These century-old historical excerpts were selected from the Looking Backward feature of The Vidette-Messenger newspaper, which are part of the PoCo Muse Collection. Originally, these bits of information appeared as larger stories in the Valparaiso Daily Vidette and The Evening Messenger newspapers.
June 1, 1925
Fred H. Cole, present incumbent of the office of county superintendent of schools, was re-elected at a meeting of the Porter County Board of Education. He received seven votes, as opposed to five for Charles H. Reider, principal of the Hebron school. Cole was first elected superintendent in 1908 to succeed Samuel C. Ferrell.
Dr. E. H. Powell was the winner of the golf tournament held at the Valparaiso Country Club Saturday and Sunday. He scored a 68 with his handicap. George Rynick Jr. was second with a 70 and Lowell Dowdell third with a 71. The tourney was the first to be played over the permanent course.
June 2, 1925
An increase of $800 in salary was granted by the Porter County Commissioners to Judge Harry L. Crumpacker, of the Porter Superior Court, on a petition signed by nearly three-hundred taxpayers of the county. The increase is due to a law passed several years ago providing that judges might be paid $2,800 in addition to their $4,200 salary received by the state. LaPorte County has paid Judge Crumpacker $2,000 of the amount for several years.
June 3, 1925
Byron Loomis, son E. L. and Nellie Loomis, will be graduated from the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis today. Midshipman Loomis is completing his course with high honors. After receiving his commission as ensign, he will come to Valparaiso for a month’s visit with his parents. Ensign Loomis’ first assignment will be on the U.S.S. Cincinnati at New York harbor, where he will be stationed all summer.
June 4, 1925
The Foster Lumber & Coal Company, of Valparaiso, has been awarded the contract to build the club house for the Valparaiso Country Club on a proposal to erect the structure at a cost not to exceed $15,0000, and according to the plans and specifications. The new building is to be 30x90 feet, with a huge porch facing the east. The dance hall and banquet room is to be 30x50 feet. The basement is to be fully excavated. It is expected the building will be ready for occupancy by Labor Day.
The Dunes Highway in north Porter County is presenting a problem for the state highway commission. The highway is going to pieces under the extreme heat. In one spot, near Tremont, a section of the pavement exploded like someone had placed a stick of dynamite under it. Superintendent George Pearce reported yesterday that eight places in the pavement had disintegrated. Pearce reports the same condition exists on Lincoln Highway, west of Valparaiso. The asphalt pavement, east of Valparaiso, is said to be standing up fine.
June 5, 1925
Four Valparaiso University students refused to be balked by such a little thing as a Grand Trunk freight train, which blocked the Calumet Avenue crossing yesterday afternoon about 5 o’clock. When the engineer refused to heed their honkings, the driver of the car drove down the tracks until the caboose was reached and then went around it and down Calumet Avenue. City police stopped the car at the Presbyterian Church corner and took them to the station for questioning. They were released after a lecture. The students said they did not want to be late for supper.
Pleas of not guilty were entered by Catherine Cassler and Loren Patrick, arrested Decoration Day at Hebron in a raid by Sheriff W. B. Forney, when they were arraigned this morning before Judge H. H. Loring in Porter Circuit Court. The defendants were represented by Attorney John J. McGuire. Capitola Dilley, president of the Porter County W.C.T.U., and Rev. A. T. Neblung, pastor of the Hebron Christian Church, were interested spectators in court. Both are backing Cassler in her fight for vindication. A group of Hebron citizens are asking that the state press the charges against the pair to the limit. Among them are Senator Will Brown, Mel Morrow, and Geo. C. Gregg. The case promises to be a merry legal battle.
June 6, 1925
Charlotte Ann Lucas Crumpacker, widow of the late Congressman Edgar D. Crumpacker, died Friday evening at 9:40 o’clock at her Valparaiso home on Michigan Avenue and Erie Street, following a stroke suffered May 29. She was born at Belvidere, Ill., on March 6, 1853, and came to Valparaiso following her marriage in 1879. Surviving are three sons.
At a meeting of the Porter County W.C.T.U. held yesterday afternoon at the home of Nellie Gibbs, Capitola Dilley, of Hebron, president of the organization, and D. C. Shouse, federal undercover worker, were the principal speakers. Dilley reviewed step by step the work done by Shouse and his assistants in the county in uncovering evidence against liquor violators. Both Dilley and Shouse defended Cassler, arrested in a recent liquor raid, claiming that Cassler had been acting under federal orders.
June 7, 1925
Motions for change of venue in the cases of Catherine Cassler and Loren Patrick, of Hebron, charged with liquor violations, were overruled this morning by Judge H. H. Loring in Porter Circuit Court. In overruling the motions, Judge Loring said he believed there were enough fair-minded men in Porter County to obtain a jury.
