Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities

Pages past - May 14

On this date...

1972: A New Mexico State University agricultural economist was predicting water available for irrigation in Curry and Roosevelt counties would “drastically decrease in the next 90 years, causing a sharp decline in farm and ranch receipts and property tax bases.”

Frank Osterhoudt wrote a magazine article in which he reported the water supply for the two counties came strictly from underground aquifers.

“Recharge of the aquifers is limited to the downward percolation of a small amount of local precipitation, less than one half of an inch per year,” he wrote.

He predicted a 10 percent reduction in irrigated land in the area by 2020.

1967: Muleshoe High School was scheduled to graduate 96 seniors.

Wetona Kincanon was valedictorian. Neil Finley was salutatorian.

Tom Jinks was the high school principal, Neal Dillman was the school’s superintendent and class sponsors included Ruby Lee Kerr, Bee Miller, Elizabeth Black and George Washington.

Pages Past is compiled by Editor David Stevens. Contact him at: [email protected]

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