100 years ago, 1918
The story that jail labor is likely to be used upon Auburn streets, first printed in the Lewiston Journal of Tuesday, has excited a great deal of comment — most of it exceptionally favorable — throughout the county. Manager Otis will confer with the commissioners late Wednesday afternoon to attempt to arrive at some agreement. It will be remembered that the prison labor market closed Tuesday night with $2 asked by the commissioners and $1.50 offered by Mr. Otis. The Journal has talked with several citizens of both cities, and of both political parties, and all agree that the offer made by the manager was very fair.

50 years ago, 1968
“It should be a great year for Maine maple syrup producers,” Ray Hearn, veteran Maine maple syrup producer, who has already tapped over 500 sugar trees in his Rock Maple Mountain Sugar Orchard, at Danville Corner, said today. Hearn, who with his wife, Angie, have been producing maple syrup and sugar on a large scale operation since 1947, is usually most reluctant to forecast what a season is going to bring forth, but this year he says all signs point to an excellent year.

25 years ago, 1993
One of the nation’s best-known thinkers and writers on the history of humanity’s relationship with the natural world will present the annual Edmund S. Muskie Environmental Lecture at Bates College. Roderick F. Nash, professor of history and environmental studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara, will speak on “People, Nature and the American Mind” in the Muskie Archives on Campus Avenue. The public is invited to attend at no charge. The Muskie Lecture is an annual tribute to the former U.S. senator and secretary of state, a 1936 Bates graduate and leader in the environmental movement.

The material in Looking Back is reproduced exactly as it originally appeared, although misspellings and errors made at that time may be corrected.