Today in history

Today is Sunday, May 24, the 144th day of 2009. There are 221 days left in the year. On this date in 1844, Samuel F.B. Morse transmits the message, “What hath God wrought” from Washington to Baltimore as he formally opens America’s first telegraph line.

In 1819, Queen Victoria is born in London. In 1859, the song “Ave Maria,” featuring a melody by French composer Charles Gounod superimposed on a theme from Bach’s “Well-Tempered Clavier,” is first performed in Paris. In 1941, the German battleship Bismarck sinks the British dreadnought Hood in the North Atlantic. In 1959, former U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles dies in Washington, D.C., at age 71. In 1962, astronaut Scott Carpenter becomes the second American to orbit the Earth. In 1976, Britain and France open trans-Atlantic Concorde supersonic transport service to Washington. In 1980, Iran rejects a call by the World Court in The Hague to release the American hostages. In 2001, 23 people die when the floor of a Jerusalem wedding hall collapses beneath dancing guests in a horrifying scene captured on video.

May 24, 1984: Liberty police arrest three Mahoning County men in connection with a home break-in in February in which jewelry valued at $250,000 was taken. Much of the loot has been recovered.

Official Trumbull County vote totals show Mahoning County Sheriff James A. Traficant Jr. crushed his closest rival, Mahoning County Commissioner Thomas J. Carney, by margins approaching 3 to 1 in Niles and Girard and ran well ahead of him in Warren. Traficant got 56 percent of the vote in the race for the Democratic nomination for the 17th Congressional District.

Stock prices fall, with banks leading the retreat, extending a slide that leaves the Dow Jones average at 1,113.8, the lowest close in more than a year.

May 24, 1969: Teachers and legislators in Mahoning and Trumbull counties meet to point up the need for adoption of a statewide 1 percent income tax to ease school crises.

The American Federation of Technical Engineers, AFL-CIO, files suit in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court seeking to force the Youngstown Hospital Association to recognize the union as bargaining agent for certain employees.

Officials from eight cities, Mahoning County and the state hold the first in a series of meetings that could lead to the creation of an area wide public agency that would reduce Mahoning River pollution.

Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity at Youngstown State University collects over $1,700 on the first day of “Bounce for Beats,” a basketball bouncing marathon that raises money for the Heart Association of Eastern Ohio.

The Automobile Dealers Association of Eastern Ohio installs its new officers: Clyde Cole Jr. of Clyde Cole Motor Co., Warren, president; Hugh Anderson of Anderson Ford, Cortland, vice president; Ray Slavin of Bell-Wick Ford, Hubbard, treasurer; and trustees A.C. Cook, Glen Sanzenbacher, Jack Gough, Jack Ritter, Bud Greenwood, Harry Gill, Steve Guerriero, Bob Sweeney, Walt McGill and Cliff Nash.

May 24, 1959: Construction of streets and other facilities begins in College Park Estates, a proposed million-dollar real estate development in Austintown Township by Edward J. DeBartolo.

The Teamsters union strikes Pittsburgh’s three newspapers, the Pittsburgh Press, the Sun Telegraph and the Post-Gazette.

Wayne Thompson, a 13-year-old “mibs artist” from Akron, captures the Ohio state marble-shooting championship sponsored by the Veterans of Foreign Wars at Pemberton Park.

May 24, 1934: “Youngstown’s future does not depend solely upon the success of the proposed canal nor its steel production, but in the right type of men and women who will be its leaders in years to come,” says Dr. William H. Hudnut, who is marking 35 years as pastor of the First Presbyterian Church.

The Monday Musical Club announces that world famous violinist Fritz Kreisler will open its new season at Stambaugh Auditorium.

An order from Police Chief Leroy Goodwin that police officers “stamp out bootlegging and prostitution” is read at all roll calls. Goodwin described the order as nothing more than a reminder periodically given to officers.