LOCAL HISTORY

50 YEARS AGO: 1975 – The Altoona Area School District’s community education center, James Matlack instructor and James Oswalt director, was teaching a Vietnamese family of five who were located in the Altoona area how to speak and write English.

25 YEARS AGO: 2000 – Blair County Sheriff Larry Field hired attorney Joseph W. Cavrich as his solicitor after two disagreements with Blair County commissioners over minor auto accidents he and another deputy were involved in. The only other elected Blair County official who had an attorney was Coroner Patricia Ross, who hired William Haberstroh.

10 YEARS AGO: 2015 – The Altoona Planning Commission approved plans for an 83-room Wingate Hotel on the site of the former Ford Music Store at Chestnut Avenue and 10th Street. It was to include a bar and a pool.

– Compiled by Tim Doyle

WORLD HISTORY

Today is Tuesday, Aug. 5, the 217th day of 2025. There are 148 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On Aug. 5, 1962, South African anti-apartheid activist Nelson Mandela was arrested on charges of leaving the country without a valid passport and inciting workers to strike; it was the beginning of 27 years of imprisonment.

On this date:

– In 1861, Abraham Lincoln signed the Revenue Act of 1861, which levied the first income tax on Americans (a flat tax of 3% on those making over $800/year) to help fund the Union’s Civil War effort.

– In 1864, during the Civil War, Union Adm. David G. Farragut led his fleet to victory in the Battle of Mobile Bay, Alabama.

– In 1884, the cornerstone for the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal was laid on Bedloe’s Island in New York Harbor.

– In 1957, the music and dance show “American Bandstand,” hosted by Dick Clark, made its national network debut, beginning a 30-year run on ABC-TV.

– In 1962, Marilyn Monroe, 36, was found dead in her Los Angeles home; her death was ruled a probable suicide from “acute barbiturate poisoning.”

– In 1974, the White House released transcripts of subpoenaed tape recordings showing that President Richard Nixon and his chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman, had discussed a plan in June 1972 to use the CIA to thwart the FBI’s Watergate investigation; revelation of the tape sparked Nixon’s resignation.

– The Associated Press