100 Years Ago

Aug. 12, 1921

Charles A. Weatherford is in the hospital with a bullet in his back as a result of a shooting fray last night in which he is said to have attempted to shoot his former wife, Mrs. Osla Weatherford, and then turned the gun on himself. Mrs. Weatherford was not injured beyond the burns inflicted on her neck by powder, and the condition of Weatherford is not at all serious, it is thought. Weatherford came here from his home in Washington, and Henry Keys, owner of the house where Mrs. Weatherford and her four children are living, declared this morning that Weatherford has attempted to get Mrs. Weatherford to forget their past difficulties. She was granted a divorce about a month ago.

50 Years Ago

Aug. 12, 1971

You’d think college athletic recruiters would flock around Dean Fouquette like photographers around Raquel Welch in a bikini. Saturday, he will become the only person ever to play in all three Oregon prep all-star games: football, basketball and baseball. Yet when Fouquette enrolls next month at Oregon State University, he’ll be paying his own way for lack of a scholarship, all because of heredity. Dean is the son of a 4-foot-11 mother and a 5-5 father. By modern athletic standards, he’s a midget at 5-7 and 140 pounds. That is, Fouquette says he’s 5-7 and 140. His high school coach, Don Requa, thinks his little quarterback exaggerates. “When he says 5-7, he’s including his fluffy hairdo,” Requa said. “And he seemed to disappear every time we tried to get him on the scales. I’d say he’s closer to 125 pounds.”

25 Years Ago

Aug. 12, 1996

A helicopter built over the past year and a half by a Hermiston air hobbyist fell to the ground during testing Friday, slightly injuring the man. Steve Jonas, who had put 275 hours into the 1989 Rotorway Homebuilt, walked away from the wreck with cuts and bruises but was nonetheless transported to Good Shepherd Community Hospital for observation. “I’m depressed, disappointed and broke,” Jonas said after the wreck. “But alive,” added Glen Phillips, a paramedic who responded to the scene. Having completed it only six weeks ago, Jonas was testing the craft’s turning and hovering ability at a height of between 10 and 15 feet above a field west of the Hermiston Municipal Airport when the helicopter fell. The rear rotor, essential to keeping the craft stable, is suspected to have failed.