50 YEARS AGO

from the Democrat-Herald

May 3, 1971

The Baker Bulldog track team travelled to Pendleton Friday and whipped the Buckaroos in a dual meet, 79-57, grabbing firsts in nine of 16 events and breaking one school record in the process.

Mike Bennett ran the high hurdles in 14.8 seconds for the new school record and picked up first places in the high jump and low hurdles.

25 YEARS AGO

from the Baker City Herald

May 3, 1996

Not long after the third anniversary of their August 1993 purchase of the Geiser Grand Hotel, Dwight and Barbara Sidway plan to open the renovated three-story structure to overnight visitors.

The Sidways’ schedule calls for an opening in late summer or early fall, said July Daly, director of sales and purchasing for Sidway Investment Corp.

10 YEARS AGO

from the Baker City Herald

May 4, 2011

The deep snow lingering in the mountains of Eastern Oregon and Western Idaho is the reason Brownlee Reservoir, which divides the two states, looks so shrunken these days.

The reservoir, about 40 miles east of Baker City, is 60 feet below full.

ONE YEAR AGO

from the Baker City Herald

May 5, 2020

A bacterial illness has spread through Baker County’s biggest herd of bighorn sheep, but a state wildlife biologist said it won’t be clear until later this year how severe the death toll is likely to be.

Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) employees continue to monitor sheep in the Lookout Mountain unit in eastern Baker County, said Brian Ratliff, district wildlife biologist at the agency’s Baker City office.

Ratliff said he and other biologists have seen bighorns coughing — something the sheep rarely do unless they’re suffering from pneumonia — throughout the range of the Lookout Mountain herd.

With close to 400 sheep, it’s the largest herd of Rocky Mountain bighorns in Oregon.

The state also is home to California bighorns, mostly in the central and southeast parts of the state. Baker County has a herd of California bighorns in the Burnt River Canyon between Durkee and Bridgeport.

Until this winter the Lookout Mountain herd had apparently been healthy.

But on Feb. 13 ODFW received a report of a dead bighorn ram lying on the Snake River Road near Connor Creek, about 18 miles north of Huntington.