This Week In Toledo History Week of 7/26/2021

By: 
Lou Hebert

July 25
1903 - The new Home Brewing company brewery on Oak Street in East Toledo is nearing completion.
1914 - Toledo Beach advertises that the Lotus blossoms on the lagoons are in full bloom. It is the only place in America with such a “profusion” of these “sacred flowers of the Nile.” The source of their introduction to Toledo has never been confirmed. They have since vanished from Toledo area waters.
1942 - The “Red Hot Mama” Sophie Tucker appears in Toledo to sing for sailors at the Hollywood Theater Cafe.
1951- Three UT Basketball players indicted in New York for fixing point margin in a game against Niagara University in 1950 season.
1963 - New A & P store opens on Navarre in Oregon.
1967 - Racially charged rioting erupts on inner city streets of Toledo as fires are set amid heavy looting and vandalism. Police keep control, but arrest more than 60 people during the melee. Curfews are imposed city-wide. Most of the damage is in the 1200 block of Dorr Street near Detroit.
1968 - Recording star Johnny Tillotson appears at the Carousel Club on West Central Avenue.
1980 - Heinz tomato and ketchup plant closes in Bowling Green. It was at one time reputed to be the largest ketchup factory in the world.

July 26
1877 - Great rail strike is underway. Streets are patrolled by citizens and vigilantes trying to avert any mob violence in the streets.
1904 -Toledo News Bee reports that local “Chinamen” in Toledo are the frequent buyers in a growing market for opium, which is selling for $3.50 a pound.
1932 - Eighty-one-year-old vagrant James Leiby, who wandered the roadways of the U.S. for decades, dies in Toledo. Hospital attendants found that he had $6,900 in cash pinned beneath his heavy clothes.
1949 - The La Rue Lounge at the Lorraine Hotel on Jefferson features Rosa Linda, national concert pianist and radio star.
1967 - Second night of rioting and arson continues on Toledo city streets. Some police officers pelted with rocks and bottles. In Detroit, the civil unrest escalates and death toll rises to over 40.

July 27
1887 - The natural gas standpipe at Cherry Street Bridge is opened amid great celebration as giant flames are ignited, heralding a new era of “cheap gas” and an economic boom.
1897 - “Old Klondike,” Toledo’s first oil well, hits a small gusher on Millard Avenue in East Toledo.
1927-Toledo dry agents discover 15,000 bottles of bootlegged Canadian ale in a boxcar in the Pennsylvania rail yards and empty them into the Maumee River.
1936 - A brawl between several local toughs and 13 Toledo Police officers breaks out at the Speedway Inn in the 3100 block of Lagrange.
1972 - Toledo’s most famous “stripper” and burlesque theatre owner, Rose La Rose, dies of cancer at the age of 59. Hundreds of Toledo residents and others from the world of show business turn out for her funeral.

July 28
1813 - British Army attacks Ft. Stephenson in Fremont, but is repelled and retreats.
1945 - One-hundred-thousand people turn out to watch a spectacular mock battle as 1000 marines and 40 Navy planes stormed the beach at Riverside Park to show people what American troops were enduring in the war. There were flame throwers in use and numerous dynamite charges.
1948 - Toledo men Robert Bauman and John Riddle, for second year in a row, win the Fort Wayne to Toledo canoe race for the annual Aquarama Fest. Total time over the 135-mile journey: 25 hours and 38 minutes.
1954 - Toledo-headquartered National Exchange Club defends its “whites only” membership policy after several chapters in California are suspended for admitting Chinese-Americans. Club official Harold Harter, of Toledo, denies that it discriminates on the basis of race, but just requires that all members be “white.”

July 29
1891 - Explosion at sawmill in Cummings, Ohio (now a ghost town near present-day Moline) in Wood County. Four men are killed.
1915 - BGSU (then Bowling Green Normal School) holds first commencement at a downtown Bowling Green theater
1940 - An arson-caused fire destroys the historic Horton Hall in Perrysburg’s downtown. The massive home of architectural merit was built in 1823 and believed to have hosted many important guests, including President Harrison and Daniel Webster.
1954 - Jet magazine reports that former slave Robert Cunningham of Toledo who estimates his age to be no less than 112 years old is still driving an antique "Brush" automobile.
1958 - Pennsylvania Railroad says it will be shutting down three of its passenger routes out of Toledo to Pittsburgh leaving only one passenger train a day.

July 30
1918 - The lion “Cleopatra” escapes from her cage at Cedar Point, strolling the midway and sending visitors into a panic. She is eventually recaptured.
1924 - Voters in Ottawa Hills voted 58-37 to incorporate and form a village.
1958 - Passenger cruise ship Canadiana smashes into Toledo Terminal Railroad Bridge while returning from Bob-Lo Island. Two people are injured.
1959 - Work begins in downtown Toledo on the much talked about “downtown mall” on Adams Street.
1968 - Developers outline plans for the $30 million Franklin Park Mall in West Toledo with Penney’s, Lamson’s and Hudson's as the department store anchors.
1983 - Worldwide Auto Sales on Sylvania Avenue explodes and burns. Millions of dollars in damage reported.

July 31
1924 – More than 800 hooded Klansmen attend a Klan rally in Oak Harbor. NewsBee reports that many Klan members had their car tires slashed while they were marching.
1931 - Formal dedication ceremony held at Perry’s Monument on Put -in-Bay. NBC radio network carries ceremony live.
1938 - Crash between two luxury passenger trains in Ottawa County; 38 people injured.
1950 - Drive-in theaters were gaining popularity for summer movie goers in Toledo area, with six of them now offering nightly shows. They were the Toledo Drive on Talmadge; The Parkside in Oregon; the Telegraph on Telegraph Road; The Portage in Wood County; The Maumee on Conant; the Woodville in Millbury.
1963 - One of the worst traffic tragedies in state history occurs when a station wagon crashes head-on into a semi-truck on Woodville Road at Genoa. Ten members of the Felix Campos family, riding in the 1957 Chevy station wagon were killed.

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