(As reported in the Bangor Daily News)

10 years ago – Jan. 15, 1994

HERMON – Town Councilor Walter Munn Jr. reported at the council meeting that he had met with a group of local business owners to help set up a Hermon Business Association.

The two major issues that business people think need to be addressed, said Munn, are new water and sewer lines on the Odlin Road, Route 2 and the Coldbrook Road. This is also at the top of the economic development committee’s priority list, he said.

Munn said the association intends to serve as a lobbying group for economic growth and to work to maintain Hermon’s strong business support. Another business committee is being considered to study tax incentives that would benefit local businesses.

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HAMPDEN – In the first council meeting of the year, three councilors who won re-election and a first-time councilor were sworn into office Monday night.

Incumbents taking the oath of office were William Romano, Donald Muth and William Natalie. New to the council was Arthur Jones.

Town Clerk Paula Newcomb said the councilors then re-elected Romano mayor.

In other business, councilors authorized the expenditure of up to $29,000 for designing building specifications for the Lura Hoit Memorial Pool.

Councilors approved the expenditure of $862 for technical assistance for a traffic study on the Greeley Farm subdivision proposal.

25 years ago – Jan. 15, 1979

BANGOR – They slept on hardwood floors in sleeping bags, eating nothing and drinking only fruit juices. Thus the 12 youngsters from Essex Street Baptist Church learned what it was like to be hungry.

That was the idea, but the other part of the 30-hour fast was to raise money to help ease the hunger pangs gnawing at those in the food-poor parts of the world.

“They are able to relate to hunger and starvation and they know how it feels,” said Joan Butler, one of the youth advisers at the church.

The dozen teenagers raised more than $500 through pledges from members of the church, Mrs. Butler said. Adult churchgoers are forgoing coffee breaks and refreshments at meetings to add to the sum. The total amount raised will be used to feed hungry people in a Third World nation.

After the fast was over, the participants engaged in a feast to break the fast.

There was fried chicken from Kentucky Fried Chicken, hamburgers from McDonald’s, pizza from Pizza Hut, ice cream from Dairy Queen, doughnuts from Dunkin’ Donuts, and juice and other refreshments from Doug’s Shop ‘n Save, Sampson’s, Westgate IGA and Time Out Restaurant.

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BANGOR – The professional linemen and electricians on strike against Bangor Hydro-Electric Co. could have restored power after Monday’s ice storm a lot quicker than the inexperienced crews made up of supervisors and office workers, two rank-and-file union members said.

Charles Anderson and Stephen Boyington, both first-class linemen for Bangor Hydro, were responding to reports about how well the company’s make-shift crew restored power following the storm.

“We watched two inexperienced men spend 45 minutes loading a pole on a pole trailer,” Boyington said. “We can do the same thing in five to seven minutes.”

The men said they were concerned about the public image of the union and its members.

“We live in this community, and we don’t want any of our neighbors hurt,” Anderson said, explaining why the union offered to work during the ice storm to restore power in emergency of life-threatening situations.

“We’re on call 24 hours a day, and when we go out [to work on electrical lines], if we don’t know what we are doing, we don’t come back alive,” Boyington said.

And while some people think $15,000 a year for an experienced lineman is too much money, “90 percent of the people on the street wouldn’t do our job for any amount of money,” Anderson said, adding, “It took us five to six years to learn our trade. We must know what we are doing because we are still alive. You don’t see any old, careless linemen.”

50 years ago – Jan. 15, 1954

BANGOR – Frederick R. Call has assumed the duties as manager of the Bangor store of the F.W. Woolworth Co., succeeding Clifford W. Lawson. Mr. Lawson, who has been manager of the Bangor store for the past 10 years, had been made superintendent of the Fall River, Mass., district for the company.

Mr. Call comes to Bangor from Haverhill, Mass., where he has been manager of the Woolworth store for the past five years. Mr. Call and his wife are looking for living quarters in Bangor.

While in Bangor Mr. Lawson was a member of the Bangor Chamber of Commerce, the Bangor Lodge of the Elks, the Penobscot Valley Country Club and Anah Temple, Order of the Mystic Shrine.

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ORONO – Arthur Whittemore and Jack Lowe, duo-pianists, completely won the hearts of a large audience at the University of Maine. The two experts were kept at their Baldwin pianos for more than two hours, with their listeners calling for encore after encore when the scheduled program was completed.

The audience was loath to leave after the musical bounty, and crowds of students waited after the concert to meet the performing artists.

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BANGOR – Gov. Burton Cross will be the speaker at the March meeting of the Penobscot Woman’s Republican Club, according to plans made at the annual meeting held at the Penobscot Hotel. Mrs. Cross will be a guest for the meeting.

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BREWER – Two members of the Brewer Police Department, with combined service totaling more than half a century, were honored at an informal reception at the city hall upon their retirement.

Police Chief Earl Bradbury and Dispatcher Frank P. Gerry were presented with easy chairs by Councilman Gerald D. Robertson on behalf of municipal employees. Bradbury is completing 22 years as police chief, and Gerry completed 34 years with the department.

100 years ago – Jan. 15, 1904

BANGOR – Since the recent fire horror in Chicago with its frightful loss of life and attendant train of suffering, a thorough examination of the various places of entertainment and public assemblage has been made in practically every city of importance in the United States.

Bangor, of course, has been no exception to the rule, and already the Opera House has been inspected by Fire Chief Matthew Moriarty, who in the near future will inspect City Hall and other buildings where amusement seekers gather in large numbers.

There are, however, 23 public gathering places in Bangor that seem to have been overlooked in the inspection – the churches and chapels.

Only a few of the larger church buildings, including the new Central church and the recently remodeled Columbia Street Baptist Church, have street doors opening outward. In nearly all the churches the doors swing inward, and, being heavy and cumbersome, would impose serious barriers in cases of fire or sudden panic.

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ORONO – President David N. Beach of the Bangor Theological Seminary gave a most fascinating talk, “Tramping in the Scottish Border,” before a large audience composed of friends, students and faculty of the University of Maine, in Alumni Hall.

President Beach eulogized the university and what it stands for and said that there were certain bonds which exist between the institution at which he is the head and the University of Maine.

In a delightful manner, characteristic of him as those who have ever heard him well know, President Beach began his lecture with a description of the embarking, the beginning of the voyage and of the sensations and experiences through which one passes in setting out for a trip across the ocean.

The speaker then took his audience across the sea to Scotland and through the Burns, Scott, Carlyle and Wordsworth country which the remainder of the talk treated.

President Beach needs no stereopticon to illustrate his talk – his word pictures are sufficient; they are graphic in their description, clear and concise in their arrangement and detail; and he succeeded in doing what few lecturers are capable of, that of holding the undivided and closest attention of his audience through every second of the 90 minutes that the lecture took up.

Compiled by Ardeana Hamlin