This Week In Toledo History

Feb. 5
1907 - Toledo Yacht Club at Bay View Park burns to the ground. There were no injuries but thousands of dollars in artwork, trophies, paintings and other equipment and memorabilia is lost.
1927 - Two people are killed in an explosion at First Congregational Church in Toledo. A gas leak is blamed for the cause, $150,000 in damaged incurred.
1929 - Herta Zimmerman, 21, of Toledo, selected as “Toledo’s Most Deserving Girl” and will spend a week in California as guest of movie star Mary Pickford.
1930 - The Farmers and Merchants Bank in Sylvania is robbed by five gun-toting bandits of more than $2,000. One of those bandits is the notorious "Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd. He is later caught and convicted of the robbery, but escapes on his way to the Ohio penitentiary.

Feb. 6
1884 - A large portion of the Perrysburg-Maumee Bridge is swept away by flood waters.
1888 - Industrialist Edward Drummond Libbey signs contract to move his glass making company and hundreds of workers from Boston to Toledo.
1904 - Six accused coal thieves are prosecuted in East Toledo court. Several teens testify that they stole the coal because their homes had run out of fuel.
1906 - Toledo schools begin plans to open new school on Saint Clair Street for unruly and incorrigible students.
1911 - The News Bee carries a story of a Toledo widow looking for a good farm home for her boys whom she can no longer afford to care for. Her sons are "city lads", ages 13 and 11, and “would be good boys” and "country life could be their salvation".
1991 - Toledo’s Danny Thomas (Amos Jacobs), comedian, actor, and singer, dies of heart attack at age of 79.

Feb. 7
1917 - Alvin Czelusta is shot through the heart at the Marleau restaurant in East Toledo by the owner, Evelyn Marleau, because he called her a “vile” name. The case becomes a sensation as she is tried and convicted of murder by a female prosecutor. Esther Antin, becomes the first woman in Ohio to prosecute a murder case.
1931 - The Lucas County Coroner exonerates a Toledo man who shot and killed a "Peeping Tom" who was looking through the windows of his home. It was ruled as justifiable because the victim had a prison record in Canada.
1933 - Tiedtke’s department store is selling fresh “bullhead” fish for 18 cents a pound and fresh sirloin steak for 12 cents a pound.
1941 - Department of War orders 1,500 “jeeps” to be built at the Willys- Overland plant.
1954 - Toledo school board raises starting teachers’ salaries to $3,400 per year.

Feb. 8
1919 - Hundreds of Toledo soldiers from the 329th regiment return home from France after World War 1. Thousands of Toledoans gather at the tracks on Cherry Street to greet the homecoming train.
1922 - KKK reorganizes in Toledo and decides to be called the Krusaders. Three-hundred men attend first meeting at Iota Hall.
1937 - Toledo police arrest the last member of what they call the Baby Dillinger Gang, which had been
terrorizing and robbing stores in the Toledo area.
1949 - Plans are being made to greet the Ohio boxcar of the French “Merci” Train in Toledo. It is part of the train of 50 boxcars sent by France to the United States, to say thank you for helping France rebuild after World War II. Each car contains many gifts from the French people. It is preserved and on display at Camp Perry.

Feb. 9
1945 - Lt. Jacob Chandler, Toledo, a member of the segregated 92nd Division, is killed in action while serving in Italy during World War II. Chandler, had been a Toledo policeman before the war, and was the only TPD officer killed while serving in WWII. He is buried at the American cemetery near Florence Italy.
1962 - Robert Stranahan, founder of Toledo’s Champion Spark Plug Company, dies at his West Central Avenue home at the age of 75. Stranahan started the company in Boston in 1908 and two years later moved the operations to Toledo.
1963 - Toledo Sports Center on Starr Avenue destroyed by fire.
1983 - Four-thousand hopeful job applicants line up for 200 new jobs at Whirlpool plant in Clyde.

Feb. 10
1921 - A two-week-old baby girl found in a basket on a doorstep in 3100 block of Kimball Avenue in Toledo. The baby was apparently born in a Detroit hospital before being abandoned.
1929 - Toledo Police arrest 42 people in series of raids for bootlegging and gambling.
1931 - Classes open for the first time at the new University Hall on the new UT campus on Bancroft.
1931- Fire guts interior of the reputed gambling hall, the Embassy Supper Club at Jackson and Saint Clair, following a police raid.
1933 - A massive fire destroys the popular Vita Temple Theater on St. Clair Street in downtown Toledo. The building, constructed in 1862, had originally been a church, then converted to a dance hall and roller rink before becoming home to the theater in 1929.

Feb. 11
1881- Ice jams and ice floes cause major damage to buildings and boats in downtown Toledo. Heavy flooding in the downtown area along Water Street.
1924 - The Sheriff of Lucas County says no more food can be given to inmates at the jail. He says too many visitors are smuggling narcotics to the prisoners inside the food. The only food allowed will be fresh fruit.
1930 - The Rev. Jackson Cary Taylor, 82, of Toledo, a former slave, tells reporter he remembers witnessing the assassination of President Lincoln in 1865. Says he was a teenager, working for an Illinois Senator, who gave him two tickets to Ford's Theater that night and he recalls the gunshot and the shrieks of the women as people learned that Lincoln had been shot.
1959 - Ice jams break loose in Grand Rapids, causing major flooding along Maumee River. Major floods also hit downtown Fremont on Sandusky River.