100, 75, 50 and 25 year history for Odessa

100 years ago

The Odessa Record

December 21, 1919

News updates: Odessa high school won its second start of the debate series by winning from Wenatchee high school. Helen Michaelsen, William Huber and Frank Schy were the team.

The Rev. J. Charles Evans and T. J. McDermott Jr., have been named as census takers, to start after the first of the year.

O. E. Finstad has purchased the Davies store and it will be known as Ole’s place.

The cold wave which up to Monday caused the temperatures to range from 24 to 14 below, broke Tuesday and today the reading is 17 above.

No one in the community can buy fuel without a permit from the fuel committee, F. J. Guth, Fred Theil and W. L. Michaelsen, and must affirm that he has on hand less than a six day supply.

Otto V. Reich returned from Harrington where he was employed at the Harrington Manufacturing company, which closed for lack of fuel.

Jake Gettman has sold his farming outfit to his brother, George Gettman, and is moving to Portland.

Mr. and Mrs. Otto Weber arrived from Chester, Mont., to spend the holidays.

Miss Gladys Finney, who has been the stenographer in the Nevins office, left for Whitefish, Mont., to take a position in a bank.

A group of 15 men held a rabbit drive Thursday and got a full wagon load of “jacks.”

Mr. and Mrs. George Zicha are spending two weeks visiting at the Will Cordes home in Davenport.

Two of the rural schools have been forced to close because of the fuel shortage.

75 years ago

The Odessa Record

December 21, 1944

Twin boys born: Twin boys were born to Mr. and Mrs. Herb Burghard at the Sacred Heart hospital at Spokane on Tuesday.

Horace G. Engle killed in action: Horace G. (Stub) Engle was killed in action in France on December 3 it was revealed in a telegram from the war department to his parents, Mr. and Mrs. G. E. Engle, received on Sunday.

Engle, who was born October 25, 1913, at Marlin, was inducted into the army March 21, 1942, and spent most of his training period in California. He went to the European sector in June 1944, and was in several major battles, receiving the expert infantry medal and the purple heart for wounds in action in October.

Survivors include his parents; his wife, Hazel, and infant daughter, Irene, and eight brothers, five in the services; Dick, a druggist at Palmer, Alaska; Pfc. Forrest, with the signal corps in the Philippines; Roy, Marlin; Don, Portland; Pvt. Jimmie, Camp Wolters, Texas; Bobbie, RM 2/c in the navy at Treasure Island, Calif .; Sgt. Harvey, quartermaster corps in India, and Fay, S 2/c, in the navy, on duty somewhere out of San Francisco.

Surprise parents on wedding anniversary: The 55th wedding anniversary of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Schmidt Sr. was observed with a surprise party on Sunday. The surprise was complete, two of the daughters preparing an anniversary dinner while a portion of the group and the honor guests were in church. A breakfast set was given as the gift.

Those present were the Rev. and Mrs. J. P. Flemmer and Florence; Mr. and Mrs. Dan Mann, Sprague; Mr. and Mrs. Henry P. Wacker and Delmar, Don and Doris; Mr. and Mrs. Fred Schmidt and Clarence. Rev. Flemmer delivered a short anniversary address.

50 years ago

The Odessa Record

December 18, 1969

State to re-call water well bid: The state will again call for bids to drill its first test-observation well seven miles south of Odessa. No bids were submitted at the initial bid opening on December 3, according to the Department of Water Resources. The new bid opening date is set for January 6 in Olympia by the Department of General Administration.

The well will be drilled for the Department of Water Resources. The purpose of the non-production well is to monitor ground-water availability, determine yields, and gather other hydrologic and geologic information in the area.

The well will be the first under direct control and ownership of the state. The 1969 legislature authorized the test well program, which eventually will establish a network throughout the state for collecting vital water-resource data.

The well site is on a state-owned land near State Highway 21. According to preliminary plans the well will be the first to be drilled in the Odessa-Lind declining water table area.

Tentative plans call for the first well to reach a depth of 750 feet. As the drilling proceeds, pump tests will be made, samples taken and monitoring equipment installed at each important aquifer of water-bearing strata.

Water from the well will not be used for domestic, agricultural or other purposes. The project will be assisted by the U. S. Geological Survey.

Injured in school lab experiment preparation: Tom Franz, Odessa high school senior, was injured Thursday while working in the school science lab. A preparation being mixed exploded, suddenly, with glass from the broken container being driven into his left hand and abdomen.

The student was hospitalized until Friday evening. The glass particles were removed from his skin at the hospital.

Tom had prepared a similar mixture of chemicals to be used by the class instructor, Mr. Murchie, in experiments the following day, it is reported. The accident occurred when a second group of chemicals were being mixed. Others in the immediate area felt the impact of the explosion but were not injured. Some damage occurred in the lab.

Christmas concert will be held on Monday evening: The annual Christmas concert of the Odessa school music department, under the direction of George M. Roper, will be held next Monday evening, December 22, at 8:00 in the new gymnasium.

Participating in the program will be the entire music department, grades 1 through 12, it is reported. Opening the concert will be a combined choral number, “Joy to the World,” with the assistance of a brass quartet consisting of Virginia Franz and Steve Larson on trumpets, Steve Horak on trombone and Tom Franz on baritone.

