Patricia (Wertman) Conrad of East Freedom submitted this photo of the third grade class from East Freedom Elementary School from 1947. Mrs. Rogers was the teacher. Shown are (from left): first row — Patricia Wertman, Marjorie Snyder, Letty Burns, Joan Glass, Kay Helsel, Shirley Feathers, Shirley Walter, Nancy Diehl and Clarice Snare; second row — Dean Wineland, Howard Williams, Dennis Snowberger, Wayne Leighty, Richard Hoover, Sammy Wentz, Gary Showalter and Eugene Decker; third row — Paul Flaugh, Dale Smith, Paul Smith, Donald Grabill, Thomas Snyder, Terry Holland, Grant Snowberger and John Butler.

Readers are encouraged to send or deliver old local photographs of general interest for use in Yesteryear. Information about people and places should be included. Photos must be 30 years old or older and should be sent to Yesteryear, Altoona Mirror, P.O. Box 2008, Altoona, PA 16603, or emailed to community@altoonamirror.com. For more information, call Brenda Carberry, community news coordinator, at 814-946-7459.

Local news on this date

75 years ago

June 21, 1950

The Altoona Poetry Society, James Kurtz president, was to hold a first anniversary meeting at the YMCA and a poetry contest was announced for students from Altoona and Altoona Catholic high schools and Keith and Roosevelt junior high schools. A poem titled “Ecstasy” by Margaret Jones was chosen poem of the month.

June 22, 1950

The Blair County Veterans memorial fountain at Lakemont Park was to be dedicated this coming Sunday with Blair County District Attorney J. Calvin Lang the main speaker and the 28th Division National Guard Band performing. The fountain has a ring of jets with a large jet in the middle with red, blue and green lights alternating on and off.

The 215 members of the Cambria County School Lunch Institute, who were responsible for feeding 8,000 children in Cambria County schools, were guests of the Altoona A&P Co. at a banquet at the Penn Alto Hotel, where they then toured the A&P warehouse and bakery.

50 years ago

June 21, 1975

James H. Pritchard, executive director of the Blair County Community Action Agency, was to lead 92 local volunteers to a march of 30,000 in Washington, D.C., to keep President Gerald Ford’s administration from cutting their funding.

William T. Stephens, 65, Altoona Chief of Police for eight years with 38 years of total service, died June 21. He was promoted to detective after one year and retired in July 1973. He was also secretary of the Police Pension Fund.

Summer vocational programs for exceptional students in auto mechanics, woodworking, food preparation, hair care, crafts and ceramics were being held at the Altoona Area Vocational-Technical School June 16 to July 11 for volunteer students from Altoona-Blair County. Ken Rhodes and Ethel Howell were in charge of pupil services.

25 years ago

June 21, 2000

In a first for Altoona, an auction was held for unwanted railroad equipment from Norfolk Southern and Conrail’s entire 22-state system. It was held at both the Hollidaysburg and Juniata Shops with everything from motors to rail cars, some from the 1930s, for sale. The first item sold, an EMD 2,250 horsepower engine used for moving rail cars, went for $181,000.

June 22, 2000

The local Hiram Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons donated a $3,500 defibrillator to the Altoona Fire Department which Fire Chief Reynold Santone, a Hiram member, said would enable them to supplement AMED on emergency calls.

Loonette and Molly from the PBS-TV children’s show “The Big Comfy Couch” were to perform during the 11th annual WPSX-TV/

WPSU-TV Day at Bland’s Park in Tipton. The show was an award winner.

National, world news on this date

June 21

In 1834, Cyrus Hall McCormick received a patent for his mechanical reaper.

In 1893, the first Ferris wheel opened to the public as part of the Chicago World’s Fair.

In 1942, an Imperial Japanese submarine fired shells at Fort Stevens on the Oregon coast, but caused little damage.

In 1954, scientists of the American Cancer Society presented a study to a meeting of the American Medical Association in San Francisco which found that men who regularly smoked cigarettes died, particularly from lung cancer, at a considerably higher rate than non-smokers.

June 22

In 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte abdicated for a second time as Emperor of the French.

1941, Nazi Germany launched Operation Barbarossa, a massive and ultimately ill-fated invasion of the Soviet Union that would prove pivotal to the Allied victory over the Axis Powers.

In 1945, the World War II Battle of Okinawa ended with an Allied victory.

In 1970, President Richard Nixon signed an extension of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that lowered the minimum voting age to 18.

In 1977, John N. Mitchell became the first former U.S. Attorney General to go to prison as he began serving a sentence for his role in the Watergate cover-up.

Local news compiled by Tim Doyle. National, world news from The Associated Press.

Readers are encouraged to send or deliver old local photographs of general interest for use in Yesteryear. Information about people and places should be included. Photos must be 30 years old or older and should be sent to Yesteryear, Altoona Mirror, P.O. Box 2008, Altoona, PA 16603, or emailed to community@altoonamirror.com. For more information, call Brenda Carberry, community news coordinator, at 814-946-7459.