This day in history: Spokane woman sent nearly 3,000 letters from readers of Kansas City newspaper

From 1974: The Ice Capades dominated the entertainment scene in the week after Christmas.

A total of 11,150 people attended two shows at the Coliseum on the first day of the run, despite the fact that Spokane was experiencing its heaviest snowfall of the year.

A reviewer for The Spokesman-Review was mesmerized by the talented skaters, including one who could “carry a torch in each hand and spin around on his skates.” Another skater tried to leap through “two revolving hoops of fire,” but knocked one of them down and was “hurt only slightly.”

The Ice Capades would remain at the Coliseum through New Year’s Day.

From 1924: Florence T. Walker of Spokane was showered with nearly 3,000 postcards and letters after a friend wrote to a Kansas City, Missouri, newspaper and said Mrs. Walker “would appreciate postcards from other ’shut-ins’ like herself on Christmas day.”

She received not only postcards, but boxes of fudge, handkerchiefs, paper flowers and a copy of the New Testament. The mail came from every state but Vermont and New Hampshire.

Walker said the outpouring “sort of helps to ease over the rough places in one’s life.”

But she also felt sorry for her postal carrier, who “perspired freely” under the weight of all of those letters and packages.

The mail carrier had only himself to blame – he was the one who suggested that Walker’s friend write to the Kansas City Star.

Also on this day

(From onthisday.com)

1949: Queen Juliana of the Netherlands grants independence to Indonesia.