100 years ago in Spokane: A $100 prize was on the table for whoever had the ‘most popular mother-in-law’

The Hippodrome Theater announced an unusual new competition: The Most Popular Mother-In-Law Contest.

The winner would receive a $100 prize.

The audiences at the Hippodrome would be given entry blanks in which they could nominate and vote for their mothers-in-law – or somebody else’s mother-in-law.

“The good influence of mothers-in-law of their respective communities will probably be the deciding factors,” the Hippodrome manager said.

Why was he staging this contest?

Because later in the month, the theater would be hosting the feature film “Mothers-In-Law.”

From the football beat: George “Pop” Varnell wasn’t just the Spokane Daily Chronicle’s sports editor. He was also one of the premier football referees in the Northwest.

He was the referee for the big Lewis and Clark vs. North Central high school game a day earlier. It ended in a scoreless tie, but Varnell was impressed.

“They played big-time football in a big-time way,” he said. “There was no crabbing, cussing, hard feelings or any of that sort of stuff. When penalties were inflicted against them, they never crabbed. They took them like men, kept their mouths shut and hit all the harder.”

Varnell was headed to Seattle the next day to referee the big game between the University of Washington and the University of Oregon.

Also on this day

(From onthisday.com)

1876: Archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann finds the gold Mask of Agamemnon at Mycenae (located in Greece).