Drug problem

The other day, someone at a store in our town read that a
Methamphetamine lab had been found in an old farmhouse in the
adjoining county and he asked me a rhetorical question.

‘Why didn’t we have a drug problem when you and I were growing up?’

I replied, ‘I had a drug problem when I was young —

I was drug to church on Sunday morning.

I was drug to church for weddings and funerals.

I was drug to family reunions and community socials no matter the
weather.

I was drug by my ears when I was disrespectful to adults.

I was also drug to the woodshed when I disobeyed my parents, told a
lie, brought home a bad report card, did not speak with respect, spoke
ill of the teacher or the priest, or if I didn’t put forth my best
effort in everything that was asked of me.

I was drug to the kitchen sink to have my mouth washed out with soap
if I uttered a profanity.

I was drug out to pull weeds in mom’s garden and flowerbeds and
cockleburs out of dad’s fields.

I was drug to the homes of family, friends and neighbors to help out
some poor soul who had no one to mow the yard, repair the clothesline,or chop some firewood; and, if my mother had ever known that I took a
single dime as a tip for this kindness, she would have drug me back
to the woodshed.

Those drugs are still in my veins and they affect my behavior in
everything I do, say, or think.

They are stronger than cocaine, crack, meth or heroin; and, if
today’s children had this kind of drug problem, America would be a
better place.’

God bless the parents who drugged us.

That said, we believe the drug problem is going to get worse. If the MEG unit gets disbanded, and public apathy about getting involved stays at the level it currently is, it has to. While we don’t propose to know the answer to this problem, we do feel it will be worse this year. That’s our take on it, comments on any subject are welcome.

Thursday rant

It’s time to let off a little steam again. The City Council passed the $164 million budget without
the $55,00 for the zoo. According to our Mayor, it has to go to comittee. But how about some of the monies they’re spending now. As Alderman Ambrose brought up, Davenport1 gets $100,000 and the Quad City Development Group gets $93,000 in funds yearly.

Our Mayor stated it would take hundreds of thousands of dollars for our zoo to compete with Niabi. Why would we want to? We have a completely different zoo that has it’s own good points. Keep the zoo!

The speed/red light cameras case is in the Iowa Supreme Court. It appears the judge thinks the cameras were cash cows and not helping remove bad drivers from the road. If the city loses the lawsuit will they have to amend to budget to pay everyone back? If we remember right, it was estimated at $2 million last year to rebate all the tickets with interest.

It seems the house at 825 Taylor will get demolished this year. This is one property we feel would benefit from a demolition crew.

STDs are running rampant amoung the teens. It was reported yesterday in the QC Times that 1 in 4 teenage girls has an std. Funny, but I don’t remember that being a problem when I was in high school. I didn’t know about sexually transmitted diseases until I was in the military.

And lastly, the war on drugs has taken a double whammy. First crack cocaine dealers get their sentences reduced, then the MEG units lost 70% of their budgeting, ouch! These dealers are out there every day trying to poison our kids and neighbors, and now we should reduce their sentence. Then the drug enforcement arm of our Police departments lost so much funding they could end up disbanded. Way to go.

As always your comments are welcome.

Our town 3

This is the last installment in the series of Davenport history. As
mentioned previously, we have a link at the end to check the history of
our city. It runs from the 1800s to fairly recently.

1945—WOC Radio rejoins the National Broadcasting Company.

1946—The Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA) builds a new rolling mill
east of Davenport. ALCOA Davenport Works becomes the world’s largest
aluminum rolling plant.

October 1949- WOC-TV, the first television station in the QC area goes
on the air.

1950- St. Paul’s Lutheran Church moves to 2136 North Brady Street.

1951- Cruiser is born, or the first time he was slapped anyway.

1954- Marycrest College breaks away from St. Ambrose College and
operates independently.

1955- Construction is completed on the new $1.4 million Scott County
Courthouse at 416 West 4th Street, the exact spot of the original
courthouse built in 1842.

March 1, 1956- The Village Shopping Center, the first shopping center
in Iowa, opens at Kimberly Road and Harrison Street.

1957- The first McDonald’s restaurant opens in Davenport, a drive-in
at 3303 Brady Street.

