I lifted the top page on past April stories and the headline said “April Ice Storm Topples Telephone Poles!” It wasn’t ice I woke up to yesterday morning but snow! In April.
This ice story happened in April, 1957, when ice covered wires and wind toppled 17 poles of the Ohio Central Telephone Corporation on the east side of Route 42 just south of Mount Gilead. The story notes nearly 200 poles belonging to the Ohio Central Telephone Corp and Ohio Bell Telephone Co in the area were broken or uprooted by the storm.
• Other April stories include one in that same edition noting Dennis Bell was named Principal of the Cardington Elementary School. Bell had been serving as a Cardington teacher, physical education teacher, head baseball, and assistant basketball coach. He was to continue as head football coach.
This same edition names the May Day court at Cardington High School. Judith Burggraf was to be crowned queen by Carol Rhineberger, retiring queen. Attendants were Marsha Lenhart, Sherry Owens, Cassie Walck, Carol Briggs, Patricia McClenathan, Dorothy VanSickle, Joan Burton, Anita Wyatt, Loretta Garverick and Marsha Showalter.
• The April, 1938 Independent lists an ad from Koon’s Grocery where Wheaties was selling at two packages for 25 cents with the added bonus of a “gift for boys and girls — a Jack Armstrong telescope!”
• A large size of Rinso soap was 21 cents and Silver Fleece Kraut was selling at two cans for 19 cents while Sanka Coffee was listed at 35 cents!
• I wonder where the WigWam was in Cardington. An ad in 1920 noted there were pocket billiards, hot sandwiches, coffee and pie. They had the “best pool equipment in this section of Ohio!”
April, 1951: Fifty new uniforms were purchased for the Cardington Drum and Bugle Corps. Uniforms were also to be furnished for two drum majorettes, color guards, color bearers and the firing squad. Membership in the corps was increased from 25 to 35.
April, 1961: Stahl Metal Products of Cardington, received an order for 56 customized truck bodies from the Ohio Fuel Gas Company.A Cleveland Glider Pilot was forced to land his sailplane at Spring Valley Air Port northeast of Cardington. This occurred on a Saturday afternoon.
Setting out from the airport in Norwalk, unfavorable weather conditions caused him to cut his planned flight short. His goal was to glide 188 miles from Norwalk, Ohio, to Ashland, Kentucky.
April 1971: A window rattling early morning explosion started a fire in two oil tanks on a property a quarter mile north of Cardington. Twenty five Cardington and Mount Gilead firemen battled the inferno for two hours. The fire could be seen from Interstate 71. Cardington’s first Easter egg hunt in many years attracted an estimated 350 children.
