Other days

100 YEARS AGO Aug. 29, 1917

■ An ordinance passed by the City Council requiring all men in Little Rock between the ages of 18 and 45 to work on the streets six days a year or to pay to the city $1 a day in lieu of work. The penalty for failure to comply with the ordinance is a fine of not less than $5 nor more than $25, is effective at once.

50 YEARS AGO Aug. 29, 1967

■ There are compelling reasons why Little Rock University should be merged with the University of Arkansas in accordance with a proposal that the governing boards of the two institutions have made to the state legislature. The reasons for the merger are as evident as the expanding demand for higher education and the expanding population of Central Arkansas. Trends in colleges and university show that in Arkansas and all states a maximum effort will be essential in response to rapidly increasing enrollment.

25 YEARS AGO Aug. 29, 1992

■ Alcohol is the most recognizable cause of mental retardation in the United States, Dr. Kenneth Jones, a California pediatrician, said at a symposium at Arkansas Children’s Hospital. “It’s a purely preventable cause,” he said. Jones coined the term “fetal alcohol syndrome,” and was one of the first doctors to identify the pattern of abnormalities seen in children born to mothers who drink alcohol.

10 YEARS AGO Aug. 29, 2007

•Pulaski County Circuit Judge Barry Sims on Monday set a Nov. 9 competency hearing for a convicted bank robber who state doctors have said is fit to stand trial. Harry Jeffrey Hamm, 43, is accused of holding up a Little Rock bank in December 2005, just five months after being released from federal prison for a five-state bank robbery spree. Little Rock police say Hamm, charged with aggravated robbery and theft, walked into the Metropolitan Bank branch inside a Kroger store on Chenal Parkway and gave a note to the teller that said he was armed and demanded money. The robber collected about $1,940 before fleeing. Court records show he gave detectives two accounts of the holdup, first claiming he robbed the bank to get money for his crack-cocaine habit, then saying his “mental problems,” exacerbated by his drug problems, compelled him to hold up the bank. State doctors diagnosed Hamm as suffering from bipolar disorder in February and pronounced him unfit for trial, but deemed him competent two months later after further examinations, determining that he was faking symptoms of mental illness, court records show.