January, 1981
Windham elementary schools were closed Monday, unexpectedly. It was cold, and after the two-week holiday vacation several school buses wouldn’t start. Enough started to serve the high school and junior high school, and by Tuesday all were running.
The University of Southern Maine is offering a course in bookkeeping. George Stilphen, will teach it in 10 class sessions at the Gorham campus, in the university’s Department of Conferences and Special Programs.
Maine’s Board of Environmental Protection now will let anyone aggrieved by one of its decisions appeal within 39 days. Until now you could appeal only if you had new information.
Windham has overdrawn its 1980 solid waste budget of $108,000. Town Manager Kathleen Jenks is budgeting $133,075 for 1981.
Tom Robbins has completed an outstanding career as a South Portland High School gymnast. “His feats are unrivaled in the history of Maine gymnastics,” writes his coach, Jim Connolly. In the state meet, Robbins won six trophies including the all-around title – – an unprecedented achievement. Then he led South Portland’s team past Newton High, the Boston-area Suburban League champion. Now Robbins has moved on to a career as an actor. After taking acting courses and filling several roles in studios in Phoenix, Ariz., he is working as a tour guide at Universal Studios in Hollywood and is on call for commercials and other acting jobs.
Maine is one of only three states in which Republicans lost ground in the November elections, and the Maine loss was the heaviest.
In a letter, James A. Golden announced that he would not seek a fourth term on the Gorham School Committee. He lists changes that are forcing us all to adjust creatively including longer lives; heavier costs on the young; more mothers working; birth rate down; and divorce rate up.
January, 1991
James E. Gagan, 74, broke his left hip when he fell on ice as he left his office at the law offices of Desmond Cooper Manderson and Millett, 840 Main St., Westbrook. Jim is Westbrook’s former city solicitor. He had to stay in a hospital bed while his wife Trudy made their planned Christmas visit to their daughter Patricia Hayden and granddaughter Maria Christina, 2, in Flower Mount, Texas.
Two shepherd dogs were running loose on Middle Street, Westbrook, and one of them bit a woman’s leg. Then, as animal control officer Dave Sparks and a police patrolman rounded them up, one bit the policeman.
The Rev. Richard Bennett and his wife Linda will meet with members of the Westbrook-Warren Congregational Church Saturday. He is a candidate to be the church’s new minister, a position that has been vacant several months.
Martin’s Point Health Care Center is advertising walk-in medical care for patients of all ages, with free blood pressure checks, at 595 Brighton Ave., Portland.
The docking fee at Spring Point Marina, South Portland, will be raised from $68 to $72 per foot of boat length. The operator, Port Harbor Marine, leases the marina from the city. Other prices: Breakwater Marina, $65 and $70; Channel Crossing, $65.
Linda Johnson, a former mayor, and Edwin Beecher are the new members of the South Portland Planning Board. Previously Gary Massanek and Richard Shinay were appointed to the board.
Scarborough Sanitary District Superintendent Charles Anderson’s pay was raised 7 percent, from $51,000 to $54,800. The vote was taken behind closed doors. Trustees also approved a 1991 budget of $1.8 million.
The Gorham Land Trust has paid $8,500 to buy 3.1 acres on the Little River from Donna St. Pierre and family. Part of the money was borrowed from the Windham-Gorham Rod and Gun Club. Land Trust president Robert Frazier plans a wooden ramp down the steep banking to give canoeists access to the river, which flows to the Presumpscot River. He plans a gravel parking lot for 4 or 5 cars.
Vickie and Robert Hale of Florida have sold their house on Mineral Springs Circle, Windham, for $250,000 to two Massachusetts men, Brian Smith and Alan Hutchinson.
In a strange robbery at 1:25 a.m. Dec. 24 in North Windham, a man scooped $144.36 from the cash register at the Big Apple and drove away while another man blocked the store manager from interfering. The second man and his car were still there when police arrived seven minutes after the manager’s call; he was arrested. Four or five customers were in the store.
A candlelight vigil for peace in the Middle East will be held at 8 p.m. Sunday in Riverbank Park, Westbrook, with parking at St. Mary’s Church.
Bud Dorr, son of Russ and Ginny Dorr, West Gorham, has been named chief of the Meteorological Services Division of the National Weather Service. It’s a promotion from his job as lead forecaster in Boston. He also is on the Weather Service’s team ERICA – Experiment in Rapidly Intensifying Cyclones in the Atlantic.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
