Today is Friday, July 28, the 209th day of 2006. There are 156 days left in the year. On this date

Today is Friday, July 28, the 209th day of 2006. There are 156 days left in the year. On this date in 1945, a U.S. Army bomber crashes into the 79th floor of New York's Empire State Building, killing 14 people.
In 1655, French dramatist and novelist Cyrano de Bergerac, the inspiration for a play by Edmond Rostand, dies in Paris. In 1868, the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing due process of law, is declared in effect. In 1945, the U.S. Senate ratifies the United Nations Charter by a vote of 89-2. In 1965, President Johnson announces he is increasing the number of American troops in South Vietnam from 75,000 to 125,000. In 1976, an earthquake devastates northern China, killing at least 242,000 people, according to an official estimate. In 2002, nine coal miners trapped in the flooded Quecreek Mine in Somerset, Pa., are rescued after 77 hours underground.
July 28, 1981: General Motors Corp. says its cost-cutting measures led to a profit of $514 million in the second quarter of 1981, a sharp turnaround from the losses of the same quarter a year earlier.
The cost of cleaning up a decade-old dump on government land near the Shenango River Lake may reach a staggering $250,000, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says.
Youngstown Fire Chief Charles O'Nesti says he will lay off the department's four civilian ambulance attendants, discontinuing the city's ambulance service. The attendants are among 85 city employees being laid off.
July 28, 1966: A strike by 370 Youngstown municipal employees ends after Mayor A.B. Flask promises them a 10 percent pay increase. When extended to all 1,350 employees, the raise will cost the city $870,000.
Dr. Samuel D. Goldberg, local physician, is elected president of the Jewish Federation of Youngstown by directors, succeeding Leslie W. Spero.
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July 28, 1956: Youngstown district steelworkers are awaiting the call back to work after the United Steelworkers Union agrees to a new three-year contract, ending a 28-day strike. The pact will add 28 cents an hour to workers' pay by the third year, with fringe benefits valued at an additional 24 cents.
The four-week strike cost steelworkers some $200 million in wages and the country some 8 million tons of ingot steel, D.E. Babcock, a metallurgical engineer for Republic Steel Corp., tells the Canfield Rotary.
July 1956 will go down in the record books of the U.S. Weather Station at the Youngstown Municipal Airport as the wettest July on record. So far, the area has had 7.09 inches of rain, nearly three inches above normal.
July 28, 1931: Bradford D. Gilliland, prominent band leader and musician in Warren, dies of a heart attack in Ashtabula, at the home of his sister. He had traveled with Sousa's band as a coronet soloist for six seasons.
Walter Greenwood, adjutant of Tod Post, Grand Army of the Republic, says promoters are selling tickets for benefits in the name of veteran groups, but the veterans get only a pittance from the sales.
The last year has shown a decrease in Mahoning County in civil suits, criminal charges and divorces, a report by the Mahoning County clerk of courts shows.