Otto’s Column

LOCAL HISTORY Basketball, silent movies made the news in 1928

Editor’s note: Otto Dick, Oregon has researched the people, places andeventsimportantintheOregon area’shistory for theOgleCounty HistoricalSociety.Thefollowingis oneofa seriesofthearticleshehas written.

BY OTTO DICK

The front page of the January 26, 1928 edition featured a section entitled “Happenings About Our Community”. The first happening was Matrimonial news.

This was a cartoon showing a bachelor reading a letter. While reading one of the letters he said,”(By golly I didn’t think a girl could call me such pretty names and this is the 10th letter too, gosh, gee wiz, I bet she is sweet. Oh boy ain’t it’s leap year.”

Mt. Morris High School and Mt. Morris College Basketball were important events. The Happenings section gave their next opponents against Morrison H.S. and Wheaton College.

A section on the front page was titled “Famous Movie, Ben Hur, comes to the Gem Theatre next Tuesday and Wednesday. BEN HUR is a picture that brings to your door the realms of beauty and magnificence never before conceived by man, it unfolds before your eyes scenes so awe-in-inspiring in their grandeur, so poignant and breath-taking in their tremendous action that it will enthrall you from beginning to end. Adults 50c: Children 25c.”

This would have been the 1925 silent film version. Other silent movies scheduled were The Lone Eagle, The Garden of Allah, and The Thirteenth Hour.

The Forget Section,“forget the hasty unkind word, forget you’re not a millionaire, forgetthe slander you have heard, forget the storms of yesterday, forget the knocker he’s a freak, forget the iceman’s bill so large, forget the weather if it’s bad, forget the gray streaks in your hair, forget the quarrel and it’s cause, forget the trials you have had, forget the coffee if it’s cold, but don’t forget to pay your dues.”

From the section titled “Willing Maidens Besiege Market”. This matrimonial column listed lonesome bachelors of Mount Morris who craved a touch of femininity in their prosaic lives, caused quite a stir in the gentle hearts wherever the Mt. Morris Index went.

Several of these letters were published in the Index. One couple wrote: “We are simply thrilled over your recent ad , as we are two lonely little orphan girls wanting a loving husband and home of our own. We don’t want to seem bold to our prospects, so we thought in this manner we could get in touch with them without undue embarrassment to either party. We are sending a description of ourselves for you to forward to the young men.

Other news items were:

“A radio dance at Odd Fellow Hall Saturday night was attended by a goodly number of invited guests. One of C. H. Newcomerer’s big Kolstar radios provided the music under the manipulation of Walter Deenan, local expert.”

“One of the most enthusiastic gatherings of ex-doughboys, gobs and marines ever held in northern Illinois was sponsored by Mount Morris Post, 143, American Legion of Illinois at the Kable Inn last Saturday evening.”

The Mt. Morris Index was published from 1890-1969.