25 Years Ago
May 1, 1986
The Ava Lions Club Little League baseball and softball program will begin play on June 2, according to Coach Rex Sawyer who will be in charge of the program this year.
Ava Mayor Bud Norman was on hand to cut the ribbon, officially starting the grand opening of the newly remodeled Dollar General Store in Ava last Thursday morning.
Shana Stillings, Ava High School senior, has been named a United States National Award winner in band.
Jonathan Stovall is Pack 77 Cub Scout of the Month.
Mr. and Mrs. Lou Prince, Ava, are proud to announce the engagement and forthcoming marriage of their daughter, Amy Jo, to Wesley Allen Barnum, son of Mr. and Mrs. LaVerne (Barney) Barnum, also of Ava.
Call it beginner’s luck or whatever, but Vicki Randall has two nice trophies for the effort. The Ava teenager went to Mtn. Home, Ark. a couple of weeks ago to compete in karate competition and came away with first and third place trophies in two different events. She is a student of Cliff Kight of West Plains who teaches classes one day a week at Gill’s Gym in Ava.
Marine Sgt. Brian Rees, son of Frank and Jane Rees of Route 2, Ava, was recently awarded the U.S. Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal.
RED BUD VILLAGE –– Mr. and Mrs. C.M. Letsinger, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Cunningham and Gladys Welton had dinner Saturday in Harrison, Ark.
DRURY –– Byron and Pearl Stout are driving a nice looking late model pickup.
CLEVER CREEK –– The Hicks and Barnharts worked our potatoes Friday morning. The Barnharts are putting a fence around the yard and garden this week.
50 Years Ago
April 27, 1961
The efforts of farmers, rural residents, and businessmen to obtain telephone service in the rural areas of Douglas County surrounding Ava bore fruit this week when the State Public Service Commission issued orders to the A & M Telephone Company to provide the service. A copy of the 14-page summary of the proceedings and of the commission’s findings was received yesterday by James E. Curry of Ava, attorney for the petitioners.
Four Ava High School teachers tendered their resignations last week creating a total of six vacancies on the faculty for the 1961-62 term. They were Miss Imogene Agee, vocational home economics instructor who has accepted a position in the Bolivar schools; Joe Wheeler, science teacher; Miss Ella Jean Dixon, vocal music teacher, who plans to be married soon; and Mrs. Eleanor Mosca, art instructor. The duties of Arlen Powell, football coach and physical education instructor, were severed with the school Monday and he will not finish this term.
Commencement exercises for the 93 members of the 1961 graduating class of Ava High School will be held outdoors on Friday, May 26, it was announced this week by Miss Una Ellison, class sponsor.
Three Ava residents, Andy Campbell, Mrs. Harlan House and Glen Haskins, were called to jury duty in federal court which opened in Springfield Monday morning, April 17. Campbell was selected to serve on the 12-man jury which heard the income tax evasion trial of Clyde Julian (Red) Foley last week and acquitted him of the charge after two hours deliberation, Monday morning, April 24. Mrs. House was chosen as a juror on a trial involving two members of the Irish Wilderness counterfeiting ring, which opened Monday afternoon this week.
Hershel Letsinger, son of Mr. and Mrs. Cecil Letsinger of Route 1, Ava, was among a number of southwest Missouri students who won special awards and honors present by the University of Missouri Agriculture Club at the 33rd annual banquet held in Columbia Thursday night.
Little Nancy Cradic, 17-month-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Bill Cradic, suffered second degree burns on her face, neck and chest and on the inside of her throat last Thursday night when she pulled a pan of boiling water from the cook stove at their home in north Ava.
The Ava chapter of Future Farmers of America became the proud owner of a national gold emblem plaque representing a superior chapter when members attended the Missouri state convention of FFA held at the University of Missouri’s Jesse Hall auditorium in Columbia last week.
ALMARTHA –– Clinton Beach has been employed to teach in Gainesville school next year.
EAST VANZANT –– Some have their gardens out but most of us are waiting for the ground to dry out. Several of the men are working on their fences. A good time for the job as it is wet enough to drive posts and a lot of fencing need done.
75 Years Ago
April 30, 1936
Twenty of Missouri’s thirty delegates in the national Republican convention in Cleveland on June 9 were assured for Governor Alf M. Landon of Kansas.
Six delegates recently named by the county Democratic convention will go to Joplin Tuesday to attend the state democratic convention. The delegates are C.S. Neiman, Bob Ellis, Roy Swearengin, Lloyd Story, Russell Ferguson and Miss Rhasneh Burdett.
SCHOOL NEWS –– The tennis team drew Springfield in the Altitude Carnival at Springfield Thursday. Ruskin Norman represented the school in singles; Billy Pettit and Noble Livingston in the doubles. They were defeated.