Loemma Chester, of Valparaiso, connected with the United States Public Health Service, suffered a fractured hip Saturday when she was thrown from an automobile at Terre Haute, Ind. Chester has been doing public health work in Indiana for the last six months. Previously she had been working in Mississippi.
June 8, 1925
Valparaiso school authorities today announced that plans are underway for starting work on the Valparaiso High School building within a short time so as to have the structure ready for occupancy by September 1. Arthur A. Hughart, member of the board of education, made the statement following the announcement that the board had purchased seven more acres fronting on Chestnut Street of Lewis E. Meyers, for a consideration of $14,250. Members of the board will meet with the architect this evening to go over the plans. It is proposed to build the first unit and later on add other units. The financing of a part of the construction, including the gymnasium and heating plant will be made through a holding company, and will be leased by the school board on a plan whereby the rentals will liquidate the construction cost.
George E. Hershman, of Crown Point, was named special judge to try the cases of Catherine Cassler and Loren Patrick, of Hebron, charged with liquor law violations. Attorneys for the pair filed a motion for a change of venue from Judge H. H. Loring and it was granted. The case will be heard sometime next week.
June 9, 1925
Valparaiso citizens displayed no interest in the meeting of the citizens’ council held today. Only four women, three men, and two newspaper reporters attended. Nathan H. Sheppard acted as chairman of the meeting and used his former calling, the ministry, as an illustration of the prevailing tendency toward indifference and criticism. Effie Earle, head of the city administration committee, said the committee had a central plan but no one to submit it to.
June 10, 1925
Members of the Valparaiso University senior law class were admitted to the bar by Judge H. H. Loring in Porter Circuit Court today. Those admitted were Jay E. Darlington, William H. Diercks, Paul Lowell Dowdell, Florentine P. Azuar, Paul G. Lutz, Royal L. Lease, Elbert B. Lamson, Carl A. Huebner, Rhea C. Myers, Thomas W. Skinner, Frances Elle Tilton, William Paul Wright, Charles R. Scott and Frank St. Angelo. Joseph V. Trickson, Ernest McBride and John McGuire, members of the class, had previously been admitted. John A. Gleason will be admitted in Lake County, and Gertrude Cavanaugh has not yet attained the legal age required by law. Charles R. Scott, admitted today, was graduated last year, but could not be admitted until today because of the age limit.
June 11, 1925
Jack Yasovich, former Valparaiso man, was bound over to the Lake County grand jury at Crown Point yesterday, charged with the murder of Florence Gauzca, 14-year-old East Chicago girl last fall. Yasovich was arrested by East Chicago police three weeks ago on a technical charge of contributing to the delinquency of a son, Steve, age 10. Yasovich is also under suspicion of slaying Harry Heath, of East Chicago, on December 7, 1924. Yasovich and Heath were formerly roommates.
Dr. H. M. Sherwood, superintendent of public instruction, spoke at a meeting of the chamber of commerce, Rotary, and Kiwanis Clubs at Hotel Lembke this Noon. He lauded the Bouchers for their great work at Marion Normal School, which he attended when the Bouchers were heads of the school. “Everything I have accomplished in the way of education, I owe to them,” he said. Sherwood also urged his hearers to get behind the schools and further the cause of education. He spoke of the great need for better school facilities in Valparaiso.
June 12, 1925
Ninety-six young men and women were given diplomas at the fifty-second annual commencement of Valparaiso University held in the university auditorium this morning. Joseph A. Kitchen, commissioner of agriculture and labor of North Dakota, delivered the address. He told the class that Valparaiso graduates were making good in North Dakota. As an example, he cited the fact that Walter Black, of Valparaiso, was state highway engineer. President H. M. Evans presented the diplomas.
The Hebron Woman’s Christian Temprance Union (WCTU) organization has passed a resolution endorsing the work of law enforcement and the attitude taken in the case of the State versus Catherine Cassler by Capitola Dilley, Porter County WCTU president, and extending to her any aid within the power of the Hebron union. Dilley is backing Cassler and Loren Patrick, of Hebron, arrested by Porter County authorities on liquor law violations. It is contended that Cassler was acting as undercover agent for federal officers.
June 13, 1925
Arthur A. Hughart, of the Farmers’ State Bank, was re-elected a member of the city board of education at a meeting of the Valparaiso City Council last night. Hughart’s selection was unanimous. He is an experienced school man, having served as county and city school superintendent, and also city superintendent at Coffeyville, Kan.
The case of Catherine Cassler, of Hebron, charged with liquor law violation, will come up for trial Monday in Porter Circuit Court before Special Judge George Hershman, of Crown Point. Cassler is being backed by Capitola Dilley, president of the Porter County Woman’s Christian Temperance Union. It is claimed Cassler was acting as under-cover officer for federal agents.
