Today is Tuesday, April 14, the 104th day of 2009. There are 261 days left in the year. On this date

Today is Tuesday, April 14, the 104th day of 2009. There are 261 days left in the year. On this date in 1865, President Abraham Lincoln is shot and mortally wounded by John Wilkes Booth while attending the comedy “Our American Cousin” at Ford’s Theater in Washington. (Lincoln dies the following morning.)

In 1775, the first American society for the abolition of slavery is formed in Philadelphia. In 1828, the first edition of Noah Webster’s “American Dictionary of the English Language” is published. In 1902, James Cash Penney opens his first store, The Golden Rule, in Kemmerer, Wyo. In 1909, Armenians in Adana Province in the Ottoman Empire become targets of violence during an uprising by counterrevolutionaries seeking to restore Sultan Abdul Hamid II to power. In 1912, the British liner RMS Titanic collides with an iceberg in the North Atlantic and begins sinking. In 1939, the John Steinbeck novel “The Grapes of Wrath” is first published. In 1949, at the conclusion of the so-called “Wilhelmstrasse Trial,” 19 former Nazi Foreign Office officials are sentenced by an American tribunal in Nuremberg to prison terms ranging from four to 25 years. In 1956, Ampex Corp. demonstrates the first successful videotape recorder at the National Association of Radio and Television Broadcasters in Chicago. In 1989, former winery worker Ramon Salcido goes on a rampage in Sonoma County, Calif., killing seven people, including his wife and two of his daughters; he remains on death row.

April 14, 1984: Youngstown police use Ralph Reedy, the 11- year-old son of a Youngstown policewoman, to purchase Ohio lottery tickets at two outlets. The ticket sellers are charged with violating state law, which restricts the sale of lottery tickets to people at least 18 years old.

Staff members of the U.S. House Public Works and Transportation Committee, Lt. Col. John L. Richards of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and U.S. Rep. Lyle Williams tour the Milton Dam and discuss its deterioration and the need for funds to rehabilitate it.

April 14, 1969: A three-alarm fire sweeps through the A.G. Sharp Co. on Brittain Street causing an estimated $800,000 in damage to the 31‚Ñ2 acre lumber yard.

The Rev. Walter H. Werning celebrates 45 years in the ministry and 30 as pastor of Immanuel Lutheran Church on Redondo Road.

Leonard Kirtz tells Youngstown area state legislators during a meeting at the Mahoning County School for the Retarded that conditions at Ohio’s institutions for the retarded are abominable. Several parents testify about their experiences with children at Apple Creek State Hospital.

April 14, 1959: Common Pleas Judge John W. Ford rules that Coroner David A. Belinky can hire an investigator and orders county commissioners to provide about $6,000 a year to cover the cost.

The trial of Joseph Sabatino, charged with two counts of manslaughter, will be heard by a visiting judge.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower and former President Herbert Hoover attend ceremonies dedicating a bell tower on Constitution Avenue, north of the Capitol, as a memorial to the late Sen. Robert A. Taft of Ohio.

April 14, 1934: Mahoning County Common Pleas Judge J.H.C. Lyons orders Mahoning County commissioners to pay the county’s $156,00 share of relief efforts. Gov. George White had ordered all relief efforts in the county to end.

Bandits hold up the Ohio Smelting & Refining Co. at 101 W. Federal St., tying up D.M. Hurwitz, manager, and escape with about $700 in cash and jewelry valued at $900.

Enrollment opens for 561 young men from the Youngstown district for the Civilian Conservation Corps: 382 from Mahoning County, 104 from Trumbull and 75 from Columbiana.