100 YEARS AGO Dec. 4, 1913
FORT SMITH - Orders were issued by the police today that dice shaking at cigar stands and confectionaries must cease. The order is the result of a Good Citizenship Club organized by the boy students at the high school. It is said that an investigation showed many of the boys have been in the habit of running into debt as a result of “shaking the box.”
50 YEARS AGO Dec. 4, 1963
A false alarm caused by an unidentified motorist who deposited his parking ticket fine in a fire alarm box at 7th and Spring was answered by five pumpers, two chiefs, one ladder truck and the rescue unit at 8:56 a.m. today. Firemen said the motorist was gone when they arrived, but he had apparently paid his fine only minutes earlier. A yellow parking ticket containing a dollar was found inside the fire alarm box. Firemen asked that motorists please pay traffic fines in appropriate places reminding that levers on fire alarm boxes are so sensitive that even a child can pull one.
25 YEARS AGO Dec. 4, 1988
Little Rock officials may try to force landowners in the city’s crumbling Ninth Street district to tear down buildings that don’t meet city codes. Roy Beard, chief of central codes for the Public Works Department, said his agency has proposed an ordinance to the city Board of Directors that would mandate condemnation procedures against owners of dilapidated buildings. Unless owners comply with condemnation orders, the city could place a lien on their properties, according to the proposal. The buildings - some boarded up, others crumbling - have created an eyesore along the thoroughfare from Izard Street east to Gaines Street while some other parts of downtown, primarily north of Interstate 630, have enjoyed an urban revival.
10 YEARS AGO Dec. 4, 2003
Gov. Mike Huckabee, on the day he issued the formal proclamation setting a date for a special legislative session on education reform, accused rivals Wednesday of using schoolyard intimidation. Huckabee, speaking to Little Rock business leaders, warned of Arkansas falling into a “death spiral” if the state’s public school system doesn’t undergo significant structural changes. He said superintendents are “bullying” legislators to keep those reforms from happening. Jimmy Cunningham, president of the Arkansas Rural Education Association and superintendent of the tiny Plainview-Rover School District in Yell County, said Huckabee started it. “I think the first bullying came when the governor announced his plan Jan. 14,” Cunningham said.
Arkansas, Pages 14 on 12/04/2013