With the election dominating the news today, I found, looking through a Morrow County Independent dated October, 1940 — 80 years ago — a story titled “Argument Over Politics Results in Two Arrests!”
It describes two neighbors in rural Cardington who tangled over the national election. One man drew a knife on his neighbor who lived across the road. It seems the first man had posters of Democratic candidates in his window for several weeks.
This provoked his neighbor who then posted a picture of Wendell Willkie, Republican presidential candidate, on the telephone pole opposite the first man’s home. The first man threw stones at the Willkie supporter as he climbed the pole with the pictures and when his father came to his son’s aid, the first man also drew a knife.
The first man was placed under a peace bond for two years and the second man was charged with failure to keep the peace.
‘Evil’ billboards
I am surprised to read in a 1905 edition of the Morrow County Independent an entire column on “why the billboard is a permanently evil for towns!” The article states that “the agitation against the billboard as a municipal disfigurement has already reached goodly proportions and the campaign in as yet its infancy,” says American House and Gardening magazine.
The article notes, “Some well meant efforts have been made to improve it partly by designing the billboard itself. One of the most obvious steps in municipal betterment is to do away with unnecessary unsightly objects and the billboard has been unsightly so long that many people regard it as permanently evil. The billboard, glaring and staring at every point, approaches the limit beyond which business should not go.”
Noting the many billboards I’ve seen in the past and currently, this article was ignored.
Looking back
October, 1940: An ad in the local paper notes there will be “sound movies” in the Cardington Park on Saturday, October 19. They were titled “Republican-Auto Movies” featuring the Wendell Willkie and
Charles McNary nominees for president and vice president. In case of inclement weather the movies were to be shown in the H. H. Denton Garage.
At the beginning of the month a total of 85 men were employed by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in Morrow County. the lowest total in years.
Three young Cardington men, Donald Meredith, Gary Dodds, Jr. and James Howard all began a year of service in the U. S. Army. They were members of the Ohio National Guard.
October, 1950: Charles H. Winchell of rural Cardington, a Seaman Apprentice on the Navy ship, “Showboat,” an aircraft carrier, was participating in the Korean Campaign. The aircraft on Winchell’s ship were supporting the United Nations Forces fighting there.
October, 1960: The garments designed and made by Mrs. H. H. Curl of Cardington, won first and second place at the Tennessee State Fair. Students participating in a joint Violin-Piano recital at the Cardington
Church of the Nazarene included Brenda Rhineberger, Nancy Fate, Roger Klinefeltsr and Pam McClintock.