C.H. Burdett and son, Ivan, have leased a building in Forsyth and are installing a drug store there. Mr. and Mrs. Burdett and Ivan, who for many years were residents of Ava, have recently lived in Mt. Vernon, where Mr. Burdett and Ivan operated the Ford Motor Company.
Maxine Gray, high school post-graduate student and talented musician, was selected Miss Ava from a field of thirty-four contestants in a beauty pageant in the high school auditorium Wednesday evening. Miss Gray may compete for the official title of Miss Missouri 1936.
Miss Juanita Swearengin, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Roy Swearengin, of Ongo, and Carrol Brown, son of Mr. and Mrs. Roy Brown, of west of Ava, were married Saturday evening, April 26, at the home of Mr. and Mrs. E.A. Hunsaker on south Madison Street.
Harry K. Curtis, son of the late former vice-president of the United States, Charles Curtis, was in Ava Friday on business matters pertaining to land owned by his father in this county. Mr. Curtis was alone and stayed only a short time. His home is in Washington, D.C.
Impressions made in the soft wood of the window facing of the John Teague store at Bruner have implicated four men as suspects in the recent robber of the post office there. The post office is located in the store. The four were identified as Harry Thomas, 50, and Edward Rice, 19, of Kansas City; Homer Hight, 26, Springfield ex-convict, and Raymond Eddy Lindsay, 31, of Willow springs. Impressions in the wood seemed to have been made with a big screwdriver found in the auto in which the four were riding when arrested.
Lionel Barrymore brings to the screen another of the amazing character performances. Barrymore plays Spring Davis, the veteran Missouri hunter who kills a man to avenge his faithful hound. His extraordinary speech in the courtroom, in tribute to the dog, is one of the gripping dramatic highlights.
GIRDNER –– John Medlock drilled a well for Geo. Beason last week.
WHITES CREEK –– A surprise party was given Mrs. Mault Thompson last Wednesday afternoon and those present were: Mrs. Thompson’s mother, Mrs. Glass of Ava, Mrs. Lowell Bradshaw and Stella Waters of Ava, Also Mrs. Dorothy Hamby, Mrs. Edith Thompson, Mrs. Ollie Daugherty and Dorothy Mae and Mrs. Albert Carter.
100 Years Ago
May 11, 1911
There were two or three lads whose homes are southwest of town, arrived in Ava last Friday from the “Wild and Wooly West” and with more “booze” than brains proceeded to “take in” the town. They hadn’t much more than started when Sheriff Gentry “landed” on them, marched them up to Prosecuting Attorney Stewart’s office; and when they returned ready for their homeward journey they were about sober, had less money and more experience. It cost them $12.00 a piece. Now boys we would advise you to get a little further down in the sticks before you proceed to turn things red.
May 6, the day for rural graduation in Douglas County was indeed an ideal spring day. The 8th grade graduates from the various parts of the county together with parents, teachers and friends were seen on the streets of Ava Saturday afternoon. The graduates of 1910 and 1911 met the County Superintendent at the Wilson Opera 3:30 p.m., some class yells were worked out and other arrangements made for carrying out the program outlined for the evening exercises.
EL PASO, Texas –– After several preliminary conferences of an informal nature in the last three months, the Mexican government and the revolutionists, headed by Francisco Madero, Jr., formally gathered in peace negotiations across the Rio Grande half way between the federal stronghold of Juarez and the Madero camp, five miles away to the north of the city.
An interesting game of ball was played in Ava last Tuesday afternoon between the Ava “Pikers” and the Boston Bloomer Girls. At the end of the ninth inning the score stood 11 to 5 in favor of the Bloomer Girls.
Sallie J. Adams is having her residence raised a story and rebuilt, which will be a great improvement to her property.
Elias Cobb has bought the property known as the Grant Eslick property at Ava, where he shall make his home for the present. Mr. Cobb recently went to Oklahoma but has returned and says Douglas County is good enough for him.
There are several K. P.’s in Ava who have recently moved in from other parts of the country and there is very strong talk of organizing a lodge of this order in Ava. This is one of the oldest and best orders in the country and we would like to see an organization of that kind here.
Harrison Fletcher of Ava, and Miss Polly McCrite, of Bryant, were married at the home of Squire Carson, in Ava, last Sunday evening in the presence of relatives and a few special friends.
The Ava school board met recently and employed Albert Dobyns as principle of Ava School. We believe this is an excellent choice. Miss Dora Meeker and Miss Ellen Shinpaugh have been offered their rooms for another year.
ROME ITEMS –– Rainy cold weather. A wind Wednesday night blew the Smallet Mbse. building off, down to the door. And blew the mill off the pillars.
