By Jim Bridgman
For the Gazette
50 Years Ago
If you shop weekdays at a certain Amherst supermarket maybe you’ll be checked out by Natalie Cole. Natalie, the daughter of the late Nat “King” Cole, is a sophomore at the University of Massachusetts and like thousands of students there is earning some money by parttime work.
Miss Helen A. Kiely, of 10 Munroe St., died today at Pine Rest Nursing Home. She was a chemist, specializing in paper research. She was director and chief chemist for the American Writing Paper Co. of Holyoke. In 1940, the New York Times listed her among the 100 outstanding career women in the United States.
25 Years Ago
The sleek, ultra-modern, long-awaited polymer science building at the University of Massachusetts finally has tenants. Faculty, graduate students and support staff, about 100 all told, moved into the office wing of the Silvio O. Conte National Center for Polymer Research the first week in February.
Light by light, bulb by bulb, the Midway Electric Supply company was sold this week in a two-day auction that capped its 33-year history. More than 300 bidders crammed the showroom and storage areas Thursday for the auction’s 11 a.m. start.
10 Years Ago
A slew of local contractors is being featured on a home improvement television show that is airing now. The DIY Network show, called “Indoors Out,” showcases Easthampton-based stonemasons Michael Paulsen and Michael Karmody of Stone Soup Concrete, as well as landscapers, builders and plumbers from Plainfield, Worthington, Colrain and Sunderland.
The Massachusetts Senate unanimously backed an anti-bullying bill Thursday, spurred on by the recent suicides of two students whose family and friends said had been tormented by their classmates. The bill would prohibit bullying at schools and clamp down on so-called cyberbullying by prohibiting the use of emails, text messages, Internet postings and other electronic means to create a hostile school environment.