[ CLAY COUNTY INTHE REARVIEW MIRROR
]
It’s 1975. The song is “Old 30.”
“She was mud and sand and concrete Mixed with water made of tears From the rivers runnin’ down the great divide She was three thousand miles of rockin’ rollin’ highway A million memories long and two lanes wide.
Far across the wide Missouri to the old Wyoming line From the Jersey shore to San Francisco Bay She was known to all the truckers As the mighty Lincoln Highway But to me she’s still Old 30 all the way.
Now the interstate goes screaming Through the backyards of her life But it just don’t send those shivers down my spine So before I take that exit to the highway in the sky I’m gonna take Old 30 one more time.
She was radiators boiling and the burnin’ summer sun And the blizzards blowing wild across the plain.
She was tumbleweeds a rollin’ in the gentle winds of fall And the lights of old Grand Island in the rain.”
Trucking songs were the second phase of Chip Davis’s music career. The first was Old Home Bread commercials. Bill Fries, the advertising executive for the bread commercials, felt sales pitches should be entertaining. He created C.W. McCall, the bread truck driver who delivered Old Home bread to Mavis, the waitress at the Old Home Filler Up an’ Keep on A-Truckin’ Café in Pisgah, IA. Fries hired a Texas fellow to play C.W. (he’d never driven a truck) and signed himself up to speak, not sing, the lyrics. The geography was Iowa, northeast of Omaha, not only Pisgah, but Mondamin, Pottawattamie County, and the Nishnabotna River. The song “Convoy” and the movie it spawned were the high points of this phase. The third phase of Chip Davis’s career was the New Age group Fresh Aire with dozens of albums. (Personal note: Several times I enjoyed conversations with folks who were enamored by this group which they were certain was from Germany. Imagine their surprise when I pointed to the address on the album: 9130 Morman Bridge Rd., Omaha.)
2000 – 25YEARS AGO
School board presidents from Sandy Creek, Superior, Guide Rock, Nelson, and Lawrence gathered at the Nelson school library and signed their agreement binding their districts into the South Central Nebraska Unified School District #5. The document was forwarded to the state Department of Education for approval.
An Adams County District Court jury found a Clay Center man guilty of first-degree murder in the death of a Hastings man. After studying similar cases, the prosecuting attorney chose to seek life in prison rather than the death penalty.
Members of the Clay Center speech team finished in the top six positions in 10 events at a Dorchester competition. Ryan Higbea was awarded first place for information. Brandice Studnicka took second in the same event.
The Sutton speech team finished third as hosts in a 16-school field. Sophomore Deanna Garrelts placed first in Oral Interpretation of Humorous Prose. Sutton’s Oral Interpretation of Drama team placed second. Geneva took first in team standings with Lawrence placing second.
The Harvard wrestling team still had five of their seven qualifiers active entering the semifinals at the state wrestling meet at press time for the county paper. The Harvard team was within striking distance of a state title. Watch this space.
Jeremy Gallant, wrestling for Sandy Creek/Clay Center, was seeking the gold medal that had eluded him in three prior visits to the state meet. He disposed of wrestlers from Albion, Morrill, and Valley on the way to the finals where he met an undefeated wrestler from Pender. Gallant fell behind 5-0 before scoring a reversal, losing 5-2 for a silver medal.
Matt Robinson from Sutton was 1-2 at the state meet finishing his season record at 28-15.
The Sandy Creek girls’ basketball team defeated Hebron 80-61 in the district finals earning their tenth straight trip to the state basketball tournament. Taryn Ninemire had a great game, scoring 35 points. Sandy Creek jumped out to a 20-10 first quarter lead against Sutton in the finals of sub-district play and won 63-49. Ninemire had 17 points for Sandy Creek. Sandy Gowen had 25 points for Sutton.
Harvard Lady Cards beat Clay Center 60-35 to advance to the second round in sub-district play.
David Letterman returned to his Late-Night show five weeks after an emergency quintuple heart bypass operation. (Five? I can only bid four in that game.)
Robby Knieval made a successful motorcycle jump of 200 feet over an oncoming train.
1975 – 50YEARS AGO
A winter weather recap confirmed that the winter had been marked with several light snowfalls and cloudy weather. There had been no major snowfalls or days of extended cold temperatures, so far.
