Years Ago

Today is Monday, Oct. 12, the 285th day of 2009. There are 80 days left in the year. This is Columbus Day in the United States, as well as Thanksgiving Day in Canada. On this date in 1492, Christopher Columbus arrives with his expedition in the present-day Bahamas.

In 1870, Gen. Robert E. Lee dies in Lexington, Va., at age 63. In 1915, English nurse Edith Cavell is executed by the Germans in occupied Belgium during World War I. In 1933, bank robber John Dillinger escapes from a jail in Allen County, Ohio, with the help of his gang, who killed the sheriff, Jess Sarber. In 1949, Eugenie Anderson is nominated by President Harry S. Truman to be the U.S. ambassador to Denmark; she becomes the first American woman to hold an ambassadorship. In 1984, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher escapes an attempt on her life when an Irish Republican Army bomb explodes at a hotel in Brighton, England, killing five people. In 2000, 17 sailors are killed in a suicide bomb attack on the U.S. destroyer Cole in Yemen.

October 12, 1984: Warren Township police confiscate gambling machines and tickets at two Sons of Italy clubs. Township Patrolman Raymond Lesho says three machines containing $78 and coffee cans containing $163 were confiscated.

Hart’s Jewelry stores in downtown Warren and the Liberty Plaza will be closing by the end of the year, says Fred Levy, whose father and uncle founded the business in Warren 58 years earlier.

October 12, 1969: Mahoning County elections director James Dellick predicts 100,000 people will vote in November, and elections workers will face a tabulation challenge because there will be two strong write-in campaigns, one each in the Youngstown and Mahoning County boards of education.

Carl W. Ullman, former president of Dollar Savings & Trust Co. who was active in numbers civic endeavors, dies at 77 in South Side Hospital.

October 12, 1959: Baseball celebrities will be at the second annual Curbstone Coaches Hall of Fame-Heart Fund dinner, including Tito Francona, Bob Feller, Joe Brown Jr. and Chuck Tanner.

The Rev. Donald Reagan, principal of Ursuline High School, speaks at the 10th annual Firemen’s Communion Breakfast in St. Columba Church and urges firemen to set good examples for the children who idolize them.

October 12, 1934: Appearing before the Public Works Administration, Ohio Sen. Robert J. Bulkley urges the allotment of money for the canalization of the Mahoning and Beaver rivers.

Youngstown district steel mill operations are likely to increase to 30 percent of capacity.