Today is Friday, April 25, the 116th day of 2008. There are 250 days left in the year. On this date

Today is Friday, April 25, the 116th day of 2008. There are 250 days left in the year. On this date in 1945, during World War II, U.S. and Soviet forces link up on the Elbe River, a meeting that dramatizes the collapse of Nazi Germany’s defenses.

In 1507, German cartographer Martin Waldseemueller uses the term “America” on a world map to refer to the huge land mass in the Western Hemisphere, in honor of Italian navigator Amerigo Vespucci. In 1792, highwayman Nicolas Jacques Pelletier becomes the first person under French law to be executed by the guillotine. In 1859, ground is broken for the Suez Canal.

April 25, 1983: GF Business Equipment Inc. will be reorganized as a holding company as part of financier Ronald R. Anderson’s strategy to revitalize the long-ailing firm, which was once the Youngstown area’s largest employer outside the basic steel industry.

Steelworkers employed at the General American Transportation Corp. in Masury agree to limited contract concessions that will lead to the recall of between 200 and 300 furloughed workers. The company has received an order for 194 rail cars.

April 25, 1968: Six gunmen barge into the Struthers home of coin collector Bernard Heckel and his wife, bind the couple and spend more than an hour ransacking their home. They escape with $11,000 in valuable coins, currency and savings bonds.

Fremont Camerino of the McKinley Federal Savings & Loan in Niles is elected president of the Youngstown Chapter of the American Savings and Loan Institute.

April 25, 1958: The United Auto Workers, with close to 400,000 of its peak 1.5 million membership jobless and not paying dues, will lay off 100 of its 800 international staff members and two UAW officers will take a 10 percent pay cut. President Walter Reuther’s $22,000 pay will be cut to $19,800.

Two Kwanzan Japanese cherry trees are planted in front of the administration building at Youngstown University, another near the library and the fourth near President Howard Jones’ residence to mark Arbor Day.

April 25, 1933: Thousands of Mahoning County school children will hear no school bells in the fall unless the Ohio General Assembly addresses property tax reform, say Youngstown Superintendent George Roudebush and County Superintendent C. B. Rayburn.

Dr. C. H. Beight, Youngstown Health commissioner, warns against the spread of scarlet fever into near epidemic proportions after his department receives reports of 13 new cases.