California earthquake, stock market panic: News Journal archives, week of Oct. 15

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"Pages of history" features excerpts from The News Journal archives including the Wilmington Morning News and the Evening Journal.

Oct. 15, 1964, Wilmington Morning News

Dr. King says Nobel Prize honors others, nonviolence

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said yesterday his Nobel Peace Prize honors “millions of gallant Negroes and white persons who have followed a nonviolent course” in the equal rights struggle.

Front page of the Wilmington Morning News from Oct. 15, 1964.
Front page of the Wilmington Morning News from Oct. 15, 1964.

The stocky, 35-year-old Georgia-born Black leader, who brought to the American scene massive, nonviolent protests as a tactic in fighting segregation, received news of the coveted award while undergoing a routine checkup at an Atlanta hospital….

Smiling happily as he received congratulations, Dr. King told newsmen he intends to spend every dollar of the $53,123 prize money on the civil rights movement….

Also from Oct. 15, 1964, Wilmington Morning News

Wilmington Dry to build mall

Wilmington Dry Goods Co. plans to build a large shopping mall in Brandywine Hundred.

Erdman P. Kuhn, general manager, said that Wilmington Dry – which now has outlets in the 400 block of Market Street and the Midway Shopping Center on Kirkwood Highway – will build a 100,000-square-foot department store as an anchor of the new shopping center.

The new center will be located on Naaman’s Road just east of the proposed Interstate 95 interchange. This places it between the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad tracks and the Philadelphia Pike.

The center will occupy 41 acres and will be known as the Tri-State Mall….

Recent mall news: Here's the latest store at the Christiana Mall ahead of the holidays

Oct. 17, 1987, The News Journal

Rescuers free toddler from well as nation watches

MIDLAND, Tex. – Eighteen-month-old Jessica McClure was rescued last night from an abandoned well by workers who spent 2½ days drilling through solid rock to reach her as the nation waited anxiously to learn her fate….

Jessica was hoisted by cable out of the shaft just before 9 p.m. EDT to the cheers of her parents, neighbors and rescue workers. She had been in the well nearly 58½ hours….

Front page of The News Journal from Oct. 17, 1987.
Front page of The News Journal from Oct. 17, 1987.

The toddler, who had gone without food or drink since plunging into the narrow well Oct. 14 in her aunt’s backyard, appeared alert as she rubbed her eyes in the glare of floodlights.

ABC, NBC and CBS-TV all interrupted their prime-time shows to televise the final minutes of the rescue, and CNN carried reports throughout the ordeal….

The abandoned well was covered immediately and that the rescue hole was to be filled in soon….

Oct. 17, 1995, The News Journal

Estimated 400,000 black men attend Washington march

In an unprecedented revival-style rally, hundreds of thousands of black men bonded, prayed and echoed Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan in a litany of promises in Washington, D.C. yesterday to heal black America.

“I pledge that from this day forward, I will never raise my hand with a knife or gun to beat, cut or shoot any human being, except in self-defense,” they repeated after Farrakhan, vowing to better themselves and all of black America. Some wept.

Front page of The News Journal from Oct. 17, 1995.
Front page of The News Journal from Oct. 17, 1995.

The dramatic recitation captured the rally’s spirit of atonement and brotherhood much as Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” summed up the 1963 March on Washington.

The “Million Man March” was the fourth-largest demonstration in Washington and the largest predominantly black gathering. The U.S. Park Police estimated that 400,000 men came together for the peaceful day of praying, signing and reveling in racial unity. The crowd, eclipsing the 250,000 who gathered in 1963, stretched 12 blocks….

Farrakhan urged the men to go home and join black organizations to take hold of political power, unite against racism, and cleanse black communities of crime and drugs….

Catch up on history: Women can vote, end of WWII: Pages of history from News Journal archives, week of Aug. 14

Oct. 18, 1989, The News Journal

California quake kills over 200, collapses roads, buildings

A catastrophic earthquake rocked Northern California yesterday, killing more than 200 people and injuring 400, caving in bridges and freeways, igniting fires and causing widespread damage to buildings.

The quake, which struck during the evening rush hour, registered 6.9 on the Richter scale and was on the notorious San Andreas Fault.

Front page of The News Journal from Oct. 18, 1989.
Front page of The News Journal from Oct. 18, 1989.

It was the second deadliest in the nation’s history, exceeded only by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake that destroyed much of the city and killed more than 700 people.

At least 200 people were crushed to death in their cars when a mile-long stretch of the upper level of Interstate 880 in Oakland collapsed onto the lower level….

Oct. 20, 1987, The Morning News

Panic on Wall Street: Market meltdown rivals 1929 crash

The stock market plunged out of control Monday in a selling panic that rivaled the Great Crash of 1929, pushing the Dow Jones average down more than 500 points, draining more than $500 billion from the value of stocks and sending shock waves around the world.

The market fed on itself in wave after wave of selling exaggerated by computer trading in the busiest day ever on the New York Stock Exchange.

Front page of The Morning News from Oct. 20, 1987.
Front page of The Morning News from Oct. 20, 1987.

The Dow industrials fell 508.00 points to 1,738.74, a one-day plunge of 22.6%, bringing the loss since the market’s Aug. 25 peak to nearly 1,000 points….

“We’re having extreme panic in the marketplace. It’s like Armageddon,” said Alfred E. Goldman, director of market analysis for A.G. Edwards & Sons in St. Louis….

Reach reporter Ben Mace at rmace@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: U.S. quake, stock market panic: News Journal archives, week of Oct. 15