's action but had voted to put McCalhan on probation because he failed to have another adult present when the padding took place.
25 years ago
Oct. 14, 1996
• BLYTHEVILLE --Most residents slept through an earthquake that sent tremors through the city about an hour before sunrise Sunday. Neither the Mississippi County sheriff's office nor the Fire Department reported any distress calls, and Blytheville Baptist Memorial Hospital said no one had been admitted with quake-related injuries. Frank Baldwin, a physical science technician with the U.S. Geological Survey's National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo., said earthquakes of such low magnitude rarely cause damage. "Well if you were standing on it, you would feel it," he said. "It might rattle a dish or two, but it is certainly no cause for alarm." Baldwin said small quakes are common along the New Madrid fault that runs from Cairo, Ill., to Marked Tree, about 46 miles from Blytheville. The 2.8 magnitude quake hit at 6:11 a.m.
10 years ago
Oct. 14, 2011
• Two people got more money from educational institutions than they should have, according to audit reports reviewed Thursday by the Legislative Joint Auditing Committee's Committee on Educational Institutions. Committee members voted to report both instances to prosecuting attorneys. The audit of Southeast Arkansas College in Pine Bluff found that Human Resources Specialist Margaret Taylor had entered her salary as $30,713, when she was approved for a salary of only $27,347. According to the audit, she was overpaid $2,459 between July 2009 and March 2010. She was fired June 12, 2010. An audit of the Covenant Keepers College Preparatory Charter School in Little Rock found that an employee, the son of a School Board member, received a $7,400 raise without the Arkansas education commissioner's approval.