June 14, 1925
Catherine Cassler, who entered a plea of guilty yesterday in Porter Circuit Court on a liquor law violation was fined $200 and costs and sentenced to six months in the women’s prison at Indianapolis, fainted in court just after the sentence was pronounced. It was some time before she could be moved to the county jail. Cassler made threats that she would take her life with poison, and officers kept a close watch on her.
John O. Carlson, age 42, chicken and truck farmer residing near Malden, died Monday afternoon in Valparaiso’s Christian Hospital of injuries received when his automobile truck was struck by a Pennsylvania Railroad passenger train at Liberty Way Crossing, just east of Valparaiso.
June 15, 1925
Catherine Cassler was sentenced to six months in the Indiana State Women's Prison at Indianapolis and fined $200 by Special Judge George E. Hersman in the Porter Circuit Court this afternoon at 3:45 o’clock. The court’s fine was $100 fine and 90 days sentence on each count of selling liquor and having liquor in her possession. Cassler entered a plea of guilty and threw herself on the mercy of the court. Judge Hersman informed her that she was not entitled to any mitigation of her sentence after her plea of guilty. Cassler had claimed she was acting as an undercover officer for federal agents who were working in Porter County.
Stephen P. Corboy, Jr., and Bernard Finnegan, of Valparaiso, were among the 313 graduates receiving diplomas at the annual graduating exercises held at Notre Dame university Saturday. Both were graduated from the college of law.
June 16, 1925
The construction of the Clancy St. Clair Road in Valparaiso’s Forest Park is nearing the stage where asphalt will soon be applied by the contractor, William St. Clair. The road is a penetration job and is about three-quarters of a mile in length, starting at Campbell Street and traversing through Forest Park, where it connects with Yellowstone Trail.
June 17, 1925
Word has been received here of the death last night in Los Angeles, Calif., of Peter H. Ludolph, a former Valparaiso resident. He was 71 years of age. At one time he was publisher of The Valparaiso Vidette and also conducted a newspaper in Chicago. A son, Edward, of Valparaiso, and a sister, Emma Schneider, also of Valparaiso, are among the surviving relatives.
June 18, 1925
Catherine Cassler, of Hebron, arrested by Porter County authorities on liquor charges, and who entered a plea of guilty in Porter Circuit Court after posing as an undercover worker for federal officers, was taken to the women’s prison at Indianapolis today where she will serve six months. A $200 fine assessed against her, unless paid, will further increase her stay at the prison. The whereabouts of Loren Patrick, arrested along with Cassler, are still unknown. He was released under a $1,000 bond. Cases against other persons arrested on evidence secured by Cassler will probably be dismissed.
Mary E. Long entertained last evening at a farewell dinner in honor of Prof. B.F. Williams, of Valparaiso University. After thirty years of service at the university, Williams leaves for Stillwater, Okla., to take a position in the Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College. Guests of the evening were longtime friends of Williams, who, with him, were patrons of the eating house kept by the late beloved Mary Small, at the corner of Franklin and Chicago Streets in Valparaiso.
June 19, 1925
Joseph Murphy and Edward Miller, local painters, were injured this morning when a ladder on which they were painting crashed to the ground at the Alva Leonard home on East Lincolnway in Valparaiso. Murphy suffered internal injuries and was taken to his home in an ambulance. Miller suffered a fractured bone in his right foot.
The chamber’s university committee is at Fort Wayne today presenting the university matter to the synodal meeting of Lutheran churches. The committee is endeavoring to get an endorsement of the proposition in order to facilitate the work of the National Lutheran Educational Association which at its convention at Mankato, Minn., considered the matter of taking over Valparaiso University.
June 20, 1925
James O. Cox, of Chautauqua Park, has returned from Westerville, O., where he attended the annual meeting of the trustees of Otterbein College, from which school he was graduated. Medillia Cox and daughter, Miriam, who accompanied him to Westerville, have gone to Springfield, O., to visit her parents.
James H. McGill and son, Robert, went to Chicago this morning to meet the LaFollette funeral train which arrived in the city from Washington, D.C. McGill was a great friend of the Wisconsin senator and his family, and will probably accompany the body to Madison, Wisc.
June 21, 1925
Alva Herbst, Kirchoff Park farmer, entered a plea of not guilty when arraigned before Judge H. H. Loring in Porter Circuit Court this morning on a charge of rape on Marie Palen, 12-year-old LaPorte girl. He was held under a $2,500 bond.
Paul Hayes and W. J. Wakefield, of Valparaiso Chapter No. 2, Disabled American Veterans of the World War, left yesterday for Omaha, Neb., where they will attend the annual convention of the organization. The Valparaiso men are backing J. W. Scott, of Gary, for national commander. He formerly attended Valparaiso University and served with the American Forces in France and Germany.