Don Searcy, executive director of the Nebraska American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, speaking at the Glenvil Flag Presentation Ceremony, announced that Clay County was first in the state in number of Bicentennial cities, and may be first in the nation. Fairfield, Clay Center, Edgar, Sutton, Harvard, Inland, and Glenvil were all official Bicentennial cities and Clay County was an official county. Additional applications were in work at Trumbull, Deweese, Saronville, Ong, and Eldorado Township.
The Annual Clay County Ag Day drew more than 300 people to Sutton High School despite icy roads in parts of the county. For the first time, the event included display booths inside and car, truck, and tractor displays outside. The exhibitors were pleased with the public response.
Mrs. Lorene Conant was the new Harvard correspondent for the Clay County News.
Featured business: Carl’s Mechanical Works in Harvard with Ariens gardening equipment.
Larry Sadd scored 25 points and Tim Yost added 22 as Harvard beat Henderson 85-71.
Sandy Creek beat Hebron 73-66 in double overtime. Jim Engel had 24 points and Mike Davenport had 20.
Wymore captured the team trophy in the district wrestling tournament at Sandy Creek out scoring Harvard 119 to 83 ½. Harvard’s Tim Fitzgerald took the meet championship at 167 pounds.
In basketball, Sandy Creek lost to Blue Hill, Clay Center lost to Shickley and Fairmont, and Sutton lost to Superior and Wilbur.
Former U.S. Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H.R. Haldeman and John D. Ehrlichman were sentenced to 2 ½ to 8 years in prison for their roles in the Watergate cover-up.
1950 - 75YEARS AGO
Loren Hill, deputy county clerk, filed for election to the new office of county assessor. The state legislature recently created the position effective on Jan. 1, 1951.
A break-in at the “P & J” Service Station in Clay Center netted the robbers about seventy-five cents taken from the cash register The Clay County Hatchery building received a new red and white checkered store front brightening the west side of the square.
Leland Merrill of Edgar and Leland and Dorothy Gartrell of Clay Center were among the largest senior class in the history of Nebraska Wesleyan University.
New rails arrived in Fairfield to replace the track from two miles east of town to Hastings. The new rails weighed 133 pounds compared to the existing 90-pound rails.
The Eller’s Store in Clay Center celebrated its 56th year in business with the usual gift of a bouquet of flowers from Mrs. George Linck, as she did every year.
The annual dinner and business meeting of the Farmers Union Elevator Co. in Harvard attracted 168 people. The firm had 475 stockholders and handled 559,809 bushels of grain during the past year. Dividends were paid at a rate of a nickel for each bushel of wheat; three cents for oats, and barley; four cents for corn; a nickel per cwt. of milo; 50 cents per ton of coal; five percent on merchandise; and five percent interest from stock.
The Center Theater in Clay Center was showing “The Wizard of Oz” with the cast listed as Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, and Judy Garland. (Would we list the cast in a different order today?) Sutton’s Lyric had “John Loves Mary” starring Ronald Reagan and Jack Carson.
Featured business: Harold O. Swanson, Pioneer seed corn dealer in Ong and Edgar, this week quoting the Garst & Thomas Pioneer company of Coon Rapids, Iowa describing the firm’s success winning six of twelve test plots when no other product won more than a single plot. (Unrelated tidbit: Roswell Garst and Nikita Khrushchev developed a personal relationship while the Iowa seed corn company played a part in modernizing the Soviet Union’s corn production during the Cold War. Khrushchev included a visit to Garst’s Iowa farm on his 1959 visit to the U.S.)
Edgar High defeated Blue Hill 53-43 with Pat Moore, Aubrey Wilson, and Bill Erickson scoring 16, 14, and 11 points. Harvard lost to St. Cecilia 52-51 and to Glenvil 64-39. Harvard beat Red Cloud 50-34. Fairfield dropped their final game of the season to Carleton 44-30 with Roth the high-point man with 12.
Ong defeated Shickley 19-9, and Fairfield beat Edgar 27-12 in the Edgar Grade School Invitational Basketball Tournament. D. Anderson had six points for Ong and K. Skunkwiler hit seven baskets and one free throw for 15 points for Fairfield.
