Pages past, Sept. 13: Would-be robber gets all wet

David Stevens, The Staff of The News | Last updated Sep 12, 2023 3:26pm

On this date ...

1927: Portales Canning Co. was preparing for its first full-day run of the season.

A day later, the company’s 70 employees produced 12,000 cans of tomatoes.

1930: A Muleshoe boy was being credited with the biggest snake haul of the season. Eugene Moore, 11, killed 13 rattlesnakes in a den. Most were about 8 inches long, the boy said, but two were "extra large."

1942: A rubber shortage and other wartime concerns was forcing area sports teams to cut back on competition. Muleshoe canceled its conference football games, Melrose cut its football schedule in half and Elida announced it would have no inter-school athletics contests for the entire 1942-43 school year.

1946: Roosevelt County health officials reported they had confirmed three new cases of polio and a fourth case was suspected.

One confirmed victim was a 31-year-old military veteran. The other two confirmed victims were 2-year-old children from different Portales families.

While officials debated closing Portales schools, they remained open on the advice of Dr. H. D. Newman, the county’s health officer.

1956: A Lovington man accidentally shot himself while driving about 10 miles west of Melrose. Joe Jenkins Jr. 29, told police he had been looking at his new .22 pistol, then laid it in his lap while passing a car. The injury was to his upper right thigh and he was treated at Clovis’ Memorial Hospital.

1958: A would-be robber thought he could "make quite a haul" at the City Electric Co., 217 W. Grand, "but all he got was wet," the Clovis News-Journal reported.

Police said a man entered the office and said he wanted to get out of the rain. Soon after, he "laid a small paper bag on the table and demanded it be filled with money," the newspaper reported.

The would-be robber produced a gun, but the storekeeper told him to "get out," and advanced toward him.

The man backed away, fired a shot into the ceiling, and ran out into the rain.

"City Patrolmen John Brewer and Bruce Chronister, who were departing the City Hall by car, heard the shot and saw the man running, but the car they were riding in flooded out in a stream of water, and Chronister, who gave chase on foot, was unable to catch the fleeing man," according to CN-J.

1961: Citizens Bank of Clovis and Clovis National Bank had established accounts for victims of Hurricane Carla, one of the nation’s all-time most powerful tropical cyclones. The local Red Cross, Boy Scouts and Salvation Army were collecting food, clothing and bedding to send to victims. Carla, which made landfall near Port O’Connor, Texas, destroyed nearly 2,000 homes, killed 34 people and caused at least $300 million in damage in Texas alone.

1966: Southwestern Public Service officials were responding to Clovis residents’ complaints that water-rate increases were too high.

“The Public Service Commission of New Mexico held the hearing in Clovis so the people could be heard,” said SPS District Manager Gerald Dorough.

“No one showed up to object to the proposed rate, although the hearing was widely publicized.

“Had the citizens attended this hearing they would have seen a complete presentation on the part of our company and would understand why the new rate was necessary.”

Dorough said SPS’ “rate of return” was “dangerously low,” and even the increased price would not allow the company to see a “full return” of its costs in supplying water to the city.

1966: Clovis Justice of the Peace A. C. Olona had resigned his office after 14 years.

“I haven’t felt so good for a whole year,” Olona told the Clovis News-Journal.

“My doctor says I should be out of the office for quite a while.”

CN-J did not report the specifics of Olona’s illness.

1967: A young man and two male juveniles who had escaped jail in Muleshoe were nabbed only hours later in Clovis.

The adult was picked up near a local café as he waited for a bus. The juveniles planned to make their escape in a stolen car, but timing was not on their side. They pulled out of a local motel directly in front of a state police unit, which was carrying the sheriff of Bailey County.

The trio had been accused of breaking two windows to gain access to the Farwell school, where they allegedly smashed vending machines and collected $10 in change.

1970: Clovis' first jail escape in five years had ended without injury.

Officials said a 17-year-old prisoner overpowered a 62-year-old jailer. "I tried to use a little tear gas gun I had, but he struck my hand and knocked it away," Jailer Bill Burch told the Clovis News-Journal.

Larry Smart had been arrested Sept. 11 on a car-theft warrant out of Texas. The next afternoon, he asked Burch -- who was filling in for the regular jailer -- to bring him some medicine, which precluded the assault and escape.

City police Officer Jim Coleman and Curry County Sheriff Nelson Worley captured the youth a few hours after his escape. He was located in the back seat of a car parked on East Brady Street. Authorities were concerned Smart had a pistol, but he was unarmed when captured.

1970: Portales' Varsity Drive-In Theatre was showing "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid." The movie starred Paul Newman, Robert Redford and Katharine Ross. Admission was $1.

1970: Clovis Mayor Chick Taylor, a lifelong Democrat and former Democratic chairman of Curry County, was denying he’d publicly endorsed Republican Pete Domenici for New Mexico governor … sort of.

Taylor confirmed he’d made comments at a recent New Mexico Municipal League Conference that Domenici’s background as an elected official in Albuquerque made him “particularly suited to an understanding of city problems,” Taylor told the Clovis News-Journal.

But he also said Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bruce King was one of the best-qualified Democratic candidates in years.

United Press International reported Taylor had endorsed Domenici, but Taylor said his comments were not intended as a public endorsement of either candidate.

1977: "The biggest horse auction in the nation" was finishing a two-day run at the Clovis Livestock Market.

Auction representative Herschel Caviness estimated that the 800-1,000 horses passing through the sale ring would bring more than $400,000 from buyers who had traveled from multiple states to bid on registered quarter horses, thoroughbreds, Appaloosas, and paints, as well as a large number of grade horses.

1980: Portales' Doc's Drive In offered the Ramburger with a 12-ounce soft drink for $1.35 on Mondays. The Sunday special was a steak sandwich for $1.25.

1990: City of Clovis officials were arguing with the U.S. Census Bureau over population counts.

Census takers recorded Clovis’ 1990 population at 30,750, down from the 1980 count of 31,092.

Clovis’ Assistant City Manager Art Garrett said building permits and electrical hookups had increased considerably in the past decade, suggesting a miscount.

Census officials said the 1980 count had been too high, but the 1990 number was correct.

Pages Past is compiled by David Stevens and Betty Williamson. Contact:

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