Coulee Recollections

Ten Years Ago

A hot day and an electric fence combined for a close call and some excitement in Seaton’s Grove Friday. A small brush fire spread quickly and would have consumed a home had neighbors and firefighters not responded quickly. On a hill in the nursery at his Seaton’s Grove Greenhouse, John Francis and a couple of friends noticed the smoke below an embankment behind Dennis Payne’s mobile home across the street.

People from all over the country went to the Colville Tribe’s greenhouse last Wednesday to learn about how it’s run. The tour came on the morning of the second day of the third annual Nursery Training Workshop, Intertribal Nursery Council.

Two diverse musicians will be at the Grand Gallery Theater this Saturday to entertain the audience with fiddles, banjos, synthesizers and much more. Publicity information bills the concert as “Music in Harmony with the Voices of Nature, plus old time country, blues and bluegrass.”

Twenty Years Ago

In planning for power demands expected to his by the late 1900s, the Bonneville Power Administration is looking at building a new transmission line from Spokane to Grand Coulee.

Tom and Vickey Steffens of Grand Coulee will celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary with an informal open house Sat., Aug. 21, at the Ridge Riders Hall. The couple married August 24, 1968, in Pasco and have lived most of their married life in the Grand Coulee Dam area.

Kent Anderson will be Lake Roosevelt High School head football coach.

Thirty Years Ago

Bringing in the first truckload of wheat to the Central Washington Grain Growers in Grand Coulee was Frank Sanford.

At their meeting last week, the Grand Coulee City Council approved a business license for a pizza establishment. The license was issued to John Caple with “You and Me Pizza.” It will be located in the former House Laundry Building on Midway in Grand Coulee.

This past weekend, almost 200 people had the opportunity to renew old acquaintances and make new ones as the First Baptist Church of Electric City celebrated 40 years of fellowship with an anniversary reunion.

CORRECTION – In last week’s 30 years ago an All Star Team article should have included Paula Smith not Paul Smith.

Forty Years Ago

Acquisition of approximately 1000 acres of recreation land in Grant and Thurston Counties will be considered by the Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission at their public meeting August 20. The proposed acquisition in Grant County includes 760 acres in Northrup Canyon.

The Bureau of Reclamation this week called for bids on a contract to complete the Grand Coulee Dam Third Powerplant - the last major bid-call to be issued in connection with the power expansion project.

Shireen Andrews, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Andrews of Nespelem was one of the guest artists at the Indian Concert held at the Memorial Stadium in Seattle recently.

Fifty Years Ago

According to Columbia Basin Project Manager W.E. Rawlings in Ephrata, a malfunction of one of the large circuit breakers in the right switchyard at Grand Coulee Dam Friday morning resulted in three of the dam’s 18 giant 108,000 kilowatt generators being taken off the line for about 26 minutes.

Gordan Skaar, electronics technician second class, USN, son of Mr. and Mrs. O.P. Skaar of Grand Coulee, is undergoing nine week’s schooling at the Naval Training Center.

Sixty Years Ago

Recreational developments at the Spring Canyon beach area on Lake Roosevelt will start immediately. Over $173,000 is available through congressional appropriations for this development.

The local swimming instruction classes ended Friday with 300 pupils participating.

The Bureau of Reclamation has announced the opening of the salvage yard above the sand pile to the public.

The Grand Coulee Dam area will be the center of the entertainment picture this weekend as hundreds of people are expected to head this way to enjoy boat races on the equalizing reservoir at Electric City.