This Week In Toledo History

Nov. 6
1908 - Toledo school board orders Toledo schools to begin serving hot breakfasts to growing number of students who come to school hungry.
1923 - Toledo is in grip of fear from a “mad bomber” who has detonated six bombs in the city since September.
1941 - A stone marker is dedicated on Miami Street to note the presence of an ancient Indian fort. Early pioneers had found the remnants and artifacts in the long abandoned earthworks. The marker remains near the present day grain elevators.
1945 - J.B. Simmons, first African-American elected to Toledo City Council.
2003 - The newly built wind turbines at Bowling Green begin providing electricity, becoming the first large scale wind project of its kind in Northwest Ohio.

Nov. 7
1866 -Toledo City council approves $216 payment for purchase of first Toledo police uniform caps and belts.
1907 - Toledo police report they have captured a "wild man" living along the banks of Ten Mile Creek near the Pope Motor plant and terrorizing nearby residents. Frank Gorware, unshaven and wild looking, eats mostly raw meat.
1933 - National prohibition repealed, many area taverns begin selling low power beer.
1956 - Great Eastern Shopping center opens in Northwood.
1958 - President Eisenhower arrives in Toledo to go duck hunting along the Lake Erie shoreline at the private Cedar Point Club. Ike bags his limit of mallards within three hours and returns to his plane and departs by noon.
2001 - Jack Ford is elected as first African-American mayor of Toledo, defeating Lucas County Treasurer Ray Kest.

Nov. 8
1905 - Lawyer and journalist Brand Whitlock is elected mayor of Toledo. Whitlock would be elected three times and later be appointed Ambassador to Belgium during World War l.
1908 - It is reported that the first female ever to officiate a men’s football game happened in Toledo. Miss Sophie Henry referees first quarter of game between two teams in West Toledo, but players complain they feel constricted in the use of colorful language in front a woman and vote to replace her with a young man.
1918 - The Toledo area is deeply affected by Spanish flu epidemic. Five thousand people ill, 242 deaths reported since it started. Frank McKindly, who was elected sheriff of Lucas County, does not know he won because he is delirious from the flu. He dies shortly thereafter.
1936 - Motorcycle crash claims life of Toledo police officer Harvey, "Inky", O’Neill. While chasing a speeding taxi he collides with a car at Bancroft and Monroe streets.
1953 - St. Charles Hospital on Navarre Avenue is dedicated.

Nov. 9
1879 - Massive blaze wipes out most of downtown Napoleon. Twenty-two buildings, including the courthouse, are lost in the fire.
1893 - Bradner area train crash causes the deaths of four people.
1899 - “Train wreckers” cause derailment of Detroit-bound train near Alexis Road. Three people are killed.
1913 - The so called "Great Lakes Hurricane” whips across the region. Lakes are in chaos as 19 ships are lost in the storms and 250 men perish in the cyclonic winds. It is the worst night of terror in Great Lakes shipping history.
1919 - All streetcars in Toledo are ordered off the streets of Toledo after voters oust Toledo Railway and Light Company in a dispute over fares.
1925 - Oliver Navarre, last surviving son of Toledo pioneer Peter Navarre dies at the age of 85 at his home on Steadman Street. He was a Civil War veteran and then rejoined U.S. Army to fight Indians on the Western plains for the next 30 years.
1956 - Major blaze destroys several buildings in downtown Bowling Green, resulting in $500,000 in damage.
1961 - Toledo's Ella P. Stewart School is dedicated on Avondale Avenue, honoring one of the first African-American female pharmacists in the nation. Stewart made Toledo her home and was a nationally recognized civil rights and community leader.

Nov. 10
1925 - Temple Theater in Toledo advertises that a Hollywood film director is shooting a movie on the Temple Stage every day at 3 p.m. called Toledo's Hero with a local cast.
1925 - The first victim of the so-called "Toledo Slugger" is attacked, but Mrs. Frank Hall of Putnam
Street manages to survive.
1941 - Train accident near Dunkirk, Ohio south of Findlay kills 12 people when passenger cars are overturned.
1972 - Jim Ubelhart, long time veteran news broadcaster on WSPD Radio, announces his retirement at the end of the year.
1975 - The giant ore freighter, “Edmund Fitzgerald” breaks up and sinks in a vicious storm on Lake Superior. Twenty-nine sailors are lost, many from the Toledo area, including the Captain, Ernest McSorley.

2001 - Killer storms strike Northwest Ohio. Five tornadoes touch down, doing damage to numerous cities and killing five people from Van Wert to Republic, Ohio.

Nov. 11
1918 - Germany surrenders. World War I is over. Toledoans rush into the streets by the thousands for celebrations and dances. Schools and factories and saloons are closed.
1934 - The long era of prohibition gangsters comes to close as Thomas "Yonnie" Licavoli begins serving his prison term at the Ohio State Penitentiary for murder and other crimes in the Toledo area.
1974 - First Toledo Police K-9 unit graduates from training.
1991 - Ohio's “Merci" train car that was gift from France after World War ll is re-dedicated at Camp Perry where it remains on display.

Nov. 12
1882 - St. Anthony’s Catholic Church at Nebraska and Junction in Toledo is dedicated.
1907 - Hercules nitroglycerin plant in Bradner explodes. Two men are killed, many others injured. Much of the village is leveled by blast.
1940 - Gale force winds blast the city of Toledo for two days, causing heavy damage and stranding dozens of duck hunters on Maumee Bay.
1952 - Mobster from Toledo – John “Crane Neck” Nugent – is declared “dead” after missing for 22 years. Nugent was one of the suspects in 1928 machine gun slaying of Toledo Patrolman George Zientara on Upton Avenue.