(As reported in the Bangor Daily News)

10 years ago – June 20, 1992

BANGOR – A former Maine couple now living in Hilo, Hawaii, has acquired a Central Street building that Donald Cohen once proposed for a health club.

Central Street Associates, an investment group led by Cohen, formerly owned the building, which is located at 73-87 Central St. Robert G. and Adriana Duerr, formerly of Gouldsboro, purchased the property. The Duerrs paid the amount owed to the city, plus about $2,000 in legal fees and expenses, to Nathan Dane III, a Bangor lawyer who conducted the court-ordered sale. The building has an assessed value of $592,200.

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BANGOR – Salisbury steak, chicken and hot dogs will dominate a summer picnic for the homeless and hungry population of Bangor Sunday, June 21, at Davenport Park.

Bill Rae of Manna Ministries runs a soup kitchen in Bangor, but he plans to feed the city’s hungry and homeless on a bigger scale at the picnic which he has labeled an early summer break for the working poor and for homeless people.

Food will be available for about 400 people. The event will be the third mass-scale meal Rae’s organization has held for Bangor’s economically downtrodden population.

25 years ago – June 20, 1977

ORONO – Two University of Maine at Orono faculty members have received a $32,682 grant from the Maine Council for the Humanities and Public Policy to produce a multi-media project titled “The Police and the Public.”

William and Margaret Kenda, assistant professors of English at UMO, describe the project as an effort to create new lines of communication between the police and the community.

Under the new award, the Kendas will produce two short films examining how the police and public view each other.

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HAMPDEN – Somewhere along the wooded stretch where the Patterson Road links up with the Meadow Road, Bob Hillgrove methodically pulled away from his two challengers and served notice he’ll be a tough man to beat in the rest of the Maine distance races he enters this year.

That’s where the veteran runner from Rockland made his move Saturday morning to win and break the record in the second annual 8.5 mile road race sponsored by the Hampden Jaycees and the town of Hampden.

“This made me feel real good,” said the 32-year-old Hillgrove, whose choppy, flat-footed stride carried him to a record finish of 44 minutes, 10 seconds and safely ahead of the rest of the 61 runners who started and finished the run around Hampden’s hilly “big loop.”

50 years ago – June 20, 1952

BANGOR – Municipal officials began yesterday assembling data to determine the feasibility of installing voting machines in Bangor polling places. City manager Julian H. Orr said he has written to the Automatic Voting Machine Co., Jamestown, N.Y., for cost estimates and other data relating to mechanical voting and will make a report to the City Council.

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The Bangor YMCA Dolphins, Maine’s pioneering synchronized swimming team, will receive New England-wide attention next Monday when they journey to the Mount Washington Hotel, Bretton Woods, N.H., to perform before the members of the New England Association of Insurance Agents at their annual convention.

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WASHINGTON – The cost of living, as measured by the government, today crept close to the all-time peak set last January.

Rising food and rent costs boosted the latest index, covering prices for the month, ended May 15, to 189 percent of the 1935-39 average. Last January it reached 189.1 percent, fell sharply in February and started climbing again in March.

The new figure, as published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, means an automatic 2-cent hourly wage boost for 1,250,000 railroad workers and at least a penny for an estimated 100,000 textile, aircraft and oil refinery workers.

100 years ago – June 20, 1902

The steamboat excursion season is now on, and from this time until the first of September there will be a host of pleasant sails down the river and bay each week and most of the time an excursion will go down each day

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Paul, the youngest son of Major and Mrs. Frank A. Robinson of 127 Broadway, had an exciting adventure at the Eastern Maine General Hospital on Thursday morning and which, fortunately, terminated without serious consequences that might have resulted very badly.

He with two other brothers were at the hospital for the purpose of visiting an aunt who was being treated there, and previous to entering the building the boys went into the field for the purpose of gathering a bouquet of daisies, which grew in profusion there, to take to the invalid.

As they moved about the field they approached the edge of the high rocky embankment at the rear of the hospital buildings, caused by the cutting of the railroad through the hill on which the building stands. Little Paul was among the hardest workers of the trio and was so engrossed in the work of gathering flowers that he paid little heed to where he was going. He moved backward and the first that his brothers knew they heard his cry and saw him fall over the bank.

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OLD TOWN – This is the closing week of St. Joseph’s School and has been a very busy one with the teachers and the pupils. On Thursday afternoon a recital was given in the music studio by the music students. On Friday afternoon the graduating exercises will take place in City Hall and the usually large attendance may be expected. The graduating class consists of three young ladies – Mary Brow, Nellie Hickey and Sadie Sirois.

Compiled by Matthew Poliquin