Years Ago

Today is Saturday, Oct. 10, the 283rd day of 2009. There are 82 days left in the year. On this date in 1913, the Panama Canal is effectively completed as President Woodrow Wilson sends a signal from the White House by telegraph, setting off explosives that destroy a section of the Gamboa dike.

In 1813, composer Giuseppe Verdi is born in Le Roncole, Italy. In 1845, the U.S. Naval Academy is established in Annapolis, Md. In 1911, revolutionaries under Sun Yat-sen launch their overthrow of China’s Manchu dynasty. In 1935, George Gershwin’s opera “Porgy and Bess” opens on Broadway. In 1943, Chiang Kai-shek takes the oath of office as president of China. In 1967, the Outer Space Treaty, which prohibits the placing of weapons of mass destruction on the moon or elsewhere in space, enters into force. In 1970, Quebec Labor Minister Pierre Laporte is kidnapped by the Quebec Liberation Front, a militant separatist group. (Laporte’s body is found a week later.)

October 10, 1984: Auto workers at the General Motors Buick-Oldsmobile-Cadillac fabricating plant reject a tentative national contract with GM. Frank Vicola, Local 1714 shop chairman, says the vote was 1,430 against, 699 for.

With two weeks remaining in the campaign, the Youngstown Area United Way has raised $1.4 million toward its $2.3 million goal.

U.S. Can Co. will begin a $2 million expansion of its manufacturing facilities in Hubbard.

October 10, 1969: The Youngstown Area United Appeal opens its campaign for $1.8 million.

Ohio Atty. Gen. Paul Brown agrees to assist in a continuing investigation of alleged police irregularities in Warren and cooperate in prosecution of people indicted by the grand jury.

The Youngstown Board of Zoning Appeals approves several variances to allow construction of a six-plex apartment on at 1350 Fifth Ave., between the Szabo Funeral Home and the North Side Library.

October 10, 1959: The Youngstown Board of Control approves a new rubbish contract with City Ash Co., boosting the city’s dumping costs from 50 cents to $2 a load.

The Public Utilities Commission of Ohio is considering a proposal to transfer the Boardman Transit Co.’s operating certificate to the Youngstown Transit Co.

A 13-year-old Canfield boy, Michael “Eddie” Peltz, dies of a bullet wound after a playmate fires a .32 caliber pistol at him at point-blank range.

October 10, 1934: Twenty-two hundred people hear Fritz Kreisler open the Monday Musical Club season at Stambaugh Auditorium and the enthusiastic crowd gives Kreisler 13 curtain calls and receives three encores.

All but two regular FERA projects in Mahoning County are shut down for the rest of October and works division funds will be used for direct relief.

Dr. Branimir Jelic, 30-year-old Croatian patriot visiting Youngstown, hails the assassination of King Alexander of Yugoslavia in France, saying the king was a tyrant.