Osceola dropped out of the Cornhusker Baseball League. Shelby was the leading candidate to become a member for the next season.
The first International Pancake Race was held in Liberal, Kansas. (The 76th Annual International Pancake Day is on March 4, 2025, in Liberal. The race is a competition between women of Liberal and Olney, England who run 415 yards flipping pancakes.)
Your Show of Shows debuted on NBC-TV starring Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca. The show ran through June 1954 and makes many lists of the greatest television series. Some sketches are on youtube.
1925 – 100YEARS AGO
The first county meeting of alumni of the University of Nebraska was held at the Fairfield school house. The group planned to create a county club to meet twice a year. Judge Krebs was elected president of the organization with Raymond Eller as secretary.
R.H. Moore announced that he had purchased the restaurant business of Mrs. L.J. Allen and was consolidating the restaurant with his grocery business on the north side of the square in Clay Center. He was discontinuing several grocery items including mill products and bulk items. The new name for his business was Pat’s Cash & Carry Grocery-Café.
The radio show on a Hastings station that featured talent from Sutton generated almost two columns of names of responses sent to a Sutton newspaper. A quick check finds responses from Idaho, Ohio, Chicago, Long Beach, Spokane, Wisconsin, Indiana, Missouri, Colorado, and all over the state. (Imagine some long-lost dusty recording of that radio program in a box in someone’s attic or basement.)
Newspapers were capitalizing on interest in the new field of electronics. This week’s feature in the Fairfield paper was instructions to build a voltmeter.
Sheriff Harr was leading a wide search for the missing Bert Smith, manager of the Spring Ranch Grain & Supply Company elevator. Smith left immediately before a business meeting, but the investigation found nothing amiss in any of the business affairs. Acquaintances saw him in Hastings where he said he was on the way to Omaha, but no trace was found. Relatives and friends had no clue. Sheriff Harr was left with only suspicions of a mental issue.
Featured business: Yost Bros. Lumber Company in Harvard.
The Orpheum Theater in Fairfield had “The Wanderer of the Waste Land” based on a Zane Gray novel. Harvard’s Paramount Theater had Mary Pickford’s “Through the Back Door” plus two reels of “Telephone Girl Comedy.”
Harvard lost the last game of their basketball season to Benedict, 33-29.
Harold Ross, a Colorado high-school dropout, and his wife Jane Grant published their first issue of The New Yorker magazine on February 21, 1925. The New Yorker soon established itself as a leading source of cultural criticism, humor, and reporting.
1900 – 125YEARS AGO
Voters and taxpayers at a School Creek Township school discussed the proposed Nebraska & Gulf Railroad. Meanwhile, J.B. Cessna and J.B. Keeder, representatives of the Nebraska & Gulf Railroad, were in Sutton where they told a reporter that they would present bond propositions to the county board next week.
The Harvard paper reported an unprecedented demand for residences to rent in the city with no desirable house vacant.
The notice is in the Clay Center paper every week, but it never fails to draw a chuckle: “Dr. M.L. Ong, dentist, of Edgar, will be in Clay Center Thursday at Dr. Shoemaker’s office.” (Every week. The only way to improve it would be if Shoemaker’s name were Sutton or Harvard.)
Featured business: Pont Soderberg, Photographer in Sutton. (A very high percentage of our early photos in Sutton were the product of Mr. Soderberg’s studio.)
Our photo this week is of the cover of the first issue of The New Yorker magazine 100 years ago. (Personal note: I’ve read The New Yorker since the mid-1980’s, at least, more than half my life and 40% of its life. There is a Clay County connection with The New Yorker. Burkhard Bilger has been a contributor to The New Yorker since 2001. He is the son-in-law of Ted and Gerada (Leitner) Nelson of Stillwater, Oklahoma, both graduates of Sutton High School, ’49 and ‘51.) (After writing that, I checked the magazine website discovering Burkhard’s last article was in May 2024. Later that day, the magazine posted his latest article about high school marching bands. The article will be included in the print edition of the February 17 & 24 issue. That is, Burk has a major article in the Centennial anniversary issue of The New Yorker! Applause from the county’s extended family members. We can call him “Burk.” (I think)))
