Dec. 28, 1994

Turned down by Westbrook municipal officers, Michel Salvaggio will take his request for skin shows to the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals at a meeting Jan. 4. But first the board has to study what to do with the request. It will meet tonight to work on that question with the city’s staff lawyer, Richard Sullivan. Salvaggio wants to stage all-female and all-male shows in a nightclub he’d open in the space recently vacated by Jordan’s Seafood Restaurant at 200 Larrabee Road.

The American Journal announced its annual First Baby Contest, for the first baby born in 1995. The winning baby’s parents must reside in Westbrook, Gorham or Windham. Prizes include a $50 gift certificate from Custom Country Carpets and Cabinets, a free baby seat for mom’s or dad’s bicycle from Ernie’s Cycle Shop, processing and printing a roll of mom or dad’s film from Windham Photo Barn and a $25 gift certificate from Foye and Sons.

A four-week trip took Philip and Nancy Curran, 222 Duck Pond Road, Westbrook, 6,500 miles and to 22 states. A most memorable part was a two-day visit to Gettysburg with a guided tour of the battlefield that included all of the places where units from Maine fought. They spent Thanksgiving with their daughter Martha, her husband, Lt. Raymond Goyet, and their three children, on the U.S. Naval Base at Mayport, Florida. They also visited friends and family elsewhere in Florida, and traveled through Illinois, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico and Colorado before turning back east.

This year’s seniors will graduate in Westbrook High School, not Portland City Hall, and the School Committee was asked by a parent to keep future graduation exercises there, too. Carleen Cook, whose three sons all had graduations in Portland City Hall, came to the microphone at last week’s meeting and made a lengthy plea to keep the event at Westbrook High. “Have we all forgotten that one of the compelling reasons given for renovating the gym was that we would have more available seating for graduation? It costs money to rent City Hall. We could use that money to buy more chairs,” she said.

Gorham’s Baxter Memorial Library has joined the Portland Museum of Art and the Children’s Museum in offering passes for free admission into each museum.

Dec. 29, 2004

Staff Sgt. Harold “Butch” Freeman Jr., 42, of Gorham, was among those injured last week in an attack on Camp Marez in Mosul, Iraq, the deadliest since the start of the war. Freeman and Sgt. Christopher Rushlau of Portland were evacuated to Germany for treatment following last week’s blast, which wounded 72 and killed 22, including two from Maine. A spokesman for the Maine Army National Guard in Augusta said Freeman returned to the United States on Tuesday. He’s at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. Gov. John Baldacci said both Freeman and Rushlau were in good spirits after contacting them by telephone in Germany. Freeman, who worked in construction, has been helping rebuild Iraq since deploying there with his unit last March.

Action by the Buxton Fire Department, aided by neighboring firefighters, saved a home for a family of four as the departments battled a blaze in frigid temperatures on the night after Christmas. Gary and Jenine Chrysler and their two children were still in their home at 70 Cornfield Road on Monday night despite the fire, which apparently started in a fireplace chimney. Firefighters were able to stop the fire from spreading, though it did cause damage to rafters and trusses.

A new book, “Essentials for the Be Bop Drummer,” by Westbrook native Artt Frank, was to be released this month in the United States and internationally in February. Frank, a jazz legend, was born in Westbrook in 1933 as Arthur Frank. Frank said he can’t read a single note of music and never took a lesson. But he has played with many jazz immortals, including Charlie Parker and Chet Baker, in a show business career spanning 55 years.

Donations have been flooding into a financially strapped Buxton animal shelter during the holidays after a story in the Dec. 8 American Journal described the dire situation at Little Paws Animal Shelter. About $4,000 has been received, but there’s more bad news, too. The town of Standish has decided not to renew its contract with the shelter for strays. Both Standish and Buxton have chosen to use the Animal Refuge League in Westbrook.

From a letter to the editor by Dick Chretien, Westbrook: For years, I have heavily decorated my house and yard on Arlington Avenue both for Halloween and Christmas. I take the week of Thanksgiving as a vacation and put up literally thousands of lights and decorations … On Saturday evening, Dec. 18, some low-life came into my yard and stole a penguin and a Santa Claus. Unfortunately, the person or persons that did this doesn’t seem to realize that I set this up for everyone to enjoy, not just them. I will be taking the decorations down between Dec. 30 and Jan. 2. If these items have not been returned to me by Jan. 2, 2005, when all the remaining decorations have been put away, I will not be decorating ever again. It’s too bad some coward has to ruin things for everyone.

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