10 years ago — July 31, 1981

(As reported in the Bangor Daily News)

The Bangor Planning Board will hold a public hearing Monday on a complete revision of the Commercial-1 or “neighborhood commercial zone,” a revision that would allow new kinds of small businesses to set up shop alongside residential areas.

Engineers from Hoyle, Tanner and Associates, the New Hampshire consulting firm now revising the Bangor International Airport master plan, told city officials to expect “modest” growth at the airport until the turn of the century.

25 years ago — July 31, 1966

The Bangor Urban Renewal Authority this week took steps that it hopes will lead to the start of rebuilding downtown Bangor by summer of next year. One outside urban renewal developer who declined to be identified said this week that if the Bangor authority could get reconstruction going in the third year of the project, it would be well ahead of many other urban renewal authorities with which he had contact.

City Manager Earle Stevens said Thursday that he will present a written report to the Brewer City Council concerning allegations made by a former municipal employee that “several improprieties” exist within present police department procedure. The charges made by Lawrence T. Doughty Jr., a former fire and police dispatcher, mainly allege that Police Chief Ralph W. Willoughby has drawn excessive amounts of city gasoline for his personal car and that the police department keeps no records of parking ticket and non-resident fishing license fees.

50 years ago — July 31, 1941

“The biggest night in the history of Bangor Fair,” officials said when questioned at 11 o’clock last night. There was an attendence that surprised even them. For an hour before the beginning of the Revue Moderne, crowds surged and eddied around the ticket office of the grandstand. They passed unendingly into the grandstand enclosure. The seats were filled, and still they came.