Today is Thursday, May 27, the 148th day of 2004. There are 218 days left in the year. On this date

Today is Thursday, May 27, the 148th day of 2004. There are 218 days left in the year. On this date in 1937, the newly completed Golden Gate Bridge connecting San Francisco and Marin County, Calif., is opened to the public.
In 1647, the first recorded American execution of a "witch" takes place in Massachusetts. In 1896, 255 people are killed when a tornado strikes St. Louis, Mo., and East St. Louis, Ill. In 1935, the Supreme Court strikes down the National Industrial Recovery Act. In 1936, the Cunard liner Queen Mary leaves England on its maiden voyage. In 1941, amid rising world tensions, President Franklin D. Roosevelt proclaims an "unlimited national emergency." In 1941, the British navy sinks the German battleship Bismarck off France, with a loss of 2,300 lives. In 1964, independent India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, dies. In 1985, in Beijing, representatives of Britain and China exchange instruments of ratification on the pact returning Hong Kong to the Chinese in 1997. In 1993, five people are killed in a bombing at the Uffizi museum of art in Florence, Italy; some three dozen paintings are ruined or damaged.
May 27, 1979: Ohio motorists are buying gasoline at a much greater volume than originally anticipated for the Memorial Day weekend, making supplies tight. Between 80 percent and 90 percent of the stations in the state are expected to be closed on Sunday and Monday of the long weekend.
Complaining that President Carter has ignored the "poor and powerless," Cleveland Democrats approve a resolution in support of a draft of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D.-Mass., as the party's nominee.
The All-American version of the biblical plague of locusts is surfacing in seven Eastern states as millions of periodical cicadas end their 17 years underground.
May 27, 1964: Mahoning County's relief case load is at its lowest in four or five years, Welfare Director I.L. Feuer says. Feuer says the department is reorganizing to meet new state standards and hopes to reach a goal of 85 relief cases for each caseworker.
Acting Warren Municipal Court Judge John Leopardi has ordered bail bonds doubled for traffic offenders cited into court during the Memorial Day weekend in an attempt to curb the toll of highway deaths.
The work of the Mahoning County grand jury investigating gambling activity is impeded again when only two of seven special witnesses show up. Three witnesses failed to show up a day earlier. Prosecutor Clyde Osborne says he will seek bench warrants against the witnesses if it is shown that they had been personally served with warrants to testify.
May 27, 1954: Emergency legislation to clear 13 downtown streets of rush hour traffic during the closing of the Market Street Bridge is given second reading by city council. Some councilmen appear skeptical of the need to bar on-street parking, pointing to the ease with which traffic flowed on the first day of the bridge closing.
Seaman Paul D. Wonsetler, 21, of 3018 Mahoning Ave., Youngstown, is identified as one of the 91 men killed in an explosion and fire aboard the aircraft carrier Bennington.
Gwynne Jenkins, Youngstown's "Mr. Music" in choral singing and directing for more than a quarter of a century and director of the Youngstown Civic Chorus, dies in South Side Hospital after becoming ill following a concert at Poland Methodist Church.
May 27, 1929: Roy Herbert Johnson, 16, dies almost instantly of a broken neck after striking a rock while diving into Mill Creek at Bear's Den.
Virginia Hogan, 13, returns to Omaha, Neb., with a $1,000 bag of gold, the first prize in the fifth annual National Spelling Bee held in Washington, D.C.
A battle is brewing between Youngstown City Councilman Harry Crawford and the Mahoning Valley Sanitary District over the materials to be used in laying major water mains. Crawford says he will approve of nothing but cast iron. The MVSD favors the use of concrete or steel pipe in some applications.