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

May 23, 1951

Russell Gerhart, conductor of the Altoona Civic Symphony, accepted the post of conductor of the St. Louis, Mo., Symphony. Gerhart had a violin school in the city and had also conducted the Hagerstown, Md., Bedford (founder) and Johnstown Symphonies. He had studied in Pittsburgh and with the N.B.C. Symphony Orchestra., and taught in Chautauqua, N.Y.

May 23, 1976

The State Department of Commerce and National Association of Home Builders estimated that the 31,933 homes in Blair County had an equity value of $424.5 million minus the mortgages that 61% had, bringing the value to $304.6 million.

May 23, 2001

Altoona Area High grad Michael Shawn Lucas, who studied musical theater at Carnegie Mellon, was to appear on the NBC series Law and Order. He also appeared in a commercial during the NCAA Basketball Tournament.

May 23, 2016

The 49th annual Blair County Arts Festival was held in the rain at Penn State Altoona, featuring photos taken by both students and professionals, plus live performances and craft sales.

May 24, 1951

Lady Eve Balfour of Suffolk, England, who wrote the best-selling book “The Living Soil” about agriculture, was giving a lecture and showing a film called “The Cycle of Life” tonight at Altoona Senior High School Auditorium. Blair County farmers and their families had been given special invitations.

The American Legion Ambulance Committee and Fort Fetter Riding Club were sponsoring a horse show next week at Dell Delight Park in Hollidaysburg. It was to feature new events like a 6-year-old riding contest and a Pony Express race where the rider must use four horses.

May 24, 1976

Mercy Hospital and AMED, The Civil Air Patrol, firemen and police, doctors and nurses and communication groups held a mock airplane crash drill at Mansion Park, part of Mercy’s annual preparedness exercise.

The Alto Cadet Band hired Randall Yon, a former member of the Penn State Blue Band, as its new director. The band was to accept female members for the first time this year. Yon was to be assisted by his fiance, Cindy Brennan, a former Altoona Area High School head majorette.

May 24, 2001

Area congressmen like Jerry Stern were upset when PennDOT, which spent $2.7 million on renovating its Hollidaysburg headquarters, said it needed new facilities, saying they should concentrate on fixing potholes and repairing roads and bridges.

The Lakemont Volunteer Fire Company and Allegheny Fire Company, Lt. Dave Cassidy chief, evacuated shoppers and employees from stores in the Plank Road Commons when construction workers hit a natural gas line, which was then shut off within 10 minutes.

May 24, 2016

Three generations of the Lawruk family, all named Maurice, plus Mary Lou Lawruk, cut the ribbon for the Lawruk Visitor Center at Baker Mansion which was to house the Blair County Historical Society Museum store, orientation gallery, reception area and public restrooms.

The Retired and Senior Volunteer Program of Blair County held a recognition banquet for the RSVP volunteers at The Casino at Lakemont Park. Diane Reed received the 2016 Spirit of Volunteerism Award. Music was provided by The Starting Over Quartet.

National, world news on this date

May 23:

In 1934, bank robbers Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were shot to death during a police ambush in Bienville Parish, Louisiana.

In 1939, the diesel-electric submarine USS Squalus sank during a test dive in 240 feet (73 meters) of water off the coast of New Hampshire, killing 22 crew members. (Thirty-three survivors were rescued from the vessel in a 13-hour operation using a newly developed diving chamber the following day).

In 2021, a cable car taking visitors to a mountaintop view of northern Italy’s Lake Maggiore plummeted to the ground when a cable snapped, killing 14 people.

May 24:

In 1883, New York’s Brooklyn Bridge, at the time the world’s longest suspension bridge, opened to traffic.

In 1935, the first Major League Baseball game to be played at night took place at Cincinnati’s Crosley Field as the Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 2-1.

In 1937, in a pair of rulings, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Social Security Act of 1935.

In 1941, during World War II, the German battleship Bismarck sank the British battle cruiser HMS Hood in the North Atlantic, killing all but three of the 1,418 men on board. (The Bismarck would be sunk by British battleships three days later.)

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