Street signs confuse old residents

By Hugh Gale, news editor
From the Argus-Observer issue of November 13, 1952

Some of the old timers were a little mixed up by the new street signs the city put up in Ontario.

One lady telephone street superintendent Herb Derrick and said that his men were putting up the wrong sign.

“I’ve lived here for years,” she said, “and I know I live on 8th street. Your men are putting up a sign calling it 9th. You better get out here and do something about it.”

Derrick did. The poor lady had been wrong for the 30 years she’d spent in Ontario.
The street department recently completed putting up street signs in most of the important intersections in the city. It is Derrick’s plan to have all streets designated with signs by next year.

One Ontario resident came out of his house one morning and saw the new sign at his corner. He exclaimed: “Egad, is there where I live?”

Fire Chief Bob Prahl said the new signs would be a great help to his department. He hoped that people calling in fires would now use the street address.

“Many times in the past they have said the fire was over there close to Zilch’s house, but couldn’t give the address,” Prahl said.

Derrick is proud of the substantial material the signs are made of and the easy to read four inch letters on them.

The only complaint about the signs came from an old timer who said it was a waste of taxpayers’ money: “Everybody knows where everybody lives in this here town.”