1959- Assumption High School opens at 1020 West Central Park Avenue.

1960- West High School opens at 3505 West Locust Street.

September 1963- The children’s wing of the Davenport Public Library is
completed on the east side of the Main Street building.

1963- Construction is completed on WOC-TV’s new broadcasting center at
805 North Brady Street.

1963- The Davenport Public Museum, later renamed the Putnam Museum of
History and Natural Science opens at 1717 West 12th Street.

1964- The Davenport YMCA and the YWCA merge, and the newly named Family
Y moves to 606 West 2nd Street.

1965- The Mississippi River crests at a record 22.48 feet, in what will
afterwards be called the Great Flood.

1966- The Davenport Municipal Art Gallery, later renamed the Davenport
Museum of Art, which had been housed for several years in the old
Armory Building on West 5th Street, moves to its new building at 1717
West 12th Street.

1967- The JB Quilan, retired and dry docked at Kahlke Boatyard in Rock
Island, is torched by vandals.

October 6, 1968- The new Davenport Public Library building, completed
at a cost of $1,445,000 at 321 Main Street opens.

1969- The clubhouse of the Davenport Country Club burns in a fire.

1970- Davenport Muncipal Stadium is renamed John O’Donnell Stadium.

1971- Kathy Kirchbaum, a Democrat, is elected Davenport’s first woman
mayor.

1972- The ML Parker Store closes.

July 11, 1973- Northpark Mall opens for business at 320 West Kimberly
Road.

1973- Montgomery Ward Department Store moves from 105-107 East 2nd
Street to Northpark Mall.

May 23, 1975- The International Milling Company plant (which processed
Robin Hood Flour) on East River Drive is destroyed in a fire ignited by
spontaneous combustion, possibly of the flour the plant produced.

1975- The Cornbelt Running Club holds the first Bix 7 Mile Run, a race
meant to coincide with the Bix Beiderbecke Memorial Jazz Festival.

1979- Truman School opens at 5506 North Pine Street.

1981- The Municipal Natatorium is razed.

1982- And addition is completed to Northpark Mall making it the largest
shopping center in Iowa.

December 1983- The Davenport Civic Center opens on East 3rd Street.
After a public contest, the facility is renamed the River Center.

1984- The restoration of the Adler Theatre begins.

August 17, 1985- The Sainte Genevieve, the last steam powered stern-
wheeler dredge employed on the Mississippi River, arrives at its new
home at the Port of Davenport shortly after its official retirement by
the US Corps of Engineers. The ‘Genny’, measuring 48 by 267 feet and
weighing 981 tons, is tentatively planned to hold a river museum and
restaurant.

1985- The Davenport TransitCenter opens at 300 West River Drive.

January 9, 1986- The Adler Theatre opens.

1987- Cruiser quits drinking, several bars go broke.

1987- Cruiser gets married, several people waiting for hell to freeze
over.

1993- The Mississippi River floods, finally cresting at 22.63 feet on
July 9. The flood was ranked a class 5 disaster.

2007- The Guardian Angels start a local chapter in Davenport.

2007- Cruiser and wife celebrate 20th annniversary, several people still
waiting for hell to freeze over.

Here’s the link we promised, it is from the QC Memory program. So if
you want to check out most the information from these posts, or check
to see what else happened, go to-
http://www.qcmemory.org/Default.aspx?PageId=222&nt=207

Comments on any subject are welcome.

Our town 2

Part two of Davenport history will cover 1921-1940. Events are missing 
between 1941-1945, and we can only guess that had to do with the war.
In the last installment we will provide a link to all the history, not
just what we found interesting.

 June 14, 1921- The Davenport board of education changes the names of
East Intermediate School, to Sudlow Intermediate School.

 February 18, 1922-WOC radio makes its broadcasting debut. Owned by BJ
Palmer, and operating from the campus of Palmer College of Chiropractic.
WOC is the second licensed station on the air.

 1922- The Municipal Nanatorium, Davenport’s only city swimming pool
for the next thirty years is built at the corner of Min and Front
Streets.

 1923- The Lend-A_Hand Club moves to 105 South Main Street.

 1924- The Davenport Democrat and Leader moves into its new building at
411 Brady Street.

