Death stalked the highways around South Bend on this September Sunday, as four separate auto accidents claimed the life of seven-month-old Leonard Cappaus and left 14 others injured. The worst crash occurred when George Cappaus of Plymouth, trying to pass on wet State Road No. 1, skidded his Chevrolet sideways across the highway just as H.P. Buzzell's Buick coupe slammed into them at terrific impact. Baby Leonard, sitting on his mother's lap, died instantly while Mrs. Bessie Cappaus, 23, suffered a fractured skull and wasn't expected to survive. Meanwhile, religious warfare erupted in nearby Mishawaka where police had to prevent a riot at First Christian Church. One faction, hostile to pastor S.O. Redacre, literally smashed down the basement door to force their way in for worship services while 20-30 loyal members watched helplessly. Officers had to step inside to break up a quarrel between five women that nearly came to blows.

These stories capture America's growing pains in the Roaring Twenties. The deadly auto accidents reflect the dark side of the automobile revolution — by 1926, cars were becoming ubiquitous but roads, safety features, and driving skills hadn't caught up. Meanwhile, the church schism in Mishawaka exemplifies the religious and social tensions fracturing traditional communities as modern values clashed with old ways. From Spain, news of King Alfonso's showdown with dictator Primo de Rivera hints at the political instability brewing across Europe that would soon reshape the world.

• The South Bend News-Times boasted a Saturday circulation of exactly 26,872 readers and cost just three cents
• The largest semi-rigid dirigible in the world completed a 3,000-mile test flight and successfully moored to a mast originally built for the ill-fated Shenandoah
• Eastern Iowa got hammered by eight inches of rain in less than 12 hours, with a father named Sip Terpstra and his 7-year-old son drowning after climbing onto their sedan's roof when a bridge washed out
• British government experts concluded that oysters were practicing birth control since 1921, with supplies declining steadily for no apparent reason
• A Niles city park caretaker named Levi Colzville, reportedly drunk, shot picnicker A.M. Hart in the leg with a revolver during a family farewell party for Hart's son heading to University of Michigan

• Captain Rene Fonck's planned New York-to-Paris flight was delayed by 40-mile headwinds off Newfoundland — just months before Lindbergh would make aviation history on the same route
• The Hall-Mills murder trial mentioned here would become one of the 1920s' most sensational cases, with Mrs. Frances Stevens Hall ultimately acquitted in what the press called the 'trial of the century'
• King Alfonso XIII of Spain, facing this showdown with dictator Primo de Rivera, would indeed be forced to abdicate just five years later in 1931, leading to the Spanish Republic
• That RS-1 dirigible testing at Scott Field represented America's last serious attempt at airship dominance — within a decade, the Hindenburg disaster would end the dirigible era forever
• The newspaper's three-cent price in 1926 equals about 45 cents today, when a typical daily paper costs $2-3