Monday, May 30, 1966 --

• At a profit-sharing dinner with his employees, Franklin P. Perdue announced that sales for the year ending March 31 amounted to a whopping $35 million. The total exceeded last year’s record-breaking amount of $31.6 million. Perdue said the new grain facility under construction on Zion Church Road will be able to process 500 tons of soybeans each day. The Perdue Cos. dinner was held at the National Guard Armory in Salisbury. Perdue said the business, owned by himself and his father, now has about 250 employees.
• While ex-Mayor Frank H. Morris presented a $1.4 million budget that included a 4-cent property tax rate cut, City Council President W. Paul Martin Jr. announced that the tax rate will remain at $1.24 per $100 of assessable value. Martin said no tax cut is coming because Morris’ budget counted on Wicomico County giving the city $70,000 to defray fire, police and ambulance expenses. Because the county’s budget is in turmoil, however, Salisbury won’t be receiving that cash. The county’s lack of action causes the city’s total budget to be $16,000 out of balance. Morris lost his re-election bid earlier this month to Dallas Truitt.
• Officials at the Wicomico Farmers Cooperative Auction Block are reporting a 500 percent increase in the volume of strawberries already harvested in the 1966 season. A grand total of 1,979 crates were sold on opening day last week, at an average of $6.29 per crate. Only 387 crates were sold on opening day last year.
• The Salisbury City Council has reinstated five paid holidays that now-former Mayor Frank Morris abolished when he took office four years ago. Under Morris, city employees only had New Year’s Day, July Fourth, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas off. The council’s move adds Washington’s Birthday, Maryland Day, Good Friday, Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day to the time-off calendar.
• Betty Webster, co-director of the Salisbury School of Dance, spent the weekend in Washington, D.C., with four of her star students who auditioned at the National School of Ballet. The students are: Georgine Christ, Cecile Corddry, Beth Fisher and Jody Manning.
• The Wicomico County Grand Jury has sent a message to the County Council demanding that maintenance, repairs and cleaning be monitored and improved in the County Courthouse. The jurors’ report found a “complete lack of maintenance and housekeeping in the Courthouse” and declared that the county maintenance staff “is either understaffed or incompetent.” The jury report, signed by foreman John W. Downing Jr., said services should either be contracted out, or county inmates should be added as laborers.