Today is Thursday, March 13, the 73rd day of 2008. There are 293 days left in the year. On this date

Today is Thursday, March 13, the 73rd day of 2008. There are 293 days left in the year. On this date in 1933, banks begin to reopen after a “holiday” declared by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

In 1781, the planet Uranus is discovered by Sir William Herschel. In 1884, Congress officially adopts Eastern Standard Time for the District of Columbia. In 1901, Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd president of the United States, dies in Indianapolis. In 1925, a law goes into effect in Tennessee prohibiting the teaching of the theory of evolution. In 1928, hundreds of people die when the San Francisquito Valley in California is inundated with water after the St. Francis Dam bursts just before midnight the evening of March 12. In 1964, bar manager Catherine “Kitty” Genovese, 28, is stabbed to death near her New York home; the case generates controversy over charges that Genovese’s neighbors had failed to respond to her cries for help. In 1988, yielding to student protests, the board of trustees of Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., a liberal arts college for the hearing-impaired, chooses I. King Jordan to become the school’s first deaf president.

March 13, 1983: Tumbling gasoline prices, coupled with the Youngstown area’s better business outlook, are bringing buyers back into auto showrooms, and they are looking at bigger, more expensive models.

Richard E. McGuire, president of the Greater Youngstown Area AFL-CIO Council, is named Irishman of the Year for 1983 and will be honored at a St. Patrick’s Day luncheon in St. Columba Cathedral Hall.

The Corydon Palmer Dental Society, a professional association of 254 active dentists in Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties, celebrates its 70th anniversary. Dr. David Liddle, a Warren orthodontist, says Dr. Palmer apprenticed as a silversmith and learned dentistry from other practitioners before opening an office in 1839 in Warren.

March 13, 1968: Youngstown’s new contract gives city policemen an hourly wage of $3.71, which is 38 cents more than that of a garbage truck driver. But drivers work 54-hour weeks, giving them an annual salary of $9,377, compared to $7,730 for a patrolman working 40 hour weeks.

The Youngstown Symphony Society will seek community support in an effort to acquire the Warner Theater as a cultural center, says Charles Law, president of the symphony executive board.

Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. will ask shareholders to increase the number of common and preferred shares of authorized stock in an effort to allow the company to diversify through acquisition and internal expansion.

March 13, 1958: A permanent independent citizens committee is formed to study problems facing Mahoning and Trumbull counties as the population expands.

The number of workers collecting jobless benefits dips slightly in the Youngstown district as the statewide trend remains fairly steady. Total claims in Youngstown dropped from 12,494 to 12,417.

Sheriff’s deputies in Wooster, Ohio, arrest the Amish parents of three boys who have been declared truant for not attending school beyond the eighth grade. The parents are held in contempt of court until the three boys are delivered to the custody of the county.

March 13, 1933: U.S. Sen. James J. Davis of Pennsylvania, a Sharon native operated on for appendicitis, is said to be in good condition in a Pittsburgh hospital.

Truscon Steel Co. President Julius Kahn says that word has been received that the Los Angeles plant of Truscon suffered no damage in the earthquake there and no Youngstown people affiliated with the company and in California have been reported injured.

Youngstown city engineers dispute nearly $300,000 in operating costs submitted by Ohio Edison Co. and say the existing 5.5 cent rate should be cut by at least a penny.