100 years ago
May 19, 1922
• Perhaps the general public thinks that the "knot-hole" fans at Kavanaugh Field get to see the game for nothing. This is the case as a rule, but W. S. Chestnutt will tell the world that the sport is costly. Chestnutt saw yesterday's game through one of the numerous knot-holes in the fence. He thought he was fortunate in finding a hole, but later admitted he was out of luck. During the exciting periods of the game, Chestnutt was spellbound. He couldn't leave the hole for fear he would lose his place. When a youth bumped into him he paid no further attention to him. After the game Chestnutt started home and learned that his pocketbook containing $24 was missing. He remembered how the youth bumped into him and realized where his money went.
50 years ago
May 19, 1972
• State Senator Q. Byrum Hurst of Hot Springs, a Democratic candidate for governor, said Thursday night in a 30-minute telecast that the use of "good common horse sense" would restore order to the state prison system. "The prisons do not have to be continually in a state of eruption and in a state of trouble if you just have some discipline -- I don't mean a return of any of the illegal practices of the past." Hurst said that "all we need to do down there is put some reason and intelligence and good common sense into the administration of our state prison system." He said prisons should be run humanely but in such a way that they serve as a "deterrent to crime."
25 years ago
May 19, 1997
• Maumelle has always been unique. A brainchild of developers and the federal government, it was conceived in the late 1960s as a New Town -- an experiment that blended social and urban planning theories. ... Now a report being prepared by the University of Arkansas at Little Rock's Donaghey Project for Urban Studies & Design shows that Maumelle is deviating from its original plan. Residents want to scale down the city's development goals, cap the population at 25,000 and scrap the federal government's social program agenda, the report says... "The goal of the social plan was to bring a population of people together from a mix of social and economic levels, provide them a place to work and a harmonious community," the Donaghey report explained. "The Maumelle social plan placed schools in neighborhood centers as cohesive elements, and mixed low density housing types with high density housing at the core." ...Maumelle's success or failure as a New Town depended on the economics of the private market. And the report says, "Maumelle did not sell at a rate sufficient to maintain its viability." ...Maumelle Director David Jones called residents' changing attitudes natural. "Social changes are evident. Ideas change. Views change. I don't know of any city that has gone along with a set plan for 20 years," he said.
10 years ago
May 19, 2012
• The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences terminated the employment of the wife of state Rep. Hank Wilkins from her $60,199-a-year job as a mental-health professional at the school because her employment violated state law, a UAMS spokesman said Friday. Laura Tyler, administrator of the Psychiatric Research Institute at UAMS, informed Phyllis Wilkins of Pine Bluff in a letter dated May 10 of UAMS ceasing her employment, effective at the close of business on May 14. ... Hank Wilkins, D-Pine Bluff, has served in the Legislature since 1999. The state law at issue was enacted through Act 34 of 1999, sponsored by then-state Sen. Mike Beebe, who has been governor since 2007. The law also provides that generally "no person elected to a constitutional office, after being elected to the constitutional office and during the term for which elected, may enter into employment with" any state agency.