Jan. 21, 1857: A choral concert celebrates the opening of the new city hall and county building on the site of the current Merrimack County Courthouse.
Jan. 21, 1990: The new Concord Monitor building is dedicated off Sewalls Falls Road. In April, the staff will move into the building. The paper and predecessors to which it can trace its roots have been published in downtown Concord since 1808.
Jan. 21, 1766: At Concord’s first legal town meeting, Lieutenant Richard Hasseltine is elected moderator. Among the other elected town officials are tythingmen, a sealer of leather and a scaler of lumber.
Jan. 22, 2003: Beginning later this year, the state Supreme Court will accept all direct appeals from the state’s trial courts, Chief Justice David Brock announces. The news heralds a major change in judicial policy. Last year New Hampshire’s only appellate court accepted just 39 percent of the 813 appeal requests filed, leaving the remaining unhappy litigants no other place to argue that the trial court judge had made a mistake in their case.
Jan. 22, 2001: The Concord School Board names Chris Rath the superintendent of the city’s schools. A former principal at Rundlett Junior High School and Concord High School, Rath has held the post of interim superintendent for several months.
Jan. 22, 1942: The Monitor reports that rather than wait for the draft, 32 men have enlisted at the Concord recruiting office for the duration of the war. Eleven are from Concord. Most have signed up for the air corps and been sent to Missouri to train.
Jan. 22, 1811: A cow belonging to Abner Farnum Jr. of Concord gives birth to a two-headed calf.
Jan. 23, 2000: Concord’s Tara Mounsey is named one of two defensemen on the Hockey News All-World Team of the 1990s. Mounsey’s Olympic teammate Cammi Granato is the other American in the starting six; they are joined by three Canadians and a Finn.
Jan. 23, 1938: The Sacred Heart Hockey Club, composed mostly of young Concord men of French Canadian descent, plays Butterfield of Quebec at the White Park rink. A crowd of 1,167 pays the 15-cent price of admission.
Jan. 23, 1924: Carl Sandburg appears at the Concord City Auditorium. He reads his poems, plays his guitar and sings ballads and songs. According to the Monitor, Sandburg calls modern poetry “free” since it is “not marked off into measures and cadences.” He also remarks on the ships and railroads of the modern world, saying that because “the earth today is belted with steel, there is much an interweaving of cultures as has never before been known. Acceleration, the chaos of life today, is reflected in the poetry.”
Jan. 24, 2002: The Concord Police Department announces that George Pregent of Concord has been arrested and charged with four felony-level counts of possession with intent to distribute marijuana. The police found 78 pounds of the drug, the largest recovery of marijuana in the department’s history.
Jan. 24, 1857: The mercury drops to 37 below zero in Concord.
Jan. 24, 1988: City leaders unveil plans for a new district courthouse to be built on Clinton Street. The cost: $3.5 million. “We realized 10 years ago that the present court is not adequate. It has not been an easy process,” says Mayor Elizabeth Hager.
Jan. 25, 1989: Gov. Judd Gregg encourages the Legislature to return to every-other-year sessions. “Give the people of New Hampshire the opportunity to correct an experiment that didn’t work,” he says.
Jan. 26, 1839: In Concord, rain falls for 24 hours straight. The Merrimack rises 15 feet in 15 hours. Several bridges are destroyed.
Jan. 26, 1984: Webster Bridges, chairman of the state Sweepstakes Commission, brings a sample of the state’s newest instant lottery games to the State House. Gov. John Sununu buys a scratch ticket and promptly wins $2.
Jan. 27, 2003: The Concord City Council votes to take the historic Rolfe barn through eminent domain, stopping Ken Epworth, the barn’s owner, from dismantling the building and selling the parts to an unnamed client. The Penacook Historical Society asked the city to step in so it can use the barn as a museum and community center.
Jan. 27, 1942: Speaking at the swearing-in ceremony for Concord Mayor John Storrs and the city’s aldermen, Gov. Robert O. Blood has this to say about the world war: “We will put an end to this conflict in two years.”
Jan. 27, 1943: An anonymous Webster man applies to the Concord War and Price Rationing Board for 600 pounds of sugar. “I make alky mash and need sugar to make it ferment and taste right,” he writes. The board rejects his request.
Jan. 27, 1983: Concord native John Bluto makes a brief TV appearance on an episode of “Cheers.” He plays an insurance salesman, a role he played in real life in Concord for more than 10 years.
Jan. 27, 1965: Concord Electric Company asks permission of the Federal Power Commission to close down its only generating plant, located at Sewalls Falls on the Merrimack River.
Jan. 27, 1848: Franklin Pierce returns home to Concord after leading a brigade in the Mexican War. A crowd of 3,000 to 4,000 people meet him at the city’s new railroad station. Pierce has been gone eight months. In that time, the Concord town meeting has banned “bowling, saloons and circuses.” Among those present for Pierce’s welcome home is his old friend and Bowdoin College classmate Nathaniel Hawthorne.
