Here are the top headlines from June 16 editions of The Telegraph over the years:
Chicago Bears linebacker Joe Odom, a 1998 graduate of Civic Memorial High School, paid a surprise visit to his alma mater in Bethalto on June 15, 2006, to greet members of the Eagles football team in an informal setting. The 26-year-old Odom told The Telegraph that Bethalto would always be “home for me.†A sixth-round draft pick out of Purdue University in 2003, Odom so far had played in 28 National Football League games and recorded 49 tackles over his three seasons.
The Madison County State’s Attorney’s Office announced that a 16-year-old boy would be charged with criminal sexual assault in the alleged rape of a 13-year-old Bethalto girl. A grand jury previously declined to indict two adults in connection with the allegations in a case that raised questions about race and local law enforcement. Family members of the girl, who was Black, had complained that police were slow to act because the suspects in the case all were white.
State Rep. Jim McPike, D-Alton, helped thaw $6.4 million in frozen state funding for construction projects at Lewis and Clark Community College in Godfrey. Gov. Jim Edgar decided to release the money after discussions with McPike, the Illinois House majority leader. McPike said Edgar agreed to his request to release state funds for a new $3.2 million multipurpose building and a $3.2 million renovation and extension of the Wilbur Trimpe Building.
Figures released by the Madison County Clerk’s Office showed that the county’s assessed valuation in 1975 was a record $1,061,696,764, surpassing the billion-dollar mark for the second straight year and $40 million higher than the 1974 total. The figure was used to compute the county’s tax rate, which was to set another record at 53.3 cents per $100 of assessed valuation. The new rate was expected to bring in more than $400,000 in extra funds for the financially troubled county government.
Legislation enacted by the Illinois General Assembly and signed into law by Gov. Adlai Stevenson II on June 16, 1951, invalidated steps that had been taken to establish separate community unit school districts for the East Alton-Wood River and Godfrey areas. Under the new law, petitions for the organization of community unit school districts would be required to set forth the maximum tax rates for educational and building purposes that the proposed district could be authorized to levy.
Two young Alton men drowned when their canoe overturned on the Mississippi River near the Missouri end of the Alton bridge. Authorities said Harold Lehne, 20, and Richard Pieper, 19, were thrown into the river on the evening of June 15, 1926, along with a third occupant of the canoe, Lehne’s 16-year-old brother Richard, who saved himself by hanging on to the canoe until it drifted onto the shore. The two drowning victims had been office employees at Alton Glass Co.
