Today is Wednesday, Aug. 17, the 229th day of 2005. There are 136 days left in the year. On this

Today is Wednesday, Aug. 17, the 229th day of 2005. There are 136 days left in the year. On this date in 1807, Robert Fulton's North River Steam Boat begins heading up New York's Hudson River on its successful annular-trip to Albany.
In 1896, a prospecting party discovers gold in Alaska, a finding that touches off the Klondike gold rush. In 1915, a mob in Cobb County, Ga., lynches Jewish businessman Leo Frank, whose death sentence for the murder of 13-year-old Mary Phagan had been commuted to life imprisonment. (Frank, who had maintained his innocence, was pardoned by the state of Georgia in 1986.) In 1942, during World War II, U.S. Eighth Air Force bombers attack Rouen, France. In 1943, the Allied conquest of Sicily is completed as U.S. and British forces enter Messina. In 1969, 248 people are killed as Hurricane Camille slams into the Gulf Coast. In 1969, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair concludes near Bethel, N.Y. In 1978, the first successful transatlantic balloon flight ends as Maxie Anderson, Ben Abruzzo and Larry Newman land their Double Eagle II outside Paris.
August 17, 1980: With the start of school only two weeks away, impasses have been declared between school boards and teachers at Boardman and Springfield local schools and the Leonard Kirtz School in Mahoning County and mediators have been requested at the Neshannock and Wilmington area schools in Lawrence County. Negotiations are continuing at nearly a dozen other districts in the five-county area.
Sources say the U.S. Economic Development Corp. has dropped its requirement that Commuter Aircraft Corp. have 25 firm orders for its 40-passenger commuter aircraft before it will release a $30 million federal loan guarantee for construction of a plant near the Youngstown Municipal Airport.
Violence sparked when pigs appeared at a mosque during prayers in Moradabad touches off Muslim riots in 10 Indian cities that leave at least 134 people dead.
August 17, 1965: Dr. Robert B. Day, a senior scientist at Los Alamos, N.M., scientific laboratory and a Youngstown native, is one of three mountain climbers killed in a fall on a Colorado mountain. He was a graduate of Western Reserve Academy in Hudson and Haverford College and had been granted Guggenheim and Fulbright fellowships.
Cleveland newspaperman Robert Manry arrives off the coast of Falmouth, Great Britain, completing a solo transatlantic crossing in a 131/2-foot sailboat named Tinkerbelle.
James O'Brien, the new director of the Mahoning County Welfare Department, asks commissioners for higher levels of assistance payments, new job classifications for welfare staff and says federal changes in welfare programs will mean the office will soon outgrow its quarters in the Wick Building.
August 17, 1955: Scads of flies, big ones, buzzing ones, and all of them pesky, swarm over bed-ridden patients at the Mahoning County Home, reports William K. Gibson, courthouse reporter. Supt. Clarence McMullen says the flies breed in the nearby pig barn and screens at the home are inadequate to keep them out. He recommends tearing down the barn and building a new one farther away from the home.
Attys. Clarence A. Covington Jr. and Robert E. Sullivan are named to the Mahoning County Draft Board
Local 1331 of the United Steelworkers of America establishes two full Youngstown University scholarships for children of union members and pensioners. The university will conduct competitive exams for the scholarships.
Gov. Frank Lausche reveals that the state has been conducting a quiet investigation of gambling and vice conditions in Mahoning County. Highway patrol officers have been monitoring activity as several suspected gambling dens but have been unable to work their way inside.
August 17, 1930: Two Youngstown National Guardsmen on their way to Camp Knox, Ky., are instantly killed when their Packard car collides with another car near Talmadge. Dead are Paul Hunter and Samuel Wellendorf.
Youngstown Law Director Carl Armstrong says that in his opinion Mill Creek Park commissioners "are doing good work in the management and development of the park" and he will take no legal steps toward having the park brought under municipal supervision.
Dr. Henry Suzzallo, president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, recommends a comprehensive survey of Youngstown schools by a staff of 25 to 30 specialists. He recommends establishment of a permanent research department within the school district to set up the survey and to then preserve the continuity of the fact-finder's recommendations.