50 years ago in Expo history: The kitchen of the future would be on display at the fair courtesy of Whirlpool

Whirlpool Corp. planned to participate in Expo ’74 by displaying a “fully automated futuristic kitchen.”

“It will include computerized food storage compartments, an automated menu selector, microwave cooking and an environmentally controlled garden to grow herbs, such as chives, rosemary and thyme,” the company said.

Microwave ovens were an exciting new technology in 1974 and would become a standard part of most kitchens over the next two decades.

“Computerized food storage compartments” – whatever those were – did not exactly catch on, although refrigerators today can be connected to WiFi for various functions.

The most striking thing about the futuristic kitchen was its shape – it was billed as the “Whirlpool Kitchen in the Round.” An illustration in The Spokesman-Review showed a circular kitchen island surrounded by a circle of cabinets and appliances.

From 100 years ago: The long-running political warfare in the city of Hillyard reached a new level when the city council declared that Mayor Pat Brown had not, in fact, been elected mayor.

Meanwhile, Brown declared that it was the city council that had been elected illegally. He called for a new election in March.

This latest crisis was precipitated when The Spokesman-Review reported that the last election was illegal, “being held in the wrong year.” In fact, the law did call for elections on the second Tuesday of March 1924 – not in May 1923.

Both the mayor and council were attempting to use this fiasco for their own ends, and confusion reigned.

After Brown called for a new election, a councilman said, “How can he notify anybody? He isn’t the mayor. And if he isn’t the mayor, I am.”