April 15-21, 1951 

A referendum will be held in Leaksville this summer on a bond issue to build new water and sewer treatment plants and to extend water and sewer lines to areas of town not now being served. 

Present water consumption is taxing the capacity of a small filtering system built 28 years ago when the town had a population of 1,800. The population has more than doubled, to 4,100. 

Leaksville possesses an almost unlimited supply of water from Dan River. But, with the present plant, water reserves have been critically low on several occasions, and water pressure is inadequate at several points. C.W. Mengel of Olsen Engineering Company of Raleigh told the town board plans for the expansion are complete and he expects to have cost estimates by next month. 

A Houston, Texas, man was arrested about 4 o'clock one morning and charged with attempting to crack the safe in The Big Apple supermarket on South Scales Street in Reidsville with nitrogylcerin. The man, Jarrett Lee Carter, 31, claimed he was hitchhiking through town and had gone to sleep in an alley behind the supermarket when officers approached him, but Texas police reported the man had served several prison sentences for burglary. ... Miss Shirley Pruden, Reidsville artist, has been accepted as a member of the Painters and Sculptors Society of New Jersey. The exclusive group admitted her after she submitted a canvas titled "Thoughtful Moments." ... Mrs. Oscar Leath has been re-elected president of the Reidsville Council of Church Women, and Miss Margaret Fillman has been elected vice president. 

Vista Lynn Barker, a 12-year-old sixth-grader at Stoneville School, is Rockingham County's champion speller, having won the annual county spelling bee at Wentworth School. She will represent the county in a district spelling contest April 28 in Winston-Salem. ... The 1951 Fine Arts Festival, to be held May 18-21 at the Central YMCA in Leaksville, drew 269 entries before the filing deadline this week. That's up from 242 last year. ... Coach George Wingfield is pessimistic that his Reidsville High Golden Lions football team will be very good this fall. The Lions won the state Class AA championship last year, but Wingfield noted he lost 19 of his first 22 boys to graduation, and the recent spring practice pointed up how inexperienced will be the players he will have to rely on. 

Home Furnishings: Lyre-back chair, $19.75; Triumph two-tier table with piecrust edging, $29.50. 

Music maker: Hammond organ, $1,285. 

Conveyance: Kaiser-Frazer's two-door Henry J automobile, $1,299.