Jan. 16, 1942: Five soldiers from Manchester crash the car they are driving in West Concord, where one of them has just picked up a date. None of the 1941 coupe’s six occupants are injured, but the soldiers worry about getting back to their base in Gainesville, Fla. They also wonder what they’re going to tell the people at U-Drive-It in Gainesville, where they paid $125 to rent the car to drive home on leave.
Jan. 16, 1944: All flying and ground school aviation training is suddenly called to halt at Concord Airport. A private flying school under contract with the government had turned out more than 650 pilots for the War Training Service.
Jan 17, 1726: Massachusetts grants permission to settle the area that will become Concord. A supervising committee screens would-be settlers. It wants just 100 families.
Jan. 17, 1942: Concord’s zoning board unanimously approves the Brezner Tannery’s takeover of an abandoned mill in Penacook. The tannery will open later in the year, creating 200 jobs.
Jan. 17, 1948: Concord’s new mayor, Charles McKee, says he’s not giving up on plans for a new man-made lake on the Turkey River, despite voter opposition. “As I understand it, there was a lake there once, but someone pulled out the plug and it drained away. I am told it would be a comparatively simple matter to put the plug back in.”
Jan. 18, 1982: New Hampshire is rattled by the worst earthquake in 42 years. In Concord, a city council meeting has just gotten under way. As Mayor David Coeyman gavels the meeting to order, the windows begin shaking and papers begin shuffling. “I will always remember this,” Coeyman says.
Jan. 18, 2003: Two hundred people rally in front of the State House in Concord, protesting the possibility of military action in Iraq.
Jan. 19, 1942: Sylvia Esty, an 8-year-old Jehovah’s Witness, puts her hand over her heart but refuses to say the words of the Pledge of Allegiance at the Garrison School in West Concord. She says God has forbidden her to pledge allegiance to flag and country. Concord’s school board says it may have to expel her.
Jan. 19, 1968: Speaking to students at St. Paul’s School, Arthur Schlesinger, onetime special adviser to presidents Kennedy and Johnson, opposes U.S. policy in Vietnam. He says it is based on a misguided analysis of post-World War II political realities.
Jan. 20, 1798: Concord’s first accidental fire is recorded at 10 p.m. in David George’s hat shop on North Main Street. “Let this, fellow citizens, excite everyone to vigilance,” writes the Concord Mirrour. “Query – would it not be a good plan for every man to keep a good ladder and one or two proper fire buckets always ready?”
Jan. 20, 1973: The Monitor reports on downtown progress: “Storrs Street, long planned as a bypass to Main Street traffic congestion, will probably have a traffic light of its own soon.”
Jan. 20, 1994: A three-alarm fire damages the Boutwell & Hussey-Wiren Funeral Home on North Main Street, a building that dates to the late 19th century. “I’d like to send a message out that we do plan to go on,” says Ronald Bourque, whose family has owned the business for 20 years.
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. 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, 1992: In Concord, Democratic presidential candidate Paul Tsongas says: “I want to be known as the architect of America’s economic renaissance.” Tsongas says the Japanese are “beating our tail off because they elect leaders who know what they’re doing.”
Jan. 21, 1994: For the second straight day, the temperature in Concord hits a new low for the date: 25 below zero.
Jan. 22, 1811: A cow belonging to Abner Farnum Jr. of Concord gives birth to a two-headed calf.
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, 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, 2002: In a special election in Penacook held to fill the city council and state representative seats left vacant by Dave Poulin, who died suddenly two months previously, Liz Blanchard reels in more than four times as many votes as her opponent, Myril Cox, and becomes the new Ward 1 city councilor.
