Oct. 25, 1852: Following the lead of a Boston group, 50 young men of various Christian denominations meet in Concord to consider forming a local Young Men’s Christian Association. A committee appointed from this group will lead to the organization’s local founding.
Oct. 25, 1908: Young people fan out all over Concord to raise money for Mary Pillsbury Hospital. They pin red tags on donors to keep them from being asked to give again. By day’s end, the children have raised $2,300.
Oct. 25, 2001: Gary Sampson, the man accused of killing three people, including Eli Whitney of Penacook, is indicted by federal authorities in Massachusetts on two counts of carjacking in connection with the July deaths of Philip McCloskey and Jonathan Rizzo.
Oct 26, 1988: State officials break ground for the $1.8 million Christa McAuliffe Planetarium in Concord.
Oct. 26, 2000: As the clock strikes midnight, 33 lucky shoppers are allowed to buy the new Sony PlayStation II at Wal-Mart in Concord. Some have waited in line as long as 28 hours.
Oct. 26, 2001: Patricia Cloutier of Concord, believed to be a founder of Classy Touch Enterprises, a Penacook prostitution business, turns herself in at police headquarters. According to police, Cloutier founded the business with Amy Sullivan and allegedly ran the business out of Sullivan’s home.
Oct. 27, 1908: A throng fills Concord’s Phenix Hall with hundreds standing as the state’s two U.S. senators campaign for the November election. “What a whirlwind (Sen. Joseph) Gallinger is for incessant work, work, work,” Charles Corning, the city’s mayor and the emcee for the night, writes in his diary.
Oct. 28, 1856: Thousands teem into the State House park after a torch-light procession through the streets of Concord to rally support for Republican presidential nominee John. C. Fremont.
Oct. 28, 2003: About 700 people attend the unveiling of the new and improved Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord. The theater sports a three-story glass atrium, a new paint job and a refurbished conference room.
Oct. 29, 1792: The first issue of The Mirror is published in Concord. The cost: 5 shillings per year. The publishers requests 1 shilling cash and the rest in “country produce.”
Oct. 29, 1795: Concord Bridge, the town’s first span across the Merrimack, opens with a party and parade. It is near the site of today’s Manchester Street bridge. A second toll bridge will be built to East Concord in 1796.
Oct. 29, 1989: Meat Loaf, whose 10-year-old Bat Out of Hell album has sold 17 million copies, plays one of the last big shows at the deteriorating Capitol Theatre on South Main Street. The crowd, not a full house, stands and sings the choruses with him.
Oct. 29, 2002: All four major Republican candidates, John E. Sununu, Jeb Bradley, Charlie Bass and Craig Benson, rally at the State House. “We have a lot of things to do in New Hampshire, but none of them is an income or a sales tax,” says Craig Benson, the party’s gubernatorial candidate.
Oct. 29, 2003: A legislative committee has concluded that severe management problems at the North State Street prison in Concord allowed the June 4 escape to happen. In a letter given to Gov. Craig Benson, the committee’s chairman, Rev. Karl Gilbert, names Warden Jane Coplan as the problem. The committee argues that Coplan knowingly distanced herself from critical decision-making aspects of the institution.
Oct. 30, 1865: Col. John D. Cooper of the Second New Hampshire Volunteers dies of disease in Baltimore. Cooper enlisted as a private in the Second’s Company B, also known as Goodwin’s Rifles, and survived the many battles of this regiment in the East, only to become mortally ill as the war neared its end.
Oct. 31, 1944: Elizabeth Hager is born. In the 1980s, Hager will become Concord’s first female mayor. She will serve many years as a city councilor and state representative and run unsuccessfully for governor in 1992.
