This Week In Toledo History

By: 
Lou Hebert

March 5
1876 - Peter Lonz family makes home and starts winery on Middle Bass Island.
1880 - Toledo Policeman John Hassett killed when hit by tornado debris from falling smokestack while on duty at Buckeye Brewery.
1906 - Gasoline automobile called the “Maumee” being built in Dundee, Michigan.
1934 - A Port Clinton man says he has invented the world’s smallest radio, which fits into a matchbox and is powered by a battery.
1960 - More than 30 thousand bowlers from 43 states come to Toledo to take part in the American Bowling Congress championships.

March 6
1837 -Toledo holds first municipal elections. John Berdan elected as mayor.
1857- First students graduate from Toledo’s first high school.
1916 - Toledoans horrified to learn that Toledo Hospital refused to admit a woman in labor. Ada Jones was forced out into the streets where she had her 10 pound baby boy in a snow bank in front of shocked pedestrians at Bancroft and Cherry. An investigation is promised by the hospital board.
1908- Cherry Street Bridge is hit by the steam freighter Yuma. Parts of the structure are knocked into the Maumee River.
1926 - It’s reported Edward Drummond Libbey has left $14 million to endow the Toledo Museum of Art.

March 7
1849 - The first Maumee-Perrysburg bridge is wiped out by severe flooding on the Maumee River.
1926 - WTAL, Toledo’s first radio station, (Later WSPD) begins on-air testing with new transmitter.
1928 - Two young sisters, 12 and 6, rescued from frigid waters of Miami and Erie Canal by a railroad fireman who jumped into the waterway to save the girls.
1945- Alexander Drabik of Toledo becomes first American soldier to cross over the Rhine River into Germany on the Ludendorff Bridge during World War II. The Holland Ohio native dodged German machine gunfire to make the dash to the German side.
1947 - A report is issued that elderly persons are in dire need of housing in Toledo.
1984 - Two Toledo police officers are shot and seriously wounded during call to a home on Ewing Street during a domestic disturbance call. The gunman was shot and killed.

March 8
1892 - First oil pipeline built to Toledo runs to the Gibsonburg oil storage depot.
1906 - A mystery woman in Toledo sends a large shipment of flowers to the shut-ins at the Toledo Infirmary. The rooms are filled with the bright vivid blooms of roses and lilies. The News Bee reporter says each room was filled with a bright fragrance that put light in the dull old eyes of those who received them.”
1907 - Escape artist Harry Houdini thrills audience at the Valentine Theater when he manages to free himself from the so called "Oregon Boot" involving four handcuffs and a heavy piece of steel. His next act promises an escape from a zinc-lined piano box from Starr Pianos in Toledo.
1948 - Ammonia explosion at Page Dairy on Wade Street kills sends 27 people to hospital for injuries. Fire officials say the blast was a repeat of a blast in February that killed two workers.

March 9
1768 - Future Indian leader Tecumseh born in Ohio. His legacy includes many battles in Northwest Ohio in effort to stop white expansion into Indian territory. Considered one of the greatest Native American icons of history.
1822 - Sam Ewing killed in bar fight at Roche de Boeuf in Waterville. First recorded bar fight and murder in Toledo area history.
1868 - Ice and floods slam downtown Toledo. Buildings on riverfront are damaged and part of Cherry Street Bridge is destroyed.
1921 - President Warren Harding gets gift of a dog from Charles Quscheke and Caswell Kennels of Toledo. “Laddie Boy,” a male Airedale, would become the first celebrity White House dog. Laddie Boy was so adored by Harding, he was given his own special chair in the cabinet room.
1943 - Jacob Rinebolt, Toledo’s last Civil War Veteran, dies at the age of 92. He joined the Union Army as a 14-year- old runaway. He was wounded and returned home to live his last years in South Toledo.

March 10
1894 - The business district of Cygnet in Wood County is leveled by flames from a runaway fire.
1895 - Flames lay waste to the first downtown Toledo High School building at Michigan and Madison. (Current location of the downtown library)
1913 - In Toledo, William Knox rolls the first 300 game ever recorded at a national bowling tournament.
1918 - Tornado rips through Northwest Ohio, killing five people.
1919 - Bowling Green to Toledo Interurban slams into a Cloverleaf train near Maumee, 48 people are injured.
1936 - County grand jury is hearing evidence in morals case against two night clubs in Toledo that feature cross-dressing exotic dancers.

March 11
1906 - Head-on locomotive crash on B&O tracks near Bloomdale in southern Wood County, two people are killed and 14 others injured.
1933 - Gretchen McCullough. 40, of Toledo, has been hiccoughing for 56 days straight and doctors at St. Vincent Hospital are “employing every known remedy.”
1937 - City of Toledo ends use of Toledo Police paddy wagons to transport people to hospitals after a young boy dies in a patrol wagon en-route to a hospital.
1961 - Toledoan and Cuban revolution leader Captain William Morgan is executed by Fidel Castro in Cuba. Morgan had gone to Cuba in 1958 to help overthrow the Batista regime, but later became disillusioned by Castro’s new communist government. In 2007, Morgan’s U.S. citizenship was restored posthumously.
2002 - A large and potentially dangerous hole is discovered in the reactor head of Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station in Ottawa County. Plant is shut down for over a year for repair. The discovery makes national news and prompts calls for the plant to be shut down.

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