YEARS AGO

Today is Sunday, Oct. 18, the 291st day of 2009. There are 74 days left in the year. On this date in 1962, Dr. James D. Watson of the United States and Drs. Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins of Britain are named winners of the Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology for their work in determining the double-helix molecular structure of DNA.

In 1009 (by some accounts on Oct. 18), the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem is destroyed at the order of Fatimid caliph al-Hakim of Egypt. (The church is later rebuilt.) In 1685, King Louis XIV signs the Edict of Fontainebleau, revoking the Edict of Nantes that had established legal toleration of France’s Protestant population, the Huguenots. (The French Parliament records the new edict four days later.) In 1858, the play “Our American Cousin” by Tom Taylor premieres in New York. In 1867, the United States takes formal possession of Alaska from Russia. In 1892, the first long-distance telephone line between New York and Chicago is officially opened (it could only handle one call at a time). In 1931, inventor Thomas Alva Edison dies in West Orange, N.J., at age 84. In 1944, Soviet troops invade Czechoslovakia during World War II. In 1969, the federal government bans artificial sweeteners known as cyclamates because of evidence they cause cancer in laboratory rats. In 1977, West German commandos storm a hijacked Lufthansa jetliner on the ground in Mogadishu, Somalia, freeing all 86 hostages and killing three of the four hijackers. In 1982, former first lady Bess Truman dies at her home in Independence, Mo., at age 97.

October 18, 1984: Enrollment in Mahoning County’s 14 school districts is down 1.3 percent from a year earlier at 44,163 children.

The Ungaro administration says a labor contract with a City Hall union removes its members from the jurisdiction of Civil Service, a contention that portends legal and political battles.

Joseph DeMatteis, a resident of Park Vista, is still playing the baritone horn at age 87 and will perform at the 26th annual program of the Butler Institute Chapter of Composers, Authors, Artists of America at the Butler Institute of American Art.

October 18, 1969: A 20-year-old Youngstown State University student who used a shotgun to back a Youngstown patrolman off his parents’ property in Hubbard is arraigned on a charge of possession of narcotics after police confiscate a small amount of marijuana from his apartment in the Wick Oval.

The conquest of space opens a challenge for the 1970s, U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater tells a crowd of more than 2,500 at Stambaugh Auditorium in a Skeggs Lecture sponsored by Youngstown State University.

George D. Tablack and Mahoning County Auditor Stephen R. Olenick believe they may have caught the Ohio Legislature in an error that could make all county property that is tax-free subject to taxation.

The Butler Institute of American Art is hailed as one of the three top American art collections in the world as it receives plaudits of art experts, patrons and friends during its 50th anniversary dinner and dance at the museum.

A $7.5 million community renewal program for Mahoning County, including large scale clearance and redevelopment in some sections of Austintown, Lake Milton and East Alliance, is receiving public scrutiny by a 32-member Citizens Advisory committee.

Sales of 1970 model automobiles are booming in the Youngstown district auto dealers’ showrooms, indicating a strong outlook for continuing good business and a high level of employment.

October 18, 1959: Production of steel in the three months ended Sept. 30 fell to the lowest level for any three months since 1938 due to the nationwide strike, with output at just 8.2 million tons, compared to 33 million tons the quarter before.

The Rev. Paul W. Gauss, executive secretary of the Youngstown Council of Churches, says Youngstown pastors should speak out before their congregations about the moral issues of Youngstown’s mayoral election.

More than 225 dolls are ready for sale at the Ursuline Sisters benefit in Ursuline High School. Several of the dolls are dressed as Ursuline nuns.

Kent State University begins its semicentennial year with a record-setting enrollment of 10,622, including 7,554 day students.

October 18, 1934: Sen. Simeon D. Fess, Republican candidate for re-election to the U.S. Senate, promises to keep up his attacks on the New Deal when he appears at South High auditorium in Youngstown.

More than 20,000 pledge cards arrive in Youngstown for distribution at Youngstown churches as a protest against indecent motion pictures.

The Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Co. announces receipt of a $1 million order for construction of electric transformers to be built at the Sharon plant.