Years Ago

Today is Tuesday, Oct. 6, the 279th day of 2009. There are 86 days left in the year. On this date in 1939, during World War II, as remaining military resistance in Poland crumbles, Adolf Hitler delivers a speech to the Reichstag in which he blames the Poles for the Nazi-Soviet invasion of their country and denies having any intention of war against France and Britain.

In 1683, 13 families from Krefeld, Germany, arrive in Philadelphia to begin Germantown, one of America’s oldest settlements. In 1884, the Naval War College is established in Newport, R.I. In 1927, the era of talking pictures arrives with the opening of “The Jazz Singer,” starring Al Jolson. In 1949, President Harry S. Truman signs the Mutual Defense Assistance Act, providing $1.3 billion in military aid to NATO countries. U.S.-born Iva Toguri D’Aquino, convicted of treason for being Japanese wartime broadcaster “Tokyo Rose,” is sentenced in San Francisco to 10 years in prison. (She ends up serving more than six.) In 1969, the New York Mets win the first-ever National League Championship Series, defeating the Atlanta Braves, 7-4, in Game 3; the Baltimore Orioles win the first-ever American League Championship Series, defeating the Minnesota Twins 11-2 in Game 3. In 1973, war erupts in the Middle East as Egypt and Syria attack Israel during the Yom Kippur holiday. In 1976, in his second debate with Jimmy Carter, President Gerald R. Ford asserts there is “no Soviet domination of eastern Europe.” (Ford later concedes he’d misspoken.) In 1979, Pope John Paul II, on a weeklong U.S. tour, becomes the first pontiff to visit the White House, where he is received by President Jimmy Carter. In 1981, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat is shot to death by extremists while reviewing a military parade.

October 6, 1984: The New Castle Area School Board has rescheduled its regular monthly meeting for Oct. 17 in anticipation that a hearing on a petition for a preliminary injunction to get the district’s striking teachers back to work may last into the evening.

Eric Shrum, 11, becomes only the second civilian to win the Warren Police Pension and Retirement Fund award for community service, in recognition of his testimony about a robbery at an Elm Road school that resulted in the robber’s conviction. The only other civilian recipient was television’s Mr. T.

Autoworkers at General Motors huge assembly plant ignore their union’s representation and emphatically rejected a tentative national agreement.

October 6, 1969: Three holdup suspects are captured on the South Side less than 15 minutes after a woman clerk is robbed of more than $400 at the Lawson Dairy Store.

One of the Youngstown area’s premier polo ponies, Kitty, owned by Joe Botak, dies on the family’s Canfield farm after being stung by a bee.

October 6, 1959: Congressman Michael J. Kirwan urges support for a $2.5 million bond issue for the West Branch Reservoir, saying the project is vital to the Valley’s jobs and future.

Winds up to 60 mph buffet the Youngstown district, bringing scattered damage to utility lines and trees.

A plastic container of dynamite that was placed under the car of Warren lawyer Joseph Molitoris fails to explode. A blasting cap ignited, but the dynamite didn’t detonate.

October 6, 1934: An impromptu demonstration on downtown Youngstown streets preliminary to the South and Chaney football game lands 24 boys and four men in jail after they began blocking access to stores and theaters and refused to disburse.

Mayor Mark E. Moore confers informally for two hours with his political foes on city council, Michael Kirwan and A.T. Kryzan, over their differing views of how the city’s budget should be balanced.

Youngstown is chosen as the site of the 1935 convention of the Ohio State Grotto during the current convention, held in Toledo.

Mahoning County Republican Party Chairman George S. Bishop says Sen. Simeon D. Fess will come to Mahoning County Oct. 18 to discuss national issues at a meeting to which all Republican candidates have been invited.