Looking back...

100 YEARS AGO....

Rockdale residents had raised $732 to send to the hurricane-ravaged Corpus Christi area. Donations ranged from $100 to 25 cents. The storm had claimed at least 500 lives and damage was estimated at $20-million.

The Sharp area was seeking cotton pickers. Growers reported 200 bales had already been ginned at the Sharp Gin and it was estimated cotton still in the fields would make an additional 1,800 bales.

It wasn’t so rosy in the immediate Rockdale area where rains and flooding had resulted in only 2,000 bales being ginned. Yearly average was about 10,000.

Reporter Publisher John Esten Cooke penned an editorial pleading for readers not to borrow the paper: “We know where one copy makes the round of the whole neighborhood, five or six families...one party has been abstracting another party’s Reporter from the mailbox and returning it before the owner has got his mail.

The Reporter noted what was apparently downtown Rockdale’s premier athletic of the week. “Two dogs got into a real first-class fight and within 60 seconds nearly 100 people had gathered.

FORTY YEARS AGO....

What had been a seven-acre drive-in theater was becoming a new Rockdale landmark as construction on a Walmart discount store was well underway. The 43,000 square-foot facility was to feature 36 departments and a garden center.

As the Rockdale ISD prepared to add a new junior-high campus, school trustees adopted a five-year master plan to manage growth.

Marcie Reynolds of Austin was the new manager for the Rockdale Chamber of Commerce. She came to Rockdale with her husband, Bob Reynolds, the new principal of Rockdale High School.

Underwood, Neuhaus & Associates of Houston purchased the $975,000 in water-sewer revenue bonds authorized by City of Rockdale voters earlier in the year.

It was a wild football game as Rockdale and Marlin combined for 629 yards of offense and the Bulldogs came from behind in the fourth quarter to win 32-29. TWENTY YEARS AGO....

Milam County’s new proposed budget included a proposed 21-cent tax increase, from 29.6 to 48 cents.

Rockdale ISD trustees adopted a $1.50 tax rate, bringing the RISD to the level of the state’s tax cap. Values had dropped due mostly to a $30-million decline in valuation of Alcoa’s Rockdale Operations.

Rockdale’s First Baptist Church observed its 125th anniversary with two services, a meal, unveiling of a Texas Historical Marker, the return of former pastors and lots of visiting.

Alcoa was attempting a takeover of its chief rival, Reynolds Aluminum, and industry analysts were pronouncing the effort a “done deal” after a deadline set by Reynolds stockholders passed without incident.

It was about as good a football game as you could find but the Cameron Yoemen defeated Rockdale 21-20. Rockdale scored late in the fourth quarter, gambled, went for a 2-point PAT and didn’t make it when Yoe intercepted the pass.

TEN YEARS AGO....

The Rockdale ISD’s $30.8-million bond project which included a first-ever intermediate school and an expanded-renovated high school was ending up “in the black” as between $20,000 and $30,000 in unspent funds were being returned to the district.

Rockdale ISD nominated Joan Ratliff and Tim Arledge to the Milam County Appraisal District (MCAD) board of directors. That assured their election as RISD casts enough votes in the appraisal district elections to elect two persons.

Cars were lined up around the block as Little River Health Care gave away more than 100 car seats at its Rockdale hospital.

Ground was broken on Cameron’s new Scott & White Clinic, which featured 15 examination rooms and an adjoining pharmacy.

The Rockdale Tiger football team posted its first shutout in four years, blanking brand-new Leander Rouse 54-0 at Tiger Field