Daniel Sandoval

The less likely it is for something to happen, the more inclined we are to believe that it is an intervention of fate, so the unusual occurrence is often imbued with extra meaning. Unlikely events were in the news for the first week of August, with lightning in 1907, fire in 1932, skeletons in 1957 and jobs in 1982.

100 years ago

Out of the blue - A prominent rancher was struck by lightning near Hartville, as reported in graphic detail in the Aug. 7, 1907, Natrona County Tribune. George Mitchell, president of the Laramie County Stock Growers Association, survived a lightning strike that killed the horse he was riding.

The strike was so close that the lightning bolt blew Mitchell right out of his boots and cut his hat and coat into pieces. His injuries included two holes in his scalp, a hole in his back and burns on his arms and legs.

Early reports indicated it was unlikely he would survive but the Aug. 7 Tribune said Mitchell's condition was improving. What the Tribune didn't report was the status of his brother, Ferguson Mitchell, who was riding alongside George Mitchell at the time he was struck.

Both horses were killed instantly, along with other livestock in dangerous proximity to the lightning strike.

George Mitchell was a former Casper resident and would have been known to many readers for the Tribune from the offices he held in the city and county.

Reformatory boy - Justice of the Peace J.S. Warner heard the case of a juvenile arrested for petty thefts at an asbestos camp on Casper Mountain and the kid admitted that he was a fugitive from an Illinois reform school in early August 1907.

James Broady, approximately 15 years of age, was found guilty of theft charges and sentenced to 60 days in jail.

After Broady's confession that he had a history of escape and was currently on the lam from a reformatory in St. Charles, Ill., the court expressed a willingness to release the boy to the state of Illinois if authorities there wanted him.

Unloaded gun - Tragedy occurred when a young man accidentally shot his brother to death while handling a gun at their home in the first week of August 1907. The Aug. 7, 1907, Natrona County Tribune identified the shooter and the victim only by their ages and by reporting they were the sons of Oscar Dimmer.

Dimmer was the section foreman at Richards, a railroad stop east of Moneta, at the time his 19-year-old son started to clean a .38 caliber revolver. The gun discharged and the bullet struck Dimmer's 5-year-old son. The older boy did not realize the gun was loaded.

The younger boy was brought to Casper, where Drs. Rohrbaugh and Hoff attended him, but his injuries were too severe and the child died. He was buried in Highland Cemetery.

75 years ago

Stationary hobo - A boxcar that a Casper man was using as his home was damaged by fire Aug. 6, 1932. Raymond J. Lackey was living in the Burlington Railroad yard near the stockyards when his boxcar home caught fire shortly after 10 o'clock in the morning.

Firefighters from the station on David Street were dispatched and they managed to prevent the fire from spreading to other boxcars, two of which were also being used as dwellings.

The amount of loss could not be determined but much of the property was destroyed in the fire or damaged by smoke or in the ensuing deluge of water from the firefighters. Among the valuables spared, $25 in currency was found undisturbed on Lackey's table.

Insistent fire - The store and dance hall at Madison Creek, nine miles southwest of Casper, was destroyed by fire in the early afternoon of Aug. 6, 1932. Charles Abrogast, proprietor, built a fire in the stove early in the morning and then joined a hunting expedition for sage chickens.

Mrs. Abrogast later entered the room and discovered flames dancing around the stove and quenched the fire, or so she thought. A few hours later when firefighters were called for a much bigger fire, Capt. J.C. Gibson determined the building was too involved to save.

50 years ago

Mystery solved - An aircraft and its two occupants that had gone missing five years earlier were found in the first week of August 1957. The wreckage was found in rugged terrain near Ryan Park. The crash site was also where the two men died.

Faymond Moreno, 34, of Chicago and Los Angeles, and Michael Alkore, 28, disappeared in a rented plane in July 1952. Don Donelan, operator of the airstrip at Saratoga, remembered their plane landing and Moreno making a request for fuel, but the plane took off before refueling.

The ill-fated flight never arrived at its destination and a week-long search of the flight path from Rawlins to Denver yielded nothing. Carbon County Sheriff John Terrill hinted at an explanation for the unsuccessful searches when he noted that the crash was at a steep angle, leaving the surrounding trees intact.

Skeletal remains of the two men exhibited disabling injuries like broken legs, but the actual causes of death would remain forever unknown.

25 years ago

Overwhelmed - National unemployment reached a historic high and Casper was no exception when two job openings gain the interest of more than a thousand applicants in early August 1982.

Henrietta Anderson, a Postal Service official, noted in an Aug. 6, 1982, public statement that the recession had certainly arrived in Casper when 1,400 applications came in for two mail handling positions. The national jobless rate was 9.8 percent.

"A Look Back in Time" is made possible with the help of Western History Archivist Kevin S. Anderson at the Casper College Western History Center, which is open to the public.