This Week In Toledo History

October 29
1921 - Longtime Toledo police detective Lewis Tracy passes away. He was best known as the officer who was in charge of keeping order in the so-called "Tenderloin" area of Toledo, the infamous “redlight” neighborhood.
1937 - District Fire Chief George Ehmann was killed almost instantly when the car in which he was responding to a fire was struck by another car which failed to heed the warning siren.
1960 - Tragedy at Toledo Express Airport on this day. A twin engine C-46 charter plane crashes on take-off during a rain storm at Toledo Express, killing 16 members of the Cal Poly football team and five others. It is the worst disaster in history of Toledo Express Airport. The team from San Luis Obispo, California. had just finished a game with BGSU and was heading home.
1993 - Erin Whitten, back-up goalie for the Toledo Storm, becomes first female hockey player credited with a victory as the Toledo Storm beats Dayton 6-5.

October 30
1891- North Baltimore is ravaged by the “great fire” that destroyed 49 structures, leveling much of the town.
1920 - The new Empire Theater in Toledo announces that for the upcoming elections on Tuesday, they will stay open late and announce the election results at midnight from the stage.
1948 - WSPD Radio features Art Barrie and the Toledo Edison Music Hour and WTOL radio presents a program called Children of Divorce with Toledo Judge Paul W. Alexander.
1977 - The Wood County town of Grand Rapids holds its first Apple Butter Fest.

October 31
1900 - Presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan speaks to crowd of 10,000 at Armory Park ball field in Toledo. His speech is interrupted by noisy demonstrations of high school students opposed to Bryan.
1911 - Toledoans are startled by the loud and continual sound of thousands of wild geese flocking over the city in the middle of the night. Bird experts theorize the geese might have become disoriented by heavy fog and the lights of the city.
1954 - Toledo Express Airport dedication draws more than 35,000 people to the new facility that was constructed with local money and without any federal funding.
1975 - Amtrak train service begins in Toledo. With one east and west bound train per day. First time in four years Toledo has had passenger rail service.

November 1
1903 - Ten-thousand people jam Calvary Cemetery in Toledo for All Saints Day services.
1917 - The 400-ton coal steamer “Miami” sinks in the Maumee River after colliding with a pier of the Ash-Consaul Street Bridge.
1926 - Toledo City Council OKs purchase of 10 new police cars as search for the "Toledo Slugger" intensifies after murder of school teacher Lily Croy.
1928 - The Toledo streetcars to Point Place are replaced by buses.
1935 - Powerful East Coast earthquake shakes buildings in Toledo. Many residents in area of River Road report windows rattling and pictures shaken from walls.

November 2
1935 - Lakeshore Interurban crash with a car, four miles east of Toledo along Woodville Road injures 43 people, six of them seriously.
1941 - Christian Temple Church in Toledo burns a copy of Hitler's Mein Kampf on the altar as congregation sings old hymns and the National Anthem.
1942 - Fremont's “Million Miler” pilot Jack Zimmerman is killed in an Army Air Corps seaplane crash in St. Lawrence River near Quebec, Canada. Zimmerman's remains and those of other crew members were not recovered until 2010.
1952 - Fire Chief Karl Scheidler dies after suffering a heart attack during a marsh fire in North Toledo.
1968 - The Rivoli and the Palace Theaters on St. Clair Street in downtown Toledo turn off the projectors for the last time as they go out of business.

November 3
1909 - Toledo Police court hears “startling” testimony that a local cocaine ring being run by the “Jefferson Street Gang” has been targeting teenage boys as well as adults, and that some of those young people have become “slaves” to the habit.
1917 - Phone company announces that Toledo telephone operators will no longer give out election results to callers.
1923 - Federal agents seize a large brewery at Fassett and Oak streets which they claim was licensed to make near-beer, but the brewery was selling beer before the alcohol was steamed off.

1925 - A large searchlight on Toledo Trust building in downtown Toledo is set up to signal the results of the election by flashing various patterns of lights for results of votes.
1957 - Oregon officially becomes a city.

November 4
1887 - One man is killed and ten others are thrown into Maumee River in bridge collapse at Grand Rapids.
1944 - The U.S. War Department seizes control of seven factories in Toledo because strikes at the plants are stopping flow of ammo and guns.
1958 - Michael V. DiSalle of Toledo is elected Governor of Ohio.
1960 - Senator John F. Kennedy visits Toledo for campaign rally. Twenty-five- thousand people gather at Lucas County Courthouse to hear Kennedy speak.
1971 - The popular Smith’s Cafeteria on Erie Street closes down after decades in business.