Editor’s Note: The following are excerpts taken from the Centennial Calendar (1885-1985) that was complied by Doug Giebel.

January 9, 1919

At about 2:00 p.m. our train arrived in Big Sandy. The weather was mild for January, there was only a little snow on the ground and snow on the hills and mountains. It sure looked cold and bleak, cheerless, far, wide, and bare to people used to the trees and bushes of Iowa. I was about sick with the “grippe” and wanted to go to bed.

Somehow the freight train had arrived just before the passenger train, and Dad and Harry were there. They had c...