In the news this week 120 years ago:
• “The New Year is here at last — bright, joyous and beaming,” Herald editor W. H. Robertson proclaimed in a poetic editorial. “How lovely nature has seemed, decked in her royal robes. No queen was ever more resplendent in her jewels and diadems. The multi-formed snow flakes sparkling like millions of diamonds, and the frost-encrusted trees fashioned in myriad designs by the hand of nature, form a scene of fascinating and bewildering splendor. Nineteen Hundred and Four has come to stay, and you will be wise if you make the best of it.”
• A front-page story touted the plans of the Ohio Valley Improvement Association “to secure a nine-foot stage at low water, instead of a six, the entire length of the river from Pittsburg to Cairo.” The ‘Cairo’ in question was the town of Cairo, Ill., which sits at the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. The work would necessitate a system of movable dams, 10 of which were already under construction by the federal government in the Ohio River. “The cost of this great improvement is placed at forty-five millions of dollars.”
• The ongoing creation of the town of Ambridge was chronicled in a back-page article. “A year ago last April several carloads of sand were dumped upon the spot,” a Herald reporter wrote. “To-day can be seen the nucleus of a town that will rival in reality the possibilities of ‘A Paper City,’ the creation of the lamented Petroleum V. Nasby.” Ambridge was conceived by a combination of the leading bridge concerns in the U.S. and constructed on 150 acres of land purchased by the company. In addition to large mills, “several hundred houses are being built for the use of the workmen, and several finer residences are under construction. A good many business blocks are under way, and quite a number of business firms are already established.”
