Oct. 15, 2000: About 1,800 people take part in Concord’s leg of the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk. The local event raises $157,000 for research.
Oct. 16, 2002: One hundred senior citizens gather for a ground-breaking ceremony for the city’s first senior center.
Oct. 16, 2001: Citing safety concerns relating to the Sept. 11 attacks, the Steeplegate Mall cancels its annual trick-or-treat night.
Oct. 16, 1975: The Reagan for President campaign opens a headquarters at the New Hampshire Highway Hotel in Concord. Hotel owner Matthew Morton agrees to a temporary replacement of the wording on the huge sign atop the building from “Highway Hotel” to “Reagan for President,” creating an ostentatious precedent for future political candidates.
Oct. 17, 2002: Jane Berwick, who has volunteered with the Concord Boys and Girls Club, the Capitol Center for the Arts, the United Way and the Kiwanis, among others, is named Citizen of the Year by the Greater Concord Chamber of Commerce at the group’s 83rd annual dinner in Concord.
Oct. 18, 1988: Attorney Ray D’Amante announces the name of Concord’s soon-to-be-built mall: Steeplegate. Concord, he says, is a city of steeples and they will be incorporated into the mall as a prominent design feature.
Oct. 18, 1965: Gov. John King urges state lawmakers to approve tearing down a 70-year-old tower atop the state library at the corner of Park and North State streets. He calls it “an architectural monstrosity.”
Oct. 20, 1814: The first boat of the Merrimack Boating Co., later the Boston & Concord Boating Co., arrives in Concord. Northbound commercial cargo will include sugar, molasses, rum and finished goods. The boats will carry lumber, firewood, potash (for soap) and granite south to Quincy Market.
Oct. 20, 1989: The 57-year-old Johnny Cash fills the Capitol Theatre in Concord for two performances. His humble demeanor and his repertory, heavy on gospel, trains, fisticuffs, simple justice and simple pieties, bring down the house.
Oct. 20, 1957: A thousand people attend the ceremony dedicating Concord’s new Rundlett Junior High School in the South End. After a tour, most express satisfaction with the $1.4 million school.
Oct. 20, 1897: Hundreds of people gather in Concord for the 90th birthday party of Moses Humphrey, Civil War era mayor and prime mover of two huge civic projects: the new state prison on its current site and Concord’s trolley lines. He carried out the latter project in 1880, at age 73, “against violent opposition and almost insurmountable obstacles,” the Monitor reports.
