Editor's note: The following excerpts were taken from past issues of the Butte Daily Post and The Montana Standard, and were compiled by Tracy Thornton of The Montana Standard.
June 13, 1938 Gum was the weapon of choice Anaconda police today were "sticking" to the trail of the gum chewers who "gummed" the Smelter city's lone street traffic light Saturday night, causing them more than a half hour of unpleasant work.
The gum chewers — and they must have liked peppermint, police said — plugged the control box keyhole at the corner of Park Avenue and Main Street with gum, making it impossible for the police to turn off the light.
Finally, by using matches, sticks, toothpicks and knives to clean the keyhole, the officers were able to insert the key and turn off the light.
Dec. 15, 1951 Hospital a ‘coat of many colors' Rudy Endresse, Butte painting and decorating contractor, believes the painting and decorating work at the Butte Community Memorial hospital was the largest decorating job of its kind performed in Montana in many years.
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Mr. Endresse's organization used nearly 2,000 gallons of paint and varnish and 31 different colors of paint.
Aug. 26, 1959 Historic home for miners burns The 62-year-old Maryland Block rooming house, 25 W. Quartz, which in better days housed as many as 80 miners, was destroyed Wednesday by a pre-dawn fire of undetermined origin.
No one was in the building, next to the fire station when the blaze was discovered at 3:40 a.m., and none of the nearly 30 firemen who battled the flame for four hours was injured.
Heavy clouds of black smoke poured out of the three-story brick building, blanketing the entire city and causing scores of residents, still tense from last week's earthquake, to call police and fire headquarters.
Mr. and Mrs. William (Perk) Allen, 1460 Holmes, owners of the structure, said they had no roomers there since last October when fire, believed to have started from a tenant's cigarette, burned through three top-floor rooms and a corridor and stairwell.
Allen said they received about $3,000 insurance payment after the October fire, but they had no insurance to cover Wednesday's loss.
Nov. 24, 1963 Thief doesn't have very good luck Some days nothing seems to go right, even for a guy bent on going wrong.
A would-be thief, who obviously is still in the apprentice class, tried Saturday night to break into the rear of the J.C. Penney Store, 101 W. Park. He scored only a first-rate bungle.
Police said the prowler tried to force three back doors and failed.
Not only that, he cut his hands. Not only that, too, he dropped a valuable watch.
Feb. 17, 1968 Tech grad honored in competition Dolores A. LaBranche, a 1966 metallurgical engineering graduate of Montana Tech, received honorable mention in the recent American Society for Metals metallographic competition.
Her work, "Grain Boundary Migration," was successful in Class II of the competition on "Electron Micrographs Using Replicas." The award was noted in the December 1967 issue of "Metals Materials Today." Miss LaBranche is a nuclear fuel divisions metallurgical engineer for Westinghouse. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. George LaBranche, reside at 2024 Elm.
