U.S. Highway 59 bridge make road program’s priority list

— Sequoyah County Times, Aug. 7, 1997

From the files of Your Sequoyah County Times

25 Years Ago

(From the Aug. 3 and 7, 1997, issues of the Sequoyah County Times)

–Daily temperatures have continued to rise in recent weeks, contributing to the death of a least one elderly county resident and the treatment of many others at Sequoyah Memorial Hospital‚s emergency room in Sallisaw.

—Governor Frank Keating calls the 15 road building projects approved for eastern Oklahoma this week, including a $6.75 million allocation or U.S. Highway 59 south of Sallisaw, “a major step into the 21st Century.”

It was made possible when the legislature passed House Bill 1629 which, when combined with the transportation department‚s current five-year plan projects, amounts to more than $2 billion in highway improvements over the next five years.

The impact of the formal approval for improvements to Highway 59, from south of State Highway 59, from south of State Highway 141 to the other side of the Arkansas River, is not known yet, said Nico Gomez, spokesman for the Oklahoma Department of Transportation.

50 Years Ago

(From the August, 1972, issue of the Sequoyah County Times)

—Files for this time period cannot be read.

75 Years Ago

(From the Aug. 8, 1947, issue of the Sequoyah County Times)

—Paul Carlile, member of the Oklahoma State Highway Commission Thursday told local good road boosters that the State highway Commission would issue a work order this week on the 9 miles of paving on U.S. 64 Highway east of Sallisaw.

—Although no definite date has been set by the Oklahoma State Highway Department for the opening of the Arkansas River bridge on U.S. 59 highway south of Sallisaw, the local Chamber of Commerce has started the ball rolling for one of the largest celebrations to ever be staged in this area, honoring the event sometime in October. Present plans are for the Sequoyah County Roundup Club to stage a Rodeo that night with additional entertainment that will make the celebration one that will long be remembered. No definite date can be set for the celebration until it is known when the bridge and approaches will be completed, however it is thought that it will be sometime between the first and middle of October.

—Buck Johnson, Chief of Police, today issued a warning to all chicken and dog owners that numerous complaints have come to him of dogs and chickens running loose and destroying property.

Johnson said that Tuesday an investigation of a report that a local chicken owner‚s chicks were being molested by a dog proved correct, but that the chicken owner was also breaking the law by letting their chickens run at large.

Complaints from garden growers have been more numerous against chickens than against dogs, but that to say the least the mixture of chicken cackling with dog barking was giving his force a lot of work.

100 years ago

(From the Aug. 4, 1922, issue of the Sequoyah County Democrat)

—More than 3,500 bushels of fruits have been shipped from Sallisaw this year to the northern markets as the first lap of what is to be the marketing of more than 10,000 bushels of fruits from Sallisaw trade territory before the season is over as compared with 500 bushels that were shipped from this city in 1921. Orchardists small and large in every part of Sallisaw trade territory are reporting the crops of various fruits to be ripening rapidly and the season has been favorable for a good production.

The reason why Sallisaw is shipping many times more fruit this year is because one firm in the city has urged the farmers to bring their products to them and they would buy everything that is produced on the farm. During the fall and winter months the chamber of commerce of this city had with them on various occasions the agricultural expert of the Kansas City Southern Railroad and with co-operation, meetings were held in every corner of Sallisaw‚s trade territory with farmers and “diversification” was preached and at these meetings McDonald and Matthews had a special representative at each meeting and they promised the farmer they would buy cucumbers, peaches, apples, pears, plums, grapes and etc. and in fact almost everything that is raised on the farm.