2021 One year ago
The Moscow Volunteer Fire Department responded to a shop fire on South Highway 95 that consumed and destroyed the building. It started when someone added diesel fuel to a wood stove fire, causing the flames to spread out of control, according to the fire department’s investigation. It could have been a lot worse, Chief Brian Nickerson said. With two months left in the year, the Moscow Volunteer Fire Department has responded to more 911 calls in 2021 than any previous recorded year. ... When Linda Hardesty visited the U.S. Postal Service office in Viola earlier this month to pick up her mail, she noticed an unusual sign taped to the door. The notice informed residents the post office would no longer offer retail services at its location on Main Street. After contacting the Moscow post office, Hardesty learned she could keep her address the same, but the mail typically sent to her P.O. Box in Viola would instead be available in Moscow for the time being. What was once a two-mile trek from her farmhouse to the post office is currently about a half-hour drive round-trip.
2017 Five years ago
Wallis “Wally” Friel, a prominent member of the Pullman community who served as a Superior Court judge and a trombone player in a popular local band, died at the Good Hope Adult Family Home in Pullman. He was 86 years old. ... The 2017 Gritman Medical Center LC Valley Down and Dirty Mud Run distributed $22,500 in net profits to area nonprofit organizations. The money was raised through business donations and participant fees for the annual mud run. This year’s race drew a record 552 paid competitors. The mud run made $5,000 donations to Opportunities Unlimited, Inc., Willow Center, Inc., YWCA and the Gritman Diabetes Awareness Fund, and a $2,500 donation to Centennial Project Food.
2012 10 years ago
For an hour, former Washington Gov. Gary Locke was back in his home state — via webcast, anyway. Locke, who served as the first Chinese-American governor from 1997-2005, has been the United States ambassador to China since Jon Huntsman’s resignation from the position in the summer of 2011. He fielded questions about human rights and other differences the U.S. holds with China over issues like trade. He said the administration has “not been shy” about bringing complaints to the World Trade Organization. ... Imagine if nearly the entire population of Whitman County lived in a 40-acre garbage dump. It sounds hard to believe, but that’s the reality in Guatemala City, Guatemala, where about 50,000 people call the municipal dump their home. Many of them must scavenge for food scraps to eat and discarded items to resell. Some of the women who reside in the dump have gone to school and learned how to make beads to sell to improve their living conditions, said Nancy Spada of Singing Shaman Traders in Hauser, Idaho. Some of those beads will be for sale at the 13th annual International Fair Trade Craft Sale.