 1924- WOC radio is a carrier of the first chain program in the country,
Connecting with WEAF, a New York City station 1,300 miles away.

 1926- Motorized buses begin to fill the transportation needs of
Davenport.

 1926- WOC radio becomes a affiliate of the National Broadcasting
Company.

 1927- The St. Luke’s Hospital Training School for Nurses is completed.
It is named French Hall after Colonel George Watson French, who donated
the money for the building.

 1928- Davenport takes over an airstrip along North Division Street,
naming it Cram Field after Ralph W. Cram.

 1930- BJ Palmer forms the Central Broadcasting Company, sychronizing
WOC radio with WHO radio out of Des Moines.

 August 6, 1931- Bix Beiderbecke dies of pneumonia in New York.

 November 25,1931- The RKO Orpheum Theatre opens in the Mississippi
Hotel at 106 East 3rd Street. The Hotel also opens.

 1931- Davenport Muncipal Stadium is finished at the foot of Gaines
Street.

 1932- The Union Savings Bank and Trust Company closes, due to a bank
panic that began in the fall of the previous year.

 1933- Constructin is finished on Lock and Dam No. 15, the first of
twenty-six locks  and dams across the upper Mississippi River.

 1933-WOC radio hires Ronald Regan as an announcer. Also in 1933, WOC
radio affiliates with the Columbia Broadcasting Company.

 1934- The Iowa Liquor Commission opens its first Davenport store in the
old Roddewig Building at 409-411 Harrison Street. Because this store
was so close to City Hall, it is nicknamed the ‘City Hall Wine Cellars’.

 1935- Dial service is installed for Quad-City phone users.

 1936- The last streetcars in Davenport are retired.

1937- The American Institute of Commerce (AIC), a business training
school, is established in Davenport at 617 Brady Street.

 1939- Marycrest College, the woman’s ‘branch’ of St. Ambrose College,
is established.

 1939- Scott County Hospitals have 92 cases of smallpox among them,
leading Dr. John Sunderbruch to begin campaigning for an isolation
hospital.

 1940- Construction is finished of Lock and Dam 14 near LeClaire, Iowa.

Our town

We thought it would be fun to look at Davenport history. We couldn’t
include everything that happened, but starting today we’ll list some
highlights. Today’s installment will cover 1900-1920.

March 12, 1900- Davenport women vote for the first time, over the
issue of buying the old Griswold College site to be used as a city
high school. The people vote in agreement of the plan, and the property
is purchased for $53,000.

July 25, 1901- East Davenport is decimated by a fire that began near
River Street and East Fourth and spread to the Weyerhauser and Denkman
sawmill before moving north. More than 8 blocks are destroyed, and 50
families are left homeless. Loss is estimated at $1 million.

1901- The chicago, Rock Island, and Pacific Railroad opens its new
station on Main Steet. They also elevate the tracks to ease the
incoveniences on traffic.

March 10,1903- Bix Beiderbeck is born in Davenport.

1904- The WJ Quilan is built at Kahlke Boatyards on Mill Street in
Rock Island.

1904- The Iowa and Illinois Railway Company starts the first line of
electric steetcars (called interurbans).

1906- A new synagogue at Brady and 11th Street is built to house the
Temple Emmanuel.

January 1907- Classes began at the new Davenport High School at 1120
North Main Street. The old high school was taken over as a grammer
school, now Lincoln School.

1908- A new YMCA building is built at Fourth and Harrison Streets.

1909- The Mueller Lumber Company builds a new warehouse at 501 West
Second Street.

1909- The Putnam Building is completed at 215 Main Street.

1910- Bridewell, Davenport’s women’s prison, is established on the
corner of Fifth and Main Streets.

1911- The Levee Improvement Commission begins construction of the
LeClaire Park seawall and riverfront park.

October 24, 1913- The Coliseum at Fourth and Myrtle Streets burns to
the ground. A second Coliseum is built accross Forth Street from the
origanal site.

1913- The Davenport Visiting Nurses Association establishes a Baby
Clinic.

January 23, 1915- Fire breaks out in the Crescent Macaroni and Cracker
Company. The factory reopens at the same location a year later, but has
added a water tower on the new roof, in case of another fire.

