Read it Again: Week of Jan. 16, 2003.

80 years ago this week. Ohio’s new governor, A. Vic Donahey of New Philadelphia, delivered his first message in person to the Ohio legislature, making a plea for cutting the overhead cost of government and calling on the legislature to “exhaust all means to tax honestly all intangible property now escaping taxation. He called Ohio’s taxing system a “hodgepodge” and offered a plan for “majority home rule in taxation and debt creation,” which would wipe out all state supervision over taxation and leave to each local taxing district “full control over future increases in tax levies, debts and sources of revenue.”

50 years ago this week. For the past four summers, farmers have been turning their spare rooms into a paying crop and city folk have been enjoying a relaxing, carefree time down on the farm. This has been the result of a program approved by the National Grange and started by Farm Vacations and Holidays in New York City.

Farmers who have two or more spare rooms and want to rent that space out for $25-$40 a week per person are listed in a booklet that Farm Vacations and Holidays puts out each spring.

The city people look over the descriptions, find one to their liking, write to the farmer about themselves, and if the farmer and city people hit it off, arrangements are made for the city folks to come to the country.

25 years ago this week. Northeast Ohio is providing the locale for a four-hour movie produced for television. The place is Kingsville, Ohio, in Ashtabula County. There are several stars in the movie, but for Ohio folks, the most important star is Mrs. Harold Robison. She is a resident of the area and widely known through her community activities and showing sheep.

She says her part in the movie is very minor, although the sheep are important and they are her sheep. “I appear several times, but I don’t know if you will recognize me with the makeup,” she said. Other stars of the movie are Bette Davis, David Akroid and John Calvin. The picture was adapted from the book Harvest Home.

The Ohio law says that all slow-moving vehicles on Ohio highways must carry the official triangular orange and red sign on the back as a safety badge. Some of the Old Order Amish churches decided they did not like the safety sign and refused to put it on their buggies.

But in late November 1977, Judge Nicholas Walinski ruled that the Amish could be excused from using the official sign, provided they put silver reflective tape on the backs of their buggies and used lights or lamps at night.