Marines killed in Lebanon, duPont to build schools: News Journal archives week of Oct. 22
"Pages of history" features excerpts from The News Journal archives including the Wilmington Morning News and The Evening Journal.
Oct. 22, 2003, The News Journal
College costs rise 40% in decade
Steady increases in the cost of going to college have worsened in recent years as cash-strapped states have cut back on education funding, according to a new report that says tuition and fees at the nation’s four-year colleges are up more than 40% from a decade ago.
The College Board’s annual Trends in College Pricing study, released Tuesday, revealed that public two- and four-year schools, which rely more on government money, have been particularly hard it….
The College Board, a nonprofit that owns the SAT, said tuition for in-state students at four-year public campuses jumped 14.1% this fall to $4,694. However, a dip in the price of room and board – assessed separately from tuition and fees – means that students living in residence halls are paying $10,636, only 9.3% more than in 2002-03….
Recent college news: Delaware Tech catches up on lost time with renovations aimed to support a future workforce
Oct. 24, 1983, The Morning News
Blast kills 147 Marines
President Reagan vowed again Sunday to stand firm in Lebanon, after what he termed a “despicable act” claimed the lives of at least 147 U.S. Marines.
He announced that he is sending Gen. Paul Kelley, the Marine commandant, to Beirut to review ways of better protecting the American peacekeeping force there….
The explosion triggered new demands in Congress for the administration to provide better protection for the U.S. troops or withdraw them….
According to a Pentagon spokesman, a Mercedes truck filled with some 2,500 pounds of TNT broke through a series of steel fences and sandbag barricades and was detonated in the heart of the Marines’ four-story administrative headquarters shortly after dawn Sunday. The explosion collapsed all four floors of the building, turning it into a burial mound of broken cement pillars and cinderblocks
Although a Marine sentry was able to fire five shots at the suicide driver while another Marine threw himself in front of the speeding truck, neither were effective in blocking its entry into the Marine headquarters….
Oct. 25, 1901, Every Evening
Rockford Tower nears completion
President Betts of the Board of Water Commissioners is of the opinion that the Rockford Park water tower will be completed by the latter part of next week.
The scaffolding is being taken down, and yesterday the A.S. Reed & Bro. Co. began to lay the cement floor in the observatory. After that is finished, nothing remains to be done but the completion of the lightning rod….
The tower is magnificently situated in one of the prettiest sections of Rockford Park, which is just north of Brandywine Park. It is one of the highest sites in the city, being 255 feet above tide water at the base and 380 feet at the observatory, which gives a magnificent view of the city and surrounding country and also the Delaware River….
Also from Oct. 25, 1901, Every Evening
Woman goes over Niagara Falls in barrel
Yesterday a woman named Anna Edson Taylor took a trip over Niagara Falls in a barrel and lived to tell the story.
She says she became unconscious as she went over, and that a million dollars would not tempt her to repeat the experiment.
It is well that she has gained some sense by her exploit, but it would have been better had she thought this way at first, as she has gained nothing but a little cheap notoriety by her foolhardy act.
Oct. 26, 1923, The Evening Journal
P.S. duPont aids city in school projects
Through a munificent gift of $800,000 to the city by P.S. DuPont, Wilmington is to have three entirely new and modern school buildings capable of seating at least 3,000 pupils.
Total cost of the three new schools will be $1,600,000. Mr. duPont will build one at a cost of $600,000 and the city will build two at $500,000 each….
In addition Mr. duPont…will provide plans, specifications and engineering and clerical services for the three schools. Cost of this service is estimated at $100,000.
Still further, Mr. duPont…will erect all three schools for the city at cost, thus eliminating contractors’ profits, saving the city at least another $100,000….
Catch up on history: Attacks on 9/11, Wilmington bridge blown up: News Journal archives, week of Sept. 10
Oct. 27, 1972, The Morning News
Nixon vows honorable peace as world awaits end of war
President Nixon said last night he is confident that differences blocking a final Vietnam peace settlement “can and will be worked out.”
Speaking for the first time publicly about what he termed “a significant breakthrough” in the Vietnamese negotiations, Nixon told an airport rally that “I am confident we will succeed in achieving our objective…peace with honor and not peace with surrender in Vietnam.”
Nixon’s comment came a few hours after presidential adviser Henry A. Kissinger said “peace is at hand” in Vietnam and said an agreement ending the long war could be reached within a few weeks….
In Paris and Hanoi, North Vietnam disclosed the broad outlines of a peace agreement and said the United States had agreed to sign it next Tuesday, but then backed away on the ground that South Vietnam had refused to sign it….
Reach reporter Ben Mace at rmace@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: Marines killed, duPont builds schools: News Journal archives, Oct. 22