1915- The Blackhawk Hotel opens at Third and Perry Streets.

1916- Iowa’s Prohibition Law is enacted, closing sever Quad-City
breweries, including the Zoeller Brother’s Independent Brewing Company,
which made the popular Blackhawk beer.

1917- Severe overcrowding of Davenport’s grammer schools cause the
school board to build three intermdediate schools. East Intermediate
School (1414 East Locust Street), West Intermediate School (1934 West
5th Street), and JB Yound Intermediate School (1709 North Harrison).

1918- The Davenport Board of Park Commissioners buys Suburban Island
and renames it Credit Island.

1918- The Tri-Cities gets hits by an influenza epidemic. Over 7,500
people are infected and approximately 2,000 die. The city is quarantined
to the point where attendance at funerals is restricted to family
members only.

1919- St. Luke’s Hospital moves to 1224 East High Street.

August 16, 1920- The first Mississippi Valley Fair and Exposition opens
on a 90 acre site on West Locust Street.

1920- The Kahl Building is completed at a cost of $1 million. It is on
the corner of Ripley and Third Streets.

December 25, 1920- The Capital Theatre opens in the Kahl Building.

In the last installment we’ll add a link to the information. Comments are welcome

Did you know?

I didn’t know!
How could we?
Did you know that 47 countries’ have
reestablished their embassies in Iraq ?

Did you know that the Iraqi government
currently employs 1.2 million Iraqi people?
Did you know
that 3100 schools have been renovated,
364 schools are under rehabilitation,
263 new schools are now under construction;
and 38 new schools have been completed in Iraq ?
Did you know
that Iraq ’s higher educational structure consists
of 20 Universities, 46 Institutes or colleges and 4 research centers,
all currently operating?
Did you know
that 25 Iraq students departed for the United States in
January 2005 for the re-established Fulbright program?
Did you know
that the Iraqi Navy is operational?
They have 5 - 100-foot patrol craft,
34 smaller vessels and a naval infantry regiment.
Did you know
that Iraq ‘ s Air Force consists of three operational squadrons,
Which includes 9 reconnaissance and 3 US C-130 transport aircraft
(under Iraqi operational control) which operate day and night,
and will soon add 16 UH-1 helicopters and 4 Bell Jet Rangers?
Did you know
that Iraq has a counter-terrorist unit and a Commando Battalion?
Did you know
that the Iraqi Police Service has over 55,000
fully trained and equipped police officers?
Did you know
that there are 5 Police Academies in Iraq
that produce over 3500 new officers every 8 weeks?
Did you know
there are more than 1100 building projects going on in Iraq ?
They include 364 schools, 67 public clinics, 15 hospitals,
83 railroad stations, 22 oil facilities, 93 water facilities
and 69 electrical facilities.
Did you know
that 96% of Iraqi children under the age of 5
have received the first 2 series of polio vaccinations?
Did you know
that 4.3 million Iraqi children were enrolled in primary school by mid October?
Did you know
that there are 1,192,000 cell phone subscribers in Iraq
and phone use has gone up 158%?
Did you know
that Iraq has an independent media that consists of
75 radio stations, 180 newspapers and 10 television stations?
Did you know
that the Baghdad Stock Exchange opened in June of 2004?
Did you know
that 2 candidates in the Iraqi presidential election had a
televised debate recently?
OF COURSE WE DIDN’T KNOW!
WHY DIDN’T WE KNOW?
BECAUSE OUR MEDIA WON’T TELL US!
Instead of reflecting our love for our country,
we get photos of flag burning incidents at Abu Ghraib
and people throwing snowballs at the presidential motorcades.
Tragically, the lack of accentuating the positive
in Iraq serves two purposes:
It is intended to undermine the world’s perception
of the United States thus minimizing consequent support;
and it is intended to discourage American citizens.

