25 years ago: The final report of a private group organized to promote retail expansion in downtown Lawrence said the city should pursue efforts for an enclosed downtown shopping mall. Action 80, a group of business and community leaders, said the “community interest is best served by encouraging the development of a downtown enclosed center.” It also said a downtown center should be integrated with the Massachusetts Street retail core and stated that downtown projects were “extremely difficult but are for the long-term community betterment.”

40 years ago: A big local story of 1965 had been the partial reactivation of the Sunflower Ordnance Works to produce powder for U.S. Vietnam War operations. The worker total was adjusted upward to about 3,300, a huge boost from the 280 which had been working on standby basis at the plant near DeSoto.