July 7 through the years here
100 Years ago – 1925
A fire destroyed the new Service Station that was near Lester Lumber Company’s plant on Jones Creek. Mr. Ford stated that the service station would be rebuilt immediately, as it was the only service station in that area.
Clothing for women was moving closer to pants, as evidenced by a syndicated fashion article by Julia Bottomlevy in the Henry Bulletin. The illustration showed a woman in a shirt with sleeves rolled up to the elbows, a kerchief tied at the neckline and short puffy pants which ended in bands just below the knees, with heavy stockings and ankle boots. “The service suit has been designed to answer for camping, fishing, hiking, climbing, long motor trips and general outdooring,” the column reads. “It is pictured here in khaki and worn with yarn stockings, calfskin shoes, cotton broadcloth blouse and felt hat. Just to look at it is enough to count the hours until vacation comes.”
75 years ago – 1950
Gov. George Battle heard pleas to spare the Martinsville Seven from the electric chair. Martin A. Martin was a lead attorney in the proceeding. He told the governor that every attempt was made to keep “quasi Communist groups” and other outside influences from making this another Scottsboro case. [In the Scottsboro case, https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/scottsboro-boys , on March 25, 1931, nine black teenagers were falsely accused of raping two white women aboard a freight train in Alabama.] Martin argued that the Martinsville cases did not follow due process of law and that the defendants were too young; and witnesses including Booker T. Millner’s mother, Ida Miller, asked for life in prison rather than the death sentence. Others who spoke in favor of the petition were Dr. John H. Marion, pastor of Bon Air Presbyterian Church; Dr. Gordon B. Hancock, professor at Virginia Union University; Father T.E. O’Connell, pastor of St. Paul’s Cathedral; Dr. C.C. Scott, president of Goodwill Baptist Association; Mrs. Emory Hill of the Richmond Women’s Club; Miss Roberta Wellford, a Richmond civic leader; and Dr. Joseph T. Hill, president of the Virginia General Baptist Association.
The Martinsville Coca-Cola Bottling Company advertised the automatic soda vending machine as “A welcome host to workers – in office and shops - refresh at the familiar red cooler.” The cost of a vending machine Coke was 5 cents.
50 years ago – 1975
Parents Without Partners – PWP – was a national organization aiming to provide support for single parents. It had chapters in Roanoke and Danville. Three people were trying to start a chapter for Martinsville: Sig Klaussner, a Patrick Henry Community College adult student who had been divorced for a year; Fran Hall, a cashier at Palmer’s Sureway of Collinsville who had been divorced a year after 19 years of marriage; and Mary Tuttle of Collinsville, whose husband Wallace had died of a brain tumor 4 years before.
State Police raided a gambling ring in the abandoned Oak Level School on Virginia 674. They arrested 13 people and confiscated $13,500 in cash. They also got a gaming table and gaming paraphernalia.
25 years ago - 2000
Residents of the Huntington Hills subdivision in Ridgeway were banding together to oppose the zoning approval of the expansion of a nearby apartment complex. The complex had eight apartments but the Board of Zoning Appeals approved it going up to 24 units.
— Information from museum records and the Henry Bulletin and the Martinsville Bulletin.