June 22, 1925
The Mark Wolf Company, located on North Washington Street in Valparaiso, is just finishing the construction of a new 132’ x 50’ concrete building, to be used by the concern in the handling of their coal and concrete business. A second story extends over half the length of the building to be used as storage for building and roofing supplies.
June 23, 1925
John Schumacher, who recently purchased the building on Washington Street formerly occupied by the Valparaiso National Bank, has purchased the restaurant equipment of the French Cafe on College Hill and will install it in his building. He plans to open his place within a short time.
June 24, 1925
Samuel L. Buchanan and his wife have sold their apartment building, known as the Maralou Apartments, on Michigan Avenue in Valparaiso to Julius Meister, of Wheeler. Buchanan took a stock and grain farm of 267 acres near Wheeler in exchange.
The body of Goldie Lowenstine, wife of Jacob Lowenstine, who died in Los Angeles, Calif., Monday night, will be brought to Valparaiso for funeral services and burial. The funeral party will leave Los Angeles on Friday and arrive in Chicago on Monday morning.
June 25, 1925
Norman L. Bradford, operator of the Nickel Elevator at Nickel, Ind., east of Valparaiso, has leased the Pennsylvania Elevator on South Washington Street in Valparaiso. Bradford has also acquired the grain and feed business of the McMahan Brothers, who have been operating the elevator.
Valparaiso High School will have a gymnasium for playing basketball games this fall. A. A. Hughart, a member of the city board of education, announced. Members of the local board, comprising Hughart, W. J. Morris, and George Sheeks, and Superintendent C. W. Boucher, will go to Evanston, Ill., tomorrow to look over the high school buildings in that city.
June 26, 1925
Louis I. Robinson, of Union Township, has sold his 140-acre farm in that township to John L. Diedrich, of Chicago, for a consideration of $22,400. He took an eleven-room dwelling in Chicago in exchange for the farm. The Robinson farm has been in possession of the Robinson family for a century, having been acquired by Robinson’s grandfather, Otis Robinson, from the government on April 20, 1825.
Former Valparaiso Mayor Perry L. Sisson is summering in Canada and Alaska, according to word received here. The former mayor has mailed to the Vidette copies of two Alaskan newspapers. One of them is a small four-column, four-page affair, and carries a large amount of news and an abundance of advertising. The subscription price is $12 per year.
June 27, 1925
Valparaiso Mayor E. W. Agar has announced the appointment of J. W. Riley, of Hammond, as city speed cop. It was announced that Riley would look after speed violations exclusively. For some time, the need of a speed cop has been felt throughout the city because of numerous violations of the traffic laws.
Alexander McCabe, twice tried for the slaying of Attorney Thad Fancher of Crown Point, in the Halfway House holdup near Cedar Lake in May 1924, may be released on $25,000 bond from the Porter County Jail, where he has been confined for a year. McCabe was recently convicted and given a life term by a jury in superior court, but Special Judge W. H. Worden, of LaPorte, granted him a new trial. In the first trial, the jury disagreed. He will be tried again in September.
June 28, 1925
The Hebron American Legion post has received word from the government that a cannon captured from the Germans has been shipped to Hebron from the Raritan Arsenal at Nixon, N.J. The cannon will be used as a memorial to Boone Township boys who gave their lives in the World War.
An attempt to secure release of Alexander McCabe, Chicago gangster, awaiting trial for the slaying of Attorney Thad Fancher, of Crown Point, in the Porter Superior Court, failed Saturday when attorneys for McCabe appeared before Judge Harry L. Crumpacker at Michigan City and tendered a $25,000 sturdy bond. Judge Crumpacker held this was insufficient and demanded $45,000 for the three counts on which McCabe is held. Attorneys for McCabe said the additional bond would be secured.
June 29, 1925
Sigmund Freund, of Valparaiso, last night contracted to sell his Sheridan Beach property at Flint Lake to Malcolm “Buck” Fyfe, Chicago pitcher. The property comprises 45 acres, a 50-room hotel, dance hall, boat house, 29 summer cottages and numerous small buildings. Freund purchased the property in 1905 from Aaron W. Lytle when only a few buildings were on the site.
A verdict of accidental death was returned by Coroner A. O. Dobbins in the case of Walter Mohnssen, Jr., who fell to his death from a fire escape at the Valparaiso University auditorium on Saturday night.
June 30, 1925
Because of numerous deaths among cattle in Porter County, believed due to eating poisoned weeds, County Agent A. Z. Arehart and Dr. A. M. Jacoby, federal tuberculosis tester working here, have called upon A. A. Hansen, Purdue University, to make a survey in the county to determine whether poisonous weeds exist.
Valparaiso Mayor E. W. Agar today ordered city police to strictly enforce the ordinance relating to the discharge of fireworks in the city. Last night, a fistfight resulted between youths. The fracas commenced when the trousers of one of the youths was burned by a firecracker thrown near him.