La Cañada History: ‘Mark Twain’ casts his vote at Crescenta-Cañada YMCA
Ten Years Ago
Sport Chalet officials in La Cañada announced the local sporting goods chain would expand into Arizona during 2005, opening four stores in the greater Phoenix area.
Twenty Years Ago
The La Cañada High School varsity football team, led by coach Jim Clausen, was struggling through its 1994 season. After a 21-0 drubbing by San Marino, the fourth loss in five outings, the team was looking forward to playing Monrovia, which it had beaten a few years in a row. That game, however, also went south for the Spartans, leaving them with a dismal 1-6 record as the season neared its end.
Thirty Years Ago
Bill McLinn of La Cañada, who appeared professionally throughout the U.S. and abroad in a show, “Mark Twain Himself,” turned out in costume to vote in the November 1984 election at the Crescenta-Cañada YMCA. McLinn had been campaigning to “elect” Twain that year, representing the Anti-Doughnut Mugwump Party.
Forty Years Ago
It was expected that the county Regional Planning Commission, which was planning to hold a special meeting, would approve the construction of a tall, free-standing bell tower at Church of the Lighted Window. The church, which today goes by the name La Cañada Congregational Church, was in the process of extensive remodeling that would flip the orientation of the sanctuary so that the entrance door would be at the west side of the building and the altar on the east side, underneath its famed lighted window. The bell tower would stand at the new entrance.
Fifty Years Ago
Because this was still an unincorporated area, when La Cañada Valley Beautiful wanted to rid the business district of billboards during the fall of 1964, it turned to the La Cañada Chamber of Commerce for help. But the chamber advised the beautification group that to be successful they would have to mount an appeal of a county ordinance that allowed the billboards.
Sixty Years Ago
The first meeting of the newly formed La Cañada Stamp Club was held on the evening of Nov. 4, 1954 at the Youth House (community center). Walter Scott was president of the club, which was open to all age groups.
Compiled from the Valley Sun archives by Carol Cormaci.