Oct. 1, 1976: In an appearance at the New Hampshire Highway Hotel in Concord, Ronald Reagan tells 700 Republicans that Gov. Mel Thomson must be reelected. Thomson, he says, is a “politician of national stature.”
Oct. 1, 2000: A Monitor poll finds George W. Bush slightly ahead of Al Gore in New Hampshire. The state’s four electoral votes will be essential to Bush’s eventual victory.
Oct. 2, 1856: Near the end of his term, President Pierce visits Concord to stump for James Buchanan, the Democrat nominated to succeed him. Pierce is greeted with a great parade and reception downtown. A fine horseman, he himself rides in the procession down Main Street.
Oct. 2, 1918: Two Concord soldiers – Marine Lieutenant Paul Corriveau and Private Herbert C. Drew – die in France on the same day. Corriveau is killed in action; Drew succumbs to pneumonia. Drew’s mother will call the Monitor’s attention to the coincidence that 20 years before, the two men were in the same kindergarten class at Walker School.
Oct. 2, 1929: Vincent Cozzi of Albin Street in Concord is the sculptor of a fully-equipped 6-foot doughboy being carved from a three-ton block of granite at Swenson Granite Co. When it is completed, the statue will be shipped to Harrisonville, Mo., to stand in the square as a memorial to that town’s World War dead. Cozzi is using a photo of a Missouri soldier as a model for his statue, which he expects will take eight weeks to complete.
Oct. 4, 1861: A fire on the southwest corner of Main and Centre streets destroys the Merrimack House, a marble works and a doctor’s home and office.
Oct. 4, 1983: Chubb Life President John Swope announces his company’s plans to expand, bringing 300 new employees to Concord. “This is exactly the kind of employment Concord wants,” he says. “The only environmental problem we cause is we produce too much paper.”
Oct. 4, 2000: In an effort to slow turnover, the state announces a temporary 10 percent raise for Department of Corrections employees. The increases will last two years for the officers at the state’s four prisons and three halfway houses.
Oct. 5, 1817: An earthquake rocks Concord at about 11:40 a.m. It lasts 1-2 minutes.
Oct. 5, 1918: Concord’s Board of Health urges the discontinuation of public funerals because of the Spanish Influenza epidemic, which is at its peak. The board strongly suggests that until further notice only “kinsmen and very near friends attend the last rites of people who die.”
Oct. 5, 1935: The first New Hampshire Peace Union convention meets in Concord. The state pacifist movement’s leader, Agnes Ryan, has stated the group’s goal, saying its members will witness the greatest thing “since Christ was on earth. You are going to live to see the war method abolished from the earth.”
Oct. 5, 1985: The Band, minus Robbie Robertson, plays at the rickety old Capitol Theatre on Concord’s South Main Street.
Oct. 6, 1976: Publishers announce the publication of a new pocket-sized book about Gov. Mel. Thomson called Quotations of Chairman Mel, a spoof on a book of quotes of Mao Tse-Tung. Among them, a comment to the Panamanians: “Go. Pick your bananas. We’ll run the canal.”
Oct. 6, 1978: Gov. Mel Thomson nominates Rep. Henry Richardson, the only black lawmaker in the New Hampshire House, to the Public Utilities Commission. Democrats criticize him as a Thomson yes-man.
Oct. 6, 2003: In the first action of its kind by any state, New Hampshire is suing 22 oil companies for using a gasoline additive that the attorney general says has polluted much of the state’s water supply. The additive, MtBE, has caused “an unprecedented and significant groundwater contamination problem,” Attorney General Peter Heed says at a press conference.
Oct. 7, 2000: Concord High quarterback Matt Skoby sets the school record for touchdown passes thrown in a game with five during a 38-10 win over Manchester Central.
Oct. 7, 2001: Concord native Tom Mailhot begins the Ward Evans Atlantic Challenge, a 2,900-nautical mile rowing race from the Canary Islands off Africa to Barbados in the Caribbean. Mailhot is a member of the only American team in the race.
