Trending
Leonard Alwine of Altoona submitted this photo of Car No. 70, a 1929 Osgood Bradley streetcar at the Pennsylvania Railroad Shops' Second Street Station in 1948. The station is now gone and the two lanes of trolley tracks are now two lanes of highway along Chestnut Avenue. The parking lot and buildings in the background are now all parking lots for Norfolk Southern Railroad.
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
Oct. 17, 1951
Benjamin S. Fairless, president of U.S. Steel Corp., gave the opening address as the $1.35 million National Radiator Plant, Robert S. Waters president, opened in Duncansville. The Altoona Chamber of Commerce, J.E. Holtzinger president, held a luncheon for plant officials at the Penn Alto Hotel.
Oct. 17, 1976
The Blair County Planning Commission, Travelers Protective Association, Altoona Junior Women's Club, Altoona Bicycle Club and PA National Guard had all partnered to set up bike lanes in Blair County, and a bike inspection was held at Baker Mansion.
Oct. 17, 2001
The U.S. Postal Service gave the Altoona Fire Department hazmat team and Blair County Emergency Management Agency, Rodney Bohner director, new guidelines on how to handle suspicious mail and packages.
Oct. 17, 2016
Almost 50 vendors attended the seventh annual Central PA Pets Expo at the Blair County Convention Center. Amy Jo Hanna-Eckenrode, audience development manager at the Altoona Mirror, was show director. Vendors like the Wild World of Animals and Monica's Heart Greyhound Adoption of Altoona attended.
Oct. 18, 1951
The J.C. Penney Store at 1429 11th Ave., downtown Altoona, J.C. Dunn manager, held a 12th anniversary- birthday party in which a piece of cake was given to customers. The store had about 25 employees.
Gospel Recordings Inc., Joy Ridderhof founder, located on 11th Street in Altoona, was recording gospel messages from various ministers in foreign languages for overseas countries. Messages were first recorded on tape,
then transferred to a disc record.
Oct. 18, 1976
The Blair County Federation of Sportsman's Clubs, Don Elder president, was meeting at Highland Hall in Hollidaysburg to hear Dr. Allen S. Krug, an executive of the National Wildlife Association, talk about criminal control and gun control laws. A film called "Firearms and Freedom" was to be shown.
The Altoona Recreation Commission started a program to teach archery to boys and girls ages 10 to 16 at the Howard Avenue Armory at no charge and equipment provided. Sonya Seidel and Terry Barley were the instructors.
Oct. 18, 2001
Altoona, Bon Secours, Tyrone, Nason and Van Zandt VA hospitals were all informed about the possible exposure to the anthrax bacteria after a spiked letter was opened in the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., and tested positive.
The Altoona Curve Baseball team, owned by majority holder Bob Lozinak and minority holder Tate DeWeese, was sold to Pittsburgh lawyer Chuck Greenberg. This settled a long-standing lawsuit between Lozinak and DeWeese. Both could buy in in the new ownership as minority partners if they wished.
Oct. 18, 2016
The Altoona Area School Board voted to fund a feasibility study for $22,000 to see if it would be better to renovate the old Altoona Area High School or to build a new one for $88 million.
An armored truck obtained by Operation Our Town was repaired by Allegheny Trucks at no cost after fundraising operations raised approximately $3,500, and then it returned to duty. Craig Moyer was a committee member for Operation Our Town.
National, world news on this date
Oct. 17:
In 1777, British forces under Gen. John Burgoyne surrendered to American troops in Saratoga, New York, in a turning point of the Revolutionary War.
In 1931, mobster Al Capone was convicted in Chicago of income tax evasion; he would be sentenced to 11 years in prison, fined $50,000 and ordered to pay back taxes. Capone was released in 1939.
In 1933, Albert Einstein arrived in the U.S. as a refugee from Nazi Germany.
In 1973, Arab members of OPEC, or the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Counties, cut oil exports to the United States and other nations supporting Israel in the Yom Kippur War and imposed a full embargo in December.
In 1979, Mother Teresa of India was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
In 1989, Game 3 of the World Series was canceled when the Loma Prieta earthquake struck Northern California just 30 minutes before the game was scheduled to begin at Candlestick Park in San Francisco; it would eventually be played 10 days later.
In 2024, Israel announced its forces in Gaza killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, a chief architect of 2023's Hamas-led attack on southern Israel in which militants abducted 251 people and killed some 1,200 others, prompting Israel's retaliatory war that has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians in the small coastal strip.
Oct. 18:
In 1867, the United States took formal possession of Alaska from Russia.
In 1898, the American flag was first raised in Puerto Rico, shortly before Spain formally relinquished control of the island to the U.S.
In 1931, inventor Thomas Edison died at his home in West Orange, New Jersey, at the age of 84.
In 1954, Texas Instruments unveiled the Regency TR-1, the first commercially produced transistor radio.
In 1962, James D. Watson, Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for determining the double-helix molecular structure of DNA.
In 1968, American Bob Beamon shattered the previous long jump world record by nearly 2 feet, leaping 29 feet, 2 1/4 inches at the Summer Olympics in Mexico City.
In 1972, Congress passed the Clean Water Act, overriding President Richard Nixon's veto.
In 1989, East German leader and communist hard-liner Erich Honecker was forced out after 18 years of iron-fisted rule amid mounting pro-democracy protests that helped trigger the fall of the Berlin Wall weeks later.
In 2007, two bombs exploded near a motorcade carrying former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in Karachi hours after her return from eight years in exile, killing more than 130 people; Bhutto herself was unhurt but would be assassinated in December 2007.
Local news compiled by Tim Doyle. National, world news from The Associated Press.