Aug. 20, 1816: A wandering portrait painter named Samuel F.B. Morse writes to his parents that he has just been to a party in Concord and met a 17-year- old woman who is “very beautiful, amiable and of excellent disposition.” She is Lucretia Walker, a member of one of Concord’s most prominent families. Morse decides to stay in Concord for awhile.
Aug. 20, 1844: Samuel Jackman, the oldest man in Concord, dies at the age of 96. He was a veteran of the American Revolution.
Aug. 20, 1853: Jefferson Davis, U.S. secretary of war, arrives in Concord. He dines at the Phenix Hotel, takes a ride through town and talks to residents at the Eagle Hotel. Those who had shaken hands and conversed with him at the informal reception, little thought then what a decade would bring forth and that President Franklin Pierce’s cabinet officer would be the president of a Confederacy arrayed in rebellion against the Union, a city history reports.
Aug. 20, 1945: With government defense contracts suddenly canceled, more than 2,000 New Hampshire workers are laid off, including many at Swenson Granite and Page Belting in Concord.
Aug. 21, 1851: Concord’s downtown is ravaged by the worst fire in its history. The fire starts in the old “Mechanics Home” and spreads through old wooden buildings on the east side of Main Street from Park Street south and past the State House. Lost are the Eagle Coffee House, a drug store, the Merchants Exchange, the Prescott Piano Factory and a host of other stores, offices, sheds and houses. More than 1,000 firefighters joined the futile battle. Witnesses say the glow of the fire could be seen in Francestown and Portsmouth – even Portland, Maine.
Aug. 22, 2000: The nation’s reborn scooter fascination has definitely reached central New Hampshire, the Monitor reports. “We just can’t keep them in stock,” says Laurie Sanborn, owner of Banagan’s Cycling Company in Concord.
Aug. 22, 2001: After a surprise rejection from the state’s Health Services Planning and Review Board on Concord Hospital’s proposed cancer treatment center, the hospital vows it will continue efforts to open the center and requests a rehearing. Concord Hospital spokeswoman Pam Puleo says, “Our biggest concert, and greatest disappointment, is for the people we serve and the lack of local access to radiation therapy.”
Aug. 22, 2003: Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean opens his Concord headquarters, speaking to supporters about the threat of global warming and the need to invest in renewable forms of energy. “I can see Karl Rove cackling and rubbing his hands together over the Birkenstock governor from Vermont right now, but the truth is that this president has allowed us to fall behind in so many areas, and I don’t want to fall behind in this one,” Dean says. “What I want is a president who believes renewable energy is important in this country.”
Aug. 23, 1983: Gov. John Sununu denounces the issues raised in a lawsuit challenging New Hampshire’s reliance on property taxes to fund schools as “garbage.” The suit, he says, is little more than a ploy by those who want a broad-based tax. Fourteen years later, the state Supreme Court will rule against the state in Claremont II, a similar lawsuit.
Aug. 24, 1979: Campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination in Concord, U.S. Sen. Bob Dole acknowledges that former California governor and movie actor Ronald Reagan is the heavy favorite. Dole says he hopes to be “in a position to catch a falling star. If the star doesn’t fall, the star will be the nominee.”
Aug. 25, 1855: Concord establishes its first public library. The city council appropriates $1,500: “$300 for fixtures, the residue for books.”
Aug. 25, 2003: A front-page story in the Wall Street Journal details the lavish compensation packages bestowed upon the rector and vice rector of St. Paul’s School. According to the Journal, Bishop Craig Anderson, the rector, made $524,000 in salary, benefits and deferred compensation last year – more than most college presidents, and vice rector Sharon Hennessy earned $316,400 in total compensation. Some alumni, parents and donors, outraged at Anderson’s salary, campaign for his ouster.
Aug. 26, 1988: Developers abandon plans for a seven-story hotel on Fort Eddy Road.
Aug. 26, 2003: The New Hampshire Main Street Center receives a summer gift in the form of a $50,000 donation from the Grappone Companies. The center will use the money to help pay for the technical assistance it gives to its 19 local Main Street communities.
