Jan. 3, 1852: Visiting Concord, Henry Hubbard slips on the icy walkway on his way to the Eagle Hotel. The fall breaks his left arm. Hubbard will sue the town and win a judgment of $800.
Jan. 3, 1985: Bernhard Goetz, the so-called “subway vigilante” who fled New York after shooting four teens and landed in Concord, is to be returned to Manhattan today. Merrimack County jail guard Thomas Barton says Goetz told him: “What happened had to be done, but I'm sorry it happened.”
Jan. 3, 2000: Concord Mayor Bill Veroneau opens his fifth term in office with a pledge to explore seriously the possibility of bringing a semi-professional baseball team to the city. Before the fall, the city will announce it has landed just such a franchise: the Concord Quarry Dogs, who will play their 2001 home games at Memorial Field.
Jan. 4, 1943: The state announces that the number of New Hampshire traffic fatalities for 1942 was down significantly – 42 as opposed to 102 in 1941. The state attributes the drop mainly to wartime gasoline rationing.
Jan. 4, 1950: The temperature in Concord climbs to 68 degrees, making this the warmest January day of the 20th century.
Jan. 5, 1877: Protesting his innocence to the end, Elwin W. Major is hanged at the state prison. He was convicted of poisoning his wife, but after a new investigation, Major's lawyer made an eloquent plea for clemency. The governor himself visited Major in his cell and, after an undisclosed conversation, declined to commute the death sentence. Major wears elegant black to the gallows, as though dressed for a dinner party. He kisses his jailer and absolves him of blame.
Jan. 5, 2002: The Concord police found firsthand evidence of methamphetamine's creeping presence last month in an attic crawlspace on Northeast Village Street, the Monitor reports. There, in the Heights home, officers found a pH tester and chemical bottles. Methamphetamine, also known at “crank” and “speed,” has long been a top concern for law enforcement officials in the West and Midwest. But only recently has the narcotic turned up in New England, law enforcement officials said.
Jan. 6, 1904: Arthur C. Jackson of Concord, who has purchased Daniel Webster's birthplace as a summer home, proposes to dismantle the room in which Webster was born and remove it temporarily to St. Louis. There he hopes to set it up as New Hampshire's exhibit at the national fair commemorating the Louisiana Purchase.
Jan. 7, 1942: Concord starts a three-day spell of bitterly cold weather with a low temperature of 15 below zero. The next day it'll be 25 below, and the day after that, the temperature will fall to 22 below.
Jan. 7, 1965: Construction workers in Concord use doors from a dozen demolished houses to form a barrier to close the sidewalk along Pleasant and South streets, where the new $3.5 million federal building is under construction.
Jan. 8, 1968: With the impeachment of Mayor J. Herbert Quinn behind it, the newly formed Concord city government takes its place. Seven new members of the city council are sworn in, and the newly hired city manager – John E. Henchey of Presque Isle, Maine – is on the scene.
Jan. 9, 1974: Twenty-five people brave a snowstorm to gather at the State House to pray in support of beleaguered President Nixon.
“God Loves Nixon,” reads one banner.
Jan. 9, 1997: Jeanne Shaheen, New Hampshire's first female governor, is inaugurated.
