10,20,30,40 and 50 Years Ago from the pages of the Valley Sun

Ten Years Ago

Twelve thousand named varieties of tulips awaited visitors to Descanso Gardens for the 1999 Spring Festival of Flowers. The month-long event included a host of activities, including Easter-themed fun for families.

Twenty Years Ago

Seventeen homeowners on Hobbs Drive banded together to ask the city to set a two-hour parking limit on their street in hopes of discouraging workers at nearby restaurants from using their neighborhood to park cars.

Thirty Years Ago

The annual Oak Grove School Carnival was held on March 17, 1979 for the final time in the school’s history. Due to declining enrollment, the campus at the east end of town was to be closed at the end of that school year.

Forty Years Ago

Through the efforts of Dr. Samuel Ayres Jr. of La Cañada Valley Beautiful, a prize-winning orchid tree was moved from the path of the soon-to-be-built Foothill (210) Freeway to a new site at Descanso Gardens. The 25-foot tree, reported to be “spectacular in color,” had helped win a landscaping award at 4245 Vista Bonita Way.

Fifty Years Ago

A customer was shot while thwarting a man who held a La Cañada woman as a shield while he attempted to rob the Bank of America on Foothill at Oakwood. Albert Hemsath of Montrose jumped the suspect from behind while the suspect held Mrs. Arthur Jacob with one arm and used his other hand to train his revolver on a teller. The suspect shot Hemsath in the stomach, then ran out the bank’s front door and slipped through a 100-man dragnet.