These are some highlights from the News Journal on Oct. 16, 1961:
National headlines
• ‘Reds hurl gas bombs; East German Escapees Irk Berlin ‘Vopos’”
“BERLIN (AP) — East German police threw tear gas grenades at a West Berlin crowd today after five East Berliners jumped from a second-story window of a border house into a sand-filled truck, West Berlin police said. The incident occurred at Bernauerstrasse. There, apartment houses on one side of the street are in the Soviet sector, while the sidewalks below are in West Berlin. The Vopos — East German police — were taken by surprise.
Locally
• A Cincinnati man, Edward Kessner, 65, died in a three-vehicle accident at the intersection of Main Street and Nelson Road at about noon today. Witnesses said Kessner pulled from Nelson Road into the path of an eastbound truck and semi-trailer loaded with cement sacks, and a westbound local car.
• Wilmington College’s soccer team defeated Berea College 6-2. “Soccer, a relatively new game to the Wilmington community, is a field sport played on an open field the length of a football field. … Time per quarter is 22 minutes compared to football’s 15. If the reader would like to see the difference between the two sports, see a game at Wilmington College.”
• Wilmington’s eighth-grade team lost at Xenia Central 62-6, with the locals’ lone score coming on a 30-yard pass from Larry Gordley to Dave Carter.
• “Now open” was the new Phillips 66 Service Station at SR 28 and Cherry St. in Blanchester.
• Local deaths included Josephine Gray, 66, of Midland; Elizabeth Dudley, 56, of Blanchester; Lorenzo Lynch, 88, of Sabina; Nancy Jordan, 75, of Midland; and Joe Carr, 48, of near Wilmington.
• Showing at the Murphy Theatre were Peter Ustinov and Sandra Dee in “Romanoff & Juliet” and Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason in “The Hustler.”