Above facts are verifiable on the Department of Defense web site.
http://www.defenselink.mil/
Comments are welcome

Lil John Buttera has died

We just recieved word that “Lil John” Buttera died March 2 at the age of 67 after a long battle with cancer. Born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, he moved to California specifically to work on one of Mickey Thompson’s land-speed racing streamliners. He also built the chassis for Thompson’s blue Mustang funny car before he opened his own chassis shop. This action set the standard for funny car chassis for years. In 1987 he entered the Indianapolis 500, with a car he built, and his driver qualified 8th. He built a Duece for John Corno that won the 1980 America’s Most Beautiful Roadster award, and also was into custom bikes. He pioneered the use of billet aluminum on street rods, and even taught Boyd Coddington how to machine billet aluminum. On top of all that, he was a nice guy.

Thursday rant

It’s a little late, but here’s a couple of things we find interesting. We hope the two brothers who beat some guy unconcious, and hit his wife, get some serious time out of this. These two seem to be making a career out of being jerks. Maybe some time playing with the big boys in the big house would give them a needed attitude adjustment.

Not a rant, but we’d like to give a nod to the two non-profits who are stepping up to see that the house on Harrison Street get moved. Talk has been hot and heavy on this subject for a while, but doesn’t it make more sense to reuse this house as opposed to adding tons of usable materials to the landfill?

After hearing about the off-duty policeman who was injured in a hit and run accident on Main Street, we have to wonder. How does a Honda Civic do so much damage to a Ford Explorer and still be capable of fleeing the scene? Maybe it will start a new trend at demolition derbys. We hope the policeman wasn’t injured too seriously and wish him a speedy recovery.

With the owner of the Weather Channel suing Al Gore we may be at a turning point on the global warming issue. Seems to us that if you don’t buy into the theory you’re either crazy, or an againster. We’ll let the eco-terrorists and think green people handle this one.

And lastly, this election is trying our patience. Now, even though everybody supposedly knew the rules going in, some want to change the rules. To us it’s a no-brainer, you were told going in the votes wouldn’t count, get over it. Or pay for it yourself. Don’t put the monetary burden on the states who followed the rules. We were also wondering how these two candidates can do their day jobs AND campaign 24/7. If this is any indication of how seriously they take their jobs, maybe we don’t want them for president.

That’s a couple things that stuck to our craw, your comments on any subject are welcome.

An honor, and something completely different

We were going to do a big rant today, but an email changed our mind.
A thanks for the nod to Mr. Bill Towler, and his client Auction Network.
Their website is at http://www.auctionnetwork.com
Mr. Towler asked if we would like to be in on an interview with Dan Kruse
of the Kruse auction family. They have quite the success story going on.
The Kruse family has broken more than 250 world record prices in the
collector car field. The family was to first to sell a car for a
documented $1 million. The buyer was Tom Monaghan of Domino’s Pizza. The
car was a 1934 Duesenberg SJ La Grande dual-cowl phaetom. They also sold
30 muscle cars to baseball legend Reggie Jackson for $1 million.

The Kruse family has a long history in auctioning collector cars,
distictive real estate, vintage aircraft, collectable farm tractors,
mobile homes, collectibles, rare oil paintings, factories, islands,
zoos, railroads and three entire towns.

Dan is also the owner of Dan Kruse Classics. That website is-
http://www.dankruseclassics.com
There are two auctions coming up. The first is on March 14 and 15, in
in Frecericksbug, Texas, and the other is March 29 at Daytona International
Speedway. There is more information on the websites.

And in the “Now for something completely different department”-
It would seem the city passed having a ‘disparity study for the city of
Davenport’ done by a California firm. The cost is almost $150,000.
The State will match $75,000 with the city for this study.
While some say it is a historical moment in our state, we have to
wonder the need for such a study in the first place.

That’s a little of what’s been going on. Your comments on these or
other subjeects are welcome.

Global warming fraud?

We’re working on a rant for tomorrow. In the mean time there’s this-

John Coleman, owner of the Weather Channel, is suing Al Gore to expose
‘the fraud of global warming’. He feels that by suing people who sell
carbon credits, including Al Gore, it would force global warming alarmists
to give more honest accounts of their policies.

Mr. Coleman also says that in the last 100 years the temperature has
only risen 1 degree, and that this past year alone it has went down by
1 degree due to the cold winter. He makes a good arguement for his side
of the debate. For more on this go to-
http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080303175301.aspx

We have our thoughts on this subject, and we’re sure you have yours, so
comments on this or any subject are welcome.