Other numbers will be the 4th grades playing “Jingle Bells” on their flutophones, and the 6th grade band playing a medley of two Christmas songs.

A special feature, according to the director, will be the combined elementary school chorus singing two songs in German, “O Tannenbaum,” and, with the addition of the high school choir, “Stille Nacht.”

Student conductor Neil Jeske will direct the junior high band in one selection, “Three Songs for Christmas.”

The concert is open to the public. There will not be an admission charge.

25 years ago

The Odessa Record

December 22, 1994

Council, county to talk about cesspools: The Odessa Record’s report in this series on December 8 of federal and state regulations which are in store for sewers and septic systems caused concern among members of the Odessa Town Council.

New standards have been set for existing sewers, making it necessary for many cities and towns in eastern Washington to spend millions to update their systems. So far, the regulations have not affected Odessa, but on January 1, just 10 days away, the on-site sewage regulation will become effective. It will require a sand filter for residential septic systems in areas of coarse gravel and rocky soil. Much of Odessa is built upon this type of ground.

In its report, The Record quoted Lincoln County Environmental Health Director Ed Dzedzy, who in a telephone interview stated the cost of a new system meeting on site sewage regulation specifications would be about $12,000.

He said the new septage rules would apply even to cesspools and septic tanks which are in working order and require only occasional pumping because the law will require screening or grinding of the pumped-out effluent. It is presently allowable to dispose of effluent in designated above-ground areas. The new rules call for effluent to be deposited into a waste disposal and treatment facility.

Dzedzy, whose office is charged with implementing the new septage rules, also said when present septic systems, including dry wells and seepage pits, fail, it will no longer be a question of simply pumping them out. Regulations will require that they be replaced. Expansion of a home will mean the replacement of a septic system with a new one which meets minimum-size lot requirements.

At their meeting Monday, council members called for Dzezdy to appear at the next council meeting, on Tuesday, January 3, to explain the new septage rules as they apply to Odessa. They also asked that interested residents and property owners come to the meeting to be informed.

Dzezdy has accepted the invitation and will be at the meeting, which starts at 7:10 p.m.

Some Odessa residents feel Odessa’s present method of sewage disposal is satisfactory, and they don’t believe the cost of installing a town-wide waste disposal and treatment system or upgrading present private septic systems can be justified.

“I haven’t been convinced we need (a sewer), but I think we’re not going to have a choice,” said council member Clark Zweig as he and his colleagues discussed the growing number of constraints waste disposal and treatment being placed on small communities.

“We may have been the lucky ones so far, because we haven’t had a sewer,” said Mayor Denny McDaniel. He explained Odessa has avoided the double costs which neighboring towns have faced, first in installing a sewer and then in having to modify or replace it later.

McDaniel said it’s “not what we want, necessarily, but what we’re going to have to have.”

“I think Odessa should get in a modern mode,” he said, referring to those residents who believe a sewer really isn’t necessary. “The opportunity we have now to obtain a waste disposal and treatment system with grant funds and low-interest loans could slip away. We shouldn’t wait until the cost triples.”

A different point of view was expressed this week by an Odessa resident who typifies some of the town’s newcomers.

Willard Turk and his wife moved to Odessa from the Coast as retirees, buying and restoring one of the early homes. Originally from northern Idaho, Turk years ago was attracted to Odessa when he passed through on his way to and from Seattle. He was impressed by the town’s neat and orderly appearance. This was why the Turks decided to retire here.

Throughout the 1960s, Turk was the equipment supervisor for National Construction, which specialized in sewer and street construction and remodeling. The firm revised Seattle’s sewage disposal system in the Lake Union, Ballard and University districts. Waste was diverted from polluted Lake Union to Puget Sound,” which then became polluted,” Turk said.

If a sewer is going to be built in Odessa it should be built for a community at least twice its size, Turk believes.

“You have to build for growth, otherwise you run into all sorts of problems as more people move in, which is bound to happen,” he said.

But Turk worries about who will pay for a sewer and its eventual expansion. He cited projects on the Coast which his firm had helped to build. Almost inevitable, he said, are problems caused by overloaded sewers backing up into homes in the lower areas as new home development increases.

“We wouldn’t want that to happen here, but it could,j and then they’ll come back for another $5,000 or $10,000 per household to fix or enlarge the original sewer.”

Turk says the old-fashioned outhouse is the best possible waste disposal method. It can simply be covered over with earth and moved to another site. He said cesspools are find if each residence has two of them, one for the “blackwater,” and one for the “graywater,” which is largely kitchen waste, with a soap trap in between. This combines the best features of the outhouse and the cesspool and avoids troubles caused by mixing blackwater and graywater.

Turk, like the mayor and the councilmen, is aware that the new regulations may preclude the desires of some Odessa residents to maintain cesspools and septic tanks. But that doesn’t ease his doubts and fears about who is going to pay for sewer hookups and how much that cost will be.

Wyatt Jaykim, the town’s consulting engineers for a proposed sewer project, are scheduled to report on a feasibility and engineering study which has determined the cost and what type of waste disposal and treatment facility would be best for the community. The report, which was due the middle of January, will be delayed by about two weeks, the engineers have advised the council.