100 Years Ago: 1925

A bandit’s attempt to shield a girl associate went to waste Tuesday when a jury in Salem court declared that Blanche Dubois of Lewiston, ME., was “The Girl in the Purple Mask” and a member of a robber band in Haverhill.

Samuel Linden, the Chelsea boxer, whose flash of underworld chivalry proved unavailing, also was convicted of robbery, as were Frances Maffi and Bastino Roma. The four were found guilty of holding up the store of Wadeslaw Bornarski 41 Arch street, Haverhill, on Jan. 3.

The testimony of the prosecution was that the Dubois girl, who is 18 years old, and comes from Lewiston, ME., took a leading part in the hold-up, wearing a purple mask while assisting her accomplices. Linden stoutly maintained that he was the “girl” in the mask, and that he borrowed Miss Dubois’ clothes for the exploit, without telling her what he intended to do.

Miss Dubois took her conviction stoically. The four will be sentenced Friday.

50 Years Ago: 1975

A total of 145 dog complaints were handled by Auburn’s dog officer in the month of January. According to Louis Pinette, 72 of those complaints regarded nuisances, 30 involved stray dogs taken to the dog shelter, and 23 stray animals were returned to their owners.

Eleven of the animals were deemed vicious, and one was taken to the state laboratory. Nine dogs were killed in motor vehicle accidents.

Three dog owners were taken to court. According to Pinette, one case was filed, as the dog was taken care of. The other two owners were fined.

Pinette also received 24 other animal complaints. Five concerned cats, two concerned foxes.

25 Years Ago: 2000

High School students who were confident they earned high grades this past semester were shocked to see Fs staring back at them when they got their report cards in the mail last Friday.

In some cases, students who earned all As got a report card with all Fs, said Phil Blood, Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School principal.

It was a mix-up caused by a programming error, he said. Although not every high school student was affected by the mistake, Blood said the decision was made to regenerate all of the report cards just to make sure the error was corrected.

“There were a lot of really bad report cards floating around out there,” he said.

Parents and students began calling the high school during Monday’s snow day to question the grades, he said.

The problem was quickly identified when it was learned that the programmer forgot to change one table, throwing off the system, he said.

One parent told Blood she was going to save her daughter’s report card with the Fs ” because she’s never gotten Fs before and I want to remind her what it would look like if she did,” Blood said.

The material used in Looking Back is produced exactly as it originally appeared although misspellings and errors may be corrected.