“Pages of history” features excerpts from The News Journal archives including the Wilmington Morning News, The Morning News, the Evening Journal and the Journal-Every Evening.
May 30, 1972, The Morning News
Gunman kills 3, self, at N.C. political rally
A calm gunman “shooting at everything that moved” killed three persons, wounded eight others and then killed himself outside a shopping mall where Sen. B. Everett Jordan was campaigning yesterday in Raleigh, N.C.
Police discounted theories that it was an assassination attempt on the North Carolina Democratic senator who was shaking hands just inside the North Hills Shopping Center when the shooting began.
Two of the wounded were little girls.
Witnesses said the gunman, a neatly-dressed black man identified as Harvey Glenn McLeod, 23, opened fire just as Jordan stepped through the plate glass doors. He had been chatting with two women. One was killed and the other critically wounded. The doors were shattered.
Witnesses said the gunfire went on for about two minutes and virtually every shopper outside the mall when the gunman opened fire was killed or wounded….
Police Chief Robert E. Goodwin said, “When the first siren was heard, witnesses said he turned the gun on himself.”
The chief said the man was armed with a .22-caliber rifle which he had purchased a few hours earlier, and a revolver….
June 1, 1889, Evening Journal
An awful flood; Pennsylvania city entirely submerged
A telegraph operator in the Pennsylvania railroad signal tower at Sang Hollow, 12 miles below Johnstown, says that 75 dead bodies have floated past him down the river from Johnstown.
It is stated that the reservoir above Johnstown broke and the water deluged the town, sweeping away houses by scores and drowning probably hundreds of people.
Wires are down, and no communication can be had with Johnstown….
Pennsylvania railroad officials in Pittsburgh state that they have advices that over 200 dead bodies have been counted floating down stream at Johnstown alone, while all along the line many additional lives have been lost.
Johnstown is described as wholly submerged, only two houses being entirely above the water line….
HOW WILMINGTON FLOOD AFFECTED RESIDENTS:No homes for the holidays: Wilmington residents displaced by floods struggle with housing
June 2, 1953, Journal-Every Evening
Elizabeth crowned in ancient pomp; Millions crowd streets of London to hail monarch
Britain crowned Elizabeth II today in a magnificent spectacle of ancient pomp and pageantry, before the wondering eyes of her little son Charles, heir to the throne.
The thunder of guns and the pealing of bells proclaimed to millions massed in London’s streets the formal accession of Elizabeth the queen, the first coronation of a woman since Victoria, 116 years ago.
Crowds massed 25 to 35 deep acclaimed the queen going from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Abbey and coming home again. Only 7,500 persons were in the abbey, but millions more could see the 2 ½ hour ceremony by television, for the first time.
The 27-year-old queen, who had looked drawn near the close of the long abbey ritual – and once near tears – flashed her smile. The queen’s husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, was beside her….
Conquerors of Mt. Everest congratulated by Elizabeth
Queen Elizabeth II took time out on her coronation day today to send congratulations to the British expedition that planted the Union Jack atop 29,002-foot Mt. Everest. The feat – man’s first successful attempt to scale the world’s highest peak – was announced last night by Buckingham Palace.
The news that two climbers in a party headed by Col. John Hunt had successfully battled their way to the icy summit in the Himalayas on May 29 was relayed to the queen first….
In her message, cabled to the British minister at Katmandu, the capital of the Himalayan kingdom of Nepal, the queen said:
“Please convey to Colonel Hunt and all members of the British expedition my warmest congratulations on their great achievement in reaching the summit of Mt. Everest.”
CATCH UP ON HISTORY:Pages of history: From The News Journal archives, week of March 27
June 4, 1965, Wilmington Morning News
U.S. scores with Gemini space walk
Astronaut Edward H. White II eased himself out of a Gemini capsule 135 miles above the Earth yesterday and floated for 20 eerie minutes in the chilling void of space.
He chatted nonchalantly and darted about with a space gun.
The dramatic excursion clearly was the high point of a bold celestial adventure scheduled to last four days….
President Lyndon B. Johnson was among millions of Americans who watched the launch on television….
White’s thrilling experience in the unyielding vastness of space, where even the stars refuse to twinkle, came during the third orbit, one later than planned, as he streaked at 17,500 miles an hour through the skies above his own homeland….
His feat matched that of Russian cosmonaut Alexei Leonov who drifted for 10 minutes outside the Voskhod 2 spaceship March 18….
Dr. Charles A. Berry, the astronauts’ physician, in noting that White was not disoriented during his space stroll, remarked: “He even walked on the spacecraft. Ed was all over Gemini 4…under, behind and on top of it.”
The capsule was orbiting between 100 and 175 miles up….
Reach reporter Ben Mace at rmace@gannett.com.
